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ON THB

SUPERNATURAL
ORIGIN OF CHRISTIANITY,
WITH SPECIAL BEFEBENCE 10 THE
THEORIES OF RENAN, STRAUSS, AND
THE TUBINGEN SCHOOL.

BY
GEOEGE P. EISHER, D. D.,
PROFESSOR OF CHURCH HISTORY IN YALE COLLEGE.
NEW AND ENLAEGED EDITION.

NEW YOEK:
CHARLES SCRIBNER & CO., No. 654 BROADWAY.
1870

Entered, according to Act of Congress, in thj year 1865, by
CHARLES SCRIBNER & CO.,
In the Clerk'6 Oflace of the District Court of the United States for the
Southern District of New York.

n

JOHN P. TROW & CO.,
PRINTERS, STEREOT^PERS, $ ELECT RQTVPERS.
60 GREENE STREET, H.Y.

PREFACE. IX
for granted, but proved " — in regard to Christiani
ty — "that any reasonable man, who will thoroughly
consider the matter, may be as much assured as he
is of his own being, that it is not, however, so clear
a case that there is nothing in it"

CONTENTS,

INTRODUCTION'.

THE NATURE OF THE CONFLICT OF CHRISTIAN FAITH
WITH SKEPTICISM AND UNBELIEF . . . 1
II.
THE GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL ... 33
Supplementary Notes : I. The Recent Literature upon the Jo
hannean question.
II. The Paschal Controversies in their
relation to the Gospel of John.
III.
RECENT DISCUSSIONS UPON THE ORIGIN OF THE FIRST
THREE GOSPELS  153
Supplementary Note : The Theories of Holtzmann and Meyer.
IV.
BAUR ON PARTIES IN THE APOSTOLIC CHURCH AND THE
CHARACTER OF THE BOOK OF ACTS . . 205
Supplementary Note : Lightfoot on the Apostolic Convention ;
Renan's work on the Apostles and his
Life of the Apostle Paul.

BAUR ON EBIONITISM AND THE ORIGIN OF CATHOLIC
CHRISTIANITY  283
Supplementary Note : Beyschlag on the Character of the Ro
man Church.

xii CONTENTS. VI.
THE MYTHICAL THEORY OF STRAUSS  S39
Supplementary Note : The alleged Credulity of Mankind at the
Period of the rise of Christianity.
VII.
STRAUSS'S RESTATEMENT OF HIS THEORY . . .421
VIII.
THE LEGENDARY THEORY OF RENAN . . . .433
Supplementary Note : Renan on the Resurrection of Jesus :
the 13th Edition of his Life of Christ.
IX.
THE CRITICAL AND THEOLOGICAL OPINIONS OF THEO
DORE PARKER  449
X.
AN EXAMINATION OF BAUR AND STRAUSS ON THE CON
VERSION OF PAUL  . 459
Supplementary Note : Renan on the Conversion of Paul.
XI.
THE NATURE AND FUNCTION OF THE CHRISTIAN MIRACLES 471
XII.
THE TESTIMONY OF JESUS CONCERNING HIMSELF . . 615
Supplementary Note : The Originality of Jesus.
XIII.
THE PERSONALITY OF GOD : IN REPLY TO THE POSITIV-
IST AND THE PANTHEIST  539
Supplementary Note : The Argument from Design.

INTRODUCTION.

"What is the distinction between the natural and the
supernatural ? When we speak of the nature of a particular
thing, we denote the inward properties or constitution which
make it to be what it is, and which are looked upon as the
ground of its phenomenal action. Nature, in the wider sense,
denotes the assemblage of concrete existences in the creation
about us, regarded as mutually connected and as producing
the aggregate of phenomena that make up our possible expe
rience. But the term nature sometimes designates not the
world of matter and of mind taken together, but the world
of material existences in distinction from intelligent beings.
The school of Coleridge, in common with many German
writers, make nature antithetical to will. " Whatever is
comprised in the chain and mechanism of cause and effect,
of course necessitated, and having its necessity in some other
thing, antecedent or concurrent — this is said to be natural ;
and the aggregate and system of all such things is nature." '
That the law of cause and effect does not reign over the will
as it reigns over matter, and even over, mind except as far as
mental operations are controlled by the will, is a truth of
great moment. Yet the products of human intelligence are
not ordinarily styled supernatural works, though they may
be described as " the works of man " in distinction from the
" works of nature." 2 A frequent antithesis of nature is art ;
yet the products of art are not styled supernatural. The
will of man and his voluntary actions must be embraced
tinder the word nature, in the extended meaning of the term.
1 Coleridge, Aids to Reflection. Works, (Shedd's edition), 1. 152, N. H.
Bushnell, Nature and the Supernatural, ch. II.
* See the Duke of Argyll, Reign of Law (5th ed.), p. 8.

Xiv INTRODUCTION.
Inasmuch as the will has a certain, circumscribed sphere of
operation, and the character of the effects which it is capable
of producing is known, the possible consequences of human
volitions take their place in what we call the course of nature.
When we seek for a more precise conception of nature —
leaving the will, for the moment, out of the account — we
have to choose between several conflicting hypotheses. To
say nothing of idealism — are natural phenomena due to an
efficiency once imparted to things by the Creator, but now
abiding in them ? Or are the modifications of matter and
mind immediately caused by the power of God, acting accord
ing to a uniform, established method ? This last hypothesis —
that of occasionalism — is thus expressed by Dr. Samuel Clarke :
" The course of Nature, truly and properly speaking, is noth
ing else but the will of God producing certain effects in a
continued, regular, constant, and uniform manner." He holds
that material existences have no power but that of continuing
in their present state, whether of rest or motion. "With him
in the general doctrine of occasionalism agree Malebranche and
other Cartesians, Reid and Stewart and many other philoso
phers, including, in this country, Professor Francis Boweii.
The opposite doctrine, that efficiency resides in nature and
[that natural phenomena spring from powers inherent in mat
ter, has gained, perhaps, the suffrages of a majority of meta
physicians, including, of course, many who dissent from the
principles which Leibnitz associated with this hypothesis.
But this division of opinion relates to a ppint which is not
vital in our present inquiries. Theists who believe in the
en?ch3ncx^f|ficondj3auses, hold to the sustaining and cooper
ative agency of God inconnection with them. They hold that
second causes are an instrument employed by God to execute
His will. Whether He acts directly in producing natural
phenomena, or by means of. the powers which He has, so to
speak, deposited in material existences, is a question which
we are not obliged here to discuss. Enough that natural
phenomena are produced, either directly or mediately, by Him.
Therefore, it is obvious that a supernatural event, or a
j miracle, is not distinguished from a natural event by having
the will of God for its antecedent. "Whether a fever is gradu-

INTRODUCTION. XV
ally cured by a restorative process of nature, or is instantly
cured by a word or the touch of "the hand, it is the same
Being who produces the effect. It is the power of God,
either directly exerted, or through an intermediate link bind
ing the primary cause to the effect. It is God who makes the
sun to rise on the good and evil, and the rain to fall on the
just and unjust.
What, then, is the defining characteristic of a supernatural
event ? It is_an_event out of the ordinary course of nature ; i
presupposing, therefore, an exertion of Jjower^ on the part of
God, whicrTTs exceptionaTand peculiar. Its want of conform
ity with the established and otherwise uniform course of I
events is the criterion of a miracle.
Before we can judge as to-the likelihood that such an excep
tional occurrence will take place, we must consider the source
and character of our conviction as to the uniformity of nature.
This brings us to the philosophy of Induction. On what
ground do we expect the future to be like the past ? "What
leads us or authorizes us to infer the unknown from the
known ? How do we know that the next stone that is thrown
into the air, will descend again to the earth ?
There are two answers to these 'questions ; one given by
the a-posteriori, empirical, positivist school, and the other by
the adherents of an a-priori, spiritual philosophy. According
to Hume, and to Mr. J. S. Mill who has revived some of
Hume's essential principles, the sole ground of this expecta
tion as to the future is customary experience. That any
causal agency belongs to the antecedents of an event, we have
no evidence. Nor is there any proof of the reality of efficien
cy, in the common understanding. of the term. " There ap
pears not," says Hume, "throughput all nature, any one in
stance of connection which is conceivable by us. All events
seem entirely loose and separate. One event follows another,
but we never can observe any tie between them. They seem
conjoined, but never connected.'1'' 1 Our notion' of power be
longs to the imagination, and is consequent on the association
of ideas. " After a repetition of similar instances, the mind
is carried by habit, upon the appearance of one event, to ex-
1 Hume, Inquiry, &c. Works (Edinburgh, 1836) IV. p. 87.

XVI INTRODUCTION.

pect its usual attendant, and to believe that it will exist. This
connection, therefore, which we feel in the mind, this custom
ary transition of the imagination from one object to its usual
attendant, is the sentiment or impression from which we form
the idea of power or necessary connection. Nothing farther
is in the case." 1 Hume, as is well known, resolves belief into
the vivid feeling in regard to an object, which is awakened
by the perception or memory of an object usually conjoined
with it. " I say that belief is nothing but a more vivid, lively,
forcible, firm, conception of an object, than what the imagin
ation alone is ever able to attain." 2 In these terms is given
the distinction between belief and fiction. On the insufficien
cy of this definition we need not now comment. We are
only concerned to notice here that, according to Hume, our
belief or expectation as to the future is an effect produced on
the mind by the habitual conjunction of one event with an
other, in the past. The strength of this belief is proportioned
to the greater or less degree of constancy which has attended
this conjunction. Where this conjunction has been uniform,
or in a case where experience is without exception, there is
the highest strength of belief. The application of this doc
trine to the testimony for miracles is obvious. His argument
on this subject consists in outweighing our only partial expe
rience of the credibility of testimony lay our uniform experi
ence of the constancy of nature.
Mr. Mill agrees with Hume ' in identifying causation with
invariableness of succession, to the exclusion of every other
idea of efficiency or force. The causeof a phenomenon means
nothing but the assemblage of its antecedents. "We believe '
in causation as thus defined, solely- on the" ground of obser
vation ; and the general principle that every event must have
a cause, or a set of antecedents invariably preceding it, rests
on no other foundation. Hence, we are not justified 'in re
garding this as a universal axiom. " I am convinced that any
one accustomed to abstraction and analysis, who will fairly
exert his faculties for the purpose, will, when his imagination
has once learnt to entertain the notion, find no difficulty in
conceiving that in some one, for instance, of the many firma-
1 Hume, Inquiry, &c, Works, IV. p. 88. a Md. p. 59.

INTRODUCTION. XVH
ments into which sidereal astronomy now divides the unirerse,
events may succeed one another at random, without any fixed
law ; nor can any thing in our experience, or in our mental
nature, constitute a sufficient, or indeed any reason for believ
ing that this is nowhere the case." ' " The uniformity in the
succession of events, otherwise called the law of causation,
must be received not as a law of the universe, but of that
portion of it only which is within the range of our means of
sure observation, with a reasonable degree of extension to
adjacent cases." 2
It surely follows from these doctrines that a miracle is far
from being an inconceivable or impossible event ; and that in
order to prove a miracle, it is only necessary to. admit the
I existence of a Being who, being able to perform it, has a rea-
' son for so doing. This is conceded and maintained by Mr.
Mill himself. " A miracle," says Mr. Mill, "(as was justly re
marked by Brown) is no contradiction to the law of cause and
effect ; it is a new effect, supposed to be produced by the in
troduction of a new cause. Of the adequacy of that cause, if
it exist, there can be no doubt ; and the only antecedent im
probability which can be ascribed to the miracle, is the im-
/ probability that any such cause had existence in the case." 3
Mr. Mill proceeds to show that all that Hume has made out is,
that nq^eyidence_can jirjiv£_ajniracle_to_ an_atheist, or to a
/ deist who supposes himself able to prove that God would not
I interfere to produce the miraculous event in question.4 In
other words, Mr. Mill professes to coincide, as to the logical
principles applicable to this subject, with the ablest writers
on the Evidences of Revelation, who hold " that_na^uralj^li-
gip^Js_th^3e^essaryJbasjs_of_jevealed; that the proofs of
Christianity presuppose the being and moral attributes of
God ; that it is the conformity of a religion to those attributes
which determines whether credence ought to be given to its
external evidences." It is plain that a philosophy which casts
away a-priori beliefs, unless, indeed, it denies the existence of
a Supreme Being, is precluded from shutting the door upon
the testimony to miracles. It must inquire for the facts, with
1 Mill, System of .Logic, II. p. 110.
' Ibid. p. 118. 3 Ibid. Lojic, II. p. 185. ' Ibid. p. 186.

XV111 INTRODUCTION.
a mind free from the bias of theories as to what must be or
cannot be.
Let us now consider how the case of supernatural Chris
tianity stands, in the view of the philosophy opposite to the
empirical or positivist. We hold it to be a manifest error to
identify, as Hume does, belief with vivid association. We
believe that Mr. Mill's system furnishes no real basis for in
duction. How can the conjunction of two events in the past
afford any warrant for the assumption that they will be con
joined in the future ? Mr. Mill assumes that every particular
induction proceeds on the assumed truth, that the course of
nature is uniform. But on what is this last conviction found
ed ? This, also, is an induction from experience. Mr.
Mill follows Hume in this plain paralogism ; and nothing that
he says on the subject tends to relieve his system of the fatal
inconsistency. We have only our past experience of the con
junction or chronological association of phenomena. What
right have we to conclude that the future will be like the past ?
As far as we can see, Mr. Mill's system affords no satisfactory
response to this question. '
Of the instinctive expectation of which we speak, as it
exists even in our infancy, and which is shared by the lower
animals, we know of no more reasonable solution than that
offered by Reid. He makes it an instinctive feeling analogous
to the native tendency to believe what is told us. We put
confidence in the indicia of nature, as we do in the signs of
thought when we are in communication with others. A
child who has burned his finger in the flame, seeing the flame
again, expects that a like result will ensue upon contact with
it. It is a sort of confidence in the language of nature. But
even this instinctive faith, in the case of a rational being, in
volves a latent belief in final as well as efficient causes. In
cluded in the expectation that the future will conform to the
past, is the conviction that there is design in nature. Scien-
1 Mr. Mill speaks of " the mere unreasoning propensity to expect what
has been often experienced " (II. 110) ; of " the strong tendency of the hu
man mind to ascribe every phenomenon to some cause or other ; " but these
and a few other expressions of an equivalent purport receive no further ex-
planation, and are set in no connection, with the principles of his system.

INTRODUCTION. XIX
tific anticipation has no other basis but the prior, intuitive
belief that there is a plan in nature, an order, an adaptation
of means to ends. This native belief is implied in the funda
mental axioms of induction. It has been a practical aid in
scientific discovery. It is a source of mistake only when it
is used to supersede investigation. To this abuse alone is
the well-known censure of Bacon applicable.
Admit that nature Js the fruit of design, and fulfils ajplan
of God — and this every theist must hold, whether he con
sider that final causes are the object of an intuitive belief or
are inferred, by analogical reasoning, from an observation of
the world — and the whole_subject of miracles is put in a
clear light. The uniformity of nature is no blind necessity,
but is an arrangement of wisdom. Nor does the order of
nature stand by itself apart from all relations to any thing
beyond. It is only one province in the whole divine, system.
There is a moral administration, as well as an administration
of physical laws. Material existences are parts, and sub
ordinate parts, of this broader system. The motives that
dictate the establishment and maintenance of the course of
nature may require, that this should not be absolutely with
out interruption. God may choose to reveal Himself to those
who discern Him not in the uniform action of His power, by
j extraordinary manifestations. The law of the universe is
higher than the law of any particular, subordinate portion
of it. A miracle is not contra-natural, but merely super
natural. It is an unwonted exertion of divine power, for
which there is a good reason ; and this reason once admitted
to exist, the miracle is not less credible than an ordinary
phenomenon. Thus, the truths of natural religion and the need of a
revelation set aside the presumption that otherwise exists
against the credibility of miracles. It is religion, to be sure,
but it is rational religion, the highest philosophy, which lifts
a protest against the dogmatic incredulity of those who
think it not worth while to examine the evidences of Chris
tian revelation.
We pass now to the critical branch of the inquiry. The

xx INTRODUCTION.
principal hypotheses on the ground of which it is sought to
impugn the evidence of the New Testament miracles are the
mythical theory, as set forth by Strauss, and the theory of
pious fraud, either in the form of attributing the New Testa
ment-histories to pseudonymous "authors of the sub-apostolic
age, as is done by the Tubingen criticism, or in the form of
ascribing collusion and deceit, as well as delusion, to
Christ and the Apostles, as is done by Renan. All these
hypotheses are examined in the course of this volume. Here
we content ourselves with a few additional remarks on the
present aspects of the controversy. The mjtMraLtheory, in
common with the peculiar theory of Baur, would make it
out that we have no cotemporary evidence to the miracles.
The testimony emanates either from Christian disciples who
lived in the neighborhood of Jesus, but had personally
known little of Him — this is suggested by Strauss ; or it
emanates from Christians living subsequently to the Apos
tles, and supplying, to a a considerable extent, from their
own deliberate invention the supernatural features of the
Gospel narratives. Both Strauss and Baur were obliged to
except the great miracle of the Resurrection, to which they
concede that the immediate disciples testified, and which
Baur would explain, as far as he seeks to explain it, by
adopting the hypothesis of Strauss. The great question is,
did Matthew, Peter, and their fellow-disciples of the original
company, themselves testify to the miracles recorded of
Jesus, as it is allowed that they did respecting the one
miracle of the Resurrection ? We say, this is the great
question ; for the idea revived by Renan, who figures to his
imagination Jesus and his Disciples after the model of a
half-credulous, half-deceitful priest of more modern days, and
so represents them as contriving or conniving at frauds, is a
notion which neither on its own account nor for the sake of
any assent that it has gained, requires to be elaborately con
futed. It may be safely affirmed, moreover, that the myth
ical theory, which refers the New Testament narratives of
miracles to the unconscious working of fancy among the first
Christians, shaping history after a preconceived conception
of the Messiah, is an exploded hypothesis. This may cer-

INTRODUCTION. XXI
tainly be said of it, regarded as an explanation applicable
generally to the New Testament miracles ; for not only is it,
as we show hereafter, for many reasons quite untenable, but
it is actually rejected not merely by Baur and his more
astute school, but is really to a great extent now given up
by Strauss himself. It is clear that it was rather the events
that suggested to the early Disciples the Old Testament
passages, than the passages that suggested the events.
When the events were before them, corresponding predic
tions were expected and sought for. The interpretation
given to Old Testament quotations in the New presents
difficulties ; these, so far from suggesting that the passsage
created the event, favor the supposition that it was the event
that called to mind the passage. The Tubingen criticism,
which impugns the evidence of miracles, by attacking the
received views as to the date and authorship of the New
Testament histories and of most of the canonical epistles, is
the theory from the skeptical side that chiefly merits atten
tion. But it is, every day, more and more evident that the
Tubingen critics, in their literary criticism, undertook a
hopeless task. That, as a result of the controversies and
inquiries which they have instigated, much light has - been
thrown on the Scriptures of the New Testament and on tho
obscure period at the beginning of ecclesiastical history, is
true. They have not, however, furnished grounds for an
essential alteration of the generally accepted views respecting
the date and authorship of the evangelical histories. We
may advert, in this place, to the critical work of Holtzmann
upon the Synoptical Gospels.1 Holtzmann is an associate of
Schenkel at Heidelberg, and he writes with no prejudice
against the Tubingen views, and with no bias in favor of
what are counted orthodox opinions. His work involves a
complete survey of the critical theories which have been
broached respecting the origin and the mutual relations of
the first three Gospels. It includes a most searching, micro
scopic examination of their contents. We are far from being
1 Die Synoptischen Mvangelien ; ihr Ursprtmg und Geschichtlicher Cha-
rakter, von Heinrich Julius Holtzmann, ausserordentlicher Professor der
Theologie in Heidelberg, etc., Leipzig, 1863.

XXU INTRODUCTION.

able to accord with all his conclusions. But it is interesting
to observe that he finds himself, to his own surprise, as he
himself remarks, in striking harmony with the Church tradition
in regard to the origin of these books. His points of variance
from this tradition, although they are important, do not issue
in any essential diversity on the cardinal topics of the time
of their composition and their relation to the Apostolic
Church. In agreement with the prevailing tendency of crit
icism at present, he gives the priority to Mark or rather to
a document which he styles the primitive Mark, but which
comprised nearly all that is contained in the second Gospel.
This Gospel, he holds, was the result of certain additions and
subtractions by another editor than the original author.
This original author was Mark, who was probably a com
panion of Peter. The document which he wrote is also at
the foundation of Matthew and Luke, or a leading source
from which the matter of these Gospels was drawn. A
second document was the Discourses by Matthew, from
which the author of our present Matthew, as well as Luke,
largely drew their reports of the Saviour's teaching. But
Holtzmann thinks it certain that all of the first three Gos
pels existed in their present form between the years 60 and
80. Both of the original documents, the first Gospel in its
completed form, and, not improbably, the completed second
Gospel also, were extant prior to the destruction of Jerusa
lem by Titus ; and Luke's Gospel could not have been writ
ten long after that event. Of Holtzmann's opinion, in re
spect to the documents, we shall speak on a subsequent page.
Now we call attention to the fact that this very able critic
independent in his judgment and rather skeptical than
otherwise in his intellectual tendencies, makes these Gos
pels proceed from the contemporaries of Jesus and the circle
of His Apostles. Of the mythical theory, he says : " On the
ground of the established fact that all of our Gospels "—i. e.
the first three—" were written about the year 70 ; that A and
A"— the two primitive documents— " must then have been
extant not far from ten years, it may be asserted with all con
fidence that the historical interval between the fact and the
record is too small to account for the production of an image

INTRODUCTION. XX1U
with individual features so endlessly varied."1 We cannot
forbear to translate a page in which the necessity of suppos
ing that the miracles were actually performed as the Evan
gelists declare, is strongly set forth.
" Almost all of the theologians who attach themselves to
the Tubingen, criticism, have acknowledged of late that the
restless energy of the Pauline spirit does not suffice to ex
plain the origin of Christianity, if behind that and setting
that in motion there did not stand a Personality of preem
inent, all-controlling force, — the Personality of Jesus Himself.
' That his life made a deep impression upon the minds of the
Jewish people is proved by the strength of the passions
which he kindled, as well for as against himself, the catas
trophe in which he succumbed to the hatred of his enemies, the
Faith which survived in assured confidence his crucifixion.' !
But even the beginning of our principal Document (Mark i :
45, ii. 2) leaves no room for us to doubt that it was the con
stant, unremitted use of his power to work miracles, through
which the people felt themselves drawn to Him, while, at the
same time, they looked on the miracles of Jesus as the
authentication of His messiahship (A Matt. ix. 33),— which
Jesus not only does not disclaim, but expressly sanctions {A
Mark ii. 10). In general, the ethico-religious character of
Jesus is as strongly as possible implicated. ' It will always
be the same alternative at which the suspicion against His
moral purity and perfection must arrive : that He, if a sinner
notwithstanding his declarations respecting Himself, cannot
at the same time, be an eminently pious and pure being,
but only the dilemma remains that was presented to the
Pharisees, when they had reached the verge of the Sin
against the Holy Ghost : singly and wonderfully superhuman
either in evil, or in good.' a But even this relation, which is
so characteristic and is attested by both Documents, concern
ing the Pharisees, who see themselves obliged to attribute de
monic powers to Jesus, — even that remarkably characteristic
1 Um einen Reflex von so tausendfach individuell gefarbtem Lichte her-
vorzubringen," p. 502.
* Holsten , Zeilschrift fur wissenschaftliche Theologie, 1861, 5. 265.
3 Dorner, Ueber Jesu siindlose Vollkommcnheit, 1862, s. 4 seq.

XXIV INTRODUCTION.
defence, by which Jesus, in A as well as in A, meets an imputa
tion of this kind, must be utterly without significance, in case
the supposition on which it is all founded, the actual occur
rence of miraculous cures, is not to be conceded. In fact, we
could not tell what has the stamp of historical truth upon it,
or what is legendary, if an argument, like that in A Mark : iii.
24-29, is to be held to have arisen out of nothing, in the
myth-teeming atmosphere of the later apostolic times. Even
Strauss, therefore, recognizes the historical reality of that
accusation as well as of the answer of Jesus, in their essen
tial parts, without expressing himself further respecting the
consequences which follow against his own hypotheses. But
similar circumstances recur at every step, as we proceed. In
case the narratives of miracles are to be stricken out of the
narrative matter which is available for history, there will be
effaced, at the same time, most of the hues, by means of
which that so individual and living portraiture of the person
ality and the work of Jesus can be delineated. In short, the
narratives of miracles form to so great an extent the sub
stance of the Synoptical Record, that so soon as one breaks
them out of it, the whole mosaic loses all intelligible plan, all
comprehensible outline. Especially Ewald1 and Weisse3
are entitled to the credit of calling attention to this feature
of miracles as daily works (conf. Luke xiii. 32), to the fact
of the constant performance of Christ of this every-day
labor and to the essential need of just such a daily work for a
Messiah." "Without the recognition of daily occurring
miraculous healings, there is absolutely no evangelical his
tory. Whoever puts them away, carries away at the outset,
from the table to which he invites one, the daily bread, and
will leave nothing else that can satisfy." s Holtzmann shows
that those individual touches in the Evangelists' portrait of
Christ, the marvellous conjunction qf which produces the
highest grade of historical evidence, have come to us in the
closest, most indissoluble connection with the narratives of mi
racles. But this portrait, which stands out in the sharpest out
lines, is one that could not have been contrived or imao-ined.
1 Geschichte Christus, a. 189. ' Evangelische Geschichte, I. s 334-368
a Ibid. 608, seq.

INTRODUCTION. XXV
The energetic manner in which Jesus began his Galile
an ministry and the powerful impression which he made
upon the people, are most graphically set forth in the Gospel
of Mark. The consciousness of His divine calling and of the
mighty work which He had in hand is manifest at the start
and carries everything before it. His words and still more
the exertions of His miraculous power, cause him to be
literally besieged by the people who flock after Him. Not
withstanding his injunctions to the contrary, bis fame spreads
rapidly from place to place. Soon He begins to avoid the
towns and to await the coming of the people to Him (Mark
i. 45; ii. 13; iii. 20). It becomes necessary for Him to
retire into solitary places for rest. " In the early morning
(i. 35), as well as the late evening, He withdraws Himself
into the silence of nature, that in long-continued prayer to
the Father He may gain refreshment after the powerful ten
sion of His physical and spiritual powers."1
It is impossible, on grounds of historical criticism, to dis
criminate, as some followers of Schleiermacher have been
disposed to, between the greater miracles and such as they
conceive themselves able, with more plausibility, to refer to
a mysterious psychological influence inherent inthe wonderful
person by whom they were wrought. There stand in the
primitive Document, not only the many miracles of healing,
such, for example, as the cure of the mother of Peter's wife
and the various diseased persons brought to his house (Mark
i. 29-34), the case of the Paralytic (ii. i-12), of the epilep
tic sou (ix, 14-29), and of the Gadarene maniac, (v. 1-20),
but also the calming of the sea (iv. 35-41), the raising of the
daughter of Jairus (v. 21-43), the walking upon the water
(vi. 45-54), the feeding of the multitudes (vi. 30-34 ; viii. 1-
10). These are among the narratives of miracles which are
incorporated in all of the first three Gospels.
It is instructive to observe the straits into which anti-su-
pernaturalist critics are thrown when they come to the de
tailed criticism of the Gospels. Of these the Leyden Profes
sor, Scholten, is a good example. In his most recent publi
cation, which he entitles " The Oldest Gospel," he places the
1 Holtzmann, p. 478.

XXVI INTRODUCTION.
incredibility of all narratives of miracles, as a ruling canon,
in the forefront of his discussion. But even he is compelled
to say : " Without doubt, Jesus performed such works, par
ticularly cures of bodily diseases, as created and kept up
in his miracle-seeking contemporaries astonishment and ad
miration."1 He refers to passages like Matt. xi. 20 — where
Jesus alludes to the mighty works dene in Chorazin and
Bethsaida — and Luke xiii. 32, as indubitably genuine and
authentic and as proving incontestably that such works were
done by Jesus. He refers, also, to Matt. xi. 2-6, as another
proof equally conclusive. One would think that this passage,
to say nothing of those just cited, would drive Scholten from
his skeptical position, for he admits that John " had heard in
the prison the works of Jesus.'' He seeks to weaken this
evidence by interpreting the reply of Jesus, in which
the disciples of John are told to report what they had
seen and heard, as symbolical,— as if it referred to the moral
effects of the teaching of Jesus. This is a forced interpreta
tion. Jesus, in speaking of the cure of the lame, the blind,
the leprous, the deaf* and the raising of the dead, referred to
the sort of " works " of which John had heard. Who be
lieves that he bade the disciples of John go and tell their
master that people were becoming spiritually enlightened ?
He pointed them, rather, to the well-known and, as Scholten
himself holds, the expected signs of the Messiah, which were
not only the preaching to the poor, but also miracles. The
utmost that could be plausibly maintained is that Jesus had
in mind, along with the miracles, the analogous moral effects
that were beginning to follow his labors ; but even this is quite
doubtful. Why, then, should not Scholten admit in full earn
est the reality of the miracles, which his own criticism really
binds him to allow ? Why this arbitrary dissection of Mark's
Gospel, with the design of confining the work of Mark him
self to the composition of a brief sketch at the foundation of
1 Das alteste Mvangclium. K.-itische Untersuchung der Zusammenset-
zung, des wechselseitigen Verhaltnisses, des geschichtlichen Werths und des
Ursprungs der Evangelien nach Matthiius und Marcus. Von J. H. Schol
ten, Professor zu Leyden. Elberfeld, 1869.
8 P. 193.

INTRODUCTION. XXVII
the present Gospel, when at the end it is still necessary to
admit that Jesus performed cures that, according to his own
declaration, would have subdued to penitence the inhabitants
of Tyre and Sidon? Scholten, too, endeavors to make a
distinction between greater and lesser miracles, the former of
which, he rejects, and the latter — to be accounted for, as he
thinks, by a natural force belonging to Jesus — he admits. But,
as we have said, this distinction is made on a-priori and not
on historical grounds, and for various other reasons, cannot
avail. It is conceded that Jesus effected wonderful cures
upon persons diseased. It is involved in this concession that
they resorted to Him for this purpose. This would be the
inevitable consequence of the commotion which it is granted
that his wonderful works occasioned. Are we to conclude,
then, that among the diseased applicants for relief who
thronged his path, he selected only the mildest cases — such
as were suffering from nervous disorders which might be
controlled by the will? Or did he attempt to heal more
aggravated diseases and fail — puttjng forth ineffectual and
unsuccessful efforts in this direction ? It is obvious that the
hypothesis of Scholten, aside from its total want of historical
support, affords no consistent conception of the Saviour's
course of life.
That the narratives of miracles which are given in the
1 Gospels are, in the main, a faithful record of facts which ac
tually occurred, is the result of a sound, unbiassed historical
criticism, and must, sooner or later, be generally acknowl
edged. These events occurred. It ill becomes a philosophy
which prides itself on its freedom from theories and its posi-
tivist character to come in with its arbitrary denials, in the
face of historical evidence. Even Renan, far removed as he
is from the healthy atmosphere of theism, can do nothing
with the evangelical documents and with the construction of
a life of Jesus, without admitting his " thaumaturgy." We
hold that the theory which attributes the miracles to occult
forces of nature is quite untenable and unphilosophical ;
but it is the proper theory for the Positivists to adopt, pro
vided they reject the supernatural. If we are to be shut up to
facts, the facts let us at least have, and not be cut off from the

Xxviii INTRODUCTION.
results of fair historical investigation by an a priori denial of
their possibility.
The writings of Luke, as is well known, have been an
.object of special assault, both as to their genuineness and
credibility, on the part of the Ttibingen school. This point has
long been settled by the common consent of all parties, that
the third Gospel and the Acts are from the same pen. It is
a vital part of the Tubingen theory relative to these books,
that they are of a late date and come not from a real, but a
pretended companion of an Apostle. The Tubingen critics
are too sagacious to ascribe works, such as they consider these
to be, to a cotemporary and associate of Paul. Give up the point
of the late origin of these works, in the sub- Apostolic Church,
and their whole system, as they are well aware, falls to pieces.
It is one of the incongruities into which Renan falls, that while
he holds to the genuineness of the Acts, he follows largely in his
detailed interpretation the Tubingen authors. He does not ap
pear to see that the faithful concession which he makes to the '
demands of historical truth, in reference to the authorship of
these two books, excludes the Tubingen method of treating
their contents. The signal failure of the attempt to establish
a contradiction between Paul's own statements in the Epistle
to the Galatians concerning his relations to the other Apos
tles, and the record in the Acts, takes away the principal
argument used against the credibility of the latter. That
Luke was an acquaintance of Paul, and a companion in a
portion of his travels, admits of no question ; that it is of
himself that the author of the Acts is speaking where the
pronoun occurs in the first person plural, is in the highest
degree probable ; that the third Gospel was written within a
few years of the destruction of Jerusalem by Titus, is cei>
tain ; and that it was Luke who wrote the Gospel, and the
Acts not long after, there is no good ground for questionino-.
The argument of Baur and his school in favor of the late
composition of the synoptical Gospels is mainly founded on
those passages adverse to the ideas of a Jewish exclusiveness
which, it is alleged, could only emanate from a catholic, Paul
ine spirit such as can be ascribed only by an anachronism to
the teachings of Jesus. From the beginning, this argument

INTRODUCTION. XXIX
was exposed to the fatal objection that in the Gospel of Mat
thew, to which Baur gave priority and chief authority,
impressive teachings of this character are frequently recorded.
It would be wholly unreasonable to question the authenticity
of these passages, the most of them being striking, character
istic parables. Hence they offer a decisive refutation of the
main assumption on which the criticism to which we advert,
is founded. No plausible explanation of the difficulty has
been offered by the Tubingen critics, and none can be offer
ed. We allude to the subject here, however, in order to
remark that the scholars of various schools are coming to
perceive that both elements entered into the teaching of
Jesus. That is to say, there was a Judaic element, iii so far as
the divine origin of the Old Testament system, its binding
force until the new kingdom should be established, aud a cer
tain precedence in privileges on the side of the Jews, were
recognized ; and along with this, there was a full declaration,
by parables and otherwise, of the universal design and spirit
of the Gospel, involving the vanishing of the outward theocra
cy. There were these two sides in the instruction of Jesus.
The Pauline theology was the legitimate development of this
instruction. More and more is it discerned to be a really
narrow, unscientific spirit which stumbled at these seeming
contrarieties in the teachings of the founder of Christianity.
History is often broader and deeper than the canons of
critics would prescribe for its movement. It will not be con
fined within the frame-work which they, more sharp-thinking
than deep-thinking, would construct for it. The evangelical
historians, setting down in their artless way, the discourses
and acts of the Master, with no attempt at harmonizing, give
us a portraiture bearing the strongest internal marks of its au
thenticity, and one the intrinsic probability of which is never
more apparent than when it is put side by side with the
products of that dissection which is attempted upon it.
In the Gospels, intermingled with the just honor rendered to
a dispensation true and divine, though soon to be merged in
something higher, we find the beginnings, principles, prophe
cies of that spiritual, world-wide kingdom of which the
Jewish theocracy was the type and needful precursor. The

XXX INTRODUCTION.
conflicts and the gradual illumination that fell to the lot of
the Apostolic Church, are adequately explained only on the
supposition that the Gospels are, in this particular, true and
faithful histories.
The school of Baur for a long time admitted the genuine
ness of only four of the canonical epistles.- But, Hilgenfeld,
the leading representative bf the school, now adds to this
number the two Epistles to the Thessalonians and that to the
Philippians. It is, perhaps, safe to anticipate that before long
there will be the same recognition of the other Epistles, the
Pauline authorship of which had never previously been disput
ed in the Church. But taking only the four, which are admitted
on all hands, it would not be difficult to show, that lying back
of them and presupposed in them, are a character and work
accordant with what the Gospels relate of Jesus.1 They
illustrate in the concrete the traits which are attributed to
Jesus in the Epistles — attributed, we must believe, on the
ground of the facts which the Gospels set down. In short,
the impression of Jesus made by the Gospel narratives cor
responds with that which is drawn out in a more abstract
form in the Epistles. The one is the counterpart of the
other; and this is true because the Gospels are a faithful
record of the facts, from which the conception found in the
Epistles was deduced.
Thus far, in speaking of the Gospels, we have had in
mind chiefly the first three. The question of the genuineness
of the fourth Gospel is a separate one. It is examined in
detail in another part of this volume. We offer here a few
observations bearing on the present state of the discussion.
As the attack upon the Johannean authorship of this Gospel
generally has its source in a disbelief in miracles, it deserves
attention that miracles are not escaped, even if this attack
were to succeed. There still remain the well attested miracles
in far greater number and of equal magnitude, which are
recorded in the Synoptical Gospels. There is one prelimi
nary fact oonnected with the critical inquiry, which ought to
be considered as settled: that the Gospel and the first Epistle
1 This topic is well treated by J. A. Row, iLTke Jesus of tlie Evange-
lists," &c. (London, 1868.) Ch. x*ii.

INTRODUCTION. XXXI
have the same author. This, indeed, is still questioned by
.Scholten and Tayler1 and denied by Davidson,2 but on utterly
insufficient grounds. " If there is any thing established by criti
cism," says Renan, " it is that at least the first of these Epistles
is by the same author as the fourth Gospel. One might almost
call it a detached ehapter of the Gospel. The vocabulary of
the two writings is identical ; but the language of the New
Testament is so poor in expressions, so little varied, that such
inductions can be drawn with almost absolute certainty." 3
Candid students must admit, whatever assertions are made to
the contrary, that the external evidence in favor of the gen
uineness of the Gospel is exceedingly strong. How, for
example, can it be doubted that Polycarp recognized it as
genuine ? Why, even Hilgenfeld does not date it later than
from 120 to 140, while Schenkel would place it between 110
and 120, and Renan before 100. But Polycarp, as late as 160,
was at Rome on a visit, and did not die until several years
after. At this time, Irenaeus, who in his youth had known
Polycarp, was a man grown. Polycarp, a distinguished
bishop, active in ecclesiastical affairs, was thus a contempo
rary of those who give explicit testimony to the uncontra
dicted acceptance, everywhere in the Church, of this Gospel.
How can he be supposed to have been ignorant of it, or to have
doubted respecting its authorship ? But Polycarp had him
self listened to the instructions of the Apostle John himself, and
in the hearing of Irenaeus had described the Apostle. He was
bishop of a leading church in Asia Minor, in the region where
John was buried, where he was remembered by many besides
himself; where, too, Irenaeus had been born and brought up.
This is one of a great variety of proofs thart, in the early part
of the second century, when John was remembered by many
still living, the fourth Gospel was recognized by the Chris
tians of Asia Minor, among whom he had taught and died,
as his work. A good example of the cavils by which the
force o^ the early testimonies is sought to be evaded, is
1 Die altesten Zeugnisse belreffend die Schriften des AT. T., he, von J.
H. Scholten (Bremen, 1867), p. 49. An Attempt to ascertain the character of
the Fourth Gospel, &c. By J. J. Tayler, (London 1867), p. 63.
' Introd. to the Jf. T., (1868), II. 299.
3 Vie de Jesus, (13me ed., 1867), p. 338.

XXXII INTRODUCTION.
afforded in reference to Justin Martyr. That peculiar pas
sage (in Apol. i. 61) which seems evidently drawn from John
iii. 3-5, was and is denied to be taken from the Gospel, on
account of minor deviations in the quotation as compared
with the text. We had shown that " similar inaccuracies,
in quoting John iii. 3 or 5, and from a similar cause," — the
confusion of this passage with Matt, xviii. 3 — are not uncom
mon now. Dr. Abbot has pointed out examples of the same
variation from the text of this passage, which actually occur
in a number of the Fathers, including Irenaeus and Eusebius ;
and has also adduced a like instance from Jeremy Taylor.1
On what theory and by what arguments is it sought to
overbalance this weight of external evidence ? The unknown
author of the fourth GJospel, it is said, falsely pretends to be
the Apostle John in order to give currency to a fictitious his
tory of Jesus, having an allegorical import. Consider the im
probability that a Christian disciple, such as the author,
whoever he was, is admitted to have been, would undertake
this pious fraud. There was an Alexandrian Judaism which,
assuming to distinguish between esoteric doctrine and the
knowledge fit for the people, felt no moral scruple in invent
ing and disseminating pseudonymous writings. But such a
practice, as well as the theory of which it was an outgrowth,
was utterly repugnant to the simplicity and godly sincerity
that belonged to. the Apostolic type of piety. Conceive of
Paul perpetrating such an imposture ! A better conscience
on this subject was given by these writings of the New Tes
tament wherever they were thoughtfully received. Is it to
be believed that the writer who. records the condemnation
of those who " love darkness rather than light," of those who
follow him who " was a liar and the father of it " — that a
writer of this moral spirit, was himself a pretender and a
falsifier of the history of his Master ? It is said that the Sec
ond Epistle of Peter is an example of such a pseudonymous
writing, emanating from the early Church. This remains
to be proved ; the moral spirit of the book is felt to be a
strong argument against its supposititious origin. But even
if it were allowed to be pseudonymous, it would constitute
1 Bible Dictionary, (Am. ed.) p. 1433, N., (Art., Jofm, ihe Gospel of.)

INTRODUCTION. XXXU1
no parallel to the case in question.' There is a vast difference
between the issuing of a didactic and hortatory address under
the name of an Apostle, reprehensible as an enlightened con
science must always have regarded it,1 and the deliberate
falsification of the history of the Lord Himself, by one who
traverses the ground which the authentic Gospels covered—
a thing that even the apocryphal Gospels did not attempt —
and declares himself to be a certain Apostle, not directly but
with an affected modesty, the more to deceive his readers.
An allegorical history, such as this is said to be, would be a
literary product wholly without example. Renan has proved
this so conclusively that we need not spend time in defend
ing the assertion.2
Of the difficulties in palming off a fictitious Gospel of this
character on the Church of the second century, enough is'
said on a subsequent page.
We have now to glance at the internal evidence. The
Judaic ministry of Jesus is a leading feature distinguishing
the fourth Gospel from the Synoptists. Is such a ministry
probable,? Looking at the Grospels of Matthew and Mark, we should
find this outline of the public life of Christ : His baptism, a
journey into Galilee, His ministry there for a year, which,
however, is not expressly limited to that period, then His
return to Jerusalem at the Passover when He was put to
death. When we take up Luke, we find the same general
outline, but in connection with the last journey to Jerusalem
we meet with matter filling about eight chapters (ix. 51-
xviii. .15), which is most of it found exclusively in. Luke,
but which is unquestionably historical. This long passage —
the " grosse Einschaltung " the Germans call it — includes, for
example, the parables of the Prodigal Son, and the Pharisee
and Publican. Does not this circumstance suggest that there
might be more matter, and much more, which the earlier
Evangelists did not introduce into their narratives ? If Luke
from his documentary resources and from oral information
can add all this to what Matthew and Mark have given, may
there not be discourses of Jesus and incidents in His life,
' See Tertullian, de baptismo, c. 15. 2 Vie de Jisus (1 3me ed.) p. 808.

XXXIV INTRODUCTION.
which neither of the three have taken up into their records ?
Is it not in the highest degree probable that such is the fact ?
Now, as we show hereafter, there is distinct though indirect
proof, in the first three Gospels, of a protracted ministry of
Jesus in Judea, which is left by them unrecorded. Turning
to Acts x. 37, 39, we find Luke reporting a discourse of
Peter, in which Christ is declared to have preached " through
out all Judea," and the Apostles are styled " witnesses of all
things which He did, both in the land of the Jews (Judea)
and in Jerusalem." The fact of a Judaean ministry is estab
lished by the authority of the first three Evangelists, as well
as favored by the probabilities of the case.
Renan, in the last edition of his " Life of Jesus," devotes
an appendix to an elaborate examination of the contents of
the fourth Gospel. He argues cogently and conclusively
against the idea that its narratives are theological allegories,
as the Tubingen critics had maintained. He concludes that
the recital of the material circumstances in the life of Jesus,
is, in itself considered, even superior, as regards verisimili
tude, to the recital of the Synoptists, and that the author of
the fourth Gospel was possessed of a tradition independent
of that in the hands of the other Evangelists, except in rela
tion to the last days, or the passion, of Christ. Weizsacker, the
successor of Baur, also admits the Johannean origin of the
historical portion of the Gospel, and Schenkel comes sub
stantially to the same result. The great difficulty in Renan's
mind grows out of the discourses of Jesus as they are set
down in the fourth Gospel. But if the general frame-work
of the history is acknowledged to be authentic and to repre
sent an independent and trustworthy tradition, this surely
creates a strong presumption in favor of the credibility of the
rest of the work. How can the discourses be dissevered
wholly from the facts 1 It is evident that Jesus, must have
uttered very much more than what is embraced in the Syn
optical Reports. How obvious, for instance, that in that
last, long interview with His disciples, extending from the
time when they sat down at the table to the moment of His
arrest in the Garden, He must have spoken vastly more than
the first three Gospels record ! It is certain, from isolated

INTRODUCTION. XXXV
passages found in the Synoptists, that he conversed at times
in the style of the Johannean discourses.1 What proof is
there, then, that these do not present, with substantial faith
fulness, what He actually said ?
A short sketch of what the new Tubingen school have
attempted, will prepare the reader for the following Essays,
and will help him to judge whether the Tubingen criticism
has succeeded or failed in its leading aim. The authors of
this movement were disciples of the Hegelian philosophy ;
they were committed to the creed of Naturalism, at the
start. Their aim was to explain the origin of Christianity
by natural causes alone. In 1831, Dr. Baur published his
Essay on the Chrisfr-pg,rty in the Corinthian Church, in which
he endeavored, to show that they who claimed to be " of
.Christ " laid all stress upon personal intercourse with Christ,
and for this reason rejected the Apostle- Paul ; also that they
were a Judaic party, and identical with the party of Peter.
This implied a conflict in the Apostolic circle. In 1836, ap
peared Baur's dissertation on the Epistle to the Romans,
which he pronounced a polemical exposition of Paul's the
ology, directed against Jewish Christianity. This last type
of Christianity, Baur contended, was the prevailing one in
the Roman Church. As a proof that the Jewish — which,
with Baur, wa^ synonymous with Judaizing — theology
reigned, in that Church, he appealed to the pseudo-Clementine
Homilies, a document from which he drew the most import
ant inferences. In the Epistle to the Galatians, he proposed
to find complete evidence of a radical dissent between Paul
and the older Apostles. This supposed difference became
tbe criterion ,for determining the date, authorship, and de
gree of credibility to be attached to the New Testament
writings generally. His studies respecting Gnosticism, in
conjunction with this governing theory, moved him to deny
the genuineness of the Pastoral Epistles. Only four documents
were left to Paul : the two Epistles to the Corinthians, that
1 The parallelism in • style and thought between John and the Synoptists
is pointed out with reference to a large number of passages, by Godet in his
Com. sur I'Evang. de S. Jean, II. 574.

XXXVI INTRODUCTION.
to the Romans and the Epistle to the Galatians. The Acts
of the Apostles, from the alleged disagreement of this book
with the Epistle to the Galatians, and from the position at
tributed by it to the several Apostles, on the Judaizing ques
tion, was impeached both as to its genuineness and credibil
ity. Baur summed up the results of this department of his
investigations in his copious work on the Apostle Paul.
Thus far, he had not made the Gospels and the life of Jesus
the subject of critical study. "To the Pauline Epistles,"
writes Baur^1 " and the Acts standing in connection with
them, the first series of my critical labors had reference.
When Strauss's ' Life of Jesus ' appeared and stirred up such
a commotion, I remained a quiet spectator. There was noth
ing new for me in the affair, for I had seen the work grow up
just in my neighborhood, and had often enough conferred with
the author respecting it. I could, indeed, no more come out
for it than against it, for at that time I had not made the
requisite studies." Strauss's neglect of all searching investi
gation of the documentary sources of evangelical history, the
Gospels, and the almost purely negative ch aracter of his results,
could not satisfy Baur's idea of the demands of science. Strauss
had attempted to carry by storm what could only be taken by a
slow siege. Baur's relation to Strauss somewhat resembles
that of Hegel to Schelling in the field of speculation, as the lat
ter was defined in a well-known expression of Hegel. Direct
ing his attention to the fourth Gospel, Baur persuaded him
self of its late, non-apostolic origin. Like the Acts, it was a
" tendenz-sehrift," designed to inculcate theological ideas and
to reconcile antagonisms in the Church. The preference as to
historical authority being thus given to the Synoptists, they
in their turn were subjected to the critical knife. Luke was
declared to be the fruit of the addition of catholicizing ele
ments to an original Pauline Gospel, and Matthew the result
of similar changes introduced into the Ebionitic Gospel of
the Hebrews.
In the attempt to sum up in a consistent view the results
of the new criticism, Baur was anticipated by the work of
his pupil Schwegler on the postapostolic age. This author
1 Kirchengeschichte des 19fen Jahrhunderts, s. 396. TiibiDgen, 1862.

INTRODUCTION. XXXVII
tried to show that the Churches in the two great centres,
Rome and Asia Minor, were Ebionitic, and to explain how this
Judaizing, predominant party and the opposite Pauline party,
by compromises and mutual concessions, united in the one
Catholic Church. To say nothing of the arbitrary assump
tions in this work and the classification of writers as Ebi
onitic, who are demonstrably not so, Schwegler failed to ex
plain how so opposite types of theology as the Ebionitic and
the Pauline could be educed from the teachings of Christ,
and how if they had been educed they could be' cozened out
of their mutual, radical antagonism. On the first of these
questions, as well as on other topics. Kbstlin, Ritschl, Planck,
and other Tubingen disciples, expended their efforts. But
the ablest summary df the Tubingen system and the most
plausible solution of these problems were furnished by Baur
himself in his comprehensive work on the first three cen
turies. He recognizes a Catholic and universal content,
united with the Ebionitic doctrine of Jesus ; but this former,
the abiding element, is in the ethics and in the doctrine of
the relation of man to God, as given in the Sermon on the Mount
and in the Parables. But this Baur himself holds not to have
been the characteristic doctrine of Paul, and not to be that
doctrine of the Saviour's own person, which found its full
development and expression in the fourth Gospel. So that,
after all, he does not avoid what he was so desirous of avoid
ing — the making of Paul the real founder, of Christianity.
As has been remarked^ there is one fact quite extraordinary,
on the supposition that the Baurian criticism is well founded.
In the first age of Christianity we have only men ; in the
following age, only writings. In one period, men without
writings (only the Apocalypse and four Epistles belonging
there) ; in the other period, only writings of great power and
influence, without known authors.
The principal features of Baur's system we examine in
the course of the present volume. It cannot escape the at
tentive reader that it rests upon a philosophical and an his
torical assumption ; and both of these we count to be false.
The philosophical assumption is that of naturalism. To
eliminate miracles from the Gospel history is a distinct aim.

XXXVHI INTRODUCTION.
The disbelief in miracles is an established, foregone conclu
sion. The historical premise, the corner-stone of the "historical
theory, is the assumed hostility of the Petrine and Pauline
theologies and of the two Apostles themselves.
But the criticism even of the free-thinking class of schol
ars has already broken down the Tubingen system. In order
to make out their scheme of historical development, their
opinions upon the origin and character of the early Christian
literature must be sustained. But this, in most cases, is im
possible. The Gospel of John, for example, cannot, as is
now generally admitted, be brought down to the late date to
which it was referred by Baur, Strauss, and Hilgenfeld.
Schenkel, Renan, Keim, Weizsacker, and others equally re
moved from the traditional views, unite in insisting that the
fourth Gospel could not have appeared later than a few years
after the beginning of the second century. They found
this opinion on irrefutable grounds. But if this be so, the
key-stone falls from the arch. The course of develop
ment which the Tubingen critics describe, extending for a
century from the death of Paul, and requiring this time for
its accomplishment, is swept away. There is no room for it.

ESSAY I.
THE NATURE OF THE CONFLICT OF CHRISTIAN" FAITH
¦WITH SKEPTICISM AND UNBELIEF.
We purpose, in several Essays, to examine the
foundations of the Christian faith, with particular
reference to some of the leading theories of unbelief
which are in vogue at the present day. It will aid
us in performing the work we have taken in hand, if,
at the outset, we present a statement of what we
conceive to be the real question or questions, with
which the controversy of Revealed Religion with
Skepticism, in our day, is chiefly concerned. This
discrimination seems important on account of the
multiplicity of controverted points relating to the
subject, . which are brought into popular discussion.
Physical science, historical study, metaphysical specu
lation, has each its own inquiries to raise and doubts
to suggest, and the effect of the simultaneous agita
tion of so many different topics, none of them un
important to a Christian believer, is, doubtless, to
breed confusion. We shall do a service, therefore,
as we hope, to some of our readers, if we stop amid
the "confused noise" of the battle, survey the field
where so many are nmning to and fro, and direct at-

2 NATURE OF THE CONFLICT WITH UNBELIEF.
tention to the really essential points which are threat
ened, though, not, as we trust, imperiled by the assault.
We shall not delay long for the purpose of char
acterizing the prevailing tone of the existing . skep
ticism and unbelief, as contrasted with similar phe
nomena at other periods in the past. Yet not to
leave this interesting topic altogether untouched, we
extract a passage from a late volume of Bampton
Lectures, in which the peculiarity of the present de
velopment of skepticism is correctly described. " The
unbelief of the present day," writes the author, " dif
fers from that of the last century in tone and char
acter ; and in many respects shares the traits already
noticed in the modern intellectualism of Germany, and
the eclecticism of France. It is not disgraced by rib
aldry ; hardly at all by political agitation against the
rehgion which it disbelieves : it is marked by a show
of fairness, and professes a wish not to ignore facts
nor to leave them unexplained. Conceding the exist
ence of spiritual and religious elements in human
nature, it admits that their subjective existence as
facts of consciousness, no less than their objective
expression in the history of religion, demands explana
tion, and cannot be hastily set aside, as was thought
in the last century in Trance, by the vulgar theory
that the one is factitious, and the other the result of
priestly contrivance. The writers are men whose
characters and lives forbid the idea that their unbelief
is intended as an excuse for licentiousness. Denying

TONE OE SKEPTICAL WRITERS. 3
revealed rehgion, they chng the more tenaciously to
the moral instincts : their tone is one of earnestness :
their inquiries are marked by a profound conviction
of the possibihty of finding truft. : not content with
destroying, their aim is to reconstruct. Their opin
ions are variously manifested. Some of them appear
in treatises of philosophy : others insinuate themselves
indirectly in literature •. some of them relate to Chris
tian doctrines; others to the criticism of Scripture
documents : but in all cases their authors either leave
a residuum which they profess will satisfy the long
ings of human nature, or confess with deep pain that
their conclusions are in direct conflict with human
aspirations ; and, instead of reveling in the ruin which
they have made, deplore with a tone of sadness the
impossibility of solving the great enigma. It is clear
that writers like these offer a wholly different appear
ance from those of the last century. The deeper ap
preciation manifested by them of the systems which
they disbelieve, and the more delicate learning of
which they are able to avail themselves, constitute fea
tures formerly lacking in the works of even the most
serious-minded deists,1 and require a difference in the
spirit, if not in the mode, in which Christians must seek
to refute them." 2 A general description like the
foregoing is, of course, liable to much exception and
qualification when it is applied to particular individ-
1 Such as Herbert and Morgan.
2 Farrar's Bampton Lectures, Am, Ed., p. 307.

4 NATURE OF THE CONFLICT WITH UNBELIEF.
uals. Yet the drift of it will be recognized as correct
by those who regard with a penetrative eye the skep
tical literature of the day. In contrast with the past,
unbelief is oftener now an infection \ than a willful
attack. There are more at present who can be truly
said to be afflicted with doubt. In the refinement and
learning exhibited by the antagonists of Revelation,
a decided superiority belongs to the present.: Just
place Paine's Age of Reason by the side of Renan's
newly published Life of Christ! The difference of
the old infidelity from the new, is instantly felt
by the dullest observer. The spirit of the one is
coarse and bitterly hostile to Christianity ; the depend
ence is more on railing than reasoning; and the
warfare is waged without the aid of historical knowl
edge. The Deistical writers were, to be sure, fre
quently above Paine in the character of the weapons
they employed, and in the temper with which they
wielded them ; and yet the name of Paine fairly sug
gests the general character of the movement, at least
in its later stages. The work of Renanis the produc
tion of a scholar possessed of abundant philological
and historical learning ; it is dedicated to a departed
sister who aided in its composition; it abounds in
expressions of sentiment ; it knows how to value
much that is sacred to the Christian believer; it is
founded upon laborious- studies and upon travels in
the land of the Bible. Skepticism has without doubt
improved immensely in its general tone. And yet the

SUBTLE CHARACTER OF MODERN SKEPTICISM. 5
sketch which we have quoted above, in order' to be
fall, would require to be qualified by a distinct men
tion of the fact that there is witnessed on the side of
skeptical writers even of ; the more refined school, in
our own times, the occasional development of an ani
mosity toward the Christian faith, that ill accords
with their habitual tone, and seems to imply that after
all there lies deep down in the heart an unwholesome
fountain of bitter feeling with reference to the doc
trines and restraints of ; religion.
Por the reason that the peculiar traits of the mod
ern skepticism, and the peculiar character of the class
who are affected by it, are not clearly discerned, the
comparative strength of the infidel party in our times
is underrated by not a few even of Christian teachers.
When the present is compared with the past, they
begin at once ' to take a census of the known or
avowed opposers of Christianity, and to put the result
of this count of heads by the side of a similar reckons
ing made for an earlier epoch; They are not awake
to the subtler form which skepticism has "assumed.
They fail to see that, though it be often less tangible
and pugnacious, it is more diffused like an atmosphere.
They are not aware how widely the seeds of unbelief
are scattered through books and journals which find a
hospitable reception even in Christian families. And
they do not appreciate the significance of the fact that
so large a number of the leaders of opinion on mat
ters outside of the sphere of religion, are adherents,

6 NATURE OF THE CONFLICT WITH UNBELIEF.
more or less outspoken, of the skeptical school.
Infidelity appears in better dress and in better com
pany than of old; it takes on the function of the
educator and social reformer ; it prefers a compromise
with Christianity to a noisy crusade against it ; but
the half-friendly attitude it assumes may render the
task of exposing and withstanding it all the more
difficult. This ambiguous, fluctuating tone of the
skepticism of our day, renders the analysis oi its fun
damental position the more incumbent ; and this we
attempt in the present Essay.
We begin with remarking that the principal ques
tion at issue is not the Inspiration of the Scriptures.
There is one point of view, as we shall shortly explain,
from which the importance of this question is not ex
aggerated. But the mere question of the relation of
human agency to divine agency in the production of
the Scriptures is, in itself considered, of not so great
moment. The fact of Inspiration is chiefly important
as containing a guaranty for the authority of the
Bible. If the Bible were exclusively the work of men,
and yet came to us attended with a divine attestation
to the truth of its contents, the main end for which
Inspiration is desired and thought necessary, would be
attained. The authority of the Scriptures as a Rule
of Faith and Practice is the doctrine of prime value ;
and Inspiration is required as a shield against the lia
bilities to hurtful error, which pertain to every exer
tion of the human mind without the aid of a higher

THE QUESTION OF INSPIRATION. 7
light. Something is gained, in our view, in the dis
cussion of these topics, when we steadily keep in mind
the great object to be secured (if it can be consist
ently with truth), which is none other than the Protest
ant principle of the Authority of the Bible as a guide
to. the knowledge of duty and salvation. Whether
he proceed from a scientific or a practical motive, the
inquirer for rehgious truth has first to settle the
question, where shall this truth be found. This is
obviously the first step. Until this point is deter
mined, there is no criterion of truth, no "judge to end
the strife " of diverse opinions. The Roman Catholic
considers the Church, through the voice of its clergy
and their head, the infallible expounder of truth. Ins
every doubt, he has an arbiter at his side whose ver
dict, being the direct result of divine illumination,,
is held to be conclusive. The Protestant agrees with.
the Roman Catholic in holding to an objective stand
ard, but the standard with him is the Bible, which he-
feels authorized to interpret for himself. Denying
that the Church is either the unerring interpreter of
Scripture, or the infallible guardian of oral teaching of
Christ and the Apostles, which tradition has- handed
down, he falls back upon the Bible itself. The Bible
alone is his Rule of Faith. This we take to be the
fundamental position of Protestantism on the question
which, as we have said, stands at the threshold, of all
profitable religious inquiry. OH the; contrary, the
Rationalist differs from both the Roman. Catholic and,

8 NATURE OF THE CONFLICT WITH UNBELIEF.
Protestant, first in setting aside every objective Au
thority, every Authority exterior to the mind itself, in
matters of religion, and then in positively maintaining
the sufficiency of Reason. Nothing is allowed to
stand which cannot justify itself at this tribunal of
his own understanding. There is no divine testimony
which is separate from the thoughts and deductions
of the human mind, and entitled to regulate belief.
We may stop to observe that an ingenious German
writer 1 has not improperly classified the Mystic with
the Rationahst, so far as the former takes his own
feeling for a source and criterion of truth, superior
to any external Rule. The Mystic and the Ration
alist meet on the common ground of a renunciation
of objective Authority, the one relying ultimately
upon subjective reason, the other upon subjective
feeling, for all his convictions of religious truth. And
hence the Mystic is found to pass over, not unfre
quently, by a natural and easy transition, to the
position of the Rationalist, the difference between
them often depending for the most part on a diversity
of temperament and education. Now the Protestant
principle which is thus distinguished from that of the
Romanist and of the Rationalist, is of vital moment ;
and it stands in close connection with the other doc
trine of Biblical Inspiration. Give up the principle
of the Normative Authority of the Bible, and we are
driven upon the alternative of either abjectly surren-
1 Kliefoth, Einleitung in, die DogmengeschicMe.

THE QUESTION OF INSPIRATION. ' i S
dering ourselves to the Church, cr of being set adrift,
with the Rationalist, upon a sea of conjectures and un
certified : reasonings of men. When, for example, I
open an Epistle of St. Paul, and find there a passage
upon the design and effect of the Saviour's death; and
when I have ascertained the sense of the passage by a
fair exegesis, may I then be' sure of its truth? Or
when I meet, on the page of Scripture with practical
injunctions pertaining to the duties of life,: may I
depend upon them as strictly conformed to the truth,
and shape my conduct in accordance with' them ?
Here is the practical question concerning the Bible;
and the fact of Inspiration, or of supernatural aid
enjoyed by the ^ writers, owes its value chiefly to the
assurance it may afford upon this primary question.
It is interesting to observe that the most discerning
of those theologians at the present day who are dis
satisfied with the old formulas concerning Inspiration,
feel the necessity of still abiding by the cardinal
Protestant principle of the Normative Authority of
the Scriptures. The Bible is still held to be the safe
and sufficient-Rule of Faith, upon which the Christian
may cast himself without misgiving. Thus Dr.
Arnold, holding that the apostles in the New Testa
ment predict the speedy Advent of Christ to judg
ment, is, nevertheless, careful to remark, that by
the recorded words of Christ which declare this point
not to be a subject of Revelation, and by the circum
stance that those injunctions of St. Paul which were

10 NATURE OF THE CONFLICT WITH UNBELIEF.
founded in his own mind on this expectation, are
expressly given as not having divine authority, but as
counsel, the error of the apostles is prevented from
havmg the effect to weaken in our estimation their
general authority. That is to say, this anticipation
was an error, but an error into which they do
not profess that Inspiration led them, and from the
misleading influence of which all are saved who
attend to the words of Christ in the passage above
referred to. Another witness to the importance of
upholding the Protestant view upon this subject is
the learned and brilliant theologian of Heidelberg,
Dr. Rothe. In the essays * which he put forth a few
years ago, and which he has since collected in a httle
volume, the old theological definitions in regard to
Inspiration are frankly discarded for the reason that, in
the opinion of the author, they were constructed from
a mistaken conception of the nature and method of
Divine Revelation. Not only does he extend the in
fluence of the human element, or factor, in the com
position of the Scriptures so far as to admit of the in
troduction of errors in physical science and in history,
but he does not hesitate to allow that the Apostles fell
into mistakes in reasoning and in their method of in
terpreting the Old Testament, and to distinguish be
tween the doctrines they set forth, and the arguments
1 First published in the Studien u. Kritiken. They are collected
by the Author under the Jitle, Zur Bogmatik.

THE QUESTION OF INSPIRATION. 11
to tvhich they resort in confuting adversaries, and
which are more or less the result of their own fallible
reflection. In these and other particulars, Rothe
departs widely from the accepted formulas of doctrine.
And yet he maintains, and feels it necessary to
maintain, the Normative Authority of the Scriptures.
This he endeavors to save by his view that the Bible
is not only a self-explaining, but, to some extent, also
a self-correcting, book. If we are able to discern the
imperfection of an ethical sentence, or ethical judg
ment, in one portion of the Scriptures — for example in
the Psalms — we do this only by means of a more
advanced ethical standard which the Gospel, or the
Scriptures as a whole, has given us, so that the Rule
of Faith — the source of knowledge — still remains an
objective one. We are still moving in the sphere of
the Bible, seeing in the Bible's own teaching, judging
by the Bible's own standard. A view not dissimilar
from that of Rothe is suggested in various passages
of the celebrated Letters of Coleridge on the subject
of Inspiration. "Is it not a fact," he asks, "that
the books of the New Testament were| tried by their
consonance with the rule, and according to the
analogy, of faith ? Does not the universally admitted
canon — that each part of the Scripture must be in
terpreted by the spirit of the whole — lead to the
same practical conclusion as that for which I am now
contending ; namely, that it is the spirit of the Bible,
and not the detached words and sentences, that is in-

12 NATURE OF THE CONFLICT WITH UNBELIEF.
fallible and absolute?"1 It is foreign to our pres
ent purpose to criticise these views of Rothe, which
have evidently made a strong impression in Ger
many, or the somewhat similar, though less guarded,
declarations of Coleridge. We advert to them both,
simply to illustrate wherein lies the importance of
the doctrine of Inspiration, and how essential it is,
even in the opinion of profound theologians who are
counted among the most liberal of the adherents
of the Evangelical system, to uphold the Protestant
doc'trine of an objective and on the whole unerring
standard of religious truth and duty.
Yet the subject of the Normative Authority of
Scripture is of subordinate interest when compared
with the debate that has arisen upon the historical
reality of the Scriptural miracles. The attention of
thoughtful men, everywhere, is concentrated upon
the question of the verity of those parts of Scriptural
history which describe miraculous events. If this
be established, the speculative objections to the
doctrinal system of Christianity at once fall to the
ground. All opposition of this sort is then silenced,
if not satisfied. On the other hand, if the miracles
are disproved, Christianity is stripped of its essential
peculiarity. The central fact; of a Supernatural
Interposition having for its end the restoration of
1 Coleridge, Confessions of an Inquiring Spirit, in Ma Works,
Am. Ed. vol. v. p. 612.

THE QUESTION OF THE REALITY OF MIRACLES. 13
man to communion with God, is lost. The Chris1
tian system of doctrine is reduced to a mere product
of the human mind, having no divine sanction, and
mixed, we know not how largely, with error. That
this question of the historical reahty of the Scriptural
miracles involve's the whole claim of Christianity to
be a Revelation, is plain, for Revelation and Miracle
are inseparable from each other. In fact, the ablest
skeptical writers of the present day have set them
selves to the work of undermining the evidence for
the Scriptural miracles. To explain the origin of
Christianity, and the origin also of the New Testa
ment narratives of supernatural events, on some
hypothesis that shall dispense with the need of
putting faith in the latter, is the problem which they
are struggling to solve. The Life of Christ by
Strauss, in both the earher and the reGent form, is
simply an elaborate attempt to set aside miracles,
by propounding some hypothesis more plausible
than the old exploded theory of a wilful deception
on the part of the early disciples. The Life of
Christ by Renan is likewise little more than an effort
to account for Christ and Christianity and the Chris
tian Scriptures, without giving credence to miraculous
events. The. recent criticism of the New Testament
canon, embracing the attempt to impeach the gen
uineness of various books, is only, a part of the great
discussion of the historical truth of the New Testa
ment miracles ; for it is difficult to attack the credi-

14 NATURE OF THE CONFLICT WITH UNBELIEF.
bility of the Gospel histories without first disproving
their genuineness. This main issue is never with
drawn from the mind of writer or reader. The
resources of learning and skill which are expended
by the Tubingen school of critics with Baur at their
head, and in turn by their antagonists, in reference
to the authorship and date of the Gospels and of
other portions of the New Testament, are only a
chapter in the controversy to which we allude. The
spectacle presented is that of a conflict for the pos
session of a place not so much valued for itself, as
for being the key that carries with it another posi
tion on which all thoughts centre. Thus the real
issue between the believer and the unbeliever has
become distinct and conspicuous. Did Christ do
the works which none other men could do? This
is the vital question — we might almost say, the
only question. The case of Christianity rests upon
the decision of it. Its claim to a rank essentially
different from that of other rehgions and philosophies,
stands or falls according as this question is answered.
Is the doctrine of God, or does Christ speak of him
self, uttering a human wisdom which, however rare,
is only human, bearmg upon it no loftier sanction,
/d even mixed with an amalgam of error ?
This being a question so momentous, we have a
right to expect of every one who enters into the dis
cussion of the character of the Scriptures, especially
if he be understood to represent the Christian cause,

THE QUESTION OF THE REALITY OF MIRACLES. 15
that he shall declare himself in regard to it without
ambiguity. Whatever view he may take upon special
questions, upon this cardinal proposition of super
naturalism he has no right to appear to halt or to
oscillate between two opinions. The volume of Essays
and Reviews which lately kindled so great an excite
ment in the English Church, appears to us to be liable
to this charge. In several of the dissertations that
compose it, there is manifest an evasiveness and
indecision, a disposition to pare down the supernatural
in the Scriptures to a minimum, if not to doubt its
existence altogether. An explicit, unshrinking avowal
of a belief in the historical reality of the Christian
miracles, would have redeemed that book, in our judg
ment, from its gravest fault. We remember that a
critic of the Essays, in one of the English literary
journals, cited from the book one skeptical insinuation
after another, appending to each the question: "but
what of the Resurrection ? " This or that stricture
may be just, or may not be — such was the purport of
criticism — but what of the Resurrection of Christ from
the dead ? On what ground do these authors stand ?
Is it the design to shake the faith of men in super
natural Christianity and recommend a naturalistic
theory ? If not, why this hesitation to commit them
selves to a bold avowal on the subject of miracles, and
to let their readers see how much is implied in the fact
of the Resurrection of "Christ? The concession that
a single miracle took place in connection with Chris-

16 NATURE OF THE CONFLICT WITH UNBELIEF.
tianity imparts to this religion an unspeakable elevation
and awfulness in the view of every considerate mind.
Although in these remarks we have chiefly in mind
the New Testament, yet we should be inclined to
bring a similar accusation against Stanley, for the
ambiguous tone of his recent History of the Jewish
Church, did he not expressly disclaim the ability to
sever, in his own mind, in many cases, the natural and
the supernatural. We are continually left afloat in
regard to this most interesting and most important
question. Now an event appears to be represented as
miraculous, and in the next sentence it is resolved into
a merely natural occurrence. Were it not for the
distinct avowal of the author, to which we have advert
ed, his work would be justly chargeable with 'being
written in a Jesuitical tone— a tone least of all corre
sponding with the author's character. For ourselves
we must acknowledge our preference for a single page
of severe scientific criticism, over a library of volumes
like this of Dr. Stanley, where so little is decided and
settled. What men crave in these days, is satisfaction
upon the difficult questions, which meet them in the
early portions of the Old Testament, and, if at all in
earnest, they will not be content to be put off with
pleasant description. In striking contrast with the
censurable uncertainty of the Essays and Revieios
upon the subject of miracles, is the tone of Rothe in
the httle work to which we have already alluded.
Starting with the avowed design to oppose the

THE PRINCIPAL QUESTION AN HISTORICAL ONE. 17
views more commonly taken of the Scriptures, he
is careful at the outset to avow his undoubting
faith in miracles and in the supernatural character
. of Christianity. He desires it to be distinctly
understood that on this subject he is full and clear.
On this platform he will stand in the prosecution of
the further inquiries to which he invites attention.
Such a course alone is worthy of a theologian who has
a nobler aim than merely to instill doubts concerning
the justice of received views.
Thus, the principal question in the controversy
with unbehef is an historical one. Hardly a worse
mistake can be committed in dealing with most
skeptics at the present day, than to begin by insisting
upon the inspiration of the Bible. We should rather
place ourselves back in the position which the apostles-
occupied in preaching to the Gentiles, before the New
Testament Scriptures were written. We should make-
it our first aim to substantiate the great facts which>
are recorded in the New Testament, and which formed;
the pith and marrow of the apostles' testimony. We-
must meet the skeptic on the ordinary level of histori
cal investigation, and bring before him the proof that;
the Gospel miracles were actually performed, sub
stantially as these histories of the New Testament
narrate. There is no other common ground on which
he and we can stand. Unless he can be satisfied of
the credibility of the Gospels in these main particulars,-.
it is useless to go farther and attempt to« convince him>

18 NATURE OF THE CONFLICT WITH UNBELIEF.
that this body of writings is the product of Divine
inspiration — much less that they contain no sort of
error. The first and the great proposition to be estab
lished is, that God has made a supernatural revelation ;
and this done, other points of truth may follow in
their proper place. In this controversy, it behooves us
to keep in mind the order of things to be believed.
First comes the leading, the commanding truth, of a
miraculous attestation to the mission of Jesus. Let
this once become a firm conviction, and the next step
is to ascertain his teaching and the contents of his
religion. Every earnest mind will be ready to take
this step ; will immediately look about for some
authentic source of knowledge on this subject; and
then the peculiar character and claims of the Bible will
be made a theme of investigation.
jf- While we hold that the direct question at issue
with the skeptic and unbeliever is an historical one, we
think that Apologists fall into a mischievous error in
defining the nature of the evidence for Christian Reve
lation. This evidence, it is frequently said, being
historical, is of a moral or probable kind, as distin
guished from demonstrative. The appreciation of
it, therefore, it is added, depends in no small degree
upon the spirit of the individual by whom it is
weighed. So far we fully agree with the ordinary
Apologist, and could say with him that the force
which the historical proofs wiU actually have in per
suading the mind, differs with the tempers of feel-

THE RATIONALISTIC TEMPER. 19
ing which are brought^ to the consideration of them.
Only we say, it is a fatal error to confine the inward
qualification for judging of this evidence, to the
virtues of candor, simplicity, and honesty. On the
contrary, we freely concede and contend that these
virtues may exist up to the ordinary measure, and
even beyond it, and yet this evidence fail of leading
the mind to conviction. We freely grant that unbe
lievers 'have lived in the past, and some live to-day,
whose ability for historical investigation is of an
unusually high order. In the treatment of secular
history, they evince no want of candor and no exces
sive increduhty. And although they withhold their
belief from the supernatural facts of Christianity, we
cannot charge them with any marked disposition to
pervert, conceal, or disparage the evidence by which
these facts are supported. We would not for a
moment deny that great names are on the roll of
infidelity ; names of men who, to say the least, are
not peculiarly liable to the charge of being uncandid
and prejudiced in their investigation of any important
subject. The Christian Apologist, as we think, is
entitled and required to take higher ground, and to
extend this qualification for appreciating the proofs
of revelation beyond the common virtues of fairness
and honesty. We are called upon distinctly to re
cognize the truth, that in the consideration of this
subject we find ourselves in a sphere where the deep
alienation of the human heart from God and Divine

20 NATURE OF THE CONFLICT WITH UNBELIEF.
things exerts a powerful influence upon the judg
ment.1 When we are called to determine the truth
or falsehood of any historical statement, our judgment
will be affected inevitably by the view we take of the
conditions and causes at work in connection with the
event which is alleged to have occurred. The same
law is apphcable to the Gospel history. Were these
events ordinary, or unmiraculous events, the evidence
for them would not only be convincing, but, for all
thorough students, overwhelming. But another ele
ment may come in to arrest the judgment and defeat
the natural effect of the proof; the circumstance,
namely, that the events are thought to be either out
of the range of possibility, or in the highest degree
unlikely to occur. The evidence may be felt to be
all that could be asked, and more than could be re
quired, in the case of any natural event, but the
event being, if it occurred, a miracle, there is a positive
incredulity beforehand, which, it may be, no amount
of historical proof can overcome. This variable
element, which may neutrahze the strongest array
of. historical evidence, lies in the general habit of
feeling with reference to supernatural things. At
the bottom of unbelief is a rationalistic or unreligious
temper. This truth is 'admirably set forth in one
of the sermons of Arnold. "The clearest notion,"
1 It may be well to .compare here what the New Testament
itself has to say of the prerequisites of faith. See Matt. xi. 25 ;
1 Cor. i. 19-27; and like passages.

THE RATIONALISTIC TEMPER. 21
he says, " which can be given of Rationahsm would,
I think, be this : that it is the abuse of the under
standing in subjects where the divine and human,
so to speak, are intermingled. Of human things
the understanding can judge, of divine things it
cannot ; and thus, where the two are mixed together,
its inability to judge of the one part makes it derange
the proportions of both, and the judgment of the
whole is vitiated. For example, the understanding
examines a miraculous history: it judges truly of
what I may call the human part of the case ; that is
to say, of the rarity of miracles, of the fallibility of
human testimony, of the proneness of most minds
to exaggeration, and of the critical arguments affect
ing the genuineness or date of the narrative itself.
But it forgets the divine part, namely, the power and
providence of God, that He is really ever present
amongst us, and that the spiritual wrorld, which
exists invisibly all around us, may conceivably and
by no means impossibly exist, at some times and
to some persons, even visibly." This Rationalism,
however, is a thing of degrees. Where not including
an, absolute disbelief in the realities of a higher world,
it may still involve a practical insensibility to their
influence. They are left out of the account in de
termining the question of the truth or falsehood of
the New Testament history. We would make this
variable element still more comprehensive, including
within it the soul's sense of sin and discernment of

22 NATURE OF THE CONFLICT WITH UNBELIEF.
the beauty of holiness. The judgment which the
mind forms in respect to the proofs of Christian
Revelation, is greatly affected by the presence or
absence of certain experiences of the heart, which are
rational and just, but which belong in a very un
equal degree to different men. An illustration of
the general truth contained in Arnold's remark may
be taken from another, but, in some respects, a kin
dred department. Let us suppose that a painting
is discovered in some Italian town, which, it is
claimed, is a work of Raphael. Now for the settle
ment of this question there are two sources of proof.
There is, in the first place, all that bears on the
outward authentication of the claim; as the consid
eration of the place where the painting is found,
the integrity of those who had it in charge, the his
torical circumstances which are said to connect it
with the artist to whom it is ascribed, the known
facts in his life which tend to prove or disprove
the truth of the pretension. As far as this kind
of proof is concerned, any discriminating person
may be pronounced competent to appreciate the
degree of force that belongs to it, and, if the settle
ment of the point depended exclusively upon this.
branch of the evidence, to come to a just conclu
sion. But there is obviously another sort of evi
dence to be considered and weighed. The character
and merits of the painting, as a work of art, in
comparison with the high and peculiar excellence

THE RATIONALISTIC TEMPER. 23
of Raphael, must enter into the case, as a part of
the proof. But how many are the acute and pains
taking men who are here disabled from estimating
---from feeling, we might rather say, the force of
this branch of the evidence! They can examine
the documents, they can question the witnesses,
they can scrutinize all the outward testimony ; but
they are destitute of the perceptions and feelings
which are the indispensable qualification of a critic
of art ! The analogy holds true in this particular,
that in the question of the verity of the Gospel
histories, one great part of the evidence lies in a
province beyond the reach of the faculty of under
standing, in ' the sense in which Arnold uses the
term. The whole mode of thought and feehng con
cerning God, and His Providence, and His charac
ter, concerning human sin and human need, has a
decisive influence in determining the judgment to
give or refuse credit to the historical proof. Possi
bly God has so arranged it, that while this proof is
sufficient to satisfy one whose spiritual eye is open
to these reahties, it is yet endued with no power to
create conviction where such is not the fact. He
who magnifies the presumption against supernat
ural interposition, not allowing for the moral emer
gency that calls for it, and hardly recognizing the
Power from whom it must come, puts on a coat-of-
mail which is proof against all the arguments for
Revelation. He is shut up to unbelief by a logical

i'L NATURE OF THE CONFLICT WITH UNBELIEF.
necessity. The effect of the internal argument for
the supernatural origin of the Gospel is directly
dependent upon that habit of feeling, either ra
tionalistic or the opposite, the operation of which we
have described. The various particulars of this
argument, at least the most important of them, are
lost upon an unreligious nature. The painful con
sciousness of sin, for example, is the medium through
which is discerned the correspondence of the Gospel
method of salvation with the necessities and yearnings
of the soul. An experience of the disease opens the
eye to the true nature and the value of the remedy.
Such an impression of the evil of sin and of personal
guilt, as men hke Luther and Pascal have had, un
covers the deep things of the Gospel. In the Gospel
system alone is the situation of the soul, which is
slowly learned by the soul itself, understood and
met. Another eye has looked through the heart
before us, and anticipated the discovery, which we
make imperfectly and by degrees, of its guilt and
want. We might point out how the same self-
knowledge will find in the spotless character of
Christ a glory and impressiveness undiscernible by
such as think not how great a thing it is to be free
from sin. And so the tremendous power exerted
by Christianity to reform the world— to move men
to forsake their sins — will be estimated aright. It
is no part of our present purpose to exhibit in detail
the blinding effect of the rationalistic temper. Who-

THE RATIONALISTIC TEMPER. 25
ever carefully surveys the more recent literature of
skepticism, will not fail to see the source from which
it springs. It was by ignoring the existence and
character of God that Hume constructed a plausible
argument against the possibility of proving a miracle.
The moment that the truth concerning God and the
motives of His government is taken into view, the
fallacy of Hume's reasoning is laid bare. The first
canon which Strauss lays at the foundation of his
criticism is the impossibility that a miracle should
occur. Any and every other hypothesis, he takes for
granted, is sooner to be allowed than the admission
of a miraculous event. He assumes, from beginning
to end, that "a relation is not historical, that the
thing narrated could not have so occurred," when
" it is irreconcilable with known, and elsewhere uni
versally prevailing, laws." By this circumstance,
before ah others, the unhistorical character of a
narrative is ascertained.1 So M. Renan, at the out
set of his late work, remarks : " That the Gospels
are in part legendary is evident, since they are full
of miracles and the supernatural."2 Afterward,
though he does not with Strauss openly affirm the
strict impossibility of a miracle, he lays down " this
principle of historical criticism, that a supernatural
relation cannot be accepted as such, that it always
implies credulity, or imposture, that the duty of the
1 Strauss's Leben Jesu, B. I., S. 100.
8 Renan's Vie de Jesus, p. xv.

26 NATURE OF THE CONFLICT WITH UNBELIEF.
historian is to interpret it, and to seek what portion
of truth and what portion of error it may contain."
But how futile is the attempt to convince one that
an event has occurred, which he professes to know
is either impossible, or never to be beheved! In
other words, how futile to argue with one who begs
the question in dispute !
The foregoing observations upon the reception
that is given by skeptics at the present day to the
proof of Christian miracles, bring us to the deeper
and more general cause of unbelief, which is none
other than the weakening or total destruction of
faith in the supernatural. It is not the super
natural in the Scriptures alone, but the supernatural
altogether, which in our day is the object of dis
belief. At the root of the most respectable and
formidable attack upon Christianity — that which
emanates from the Tubingen school of historical
critics — is an avowed Pantheism. The doctrine of
a God to be distinguished from the World, and
competent to produce events not provided for by
natural causes, is cast away. The apotheosis of
Nature or the World, of course, leaves no room for
anything supernatural, and a miracle becomes an
absurdity. Indeed, the tacit assumption that a
miracle is impossible, which we find in so many
quarters, can only flow from an Atheistic or Pan
theistic view of the Universe. The Deist can con-

INCONSISTENCY OF MODERN DEISM. 27
sistently take no such position. He professes to
beheve in a hving and personal God, however he
may be disposed to set Him at a distance and to
curtail His agency. He must therefore acknowl
edge the existence of a Power who is able at any
moment to bring to pass an event over and beyond
the capacity of natural causes. Nay, if his Deism
be earnestly meant, he must himself believe in a
miracle of the most stupendous character—in the
creation of the world by the omnipotent agency of
God. Holding thus to the miracle of creation as
an historical event, he cannot, without a palpable
inconsistency, deny that miracles are conceivable or
longer possible. For no sincere Deist can suppose
that the Creator has chained Himself up by physical
laws of His own , making,, and thereby cut Himself
off from new exertions of His power, even within
the sphere where natural forces usually operate ac
cording to a fixed rule. One of the marked charac
teristics of our time, therefore, is the loose manner
in which Deism is held even by those who profess
it, as shown in their reluctance to take the con
sequences of their creed and their readiness to pro
ceed in their treatment of the subject of miracles
upon Pantheistic principles. The theories and argu
ments of Strauss and the Tubingen skeptics, which
are the offshoot of their Pantheistic system, are
adopted, for example, by Theodore Parker, who pro
fesses to believe in the personality of God. But

28 NATURE OF THE CONFLICT WITH UNBELIEF.
though entertaining this different belief, it is plain
that he generally brings to the discussion of miracles
the feeling and the postulates of a Pantheist. His
Deism is so far from being thorough and consistent,
that he not only, here and there, falls into the Pan
theistic notion of sin, as a necessary stage of develop
ment and step in human progress, but also habitually
regards a miracle as equivalent to an absurdity.
A gifted female writer has lately put forth a plea in
behalf of a Christless Theism which she wishes to
see organized into a practical, working system.1
Anxious respecting the possible fate of the truths
of Natural Rehgion in the crisis occasioned by the
supposed downfall of faith in Revelation, she forgets
that skepticism as to the supernatural origin of
Christianity generally results from a prior adoption
of an Atheistic or Pantheistic philosophy. The evil
she dreads is not an accidental consequence, but an
effective cause, of disbehef in the claims of the
Gospel. At least, faith in Revelation and faith in
the verities of Natural Rehgion sink together.. The
same writer forgets also that the doctrine of Theism,
however supported by the hght of Nature, came to
us, in point of fact, from the Bible. The nations
learned it from the Bible. It is a truth which we
practically owe to Revelation. And as this is the
case, so it is natural that with the denial of Revela
tion, that doctrine should be discarded. The result
1 Frances Power Cobbe, Broken Lights.

THE TENDENCY TO PANTHEISM. 29
of previous experiments should warn against the
indulgence of the hope that Natural Rehgion can
succeed in the effort to embody itself in a practical
system of worship. The Theophilanthropists of the
French Revolution, who espoused the three principles
— God, Virtue, Immortality — tried to maintain rehg
ious worship. In Paris alone their assembhes at
one time numbered not less than twenty thousand
persons, and occupied ten churches. But there was
not vitality enough in the system to keep it alive,
and this apparently promising sect quickly melted
away. In the ancient world, among thinking men,
skepticism as to the supernatural on the one hand,
and the Christian faith on the other, were the two
combatants, and so it will be now. As far as this
class are ahenated from Christianity, they are more
commonly alienated in an almost equal degree from
all religious faith. Signs of such an obscuration of
faith appear in various quarters. Not a few ill-
supported speculations of physical science, which
have been lately brought before the public, have
their real motive in a desperate reluctance to admit
a supernatural cause. The most unfounded con
jectures are furnished in the room of argument, so
earnest is the desire of some minds to create the
behef that the worlds were not framed by the word
of God, and that things which are seen were made
of things which do appear. To this we must refer
the ambition Of some philosophers to estabhsh their

'60 NATURE OF THE CONFLICT WITH UNBELIEF.
descent from the inferior animals — a wild theory,
only to be compared with the old mythologic doc
trine of transmigration!. The disposition to remove
God from any active connection with the world, or
to transport Him as far back as possible into the
remote past, is the real motive of this attempt, which
can plead no evidence in its favor, to invalidate abso
lutely the distinction of species and discredit our
own feeling of personal identity and separateness of
being." There can be no doubt that a powerful
tendency to Pantheistic modes of thought is rife at
the present day. The popular literature, even in
our country, is far more widely infected in this way
than unobservant readers are aware. The laws of
Nature are hypostatized— spoken of as if they were
a self-active being. And not unfrequently the same
tendency leads to the virtual, if not explicit, denial
of the free and responsible nature of man. History
is resolved by a class of writers into the movement
of a great machine — into the evolution of events with
which the free-will neither of God nor of man has
any connection.1
We are thus brought back, in our analysis of
the controversy with the existing unbelief, to the
postulates of Natural Religion. On these the Chris-
1 The tendencies to Naturalism, at work at the present day,
are forcibly and comprehensively touched upon in Chapter I.
of Bushnell's "Nature and the Supernatural" — a work which,
in its main parts, is equally profound and inspiring.

THE TENDENCY TO PANTHEISM. 31
tian Apologist founds the presumption, or anterior
probability, that a Revelation will be given. These,
together with the intrinsic excellence of Christianity,
he employs to rebut and remove the presumption,
which, however philosophers may differ as to the
exact source and strength of it, undoubtedly lies
against the occurrence of a miracle. The antecedent
improbability that a miracle will occur, disappears
in the case of Christianity. The issue relates to the
miracles ; but the ultimate source of the conflict is
a false or feeble view, on the part of the unbeliever,
of the primitive truths of religion. This will explain
how a new awakening of conscience, or of rehgious
sensibihty, has been . known to dispel the incredulity
with which he had looked upon the claims of Revela
tion. It is more and more apparent that the cause of
Natural Religion, and that of Revealed Rehgion,
are bound up together. But the native convictions
of the human mind concerning God and duty cannot
be permanently dislodged. Atheism is an affront
ahke to the inquiring reason and the uplooking soul
of man. Pantheism mocks his religious nature. It
is inconsistent with religion — with prayer, with wor
ship — with that communion with a higher 'Being,
which is religion": It is inconsistent, also, with
morality, in any earnest meaning of the term; for
it empties free-will and responsibility, hohness and
sin, of their meaning. Every one who acknowledges

32 NATURE OF THE CONFLICT WITH UNBELIEF.
the feeling of guilt to be a reahty and to represent
the truth, and every one who blames the conduct
of another, in the very act denies the Pantheistic
theory. Conscience must prove, in the long run,
stronger than any speculation, no matter how plausi
ble. In the soul itself, then, in its aspiration after
the hving God and its conviction of freedom and
of sin, there is erected an everlasting barrier against
the inroads of false philosophy, and one that will
be found to embrace within the shelter of its walls
the cause of Christianity itself.

ESSAY II.
THE GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
The Gospel that bears the name of John is one
of the main pillars of historical Christianity. Chris
tianity would indeed remain were the apostolic author-
, ship and the credibility of this Gospel disproved ; for
before it was written, Jesus and the resurrection had
been preached by faithful witnesses over a large part
of the Roman world. Christianitv would remain ; but
our conception of Christianity and of Christ would be-
materially altered. The profoundest minds in the>
Church, from Clement of Alexandria to Luther, and!
from Luther to Niebuhr, have expressed their sense of
the singular charm and surpassing value of this Gospel..
,In recent times, however, the genuineness of the fourth
Gospel has been impugned. It was denied to be the
work of John by individual skeptics at the close of the
last century; but their attack was not of a nature
either to excite or to merit much attention. Not until
Bretschneider published (in 1820) his Probabilia did
the question become the subject of serious discussion.
But the assault which has been renewed by the critics
of the . Tubingen school, with Baur at their, head, has
more lately given rise to a most earnest; and important

34 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
controversy. The rejection of John's Gospel by these
critics is a part of their attempted reconstruction of
early Christian history. Starting with the assertion of
a radical difference and hostility between the Jewish
and the Gentile types of Christianity, — between the
party of the Church that adhered to Peter and the
original disciples, and the party that adhered to Paul
and his doctrine, — they ascribe several books of the
New Testament to the effort, made at a later day, to
bridge over this gulf. The Acts of the Apostles pro
ceeds from this motive, and is a designed distortion
and misrepresentation of events connected with the
conflict about the rights of the Gentile converts. And
the fourth Gospel is a product of the same pacifying
tendency. It was written, they say, about the middle
of the second century, by a Christian of Gentile birth,
who assumed the name of John in order to give an
apostolic sanction to his higher theological platform, in
which love takes the place of faith, and the Jewish
system is shown to be fulfilled, and so abohshed, by
the offering of Christ, the true paschal Lamb. We
hold that the fundamental proposition, which affirms a
radical hostility between Pauline and Petrine Chris
tianity, can be proved to be false, even by the docu
ments which are acknowledged by the Tubingen school
to be genuine and trustworthy; and that the super
structure which is reared upon this foundation can be
proved, in all its main timbers, to be equally unsub
stantial. In the present Essay, however, we shall take

PLAN OF THE ESSAY. 35
up the single subject of the authorship of the fourth
Gospel, and shall make it a part of our plan to refute
the arguments which are brought forward by the skep
tical critics on this question — the most important
critical question connected with the New Testament
canon. But while we propose fairly to consider these
arguments, we have no doubt that the attack upon the
genuineness of John has its root in a determined
unwillingness to admit the historical reality of the
miracles which that Gospel records. This feeling,
which sways the mind of the critics of whom we
speak, is the ultimate and real ground of their refusal
to beheve that this narrative proceeds from an eyewit
ness of the hfe of Jesus. And were there nothing in
Christianity to remove this natural incredulity, "and to
overturn the presumption against the occurrence of
miracles, the ground taken by the Tubingen critics in
reference to this question might be reasonable. It is
right to observe that* behind aU their reasoning there
lies this deep-seated, and, in our opinion, unwarrantable
prejudice. We have recorded below the titles of some of the
more recent defences of the Johannean authorship : 1
Bleek's Introduction, in which the author discusses
1 Bleek's Einleitung in das If. T., 1862, and Beitrage zur Evan-
gelien-Kritik, 1846. Meyer's Kom. &ber das Evang. des Johannes, 3s
A., 1856. De Wette's Kom. uber das Evang. des Johannes, 4" ed.
(edited by Bruckner), 1852. Schneider's Aechtheit des Johann.
Evang., 1854. Mayer's Aechtheit des Evang. nach Johann., 1854.
Ebrard's Wissenchaftl. Kritik der Evangel. Geschichte, 2° A., 1850, pp.

36 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
the question at length, with his wonted clearness and
golden candor, and his Contributions to the Criticism of
the Gospels, in which some important points are treated
more fully ; Meyer's Introduction to his Commentary
on John, which contains a brief, condensed exhibition
of the principal points of argument; Bruckner's
edition of De Wette's Commentary on John, in which
the later editor has presented the internal proofs with
much force, and has noticed in detail the interpretations
of Baur ; Schneider's little tract, which handles with
ability certain parts of the external evidence, but falls
far short of being a complete view ; Ewald's Essays,
which contribute fresh and original thoughts upon the
subject, but are not without faults in opinion as well as
temper ; Ebrard's Critical Examination of the Evangeli
cal History, which, notwithstanding an occasional flip
pancy of style and tendency to overstatement, contains
many valuable suggestions ; and Mayer's copious
treatise, in which the external testimonies are ably con
sidered, though too much in the temper of a contro-

828-952. Ewald's Jahrb., III. s. 146 seq., V. s. 178 seq., X. s. 83 seq.
— The following are among the most important Essays in opposition
to the Genuineness of John : Baur, Kritische Untersuchungen uber
die Kanon. Evangelien (1847), and Die Johanneisehe Frage u. ihre
neuesten Beantwortungen, in Baur and Zeller's Theologische Jahrhu-
clier, 1854, pp. 196-287; Zeller, Dieaussern Zeugnisse uber das Daseyn
und den Ursprung des iiierten Eoangeliums, in his Theol. Jahrb. 1845,
pp. 579-656, comp. 1847, pp. 136-174; ffilgenfeld, Die Evangelien n,
s. w. (1854) ; Strauss, Das Leben Jesu fur das deutsche Volk (1864),
p. 62 seq.

RESIDENCE OF JOHN AT EPHESUS. 37
versialist, and with occasional passages not adapted to
convince any save members of the Roman Catholic
church, of which the author is one. We intend to
present our readers with a summary of the arguments,
most of which are touched upon in one or another of
these writers ; although we lay claim at least to
independence in weighing, verifying, and combining
the various considerations which we have to bring
forward. That the apostle John spent the latter part of his
life in Proconsular Asia, in particular at Ephesus, is a
fact fully estabhshed by trustworthy testimony of
ancient ecclesiastical writers. At the conference of
Paul with the other apostles in Jerusalem (Gal. ii. 1
seq. ; Acts xv.), which occurred about twenty years
after the death of Christ, John is mentioned, in con
nection with Peter and James,' as one of the pillars of
the Jerusalem church. Whether he was in Jerusalem
on the occasion of Paul's last visit, we are not informed.
It is in the highest degree probable that John's resi
dence at Ephesus began after the period of Paul's
activity there, and either after or not long before the
destruction of Jerusalem. Among the witnessesTto the
fact of his living at EphesusYin the latter part of the
second centuryiPolycrates and Irenaeus are of especial
importance, rolycrates was himself a bishop of
Ephesus near the end of the second century, who had
become a Christian as early as a. d. 131, and seven

38 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
of whose kinsmen had previously been bishops oi
presbyters. In his letter to Victor, he expressly says
that John died and was buried at Ephesus.1 Irenaeus,
who was born in Asia, says of the old presbyters,
immediate disciples of the apostles, whom he had
known, that they had been personally conversant with
John, and that he had remained among them up to the.
times of Trajan (whose reign was from the year 98 to
117). Some of them, he says, had not only seen John,
but other apostles also.2 Whether the ancient stories
be true or not, of his fleeing from the bath on seeing
there the heretic Cerinthus, of his recovering the young
man who joined a company of robbers, or the more
probable story, found in Jerome, of his being carried
in his old age into the Christian assemblies, to which
he addressed the simple exhortation : " Love one
another," they show a general knowledge of the fact
of his residing at Ephesus, and of his living to ail
extreme old age.3 His Gospel, also, according to the
testimony of Irenaeus, Clement, and others, and the
general belief, was the last written of the four, and the
tradition places its composition near the close of his
life. 1 Euseb., Lib. Y. c. 24 ; cf. Lib. III. c. 31.
2 Adv. Eaer., Lib. II. c. 22, al. 39. § 5.
" Iren. adv. Eaer., Lib. III. c. 3. §4. (Euseb., Lib. IV. c. 14)—
Olem. Alex., Quis dives salvetur, o. 42. (Euseb., Lib. III. o. 23.) 
Hieron. in Ep. ad Galat. VI. 10.

the external evidence. 39
The External Evidence.
Mayer begins his argument by an appeal to Jerome
and Eusebius ; the one writing in the later, and the
other in the early, part of the fourth century ; both
having in their hands the hterature of the Church
before them ; both diligent in their researches and
inquiries ; both knowing how to discriminate between
books which had been received without contradiction,
and those whose authority had either been disputed or
might fairly be questioned ; and yet neither having any
knowledge or suspicion that the fourth Gospel was not
known to the writers of the first half of the second
century, with whom they were familiar. This appeal
is not without force ; but instead of dwelling on the in
ference which it appears to warrant, we choose to begin
with the unquestioned fact of the universal reception
of the fourth Gospel as genuine in the last quarter of
the second century. At that time we find that it is
held in every part of Christendom to be the work of
the Apostle John. The prominent witnesses are Tertul
lian in ' North Africa, Clement in Alexandria, and
Irenaeus in Gaul. Though the date of Tertullian's
birth is uncertain, a considerable portion of his life
fell within the second century, and his book against
Marcion, from which his fuUest testimony is drawn, was
composed in 207 or 208. His language proves the
universal reception of our four Gospels, and of John
among them. These together, and these exclusively,

40 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
were considered the authentic histories of the life of
Christ, being composed either by apostles themselves
or by their companions.1 The testimony of Clement
is the more important from his scholarly character and
his wide acquaintance with the Church. He became
the head of the Catechetical school at Alexandria about
the year 190. Having been previously a pupil of
various philosophers, he had in his mature years sought
instruction from Christian teachers in Greece, in Lower
Italy, in Syria, in Palestine, as well as in Egypt ; and
his works which remain prove his extensive learning.
Not only is the genuineness of the fourth Gospel an
undisputed fact with Clement, but, not to speak of
other testimony from him, he gave in his lost work,
the Institutions, quoted by Eusebius, "a tradition
concerning the order of the Gospels which he had
received from presbyters of more ancient times ; " that
is, concerning the chronological order of their composi
tion.2 But of these three witnesses, Irenaeus, from the
circumstances of his life as well as the peculiar charac-
1 Adv. Marcion., Lib. IV. c. 2 ; also c. 5. He says in this last
place : " In summa, si constat id verius quod prius, id prius quod et
ab initio, id ab initio quod ab apostolis ; pariter utique constahit, id
esse ab apostolis traditum, quod apud ecclesias apostolorum fuerit
sacrosanctum." Then shortly after : " eadem auctoritas ecclesiarum
apostolicarum caeteris quoque patrocinabitur evangeliis, quae proinde
per illas, et secundum illas habemus : " here follows the enumeration
of the four. It is historical evidence — the knowledge possessed by
the churches founded by the apostles, — on which Tertullian builds.
2 Euseb., Lib. VI. c. 14. That the four Gospels alone were re
garded as possessed of canonical authority is evident from other

THE EXTERNAL EVIDENCE : IRENAEUS. 41
ter of his testimony, is the most important. A Greek,
born in Asia Minor about the year 140, coming to
Lyons and holding there first the office of presbyter,,
and then, in 178, that of bishop, he was familiar with
the Church in both the East and the West. Moreover,
he had in his youth known and conversed with the
aged Polycarp of Smyrna, the immediate disciple of
John, and retained a vivid recollection of the person
and the words of this remarkable man. Now Irenaeus
not only testifies to the universal acceptance in the
Church of the fourth Gospel, but also argues fancifully
that there must be four and only four Gospels to stand
as pillars of the truth ; thus showing how firmly set
tled was his faith, and that of others, in the exclusive
authority of the canonical Gospels.1 To the value of
places.in Clement. In reference to an alleged conversation between
Salome and Jesus, Clement says: "We have not this saying in the
four Gospels which have been handed down to us, but in that according
to the Egyptians, — iv to'is irapaSeSofiivois rffiiv TerTapaiv evayyikiois ovk
c^ofitv to pryrov, a\\' iv rw Kar* AlyvTrrlovs. Strom., Lib. III. C. 13.
(See Lardner, Vol. II. pp. 236 and 251).
1 Adv. Baer., Lib. III. c 1. § 1. This noted passage on the four
Gospels thus begins : " Non enim per alios dispositionem salutis nos
trae cognovimus, quam per eos, per quos evangelium pervenit ad nos ;
quod quidem tunc praeconaverunt, postea vero per Dei voluntatem in
scripturis nobis tradiderunt, fundamentum et columnam fidei nostrae
futurum." Like Tertullian, he makes his appeal to sure historical
evidence. In speaking of Polycarp and the men who followed him,
he says of the former (III. 3. 4) : " qui vir multo majoris auctoritatis
et fidelior veritatis est testis, quam Valentinus et Marcion et reliqui,
qui sunt perversae sententiae." The curious attempt to show that
there could not be more or fewer than four authoritative Gospels is in
Lib. III. c. 11. § 8.

42 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
his testimony we shall have occasion again to refer.
We simply ask here if it was possible for Irenaeus to
express himself in this way — to affirm not merely the
genuineness of the four Gospels, but the metaphysical
necessity that there should be four — if John's Gospel
had been made known for the first time during his
lifetime, or shortly before. With these noteworthy
witnesses, we associate the great name of Origen, the
successor of Clement at Alexandria, although Origen's
theological career is later, terminating near the middle
of the third century, he having been born but fifteen
years before the end of the second ; for his extensive
journeys through the Eastern Church, and as far as
Rome, and especially his critical curiosity and erudition,
| together with the fact that he was born of Christian
parents, give extraordinary weight to the evidence he
affords of the universal reception of John's Gospel. I
In the same category with Irenaeus, Clement, and
Tertullian, belong the Canon of Muratori, or the list
of canonical books which Muratori found in an old
manuscript in the Milan library, and which is certainly
not later than the end of the second century; and
the ancient Syriac version of the New Testament,
the Peshito, having a like antiquity. In both these
monuments the Gospel of John is found in its proper
place. Nor should we omit to mention here Polyc
rates, the bishop of Ephesus, who, as we have said,
represented the Asia Minor churches in the controversy
concerning the celebration of Easter in the year 196,

THE EXTERNAL EVIDENCE. 43
and in his letter to Victor, the Roman bishop, alludes
to John, who, he says, "leaned upon the Lord's
breast," 6 exl to Grrj&og tov xvq'iov dvansooiv^
Even Hilgenfeld, one of the most forward of tht
Tubingen critics, does not longer deny that the expres
sion is drawn by Polycrates from John xiii. 25 (xxi.
20). It proves the acceptance of John's Gospel by
the Christians of Asia Minor.
Looking about among the fragments of Christian
literature that have come down to us from the second
half of the second century, we meet with Tatian, sup
posed to have been a ptipil of Justin Martyr, though
after the master's death the disciple swerved from his
teaching. It is now conceded by Baur and Zeller that
in his apologetic treatise, the Oratio ad Graecos, com
posed not far from the year 170, he quotes repeatedly
from the Gospel of John.2 There is also no reason to
doubt that his work entitled Diatessaron — a sort of
exegetical Harmony — was composed upon the basis of
our four Gospels. Eusebius says that Tatian " having
formed a certain body and collection of Gospels, I
know not how, has given this the title Diatessaron, that
is, the Gospel by the four, or the Gospel formed of the
four, which is in the possession of some even now." 3
1 Euseb., Lib. V. c. 24.
2 The following are examples, — Oratio, c. 13 : ko\ tovto tanv Spa
to ilprffiivov ' ^ ukotIo to 05s ov KaTa\au.(3dvei. C 19 : irdvra in avrov,
Kai xaPls avrov yiyovev nv8i ev. C 5 : o \6yos iv apx.7 ytvvrfieis. C. 4 :
vvcvpa 6 9eoV See Bleek, s. 229.
* Lib. IV. c. 29.

44 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
Precisely how the work was constructed from the
four Gospels, Eusebius appears not to have known.
He testifies, however, to the fact of its being in the
hands of catholic Christians. At the beginning of the
fifth century Theodoret tells us that he had found
two hundred copies of Tatian's work in circulation, and
had taken them away, substitutmg for them the four
Gospels.1 A Syriac translation of this work began,
according to a later Syrian writer, Bar Salibi, with the
opening words of the Gospel of John : " In the begin
ning was the Word." To this Syriac edition, Ephraem
Syrus, who died in 378, wrote a commentary, as Syriac
writers inform us ; and this translation must therefore
have been early made. The attempt of Credner to
invalidate this evidence on the ground that the Syrians
confounded Tatian with Ammonius, the author of a
Harmony in the early part of the third century, is
overthrown by the fact that Bar Salibi distinguishes
the two authors and their works.2 Considering all the
evidence in the case, together with the fact that Tatian
is known to have quoted the Gospel of John in his
Oratio, there is no room for doubting that this Gospel
was one of the four at the foundation of the Diatessa
ron. Contemporary with Tatian was Theophilus, who
became bishop of Antioch in 169. In his work Ad
Autolycum, he describes John's Gospel as a part of the
Holy Scriptures, and John himseK as a writer guided
1 Theodoret, Haeret. Fab., I. 20, as cited by Bleek, s. 230.
1 See Meyer's Einl, s. 9. Lardner, Vol. n. p. 445. Bleek, s.230.

THE EXTERNAL EVIDENCE. 45
by the Holy Spirit.1 This explicit statement is a most
weighty item of evidence. In addition to this, Jerome
states that Theophilus composed a commentary upon
the Gospels, in which he handled their contents synop-
tically -. " quatuor evangehstarum in unum opus dicta
compingens." 2 There is no good reason for questioning
the statement of Jerome respecting a work with which
he appears to have been himself acquainted. A contem
porary of Theophilus is Athenagoras. His acquaint
ance with the Prologue of John's Gospel may be
inferred with a high degree of probability from his
frequent designation of Christ as the Word. " Through
him," he says, " all things were made, the Father and
Son being one ; and the Son being in the Father, and
the Father in the Son ;" 3 — language obviously founded
on John i. 3; x. 30, 38; xiv. 11. Another contem
porary of Theophilus, Apollinaris, bishop of Hierapolis
in Phrygia, in a fragment found in the Paschal
Chronicle, makes a reference to the pouring out of
water and blood from the side of Jesus (John xix. 34),
and in another passage clearly implies the existence
and authority of the fourth Gospel.4 The Epistle of
the churches of Vienne and Lyons, written in 177,
1 ' OZev SMaKovaiv fjfias al ayiai ypaipal Kal jrdcres ol irvevparoipopoi,
i£ &v 'l<oawr]s \iyei' iv ap^g, k.t.X., quoting John i. 1, 3 (Lib. II.
c. 22). 2 Hieron. de viris ill., 25, and Ep., 151. Bleek, s. 230.
8 Suppl. pro Christianis, c. 10.
4 Chron. Pasch., pp. 13, 14, ed. Dindorf, or Bouth's Beliq. Sacrae,
I. 160, 161, 2d edit. See Meyer's Einl., s. 9. There appears to be nc

46 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
and presenting an account of the sufferings of their
martyrs in their great persecution under Marcus
Aurelius, an epistle from which Eusebius gives copious
extracts,1 contains a clear reference to John xvi. 2, in
the passage where they say : " Then was fulfilled that
which was spoken by our Lord, that the time will come
when whosoever killeth you will think that he doeth
God service." The same epistle, applying the thought
of 1 John iii. 16 (comp. John xv. 12, 13), praises the
love of one of their martyrs who "was willing in
defense of the brethren to lay down his own life." 2
But every testimony to the first epistle is, for reasons
to which we shall advert hereafter, virtuaUy a testimony
for the Gospel.
We go back now to the first half of the second
century, and among the remnants of early Christian
literature which remain, where so much has irrecover
ably perished, the writer who is most entitled to con
sideration is Justin Martyr. He was born about the
year 89, and his life extended at least ten years beyond
the middle of the next century. A native of Flavia
Neapolis, near the ancient Sichem, he had visited vari
ous countries, having been at Alexandria and Ephesus
before he came to Rome. He had, therefore, an exten
sive acquaintance with the Church. It is well known
sufficient reason for questioning the genuineness of these fragments,
as is done by Lardner (Vol. II. p. 315), and Neander {Church Hist.,
Vol. I. p. 298, N. 2). See Schneider, s. 52.
1 Euseb., Lib.V. cl.
2 Epist.Eccl.Vien. etLugd., cc. 3,4. Bouth. Beliq. Sacrae, I. 298, 300.

THE EXTERNAL EVIDENCE : JUSTIN. 47
that Justin in different places refers to works which
are styled by him the Records or Memoirs by the
Apostles and their Followers or Companions, and which,
as he observes, " are called . Gospels." 1 He quotes
from these as the authentic and recognized sources of
knowledge respecting the Saviour's life and teaching.
He further states that they are read on Sundays in the
Christian assemblies, where " all who live in cities or in
country districts " meet together for worship. They
are read, he says, in connection with the writings of the
Old Testament prophets : and when the reader con
cludes, the people are instructed and exhorted " to the
imitation of these excellent things." 2 The evangelical
histories which he has in mind, then, were used in the
public worship of Christians everywhere. What were
these Records or Memoirs? This title, we may
observe, was probably given to the gospel histories,
partly for the reason that in Justin's view they bore a
character analogous to Xenophon's Memorabilia of
Socrates, and also because it was a designation inteUi
gible to those for whose benefit he was writing. Of the
1 ra. dirop.vriu.ovevp.aTa tuv drroaToKav. Apol., I. c. 67. diropvrjpovci-
p.aai, & <prjpi vrto rfiiv aTtoaroKav avrov Kat rav eKelvois mapaKoXov'ZSTjo-dv-
Ttnv erui/rtrd^Sat. Dial. 0. Tryph., C 103. of yap dVoaroXot iv tois
yevopivots vir avraiv aTropvTjpovevpaaiv, a KaXeirai evayyi\ia, ovrtos
napiSaKav. Apol., I. c. 66. Justin twice uses the term to eiuyy/Xioj/,
as the later fathers often do, to denote the Gospels collectively.
(Dial. c. Tryph., cc. 10, 100.) This designation implies that the Gos
pels to which he refers — the collection of Gospels — wore possessed of
an established authority.
2 Apol, I. c. 67.

48 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
direct citations from these Gospel Memoirs in Justin,
and of the numerous allusions to sayings of Christ and
events in his life, nearly all plainly correspond to pas
sages in our canonical Gospels. That the quotations
are inexact as to phraseology, is not a peculiarity of
Justin. He probably quotes from memory ; and for
his purpose it was not requisite that he- should be
verbally accurate.
Before we proceed to speak of his use of John in
particular, we wiU advert to the question which has
been warmly discussed, whether he quotes from other
gospel histories than those in our canon. Considering
that the cases of an allusion to sayings or transactions
not recorded in the canonical Gospels, are so very few,
and that of these not one is explicitly referred by
Justin to the Memoirs,1 it is not at aU improbable
that the source of his knowledge in these exceptional
cases was oral tradition. Living so near the time of
the apostles, when, as we know, some unrecorded say
ings of Christ and circumstances in his life were orally
reported from one to another, this supposition is by
no means unnatural. Yet as written narratives, be
sides the four of our canon, were extant, and had
a local circulation — especiaUy the Gospel of the He-
1 Such a reference to the Memoirs has been supposed in Dial.c.
Tryph., c. 103 (p. 352 ed. Otto), but erroneously. Nor is there a ref
erence to the Memoirs in Dial c. Tryph., c. 88 (p. 306 ed. of Otto),
where i'ypayjrav ol an-oV-roXoi avrov refers grammatically only to the last
part of the sentence. There is no citation by Justin from the
Memoirs, which is not found in the canonical Gospels.

THE EXTERNAL EVIDENCE : JUSTIN. 49
brews among the Ebionite Christians — Justin may
have been acquainted with one or more of these,
and thence derived the exceptional passages which
we are considering. That either of these, however,
was generaUy read in the churches (as were the
Memoirs of which Justin speaks) is extremely im
probable ; for how could any Gospel which had been
thus made famihar and dear to a multitude of Chris
tians by being read in their assembhes, be suddenly
thrown out and discarded without an audible word of
opposition? How can such an hypothesis stand in
view of the fact that by the time Justin died Irenaeus
had already reached his manhood ? It is clearly es
tablished that Justin had in view the same Gospels
which we read in our Bibles, although, as we have
said, he may have been acquainted with other less
trustworthy narratives of the life of Christ.1 If we
suppose, as there is no necessity for doing, that he de
rived a few facts or sayings from such a source, it by
¦ no means follows that he put these writings on a level
with the authoritative Memoirs — the. ccTtof^vrjfiovsv-
juutcc. Be it observed, that in the multitude of his
* That by the dnopvr]povevpiara Justin had in mind solely the four
Gospels, is earnestly maintained by Semisch, and by Professor Norton
in his very able work on the Genuineness of the Gospels. Bleek
holds that he had these mainly, if not exclusively, in view. Ewald,
without any just reason, thinks that because the records are said to
emanate from the apostles and their followers, he had reference t(
many such writings, which were in his hands. Jahrb. d. Bibl WU",
VI. 60. 4

50 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
aUusions to the evangelical history, those which
cannot be distinctly traced to the canonical Gospels
do not exceed six in number.
The evidence that the fourth Gospel formed one
of Justin's authoritative Records or Memoirs cannot
be gainsaid. In a long hst of passages coUected from
Justin by Semisch and other writers, there is a
marked resemblance in language and thought to
places in the fourth Gospel.1 In regard to many
of these, to be sure, we are not absolutely, obliged to
trace them to this source. They may have been
derived from unwritten tradition. But wre are author
ized to find the origin of this class of expressions in
John, when we have assured ourselves, from other
passages which admit of no doubt, that Justin made
use of the fourth Gospel. And from this conviction
there is no escape. We mention here only one, but
perhaps the most obvious and striking, of the special
quotations which Justin has drawn from this Gospel.
Having described with some detaU the method of
Christian baptism, Justin adds ; " For indeed Christ
also said: 'except ye be born again, ye shaU not
enter into the kingdom of heaven.' And that it is
impossible for those who are once born to enter into
their mother's womb, is plain to all."2 Here is a
1 The work of Semisch to which we refer— Die Denkwurdig-
Tceiten des M&rtyrers Justinus — is a thorough examination of the ques
tion: What Gospels were made use of by Justin?
3 Apol., I. C. 61 : Km yap 6 xpiorot erne v • *Av py dvayevvnSrJTf, ov mrj
eio-eXSi/re eis ttjv fiaoCkeiav t&v oipavav. "On fie Kai abivarov its ras

THE EXTERNAL EVIDENCE : JUSTIN. 51
passage so peculiar, so characteristic of John's Gospel,
that we are precluded from attributing it to any other
source. Is it credible that Justin drew this passage
from some other gospel, which suddenly perished and
was supplanted by that bearing the name of John ?
Writers of the Tubingen school have suggested that
this, as well as other passages seeming to be from
John, were taken by Justin from the Gospel of the
Hebrews. Aside from the entire absence of proof in
support of this assertion, aU the information we have
concerning the Gospel of the Hebrews warrants the
declaration that it contained no such passages. The
Gospel of the Hebrews bore a great resemblance
in its contents to our Gospel of Matthew. It was the
product of a translation and mutilation of our Greek
Matthew. There is much to be said in favor of the
opinion, for which Bleek argues, that the known fact
of its resemblance to Matthew first gave rise to the
impression that Matthew originally wrote his Gospel
in the Hebrew tongue.1
pjjrpas tS>v tckovcSiv tovs aira£ yevvapivovs ipftijvat, (jyavepuv itdaiv tori.
There is no reasonable doubt that the quotation in Dial. c. Tryph., c.
88, ovk tipl 6 xpto-Tos, iya> cbavr/ j3owj/ror, is from John i. 20, 23 : ovk
elpl e'yo> 6 \piar6s .... iyit (pavfj fioStVTos iv rfj iprjpa.
1 The occurrence of this passage relative to regeneration in the
Pseudo-Clementine Homilies (Horn. xi. 26), with the same deviations
from John that are found in Justin's quotation, was made an argument
to prove that both writers must have taken it from some other Gospel
— the Gospel of the Hebrews. But the additions to the passage in the
Homilies, and the omission of the part concerning the impossibility
of a second physical birth, — points of difference between Justin and

52 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
The fact of Justin's acquaintance with John's
Gospel, however, does not rest solely upon the evi
dence afforded by the citation of isolated passages.

the Homilies, — are quite as marked as the points of resemblance,
which may be an accidental coincidence. The deviations in Justin's
citation from the original in John are easily explained. They are
chiefly due to the confusion of the phraseology of this passage with !
that of John iii. 5 and Matt, xviii. 3, — than which nothing was more
natural. Similar inaccuracies, and from a similar cause, in quoting
John iii. 3, are not uncommon noiv. That Justin uses the compound
verb dvayewda, is because he had found occasion to use the same
verb just before in the context, and because this had become the cur
rent term to designate regeneration.
Baur in one place adduces John iii. 4 as an instance of the ficti
tious ascription to the Jews, on the part of the author of this Gospel,
of incredible misunderstandings of the words of Jesus. If this be so,
surely Justin must be indebted to John for the passage. Anxious to
avoid this conclusion, and apparently forgetting what he had said
before, Baur, in another passage qf the same worh affirms that this
same expression is borrowed alike by the author of John and by
Justin from the Gospel of the Hebrews ! See Baur's Kanonische
Evangelien, pp. 290, 300, compared with pp. 352, 353. There were
two or three other citations, however, inthe Homilies, in which it was
claimed that the same deviations are found as in corresponding cita
tions in Justin. But if this circumstance lent any plausibility to the
pretence that these passages in Justin were drawn from some other
document than the canonical John, this plausibility vanishes and the
question is set at rest by the publication of Dressers ed. of the
Homilies. This edition gives the concluding portion, not found in
Cotelerius, and we are thus furnished (Horn. xix. 22, comp. John ix.
2, 3) with an undenied and undeniable quotation from, John. This
makes it evident that Horn. iii. 52 is a citation of John x. 9, 27, and
also removes all doubt as to the source whence the quotation of
John iii. 3 was derived. The similarity of the Homilies to Justin, in
the few quotations referred to above, is probably accidental ; if not, it

EXTERNAL EVIDENCE: JUSTIN. 53
In his doctrine of the Logos and of the Incarnation,
and in the terms under which the person of the
Saviour is characterized, are indubitable marks of a
familiarity with John. This peculiar type of thought
and expression pervades the whole theology of Justin.
We can hardly doubt that it was derived by him from
an authoritative source. In one passage, Justin di
rectly attributes the truth of the Incarnation, " that
Christ became man by the Virgin," to the Memoirs.1
Are we to believe that this whole Johannean type of
doctrine was found in some unknown Gospel, which
in Justin's day was read in the Christian congregations
in city and country, but was suddenly displaced by
another Gospel having just the same doctrinal peculi
arity; a change which, if it took place at all, must
have occurred in the later years of Justin's life, and in
the youth of Irenaeus? And yet Irenaeus knew
nothing of it, had no suspicion that the fourth Gos-
' simply proves that Justin was in the hands of their author. This may
easily be supposed. The date of the Homilies is in the neighbor
hood of 170. See on these points Meyer's Einl, s. 10. Bleek,.s. 228.
Semisch, 193 seq.
1 Dial. e. Tryph., o. 105; The explicit reference to the Memoirs is
grammatically connected only with the Clause which we have cited
above, and not with the entire sentence, as has been frequently sup
posed. Tet, it is scarcely doubtful that the whole conception of
Christ, of which this clause was a part, was derived from the same
source. "For I have proved," says Justin, " that he [Christ] was the
only-begotten of the Father of all things, being properly begotten
by Him as his Word and Power," — here follows the clause, with the
reference to the Memoirs, which is quoted above.

54 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
pel had any author but John, or that the fixed and
sacred number four was made up by so recent an
intruder !
The value of this testimony of Justin is evinced
by the various and incongruous hypotheses which have
been resorted to, for the purpose of undermining it.1
But all now admit (what ought never to have been
disputed) that under the name of Memoirs he refers to
no single Gospel exclusively, but to a number of
Gospels. It is admitted, also, that among them were
the Gospels of Matthew, Mark, and Luke. But the
Memoirs were by " Apostles and their Companions."
Besides Matthew, Justin's coUection must necessarily
have embraced one other apostle. Whose work was
this but that of John? No other work which
pretended to emanate from an apostle can supply the
vacant place. No evidence which is worth considera
tion points to any other; no other ever had the
c-arrency which Justin ascribes to the documents to
1 We have not thought it necessary to refute Hilgenfeld's hypo
thesis,, that one of Justin's principal authorities was the apocryphal
Gospel of Peter. (See Hilgenfeld, Die Evangelien Justiris, 1850, s.
259 seq.) This Gospel Hilgenfeld assumes to have been the basis of
the canonical Gospel of Mark, — a groundless assumption, resting
upon a misinterpretation of Papias, who refers to the canonical
Gospel itself, and not to any unknown work out of which this
Gospel is thought to have grown. The idea that the Gospel of
Peter, a book so insignificant and so little known in the early church,
was one of the authoritative documents of Justin 1 The proofs
which Hilgenfeld adduces, are, in our judgment, far-fetched and des
titute of force.

EXTERNAL EVIDENCE : JUSTIN. 55
which he refers. When we find in Justin, therefore,
the same designation of the authors bf his Gospels, —
"Apostles and their Companions," — which Irenaeus
and TertuUian use to denote the four canonical
writers,' how can we resist the conviction that these
are the writers to whom he, as weU as they, refer ?
" The manner," says Norton, " in which Justin speaks
of the character and authority of the books to which
he appeals, proves these books to have been the
Gospels. They carried with them the authority of the
Apostles. They were those writings froJ^which he
and other Christians derived their knowledge of the
history and doctrines of Christ. They were wdmpft
upon by him as primary and decisive evidence in his
explanations of the character. of Christianity. They
were regarded as sacred books. They were read in
the assemblies of Christians on the Lord's Day, in
connection with the Prophets of the ©Id Testament.
Let us now consider the maimer in which the Gos
pels were regarded by the contemporaries of Justin.
Irenaeus was in the vigor of life before Justin's death;
and the same was true of many thousands of Chris
tians living when Irenaeus wrote. But he teUs us
that the four Gospels are the four pillars of the
church, the foundation of Christian faith, written by
those who had first oraUy preached the gospel, by
two apostles and two companions of apostles. It
is incredible that Irenaeus and Justin should have
spoken of different books." When "we find Ire-

56 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
naeus, the contemporary ,of Justin, ascribing the same
character, the same authority, and the same authors,
as are ascribed by Justin, to the Memoirs quoted by
him, which were caUed Gospels, there can be no rea
sonable doubt that the Memoirs of Justin were the'
Gospels of Irenaeus." 1
But we have testimonies to the genuineness of
the fourth Gospel prior even to Justin. The first of
these we have to mention is Papias, who flourished in
the first quarter of the second century. He wrote a
work in five books entitled " An Explication of the
Oracles of the Lord," in the composition of which he
depended mainly on unwritten traditions which he
gathered up in conversation with those who had heard
the apostles. Eusebius states that " he made use of
testimonies from the First Epistle of John." 2 That
this Epistle and the fourth Gospel are from the same
author, has been, it is true, called in question by
the Tubingen critics. But if internal evidence has
any weight, is ever entitled to any regard, we must
conclude, in agreement with the estabhshed, universal
opinion, that both these writings have a common
author. In style, in language, in spirit, in tone,
they have the closest resemblance ; and to ascribe this
resemblance in either case to the imitation of a coun
terfeiter, is to give him credit for an unequaUed

1 Gen. of the Gospels, Vol. I. pp. 237-239.
' Euseb., Lib. III. c. 39.

EXTERNAL EVIDENCE.

57

refinement of cunning.1 So that the testimony of
Papias to the first Epistle is likewise evidence of the
genuineness of the Gospel. The attempt is made,
indeed, to invahdate this testimony by the suggestion
that possibly Eusebius gives,, in this instance, simply
an inference of his own from passages in Papias
which that author himself may not have found
in John. But this suggestion rests upon no proof,
and has not, the force of a probabiUty, in view of the
explicit assertion of Eusebius. The Tubingen critics
make much of the circumstance that Papias is not
said by Eusebius to have made use of John's Gospel ;
but until we know what particular end Papias had in
view in his aUusions to New Testament books, this
sUence is of no weight. That he did acknowledge
the First Epistle of John, indicates that he also
knew and acknowledged the Gospel. Turning to the
Apostohc Fathers, we find not a few expressions,
especiaUy in the Ignatian Epistles, which remind us
of passages peculiar to John ; but in general we
cannot be certain that these expressions were not
drawn from oral tradition. Yet in some cases they
are much more naturally attributed to the fourth
Gospel, and in one instance this can hardly be
avoided. Polycarp, in his epistle to the Philippians,
says : " for every one who does not confess that Jesus
1 On the certainty that the first Epistle was written by the
author of the Gospel, see De Wette's Einl. in das N.. Testament.
§ 177 a.

58 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
Christ is come in the flesh is antichrist."1 The
resemblance of language to 1 John iv. 3 is striking ;
but a thought which in that form is so peculiar to
this canonical epistle, being, as it were, the core of
the type of doctrine which it presents, can hardly,
when found in Polycarp, an immediate pupfl of John,
be referred to any other author.2 Another and stiU
earher testimony is attached to the fourth Gospel
itself (John xxi. 24). This passage purports to come
from another hand than that of the author, of whom
it says : " we know that his testimony is true." It
has been attached to the Gospel, as far as we are able
to determine, from the time when it was first put
in circulation. If it be not part and parcel of a
flagrant imposition, it proves the work to have been
written by the beloved disciple.
An important part of the external evidence for
the genuineness of the fourth Gospel, is the tacit
or express acknowledgment of the fact by the various
heretical parties of the second century. Significant,
in connection with this point, is the circumstance that
the Artemonites, the party of Unitarians who came
forward in Rome near the end of the second century,
did not think of disputing the apostolical origin
of that Gospel to which their opponents were indebted
for their strongest weapons. Had the fourth Gospel
1 rfj yap bs av ^ SpoXoyf, 'Iqo-ovv Xpio-rbv iv o-.apKi e'XijXuSe'j/oi
dvrixpioros e'o-n. Ad Phil. 7.
a Meyer's Einl, s. 5.

EXTERNAL EVIDENCE : MARCION. 59
first been heard of within the lifetime of the old men
theh living in the Roman church, we should look for
an attack from this Unitarian party, who did not lack
ability, upon its authority. But no doubt of this
kind was expressed. From the disputes which agi
tated the middle part of the century, however, the
argument we have to present is mainly derived. If
the fourth Gospel was acknowledged to be the work
of John by Marcion, the Valentinian Gnostics as
well as their opponents, and at the epoch of the
Montanistic controversy, the most skeptical must give
up the attempt to bring down into the second or
third quarter of the second century the date of its
authorship. We begin with Marcion. Marcion was a native of
Pontus, and came to Rome about the year 130. In
his enthusiastic and one-sided attachment to Paul's
doctrine, he exaggerated the contrast of law and
gospel into an, absolute repugnance and contrariety,
rejected the Old Testament, regarding the God of
the Old Testament as an inferior Divinity, hostile to
the Supreme Being, and consequently was led to make
up a canon of New Testament writings to suit
himself. His Gospel, as the church* Fathers testify,
was a mutilated copy of Luke, so altered as to answer
to his pecuhar tenets. The priority of our Luke
to Marcion's Gospel is now generaUy aUowed, even
by the Tubingen critics who had previously taken the
opposite ground. There is, indeed, no room for doubt

60 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
in reference to this fact. Not only is Marcion known
to have altered the Pauline. Epistles to conform them
to his opinions, but the fragments of his Gospel
which have been preserved, are plainly the product of
an alteration of corresponding passages in. our third
Gospel. But our present inquiry relates to John.
Was Marcion acquainted with the fourth Gospel?
The negative has been "stoutly, maintained by the.
school of Baur, in opposition, however, to decided
proof. We learn from Tertullian that Marcion re
jected John's Gospel — a fact which imphes its exist
ence and general reception ; and Tertullian explains
his motive in this procedure. Tertullian says : " But
Marcion having got the Epis.tle of Paul to the
Galatians, who blames the apostles themselves, as not
walking uprightly, according to the truth of the
gospel, and also charges some false apostles with per
verting the gospel of Christ, sets himself to weaken the
credit of those Gospels which are truly such, and are
published under the name of apostles,, or likewise of
apostolical men." 1 That is to say, conceiving, like the
1 Sed enim Marcion nactus epistolam Pauli ad Galatas, etiamipsos
apostolos suggillantis ut non recto pede incedentes ad veritatem
evangelii, simul et accusantis pseudapostolos quosdam pervertentes
evangelium Christi, connititur ad destruendum statum eorum evange-
liorum quae propria et sub apostolorum nomine eduntur, vel etiam
apostolicorum, ut scilicet fidem, quam illis adimit, suo conferat. Adv..
Marcion., Lib. IV. c. 3. This accounts for his not selecting John's
Gospel instead of Luke. His zeal for Paul, which was attended witb
hostility to the other Apostles, was his prime characteristic.

EXTERNAL EVIDENCE : MARCION. 61
modern school of Baur, that there was a hostUity
'between Peter, James, and John on the one hand,
and Paul on the other, and making himself a partisan
of Paul, he rejected everything that came from
them. Tertullian makes it clear that by "the Gos
pels published under the name of apostles or likewise
of apostolical men," he intends the fqur of our canon.1
Hence the Gospels which he says were rejected
by Marcion must be Matthew, Mark, and John.
Again, TertulUan, speaking of the adoption by Mar
cion of Luke's Gospel alone, says : " Now, since it is
known that these (Matthew, Mark, and John) have
also (as weU as Luke) been in the churches, why has
Marcion not laid hands on these also, to be corrected
if they were corrupt, or received if incorrupt ? " 2
Tertullian would convict Marcion of an inconsistency
in laying aside the other Gospels,8 not pretending
to purge them of fancied corruptions, and yet not
receiving them. Once more, in regard to a certain
opinion of Marcion, Tertullian says, addressing Mar
cion, that if he did not reject some and corrupt others
of the scriptures which contradict his opinion, the

1 Adv. Marcion., Lib .IV. c. 2. " Denique nobis fidem ex apostohs
Ioannes et Matthaeus insmuant, ex apostolicis Lucas et Marcus in-
staurant," etc.
2 Adv. Marcion., Lib. IV. c. 5. "Igitur dnm constet haec quoque
apud ecclesias fuisse, cur non haec quoque Marcion attigit aut emen-
danda, si adulterata, aut agnoscenda, si integra ?" etc.
" " Quod omissis eis Lucae potius institerit." Ibid.

62 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
Gospel of John would convict him of error.1 The
correctness of Tertullian in these statements has been
impeached, but he had taken pains to inform himself
concerning the life and opinions of Marcion, and there
is no good ground for charging him here with error.
His accuracy is confirmed by the explanation he gives
pf the origin of Marcion's hostUity to the apostles, as
proceeding from his wrong view of the passage in
Galatians. We must conclude, therefore, that when
Marcion brought forward his doctrine, the fourth
Gospel was extant, the acknowledged work of John.
The general reception of John as an apostohc
work preceded the Valentinian Gnosticism. Valen
tinus, the author of the most vast and complete of
all the fabrics of Gnostic speculation, came to Rome
about the year 140. That the Gospel of John was
admitted to be genuine, and used as such, by his
party, is well known. Irenaeus speaks of the Valen
tinians as making the most abundant use of John's
Gospel : eo quod est secundum Johannem plenissime
utentes.2 Heracleon, one of the foUowers of Valen
tinus, wrote a commentary upon John's Gospel, from
which Origen in his work upon John frequently

1 " Si scripturas opinioni tuae r«sistentes non de industria alias re-
iecisses, alias corrupisses, confudlsset te in hac specie evangelium
Ioannis," etc. De Came Christi, c. 3. For other passages to the same
effect from Irenaeus and Tertullian, see De Wette's Einl in d. N. T.
§ 72 c. Anm. d.
2 Ado. Eaer., Lib. HI. c. 11. § 7.

EXTERNAL EVIDENCE: VALENTINE. 63
quotes.1 Ptolemaeus, another foUower, expressly
designates the Prologue of John as the work of the
apostle, and puts his own forced explanation upon
its contents.2 The precise date of Heracleon and
Ptolemaeus we cannot determine, but they must
have written not far from the middle of the century.
But did Valentinus himself know and acknowledge
the fourth Gospel as the work of John? This we
might infer with great probabihty from its accept
ance by Heracleon and his other foUowers. We
should draw the same conclusion from the silence
of Irenaeus as to any rejection of John's Gospel by
Valentinus, and from his statement as to the use
of it by the school in general. Moreover, Tertullian
contrasts Valentinus and Marcion in this very partic
ular, that whereas the latter rejected the Scriptures,
the former built up his system upon perverse inter-

1 The passages in Heracleon referred to by Origen are collected
in Grabe's Spicilegium, Vol. IL, and in Stieren's ed. of Irenaeus, I.
938-971. 2 Epist. ad Floram, c. 1, ap. Epiph. Eaer., xxxiii. 3. See Grabe's
Spicilegium, II. 70, 2d ed., or Stieren's Irenaeus, I. 924.
The work which passes under the name of Excerpta Theodoti, or
Doctrina Orientalis, a compilation from the writings of Theodotus and
other Gnostics of the second century, contains numerous extracts from
one or more writers of the Valentinian school, in which the Gospel
of John is quoted and commented upon as the work of the apostle.
See particularly cc. 6, 7. These Excerpta are commonly printed with
the works of Clement of Alexandria ; they are also found in Fabri
cius, Bibl. Graeca, Vol. V., and in Bunsen's Analecta Ante-Nicaena,
Vol. I.

64 GENUINENESS OF THE TOURTH GOSPEL.
ppetation. Valentinus, he says, did not adjust the
Scriptures to his material — his doctrine— but his
material to the Scriptures.1 Marcion made havoc
of the Scriptures ; Valentinus autem pepercit. And
TertulUan says, directly, that Valentinus makes use
of the whole instrument, i. e. canonical Gospels.
Tertullian's phraseology has been sometimes errone
ously supposed to indicate doubt upon this point.
He has been translated as follows : " for if Valentinus
appears (videtur) to make use of the entire instrument
(i. e. our Scriptures), he has done violence to the
truth with a not less artful spirit than Marcion."2
Were this the exact sense of the passage, the videtur
might naturally be considered the concession of an
adversary, Tertullian not being able to charge his
opponent with the actual rejection of any of the
Gospels, however tempted by polemical feeling to
throw out such an imputation. But the term videri
is frequently used in the writings of Tertullian, not
in the sense of "seem," but "to be seen," "to be
fuUy apparent ; " and such we are persuaded is its
meaning in the present passage.3 But aside from
1 " Valentinus autem pepercit, quoniam non ad materiam scrip
turas excogitavit  auferens proprietates singulorum quoque
verborum." De Braescript. Eaeret., c. 38.
2 "Neque enim si Valentinus integro instrumento uti videtur,
non callidiore ingenio quam Marcion manus intulit veritati." De
Braescript., c. 38.
8 Comp. Tert. Adv. Brax., c. 26, 29 ; Adv. Marc, iv. 2 ; De Orat.,
o. 21 ; Apol, o. 19 ; Adv. Jud., c. 5, quoted from Is. i. 12.

EXTERNAL EVIDENCE: VALENTINE. 65
this evidence, we are furnished with direct proof of
the fact that Valentinus used and acknowledged
the Gospel of John, through the lately-found work of
Hippolytus. Hippolytus wrote the "Refutation of
all Heresies " in the earlier part- of the third century.
He devotes considerable space to the systems of
Valentinus and the Valentinians, which he traces to
the mathematical speculations of Pythagoras and
Plato. In the course of his discussion, referring to
Valentinus, he writes as follows: "All the prophets
and the law spoke from the demiurg, a foolish god,
he says— -fools, knowing nothing. On this account
it is, he (Valentinus) says, that the Saviour says :
' aU that came before me are thieves and robbers.' " 1
The passage is obviously taken from John x. 8..
The pretension of the Tubingen critics ' that the-
author here ascribes to the master what belongs toi
his pupils, is improbable ; since Hippolytus, while
coupling Valentinus and his foUowers together in
cases where their tenets agree, knows how carefuUy
to distinguish the different phases of belief in the'
schools. The peculiarities of the Italian Valentin
ians, Heracleon and Ptolemaeus, of the oriental:
Valentinians, Axionikus and Ardesianes, and the
special opinions of other individuals of the party,
are definitely characterized. We have in their dis
position of this case a specimen of the method ofi'

1 Hippolytus (Duncker and Schneidewin's ed.),,Lih..VL c. .35;
5

66 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
reasoning adopted by Baur and his foUowers. Hip
polytus, we are told, may have attributed to Valen
tinus what belongs only to his pupUs. Granted,
he may have done so. The supposition is possible.
But what is the evidence that in this instance he
did so? We are to assume that he is right untU
he is proved to be wrong. We are not arguing
about what is possible or impossible; but we are
discussing points where probable reasoning alone is
applicable. So, these critics tell us it is possible
that Polycarp quoted an anonymous sentence current
at the time, which is also taken up into the first
epistle bearing the name of John. It is possible
that this or that writer drew his passage from some
lost apocryphal work. The possibility we grant,
for in these matters demonstration is of course pre
cluded. But the suggestion of a mere possibUity
on the opposite side against a presumptive, natural,
and probable inference, cannot pass for argument.
When Ave look at the interior structure of the
system of Valentinus, we find that the characteristic
terms employed by John are wrought into it, some
of them being attached as names to the aeons which,
in a long series of pairs, constitute the celestial
hierarchy. Among these pairs are such as /xovoysvrjs
and dlrivrsca, Xoyog and £c«J. The artificial and
fantastic scheme of Valentinus, so in contrast with
the simplicity of John, wears the character of a
copy and caricature of the latter. That it has this

EXTERNAL EVIDENCE : BASILIDES. 67
relation to John we cannot, to be sure, demonstrate ;
for it may be contended that both the Gnostic and
the author of the fourth Gospel took up current
terms and conceptions, each writer applying then:
to suit his own purpose. But the freshness and
apparent originality of John's use of this language,
not to speak of the other proofs in the case, are
decidedly against this theory of Baur. When we
bring together all the items of evidence which bear
on the point, we feel warranted to conclude with
confidence that not only Ptolemaeus and the other
disciples of Valentinus, but also their master, alike
with his opponents, acknowledge the apostolic author
ship of the Gospel.1 Through Hippolytus we are
provided with another most important witness in the
person of BasUides, the other prominent Gnostic
leader, who taught at Alexandria in the second quar
ter of the second century. Among the proof-texts
which Hippolytus states that BasUides employed,
are John i. 9 : " This was the true light that lighteth
every man that cometh into the world ; " and John
ii. 4 : "My hour is not yet come."2 In the passage
in Hippolytus containing these quotations ascribed
to Basilides, and in the closest connection with them,
stand his essential principles and characteristic ex
pressions ; so that the suggestion of a confounding
of master and pupUs on the part of Hippolytus has
1 See Schneider, s. 35. 2 Hippol., Lib. VII. cc. 22, 27.

68 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
not the shadow of a support. In connection with
this piece of evidence, we may advert to the state
ment pf Agrippa Castor, a contemporary of BasUides,
that he wrote, "twenty -four books on the Gospel."1
It has been rendered highly probable that this denotes
a commentary on the four Gospels.2 The same
expression-r— " the Gospel " — it wiU be remembered,
is used by Justin Martyr, as weU as by the Fathers
subsequent to him, for the Gospels coUectively.
How widely extended was the knowledge and
use of the fourth Gospel among the heretics of the
second century, is further iUustrated by the numerous
quotations that were made from it by the Ophites
or Naasseni, and the Peratae, which are preserved
by Hippolytus.3 We have to touch upon one other movement in
the second century, the controversies connected with
Montanism. The main features of Montanism were
the ChUiasm, or expectation of the Saviour's miUennial
reign and speedy advent, and the prophecy or ecstatic
inspiration. In the mUlennial doctrine, as weU as
in the belief in the continued miraculous gifts of
the Spirit, there is a striking resemblance between
the Montanists and the followers of Edward Irving.
We cannot say how far Montanism professed to
found itself on John's Gospel, because we know not
1 Euseb., Lib. IV. c. 7.
2 See Norton's Gen. of the Gospels, Vol. HI. p 238.
8 Hippol, Lib. V. cc. 7, 8, 9, 12, 16, 17.

EXTERNAL EVIDENCE. 69
precisely when in the development of the sect the
claim to the presence of the Paraclete, in this form,
was set up. We allude to Montanism, therefore, to
speak of a certain party that opposed it. Irenaeus
speaks of some who, in their opposition to the re
cent effusions of the Divine Spirit upon men, do not
accept of the Gospel of John, "in which the Lord
promised that he would send the Paraclete, but at
the same time reject both the Gospel and the pro
phetic Spirit."1 Shortly before, he had spoken of
some who Would fain exhibit themselves in the
character of searchers for truth, possibly referring
to this same class. Epiphanius describes a class of
zealous opponents of Montanism, who were probably
the same mentioned by Irenaeus. Epiphanius styles
them Alogi, as opposing the Logos Gospel. They
maintained that the Gospel of John did not agree
with the other three Gospels, in regard to various
points in the hfe of Christ, — as in the omission of
the forty days' temptation, and in the number of
passovers he is said to have kept.2 Their opposition,
1 Irenaeus, Lib. III. 11. 9. Let the reader mark that this is the
only allusion to a rejection of the fourth Gospel, as not : by John,
which we find in any writer before the latter part of the fourth cen
tury. The party to which Irenaeus refers consisted probably of a
few eccentric individuals, who attracted no attention, and none of
whose names are preserved. Moreover, as we have remarked above,
any slight weight which their opposition could be conceived to have,
is neutralized by their equal opposition to the Apocalypse.
2 For a full explication of the character of the Alogi as they are de
scribed by Epiphanius and Irenaeus, see Schneider, s. 38 et seq.

70 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
however, is really an argument for the genuineness
of John. It shows the general acknowledgment of
this Gospel at the time when they made their opposi
tion, which was not long after the middle of the
second century. It proves that their opponents, the
Montanists, and the Church generally, received it.
Moreover, their groundless ascription of the Gospel
to Cerinthus is a valuable testimony from them to
its age; for Cerinthus was a contemporary of John.
Baur's unfounded praise of the critical spirit of this
insignificant party, is strange, considering that they
also rejected the Apocalypse, which he holds to be
the genuine work of John, and that they ascribed
both the Apocalypse and the Gospel to the same
author. It seems probable that the Alogi were led by
their strong hostility to the Montanistic enthusiasm to
dislike the fourth Gospel when Montanism claimed to
find a warrant for itself in the promise of the Spirit,
and on this doctrinal ground, making use also of the
apparent historical differences between the fourth Gos
pel and the other three, they rejected it. Precisely
what was the nature and reason of their opposition
to the doctrine of the Logos we know not ; but their
feehng on this subject accords with their rationalistic
turn of mind. The circumstances of their opposition,
as we see, are a strong indirect argument for the an
tiquity and genuineness of the Gospel they rejected.1
1 We are also entitled to cite Celsus as a witness to the fourth

EXTERNAL EVIDENCE. VI
Before we leave this topic — the use of the fourth
Gospel by the heretics — we ask our readers to con
sider the full weight of the argument that is founded
upon it. The great doctrinal battle of the Church
in the second century was with Gnosticism. The
struggle with this first heresy of a Gentile origin
had its beginnings early. The germs of it are dis
tinctly perceived in the Apostolic Age. At the
middle of the second century, the conflict with these
elaborate systems of error was raging. By Justin,
the Valentinians, the BasUideans, the Marcionites
(foUowers either of Marcus or of Marcion), and
other Gnostic sects, are denounced as warmly as by
Gospel. The date of Celsus is about the middle of the second cen
tury. He professed to derive his statements concerning the evan
gelical history from the writings of the disciples of Christ. The
great body of his statements are plainly founded on passages in our
canonical Gospels, especially in Matthew. But Celsus speaks of
Christ being called by his disciples the Word. He speaks of the
blood which flowed from the body of Jesus,- — a circumstance pecu
liar to John's narrative. He also says : " To the sepulchre of Jesus
there came two angels, as is said by some, or, as by others, one
only." Matthew and Mark mention one only, Luke and John two.
Again, Celsus gives the Christian narrative of the Resurrection as
containing the fact that Christ, " after he was dead, arose, and
showed the marks of his punishment, and how his hands had been
pierced." This circumstance is recorded only in John xx. 27. It is
indeed " possible," as Meyer suggests, that Celsus found these things
in apocryphal gospels, but the probability is the other way. Meyer
should not have so lightly valued the testimony afforded by Celsus.
These passages from Origen against Celsus may be. found in Lardner,
Vol. VII. pp. 220, 221 and 239. To the testimony of the Clementine
Homilies we have before adverted.

72 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
Irenaeus and his contemporaries.1 And by both
of the parties in this wide-spread conflict, by the
Gnostics and the church theologians, the fourth
Gospel is accepted as the work of. John, without a
hsp of opposition or of doubt. If the fourth Gospel
originated as the Tubingen school pretend, it ap
peared in the midst of this distracted period ; it was
cast into the midst of this tumult of controversy.
With what incredible skUl must this anonymous
writer have proceeded, to be able to frame a system
which should not immediately excite hostUity and
cause his false pretensions to be chaUenged ! How
can we suppose that a book, appearing for the first
time at such an epoch, having of necessity so close a
bearing on the great themes of controversy, and
claiming to be the production of an apostle, would
encounter no denial? The acknowledgment of this
Gospel, both by the Gnostic who was obliged - to
pervert its teachings through forced interpretations,
and by the orthodox theologian, furnishes an irresisti
ble argument for its genuineness.
Thus far we have dealt, for the most part,; with
those isolated passages of the early writers wherein
the existence and authoritative standing of John's
Gospel are presupposed. Not aU these separate
items of evidence are of equal strength. Together
they constitute an irrefragable argument. And yet
1 Dial. c. TrypL, c. 32.

EXTERNAL EVIDENCE : TRADITION. 73
the main, most convincing argument for the genuine
ness of this Gospel, is drawn from the moral impossi
bility of discrediting, in such a case, the tradition
of the early Church. Let us consider for a moment
the character of this argument.
We begin with observing that, on matters of
fact in which men are interested, and to which,
therefore, their attention is drawn, and in regard to
which there are no causes strongly operating to blind
the judgment, the evidence of tradition is, within
reasonable limits of time, conclusive. An individual
may perpetuate his testimony through the instru
mentality of one who long survives him. The testi
mony of a generation may in like manner be trans
mitted to, and through, the generation that comes
after. Next to the testimony of one's own senses
is the testimony of another person whom we know to
be trustworthy. And where, instead of one individ
ual handing over his knowledge to a single successor,
there is a multitude holding this relation to an equal
or greater number after them, the force of this kind
of evidence is proportionably augmented. Moreover,
the several generations do not pass away, like the
successive platoons of a marching army, but the
young and the old, the youth and octogenarian, are
found together in every community; so that upon
any transaction of public importance that has occurred
during a long period in the past, witnesses are
always at hand who can either speak from personal

74 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
knowledge or from testimony directly given them by
individuals with whom they were in early life famUiar.
Few persons who have not speciaUy attended to
the subject, are aware how long a period is some
times covered by a very few Unks of traditional testi
mony. Lord Campbell, in his Lives of the Chancel
lors, remarks of himseU, that he had seen a person
who had seen a spectator of the execution of Charles
I:, in 1649. A single link separated Lord Campbell
from the eyewitness of an event occurring upwards of
two hundred years before. Suppose this interven
ing witness to be known by Lord CampbeU to be a
discriminating and trustworthy person, and we have
testimony that is fully credible. We borrow two
examples from Mr. Palfrey's exceUent History of
New England. The first relates to the preservation
of the knowledge of the landing-place of the Pilgrims.
Plymouth Rock, says the Historian, "is now imbedded
in a wharf. When this was about to be buUt, in
1741, Elder Thomas Faunce, then ninety-one years
old, came to visit the rock, and to remonstrate against
its being exposed to injury; and he repeated what
he had heard of it from the first planters. Elder
Faunce's testimony was transmitted through Mrs.
White, who died in 1810, ninety-five years old, and
Deacon Ephraim Spooner, who died in 1818, at the
age of eighty-three." 1 In another place, Mr. Palfrey
1 Palfrey's Eist. of N. England, Vol. I. p. 171. N. 3.

EXTERNAL EVIDENCE : TRADITION. 75
has occasion to observe : " When Josiah Quincy, of
Boston, was twelve or thirteen years old, Nathanael
Appleton was still minister of Cambridge, and a
preacher in the Boston pulpits ; Appleton, born in
Ipswich in 1693, had often sat, it is likely, on the
knees of Governor Bradstreet, who was his father'a
neighbor ; and Bradstreet came from England, in
John Winthrop's company, in 1630. Eyes that had
seen men who had seen the founders of a cisatlantic
England, have looked also on New England as she
presents herself to-day." x Mr. Quincy died in 1864.
Every man of seventy who can unite his memory
with the memories of the individuals who had attained
the same age when he was young, can go back
through a period of more than a hundred years. He
can state what was recollected fifty years ago con
cerning events that took place a half century before.
If, in reference to a particular fact, we fix the earliest
age of trustworthy recollection at fifteen, and sup
pose each of those, whose memories are thus united,
to give their report at the age of eighty, there is
covered a period of one hundred and thirty years.
We can easily think of cases where, from the charac
ter of both the witnesses, the evidence thus derived
would be entirely conclusive.
But traditionary evidence had a special security
and a special strength in the case of the early Christian
1 Palfrey's Eist., Vol. HI. p. vi. of the preface.

76 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
Church. The Church, as Mayer forcibly observes, had
a physical and spiritual continuity of life. There was
a close connection of its members one with another.
"Like a stream of water, such a stream of youths,
adults, and old men is an unbroken whole." The
Church was a community — an association. A body of
this kind, says Mayer, recognizes that which is new as
new. It is protected from imposition. How would it
be possible, he inquires, for a new Augsburg Confession
to be palmed upon the Lutheran churches as a docu
ment that had long been generaUy accepted ?
In estimating the force of this reasoning, we must
take notice of the number of the early Christians.
We must remember that at the close of the first
century Christianity was planted in aU the principal
cities of the Roman Empire. It was in the great
cities and centres of intercourse, as Jerusalem, Antioch,
Ephesus, Corinth, Alexandria, Rome, that Christianity
was earliest established. As early as Nero's persecu
tion (a. d. 64) the Christians who were condemned,
constituted, according to Tacitus, a " great multitude." l
In Asia Minor, in the time of Trajan, or at the close
of the century, they had become so numerous that,
according to Pliny, the heathen temples were almost
deserted. A century later, making due allowance for
the rhetorical exaggeration of Tertullian, and not
depending on him alone, we are certain that the
number of the Christians had vastly multiplied. In
1 Ann., I. xv. c. 44.

EXTERNAL EVIDENCE. 77
every part of the Roman Empire, in aU places of con
sideration, and even in rural districts, Christian assem
blies regularly met for worship. And in aU. these
weekly meetings the writings of the apostles were
pubhcly read, as we learn from so early a writer as
Justin Martyr.
Now we have to look at the Christian churches in
the second century, and ask if it was possible. for a
history of Christ, falsely pretending to be from the
pen of the Apostle John, to be brought forward twenty,
thirty, or forty years after his death, be introduced into
aU the churches east and west, taking its place every
where in the pubhc services of Sunday? Was there
no one to ask where this new Gospel came from, and
where it had lain concealed? Was there no one, of
the many Who had personaUy known John, to expose
the gigantic imposture, or even to raise a note of sur
prise at the unexpected appearance of so important a
document; of which they had never heard before ?
How was the populous church at Ephesus brought to
accept this work on the very spot where John had lived
and died ?
. The difficulty, nay the moral impossibility, of sup
posing that this Gospel first saw the hght in 160 or
140 or 120, or at any of the dates which are assigned
by the Tubingen critics,, will be rendered apparent, if
we candidly look at the subject.1 We have spoken of
1 The latest assailant of the Genuineness of John, Schenkel, in his
work, Das Gharakterbild Jesu, places the date of the Gospel from

78 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
Irenaeus and of his testimony to the undisputed, un
doubting reception, by all the churches, of the fourth
Gospel. If this Gospel first appeared as late as or later
than 120, how does it happen that he had not learned
the fact from the aged presbyters whom he had known
in Asia Minor ? Irenaeus, before becoming bishop, was
the coUeague of Pothinus at Lyons, who perished as a
martyr, having, as the letter of his church states,
passed his ninetieth year. Here was a man whose
active life extended back well-nigh to the very begin
ning of the century, who was born before John died.
Supposing John's Gospel to have appeared as late as
120, the earliest date admitted by any part of the
skeptical school, Pothinus was then upwards of thirty
years old. Did this man, who loved Christianity
so well that he submitted to torture and death for its
sake, never think to mention to Irenaeus an event
of so great consequence as was this late discovery of
a life of the Lord from the pen of his most beloved
disciple, and of its reception by the churches ? Polyc
rates, bishop of Ephesus, at the time of his contro
versy with Victor, describes himself as being " sixty-
five years of age in the Lord," as having " conferred
a. d. 110-120. This indicates progress in the right direction among the
skeptical critics. But as they push back the date, they have to en
counter a new source of difficulty. The nearer they approach to the
time of the Apostle, the greater the number of persons who were
familiar with him and his circumstances, and the greater the obstacle,
from this cause, to a successful imposture. It may here be observed
that Schenkel contributes nothing new on the question before us.

EXTERNAL EVIDENCE. 79
with the brethren throughout the world, and studied
the whole of the Sacred Scriptures ; " as being also of
a family, seven of Whose members had held the office
of bishop or presbyter. According to his statement,
his own life began as early at least as the year 125,
whUe through his famUy he was directly connected
with the contemporaries of John. How is it that
Polycrates appears to have known nothing about this
late appearance of the wonderful Gospel which bore
the name of John, but was the work of a great
unknown ? How is it that the famUy of Polycrates
either knew nothing of so startling an event, or if they
knew anything of it preserved an absolute sUence?
Clement of Alexandria had sat at the feet of venerable
teachers in different countries, of whom he says that
they " have lived by the blessing of God to our time,
to lodge in our minds the seeds of the ancient and
apostohc doctrine." From none of these had he
derived any information of that event, so remarka
ble, if we suppose it to have occurred — the sudden
discovery of a gospel history by the Apostle John,
of which the Christian world had not before heard.
Justin says that in the churches there are many men
and women of sixty and seventy years of age, who
have been Christians from their youth; and he is
speaking only of the unmarried class.1
So at every preceding and subsequent moment in
the first half of the second century, there were many
* Apol, I. c. 15.

80 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
old persons in every larger church whose memory went
back far into the apostolic age. Now if the statement
of Irenaeus and his contemporaries as to the compo
sition of the fourth Gospel by the Apostle John
was false, and this work in reality saw the light
not till long after his death, when some forger
offered it for acceptance, how is it possible that
there should be none to investigate its origin when
it first appeared, and none afterwards to correct the
prevalent opinion concerning it ?
, There is no way for the skeptical critic to meet
this positive argument, founded on the unanimous
voice of tradition, and this negative argument ab
silentio in refutation of his theory, unless he can prove
that the Christians of the second century were so
indifferent as to the origin of their scriptures that they
received whatever might offer itself to their accept
ance, provided the contents were agreeable to their
doctrines and prepossessions. If there were few or
none who were either inquisitive or competent j.o judge
of the real claims of a book that professed to be an
authentic and apostolic history of Christ, then an
imposture of this magnitude might be successful,
provided a person were found shrewd and unscrupulous
enough to undertake it. But how stands the fact?
The greater portion of the early Christians were
undoubtedly from the poorer class. Even these must
have been deeply interested in obtaining authentic
accounts of that Master for whom they were offering

EXTERNAL EVIDENCE. 81
up life itself. But they had among them trained,
inquisitive scholars — - men educated in the schools
of phUosophy. Justin Martyr and the Greek Apolo
gists are not liable to the charge of illiteracy. It was
a time when Christianity had to answer for itseU, as
weU in treatises addressed to the public magistrate as
before the civil tribunals. It is, moreover, a note
worthy fact that the writers bring to the Scriptures the
test of historical inquiry. They do not ask what book
is doctrinaUy acceptable, but what book bears the
stamp of an apostolic approval. Referring to a say
ing of Christ adduced from an apocryphal Gospel of
the Egyptians, Clement's first remark is, that it is,
not contained in the four Gospels which " have been*
handed down to us." Irenaeus and TertulUan insist;
only upon the historical evidence that the canonical
Scriptures are apostolic. Nothing but authentic tradi
tion is of any weight with them on the question. It is-
true that Schwegler, Strauss, and some other writers are
in the habit of asserting that the Christians of the first
ages were whoUy uncritical, and were satisfied with the
claim of any book to be apostolic, if it seemed edify
ing. But scholars need not be told that sweeping
representations of this nature are not sustained by
proof and are grossly exaggerated. Origen, that most
learned and inquisitive scholar, was bom when Irenaeus
was stiU in the midst of his activity. The earlier con
flicts with Judaizing and Gnostic heresy which carry
us far 'back of Irenaeus towards the commencement,
6

82 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
of the century, stimulated Christians to the exercise of
discrimination in respect to writings which claimed an
apostolic sanction. Appeal is made to the instance
of the partial acceptance, at the 'end of the second or
early in the third century, of the Pseudo-Clementine
Homilies. This work, however, was accompanied with
pretended documents in attestation of its apostolic
authorship, and with an explanation of the reason why
it did not sooner appear ; 1 and was hence supposed to
be a genuine work which had been altered and inter
polated by heretics. A few facts of this nature are no.
more sufficient to convict the contemporaries of Origen,
Irenaeus, and Justin of utter indifference or heedless
ness in respect to the authorship of books, than the
acceptance of Ossian or the credence given to the
Shaksperian forgeries of Ireland suffice to convict the
contemporaries of Porson and Johnson of a like stu
pidity. Moreover, the incomparably greater import
ance which belonged to the histories of the life and
teachings of Christ, in the estimation of the early
Christians, by the side of such works as the Clementine
Homilies and Recognitions, destroys the paraUel. The
latter might be accepted, in certain circles at least,
with little inquiry ; that a deception should be success
ful, and universaUy successful, in the case of the former,
is inconceivable. AU the knowledge we have relative
to the formation of the New Testament canon goes to
disprove the imputation of carelessness or incompetency
1 See Gieseler's K. G., B.I. 285. N. 21.

EXTERNAL EVIDENCE. 83
brought against the Christians of the second century.
There is proof that the four Gospels of our canon were
distinguished, as having preeminent authority, from
all other evangelical histories in the early part of the
second century. AU other narratives of the life of
Christ, including those of the many writers of whom
Luke speaks in the introduction to his Gospel, as well
as those of subsequent authors, were discarded, and,
if used at aU, were explicitly treated as not endued
with authority. Four, and only the four, in the time
of Irenaeus and TertuUian, were regarded as apostolic
and canonical. Lechler1 mentions an example from
Eusebius Ulustrating the feeling of church teachers at
that' time. Serapion, who was bishop of Antioch
about 190, found in circulation at Rhosse (Orossus), a
town of Cilicia, an apocryphal gospel called the Gospel
of Peter. He says in regard to it : " We, brethren,
receive Peter and the other apostles as Christ himself.
But those writings which falsely go under their name,
as we are well acquainted with them, wre reject, and
know also that we have not received such handed down
to us." 2 This is one expression ; but it falls in with
the whole current of the evidence in relation to the
temper of Irenaeus and his contemporaries.
Having thus surveyed the external proofs of the
genuineness of John, we pass to consider
1 Studien u. Krit., 1856. 4. s. 871.
2 Euseb., Lib. VI. c. 12.

84 genuineness of the fourth gospel.
The Internal Evidence.
1. The fourth Gospel claims to be the work of the
Apostle John ; and the manner of this claim is a
testimony to its truth. The author explicitly declares
himseU an eyewitness of the transactions recorded
by him (1. 14, compared with 1 John i. 1-3, iv. 14 ;
John xix. 35 ; compare also xxi. 24.) In the course
of his narrative, one of the disciples, instead of being
referred to by name, is characterized as that " disciple
whom Jesus loved " (xiii. 23 ; xix. 26 ; xx. 2 seq. ; xxi.
7). In the appendix to the Gospel (xxi. 24 ; compare
ver. 20) this disciple is declared to be its author. And
we cannot well explain this circumlocution, except on
the supposition that the author resorts to it in order to
avoid the mention of his own name. Now, who of the
disciples most intimate with Jesus is referred to under
this description? Not Peter; for Peter is not only
repeatedly spoken of by his own name, but is expressly
distinguished from the disciple in question (xiii. 24 ;
xx. 2 seq. ; xxi. 7 ; 20 seq.). Not James ; for besides
the proof derived from the universal supposition of the
ancient Church, that James was not the person denoted,
we know that he was put to death early in the apostolic
age (Acts xii. 2), while we may infer from John xxi.
23, which is otherwise confirmed, that the disciple in
question must have reached an advanced age. If it be
granted that the author, whoever he may have been,
was one of the original disciples, James is excluded,

INTERNAL EVIDENCE. 85
because the Gospel was evidently written later than
his death, and out of Palestine. But if the disciple
whom Jesus loved is not Peter or James, who can it
be but John ? That the author would represent him
self to be John, is also strongly suggested by his
omitting to attach to the name of John (the Baptist)
the usual appeUation 6 ftccTtTiOTqg, especiaUy when we
observe that he is elsewhere careful, as in the case of
Peter and of Judas, to designate precisely the person
meant. Supposing the writer to be himself John the
Evangelist, and moreover to have stood, as a disciple,
in an intimate relation with the Baptist, we have a
double reason for his omitting in the case of the latter
this usual title. The connection of the beloved dis
ciple with Peter (xx. 2 seq. ; xxi. 7 ; and also xviii. 15
seq., where the aXXog fia&rjrrjg is none other than the
beloved disciple) is another argument tending to show
that John is meant ; since we find afterwards, in the
Acts, that John and Peter are closely associated.1
Indeed, it is held by Baur that the design is to
lead the reader to the inference that John is the
author. Now, if we suppose that this inference is
the simple fact, we have in the modest suppression
of his name by John the manifestation of a certain
delicacy of feehng, which is consonant with the spirit
of the work. It would be connected with its real
author by those to whom he gave it, without any
1 See also Luke xxii. 8.

86 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
proclamation on his part of his relation to it; as in
truth it was ascribed to John from the outset. On
the contrary, supposing the Gospel not to be genuine;
we are obliged to attribute to the author a refine
ment in fraud, an outlay of skiU in deception, whoUy
inconsistent with the simplicity and pure tone of this
Gospel, and not likely to' exist in a literary forger.
Judging from other known specimens of apocryphal
hterature, and from the intrinsic probabUities in the
case, we should expect of such a fraudulent writer,
that he would boldly and openly assume the name
and apostolic authority of John, instead of leaving
the authorship to be ascertained in the manner we
have indicated, by a careful inspection and combina
tion of passages. The indirect, modest way, then,
in which the author discovers himseU, carries with it
the unmistakable character of truth.
2. The truth of this claim of the fourth Gospel
to have John for its author, is confirmed by the
graphic character of the narrative, the many touches
characteristic of an eyewitness, and by other indica
tions of an immediate knowledge, on the part of the
writer, of the things he relates.
In respect to these points, which mark the narra
tive as the product of an eyewitness and of one
directly cognizant of the facts, none of the other
Gospels can be compared with the fourth. We
have not in mind here the general plan and outline
of the history, which will be considered under another

INTERNAL EVIDENCE. 87
head, but rather the style in which' the various inci
dents are presented. Of this pervading pecuharity
of the fourth Gospel our readers will be reminded
by a few examples. As one instance, we may refe.
to John i. 35 seq., where an account is given of
the calling of the disciples : " again the next day
after "• — the day is thus definitely given — " John stood
and two of his disciples; and looking upon Jesus as
he walked," — here we have the position of both
John and Jesus, — " he saith, ' Behold the Lamb
of God! ' And the two disciples heard him speak*
and they followed Jesus. Then Jesus turned and saw
them following, and saith," etc. In reply to their
question, " ' Where dwellest thou ? ' He saith unto
them, ' Come and see.' They came and saw where
he dwelt, and abode with him that day, for it was
about the tenth hour." Supposing the writer to
have been one of these two disciples, speaking of
an event that WG-uld be indelibly stamped upon
his memory, this minuteness of description would
be natural. If we have not' an eyewitness, we
have a subtle and painstaking deceiver. For another
example of vivid recollection we may refer to John
xiii. 21 seq., in the description of the last supper.
We are told that Jesus was troubled in spirit, " and
said, ' Verily, verily I say unto you that one of you
shall betray me.' Then the disciples looked one on
another, doubting of whom he spake." There is
' first an interval of silence, and looks of inquiry and

88 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
fear cast from one to another; but who would
venture to ask the question, which of their number
was to be faithless? "Now there was leaning on
Jesus' bosom one of his disciples whom Jesus loved.
Simon Peter therefore beckoned to him " — he signified
his wish by a motion of the hand — " that he should
ask who it should be of whom he spake. He then
lying on Jesus' breast, saith unto him, 'Lord, who
is it?'" Jesus replies that he wUl point out the
individual by handing him the sop. This silent act,
understood by John, was foUowed by the remark of
Jesus to Judas : " That thou doest, do quickly. Now
no man at the table knew for what intent he spake
this unto him." Some of them, we are told, thought
that Judas was directed to buy those things that
they " had need of against the feast, or to give some
thing to the poor." Who can avoid feeling that the
writer is here presenting a scene that was pictured
on his memory ? How unnatural, as well as painful,
is the supposition of a carefully contrived fiction!
Another instance of particular recoUection is found
in John xviii. 15 seq., where, in connection with the
account of the bringing of Christ before Caiaphas,
we read : " And Simon Peter followed Jesus,, and so
did another disciple; that disciple was known unto
the high priest, and went in with Jesus into the
palace of the high priest. But Peter stood at the
door without." Peter had no such means of admis
sion. "Then went out that other disciple which

INTERNAL EVIDENCE. 89
was known unto the high priest, and spake unto her
that kept the door, and brought in Peter." There
the inquiry of this door-keeper drew from Peter his
first denial of a connection with Christ ; and we read
further : " The servants and officers stood there, who
had made a fire of coals ; for it was cold: and they
warmed themselves, and Peter stood with them and
warmed himself." The circumstance of there being
a fire is mentioned by Luke, but in the manner of
stating it in John, as well as in the preceding circum
stances that are peculiar to him, we find the clearest
signs of a personal recoUection. The record of the
inward conflict and vacUlation of PUate as displayed
in his conduct (ch. xix.), is characterized by the same
features, which show it to be a vivid recoUection of
circumstances witnessed by the writer. So there
is much in the narrative of the crucifixion having
the same peculiarity. Thus we read (vs. 26, 27) :
" When Jesus therefore saw his mother, and the
disciple standing by whom he loved, he saith unto
his mother, 'Woman, behold thy son.' Then saith
he to the disciple, * Behold thy mother.' And from
that hour that disciple took her to his own home."
And again we read (vs. 34, 35) : " One of the soldiers
with a spear pierced his side, and forthwith came
there out blood and water. And he that saw it bare
record, and his record is true ; and he knoweth that
he saith true, that ye might believe." Is this too
a fiction, which the author sought to commend to

90 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
credence by a solemn asseveration, or is it a simple,
faithful reminiscence?
What a life-like description, and how true to the
conception elsewhere gained of the respective charac
ters, is the account of the running of Peter and John
to the empty- sepulchre ! They "ran both together; "
but the other disciple, outrunning Peter and arriving
first at the sepulchre, pauses, and, stooping doion to
look in, sees " the linen clothes lying ; " yet struck,
perhaps, with a feeling of awe, enters not. "Then
cometh Simon Peter following him ; " but not sharing
in the hesitation of his companion, with characteristic
impetuosity, at once goes in, "and seetk the linen
clothes lie, and the napkin that was about his head
not lying with the linen clothes, but wrapped together
in a place by itself. Then," encouraged by the
example of his more forward associate, "went in
also that other disciple, which came first to the
sepulchre, and he saw and believed" (xx. 3-9).
The same freshness and naturalness which belong
to the record of outward events are found in the
portrayal of mental experiences. We mention, as
an example, the notice of the refusal of Thomas to
believe without seeing, and of the reaction of his
mind on being shown the print of the nails (John
xx. 24-29) ; and the refusal of Peter to have his
feet washed by the Master, followed by the request:
"Not my feet only, but also my hands and my
head" (John xiii. 9). The ninth chapter, which

INTERNAL EVIDENCE. 91
describes the healing of a man who had been bhnd
from his birth, and the eleventh chapter, containing
the narrative of the raising of Lazarus, in their
naturalness, vividness, and fulness of detafl, cannot
fail to impress the candid reader with the conviction
that the writer was personaUy cognizant of the cir
cumstances he relates. In how simple, unartificial
a strain does the narrative, in each case, proceed!
And in how life-like a way are the circumstances
Unked together! Observe, in the first narrative,
the exclamation of the neighbors on seeing the man's
sight restored : " Is not this he that sat and begged? "
the different voices : " some said, ' this is he ; ' others
said, ' he is like him ; ' but he said, 'I am he ; ' "
the evident perplexity of the Pharisees; the parents'
way of prudently evading a direct answer to their
interrogatories by referring them to the man himself:
" he is of age, ask him ; " the naif energy with
which he confronted the Pharisees' queries. In
reading this passage of the fourth Gospel, it is difficult
to resist the impression that the writer is stating,
in a perfectly artless manner, circumstances that
fell within his own immediate knowledge. Not less
strongly is ,this impression made of the writer's
immediate knowledge, as well as fidelity, in reading
the eleventh chapter. Notice, for example, this
passage in the conversation of Jesus with his diseiples
before he started for Bethany : " after that he saith
unto them, ' Our friend Lazarus sleepeth ; but I go

92 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
that I may awake him out of sleep.' Then said his
disciples, 'Lord, if he sleep, he shall do weU.'
Howbeit Jesus spake of his death ; but they thought
that he had spoken of taking of rest in sleep. Then
said Jesus unto them plainly, ' Lazarus is dead.' "
This conversation was surely remembered. What
motive would lead one to invent such a conversa
tion? Observe, also, the graphic minuteness of
the following statements (vs. 28 seq.) : Martha, who
had gone out to meet Jesus, when she had spoken
with him, " went her way and called Mary her sister
secretly, saying, 'the Master is come and calleth
for thee.' As soon as she heard that, she arose
quickly and came unto him. Now Jesus was not
yet come into the town, but was in that place where
Martha met him. The Jews then which were with
her in the house, when they saw Mary that she
rose up hastily and went out, followed her, saying,
' she goeth unto the grave to weep there.' " We
must suppose here either an accurate knowledge
on the part of the writer, or an elaborate and
gratuitous skUl in contriving falsehood. Who can
foUow this narrative through, and note the expres
sions of deep-felt human feehng, — including the
reference, in a single word, to the tears of Jesus, —
and not be struck with the obvious truthfulness of
the writer? Or are there no marks by which sincerity
and truth can be distinguished from fraud ? 1
1 Among the illustrations of the present topic referred to by

INTERNAL EVIDENCE. 93
There are many passages which show incon-
testibly that the author of the fourth Gospel wrote
from an interest in the history as such.1 There
are numerous uncontrived and unmistakable signs
that he is writing from recoUection, and not from
invention. Among the examples of this peculiarity
are the aUusions to Nicodemus in three places, which
are widely apart from each other (John ni. 2; vii. 50;
xix. 39), and which imply an increasing faith in his
mind. The particular mention of the time of the
occurrence of different events, as on this or that day,
is not important to the narrative, and simply indicates
that the writer brings out facts as they lie in memory:
see John ii. 13 ; iv. 6, 40, 43 ; v. i. ; vi. 4, 22 ; vii. 2,
14; xii. 1, 12 ; xviii. 27 seq. ; xix. 14. The name of
the servant whose ear was cut off by Peter is given :
John xviii. 10. Localities are designated, where no
other than a historical interest can prompt the
writer to do so. For example, it is said (c. ni. 23)
that John was baptizing " in Aenon near to Salim : "
the Evangelist describes a pool at Jerusalem (John v.
De Wette (Einl. in das jY. T. § 105. a), and which we have not espe
cially noticed, are John v. 10 seq. (the circumstances that followed
the cure wrought at the pool of Bethesda ; the questions put to the
man who had been healed, by the Jews ; his not knowing who it
was that had healed him ; his subsequent meeting with Jesus in the
temple) ; vii. 1 seq. (the secret journey of Christ to the feast of
Tabernacles, after the conversation with his unbelieving relatives) ;
xii. The whole of chap. iv. (the interview of Christ with the woman
of Samaria), is a striking example of vivid, detailed narration.
1 See Bruckner's De Wette, Einl, s. xv.

94 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
2), as being by the sheep-gate — gate and not market
should have been supplied by the English translators
> — and " called in the Hebrew tongue, Bethesda,
having five porches:" in c. viii. 1, we read that
"Jesus went unto the mount of Olives, and early
in the morning he came again into the temple ; " so '
that the fact of his going at night to the mount of
Olives is simply recorded, with no mention of any
thing that he did, or that occurred there — a striking
instance of historical recollection, since no signifi
cance attached to the bare fact of his going to the
mount : Philip is designated (c. xii. 21) as " of Beth
saida of Galilee," although this has no apparent
connection with the incident there recorded of him :
it is narrated that PUate sat down in his judgment-
seat " that is called the Pavement, but in the Hebrew,
Gabbatha ; " a description of no moment in itself,
but involved in the writer's recollection of the spot.
A similar mark of historical faithfulness is con
tained in the incidental aUusions to features of the
gospel history which yet the Evangelist does not
record, but which were preserved either by the
Synoptics or in oral- tradition. These things, it is
assumed, are known to his readers. We have in
John iii. 24, in the allusion to John's being cast
into prison, a signal instance of this sort. Jesus is
spoken of as from Nazareth (John i. 45, 46), although
no explicit statement about his residence there had
been given. He is designated by the people of

INTERNAL EVIDENCE, 95
Nazareth as "the son of Joseph, whose father and
mother" were known to them (John vi. 42 ; comp.
i. 45). For the first time, in c. vi. 67, " the twelve "
are incidentaUy mentioned. Didymus, the Greek
name of Thomas, is associated with the Hebrew
designation of , this apostle in John xi. 16, xx. 24,
xxi. 2. In c. xi. 2, the Evangehst explains paren-
theticaUy that Mary, the sister of Martha, was
the same Mary which anointed the Lord with oint
ment, and wiped his feet with her hair. This inci
dent, which is given in Matthew xxvi. 6-13, Mark xiv.
19, is assumed by the Evangehst to be well known,
although he had not himself recorded it, and it
appears in his narrative at a later point (c. xii. 3).
We have no need to pursue the topic further.
We find everywhere in this Gospel the air and
manner of an eyewitness and participant in the scenes
recorded. 3. The general structure and contents of the
fourth Gospel, considered as a biography of Christ,
are a convincing argument for its historical truth and
genuineness. We come now to the decisive point in the conflict
between the advocates and the opponents of the
genuineness of this Gospel. It is contended by the
latter that the representation which is found in the
fourth Gospel, both of the course of events in the life
of Christ and of the character of - his teachings, is not
only " divergent from that of the other Gospels,

96 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
but absolutely incompatible with it ;" and that since
these Gospels in this respect are right, the fourth
cannot be the work of an apostle.
The difference between the fourth Gospel and the
other thre.e, in the particulars referred to, is in
truth very palpable and very important. The impres
sion made by the first three, or synoptical Gospels,
regarded by themselves, is that Jesus, after his bap
tism and temptation, repaired to GalUee, and remained
there until shortly before his death, when he went up
to Jerusalem to the passover. They record his teach
ings and miracles in Galilee and on this journey to
Jerusalem, but say nothing of any intermediate visits
to that city, and nothing of any prior labors there.
From the synoptical Gospels alone, the impression
would be gathered that the period of his ministry
was only a year. On the other hand, John distinctly
mentions not less than two journeys of Jesus from
GalUee to "Jerusalem previous to the last (ii. 13; v. 1),
and seems to justify the conclusion that in each of
these visits he remained a considerable time either in
the city or in its neighborhood. The duration of his
ministry, according to the fourth Gospel, cannot
be less than two years and a hatf, and may possibly
exceed three years. Not less remarkable is the differ
ence in the style of the Saviour's teaching in
this Gospel, compared with the representations found
in the other three. In the synoptical Gospels, Christ
utters either brief, sententious apothegms, or parables ;

INTERNAL EVIDENCE. 97
whUe in the fourth Gospel we have extended dialogues
and long discourses in quite a different vein. Other
minor points of difference might be mentioned, but
these which we have named are of chief importance.
Before we proceed to consider in detail the bear
ing of these peculiarities of John upon the main'
question before us, we offer one prehminary remark.
The more serious the difference between the contents
of the synoptical Gospels and of John, the greater is
the difficulty to be met by the opponents of the genu
ineness of the latter. For how could a Gospel which
so runs athwart the accepted views of the life and
teaching of Christ, be brought forward and gain cre
dence unless it were known to have the sanction
of an apostle? The later the date assigned to>
the Gospel, the greater is the difficulty. What motive'
for a forger, fabricating his work long after the
apostohc age, to depart from the traditional and certi
fied conception of Christ's life and teaching? And
supposing him to have a motive to do this, how could1
he succeed? These are questions to which the oppo
nents of the genuineness of the Gospel find it impossi
ble to give any satisfactory answer. Even if they
were to show that the contrast between John, and the
synoptical histories almost amounts to an incompat
ibility, they only increase thereby the difficulty of
solving the problem we have suggested. What in
ducement had a writer of the second; century to-
deviate, without necessity, and to- so extraordinary.

98 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
an extent, from the long prevalent and authorized view
of the Saviour's life ? And how was the Church per
suaded to accept this new version of his career?
Such is the hard problem presented to the skeptical
critic. On the contrary, if it can be made to appear
on a careful investigation, that, in these very particu
lars which are made the ground of objection, the
fourth Gospel unquestionably presents historical truth ;
that incidentaUy it supplements the other three just
where they need explanation ; and especially that this
Gospel alone presents a consecutive and connected
view of the life of Christ, we have gone far toward
establishing, its apostolic authorship. We have not
only obviated the principal objection ; we have also
furnished a positive and convincing argument on
.the other side. Its historical peculiarities, so far from
being a fatal objection against, wiU be seen to be
a conclusive argument for, its genuineness. jOnly an
apostle could have thrown this flood of light upon the
course of events in the life of Christ. Only an
apostle could have brought to the support of his
narrative an authority sufficient to obtain for it cre
dence, j We shall be obliged to notice with brevity
the various considerations connected with the present
l4opic. 1. The journeys of Christ to Jerusalem and
his ministry there. For reasons which we cannot
with certainty determine, the synoptical Gospels con
fine themselves to the GalUean ministry. The ques-

INTERNAL EVIDENCE. 99
tion is : Have we ground for concluding, independently
of John, that Jesus had repeatedly visited that city
and labored there? The synoptical Gospels say noth
ing inconsistent with his having done so ; they are
simply silent upon the subject. It would certainly be
more natural to suppose that Jesus who claimed to be
the Messiah, even if his ministry had continued but a
year, would during this time have gone up to Jerusa
lem, both as an act of compliance with the law and as
a means of gaining access to such a multitude as the
festivals brought together. It is not easy to account
for the fanatical hatred of the Pharisees in Jeru
salem towards him, if we suppose that he had never
crossed their path, save in casual encounters with
them away from Jerusalem, in Galilee.
Various facts mentioned in the synoptical Gospels
seem to presuppose such previous labors on his part
in the capital. Thus Joseph of Arimathea, a member
of the Sanhedrim, is said, in the synoptical Gospels,
to be a disciple of Jesus (Matt, xxvii. 57 seq. ; Luke
xxiii. 50 seq. ; Mark xv. 42 seq.) ; but Joseph was a
resident of Jerusalem, having, as we are told, a
tomb there. There, it is probable, he became ac
quainted with Christ. Again, we learn from Luke
(x. 38 seq.) that Jesus stood in such intimate
relations with the family of Martha and Mary, as
imply a previous stay in that neighborhood prior
to this last visit. But we are happily furnished with
a conclusive proof of the Saviour's repeated visits

100 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
to Jerusalem, in the lamentation he uttered over
the city, as recorded by both Matthew and Luke
(Luke xiii. 34 seq. ; Matt, xxiii. 37 seq.) : 'hgovoa-
\y\^i, "laqovGaXrifj- .... noGccxcg tjihsXrjGa STViGvva^ai
ra rexva gov .... xai ovx fj&sXrjGaTS, x.t.%.
Baur would make it out that the whole Jewish
people are apostrophized under the term " Jerusalem,"
as the centre and home of the nation. This interpre
tation seems improbable, when we remember that
when the Saviour uttered these words he was gazing
upon the city. It is demonstrated to be false by the
context in Luke. Immediately before, in the preced
ing verse, the Saviour says: "for it cannot be that
a prophet perish out of Jerusalem''
It may be well to notice the last device of inter
pretation, by which Strauss struggles to avoid the
inevitable inference to be drawn from this passage.1
We notice his new hypothesis more wUlingly, because
it offers so fair an illustration of his general method
of criticism. "This expression," says Strauss, "can
Jesus least of all have used where Luke puts it,
on his journey to Jerusalem, and before he had
once during the period of his pubhc activity seen that
city. But even in Jerusalem itself, after a single stay
there of only a few days, he cannot have pointed out
how often he had attempted in vain to draw its
inhabitants to himself. Here all shifts"^— such as
1 Leben Jesu fur das deutsche YoTk% s. 249.

INTERNAL EVIDENCE. 101
that of Baur, noticed above — " are futile, and it must
be confessed : if these are really the words of Christ,
he must have labored in Jerusalem oftener and longer
than would appear from the synoptical reports."
Now, the reader will ask, how is this conclusion to be
escaped? Nothing more easy. "These are not his
words," says Strauss. It is true that Matthew gives
them as such, in connection with the other decla
ration : "wherefore, behold, I send unto you prophets,
and wise men, and scribes, and some of them ye shall
kiU and crucify," etc. But this last expression, as
quoted by (Luke xi. 49 seq.), is disconnected from
the apostrophe to Jerusalem, which is found later,
in c. xni. 34, 35. And that expression concerning
the rejection of the divine messengers, though occur
ring in the midst of a discourse of Christ, is intro
duced by Luke with the words : " therefore also said
the wisdom of God." On these data, Strauss sets up
the theory that the whole passage, as found in
Matthew, is a quotation from some lost christian
book written about the time of the destruction of
Jerusalem, in which the personified wisdom of God
was represented as speaking! It is interesting to
mark the process by which he arrives at this conclu
sion. Matthew is held to be right in conjoining the
two expressions, and Luke wrong in separating them.
But Matthew is wrong in leaving out the intro
ductory words : " therefore also saith the wisdom of
God." Luke, again, is wrong in not connecting both

102 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
expressions with this formula, and in making the
apostrophe to Jerusalem to be the words of Christ,
himself. Why Matthew, whom Strauss elsewhere pro
nounces altogether the best authority, especiaUy in
regard to the discourses of Christ,1 should leave
out the formula of citation, and attribute to Jesus
words extracted from the supposed lost book, is
indeed a difficulty. Strauss says that it was owing to
the singularity — seltsamkeit — of .this formula ! Why
Luke should attribute to Christ himseU the words
of lamentation over Jerusalem, when they stood con
nected with the passage relative to divine messengers
in a book that did not purport to be a record of the
words of Christ, is another unexplained circumstance.
It is plain that Strauss credits, or discredits, each
evangelist, in an entirely arbitrary manner, in order
to meet the exigencies of a theory. The apostrophe
to Jerusalem must be regarded as the outpouring
of Christ's own feeling and as uttered by him. Both
evangehsts explicitly declare this. And apart from
the considerations already mentioned, the conclusion
of the passage has no propriety unless it were spoken
by Jesus: "for I say unto you, ye shall not see
me henceforth, till ye say, Blessed is he that cometh
in the name of the Lord." In the passage (Luke
xi. 49) : "therefore also saith the wisdom of God,"
the last phrase probably denotes Jesus himself, and
may have been attached in current speech to this cita-
1 Leben Jesu fur d. deutsche Volk, s. 115.

INTERNAL EVIDENCE. 103
tion of his words. Hence Luke takes it up into his
report.1 The apostrophe to Jerusalem proves, therefore,
that Jesus had again and again preached in that city
and labored to convert its inhabitants. The fourth
Gospel is incidentally but convincingly sustained
in attributing a prolonged ministry to Christ and
repeated labors at Jerusalem, by the synoptical Gospels
themselves. But suppose a writer in the second
century to have set himself to the work of composing
a fictitious gospel for the purpose of indirectly inculca
ting a dogmatic system of his own ; how certain that
he would have adhered to the traditional view of
the course of the Saviour's ministry ! By giving it a
longer duration, and introducing visits to Jerusalem
and labors there not mentioned by the received
Gospels, he would only invite suspicion and expose
himself to detection. No advantage could be con
ceived to foUow such a wide departure from the
prevalent conception, which would not be immeasura
bly outweighed by the certain disadvantages and perils
1 This is the opinion of Neander and Meyer. Strauss is not so
original as he claims to be, in this piece of interpretation. Baur,
after suggesting his own explanation, of which we have spoken
above, remarks in a note that if this interpretation is unacceptable,
then the lament over Jerusalem may be taken as the words of some
(unknown) prophet, which in this definite form were (fictitiously) put
into the mouth of Christ. See Baur's Kanon. Evang., s. 127. Ir.
plainer language: if you cannot explain away the meaning of the
passage, deny that Christ said it !

104 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
attending it. It must have been, then, from a regard
to historical truth and from a. knowledge of the' facts,
that the author of the fourth Gospel has so construct
ed his history. And this author, whoever he was,
had an authority with Christians so great as to enable
him to vary thus widely, without the imputation of
error, from the prevalent tradition.
The more the general plan of the fourth Gospel
is examined, the more is it seen to rest upon the solid
foundation of historical verity. The progress of events
in the life of Jesus, from the beginning onward to
the final result, is clearly understood from this Gospel.
We see how it came to pass that though " he came to
his own, his own received him not." The vacillation
of the people, now turning in his favor, and now, as
he disappointed their expectations, turning against
him, together with the origin and growth of the im
placable hostUity of the Jewish leaders, are made
entirely comprehensible.
And the fourth Gospel alone gives an adequate
explanation of the way in which the catastrophe was
brought on. We see how the consequences of the
raising of Lazarus obliged the Pharisees to proceed at
once to the most decisive measures against Jesus. If
was this event, and the effect of it upon the minds of
the people, that precipitated the result. In regard to
this closing portion of Christ's life, we have in John
the clue to the solution of what is left, in part, unsolved
in the other Gospels. Even Kenan finds that " the last

INTERNAL EVIDENCE. 105
months of the hfe of Jesus in particular are explained
only by John." l A narrative is commended to
credence by being thus consistent and inteUigible.
The same distinction, the same verisimilitude, belongs
to the account of the Saviour's resurrection, a section
of the history in which the synoptical Gospels are espe
cially fragmentary. In John we have a view, as clear
and coherent as it is artless and natural, of the trans
actions that foUowed his reappearance from the tomb.
2. In considering the credibihty of the fourth
Gospel, as this question is affected by a comparison of
its matter with the contents of the other three, we
have to notice the difficulty and apparent discrepancy
upon the date of the crucifixion, and also the paschal
controversies of the second century, in their bearing
upon this point of chronology.
It is weU known to every student of the Gospels
that there is difficulty in reconciling the statement of
the first three, respecting the date of the last supper,
and consequently respecting the date of the death of
Christ, with the statement of John. AU the evangelists
agree as to the day of the week — -that the supper was
on Thursday evening, and the crucifixion on the next
or Friday morning. The synoptical Gospels, however,
appear to place the last supper in the evening when
the Jews ate the passover-meal ; i. e. on the evening
of the 14th Nisan, or, according to the Jewish reckon-
1 Benan, Vie de Jesus, p. xxxiii.

106 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
ing, the beginning of the 15th Nisan. The fourth
Gospel, on the other hand, appears to place the last
meal of Jesus with the disciples on the evening before
the passover-supper of the Jews ; i. e. on the 13th, or,
according to the Jewish reckoning, the 14th, Nisan,
and the crucifixion on the moming immediately before,
instead of after, this Jewish festival.
The Tubingen critics regard the two representations
as reaUy inconsistent and irreconcUable ; and on this
ground, as they hold that the fourth Gospel is incor
rect, they maintain that it could not have proceeded
from John. If the two representations can be fairly
harmonized with each other, of course their argument
vanishes with the foundation on which it is built.
Without pronouncing judgment on the various modes
which have been proposed by Dr. Kobinson and other
harmonists for reconcUing the two accounts, let us con
sider the effect, as regards the credibility and genu
ineness of the fourth Gospel, of admitting that the
discrepancy is real and irremovable. The diversity of
the principles of criticism which are adopted by the
major part of the able defenders of supernatural
Christianity and evangelical doctrine in Germany, from
those in vogue among us, is remarkably exemplified by
their treatment of the particular question before us.
Not only do Neander, Bleek, Meyer, and others hardly
less distinguished, coincide with their adversaries in
admitting that the discrepancy is irremovable; but
Bleek buUds upon it an earnest argument for the

INTERNAL EVIDENCE. 107
credibUity and apostolic authorship of John.1 He
insists, with much force, upon the improbabUity that a
writer in the second century, who wished to be con
sidered an apostle, would contradict the three Gospels
and the accepted tradition of the Church, on such a
point as the date of the last supper and of the cruci
fixion. Who but an apostle; or one thoroughly
acquainted with the facts, would think of making him
seU responsible for such a deviation? Who,. but an
apostle, could hope to be believed ? In a word, how
extremely unnatural that a forger should think of
assigning another date to these leading facts in the
evangelical history ! Bleek, also, endeavors to show
that the supposition that the crucifixion took place on
the morning before the passover-lamb was eaten, is
corroborated by incidental statements in the synoptical
- Gospels themselves,2 as well as by aU the probabflities
in the case ; so that the accuracy of the fourth Gospel,
in this particular, is established, and thus a strong
argument is furnished for its general credibUity.3
1 It should be stated that these critics do not consider the first
Gospel, in its present form, to emanate from the Apostle Matthew.
See Neander's Leben Jesu, s. 10. Bleek's Einl, s. 88 seq. The first
Gospel is held to stand in substantially the same relation to the
apostles as the other two ; and the historical position of all three is
indicated in Luke i. 1, 2 ; i. e. they record the things which were
delivered to their writers by eyewitnesses. It is not the eyewitnesses
'themselves, but those to whom they spoke.
' Matt. xxvi. 5, xxvii. 59 seq. ; Mark xv. 42, 46 ; Luke xxiii. 56.
3 Ellicott, in his Life of Christ (Am. Ed. p. 292, N. 3) considers

108 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
The opponents of the genuineness of John attempt
to draw a support for their cause from the paschal con
troversies of the second century. These arose from a
difference in practice in regard to a certain festival
celebrated about the time of the Jewish passover.
There was discussion on this difference, in which the
churches of Asia Minor were opposed by the church of
Rome, on the occasion of Polycarp's visit to Anicetus
of Kome about the year 160 ; then ten years later, in
which Claudius Apollinaris, bishop of Hierapolis, and
Melito of Sardes, took part ; and especiaUy at the end
of the second century, when Victor, bishop of Rome,
proposed to break off fellowship with the Asia Minor
bishops on account of their refusal to abandon their
ancient custom. In these controversies, and in the
defence of their practice, the Asia Minor bishops were
in the habit of appealing to the authority of the Apostle
John, who had lived in the midst of them.
Everything turns upon ascertaining the real point
of difference and the real character of the Asia Minor
observance. So much is certain, that this observance,
whatever may have been its origin or significance,
occurred on the evening of the 14th, or, in the Jewish
reckoning, the beginning of the 15th, Nisan. Baur
that no other interpretation of John is admissible but that which
places the last supper on the evening before the usual passover-meal
of the Jews. " The statements," says Ellicott, " are so clear, that to
attempt, with Wieseler (Chron. Synops.), Bobinson (Bib. Sacra for
Aug. 1845), to explain them away, must be regarded as arbitrary and
hopeless." See John xiii. 1, 29, xviii. 28, xix. 31.

INTERNAL EVIDENCE. 109
holds that it was estabhshed as a commemoration of
the last supper, the passover-meal of Jesus with his
disciples ; and hence infers that John, whose authority
supported the Asia Minor observance, could not have
written the account of the last supper in our fourth
Gospel. But Baur's argument is on a foundation of sand.
It is clear, from the earhest discussions on the subject,
that the difference did not consist in a diverse mode of
observing the same festival ; but that in Asia Minor
there was a festival which did not exist at Rome. This
commemoration was on the 14th Nisan, on whatever
day of the week it might fall; whence the adherents
of the Asia Minor custom were called Quartodecimani,
while Occidental Christians observed Friday and Sun
day of each week as the. days, respectively, of the
Lord's death and resurrection. A day was observed
by the Asia Minor Christians which was not observed
at Rome. Nor is there any probability that the Asia
Minor festival was estabhshed as a commemoration of
the last supper.
There are two views as to the origin of their
festival. It was the final view of Neander, and is the
opinion of Meyer and Schneider, that it commemorated
the death of Christ — the sacrifice of the true paschal
Lamb, of which the Mosaic paschal lamb was the type
(1 Cor. v. 7 ;. John xix. 36). If this be the fact, the
festival accords with the supposed chronology of John's
Gospel. The fragment of ApoUinaris has been sup-

110 GENUINENESS OP THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
posed to connect the Asia Minor festival with the last
supper, and to defend the correctness of the day of its
observance by an appeal to Matthew. But Schneider
forcibly argues that Apollinaris is reporting, not his
own view, which was that of the Quartodecimani, but
the view of a smaUer party of Judaizers, from which
he dissents ; so that Apollinaris (as also the fragment
of Hippolytus) is really a witness to the agreement of
the Quartodecimani with the chronology of the fourth
Gospel. The other hypothesis concerning the design
of the Asia Minor festival, is that of Bleek, De Wette,
and others, who consider this festival to have been
originally the Jewish passover, which the Jewish con
verts at Ephesus and elsewhere had continued to
observe, and with which in their minds Christian ideas
md associations were more and more connected. In
particular, there was naturally associated with it the
recollection of the last supper of Jesus with the dis
ciples. There was no such reference originally con
nected with the festival, nor did this association of it
with the last supper grow up until long after the death
of John. This apostle did not interfere with a com
memoration which he found established in Ephesus
and other places in that region. Bleek shows that the
. theory of an original reference of the Asia Minor
festival to the last supper would imply an earlier origin
of the yearly Christian festivals than we have any
reason to think belonged to them. It is not inconsist
ent with Bleek's general view, to adopt Schneider's

INTERNAL EVIDENCE. Ill
interpretation of Apollinaris, in which case even this
writer affords no proof of an association by the Quarto
decimani of their festival with the Saviour's last sup
per. This hypothesis relative to the character of their
commemoration, that it was at the outset simply the
Jewish passover, which in Rome, and in other churches
where the GentUes were more predominant, was not
kept up, appears to us to be best supported. In any
case, the charge that a contradiction exists between the
early Asia Minor tradition concerning John's testimony
and the chronology of the fourth Gospel is without
*
foundation. 4. The discourses of Christ in the fourth Gospel.
These have been used as an argument against the
apostolic origin of this Gospel : an argument founded
on their inherent character ; their relation, both as to
form and matter, to the teaching of Christ recorded by
the synoptical evangelists ; the portraiture of Christ
which they convey ; their fitness to the circumstances
under which they are alleged to have been spoken ;
their uniformity, both with each other and with the
expressions of other characters in the Gospel, as weU as
with those of the author himself.1
Under this head we shaU chiefly follow Bleek,
regretting, however, that we are under the necessity of
abridging his excellent suggestions.
That the discourses of Christ in John stand in
contrast, in important respects, with his teaching in the
1 Bleek, s. 194.

112 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
other Gospels, is not denied. The first question is,
whether the contrast is so great that both styles of
teaching could not belong to the same person. Here
Bleek pertinently refers to the case of Socrates, and to
the opinion that is coming to prevaU, that the repre
sentation in Plato has much more of truth than was
formerly supposed ; an opinion held by such men as
Schleiermacher, Brandis, and Ritter, and commended
by the apparent necessity of supposing a more specula
tive element in the teaching of Socrates than Xenophon.
exhibits, if we would account for the schools of
speculative philosophy that took their rise from him.
He must have had another side than that which we
discern in Xenophon's record.1 How much easier is
this to be supposed in the case of Him who was to act
effectually upon every variety of mind and character !
How natural and inevitable that each of his disciples
should apprehend Christ from his own point of view,
according to the measure of his own individuality ; so
that for the understanding of Christ in his fulness, we
have to combine these various, but not incongruous,
representations of him.
But, as in a. former instance, we find in the synop
tical writers proof that the fourth Gospel, in the
1 Whoever will examine cc. ix. and x. of the fourth Book of the
Memorabilia, will see that these are fragmentary specimens from
another vein than that which furnishes to Xenophon most of his
reports. A like feeling is produced when we compare the last
chapter of the Mem. with Plato. Socrates must have said much
more, in this closing period, than Xenophon has recorded.

INTERNAL EVIDENCE. 113
character of the discourses attributed to Christ, does
not depart from historical truth. As to their form, we
are told, especially in Matt. xiii. 10 seq., that the
Saviour, at least in discoursing to the disciples, did not
confine himseU to the gnomes and parables ; that he
spake thus to the people on account of the dulness of
their understanding, whUe to the disciples it was " given
to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven."
The statements (Matt. xiii. 34 ; Mark iv. 34) that he '
never spake to the people save in parables, are of
course of a general character, and, fairly interpreted,
are not inconsistent with his addressing the people at
times in accordance with the reports of John. Occa
sionally in the synoptical Gospels, moreover, we meet
with expressions of Jesus in striking consonance with.
his style in the Johannean discourses, and thus giving
us a glimpse of another manner of teaching which the
synoptical writers sparingly report. The most remark
able example is Matt. xi. 25 seq. (compare Luke xi. 21
seq.), the ejaculation of Jesus, beginning :. " I thank
thee, 0 Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because
thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent,
and hast revealed them unto babes. Even so, Father,
for so it seemed good in thy sight." How perfectly in
harmony with the style of Jesus, in the latter part of
John ! 1
1 In John, also, examples of the aphoristic style, such as prevails
m the synoptical reports of the teaching of Christ, are not wanting..
See John xii. 24, 26 ; xiii. 16, 20.
S

114 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
As to the contents of the fourth Gospel, it is
freely granted that the higher nature of Christ and
the relation of the Son to the Father are here a much
more predominant theme. EssentiaUy the same con
ception of Christ, however, is found in the first three
Gospels. In them he is the Son of God, in a higher
than any official sense : he is the judge of the world.
And in several passages, we find him claiming the
lofty attributes given him in John, and in the same
style. Thus in Matt. xi. 27 he says : " AU things
are delivered to 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 whom the
Son will reveal him." This mutual knowledge, ex
clusive, superhuman, and perfect, on the part of the
Son and the Father, is affirmed here in the pecuhar
manner of the fourth Gospel. In Matt. xxii. 41 seq.
(compare Mark xii. 35 seq.; Luke xx. 41 seq.) we
have a plain suggestion of the fact of his pre-existence.
The objection that the discourses of Christ in
John have a close resemblance to the style of the
evangehst himself and to that of his first Epistle, is
obviated when we remember that, as a result of his
peculiar relation to Christ, the Saviour's mode of
expression would naturaUy be taken up; that we
are under no necessity of supposing that he aimed
to give a verbaUy accurate report of the Master's
teaching; and that some freedom as to style is un
avoidable in abbreviating and selecting the portions

INTERNAL EVIDENCE. 115
of his discourse for which there was a place in so
brief a work. AU this, as weU as that thorough
inward digestion and assimUation, on the part of
the evangelist, of the Saviour's discourses, which
were consequent on the length of time that had
elapsed since they were heard, will account for the
peculiarity in question, without impairing in the
slightest degree the historical truth and substantial
accuracy of the Johannean reports.
The falsehood of the assertion that these dis-:
courses are fictitious and put into the mouth of Jesus
by the writer, after the manner of ancient Greek
and Roman historians, is evinced in particular by
certain briefer expressions which are interspersed in
them, and which admit of no explanation except on
the supposition that the reports are faithful A
signal example is John xiv. 31, where, in the midst
of a long discourse to the disciples, occur the words :
" Arise, let us go hence ! " x They are not foUowed
by any intimation that the company actuaUy arose
and left the place where they were. On the con
trary, the discourse goes on, in the words : "I am
the true vine," etc. But if we suppose what foUows
to have been spoken by the way; or, which is per
haps more natural, if we suppose that having spoken
the words first quoted which summoned the disciples
to quit the place where they were, the Saviour's
1 iytipeo?!e, ayapev ivrevZtv.

116 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
interest in his theme and love for them led him to
go on still longer, whUe, it may be, they all remained
standing, then these words have a proper place and
meaning. The circumstance would imprint itself
on the recoUection of John, and it affords an impres
sive proof of his fidelity in reporting his Master's
discourses. But no reason can be given why a forger
should have introduced this fragmentary, unexplained
phrase. Had he chosen to interrupt the discourse
by such a phrase, he would infaUibly have added some
other statement, such as : then they arose and went.
This little phrase, to a candid reader, is a most
convincing item of evidence. Bleek also dweUs upon
the character of the prophetic utterances of Christ
in John, especially of the predictions relative to his
own death. The fact that they are in the form of
intimations, rather than distinct declarations, will
better account, in the view of Bleek, for the misun
derstanding of them on the part of the disciples. The
form in which they appear in John wears, in his
opinion, the stamp of historical truth, since it is
altogether probable that in this form they were
actually spoken. EspeciaUy, as Bleek thinks, is the
historical fidelity of the evangelist shown by those
passages from Christ upon which the evangelist puts
his own interpretation, drawn from an observation
of the subsequent event. Such are John ii. 19:
"destroy this temple, and in three days I wiU raise
it again," where we are told that the obscure reference

INTERNAL EVIDENCE. 117
to the temple of his body was discerned by his disci
ples not till after the resurrection ; and John xn. 32 :
" and I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw
all men unto me," to which the evangelist appends
a similar explanation. There can be no doubt in
these instances that the apostle has faithfuUy reported
the sayings of Jesus ; and this fact must be even
more evident to those critics who do not hesitate
to question, in these cases, the perfect correctness of
the disciples' interpretation.
5. The Hellenic culture and the theological point
of view of the author of the fourth Gospel are made
an objection to the Johannean authorship. They
prove, it is maintained, that the work does not belong
to the apostohc age, was not written either by a
Palestinian or by any other Jew, but by a GentUe
Christian of the second century. In the notice of
these several points we principaUy foUow Bleek.
(1) Was the author of the fourth Gospel a
Jew ? It is objected that his manner of referring
to the Jews proves him not to be of their number.
Thus we read of the "Jews' Passover," "the Jews'
feast of tabernacles," the "feast of the Jews," the
" preparation of the Jews," the " ruler of -the Jews "
(ii. 6, 13 ; iii. 1 ; v. 1 ; vi. 4 ; vii. 2 ; xi. 55) ; and fre
quently the author, alluding to the adversaries of
Jesus and those with whom he came in contact,
speaks of them in general as ol 'Ioudaioi. This
6tyle is capable of explanation only on the hypothesis

118 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
that the Gospel was written late in the apostolic
age, when the Christian Church had come to be
fully independent of the Jewish, and by a writer who
was himseU outside of Palestine, and addressed his
work not only to Jews, but also, and still more, to
GentUes and Gentile Christians. And this supposi-
tion, which removes the difficulty, is itseU the church
tradition concerning the composition of John.1 But
independently of this tradition, there can be no doubt
that the author was of Jewish extraction. In proof
of this, Bleek refers to the writer's familiarity with
the Jewish laws and customs, which is so manifest
in his account of the events connected with the
Saviour's death; to the pragmatical character of the
Gospel, so far as the fulfilment of Old Testament
predictions and promises is frequently pointed out;
and to the fact that a portion of these citations are
translated directly from the Hebrew, instead of being
taken from the Septuagint, — a fact that is conclu
sive in favor of his Jewish, and strongly in favor of
his Palestinian, origin. It occurs to us, also, that
Baur, in conceding that the author professes to be
the Apostle John, may be himself challenged to
explain why he is so negligent in affording evidence
of a Jewish extraction. Surely, so expert a counter
feiter would not have forgotten a point so essential
1 Even Paul speaks of his "former conversation in the Jews'
religion; " of his profiting " in the Jews' religion,'1'1 Gal. i. 13, 14.

INTERNAL EVIDENCE.

119

to a successful attempt to personate the Apostle. The
charge that errors are found in John inconsistent
with the hypothesis that the author was a Palestinian
Jew, is without foundation. That Bethany (the true
reading for "Bethabara beyond Jordan," in John
i. 28) was either the name of a place in Peraea, or
was a slip of the pen for Bethabara; that, at any
rate, the writer did not misplace the Bethany where
Lazarus dwelt, is demonstrated by John xi. 18, where
this town is expressly said to be fifteen stadia from
Jerusalem. The assertion that in the designation of
Caiaphas as high priest for that year, do%i&0tvg tov
svcuvtov sxdvov (xi. 51; xvhi. 13,) the author
implies a belief that the high priest was changed
every year, is entirely unwarranted by anything in
the text. The term " Sychar " for the old city
Sichem, instead of being a blunder, may be an old
pronunciation of the Jews and Samaritans of that
time. As used by. the Jews there may lurk under it
a reference to the hated character of the Samaritans ;
or, finaUy, it may be simply an error of transcription.1
1 See Bleek, s. 209. The supposition that it is really the name
of a town distinct from Sichem, though near it, agrees with the
- oldest traditions, and on several accounts seems more probable. So
Hug (Introd. Part IL, sec. 59), Ewald (Die Johan. Schriften, I. 181),
Bruckner, Baumlein, Thomson, (The Land and the Book, II. 206),
and others. Comp. Grove's art. in Smith's Bible Diet. The ex
planations given above (from Bleek) rest purely on conjecture;
this rests on historical and topographical arguments, confirmed by
the existence at the present day of a place with a similar name
('Askar) near the site of Jacob's well. Lightfoot (Chorog. Enquiry.

120 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
(2) The objection is made that a Galilean fisher
man, hke John, could not be possessed of so much
Greek culture as the fourth Gospel discovers. But
the famUy of John were neither in a low station, nor
in straitened circumstances. He was certainly trained
by his pious mother in the knowledge of the Old
Testament. He may have been early taught the
Greek language, which was then so widely diffused.
The report which the members of the Sanhedrim
had heard, that Peter and John were unlearned and
uncultivated men (Acts iv. 13) can only signify that
they were not educated in the schools of the Rabbis.
Had John not attained some mastery of the Greek
, language, it is not so hkely that he would have taken
up his residence in the midst of Asia, where only
Greek was spoken, even by the Jews. And during
his prolonged residence there his familiarity with the
language would doubtless increase.
(3) The type of doctrine in the fourth Gospel,
and especiaUy its Christology, have been thought to
be an argument against its composition by John,
the Palestinian Jew. In particular, the Logos idea
in John, it is said, was an Alexandrian notion,
borrowed from the Greek philosophy, and introduced
into Christian theology at a later period. We cannot
prefixed to John, ch. iv. sec. 5) finds " the valley of the well of
Sokar " spoken of in the Talmud as at a great distance from Jerusa
lem. He also suggests, as does Hug, that the name "DID may
denote a burial-place.

INTERNAL EVIDENCE. 121
enter at length into the discussion of this point. We
simply say that, as regards the language or the form
of the doctrine, it may have been derived from the
book of Proverbs and from Sirach, and not improb
ably was derived from this source, though further
developed, by Philo himself. Elsewhere and earlier
in the New Testament itseU, if not in the Epistle to
the Hebrews, yet undeniably in the Apocalypse, we
meet with the Johannean terminology. But, even
if the language pertaining to the Logos came at
first from the Greek phUosophy, it may have been
taken up by John, as a fit designation of the pre-
existent Christ. Properly quahfied, it became a
vehicle for conveying his conception of the Son in
his relation to the Father. ' In the use of this term,
John enters upon no speculation. He would rather
turn away the mind from vain speculations, from the
unprofitable discussions about the Logos that may
have been current, to the living, historic Revealer
of God, the actual manifestation of the Invisible One,
the Word made flesh, which had " dwelt among us."
Accordingly, after the first few verses, we hear no more
of the Logos. No allusion to the Logos is introduced
into his report of. the discourses of Jesus. As to the
matter of the conception, we utterly deny the theory
of the school of Baur, that the early church was
Ebionite, regarding Christ as a mere man. We hold
that this theory is abundantly refuted by passages
in the synoptical Gospels and Pauline Epistles, and

122 GENUINENESS Otf THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
is proved to be false by a fair view of the early history
of the Church. The theology of PhUo, it deserves to
be remarked, contains nothing more than the vaguest
conception of the Messiah, and is throughout far more
speculative than ethical ; affording, therefore, no
materials for that conception of Jesus Christ which
is found in John, and which only an intuition of the
living person of Christ could have awakened. The
conception of Christ in John is the product of the
impression made by Christ himseU upon the soul of
the disciple.(4) We have to notice another objection emanating
from the school of Baur, that the free and hberal
spirit of the fourth Gospel toward the GentUes is
inconsistent with the position attributed to John in
Galatians ii. 9. But this objection proceeds from
the assumption, underlying the whole system of the
Tubingen school, that Peter and the other Jerusalem
apostles were radicaUy opposed to the doctrine of
Paul relative to the rights of the GentUes ; that they
were, in short, Judaizers. We hold this assumption
to be demonstrably false, and the fabric of historical
construction reared upon it to be a mere castle in
the air. There is nothing improbable in the circum
stance of the inquiry for Jesus made by the devout
Greeks (John xii. 20) at which Baur stumbles. Even
in Matthew, which Baur regards as preeminently a
Jewish-Christian Gospel, is recorded the Saviour's em
phatic commendation of the Centurion's faith (viii.

INTERNAL EVIDENCE. 123
10 seq.); the distinct prediction, that the kingdom
should be taken from the Jews, and given to another
people (xxi. 43) ; the injunction to preach the gospel
to every creature (xxviii. 19); the prophecy that it
should be preached to aU nations (xxiv. 14); and the
parables describing the universal spread of the gospel
(ch. xiii.). We are not to leave out of view, in
considering the spirit of the fourth Gospel with
reference to Gentile Christianity, the inevitable effect
of great providential events, of which the destruction
of Jerusalem was one, and of the long interval of time
during which the distinct character of the Christian
Church and the broad design of Christianity had
become more and more plain. In this objection of
Baur, the attempt is made to uphold one false proposi
tion by another that is equally false.
There is one objection not to be separated en
tirely from the one last considered, but which is more
serious and plausible than any we have named. The
other difficulties which we have noticed, though not
unworthy of consideration, vanish, and in most cases
even turn into arguments for the contrary side. But
the difficulty we have now to speak of, is urged with
especial emphasis. It is strongly maintained by
those who impugn the genuineness of John, that the
Apocalypse, which they hold to be his work, cannot
come from the same author as the fourth Gospel. It
cannot be denied that there exists a degree of dis
parity, both in language and thought, between the

.124 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
Apocalypse and this Gospel. " The language [of the
Apocalypse] is incomparably rougher, harder, more
disconnected, and exhibits greater errors than is true
of any other book in the New Testament, while the
language of the Gospel, though not pure Greek, is in
a grammatical view • incomparably more correct." J
This contrast between the style of the two books was
stated as long ago as the middle of the third century,
by Dionysius of Alexandria.2 So there are various
special peculiarities of language in the Gospel which
are missed in the Apocalypse. " A stUl greater and
more essential difference is discovered when we look
at the contents, spirit, and whole character of these
"writings." 3 Under this head Bleek refers, in partic-
1 ular, to the different position of the Apocalypse with
reference to the Jewish people, so opposite to that of
the Gospel, where ol 'Iovdctioi is often, without
qualification, the designation of the opposers of
'Christ; to the definite expectation of the second
advent and mUlennium, together with the conception
of anti-Christ as a particular individual, which is
unlike the conception found in 1 John n. 18 seq. ;
iv. 3. We have to weigh the objection to the
genuineness of the Gospel which these differences have
suggested. 1. The impossibility that both books should have
the same author is far from being established. The
1 Bleek, s. 626.
2 Euseb., Lib. VII. c. 25. 3 Bleek, s. 626.

INTERNA! EVIDENCE. 125
Apocalypse was written shortly after the death of
Nero and shortly before the destruction of Jerusalem. .
The interval prior to the composition of the Gospel
was not far from twenty years, — a period giving room
for important changes in the style and habits of
thought of any writer ; an era, too, most eventful, as
concerns the development of the plan of providence
relative to the' Jewish nation. That they were des
tined, as a body, to reject the gospel, and to be
rejected of God, was made manifest. It must be
confessed that the force of our remark, so far as it
pertains to the change in style and modes of thought,
is weakened by the fact that, when the Apocalypse
was written, John must have been sixty years old ; a
period of life after which important changes of this
character are less likely to occur. But another con
sideration is to be taken into the account, — that the
mood of mind and feeling out of which the Apocalypse
was written was altogether peculiar and extraordinary,
as was the state of things in the midst of which the
author wrote. The same author, at such a time,
when his soul was stirred to its depths by the terrible
events, either present or " shortly to come to pass,"
and writing under the impulse of prophetic inspira
tion, would fall into quite a different style from one
that would be natural in a calmer mood, when his
only object was to .set down recoUections of Christ and
his teaching. Moreover, there are not wanting various
points of resemblance, both in language and matter,

126 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
between the two works. To prove this relationship,
we have the authority of Baur himself, from whom we
translate the following passage: "We cannot ignore
the fact that the evangelist put himself in thought
in the place of the Apocalypsist, -and designed to
make use, for the ends aimed at in his Gospel, of
the consideration enjoyed by the Apostle John, who,
as apostle, as author of the Apocalypse, and as having
been for so many years the principal head of their
churches, had become the highest authority with the
Asia Minor Christians. Nay, it is not merely the
borrowing of the external support of so distinguished
a name; there are not wanting, also, internal points
of affinity between the Gospel and Apocalypse; and
one cannot forbear to wonder at the deep geniality,
the fine art, with which the Evangehst, in order to
transmute spiritually the Apocalypse into the Gospel
[um die Apokalypse zum Evangelium zu vergeistigen],
has taken up the elements which, from the point of
view of the Apocalypse, led to the freer and higher
point of view of the Gospel." 1 Now, admitting that
so close an inward relationship connects the Gospel
with the Apocalypse, why not refer this to the natural
development of the author's own mind and the pro
gress of his views, rather than ascribe it to a hateful
fraud and lie ? If the art of the forger was so clever
and admirable, how can we accept Baur's further
view, that he has palpably and obviously betrayed
1 Baur's " Das Christenthum,'" etc., s. 147, 2d Ed.

INTERNAL EVIDENCE. 127
himself? Whatever opinion is entertained of the
authorship of the Apocalypse, the Tiibingen theory is
convicted of a gross inconsistency. That both works*
the Apocalypse as well as the Gospel, come from the
Apostle, is the judgment of Gieseler; and as far as
authority is concerned, the confident assertions made
on the other side are more than balanced by the calm
opinion of this deeply-learned and impartial scholar.
Says Gieseler : " the internal difference, in language
and modes of thought, between the Apocalypse which
John wrote before he had passed beyond the Hebrew
training and the Palestinian Jewish Christianity, and
the Gospel and the Epistles which he wrote after
living from twenty to thirty years among the Greeks,
is so inevitable a consequence of the circumstances in
which he was placed, that, had this effect not occurred,
the fact would have awakened suspicion. And yet
there exist in the two works many points of resem
blance, and evidences of the continuity of the author's
development and culture." 1
2. But even if it were established that the Apoca
lypse and the fourth Gospel are not from one author,
the verdict must still be given in favor of the genuine
ness of the Gospel. Bleek agrees, on the whole, with
De Wette and Baur in supposing that we are com
pelled to reject the Johannean authorship of one or the
other, an,d, in common with Neander and many other
critics of the evangelical as well as the unbelieving
' Gieseler's K. G., B. I. s. 127. N. 8.

128 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
school, holds the opinion that the Apocalypse is
not the work of John. As we have said, provided the
dilemma can be made out to exist, this is the reasonable
opinion. The Apocalypse has no doubt been in the
church since the date we have assigned for its compo
sition. As early as Justin Martyr it was quoted
as the work of the Apostle John ; but its genuineness
was also early questioned. It was questioned not
only by the Alogi, but also by the Roman presbyter
Caius (circa 200) who likewise ascribed it to Cerin
thus.1 Dionysius of Alexandria, the pupil and suc
cessor of Origen, to whose opinion on the style of
the Apocalypse we have adverted, endeavors to prove
from internal evidence that the Apostle John did
not write the work, and is inclined to attribute it to a
contemporary of the Apostle at Ephesus, John the
presbyter. Eusebius leans to the same opinion. He,
also, hesitates about placing it among the Homologou-
mena, or New Testament writings which were univer
sally received as apostolical.2 It was not included in
the ancient Syrian version. Long after it was
received universally in the Western church, doubts
concerning its genuineness continued in the East. If
written by John the presbyter, " a holy and inspired
man," as Dionysius supposes him to be, the later
habit of ascribing it to the Apostle, may have been
a mistake for which the real author was not respon-
1 Euseb., Lib. III. c. 28. 2 Euseb., Lib. III. c. 25.

INTERNAL EVIDENCE. 129
sible. And if the denial of its genuineness sprang
from the great reaction of the Church in the second
century against Chiliastic views, it was supported, as
we have seen in the case of Dionysius, by critical
arguments. The evidence for the apostolic authorship
of the Apocalypse is far from being equal to the accu
mulated weight of evidence for the Johannean author
ship of the fourth Gospel. For the former, the main
proofs of a composition by the Apostle are external.
In the case of the fourth Gospel, besides having
all that can be asked in the way of external evidence,
we are able to add the most impressive internal proofs
of its genuineness.
In giving the internal evidence for the genuineness
of John, it would be a great oversight to omit a
notice of the proof afforded by the last chapter.
Every reader of the Gospel wUl observe that in the
last verses of the twentieth chapter the author appears
to be concluding his work. It was held by Grotius,.
with whom agree many living critics on the evangel
ical side, as well as Zeller and other disciples of the
Tubingen school, that the entire twenty-first chapter is
from another hand. Others are of opinion that this
is true of the last two verses alone. That such is
the fact respecting the last verse and the last half of
the verse preceding, from the words, " and we know
that his testimony is true,"— admits of no rational
doubt. The remainder of the chapter bears strong
marks of genuineness, although it is not improbable

130 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
that John added the chapter to his Gospel as a sort of
supplement. In any case, it is obvious that the con
versation upon the question whether John was to
survive until the advent of Christ, would possess no
interest and have no pertinency at any time long
subsequent to his death. But the concluding verses,
regarded, as they must be, in the light of a testimony
to the genuineness of the Gospel on the part of
the person or persons by whom it was issued, consti
tute an impressive proof. The fact that this attesta
tion is anonymous indicates that he or they who made
it, were well known to those for whom it was de
signed ; it is utterly inconsistent with the supposi
tion of fraud. What meaning or value would an
attestation wholly anonymous have possessed, at the
first appearance of the Gospel, unless the source
whence this testimony proceeded were well known?
An impostor would have named the church of Ephesus
or its bishop, if he had intended to give a facti
tious credit to his forgery, by claiming their sanction
for it. Suppose this conclusion to have been written
by friends to whom John had delivered his Gospel,
and from whom it went forth to the world, and
the whole phenomenon is explained.
In the preceding pages, various objections from
the side of disbelievers in the genuineness of this
Gospel have been incidentally considered. Yet the
aim has been positively to establish our proposition,

REFUTATION of baur. 131
with the introduction of no more of polemical matter
than seemed indispensable to this end. We now
propose to subject the theory of Baur to a more
detailed examination.
Baur's Theory Respecting the Authorship of
the Fourth Gospel.
To reduce the observations of Baur to a seU-
consistent hypothesis is not an easy task. In general,
however, he holds that the main idea of this Gospel
is the development of the unbelief of the Jews in its
conflict with the self-manifestation of Christ, until that
unbelief culminates in the taking of his life. Baur is
not original in supposing this to be a leading thought
in the writer's mind. But nothing is thereby proved
against the verity of the history, since the actual
course of Christ's life was attended with the develop
ment of a spirit of disbelief, which finaUy broke out
in the great act of violence. But Baur goes farther.
He pretends that the history is fictitious and is ar
tificially contrived as a vestment for the idea. This,
however, is not the sole idea for which, as it is
claimed, the writer weaves a fictitious dress. That
faith, in order to be real and of any value, must
be seU-sustained by an inward power of its own, with
no help from outward proof through miracles, is sup
posed to be another leading thought of the writer;
and this, it is pretended, he illustrates by means of
invented narrative. Besides, Baur professes to find the

132 genuineness of the fourth gospel.
traces of Gnostic DuaUsm in the antithesis of light
and darkness, to which the Gospel writer more thar,
once adverts.1 Sometimes the language of Baur
would seem to imply that the Evangelist, misled
by the vividness of his own conceptions, actuaUy con
founds them with reality. But, notwithstanding an
occasional vague expression of this kind, it is Baur's
real meaning, as he abundantly explains, that the
narratives of the fourth Gospel are intentional fictions
composed to embody certain ideas and recommend
them to acceptance.
This remarkable hypothesis Raur undertakes to
support by exegesis. The character of his interpreta
tions we shall now exhibit to the reader. We should
observe that in this department of our inquiry we
have derived essential aid from the acute observations
of Bruckner. 1. There is no truth in the charge that a Dualistic
theory is taught in John's Gospel. In connection
with every passage which Baur cites, the distinction
between light and darkness is declared to be ethical.
It is not a physical or metaphysical separation, but is
founded in voluntary character. Men remain in dark
ness " because their deeds are evil ;" they will not
come to the light for fear of being rebuked. See
John iii. 19-21 ; also, compare John viii. 47 with viii.
34, and John xii. 35, 36 with John xii. 43. It is said
that " all things were made by " the Word, and that
1 Baur, Die Kanon. Evangelien, s. 88, 89.

REFUTATION OF BAUR. 133
He " came unto His own" i. e., to the Jews (John
i. 3, 11). How baseless then is the imputation of a
Gnostic Dualism to the Evangelist, in which the
Jews, or most of them, are destitute of " the light-
nature!" 2. Baur's exposition of the passages relative to
John the Baptist is most unnatural. In c. i. 32, 33
there is given the testimony of John the Baptist to the
descent of the Spirit, as a dove, upon Jesus. This
sign, he said, had been appointed " by Him who sent
me to baptize with water." IJow plain, especially
with the narrative of the Synoptics before us, that the
recognition of Jesus was at his baptism, which
the Evangehst notices here, though it had taken place
earlier than the events just before recorded ! Yet
Baur denies this, and even denies that the passage
implies that Jesus was baptized by John ! Baur
attempts to establish the existence of an artificial
chronology — a double trias of days, beginning with
c. i. 29 and terminating with c. ii/12; but we need
say no more than that the double trias is made
out by assuming a new day, falsely and without the
slightest support from the text, at ver. 41. Had the
Evangelist contrived the chronological scheme which
his critic imputes to him, he would not have omitted
to make the division of time at ver. 41, which the
critic interpolates.
Baur's treatment of the narrative of the miracle
in Cana is extraordinary. Why a circumstantial ac-

134 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
count of this kind should be deliberately fabricated by
such a writer as the Evangelist, is a question not easy
to answer. Baur sees in it an allegorical representa
tion of the position of John the Baptist (which is indi
cated by the water), and the transition to the higher
position of Jesus (which is denoted by the wine);
together with a further reference to Jesus under the
symbol of the bridegroom. Not that the Evangelist
means that his readers should regard his narrative as
a fiction ; he would palm it off on them as fact. But
it is the force of " the idea " in his own mind, which
moves him to the invention of the story. It is hardly
necessary to say that the notion of an allegory is
favored by not so much as a hint in the narrative
itself ; nay, it is excluded by the declaration (in ver.
11) that the end of the miracle was the mamfestation
of the glory of Christ.
A good illustration of the style of Baur's exegesis
is afforded by his comments on John iii. 22, where
Jesus is said to have tarried with his disciples and
baptized. In the next chapter (John iv. 2), it is
incidentally explained that Jesus himself baptized
not, but his disciples. That this explanation, omitted
in the first passage, should be thrown in afterwards, is
nothing strange. But Baur sees in the two passages
the proofs of a deep design. The Evangelist, he
thinks, would elevate Jesus above John, but would do
it gradually, with a kind of artful rhetoric. First, he
equalizes the former with the latter, by stating that

REFUTATION OF BAUR. 13E
Jesus baptized ; then, after an interval, he advances a
step by adding that Jes^s did not (like John) himself
baptize, but caused this rite to be performed by his
disciples. Such a puerile device is gravely imputed to
the artless writer of this Gospel !
3. On other points in the earlier chapters of John,
Baur's interpretation wUl not bear examination. It is
represented that the author of the Gospel makes
Judgea " the country " of Jesus (John iv. 44) ;
although it is perfectly evident from the context that
such is not his meaning, but that he ascribes the
increasing admiration of Jesus on the part of the
Galileans, his countrymen, to the commotion which
he had occasioned at Jerusalem. Nicodemus is pro
nounced a fictitious character, introduced as a repre
sentative of the unbelieving Jews who require miracles,
while the woman of Samaria is said to represent the
susceptible GentUes who believe without the need of
miracles. Unfortunately for Baur's theory, Nicodemus
is not described as an unbeliever, but as having some
degree of faith, and the Samaritan woman believes in
consequence of the evidence which she had of the
miraculous knowledge of Christ, by whom she was
told all things that ever she did (John iv. 29).
4. The effort of Baur to destroy the credibUity of
the seventh chanter, a portion of the Gospel which is
stamped with irresistible evidence of truth, leads him
into still more perverse interpretation. Jesus (ver. 10)
went up to the feast, not with his brethren, not openly,

136 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
" but as it were in secret " — cog iv xqvxtw. This
plain statement, Baur not only twists into a declaration
that Jesus made himself, after a Docetic fashion, invisi
ble, but, also, that he presented himseU before the
Jews in a form different from his own. And this is
only one of the misinterpretations which the seventh
chapter is made to suffer. Of this misrepresentation
of the sense of cog iv xqvjitcq, Bruckner says : " it is
not sustained by the words themselves, it rests upon
the false interpretation of vs. 15 and 20, and it is
fully refuted by ver. 14, where the public appearance
of Christ without any such Docetic transformation is
related, as well as by ver. 25, where Jesus is actually
recognized by some at the same moment when others
do not know him,- — so that, if Baur's view were right,
he must have taken on a shape which veUed the
identity of his person from some, while it was disclosed
to others." Baur's treatment of the entire chapter,
Bruckner has well exposed. " According to . Baur,"
says this able critic, " the theological end (tendency) to
be accomplished by the seventh chapter is to show how
the dialectics nito which unbelief enters carry their
own dialectical refutation ; and in this way, that Jesus
in three different sorts of self-mamfestation confronts
the unbelief of the Jews : in the first, iv xovjitoo ; in
the second, at ver. 28 ; in the third, at vs. 37 seq.
This whole arrangement by Baur breaks to pieces on
the correct interpretation of ver. 10, which refers to no
appearance of Christ before the Jews, such as Baur

REFUTATION OF BAUR. 137
pretends to be referred to by the iv xqvnrco ; it, also;
clashes with the fact that the favorable inclination of
the people to Jesus (vs. 12, 31, 40, 41) is just as
often brought forward, as is the unbelief of the Jews ;
it ignores the distinction between " the people " (pxXog)
and the Rulers, which runs through the whole chapter,
and which greatly influences the words of Christ, as
well as the replies to him and the judgment concerning
them ; it robs the narrative, in which the Evangelist is
much more concerned with things done than with
things said, of its life ; and it imputes to the Evange
list purposes which are nowhere indicated, and have no
jnore plausibility than a great many others which
might be suggested with an equal or greater show of
justice." * If we could reasonably ascribe to the
author of the Gospel any "tendency," it would be
more rational to say that he designed to set forth the
schism between the people and the rulers, and even
among the rulers themselves, than to exhibit the
unbelief of the Jews as a body. And Baur's exegesis
of this chapter may serve as a touchstone of his
theory. He is under the necessity of finding in this,
as in every other narrative in the Gospel, some occult
design, "the idea," which sways the writer in the
contrivance of his alleged fiction. To explain the
narrative in detail conformably to this theory is found
quite impossible, without a resort to the most fanciful
and violent interpretation. 1 Bruckner's De Wette, s. 139, 140.

138 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
5. Baur would have us believe that the Evangelist
has made up various tales and conversations in order
to exhibit a particular conception of faith and of
unbelief. Thus, the belief of the Samaritans and the
belief of the nobleman (John iv. 39, 50) are designed,
we are assured, to commend a faith which is founded
on the words of Christ, instead of on miracles. It is
impossible not to see the difference of the two cases.
The faith of the Samaritans was first awakened by the
saying — Sect tov Xoyov — of the woman : " He told me
all that ever I did." It rested on belief in her testi
mony to the exhibition of miraculous knowledge.
The nobleman, on the contrary, believed the word-y
tcq loya — of Jesus ; that is, credited a particular
declaration; and he "believed," at least was assured
in his faith, after the miracle and in consequence of it,
ver. 53. EquaUy fanciful is Baur's notion that the
design of the sixth chapter is to depict the manner
in which a faith that is produced by miracles, shows
itself a mere semblance of faith ; that the allusion to
Judas (vi. 64) is to show how a perverse will be
comes likewise the mere counterfeit of faith ; that
the inquiry, " have any of the Rulers or the Phari
sees believed on him," is put into the mouth of the
Pharisees and Priests for the purpose of presenting the
climax of unbelief, when it rests upon no grounds at
aU ! The case of Thomas is considered by Baur to be
a fiction to illustrate the doctrine that faith, when based
on sight, is no faith. But Jesus does not say that

REFUTATION OF BAUR. 139
Thomas has no faith ; he says the opposite. He says,
" because thou hast seen, thou hast believed" and then
exalts the faith of those who have not seen. But
these last are not those who believe without evidence,
but who believe on the evidence of testimony, which
Thomas (ver. 25) had refused to do. That Baur's
interpretation of the Evangehst's design is false, the
verses immediately following the account of the skep
ticism of Thomas decisively prove : " Many other signs
truly did Jesus  but these are written, that ye might
believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God."
6. Certain circumstances in the narrative of John
which to an unprejudiced reader afford irresistible
evidence of its historical truth, are construed by this
hostile and suspicious criticism into proofs of sinister,
mendacious contrivance. For example, the anointing
of the eyes of the blind man with clay (c. ix. 6) is
pronounced an invention to make the breaking of the
Sabbath more marked ; and the delays and reluctance
of PUate, which are so true to nature, are fabricated to
enhance the guilt of the Jews in condemning him.
In the same spirit Baur charges that the hearing of
Jesus before Annas is a fabrication to heighten the
guUt of the Jews; although John does not stop to
record the actual condemnation of Jesus by either
Annas or Caiaphas, and a careful examination of his
narrative (comp. John xviii. 24 with vs. 18, 25, 28)
shows that the denials of Peter took place after Jesus
was led away from Annas to Caiaphas, so that nothing

140 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
that occurred in the interview with the former is
recorded. One of the most extravagant specimens of
the Tubingen method of criticism is the notion that in
this Gospel there is a studied depreciation of Peter.1
The honor put upon Peter by his Master's solemn
charge (John xxi. 15, 18), an incident recorded by no
other evangelist, would seem to be a sufiicient refuta
tion of a charge which rests on trivial grounds. It is
even affirmed by these critics that in John xviii. 26,
where one of the servants who interrogated Peter is
characterized as a kinsman of the person " whose ear
Peter cut off," the Evangelist goes out of his way to
bring .in an act discreditable to Peter; an act, too,
which these critics also say is falsely attributed to him.
A double falsification is thus laid to the charge of the
Evangelist, and in one instance, at least, a very cun
ning falsification. Our readers must judge whether
thoughts like these really had their birth in the mind
of the Evangelist, or only in the mind of his critic.
7. Baur dwells with much emphasis on the account
of the piercing of the side of the crucified Jesus by a
soldier's lance, as a passage fuUy sustaining his hypo
thesis respecting the general character of the Gospel,
and in particular his theory that the author dates the
crucifixion on the morning before the occurrence of the
Jewish passover meal, in order to make that event
coincide chronologically with the slaying of the pass-
over-lamb. Having said that the soldiers did not
1 Baur, s. 323.

REFUTATION OF BAUR. 141
break the legs, of Christ, but that one of them pierced
his side, probably in order to assure himseU that he
was dead, as he appeared to be, the Evangelist adds
(John xix. 36, 37) : " these things were done that the
scripture should be fulfilled, ' a bone of him shall not
be broken.' And again another scripture saith, ' they
shall look on him whom they pierced.' " Now this
passage is all that the Gospel says which can be
thought to imply a simUitude between Christ and the
slain lamb of the passover.1 We are wiUing to
concede that such an analogy is here implied, in the
circumstance that the bones of Christ were not broken.
But the attention of the Evangelist is more drawn to
the fact that predictions are fulfilled (see ver. 37),
irrespective of the thought that thereby Jesus was
exhibited as the Passover-Lamb ; and his interest is
still greater in the surprising fact that water with blood
flowed from the wound in his side. Had it been a,
leading purpose on his part to set forth a parallelism
between the crucifixion and the slaying of the lamb, a
purpose so prominent in his mind as to lead him to
contradict the received authorities by misdating
Christ's death, it is impossible that the analogy should
have been suggested in so cursory and incidental a
way. He would infallibly have made his theological
idea clear and conspicuous. The Apostle Paul himself,
1 The exclamation of the Baptist (John i. 29) refers to the con
ception of the Messiah which was drawn from Isaiah liii., and not
to the lamb of the passover.

142 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
who, according to Baur, undoubtedly placed the death
of Jesus on the morning after the Jewish passover-
meal, brings forward even more explicitly the same
analogy which John is supposed to suggest, and
probably does suggest, in the passage on which we are
commenting. Paul says (1 Cor. v. 7) : " for even
Christ, our Passover, is sacrificed for us." It is
worthy of note that the same thought which is
innocent when suggested by Paul, is made to bear so
tremendous a burden of consequences when suggested
by the Evangelist. The reader will not forget that
this passage in John in respect to the piercing of the
body of Christ by the soldier's lance, is accompanied
by a solemn asseveration of its truth, the Evangehst —
for it is of himself that the writer speaks — professing
to have been an eyewitness (c. xix. 35). It is curious
to inquire how Baur disposes of this passage, which if
it be false, must be held to resemble very closely
wilful lying, notwithstanding the disquisitions of the
Tubingen critics about anonymity, the license allowed
to literary forgery in the old time, and " the power of
the idea." Baur's language, in commenting on this
asseveration of the Evangelist, is unusually hazy. He
appears to say that it is only the truth of the intuition
that Christ in dying opened the fulness of spiritual
life for the believing world, which " the Evangehst
testifies to with the immediate certainty of his Chris
tian consciousness." It cannot be Baur's intention to
say that the Evangelist does not design to make his

»
REFUTATION OF BAUR. 143
readers believe in the objective facts which he here
records ; and yet the critic shrinks, with a somewhat
commendable feeling, from distinctly charging him
with conscious mendacity. It will be plain to every
unsophisticated mind that what is called " the might
of the idea," granting that such a force was operative
in the Evangelist's mind, would lead no one but a liar
deliberately to affirm that he had seen a certain person
struck with a lance bv a soldier, when he had not.
8. It would be easy to multiply from Baur's
treatise examples of what we cannot but consider a
whoUy improbable, and even forced, 'exegesis of pas
sages in this Gospel. For the present discussion,
however, it is only essential to notice his interpreta
tions so far as they are employed to sustain his lead
ing hypothesis. Yet, we cannot forbear to mention
one or two additional instances of this unnatural con
struction of the Evangelist's words. The critic finds
in the reply of the risen. Jesus to the salutation of
Mary : " go unto my brethren, and say unto them, I
ascend unto my Father," an expression of the pur
pose of Christ to ascend on the instant ; and, accord
ing to Baur, that he did then and, there ascend, is the
Evangelist's idea. It is hardly necessary to say that
the present tense of the verb does not at aU confine us
to this strange inference, which is contradicted by vs.
26, 27. It is obviously the idea of the Evangelist
that Christ had been on the earth up to the time of his
meeting Mary (vs. 1-17), which of itself overthrows

144 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
Baur's notion that he is represented as ascending imme
diately on his rising from the dead. A signal instance
of a similar style of exegesis, as well as iUustration of
the embarrassment in which Baur involves himself in
his arraignment of the Evangelist, is the explanation
he gives of John xiv. 31, a passage which we have
adduced in proof of the fidelity of the Evangelist's
report of the discourses of Christ : " Arise, let us go
hence " (iytioioda, ayafi&v). These words, which
were doubtless a current phrase, happen to be used,
by Christ, according to Matt. xxvi. 46, in another
connection. The author of John, says Baur, found
them in the Synoptics and introduced them at this
place, in order to make a pause ! It happens that a
pause is made without this phrase, which in any event
would be perfectly inapposite to the purpose. As
far as we can see, the Evangehst might as weU be
conceived to introduce the fragment of a genealogy
for the sake of making a transition to a new topic, as
a phrase like this.
These curiosities of interpretation remind us of
the incongruous representations of the Tiibingen
criticism in regard to the relation of the Evangelist
to the synoptical writers. All concede that the fourth
Gospel, in structure and contents, has the character
of an independent narrative. This independence the
Tubingen critics, in many instances, exaggerate into
an intended contradiction, and a seemingly needless

REFUTATION OF BAUR. 145
;ontradiction on essential points. Yet they affirm,
in the same breath, that even on these points where
the Evangelist wantonly breaks loose from the synop
tical authorities, he slavishly borrows from them. It
is in imitation of the synoptical writers that John
makes Jesus visit Jerusalem to attend festivals ; yet
he does not scruple to contradict them in multiplying
the number of these visits : he takes from the other
Gospels the circumstance of the scourging in the
temple, but transfers it from the end to the beginning
of his ministry : he is dependent on the same writers
for much that is said of John's baptism " with water,"
and his recognition of Jesus (John i. 31, 35), and yet,
implies that Jesus was not baptized. For these and'
numerous other supposed deviations from the Synop
tics, the critics are able to assign no sufficient reasons..
The Synoptics might have been followed, and the ends
attributed to the Evangelist equally well secured.
The Tubingen pretension is most inconsistent when
single words and scraps of sentences are aUeged to be
borrowed from the first three Gospels, although the
passages where they are found in the Evangelist, are,
in their matter, original and wholly independent of
those Gospels. A good example is the passage,
" Arise, let us go hence " (John xiv. 31), which has
already been referred to. Sometimes Baur is obliged
to faU back on hypotheses more characteristic of
Strauss, in order to provide his readers with some
explanation of the narratives of miracles. Thus, the
10

146 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
raising of Lazarus is to present an exertion of miracu
lous power, which is a grade above the case, in the
Synoptics, of the raising of the son of the widow of
Nain. Of course, not a particle of proof is vouch
safed in support of this empty conjecture. Again,
Baur contends that the narrative of the healing of the
nobleman's son (John iv. 46 seq.) is a copy or imita
tion of the narrative in Matt. viii. 5 seq. of the cure
of the centurion's servant. Baur supposes that the
former narrative was to prove the superiority, in the
judgment of Christ, of a faith which rests oh his
word alone; and he further supposes that -a constant
aim of the fourth Gospel is to covertly extol the
susceptibility of the Gentiles, in contrast with the
unbelief of the Jews. Now in Matthew's narrative
(Matt, viii.), Jesus is represented to have marvelled
at the centurion's faith, and to have said : " Verily I
say unto you, I have not found so great faith, no, not
in Israel ! " If the author of John were foUowing
Matthew's narrative, this would be the most, welcome
and the most apposite passage in the whole of it. Yet
he omits it altogether ! Can a hypothesis receive a
more complete overthrow than is experienced by that
of Baur concerning this portion of John ?
We have judged it desirable thus to sift the inter
pretations of the Tubingen critics, for the sake of
thoroughly acquainting our readers with the character
of the arguments which are relied upon in the assault
upon the genuineness of this Gospel.' Be it remem-

REFUTATION OF BAUR.

147

bered that all this unsound, artificial interpretation is
indispensable to the success of their cause. A corres
pondence must be found between the various inci
dents, conversations, discourses, in John and the
theological "tendency" which has the credit of
fabricating them. A failure to detect this corres
pondence, in the detailed investigation of the Gospel,
and by a fair exegesis of it, is the downfall of the
entire theory, even if there were nothing else to be
said against it. That such a failure is justly attribu
table to the critic, the foregoing examination has
sufficiently evinced.
In a previous part of this Essay, we have re
marked upon the proofs of an interest in the history
as such— a genuine historical feeling — on the part of
the author of this Gospel. These are proofs which, be
ing obviously undesigned features in the narrative, are
peculiarly impressive. And since the variations in
John from the synoptical Gospels can be accounted
for on no such theory as that of the Tubingen critics,
we are authorized in pronouncing them evidences
of the faithful recoUection of the Evangelist. Let the
reader examine his account of the baptism of Jesus
and the testimony to Jesus by the Baptist (John i.
19-37); his record of. the caUing of the apostles
(John i. 35-43) ; his description of the designation
of the traitor, at the last supper (John xiii. 21-30) ;
his narrative of the denials of Peter (John xviii. 15

148 ulAUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
seq.) ; iris specification- of the dates of the supper and
the crucifixion ; his relation of the circumstances
attending the last journey of Jesus to Jerusalem. Let
the reader compare the Evangelist in these places
with corresponding passages in the Synoptics, and
he will feel that he has in his hands an independent
and accurately informed historian.
When Baur, leaving the special criticism of the
Gospel, proceeds to state his conception of the charac
ter and motives of the author of this extraordinary
composition, he betrays, if we mistake not, in his
lowered, apologetic tone, some feeling of embarrass
ment. What conception have the Tubingen critics
of the writer of this Gospel ? He was a man, as
Baur says, of remarkable mind, of an elevated spirit,
and penetrated with a warm, adoring faith in Christ
as the Son of God and Saviour of the world. That
faith must have been founded on the evangelical
history. At least, it must have involved a reverential
sense of the sacredness of that history. How could
such a man fabricate a life of his Master, as a sub
stitute for the authentic lives with which he was
acquainted? How could he pervert, distort, falsify
transactions, with the reality of which his holiest feel
ings were bound up ; artfully assuming to be an
apostle and confidant of the Lord, for the sake of
ascribing to him discourses that he never uttered and
deeds that he never performed ! Baur compares the

REFUTATION OF BAUR.

149

Evangelist with the Apostle Paul.1 He, says Baur,
was not one of the original disciples. It was only
through visions that he personally knew Christ. And
Baur draws a deliberate parallel between the Apostle
to the Gentiles, and the unknown but gifted and
ardently believing author of this Gospel. The com
parison is an unhappy one for his theory. Imagine
the Apostle Paul sitting down to fabricate a fictitious
history of the Saviour ! Imagine him casting away
the authentic deeds and words of Christ and invent
ing in the room of them a fictitious tale of his life !
The thought of so sacrUegious an act could never
occur to his earnest soul. Had it been suggested by
another, with what indignation and horror would he
have repelled the proposal ! No reader of the Pauline
Epistles wiU have a doubt on this point. Yet an im
posture even more flagrant is attributed to the
author of the fourth Gospel, for he claims to be a com
panion of Christ ; while at the same time his accusers
associate him with Paul, as a counterpart in intellec
tual and moral qualities, and in the depth and ardor of
his faith in the Lord. The religionists, weak-minded
and of obscure moral perceptions, who are responsible
for the clumsy fabrications found in the apocryphal
Gospels, for the most part confined themselves to
those periods of Christ's life where the canonical
authors are silent, such as the infancy of the Lord.
They sougltt to connect with the authentic narratives
1 Baur's Kan. Evangelien, s. 384.

150 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
their silly inventions. It was reserved for the writer
of the fourth Gospel to attain to that pitch of audacity,
or that confusion as to the distinction between truth
and falsehood, which qualified him to extend his
cleverly executed fraud over the whole contents of
the evangelical history. And yet he was one fit to be
placed in the same category with Paul !
It is incredible that a work of the power and
loftiness of the fourth Gospel should have sprung up
in the second century. Let any one who would
understand the difference between the apostolic and
the next foUowing age undertake to read the Apostolic
Fathers. He will be conscious at once that he has
passed into another atmosphere. He has descended
from the heights of inspiration to the level of ordinary,
and often feeble, thinking. In the first haU of the
second century there is no writer of marked origi
nality; none who can be called fresh or suggestive.
To set a work like the fourth Gospel in that age is a
literary anachronism. That a writer, towering so
above aU his contemporaries, should stoop to wear a
mask, and gain his end by a hateful, Jesuitical contri
vance, is a supposition burdened with difficulties. The
irrational character of this hypothesis, Neander has
well shown in a passage which is valuable alike for
its thoughts and for the source whence they come, and
with which we conclude the present Essay.
"The whole development of the Church from
Justin Martyr onward testifies to the presence of such

REFUTATION OF BAUR. 151
a Gospel, which operated powerfully on men's minds.
It cannot be explained from any single mental ten
dency in the foUowing age, nor from the amalgama
tion of several. To be sure, this production existed
as a representation of a higher unity, as a reconciling
element with reference to the contrarieties of that age,
and could exert an attractive power over minds of
so opposite a kind as a Heracleon, a Clement of Alex
andria, an Irenaeus, and a Tertullian. Where should
we be able to find in that age a man who was eleva
ted above its contrarieties of opinion [Gegensiitze],
by which everything is more or less swayed? And
a man of so superior a Christian soul, must needs
skulk in the dark, avail • himself of such a mask,
instead of appearing openly in the consciousness of
aU-conquering truth and in the feeling of his mental
preeminence ! Such a man, so exalted above aU the
church Fathers of that century, had no need, forsooth,
to shrink from the conflict. He must certainly have
put more confidence in the might of truth than in
these arts of darkness and falsehood. And how can
it be shown that such a man, when he is contemplated
from the point of view of his own age, would have
been restrained by no reverence for sacred history, by
no scruples, from falsifying a history, the contents
of which were holy to him, through arbitrary fictions,
manufactured in the interest of a given dogmatic
tendency, — through lies, in fact, which were to find
their justification in the end to be attained by means

152 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
of them ? And how unskilfully would he have pro
ceeded if, in order to attain his end, he presented the
history of Christ in a way that was in absolute con
trast with the universally accepted tradition? Nay,
only from such an apostle, who stood in such a rela
tion to Christ as a John stood, who had thus taken up
into his own being the impression and image of that
unique personality, could proceed a work which stands
in such a relation to the contrarieties of the post-
apostolic age. It is a work out of one gush, original
throughout. The Divine in its own nature has this
power of composing differences, but never could a
product so fresh, so original in its power [urkriiftiges],
proceed from a contrived, shrewdly planned, recon
ciliation of differences. This Gospel, if it do not
emanate from the Apostle John and point to that
Christ, the intuition of whom, on the part of the
writer, gave birth to it, is the greatest of enigmas."1
1 Meander's Geschichte d. Fflanz. u. Leit. der Kirche, 4 A. B. 2
s. 637

ESSAY III.
RECENT DISCUSSIONS UPON THE ORIGIN OF THE
FIRST' THREE GOSPELS.
The characteristics which belong in common tc
the first three Gospels, and distinguish them from the
Gospel of John, we suppose to be familiar to the
reader. The first three Gospels — the Synoptics — ¦
dwell chiefly upon the GaUlean ministry of Jesus.
Compared with John, they are less heedful of the
chronological order. In »truth, the chronological out
line of the Saviour's ministry can be gathered from
the fourth Gospel alone. The Synoptics not only
have a large amount of matter in common, but
their consonance in phraseology extends too far to
be the result of accident; at the same time that
the divergences, existing side by side with this resem
blance, equally demand an explanation. This mingled
divergence and coincidence have put to the test the
ingenuity of critics. One general theory is that of an
original Gospel, existing prior to the three, but revised
or enlarged by each historian independently. But
this theory has two branches, there being some who
hold that the original Gospel was a written work,
whUst others consider it a mass of oral tradition which

154 ORIGIN OF THE FIRST THREE GOSPELS.
had acquired a fixed form. The other general theory-
is that of a priority on the part of one of the evange
lists, the use of whose work by a successor gives occa
sion to the peculiarity in question. But the various
hypotheses which have been brought forward under
this theory, or the different views as to the order
in which the Gospels were written, exhaust the possi
bilities of supposition. They form, in fact, an ex
ample in permutation. Matthew, Luke, and Mark,
was the series in the hypothesis of Griesbach, which
has been extensively followed. Another set of critics
are equally confident that the precedence in age
belongs to Mark.1 Others, again, are satisfied with
neither of these views. The long-continued diversity
of opinion on the subject is a sign of the difficulty of
the problem. This problem we do not propose to
discuss in the present Essay. We might even waive
the question whether these three narratives were com
posed by the persons to whom they are respectively
ascribed, were it not that this question cannot be
wholly disconnected from the proposition which we
deem to be of prime importance. Could it be shown,
as is maintained by some critics who accept the narra
tive as substantially historical and credible, that the
first Gospel was not written by Matthew, the propo
sition with which we are at present concerned, would
1 For a full classification of critical opinions on this subject, see
Meyer's Einleitung to the first volume of his commentary on thft
N. T., or Holtzmann's recent work, Die Synoptische Evangclien.1863.

AIM OF THE SKEPTICAL SCHOOL. 155
not be seriously affected. What, then, is the question
of fundamental importance, on which the credibility
of the Gospel history turns?
The main thing which the skeptical school seeks to
accomplish, as far as the first three Gospels are con
cerned, is to bring down their date into the post-apos
tolic age. History is testimony. The credibility of
testimony depends — supposing that those who give it
Avish to tell the truth — on their means of information.
The credibUity of the Gospels is conditioned on the
fact that they emanate either from actual witnesses of
the events recorded, or from well-informed contempo
raries. If it could be established that these narratives
were drawn up, long after the actors in the events, and
the generation contemporaneous with them, had passed
away — that they comprise floating stories and tradi
tions which were gathered up at or after the end of
the century in which Christ and his immediate disci
ples, and those who heard their teaching, hved — their
historical value might well be caUed in question. To
support some hypothesis of this kind, or at least
to throw a mist of uncertainty over the whole question
of the origin and date of the Gospels, is the end and
aim of skeptical criticism. We, on our part, maintain
that nothing has been brought forward in behalf
of the skeptical cause, which tends to weaken the
established view that the Gospels belong to the apos
tolic age, embody the testimony of the eyewitnesses
and earwitnesses of the life of Christ, and come

156 ORIGIN OF THE FIRST THREE GOSPELS.
down to us with the seal and sanction of the apos
tolic Church.
We are not required to review in detaU the proofs
of the early date of these histories. It will be suffi
cient to examine the grounds on which the received
view is sought to be impugned. It may be well,
however, to remind the reader, in a few words, of the
nature of the proof which has been relied on for estab
lishing the early origin of the first three Gospels
— as it is these which we are now to consider.
Every fair and discerning reader must feel how well
the whole tone and style of these writings comport
with the belief that they emanate from the first age of
Christianity. GalUee is reflected in them in a thousand
indefinable touches. Christ — to mention a single
peculiarity — has not come to be an habitual name of
the Saviour, as it begins to be even in the Epistles
and in John, but is purely an official title. In these
Gospels he is simply called Jesus. For the early date
of the first three Gospels, we have the unanimous
voice of Christian antiquity. They are considered and
declared by the early Church to be authoritative pro
ductions handed down from the apostolic age. We
find in the writers of the post-apostolic period no
other conception of the life and ministry of Christ
than is presented in the canonical Gospels. We meet
here and there with a saying of Christ or an incident
in his life which they would seem to have derived
from some other source of knowledge ; but these ex-

DATE OF THE SYNOPTICAL GOSPELS.

157

ceptions are so very few and unimportant as to render
the prevailing fact of the coincidence between the
representation of the Fathers and that of the Gospels
the more striking. The apostolic Fathers do not
formally, state the sources whence their quotations are
drawn. They commonly bring forward a fact of the
Saviour's life or a passage of his teaching, without
formal reference to the authority from which they
derived it. Nor do they evince any care for verbal
accuracy. But the apostolic Fathers, the contempo
raries and survivors of the apostles, contain many
passages which are unmistakably drawn from the
synoptical Gospels. The peculiar method of intro
ducing New Testament passages favors the supposi
tion that they quote from recognized documents.
At least in one important passage, an authoritative
written source is expressly referred to. Barnabas
remarks : x " Let us therefore beware, lest it should
happen to us as it is written .- there are many called,
few chosen." This quotation, which is found in Matt.
xx. 16 and xxn. 14, is introduced by the same phrase
which the Jews made use of in citing from their
sacred books. Barnabas referred to some book having
a like authority among Christians, and in no other
book of this class except our Matthew is the passage
found. The value of this "quotation as a decisive.
proof that, when it was made, the Gospel of Matthew
1 c. iv. Whether the Epistle of Barnabas be genuine or not, it ie
oertainly very early.

158 ORIGIN OF THE FIRST THREE GOSPELS.
was clothed with canonical authority, has been fully
established by the recent discovery of the Greek text
of Barnabas in the Codex Sinaiticus. By this docu
ment the phrase, it is written, is proved to be a part
of the original, and not an addition of the Latin
translator, as Credner and others had been inclined to
maintain. The Epistle of Barnabas belongs in the
early part of the second century. That a canon
of the New Testament had begun to be formed,
is also clearly indicated by this manner of quota
tion. That Matthew did not stand as the sole Gos-
pel in this canon, Tischendorf has argued on good
grounds.1 The drift of the evidence points to the
conclusion that the four Gospels enjoyed then the
preeminence which they bear in Justin and the wri
ters that follow him. This we know, that the long
scrutiny which has been directed to the quotations in
Justin has established, beyond all reasonable doubt, the
fact of a use by him of all of our canonical Gospels.
And Justin was born a little more than ten years
before the end of the first century, and less than
twenty years after the capture of Jerusalem, and at a
time when the Apostle John was probably still living.
From Matthew and Luke especially, his citations are
very numerous.
Let us now take up the Synoptics in their order,
commencing with
1 See Tischendorf, Wain wurden die Evangelien vcrfasst ? p. 42 seq.

MATTHEW. 159

Matthew,

I. We begin with an examination of the tes
timony of Papias, which, in respect to both Mat
thew and Mark, is most valuable, and has properly
attracted the earnest attention of modern critics.
Renan buUds upon this testimony, or rather upon his
misconception of it, his theory respecting the origin
of the Gospels. Scholars of every school unite in
their estimate of the importance to be attached to this
piece of evidence. ,
Papias was bishop of Hierapolis, in Phrygia, in the
first half of the second century. Pie is described by
Irenaeus 1 as " an ancient man," a contemporary and
friend of Polycarp, who was a disciple of John the
Evangelist. Irenaeus also states that Papias had
himself heard the Apostle John, but Eusebius con
siders that Irenaeus errs in this particular by wrongly
interpreting the language of Papias. But Papias says
of himself that he made inquiries of many persons
who had been familiar with the apostles, and he was
certainly acquainted with John the Presbyter, who
was a contemporary of John the Apostle at Ephesus.
Partly, but not wholly, on account of his mUlenarian
views, so offensive to Eusebius, Papias is pronounced
by the latter a man of inferior talents. But however
moderate his intellectual powers, he was justly re
garded as an honest witness or reporter of what he
1 Quoted in Euseb., E. E., Lib. iii. c. 39.

160 ORIGIN OF THE FIRST THREE GOSPELS.
had seen and heard.1 He reports what he had re
ceived from companions of the apostles. He busied
himself with gathering up from oral tradition, the
declarations of the apostles, which he published, with
comments of his own, in' a work consisting of five
books. From this work, Eusebius presents us with
the foUowing extract :
" And John the Presbyter said this : ' Mark being
the interpreter of Peter wrote accurately whatever he
remembered, though indeed not [setting down] in
order what was said or done by Christ, for he did not
hear the Lord, nor did he follow him : but afterwards,
as I said, [he followed] Peter, who adapted his dis
courses to the necessities of the occasion, but not so as
to furnish a systematic account of the oracles of the
Lord (xvpiccxcov Xoyecov or Xoycov) ; so that Mark
committed no fault when he wrote some things as he
recollected them. For of one thing he took care — to
pass by nothing which he heard, and not to falsify in
anything.'" "Such," adds Eusebius, "is the relation
in Papias concerning Mark. But of Matthew this is
said : ' Matthew wrote the oracles (rec Xoyiu) in the
Hebrew tongue ; and every one interpreted them as he
was able.'"
The often-quoted passage in Papias relative to the colossal
grapes to be expected in the Millennial age awakens no doubt as to
his veracity. It only shows that apocryphal sayings of Christ were
early set in circulation, and by its contrast with the style of the
canonical Gospels, confirms their veracity.

MATTHEW. 161
The passage had always been considered, up to r
recent date, as referring to our Gospels of Matthew
and Mark. It was suggested, however, by Schleier
macher that the logia, which we have rendered ora
cles, signifies only discourses; and hence a number
of critics, including the distinguished commentator,
Meyer, have founded upon this testimony of Papias
the opinion that at the basis of our first Gospel, and
prior to it, was a collection by Matthew of the teach
ings of Christ, and that the canonical Gospel was the
product of a subsequent addition of narrative matter
to that earlier work.
We believe this restriction of the sense of logia*.
in the passage, to be unauthorized and erroneous, andl
that the old interpretation of Papias, the interpreta
tion which Eusebius evidently gave the passage, is the;
true one. It is well, however, to see how the case:
stands, provided the term receives the limited meaning,
which these critics affix to it. Papias, in what he1
says of Matthew, does not quote the Presbyter;;
yet it may safely be concluded that he derived' this,
information from the same earher authorities whence
the rest of his work was drawn.
The principal remark we have to make here is,,
that even supposing logia to mean discourses simply,
yet Papias is speaking, as Meyer concedes and maim
tains, aoristicaUy— of something that had occurred at
a former time, but was no longer the fact. That
is, when he says that "everv one interpreted the
11

162 ORIGIN OF THE FIRST THREE GOSPELS.
Hebrew Matthew as he could " — fiqfxr\vtvG8 §" (xvru
cog rjdvvaTO txaGiog — he means, and imphes in his
language, that the necessity of rendering the Hebrew
into the Greek had once existed, to be sure, but ex
isted no longer. Why not ? Evidently because the
Greek Matthew was now in the hands of Christians.
This Greek Matthew which Papias and his contempo
raries used, was unquestionably our first Gospel in its
present form. Our Greek Matthew is represented by
the Fathers to be a translation of a Hebrew Gospel.
If we admit the correctness of the tradition, then, as
Meyer shows, the Hebrew Matthew must have re
ceived its supplement of narrative matter, and in its
complete form been generaUy connected with the
name of this apostle, before the Greek version Was
made. The hypothesis that this' Gospel received es
sential changes or additions of matter, subsequent to
the time of Papias, is excluded by an overwhelming
i
weight of evidence. There is^ indeed, other and suffi
cient proof that our Matthew existed in its present
form within thirty or forty years of the Saviour's
death. But independently of this proof, and even
when the sense of logia is limited, the testimony of
Papias himself — still more, if that testimony emanates,
as is probably the fact, from pupils of apostles whom
he had consulted — carries back the date of our Mat
thew, in its present form, into the apostolic age.
But if logia cover the narrative matter as weU as
the discourses, and U Papias thus refers to the Gospel

MATTHEW. 163
of Matthew as we have it, the early origin of the
Gospel is explicitly attested.
That such is the real purport of the logia is
apparent from the following considerations :
1. The word is capable of this more extended
import. It denotes sacred words — oracles; and with
its kindred terms has this meaning not only in ecclesi
astical writers, but also in the New Testament. It is
probably used in Heb. v. 12 as an equivalent for
the whole Christian revelation. The restriction of its
meaning by Meyer, in this place, is opposed by other
good critics, including Bleek.1 We have a clear
example in Luke i. 4 : " that thou mightest know the
certainty of those things— ^-Xoyav — wherein thou hast
been instructed." Luke writes a consecutive histoiy
of the life and ministry of Jesus in order to assure
Theophilus of the certainty of the things which were
believed among Christians, and had been taught him.
The contents of the Gospel of Luke which follows,
1 \6yia is used for the Old Testament — the whole revelation of
God — in Romans iii. 2. Other passages where the word is found,
are Wisdom xvi. 11 (comp. v. 5) ; Acts vii. 38 ; 1 Peter iv. 11. For the
sense of the word in ecclesiastical writers, see Suidas sub voce ; also
Wettstein, T. ii. p. 36. Important illustrative passages are Ignatius ad
Smyr. c. iii, and the classification of the Scriptures by Ephraem Syrus
(in Photius). In this last place, ra KvpiaKa \6yia seems to be plainly
a designation of the Gospels. We may observe here, that even if the
sense of logia in Papias were, philologically considered, doubtful, the
existence of another work than our Matthew, for which there is not
a particle of evidence from any other source, could not be inferred
from a single doubtful expression.

164 ORIGIN OF THE FIRST THREE GOSPELS.
constitute the logoi. Even Meyer allows that the
narrative matter is included in the word, though
indirectly.. The objection of Credner, that the applica
tion of the term logia, in the sense of divine words, to
the New Testament writings, presupposes a view of
their inspiration which was not prevalent so early as
the time of Papias, has, in our judgment, no vaUdity.
The reverence of Papias for the declarations of the
apostles, which breathes through the whole passage in
Eusebius, accords weU with such a mode of character
izing them. The form of the quotation from Matthew
in Barnabas, on which we have commented above,
shows the error of Credner 's opinion. The whole of
the apostles' testimony in regard to the teachings and
works of Christ, constituted the logia — the oracles of
the Lord, or the oracles pertaining to the Lord.1
2. It is well-nigh certain that in the account which
Papias gives of Mark's Gospel, the logia includes the
works as weU as words of Christ. Papias attributes a
want of order to Mark's record of the words and
works of Christ — the things " said or done " by Him.
He then proceeds to explain the reason of this peculi
arity. Mark had derived his information from listening
to the discourses of Peter. But Peter was in the habit
1 It has been thought by some that the works and words of Christ
were termed the " logia of the Lord," as being the total expression
which He made of Himself. But this is less natural. Nor do we
think that other critics are right in referring the logia to the dis
courses, as being the predominant feature of the gospel, or the
feature with which Papias was chiefly concerned.

MATTHEW.

165

of selecting his matter to suit the occasion, and there
fore did not furnish a systematic statement of the logia
of the Lord.1 How can the logia here denote anything
less than " the things said or done ? " Papias adds,
that in writing some things according to his recollec
tion, Mark committed no fault. Even, here Meyer's
lexical scrupulosity would fain limit the logia to the
discourses of Christ, and then make the " some things,"
which Mark set down without following the chrono
logical order, relate only to this part of his reports.
But this interpretation is obviously strained, and
appears to be directly overthrown by the circumstance
that Papias attributes the absence of order to Mark's
reports of the deeds as weU as the words of Christ.
Why should Peter observe the chronological order
more carefuUy in referring to incidents in the life of
Christ, than in recalling his discourses ? That logia
has the comprehensive meaning in the description of
Matthew, is thus proved by the extended sense which
we are under the necessity of attributing to it in the
passage that follows respecting Mark.
3. If the logia do not embrace the whole of Mat
thew, then Papias furnishes no account of the origin
of the Gospel, with the exception of that part of it
which includes the discourses of Christ. He had in
his hands, as Meyer and aU sound critics admit, our
complete Gospel of Matthew. It would be natural
for him, if he began to give an account of its origin,
1 The reading of Heinichen here is \6yav ; but Xo-yiW is the read
ing adopted by other good critics. See Meyer and Bleek.

166 ORIGIN OF THE FIRST THREE GOSPELS.
to explain how the narrative portions of the Gospel were
brought into it. Eusebius takes it for granted that
Papias is explaining the origin of the canonical Gospel of
Matthew, and for this reason cites the passage. Neither
Eusebius nor any writer before him, nor any writer for
fifteen centuries after him, knew anything of a collection
of discourses of Matthew, or of any work of Matthew,
save the entire canonical Gospel which bears his name.
4. Irenaeus, whom Meyer elsewhere l pronounces
an independent witness on the subject, says that Mat
thew wrote his Gospel in the Hebrew. Irenaeus gives
the same tradition which is given by Papias, who was
an old man when Irenaeus was a youth. Irenaeus
knows nothing of a composition of a report of the
Saviour's discourses by the Apostle Matthew, which
received a narrative supplement from some later hand.
The other writers of the second century are equally
ignorant of a fact which,' if it be contained in the testi
mony of Papias, must have been generaUy known.
5. The work of Papias himself was entitled an
Exposition of the Oracles {Xoyicov) of the Lord. But,
as we know from the fragments that remain, it was
partly made up of narrative matter. Incidents in the
life of Christ, and teachings of Christ, equally found a
place in this work. Meyer, unjustifiably as we think,
would make the narrative matter in Papias a part, not
of the logia, but of the Exposition attached to the
logia. The truth seems to be that Papias gathered up
1 Meyer's Einl z. Matthaus, s, 5.

MATTHEW.

167

all that he could hear of what the disciples of Christ
had reported of him, and accompanied this record with
observations of his own.
We are persuaded, and we trust that the con
siderations above presented will convince our readers,
that this restriction of the sense of logia, which goes
no farther back than Schleiermacher, and is a subtlety
that escaped Eusebius and Irenaeus, is without any
good foundation. And we are brought to the conclu
sion that the testimony of Papias, that " ancient man,"
who had been conversant with many of the disciples
of the apostles, establishes the fact of the origin of
the first Gospel in the apostolic age.
II. The relation of the Gospel of Matthew to the
uncanonical Gospel of the Hebrews, affords proof of
the early date of the former.
The Gospel of the Hebrews, written in the Aramaic
dialect, was the most widely known of all the uncanon
ical Gospels. It was the Gospel in use among the
Hebrew Christian sects, which were separated from the
general Church. It existed, however, in varying forms.
Thus, the stricter Ebionites had cut off the first two
chapters, in which the circumstances attending the
miraculous birth of the Saviour were related. The
numerous aUusions in the Fathers to the Gospel of the
Hebrews — the tvayyiXiov xccir' 'Efiqaiovg—mske it
clear that it had a close resemblance to the canonical
Matthew. A careful comparison demonstrates that it

168 ORIGIN OF THE FIRST THREE GOSPELS.
was our Matthew, altered and amplified. That the
priority belongs to the canonical Gospel — whether it
existed originaUy in the Plebrew or the Greek, we will
not now inquire — is established. For example, in the
Latin translation of Origen's commentary on Matthew,
there is quoted from the Gospel of the Plebrews a
narrative of the conversation of the young man with
Jesus, a passage corresponding to Matthew xix. 16 seq.
The young man, as in Matthew, comes to Jesus with
his question as to the method of attaining eternal
life. Jesus tells him to obey the law and the prophets.
" He replies, ' I have done so.' Jesus said unto him,
'come, sell all that thou hast and divide among the
poor, and come, follow me.' But the rich man began to
scratch his head, and was not pleased," etc. No one can
doubt in regard to such a passage, that it springs from
the amplification of the simple narrative in Matthew.
The narrative is spun out with apocryphal details.1
We are concerned to ascertain, next, the age of the
Gospel of the Hebrews. It was certainly known to
Hegesippus, before the middle part of the second
century. And there is no reason to think that it was
then new. HimseU a Hebrew Christian by birth, he
had probably been long acquainted with it. But we
will not indulge in conjecture. It is safe to affirm that
the Church received no evangelical history from the
1 The priority of Matthew has been convincingly shown by vari
ous writers; among them _ by Franck, in a thorough Article in the
Studien u. Kritiken, 1848, 2.

MATTHEW.

169

judaizing Christians after the latter had become separa
ted. The existence of the Gospel of Matthew among
them — for the Gospel of the Hebrews was an altered
Matthew — requires us to conclude that it enjoyed a
general acceptance before the Jewish-Christian parties
were formed. But these acquired a distinct existence,
according to the trustworthy testimony of Hegesippus,
at the beginning, or about the beginning, of the second
century. Before this, however, and from the time of
the destruction of Jerusalem, the movement towards
separation began. The judaizing Christians looked
with growing jealousy and hostUity upon the GentUe
believers and their churches. To our mind, it is
altogether improbable that the Gospel of Matthew
could have been composed, and have been accepted
by both classes of Christians, at any time subsequent
— to say the least, long subsequent — to the destruction
of Jerusalem by Titus. Besides the difficulty of ac
counting for its acceptance on both sides, on the sup
position of a later date, the partisan feelings of the
judaizing Christian would infaUibly have been reflected
on its pages. But in this artless chronicle there is
not the slightest trace of judaizing bitterness.
III. We have to consider now the prophecies of
the second advent of Christ, which are contained in
Matthew, in their bearing on the date of the Gospel.
In touching upon this topic, we are brought in
contact, indeed, with the principal exegetical difficulty

170 ORIGIN OF THE FIRST THREE GOSPELS.
in the New Testament. The final advent of Christ to
judgment, and the destruction of Jerusalem, appear
to have been connected together in time,, as if the
former were to foUow immediately upon the latter.
After what seems clearly to be a prediction of the
downfaU of Jerusalem (Matthew xxiv. 1-29), we read
that "immediately (ev&sag) after the tribulation of
those days," the Son of Man wUl come in the clouds
of heaven, in the sight of " aU the tribes " on earth,
and " gather together his elect from the four winds,
from one end of heaven to the other " (vs. 29-32,
comp. c. xxv. 31 seq. and Luke xxi. 27, 31). And we
read (in ver. 34) : " this generation (ysved) shaU not
pass, till aU these things be fulfilled."
We are not caUed upon, in this place, to consider
the difficulty that is presented by these passages. The
paramount question of the origin and date of the
Gospel is the question which we have in hand. That
our Saviour did not predict that the world would come
to an end instantly on the destruction of Jerusalem, is
shown by other parts of his own teaching. Pie is
represented in the synoptical Gospels as declaring that
the time when the end would occur was not a subject
of Revelation, but a secret of the Father. In a more
comprehensive way, he said to the disciples (Acts i. 7) :
" It is not for you to know the times or seasons, which
the Father hath put in his own power." And the
apostles, though hoping and looking for the end, did
not claim in their Epistles to be taught by Inspiration

MATTHEW.

171

when the end would come. Moreover, there are
various teachings of the Saviour in regard to His king
dom, which imply a slow progress and a long operation
of the gospel in the world. It is like leaven. It is like a
grain of mustard-seed. It is the salt of the earth. It
is to be preached to all nations. He compares Himself,
as to the moral effect of His death, to the corn of wheat
which, if it do not fall into the earth and die, " abideth
alone ; but U it die, it bringeth forth much fruit."
We can afford^ in the present discussion, to waive
the inquiry how these predictions as they are set down
in the first Gospel (and so substantially in Mark and
Luke), are reconeUable with these other teachings of
Christ and with historical fact. It is enough that
skeptics, almost with one voice, have maintained that
here is really a distinct prediction that the end of the
world would occur in connection with the destruction
of Jerusalem and within the lUetime of the generation
then on the stage; Theodore Parker has expressed
this view. Gibbon makes the supposed prediction a
theme of his elaborate satire. Now, if this be their
interpretation, they are compeUed to acknowledge that
the Gospel which contains this erroneous prophecy
appeared in its present form before Jerusalem was
captured by Titus, or before the year 70. It must
have been written as early as thirty or forty years after
the Saviour's death. No Gospel- writer would set forth
without explanation a prediction of a mighty event,
which aU his readers would know had not been verified.

172 ORIGIN OF THE FIRST THREE GOSPELS.
No writer in the year 80, or 90, or 100, would fix
the date of the end of the world at the destruction of Je
rusalem, in a document which he wished to be believed.
We may even take a step farther. If some inter
pretations of the passages in Matthew be adopted,
which recognize an infaUible accuracy in the synoptical
reports of the Saviour's teaching, yet it may be safely
held that had the Evangehst been writing at a later
time, some explanation would have been thrown in to
remove the seeming discrepancy between prophecy and
fulfilment. If it be supposed, for example, that in
the perspective opened to the prophetic vision, two
grand events, though parted in reahty by a long
interval, were brought together — as distant mountain-
peaks when approached are found to be far apart —
yet it would be natural to expect that when the
interval had actuaUy disclosed itself to the observer,
some intimation of the ''fact would be dropped. So
that even on the orthodox, as weU as on the skeptical,
interpretation of the eschatology in the Synoptics,
their early date is manifest.
It remains for us to notice the Tubingen hypo
thesis concerning Matthew. Baur's general theory is
not the mythical theory, but " the tendency-theory."
He has discussed and pointed out the weakness of the
procedure of Strauss in his attempt to disprove the
statements of the fourth Gospel by opposing to them
the authority of the Synoptics, and at the same time
to contradict the Synoptics by quoting the fourth

MATTHEW. 173
Gospel against them. If there is to be any positive
construction of the evangelical history, as Baur per
ceived, there must be gained somewhere a firm stand
ing-place. This he finds in the first Gospel. Not
that even this Gospel is fully authentic and historical.
Yet there is in Matthew a substantial kernel of his
torical truth. All the Gospels are, more or less, the
product of a theological tendency ; that is, they result
from the artificial recasting and amplifying of the veri
table history in order to suit the views of some theo
logical party or interest in the primitive church. In
Matthew, the Jewish-Christian side is the prevaUing
motive determining the cast and tone of the narrative.
Luke represents the opposite, or Gentile, party. But
the first Gospel is less inspired by a definite, dogmat
ical interest, which leads in the other Gospels to the
conscious alteration and fabrication of history; and
Baur is disposed to concede to Strauss that there is a
larger admixture of the myth or the unconscious crea
tions of feehng in Matthew, than is true of the
remaining Gospels.
When we come to inquire for a precise explanation
of the origin of the first* Gospel, we are met with
very divergent responses from the various choir-leaders
of the Tubingen school. In fact, with respect to the
whole of the special criticism by which they seek
to convict the Gospels of being tendenz-schriften, they
are hardly less at variance with each other than
with the Christian world generally. Passages that

174 ORIGIN OF THE FIRST THREE GOSPELS.
are confidently quoted by one critic in proof of a
certain " tendency," are aUeged by another as iUustra-
tions of a " tendency " exactly opposite. With regard
to Matthew, Hilgenfeld, who agrees, in this particular,
with Strauss, does not limit the sense of the logia of
Papias so as to exclude narrative matter; yet he
pretends to be able to dissect the first Gospel and to
separate a primitive Matthew — an TJr-Mafthaus — from
later accretions. We are absolved from the necessity
of foUowing him in the baseless and arbitrary division
which he seeks* to run through the contents of Mat
thew, since his construction has gained so little ap
plause even from his master. But we may attend for
a moment to Baur's own view. He appears to take
the logia in the restricted meaning, and to attach some
importance to the supposed tradition of a coUecti'on
of logia, forming the basis of our Matthew. This
hypothesis we have aheady examined. Baur's effort
to bring down the date of the Gospel into the second
century is a bad failure. Desirous of holding that
the second advent is foretold as immediately subse
quent to the predicted destruction of Jerusalem, he is
obliged to refer the latter prediction to some other
war than that of Titus. Accordingly, he interprets it
as applying to the war of Hadrian in the year 131 or
132, and therefore fixes the date of the composition of
the Gospel between 130 and 134! It is unfortunate
for this bold assertion, that our Matthew was an au
thoritative writing among Christians, and read as such

MATTHEW. 175
in their assembUes " in city and country," in the time
of Justin Martyr, who was born near the end of the
first century. But aside from this historical testi
mony, which it is vain to attempt to invalidate, Baur'
interpretation can be easily proved to be palpably
false. Ih the destruction of Jerusalem foretold in
Matthew (xxiv. 1-4) the temple was to be laid in
ruins. This was accomplished by Titus, and not by
Hadrian. With what face then can the prophecy be
referred to the war of Hadrian ? It is doubtful, in
deed, whether, in this last war, there was even a des
truction of the city. The paraUel passages in the
other evangelists (see Luke xxi. 5-7, 12, 20), deter
mine the reference of the prediction to the war of
Titus, beyond the possibility of doubt. Moreover,
" this generation " was not to pass away before this
event was to occur. Baur claims that this phrase —
ri ytvid avvrj — may cover a period as long as a cen
tury. But this claim is void of truth. The phrase
everywhere in the New Testament signifies the average
term of human life, and was held, according to the
Greek usage, to be equivalent to a third of a century.
Besides, explanatory expressions occur in the prophet
ic passages of Matthew, which define the meaning of
the phrase in the way we have stated.1 The diffi
culty presented by these passages, we are firmly con
vinced, is not to be escaped by affixing another than
the proper and uniform meaning to this phrase.
1 See Matthew xvi. 27, 28.

176 ORIGIN OF THE FIRST THREE GOSPELS.
The forced and manifestly false interpretation of
Baur, which has been noticed above, is due to the
straits into which he is brought by his untenable
theory. Confronted by unimpeachable historica]
witnesses, he is not only obliged to ignore, or unjusti
fiably to disparage, their testimony, but also to resort
to shifts in interpretation which only mark the des
peration of his cause. There is absolutely nothing to
conflict with the supposition that our first Gospel
comes down, in its integrity, from the apostolic
Church ; while the positive evidence, both direct and
corroborative, fully establishes the fact.
MARK.
The ancient testimonies, of which that of Papias is
the first, to the genuineness and early date of the
second Gospel, would seem to preclude the possibihty
of a question on these points. Mark is declared to
have been an attendant of Peter and to have derived
his knowledge of the life and ministry of Jesus from
the discourses of that apostle. This is substantially
the declaration of aU the writers in the second half
of the second century ; and it has been thought by
some good critics that even as early as Justin Martyr,
and in one passage of Justin himself, the Gospel of
Mark was styled Peter's Gospel.
But it has been contended of late that the descrip
tion of Papias does not answer for our Mark and

MARK. 177
must refer to some other work.. : In the later form of
the theory, Papias is made to describe an earher Mark
— an < Ur-Markus-i— which is the germ of our present
Gospel. Now of the existence of this earlier work there is
no intimation in any of the Fathers. How did the fact
of its existence escape the knowledge of Irenaeus and
his contemppraries ? When did all the manuscripts
of it disappear ? In truth, the theory in this form
is preposterous, and even Baur is driven to a different
hypothesis. Before attending to this, however, let us
revert to the statements of Papias and see how far
they are from lending support to the notion that he
had in mind any other work than our Mark.
Papias, or John the Presbyter, his informant,,
represents that Mark, though a careful and accurate-
writer, depended on the, oral discourses of Peter for
his knowledge and therefore did not dispose his
matter — iv Tagtc — in the chronological order. This
is all the evidence on which the theory of an earlier
Mark. is founded! But, in any event, this remark is
only the impression of an individual as to the charac
ter of the second Gospel. He doubtless compared
Mark with the more consecutive narrative of Matthew.
Moreover, it is plain that he had in mind the lack of
completeness in Mark, which begins abruptly with
the preaching of John. For he afterwards explains
that Mark wrote down "some things" — whatever he-
recollected; though it is added that he left out noth^
12

178 ORIGIN OF THE FIRST THREE GOSPELS
ing that he heard. The necessary gaps and omissions
constituted in part the want of order — rd&g — which
he noticed in Mark.1 The second Gospel did not
seem to be a fuU, systematical digest — a Gvvra^cg —
of the words and deeds of Christ, hke Matthew, but
had a more irregular, fragmentary structure. Not
that Mark neglected arrangement altogether and
simply pasted together the reports of Peter in the
order in which he heard them. This is not at all
implied; but only that he had not the means of
exactly arranging and fiUing out his history. To caU
into existence another work, different from, our Mark,
on no other ground than this observation of Papias, is
a foUy of criticism.
The Tubingen writers have set up the wholly
unsupported assertion, that our Mark is the amplifica
tion of an earlier " Gospel of Peter ; " but, as might
be expected, they have little agreement with each
other in the forms which they give to their theory.
Hilgenfeld is persuaded that Mark is the product of
a recasting, in the Petrine interest and that of the
Roman Church, of the Gospel of Matthew.2 Marvel
lous that this Petrine, Roman Cathohc partisan should
1 Meyer is plainly wrong in making the " some things "—ma-
cover only a portion of what Mark set down. The meaning is that
only a part of the teachings and works of Christ find a place in his
Gospel. The want of order, as we have said before, is predicated as
much of the record of the " things done," as of the " things said."
2 Hilgenfeld's Die Evangelien, s. 148.

MARK.

179

have left out of his work the passage : " Thou art Peter,
and on this rock wiU I build my church ! " Strange
that he should have stricken out the passage which,
above all others, was suited to his purpose! Baur,
seeing that the supposition of an earlier Gospel of
Mark is incredible, on account of the absence of all
traces of such a work and all allusions, to it, has
invented a new hypothesis which is, if possible, more
irrational than Hilgenfeld's. Papias has mixed up,
we are told, things that have no connection — the
existence of the Gospel of Mark, with which he was
perhaps not even acquainted, and the legend of dis
courses which were thought to have been delivered
by Peter on his missionary journeys. But of what
weight is this naked conjecture in opposition to the
distinct testimony of Papias? If a witness is to be
set aside on so flimsy a pretext, there is an end of
historical investigation. Besides, it is not Papias
alone who testifies to the Gospel of Mark and the
connection of Mark with Peter. Irenaeus, Clement,
Eusebius, say the same; and there is no reason to
suppose that they simply reecho the statement of
Papias. All these writers represent what was un
questionably the general behef' at the time when
Papias wrote.
These assaults upon the integrity of the Gospel of
Mark, by critics who do not stick to any one hypo
thesis as long as it takes the seasons to revolve, have
not weakened in the slightest degree that argument in

180 ORIGIN OF THE FIRST THREE GOSPELS.
behaU of the Gospel on which the Church has rested
from the apostolic age until now. Are historical
testimonies to be blown away by the empty guess of
a theorist ? LUKE.
The school of Baur have been especially confident
in asserting that Luke's Gospel was written to further
a certain theological interest. It is a tendenz-schrift,
they are sure, which emanates from the Pauline side,
and represents the gospel history in a way to favor
the Gentile claims and privUeges.
Now, every historian who is not a mere story-
teUer, writes from his own point of view. Every
historian wiU disclose in the complexion of his work
his own character and situation. Certain aspects of
the subject which have for one writer a peculiar
interest, are thrown by a writer of a different cast
more into the background. The position and charac
ter of an historian affect his selection and disposition
of the matter. But the question is "whether he is
betrayed into inveracity and perversion by the bent
of his mind and his party connections. It is clear
that Luke, a disciple of Paul and writing for a
heathen convert, is more interested in the intention
of the author of the gospel to provide salvation equally
for the GentUes. But is he thereby led to indulge in
misstatement and invention? Does he omit import-

LUKE, 181
ant facts because they would clash with a view which
he wishes to make out? And does he not scruple to
, fabricate incidents for the sake of helping forward a
party interest ? This is charged by Baur — charged,
as we beheve, without proof, and falsely. There is no
inconsistency between the representation of the hfe
and teachings of Christ in Matthew, and that made
in Luke. The design of Christianity to embrace the
Gentiles, even to bring to them an advantage above
the unbeheving nation to whom the gospel first
comes, is abundantly attested in Matthew. What are
the proofs by which Baur would sustain his impeach
ment of Luke? They are, one and all, destitute of
weight. Luke omits to mention the distinction put
upon- Peter when he was styled the Rock ; but so does
Mark. Tt is charged that Luke contrives to disparage
the twelve disciples, in order to pave the way for an
inference to the honor of Paul. This is pure fancy,
and has against it such passages as Luke xxu. 29, 30,
where the Lord declares, that a kingdom is appomted
for this band of disciples, even as the Father had
appointed for him; and that they should "sit on
twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel."
Hilgenfeld is acute enough to find in this promise
a designed depression of the twelve, since they are to
judge Israel alone ! What, then, is the purport
of the same promise in "judaizing" Matthew?1
That the kingdom is preached in Samaria, according
1 Matt. xix. 25.

182 ORIGIN OF THE FIRST THREE GOSPELS.
to Luke, is also, if we are to believe Baur, a fiction
designed as a typical prelude to Paul's free offer of
salvation to the heathen, and to pacify objectors to this
last procedure. Especially is the mission of the
Seventy (Luke x. 10) discredited, and ascribed partly
to the desire to diminish the consideration of the
twelve, and partly to the wish to furnish a justifying
paraUel or preparation, in the manner just mentioned,
for the Pauline liberality to the Gentiles and for the
missions among them. But in sending out the
Seventy, Christ did not organize them into a per
manent body. There is no trace of such a body of
disciples in the Acts, as there certainly would be tf
they had been a permanent body, or U the narrative
in Luke had been a doctrinal fiction. The Seventy
were provisionally employed, in the course of this last
joumey of Jesus to Jerusalem, when He was desirous
of making Himself more widely known to the pebple.
The number was fixed at seventy, not because the
Jews reckoned the languages of the world at seventy,
which is Baur's explanation, but more hkely in allu
sion to the seventy elders appointed by Moses, just as
the twelve disciples corresponded with the number of
tribes. Nor did the Seventy go to the heathen. It
does not appear that they went to the Samaritans even ;
and Luke himself records that by the Samaritans
Jesus himself had been inhospitably received.1 It
has been properly suggested, in reply to Baur, that
1 Luke ix. 51 seq.

LUKE.

183

were this incident a wUful fiction, it would be sc
contrived as to present a greater resemblance to the
later apostolic history, than the occult, remote, far
fetched analogy which Baur imagines himself to
discern. So slender are the principal grounds on
which important portions of the third Gospel are pro
nounced a fabrication! They iUustrate the morbid
suspicion of these critics, and their slavish subjection
to a preconceived, indefensible theory concerning the
original character of Christianity.
One of the most important topics connected with
modern discussions relative to the origin of the third
Gospel, is the relation of that Gospel to the Gospel of
Marcion. In the genial portraiture which Neander
has drawn of this noted heresiarch, it appears that the
love and compassion of Christ had struck into his
soul. Not discerning that this love and compassion
presuppose and require the feelings of justice, he
conceived that the representations of the character of
. God in the Old Testament are inconsistent with the
image he had formed of Christ. Moreover, the apos
tles, with the exception of Paul, seemed to him to be
entangled in Old Testament views and to have
perverted the pure doctrine of Jesus. On the con
trary, the expressions in Paul about the Christian's
emancipation from the law and about free grace, being
imperfectly understood by Marcion, fell in with the
current of his feeling. Hence, though starting from

184 ORIGIN OF THE FIBST THREE GOSPELS.
a practical and not a speculative point' of view, he
developed a gnostical theory, according to which the
God of the Old Testament was a Demiurg, inferior
to the Father of Jesus. He shaped his scriptural
canon to suit his doctrinal belief. The Gospel of
Luke, as written by a companion of Paul, and as
bringing out the Pauline doctrine, he regarded with
favor; but, according to the unanimous testimony of
the Fathers, he mutilated and abridged this Gospel
in order to conform it to his own system. • Similar
liberties he took with the Pauline Epistles, which he
also received. He may have fancied that the changes
which he made in aU these documents were a restora
tion of them to their original form. Yet there is no
indication whatever that these changes were made on
any other authority than his a-priori theory of what
Christ and the apostles must have taught.
A native of Pontus in Asia Minor, Marcion came
to Rome about the year 140 — possibly ten years later.
Hence, if the statement of Tertullian and the rest of
the Fathers is correct, respecting the relation of his
Gospel to that of Luke, he is a most important witness
to the early and general reception of Luke's Gospel in
its present form. It would seem to be well-nigh
impossible to caU in question this early testimony. It
is true that Marcion did not succeed in removing from
Luke all features not in keeping with his system.
But this is only to say that he did not do his work
with entire thoroughness and consistency. Irenaeus

LUKE. 185
and Tertullian and their contemporaries, be it ob.
served, lived shortly after Marcion. Irenaeus had
grown to be a young man before Marcion died.
Tertullian had taken great pains, to collect information
concerning Mareion's career and system. But, inde
pendently of their testimony in itseU considered, how
can it be supposed that a Gospel which Marcion and
the Marcionites alone received, was taken up by
Catholic Christians, and enlarged and improved for
their own* use? What possible motive, could prompt
them to appropriate to themselves this heretical, spu
rious Gospel, and add it to those which they knew to
be authentic? HoW did the churches drop out the
work which Marcion used — supposed to be the real
Luke — and substitute for it the new-fangled Gospel
which was fabricated on the basis of it? How is it
that we have no notice of this exchange-r-no traces of
a previous use of the curtaUed Luke of Marcion, on
the part of the churches? And such a procedure
would bring down the date of the canonical Gospel to
130 or 140 !
The first to dispute the received view as to Mar
eion's Gospel, was the founder of German rationalism,
Semler. He suggested1 that our Luke and Mareion's
Luke are different recensions, or editions, of the same
work. Others after him assigned the priority to the
Luke of Mareion. Opinion swayed from one side -to
the other on this question, untU Baur strenuously
contended that Mareion's Gospel is first and the

186 ORIGIN OF THE FIRST THREE GOSPELS.
canonical Luke was made on the basis of it. This
hypothesis he defended at length in his work on the
Canonical Gospels} But a careful comparison of the
numerous passages of Mareion's Luke, which are
found in the Fathers, made it impossible longer to
dispute the priority of the canonical Gospel. And
after the publication of the work of Volkmar on this
subject, Baur himself retracted his previous hypothesis
and came on to the same ground. In his work on
Mark's Gospel, he says : " It is no longer to be denied,
as I have become convinced by a repeated examination,
that most of the variations between Mareion's Gospel
and our own are, with a prevailing likelihood, to be
regarded as arbitrary alterations in the interest of a
given system." The priority of our Luke is now an
established, uncontradicted fact. See how much this
fact involves ! Marcion took an accepted, generally
received Gospel, and applied to it his pruhing-knife.
Our Luke, then, was most certainly an authoritative
document in the churches early in the second century.
But a more valuable deduction may be made with
entire confidence. Marcion selected a work which he
regarded, and others regarded, as the composition of a
disciple of Paul, and deriving its authority and value
from this circumstance. We may safely infer that our
Gospel was generaUy considered at the beginning of
the second century, or about thirty years after we sup
pose it to have been written, to be the work of an
1 Baur's Kanonische Evangelien, s. 393 seq. (1847).

LUKE. 187
earlier writer, an associate of the apostles. As con
cerns the argument from tradition for the genuineness
and early date of Luke, we could ask for nothing
more. Baur's whole theory concerning Luke was, in
reality, shattered by the demolition of the false and
most improbable hypothesis of a priority of Mareion's
Gospel. Yet, in his later works, he does not whoUy
abandon his erroneous construction. The canonical
Luke, he still holds, was originaUy composed by a
strictly Pauline and anti-Petririe Christian. Various
passages which are plainly and palpably irreconcUable
with such a theory, he declares to be interpolated by a
subsequent writer whose position is "mediatory," or
half-way between the two parties, into which Baur
falsely supposes the early Church to have been split.
For this theory of a later editor, there is not an iota of
historical evidence. It is, like so many other hypothe
ses, spun out of the bowels of the critic. The dissec
tion of the Gospel, which is attempted, is from begin
ning to end a purely arbitrary proceeding, and has no
better foundation than had the mutUation attempted
by Marcion. To Ulustrate the groundless and arbi
trary character of Baur's criticism of Luke, we bring
forward a single instance. In Luke xvi. 16, there is
recorded the saying of the Saviour : " It is easier for
heaven and earth to pass, than one tittle of the law to
faU." In place of "the law" — tov vojuov — there
was found in Mareion's Gospel — t&v Xoycov juov —

188 ORIGIN OF THE FIRST THREE GOSPELS,
"my words." The existence of this: declaration in
Luke concerning the perpetuity of the law, is at war
with Baur's idea of the anti- Jewish character of the
Gospel. It is one of the clearest proofs of the un
founded nature of his theory. Hence,: he puts forward
the assertion that Marcion has the true reading.. For
the reading of Marcion there is no manuscript support
whatever. It comports, moreover, with the character
of all the rest of his alterations. He aims to erase
whatever gives a sanction to the Old Testament law.
Yet we are expected to accept the wholly unsupported
and groundless: doctrine of that oracular, personage.
styled Die Kritik, who reverses his own decision with
every new moon !
Much of the mistaken and mischievous speculation
adverse to the genuineness of the third Gospel, has
sprung from Schleiermacher's hypothesis of the com
posite character of this Gospel and of the Acts. He
proposed the theory that the Gospel of Luke is a series
of earlier documents linked together, the task of Luke
being merely that of a compiler. This view was
ingeniously advocated. A simUar hypothesis was held
concerning the Acts, the second work of. the same
author. But this hypothesis, both in respect to the
Gospel and the Acts, has been proved to be un
founded. Whatever written materials were in the
hands of Luke, neither of his works is a mere com
pilation. Each of them has a coherent outline, and is
pervaded by qualities of style peculiar to the evange*

LUKE.

189

Ust. One of the ablest refutations of the Schleier-
macherian theory is contained in the work of Leke-
busch upon the Acts. The prologue of Luke's
Gospel evinces the error of that theory. Luke avows
his intention to prepare an orderly, a systematic and
connected, narrative of the hfe and ministry of Jesus.
And the impression made by the prologue that he
designs to fuse his materials into a regular composi
tion, is sustained by an inspection of the contents of
the work.
This prologue of Luke's Gospel is chiefly valuable
as a testimony to its genuineness and credibility. As
such, it well deserves examination. Many before him
had written accounts, more or less full, of the life and
ministry of Jesus. He has carefully foUowed down
the course of the Saviour's history from the beginning
— for this is the meaning of the passage rendered :
" having had perfect understanding of aU things from
the very first." But how did he, and " the many " to
whom he refers, ascertain the facts " most surely
believed among us ? " He answers that " they
delivered them unto us — naosdoGav rj/tuv — which
from the beginning" of the Saviour's career "were
eyewitnesses and ministers of the word." Two things
are here affirmed : first, that Luke's knowledge came
from the apostles and other immediate disciples of
Christ; and, secondly, that it came to him directly
from them, without the intervention of third persons.

190 ORIGIN OF THE FIRST THREE GOSPELS.
This last is implied in the phrase " dehvered to us "
— Ttagsdooxv fjfilv — as may be seen by an exami
nation of other passages where the same phrase
occurs ; as, for example, 1 Cor. xi. 23. The inform
ants of Luke were eyewitnesses of the history which
he undertakes to record. He was contemporary with
them. The early date of his work is verified by his
own distinct statement.
THE RELATION OF THE APOCRYPHAL TO THE CANONI
CAL GOSPELS.
The fact of the existence of apocryphal Gospels has
given occasion, among those who have not studied the
subject, to erroneous impressions. It has been sup
posed by some that a considerable number of Gospels,
besides the four of the canon, were in the hands of
the early Church, and that, for reasons which may not
have been fully sufficient, these last were selected, and
clothed with authority. This belief, or conjecture, is
unfounded, as we shall soon point out. And a careful
attention to the subject of the apocryphal Gospels has
the effect to set forth in a clearer light the antiquity
and authority of the received Gospels. A few remarks
wfll bring before the reader the more important con
siderations.1 1 The old and standard work on the subject of the apocryphal
literature is that of Fabricius. " A New and Full Method of Settling
the Canonical Authority of the New Te'stament, etc.," by Eev. 3.
Jones (Oxford, 1798), is Fabricius with English translations. The

LUKE.

191

1. None of the works now extant under the name
of apocryphal Gospels, have any claim to be consid
ered authentic histories of Christ, or to. be regarded,
in the remotest degree, as rivals or competitors of the
canonical Gospels.
It is the fashion of writers like Strauss to quote
from these apocryphal Gospels as well as from the
Gospels of the canon, for the sake of creating an im
pression that "both belong to the same category, which
no person pretending to be a scholar would venture to
assert. The apocryphal Gospels are at a world-wide
remove from the canonical Gospels, in the character
of their contents. They relate almost exclusively to
the nativity and infancy of Jesus and the glories of
his mother, or to circumstances attending and follow
ing his death. They are chiefly made up of siUy
tales, which are too plainly fabulous to merit any
attention. Nor have they any title to attention on
remarks and deductions of Jones are sometimes good, but often ill-
judged. Tbilo began to edit the apocryphal Gospels in a most
scholarly manner, but only published a first volume. Tischendorf,
besides his critical edition of the Euangelia Apocrypha (1853), has
discussed the bearing of the apocryphal Gospels upon the question
of the genuineness and credibility of the Gospels of the canon, in his
prize essay da Evangeliorum apoc. origine et usu (1851), and in
his recent dissertation, Warm, wurden die Evangelien verfasst
(1865). Norton's chapter (Genuineness of the Gospels, Vol. iii. ch.
xii.) is lucid and instructive. He goes farther than most scholars
would approve, in discrediting the existence of apocryphal books
which ecclesiastical writers mention by their titles. But his skep
ticism in this particular is a healthy antidote to extravagances in tha
opposite direction.

192 ORIGIN OF THE FIRST THREE OSPELS.
the score of age. AU of them are demonstrably later
than our Gospels. Most of them are even centuries
later. It is supposed by Tischendorf that three of
these are alluded to by early Fathers, but of this we
cannot be certain. Justin Martyr twice mentions the
Acts (axTa) of PUate, as a document where could
be found an attestation of the Saviour's history.
TertuUian has a simUar reference. A book caUed Gesta
Pilati, or Acts of PUate, forms a part of the so-caUed
Gospel of Nicodemus. But the Acts of a Roman
governor — such a work as Justin designates — was his
official Report to the Emperor, which was deposited
in the archives at Rome. Whether in the time of
Justin there was any publishe d narrative of that sort,
purporting to be Pilate's report of the judicial pro
ceeding in the case of Jesus, we are unable to say.1
But the Gesta Pilati which we possess is a narrative
of Christ's life on the basis of our Gospels, which it is
pretended that Nicodemus wrote and the Emperor
Theodosius (which Emperor of that name, we are not
told) found among the public records in the hall
of Pontius Pilate, at Jerusalem. This Gospel of
Nicodemus is unquestionably a composite work, and
the part embraced in the Acta Pilati may be, as
Tischendorf thinks, as old as Justin. Yet there has
1 Perhaps Justin refers to no writing which he had seen, but to
a public document which he supposes to exist. In the same way
(Apol, I. 34) he says : " As you may learn from the lists of the
taxing, which were made in the time of Cyrenius, the first governor
of yours in Judea."

LUKE.

193

been confessedly great Ucense in altering the text ; and
after all, the opinion of Norton that this production
is of a later date, is not conclusively disproved. Ori
gen, in the first half of the third century, once refers
to a book of James, as containing the statement that
the brothers of Jesus were children of Joseph by a
former marriage; and the apocryphal Protevangelion
of James contains a similar statement. But there is
no other aUusion to such a work untU near the end
of the fourth century. The work now extant is a silly
legend concerning the birth of Mary and the birth of
Jesus, and is thought by Norton to be of much later
date than the likewise unimportant book which Origen
casuaUy notices, and to which he attributes no au
thority. Tischendorf, however, is convinced that some
traces of an acquaintance with the Protevangelion are
found in Justin and in Clement of Alexandria, and
that the manuscripts now extant substantially corres
pond to the work which was in their hands. But the
first of these points must still be considered doubtful*
and the conclusion of Tischendorf as to the antiquity
of the work is therefore equally uncertain. Origen,
also, alludes to a spurious Gospel of Thomas. A
passage in Irenaeus is thought to indicate that it was
in use among the heretical Marcosii, and Hippolytus
states that a Gospel of Thomas was received by the-
Naasseni.1 An apocryphal work professing to emanate
1 Iren. Adv. Eaer., Lib. i. c. 20 ; Hippol. (Duncker and Schneid,
Ed.) pp. 140, 142. 13

194 ORIGIN OF THE FIRST THREE GOSPELS.
from Thomas, is now extant (though in very divergent
forms), of which the work alluded to by Origen may
have served as the basis. It is composed of fabulous
tales of the boyhood of Jesus. But Norton even
doubts whether the Gospel of Thomas, which is
mentioned by Origen, was a narrative. He thinks
that, like other spurious works bearing the name
of Gospel, it may have been a doctrinal homUy.
Tischendorf is of the opinion that the Acta and
the Protevangelion were composed somewhere in the
first decades of the second century. From the evident
dependence of these works on the Gospels of the
canon, he infers that the latter were in general use
at an earlier day. This conclusion stands or falls,
according to the judgment which is formed as to the
correctness of the date assigned to the Acta and
the Protevangelion} At aU events, these and the
other apocryphal Gospels now extant show what
sort of works would have been produced, had the
canonical writers followed their own fancy and inven
tion. In this aspect, the apocryphal Gospels afford
an impressive confirmation of the verity of the canon
ical histories. The sobriety and simphcity of the
latter, together with their distinct statement that no
miracles were performed by Jesus prior to his baptism,
are in wonderful contrast with the fanctful and fan-
1 Tischendorf supposes that the Descensus Christi ad inferos
in the Evangelium Nicodemi is also as old as the middle of the
second century.

THE APOCRYPHAL GOSPELS. 195
tastic complexion of the spurious Gospels. The
clumsiness of the counterfeit sets off the perfection
of the original.
2. The apocryphal Gospels which are mentioned
by the early Fathers, and most tf not all of which
have perished, had only a local circulation, had no
authority save with minor heretical parties, and had
no effect on that generally prevaUing conception of the
Ufe and teaching of Christ, which was founded ex
clusively on the . four authentic and canonical narra
tives unanimously received by the early Church.
We must explain -that we do not include in this
statement the Gospel of the Hebrews and Mareion's
Gospel, for the reason that both of these works were
produced by the alteration of canonical Gospels. The
Gospel of the Hebrews existed in many varying forms,
and under different titles. The Gospel of the Twelve
Apostles, for example, and other books the titles of
which have come down, to us, were different editions
of the Gospel of the Hebrews. This work, as we
have said, was our Matthew altered.1 The Gospel
1 That the Gospel of the Hebrews was never put by the church
and church writers on a level with the canonical Gospels, has been
fully proved. See, for example, the Article of Franck .(Stud, u. Krit,
1848, 2), to which we have before referred. As to the use of it by
Hegesippus, Eusebius merely says that he brought forward some
things from the Gospel of the Hebrews, as he did from unwritten
Hebrew traditions. Origen and Jerome were too intelligent to rank
it with the canonical Gospels. Eusebius places it among the
Antilegomena, it being the Gospel used by the Hebrew Christians,
Euseb., HI. 25.

196 ORIGIN OF THE FIRST THREE GOSPELS.
of Marcion was our Luke abridged and otherwise
changed. The truth which we wish to convey is, that there
were no Gospel histories in the second century which
were contending for acceptance by the side of the
Four; none which had come into general use and
were discarded; none having any claims to be au
thentic, which required to be seriously weighed. As
far as we can ascertain, there were no other Gospels
which had a consideration sufficient to render them
candidates for public favor in the Church. It should
be remarked that the first attempts at evangehcal
writing which Luke mentions in his preface, were
early supplanted by the canonical histories, so that
none of the former, as far as we can discover, were
known to the ecclesiastical writers of the second
century. The Gnostics were the falsifiers and fabricators of
Scripture, according to the statement of the Fathers.
In the controversy of Irenaeus and TertuUian with the
Gnostics, both sides take for granted a life and
teaching of Christ, which, with whoUy insignificant
exceptions, is identical with the representation of our
canonical Gospels. He is assumed to have done and
said just what they record. The leading sects of
the Gnostics were therefore governed in their con
ception of the career and ministry of Christ, by the
authority and the representations of the canonical
histories.

THE APOCRYPHAL GOSPELS. 197
TertuUian, who has so much to say of the falsifi
cation of Luke by Marcion and of his rejection of the
rest of the Gospels on dogmatic grounds, does not
mention any apocryphal Gospels as in use among the
Valentinians, the principal gnostical sect, and the
rest of his opponents. In one place only, Irenaeus
speaks of a gospel as used by the Valentinians, bear
ing the title of the True Gospel or the Gospel of Truth.
We know not whether this was narrative or homUy.
We know not whether Irenaeus had ever seen the
work. We know not whether it really existed, or
whether Irenaeus did not mistake the claim on their
part to be possessed of the true Gospel, or the true
.interpretation of the Gospel, for an allusion to a book.
But of this we are certain, that he, and, as far as we
know, they, brought forward no passage from it. The
Gospel of Basilides is another work which, if indeed
such a work existed, was probably not a narrative.
[t was little known ; and not a sentence from it is
quoted by the ancient writers. Origen says that
BasUides wrote a Gospel and prefixed his own name
to it ; a statement which is repeated by Ambrose and
Jerome. But the refutations of BasUides take notice
of nothing drawn from such a work. He is said by
Eusebius (quoting from Agrippa Castor) to have
written a work in twenty-four books " upon the Gos
pel " — apparently an exegetical work ; and this fact
may not improbably have given rise to the supposi
tion that he had fabricated a new Gospel.

198 ORIGIN OF THE FIRST THREE GOSPELS.
In order to show how obscure, comparatively,
these apocryphal Gospels were, and how far the
existence of them is from weakening, in the least
degree, the evidence for the antiquity and verity of
the canonical four, we wiU state all that is known
concerning the two most prominent of these fictions
— the Gospel of Peter and the Gospel of the Egyp
tians. The Gospel of Peter has been made to figure
conspicuously in the manifold hypotheses of the skepti
cal school of critics. It is instructive to see just how
much is known concerning this work, which, from the
ado made about it by the critics in question, one
would infer to be a document of great notoriety and
importance in the early Church. It has been said that
Justin Martyr, in a passage of his Dialogue with
Trypho, makes reference to a Gospel of Peter ; but
this is a mistake.1 The first notice of the Gospel of
Peter is from Serapion, near the end of the second
century. Serapion, bishop of Antioch, had, as we
learn from Eusebius, found that some disturbance
1 The passage is in Tryph., c. 106. See Otto's excellent note,
(Otto's Ed. of Justin, Vol.. II. p. 361). There may be an omission
of dirooTokmv before avrov, as Otto supposes ; or the avrov may
refer to Christ; or, again, the allusion may be to Mark, which was
known as Peter's Gospel. We think that the context (see c. 105)
renders it in the highest degree probable (as Otto thinks) that
Justin, according to his usual custom, refers in this place to the
dTropvopovevpara collectively and in the plural — that is, to our four
Gospels.

THE APOCRYPHAL GOSPELS. 199
had been created in the church at Rhosse, a town in
Cflicia, by a so-called Gospel of Peter which was in
the hands of some of the church-members. At first,
thinking that the book was harmless, he deemed the
affair undeserving of notice. But afterwards he pro
cured a copy of the book from some of the Docetae,
who used it, and found it to contain objectionable
matter. Origen has a Single aUusion to this Gospel,
as containing, like the book of James, the statement
that the brothers of Jesus were chUdren of Joseph
by a former marriage. It is afterwards barely men
tioned, as an apocryphal book, by Jerome. This is
all that we know of the apocryphal Gospel of Peter !
It is not clear that Origen had ever seen it. The
bishop of what was then the principal See in the East
had never heard of the book untU he met with it at
Rhosse; and when- he wished to examine it, he was
obliged to borrow a copy of some heretical Docetae
by whom it was used ! Moreover, there is nothing
to show that it was a narrative. The way in which
Serapion speaks of it would rather suggest the infer
ence that its contents were of a doctrinal nature.
Eusebius reckons it among the evidently spurious
works "which were never esteemed valuable enough
to be cited by any ecclesiastical writer." 1
The Gospel of the Egyptians is first mentioned
by Clement of Alexandria near the end of the sec
ond century. He notices a fabulous conversation of
' Euseb., III. 25.

200 GENUINENESS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL.
Jesus with Salome, cited from it by certain heretics,
but expressly characterizes the book as apocryphal. A
passage simUar to that referred to by Clement of Alex
andria is found in the spurious fragment entitled the
Second Epistle of Clement (of Rome) to the Corinthians,
which was not written earlier than the time of Clement
of Alexandria ; and it is possible that the forger of the
last work was acquainted with this fictitious Gospel.
It is enumerated by Origen and Jerome among the
titles of apocryphal Gospels, which they furnish.
Epiphanius says that the Sabelhans made use of it;
but his statement needs confirmation. So much,
and so much only, is known of the Gospel of the
Egyptians. Some have considered it one form of the
Gospel of the Hebrews. Others, including Norton,
have held it to be, not a narrative, but a doctrinal
work. It was written in an obscure and mystical
vein, and probably presented the ascetic notions of
Egyptian gnostical sectaries, among whom it origi
nated. It must have had a Umited circulation. No
Christian writer has ever attributed to it any historical
authority. We might proceed to notice other spurious gos
pels, or books caUed by the name of gospels, which
are the subject of casual allusion in ecclesiastical
writers of the first centuries. But we have said
enough to give our readers a fair impression of their
insignificant importance. Reminding the reader of
what we have said of the Gospel of the Hebrews,

THE APOCRYPHAL GOSPELS. 201
which was framed on the basis of our Matthew, we
may distinctly affirm, not only that the four Gospels
of the canon were universally accepted by the Chris
tians of the second century, but also that no other
gospel narratives can properly be said to have divided
their honors with them. It may be affirmed, with
hardly any quahfication, that they stood without
competitors. The spurious gospels secured little or
no recognition outside of heretical parties or coteries
from which they emanated. On the contrary, tf not
whoUy unknown, they were rejected by the church
teachers everywhere, and by the great body of Chris
tian people.1
It has been already remarked that the principal
anti-gnostical writers of the second century, and their
adversaries, alike proceed on a conception of the Ufe
and ministry of Jesus, which is identical with that
of the canonical Gospels. That is to say, both parties
assume that the history of Christ which we find in
our Gospels, is alone authentic. A like confirmation
of the authority of the canonical Gospels is ob
tained from Justin Martyr. They were undeniably
the Gospels to which he refers as being authoritative —
the writings of the Apostles and their Companions.
1 For an enumeration of these apocryphal writings, see De
Wette's Einl. in d. W. Testament, § 73 a ; also Hofmann's Art. —
Pseudepigraphen, etc. — in Herzog's Beal-Encyc. This last Article,
however, refers to the real and supposed allusions in the ecclesiastical
writers to the uncanonical gospels ; and the references require much
sifting.

202 ORIGIN OF THE FIRST THREE GOSPELS.
But, apart from this, in the multitude of Justin's
aUusions to the ltfe and teachings of Christ, there are
only six which cannot be at once traced to the Gospels
of the canon. Among these there is only one, or at
most two, sayings of Christ. Both of these are found,
also, in Clement of Alexandria, who regards the four
Gospels alone as authoritative. The other four cases
of deviation from our Gospels in Justin, are of trivial
consequence— shght details added to the canonical
narrative. With these unimportant exceptions, the
whole representation of the history of Jesus in this
Father, coincides with that of the accepted evange
hsts.1 Now Justin lived through the half century
that foUowed the death of John. He had traveUed
extensively. He was held in honor by his contem
poraries and successors. He gives proof, therefore,
that the prevaUing conception of the Ufe and teachings
of Christ in his time, was identical with that of the
canonical historians, and was derived from them.
There was only one tradition in the Church from the
beginning. We subjoin brief remarks on the probable mode
in which the earliest records of the life of Jesus
originated. Jesus himself wrote nothing. He acted
with quickening and renovating power upon the
world's ltfe. But for Him to become an author would
1 Semisch, Denkwurdigkeiten des Justin, s. 344. The statement
of Semisch we have verified by a careful and repeated perusal of
Justin's writings.

ORIGIN OF THE GOSPEL RECORDS. 203
violate a subtle feeling of propriety of which all of us
are sensible. At first, the fresh recoUections of the
men and women who had known him, especiaUy of
the disciples who had composed, as it were, his famtfy,
were the unwritten book which aU, who desired,
could consult. But in that age, and when the
gospel soon found numerous adherents among
Greeks, both foreign Jews and heathen, it was
impossible that the teachings of Christ and the events
of his Ufe should long remain unrecorded. At the
outset, it is probable that isolated memoranda were
made of particular events or discourses. These
rudimental records first came into being in Gahlee
and about Capernaum. In this way, a cluster of
traditions would easily come to exist. Then, and
before long, foUowed the combination of them, and
the earhest efforts at framing a connected history.
Such were the' essays which Luke notices in his
prologue. At length, within thirty or forty years of
the death of Christ, there were efforts at more regular
composition, of which the works of Luke are the
maturest specimen. The first three Gospels present
indubitable traces of such an origin as we have indi
cated. We are not to look for chronological precision
in narratives thus constructed. We are not to look for
light on aU parts and points of the Saviour's earthly
ltfe. The Gospel' of John, an original composition,
emanating from the mind and heart of the loved
disciple, is the document to be first consulted in the

204 ORIGIN OF THE FIRST THREE GOSPELS.
scientific construction of the Saviour's history. The
four together enable us to gain a knowledge of Jesus,
not so fuU as we crave, yet sufficient for every practi
cal need.

ESSAY IY.
BAUR ON PAETIES IN THE APOSTOLIC CHURCH AND
THE CHARACTER OF THE BOOK OF ACTS.1
The great question which the Church in the
apostolic age was required to consider and determine,
was the relation of Christianity to the ritual law of the
Old Testament., Was that law still binding? Or
rather — for in this form, as was natural, the question
first came up — was that law binding on the GentUe
believers ? In short, could a man be a Christian with
out first becoming a Jew ? It cannot be denied that
the full extent of the commotion which this question
stirred up, is better understood in the light of recent
discussions than was the case formerly. Discounting
very much, as we shall, from the extravagant repre
sentation of the Tubingen critical school, we stiU feel
that the sound of this great conflict reverberates
through no inconsiderable portion of the New Testa
ment Scriptures. The Epistle to the Galatians is a
1 Das Christenthum u. die Christliche Kirche der drei ersten
Jahrhunderte, von Dr. Ferdinand Christian Baur. Tubingen, 1853.
(Author's last Ed., 1860.)
Die Composition u. Entatehung der Apostelgeschichte, von Eduaru
Lekebusch. Gotha, 1854.

206 PARTIES IN THE APOSTOLIC CHURCH.
fervid argument on this one theme. The Epistle to
the Romans, though not devoted— the opinion of Baur
to the contrary notwithstanding — to this distinctive
subject, gives to the matter of the relation of the Jew
to the Gentile, a prominent place. The two Epistles
to the Corinthians bear witness to the dissension which
the same question had provoked. The Epistle to the
Hebrews is an4 argument designed to reconcile the
Jewish believer to the abrogation of the old ordinances,
and to keep him from lapsing, out of love to them,
from the faith in Christ. The book of Acts, and most
of the other monuments of the apostolic age, contain
more or less of aUusion to the grand question we have
described. For it was a grand question. It was not simply
the question — which of itself to a Jew could not fail
to have the deepest interest — of the transitory or per
petual vaUdity of the Mosaic laws and institutions.
But it was, also, the question whether Christianity was,
in its real nature, a spiritual, and so a universal, rehgion,
or only an improved sect or phase of Judaism. In this
transitional era, when the kingdom of God was break
ing through and casting off its rudimental and provis
ional form, and assuming the permanent features of a
rehgion of the spirit and a religion for mankind — in
that crisis of history, it was inevitable that such com
motion and controversy should arise. It was one
iUustration of the truth that the Son of Man did not
come to bring peace, but a sword. As new chemical

BAUR'S THEORY. 207
changes and combinations are attended with heat and
combustion, so is it with every such revolution and
new beginning in the course of history. And we may
add that even to the present day, the Protestant defini
tions of the essential nature of the gospel and of the
method of salvation, are sought especiaUy in those fer
vent declarations against bondage to rites and cere
monies, and in favor of the sufficiency of Christ, which
were elicited from the Apostle Paul in the progress of
this momentous controversy.
The history of this controversy, and of the ques
tion and parties involved ,in it, has lately acquired a
new importance, from the place which it is made to fiU
in the historical theory of Baur and his school. Strauss,
in his Life of Christ, had said little of the book of
Acts, and that little of not much weight. This book
remained a bulwark of faith for any who were disturbed
by the skeptical criticism to which the evangehcal
histories had been subjected. Here, at least, was the
testimony of a contemporary of the apostles, and a
companion of one of them, which estabhshed the fact
of a miraculous dispensation, and afforded proof of
the prior miracles of the gospel. But things could
not be left by the Tubingen critics in this unsatisfac
tory state. The book of Acts was next made the
object of attack; and, what we have now specially to
observe, this attack was a part of a systematic theory,
by which the origin of catholic Christianity,, or of
Christianity in the form we have it, and of the larger

208 PARTIES IN THE APOSTOLIC CHURCH
part of the canonical writings of the New Testament,
is explained in a naturalistic way, through a pecuhar
view of the character of the conflict to which we have
adverted, and of the consequences to which it led.
This attempted reconstruction of the history of the
apostolic age, on account of the extraordinary learning
and ability with which it has been defended, especiaUy
by Baur ; on account, also, of the light which it inci
dentaUy throws on the condition of the apostolic
church ; and, above aU, on account of that increased
confidence in the strength of the Christian cause which
the faUure of this assault upon it is fitted to inspire,
deserves a fair examination.
Before engaging in this task, it may be weU to say
a word in answer to an inquiry that is likely to occur
to the mind of a reader not conversant with the early
history of the Church. How, it may naturally be
asked, can such a theory as that of the modern Tiibin
gen school, denying as it does the accepted views
respecting the origin of most of the canonical books
of the New Testament, have even a show of plausibU-
ity ? How can it keep the field for a moment in the
face of the testimony of the early Church? Such
theories are possible, we reply, for the reason that so
scanty and fragmentary remains of hterature have come
down to us from the period immediately following the
apostolic age. After the death of the leading apostles
and the destruction of Jerusalem, there succeeds an
interval which may be properly styled n saeculum

BAUR'S THEORY. 209
obscurum. We have the writings of John which
appeared in the latter part of the first century. Then
we have the apostolic Fathers. But these writings are
not of a nature to satisfy many of the most important
inquiries in regard to the state of the Church. The
early Greek .Apologists, if we possessed them intact,
would be invaluable ; but the first copious works ema
nating from this class of writers are the treatises of
Justin Martyr, whose earliest extant production falls
into the second quarter of the second century. Pre
cious, from a historical point of view, as these works of
Justin are, they consist of Apologies -to the Pagan and
to the Jew, and leave unnoticed many points on which
light might have been thrown, had their author been
writing, for example, on some subject of doctrinal
theology. In brief, so far as this very interesting era
is concerned, we have peculiar occasion to lament — to
borrow the language of Grote when speaking of Greek
literature in general — that " we possess only what has
drifted ashore from the wreck of a stranded vessel." 1
We do not mean that the internal evidence of the New
Testament documents, the numerous items of proof
gathered from relics of the hterature of the next
period, and the testimony of the great writers of the
second haU of the second century, are insufficient.
They do constitute a body of evidence which effectually
refutes the main positions of the Tubingen school.

1 Grote's Preface to the Eistory of Greece.
14

210 PARTIES IN THE APOSTOLIC CHURCH.
But for the reasons we have stated, there is room for
the essays of conjectural criticism. A picture of the
state of things in the early Church may be drawn, a
theory ingeniously framed, whose inconsistency with
the truth is not, at the first blush, so patent as to pre
clude the need of a careful refutation. Not untU such
a theory is thoroughly probed and compared with
the multiform evidence pertaining to the subject, is it
clearly seen to be untenable.
The following are the essential points in Baur's
theory.1 The doctrine of Christ was, in principle, an
abohshment of the Old Testament ritual and of the
distinction, as to rehgious rights and privUeges, be
tween the Jew and the Gentile. But the original dis
ciples did not advance to the conclusion which lay
impliedly in the religious ideas of the Master. On the
contrary, they persisted to the end in the traditional
persuasion that the way of salvation was through
Judaism ; that the Gentile must enter the Church by
that door, and that the uncircumcised had no part in
the Messiah's kingdom. The Apostle Paul alone was
1 We have drawn our representations of the Tubingen views
chiefly from the work of Baur, the title of which is given at the begin
ning of this Essay. This work is the final, condensed presentation of his
theory relative to the origin and early history of Christianity. The
work of Lekebusch (the title of which is also given above) is the
ablest refutation, with which we are acquainted, of Baur's theory in
its bearing on the Acts of the Apostles. In this branch of the dis
cussion, especially, we have frequently availed ourselves of his sug-
eestions.

baur's theory. 211
so enhghtened as to perceive that the old rites were
abrogated by the nature of the new religion, and that
the GentUe stood on an equality with the Jew, faith
being the sole requirement. Nay, he held that cir
cumcision and the ritual were no longer admissible,
since they implied some other object of reliance than
Christ, some other condition of salvation besides faith.
Hence, there was a radical difference in doctrine
between Peter and the Jerusalem Christians on the one
hand, and Paul and his followers on the other, which
led to a personal disagreement and estrangement
between these two apostohc leaders. There grew up
two antagonistic types of Christianity, two divisions of
the Church, separate and unfriendly to each other.
Such was the state of things at the end of the apos
tolic age. Then followed attempts to reconcile the
difference and to bridge the gulf that separated Gentile
from Jewish, Pauline from Petrine Christianity. To
this end, various irenical and compromising books were
written in the name of the apostles and their helpers.
The only Epistles of Paul which are counted as genuine
are that to the Romans, that to the Galatians, and the
two Epistles to the Corinthians. But the most impor
tant monument of this pacifying effort is the book of
Acts, written in the earher part of the second century
by a Pauhne Christian who, by making Paul some
thing of a Judaizer and then representing Peter as
agreeing with him in the recognition of the rights of
the Gentiles, hoped, not in vain, to produce a mutual

212 PARTIES IN THE APOSTOLIC CHURCH.
friendliness between the respective partisans of the
rival apostles. The Acts is a fiction founded on facts,
and written for a specific doctrinal purpose. The nar
rative of the councU or conference of the apostles, for
example (Acts xv.), is pronounced a pure invention of
the writer, and such a representation of the con
dition of things as is inconsistent with Paul's own
statements, and, for this and other reasons, plainly
false. The same ground is taken in respect to the
conversion of Cornelius and the vision of Peter attend
ing1 it. Before we directly examine these views, let us
observe the main facts in the history of the reception
of the GentUes into the Church, assuming, for the
present, that the documents are trustworthy. We
shaU show hereafter, especially in regard to the Acts,
that the impeachment of their genuineness and credi
bUity cannot be sustained.
Without doubt, Christ himself observed, during
his life, the ceremonial law.1 Until that law should be
supplanted by his finished work — by the act of God
who gave it — he considered it dbhgatory. As a faith
ful servant, he came under the law. He rejected,
indeed, the traditions of the elders, the ascetic, super
stitious practices which the Pharisees had appended to
the Old Testament legislation. So he signified the
1 On the position of Christ in reference to the law, we have little
difference with Baur. Baur's observations on this topic are marked

BAUR'S THEORY. 213
authority that belonged to him to modify the law by
fulfilling it, or carrying it forward to a form answering
fully to the idea underlying it — as when he declared
himself the Lord of the'' Sabbath (Mark n. 28).1 It
is true, however, that complying with the ritual him
self, he .also bade others comply with it, even with its
minute provisions. At the same time, both by impli
cation and explicitly, he authorized the conclusion that
in the new era which he was introducing, the cere
monies of the law would have no longer any place, nor
would they be required. They belonged to another, a
rudimental, preparatory system, that was passing away.
The barrier between Jew and Gentile was about to fall
down. The sublime declaration of Jesus at the well
of Sychem respecting the nature of acceptable worship
and the abolishment of all restrictions of place, as well
as many other passages hardly less significant, wUl
readily occur to the reader. We wUl accommodate
ourselves to the predilection of the Tubingen critics for
the Gospel of Matthew, and draw some illustrations
from that source. First, the spiritual character of. the
doctrines and precepts of Jesus is a most impressive
characteristic. Righteousness and piety, as described
in the Sermon on the Mount, belong to the tempers of
the heart. The inwardness of true rehgion was never
so thoroughly and sublimely laid down as in this teach-
by his usual perspicuity and force. See Das Christenthum, etc., s.
25 seq. 1 So De Wette and Meyer.

214 PARTIES IN THE APOSTOLIC CHURCH.
ing. For him who thus taught, what value could
forms, in themselves considered, possess ? The love of
God and man is the sum and substance of duty ; to
be perfect as the Father in Heaven is perfect, the sole
aspiration. Secondly, in his direct opposition to the
Pharisees, the real character of the principles of Christ
comes out. It is formalism — a trust in forms — which
caUs forth his reprobation. " Not that which goeth
into the mouth defileth a man ; but that which cometh
out of the mouth." " Those things which proceed out
of the mouth come forth from ihe heart ; and they
defile the man " " But to eat with unwashen hands
defileth not a man." (Matt. xv. 11, 18, 20). What a
simple and luminous exposition of the nature of good
and evil ! How clear that in the eyes of Jesus, forms
had no inherent value, no abiding existence ! The
abrogation of the former system he affirmed and
explained by saying that new wine must not be put in
old bpttles, or new cloth patched into an old garment.
How could he more pointedly affirm that he was
establishing a system so far different from the old, that
the features of the two could not be blended.? To
cling to the old ritual, as something essential, would
have the effect to destroy the fundamental peculiarity
of the new system. Attempt it not, " lest the bottles
should break and the wine be spUled" (Matt, ix; 17
paral.). This, be it remembered, was in reply to the
question, why his disciples abstained from fasting.
Thirdly, Christ forewarned his Jewish hearers that the

baur's theory. 215
Gentiles would even take their place in gaining posses
sion of the blessings of the new kingdom. In con
nection with the centurion's exhibition of faith in the
power of Jesus to heal his absent servant, he said that
many would come from the east and west, many Gen
tUes, and sit down with the Patriarchs in the kingdom
of Heaven, whilst the children of the kingdom — the
natural expectants of the inheritance — would be cast
out (Matt. viii. 11, 12). In the parable of the vine
yard and the rebellious husbandmen, who stand for the
Jews, their crime in slaying the messengers of the
owner, and finaUy his son and heir, leads to their
destruction and to the letting out of " the vineyard
unto other husbandmen." The Jews, rejecting the
Messiah, are to be supplanted by the Gentiles. In
keeping with such teaching are the predictions uttered
by Christ concerning the destruction of Jerusalem and
the downfall of the temple. Looking down upon the
city, he said : " Behold your house is left unto you
desolate ! " But the disciples were commanded to
carry the gospel to the GentUes — to disciple the
nations. That the Gentiles were to be embraced in
the Messianic kingdom was a familiar part" of prophecy.
As to how the kingdom was to be extended over them,
was a point in regard to which the prevalent anticipa
tions were colored by the mistaken ideas and unspiritual .
ambition of the people. But the incorporation of the
Gentiles, in some way, into the Messiah's kingdom, all
the Jews expected. Christ commanded that the same

216 PARTIES IN THE APOSTOLIC CHURCH.
gospel which the disciples had received themselves
should be offered to their acceptance — adding the
direction that the believer should be baptized, and the
promise that he should be saved. All other points he
left to be settled in the light of providential events and
under the subsequent teaching of the Holy Spirit. In
accordance with that reserve which adapted the dis
closure of truth to the recipiency of the learner, Christ
went no farther than to throw out the great principles,
the command and the intimations which have been
adverted to, not defining precisely either what course
the heathen were to take with reference to the Mosaic
ritual, or what was to become of ceremonial Judaism.
These things the apostles were left to learn, in the
prosecution of their work, by the outward instruction
of providential events and the inward illumination by
the Spirit. This reserve on the part of Christ is a
characteristic and impressive example of the divine
method of teaching. Instead of tearing up the old
institutions — sweeping them away by a peremptory
edict, before the mind was prepared for the change
by perceiving that they had become superfluous, he left
the Church to be first educated up to the requisite
point. The dropping of the old forms was to result,
as a logical and necessary consequence, from the expan
sive force of the new system. The logic of events—
the full comprehension of the gospel — the distinct
understanding of the offices of Christ — would under
mine and supplant the ritual law. How much better

baur's theory. 217
for therevolution to take place thus, than to be precipi.
tated by an abrupt decree, enforced as a law from
without upon minds which had gained no insight into
the ground and reason for a seeming repeal of divinely
given statutes !
Let us now proceed to note the manner in which
the great lesson was learned. The apostles, and the
infant church at Jerusalem under their guidance,
continue to observe the ceremonies of the law as of
old. They have no thought of dispensing with cir
cumcision and the other requirements of the ritual.
They are Jews, believing in the Messiah. The first
murmur of difference in that young community, of
which the opening part of Acts presents so delightful
a picture, is the complaint of the Hellenists — the
foreign, Greek-speaking Jews — that their poor are
neglected in the distribution of alms. This little
incident, apart from its immediate consequence, is
significant as bringing before us the two classes of
Jews, which, though closely and cordially united by
a common descent and common creed, are yet in some
respects dissimUar, as subsequent events prove. Of
the deacons chosen, one is said to have been a
proselyte of righteousness ; that is, a heathen admitted
by circumcision to a full participation in the privileges
of the Jew. The persecution attending the martyrdom
of Stephen1 disperses the Church and leads to the
1 Stephen was a Hellenist. He was charged by " false witnesses "
with blaspheming the temple and the law, and with saying that

218 PARTIES in the apostolic church.
first effective preaching of the word beyond Jerusalem.
The vision of Peter, and the baptism of Cornelius,
are the earliest recognition of Gentile Christianity.
Whether Cornelius was, or was not, a proselyte of
the gate, cannot be determined, nor is the question
very material. The previous feeling of Peter and
the Jerusalem Christians, as to the qualifications
for admission to the Christian Church, is seen in
his remark on the occasion of his interview with
Cornelius : " Ye know how that it is an unlawful thing
for a man that is a Jew to keep company or come
unto one of another nation."2 Moreover, on his
return to Jerusalem, "they that were of the circum
cision" — the Jewish Christians — call him to account
for having eaten with Gentiles (Acts xi. 2, 3). His
defence is a recapitulation of the circumstances of his
vision and a statement of the fact that the gifts of
Jesus of Nazareth would "destroy this place," and "change the
customs" delivered by Moses (Acts vi. 13, 14). The witnesses
were "false," since doubtless they maliciously perverted what
Stephen had said. Yet it is evident from the tone of his speech —
see especially Acts vii. 47-50, and the denunciation he was uttering
when he was interrupted — that the charge was not a pure invention,
but was built up on what Stephen had said. See Neander's Gesch. d.
Pflanz. u. Leitung. u. s. w.
2 Abstinence to this extent from intercourse with the heathen
was not enjoined in the Pentateuch. But Peter's remark repre
sents the feeling and usual practice of the later Jews. The prose
lyte of the gate was uncircumcised, so that there was a like repug
nance to intercourse with him — at least to sitting at the table with
him.

baur's theory. 219
the Spirit had been exhibited by the new converts.
"Forasmuch," he says, "then, as God gave them the
like gift as he did unto us who believed on the Lord
Jesus Christ, what was I that I could withstand God ?"
This explanation for the time appeases the discontent.
But the principal event is the establishment of a
GentUe church, or a church made up partly of con
verted and baptized heathen, at Antioch. We read
that those who were scattered abroad by the persecu
tion following the death of Stephen " travelled as far
as Phenice, and Cyprus, and Antioch, preaching the
word unto none but unto Jews only. And some of
them were men of Cyprus and Cyrene, which when
they were come to Antioch spake unto the Grecians}'
not HeUenists but HeUenes, " preaching the Lord
Jesus." A great number of the Grecians — uncir-
cumcised GentUes — moved by that sense of spiritual
necessities which prevaUed so extensively among the
heathen throughout the Roman world, believed in
Christ. Observe it was men of Cyprus and Cyrene —
HeUenists — who laid the foundation of this GentUe
church. Barnabas, himself a Jew by birth, but a
native of Cyprus, is sent from Jerusalem to visit this
rising church so. strangely composed. Seeing the
reahty of the work of grace which had been effected,
he rejoiced in it, and having brought Paul — who was
also, by birth a Hellenist — from Tarsus, whither he
had retired, the two labored together for a year,
"and taught much people." Paul is now fairly

220 PARTIES IN THE APOSTOLIC CHURCH.
embarked upon the grand work of his ltfe. Partly
on account of the peculiarity of his inward experience
and partly on account of the depth and logical force
of his mind — not to speak of special enlightenment
from above — he discerned most clearly that faith,
and faith alone, is the condition of salvation ; that to
make the soul depend for pardon upon legal obser
vances along with faith, is to set the ground of
salvation, partiaUy at least, outside of Christ, and to
found the Christian hope upon self-righteousness
instead of his merits. He went straight to the
unavoidable inference that the ritual system is not
to be observed as a means of salvation, and is in no
sense obligatory upon the Gentiles. Thus Paul stands
forth, in this part of the apostohc age, the glorious
champion of the freedom and universality of the
gospel. It is a religion for the world — not for the
Jew alone, but for the GentUe equally. The wall that
divided the two classes of mankind, " the hand-writing
of ordinances " being now blotted out, has been
leveUed to the ground. The missionary journey of
Paul and Barnabas greatly enlarged the number of
heathen converts; for when they had first preached
to the Jews in the places they .visited, they then
turned, to the GentUes. After their return they
continued their labors at Antioch, now the parent
of churches among the heathen, and the second
metropolis, as it were, of Christianity. But the
church of Antioch is disturbed by certain men which

baur's theory. 221
came down from Judea — judaizers — who declared
the necessity of circumcision for salvation. As the
result of the "no small dissension and disputation
with them," it is determined to send Panl and
Barnabas at the head of a deputation to Jerusalem
to confer with the apostles and elders upon this
question. Of this visit, besides the narrative in the
Acts, we have the advantage: of an invaluable notice
from the pen of Paul himself (Gal. ii.). Waiving for
the present the consideration of this last passage, we
see from the account of Luke, that when the mes
sengers from Antioch had been received by their
brethren at Jerusalem, " certain of the sect of the
Pharisees which believed" brought forward their
demand, that the GentUe converts should be circum
cised and required to observe the Mosaic law. It is
interesting to notice that the zealous judaizers were
converted Pharisees. After much disputing, Peter
and James interpose; the former referring to the
events connected with the baptism of Cornehus, and
both rejecting the proposition of the judaizers. Their
judgment and that of the church was, that certain
statutes which the Jew deemed most essential, should
be complied with by the heathen converts. They
were to abstain "from meats offered to idols, and
from blood, and from things strangled, and from
fornication." The fact of the reading of the law of
Moses in the synagogues of every city on the Sabbath,
is set forth as a reason for the propriety of this re-

222 PARTIES IN THE APOSTOLIC CHURCH.
quirement.1 Thus, so far as the influence of the
apostles went, this great question was put to rest,
1 The precise significance of this reason has been a mooted point
among commentators. Of the various interpretations which have
been suggested, it appears to us that the choice lies between two.
Some would paraphrase the passage thus: "as to the Jews, they
need no prescription, since they will of course follow the law which
is read on the Sabbath." This was the interpretation of Chrysostom,
and is adopted by Neander. Others, including Meyer and Lekebusch,
make the passage a statement of the reason why the Gentiles were
to conform in these particulars to the Jewish law : the reason,
namely, that the reading of the law in the synagogues every Sab
bath, rendered it more offensive to the Jews to see that law, in these
conspicuous points, disregarded. This appears to us to be the true
sense of the passage. Gieseler, and also Baur, would make the
passage signify by implication, that "the Jewish law had proved
itself ineffectual for the conversion of the Gentiles, whilst the oppo
site result in connection with the preaching of Paul and his asso
ciates, had shown the ceremonial law to be the only hindrance to
the spread of the true religion." Ewald suggests that the reason
was advanced to pacify the fear of those who thought that the
Mosaic law would fall into disuse if this indulgence were extended
to the Gentile converts. Both these interpretations seem to us
much less natural than the one we have approved. The view we
adopt is supported by the authority of Professor Hackett in his
scholarly work on the Acts.
As to the decision itself, it consists of four particulars. The
heathen converts were to abstain from the flesh of animals slain as a
sacrifice to idols, from using the blood of animals for food, from
fornication, and from eating animals who had been strangled or put
to death by any other mode than by shedding their blood. The
first of these was in compliance with Ex. xxxiv. 15. The second and
the fourth were Levitical statutes, and founded on the sacredness
of blood. The third, a moral prohibition, was joined with these
adiaphora, because in the progress of heathen corruption it had
come to be regarded as almost an adiaphoron — a thing morally

baur's theory. 223
and on grounds satisfactory to Paul and his coad
jutors. But the judaizing party was far from resting
satisfied under this most Christian arrangement. As
all know, they pursued the Apostle Paul wherever
he went, sowing division in the churches he planted
and striving to destroy the esteem in which he was
held by his converts. They seem to have sometimes
made use of the name of Peter, and to have pretended
to be his foUowers, and we find a seU-styled party
of Peter among the opponents of Paul in the Corin
thian church.
After the conference at Jerusalem, there are two
occurrences that deserve special notice. The one
is the controversy of Paul and Peter, or, rather, the
rebuke of Peter by Paul at Antioch. Peter had
associated freely with the Gentile converts — had eaten
with them. But on the arrival of certain judaizing
Christians from Jerusalem, he changed his course out
of a timid regard to their prejudice, and withdrew
from the' GentUe believers. Even Barnabas was led
to follow his example. Paul pubhcly "withstood"
Peter, saying : " If thou then, being a Jew, livest
after the manner of the GentUes (ezhvixag), why com-
peUest thou the Gentiles to Uve as do the Jews
(iovdai&tv) ? " We shall hereafter consider this
controversy more at length. Here we merely caU
indifferent. See on this point, Winer's Bealworterb., Art. Eure,
and Meyer on Acts xv. 20.

224 PARTIES IN THE APOSTOLIC CHURCH.
attention to the ground of Paul's complaint, which
was a dereliction from his own principles, or hypo
critical conduct, on the part of Peter. The charge
was that "he walked not uprightly." It was not
an error of opinion, but a moral error, which Paul
censured. The other occurrence requiring special notice,
is the last visit of Paul to Jerusalem. The narrative
of Luke gives us a clear view of the state of things
in the church there. Paul and his associates were
cordially received. But when he had recounted to
the apostles the fruits of his ministry among the
GentUes, and they had welcomed the inteUigence,
James informs him of a prejudice against him in the
minds of many, owing to a report which had gained
credence. He had been charged, doubtless by Jews
and Judaizers from Asia and the west, with having
urged the foreign, Greek-speaking Jews — the HeUe
nists — to forsake the Mosaic law and abstain from
circumcising their children. This accusation was false.
The Jewish-Christian members of the GentUe churches
were, not unlikely, as Ewald conjectures, faUing away
from the observance of the ritual. And this might
have given occasion to the charge against Paul. But
there is not a particle of evidence tending to show
that he ever sought to dissuade Jews from complying
with the ritual. He rejected the doctrine that the
observance of the law is essential to salvation. He
rejected the doctrine that the observance of it was

POSITION OF THE APOSTLE PAUL. 225
obligatory upon GentUe converts ; and the adoption
by them of the Jewish ritual under the idea that
salvation Was contingent upon observing it, he re
garded as a fatal error— as a dishonor to the suffi
ciency of Christ, and a method of self-righteousness.
But his opposition to the law extended no farther.
On the contrary,- as he himself said, to the Jews he
made himself a Jew. He respected their national
feelings and customs. Hence he found no difficulty
in taking upon him the vow which James recommend
ed, as a visible proof that the charges against him
were false, and that he was no renegade from the
refigion of his fathers.1 But this act did hot save
him from the fanatical hatred of the Jews from Asia— -
the unbelieving Jews who had so often stirred up
tumults against him in the towns where he had
preached. However he may have pacified the believ
ing Jews by showing respect for the national customs,
he did not secure himself from the violence of the
Asian Jews Who were present in the city in large
numbers, and in addition to their old enmity were
exasperated by the erroneous impression that Paul
had taken Trophimus, an Ephesian GentUe whom
they had seen with him, into the temple. Hence the
mob, which had for its final consequence the journey
of the apostle to Rome.
From this survey we are brought to the conclusion
1 The feeling of James respecting the propriety of observing the
law is plainly discovered in Acts xxi. 24.
15

226 PARTIES IN THE APOSTOLIC CHURCH.
that whUe it is true that the Apostle Paul understood
the relations of the new and the old dispensation with
peculiar clearness, and vindicated the liberty of the
GentUes with a singular depth of conviction and an
unvarying consistency, it is nevertheless true, also,
that Peter and the original apostles, and the church
of Jerusalem, as far as its public action is concerned,
were in cordial fellowship with Paul and willingly
tolerated the Gentile branch of the church, not
imposing upon it the yoke of the law, with the excep
tion of the few prudential regulations recommended
by the apostolic convention.
Baur and his foUowers maintain an opposite
opinion. There existed, they hold, a radical opposi
tion in principle between these two branches of the
church, which involved a mutual antagonism on the
part of their apostohc leaders. The proof of this
position Baur professes to find chiefly in certain
expressions of the Apostle Paul in his Epistles, which
are alleged to be inconsistent with many of the
representations found in the Acts. From the two
Epistles to the Corinthians and the Epistle to the
Galatians, Baur draws most of the arguments on
which he relies to establish his position. There was
in the Corinthian church, we are told, a party which
denied that Paul had a right to consider himself an
apostle, and sought to supplant him by setting up
the superior authority of Peter and the rest of the
original disciples of Christ. This party was stirred

baur's theory. 227
up by Jewish Christians who brought the letters of
recommendation from Jerusalem, to which Paul
sarcasticaUy alludes.1 In the Epistle to the Galatians,
it is said, the radical diversity of principles between
the two types of Christianity, already developed in
the Epistles to the Corinthians, is attended with the
record of a personal alienation between Peter and
Paul, which, so far as we know, was never healed.
In the Epistle to the Romans, Paul is supposed to
write in a mUder and more conciliatory spirit ; an
nouncing his intention to carry the contribution of
money to Jerusalem, and in other ways manifesting
a disposition to overcome the hostility which, it is
pretended, existed against him and his doctrine on
the side of the mother-church. EspeciaUy does Baur
dweU upon the account in the Acts of the circumcision
of Timothy, asserting that such an act would be
absolutely incompatible with the doctrine laid down
by Paul (Gal. v. 2) : "If ye be circumcised, Christ
shall profit you nothing." Other instances of con
formity to the Jewish law, which are attributed to
Paul in the Acts, he pronounces to be equally
unhistorical. The entire representation given there
of the personal relations of Paul to Peter and his
associates, Baur affirms to be contrary to the in
timations and assertions of Paul, and to be con
tradicted, in particular, by Paul's narrative of his
1 Such letters might be taken, probably, by any .Christian who
was rectus in ecclesia, in case he wished to travel.

228 PARTIES IN THE APOSTOLIC CHURCH.
conference with the apostles, in the second chapter
of Galatians. We believe, that these propositions of the Tiibin
gen critics are not sustained by the evidence to which
they appeal, but are flatly contradicted by it, and that
their positions are contrary to the truth. What
evidence is there, in the Epistle to the Corinthians,
of such a division and hostUity as Baur affirms to have
existed ? There was a faction which claimed to be
the disciples of Peter. But what proof is there that
he gave them any countenance? There was also,
among the opponents of Paul, a party claiming to
foUow ApoUos — himseU a disciple of the Pauline
doctrine. Who pretends, that ApoUos encouraged
such a movement ? To our mind, all the language of
Paul in reference to the other apostles which is
found in these Epistles, proves the opposite of Baur's
proposition. The apostles are spoken of as one
body of feUow-laborers. In vindicating his authority
against the aspersions cast upon him, Paul asserts,
to be sure, that " he is not a whit behind the very
chiefest apostles " (2 Cor. xi. 5). But he does not
say or insinuate that "the chiefest apostles" are no
apostles, or that they are perverters of the truth.
The opposite of this is everywhere implied. He says:
" God has set forth us the apostles last, as it were
appointed to death ; " and in the record of hardship
that foUows, he associates with himseU his fellow-
apostles. Witness also his appeal to the testimony

baur's theory. 229
of the other apostles — of Peter, James, and the rest — •
in proof of the Resurrection of Christ, and the coup
ling of their testimony with the reference to the
appearance of Christ to himself: "For I am ihe least
of the apostles and not worthy to be called an apostle,
because I persecuted the Church of God." He com
pares himself with the other apostles and takes the
' ' lowest place among them ! But a more striking re
futation of Baur's view is contained in the remarks of
Paul upon the contribution he was collecting for the
poor brethren at Jerusalem. In the First Epistle he
exhorts the Corinthians to aid in making up this
" contribution for the saints " — saints it appears they
were, notwithstanding their supposed heresy and
hostility ! And in the Second Epistle he speaks of
the matter more at length. He had long been
engaged in this charitable service (ix. 2). He says
that the conveyance, by his instrumentality, of this
contribution, wiU not only relieve " the wants of the
saints," but wUl call forth at Jerusalem "thanks
giving unto God ; " that the church at Jerusalem
wiU find occasion to glorify God for the faithfulness
of the Corinthians in thus practically carrying out
their Christian profession, and for the genuineness
of their Christian fellowship {xoivaviag) manifested in
this Uberahty. He adds that the saints at Jerusalem
with prayer "wUllong after you" on account of the
abounding grace of God vouchsafed to you. A deep,
yeaniing, prayerful interest will be excited towards

230 PARTIES IN THE APOSTOLIC CHURCH.
the Corinthian Christians in the hearts of their
brethren at Jerusalem. Who can believe that this
contribution is going to a church which is considered
by Paul to be made up of Judaizers — professors of
what he calls another gospel ? If the Corinthians
had understood Paul's letter to them as Baur does,
what must have been their surprise at these incon
gruous exhortations and expressions of fraternal re
gard for the Jerusalem believers ! Turn we now to
the Epistle to the Romans, written not long after.
There we find the apostle pouring out his love and
compassion for his kinsmen according to the flesh —
explaining that the apparent rejection of them by
Divine Providence is temporary. Of the contribution
he says : " Now I go unto Jerusalem to minister unto
the saints. For it hath pleased them of Macedonia
and Achaia to make a certain contribution for the poor
saints which are at Jerusalem. It hath pleased them
verUy, and their debtors they are. For if the GentUes
have been made partakers of their spiritual things " — -
for Jerusalem was the mother-church whence Chris
tianity with all its blessings flowed out to the GentUes
— " their duty is also to minister unto them in carnal
things" (Rom. xv. 25 seq.).1 Here the Apostle Paul
honors the Jerusalem church as the fountain whence
the Gentiles have derived their Christianity. Are
these expressions compatible with the notion that this
1 Principally on account of its alleged complaisance towards the
Jewish Christians, the xvth chapter (as well as the xvith) of this

baur's theory. 231
church had no fellowship with the uncircumcised
converts of Christianity, and that its leaders were
hostile to Paul, and in turn considered by him to be
involved in fundamental error? The assertion or
insinuation by Baur, that there was any essential
change in Paul's feeling between the writing of the
Epistles to the Corinthians and Galatians, and that
to the Romans, is without foundation. During the
whole period in which the composition of the first-
named Epistles occurred, Paul was interested in the
business of gathering the contribution which he after
wards carried to Jerusalem.
But the main rehance of Baur is on Paul's narra
tive, in the second chapter of Galatians, of his confer
ence with the apostles and his subsequent conflict
with Peter at Antioch. But an examination of this
interesting passage, instead of confirming Baur's
theory, whl, as we think, demonstrate its falsity. Be
it remembered that Paul is writing to a church which
the Judaizers had tried to turn away both from his
Epistle is declared by Baur — without the shadow of external proof
and contrary to the internal evidence of both style and thought — to
be an interpolation. His argument is a mere petitio principii. The
arbitrary attempt to cast these inconvenient passages out of the
Epistle, is well answered by Meyer in his Commentary on the Bomans
(K. xv.). Bleek, a cautious and unprejudiced critic, says, in reference
to the denial by Baur and Schwegler of the genuineness of the last
two chapters of the Epistle : " The grounds for this denial are wholly
false and untenable, and the genuineness of these chapters, as well
as the fact of their belonging to our Epistle, is to be regarded as
certain." Einl. in d. If. T., a. 416.

232 PARTIES IN THE APOSTOLIC CHURCH.
doctrine and from their esteem and respect for his
person and apostolic authority, He is placed under
the necessity of explaining his relations to the other
apostles; and this he does by showing, on the one
hand, his own independence and equality with them,
and, on the other, the full recognition and fellowship
which they had accorded to him. He is speaking
of the same visit which Luke describes in the fifteenth
chapter of the Acts. Fourteen years after his first
visit to Jerusalem, when he had spent a fortnight with
Peter (i. 18), he went there in company with Barnabas
and Titus. He communicated " privately to them
which were of reputation " (rolg doxovai), the gospel
which he was in the habit of preaching.1 His motive
in taking this course is set forth in the foUowing
words : " lest by any means I should run, or had run,
in vain." That is to say, he explained his method of
preaching in order that he might be rightly judged
and appreciated by his feUow-apostles. We shall see,
as we proceed, whether or not he was successful.
Before stating the result of his conference, he de
scribes the ineffectual attempt of "false brethren
unawares brought in " to procure the circumcision
of Titus, and his own prompt and effectual resistance
1 This account by Paul, and the narrative in the xvth of Acts,
supplement each other. The latter relates to the public transaction,
including the decision which was reached ; the former, as above
stated, refers to a conference of a more private nature. But the
phraseology in Gal. ii. 2 implies that there was a public conference
also. See Ellicott and Meyer on the passage.

baur's theory. 233
to their endeavor. The " false brethren " are judaiz
ing reactionists having no right in the Christian
brotherhood, but having crept in, as it were- — intrud
ed where they do not belong. They made it their
business " to spy out the liberty " of the GentUe
converts ; that is, they watched with an inimical
intent, designing to bring these converts to accept the
yoke of the Mosaic law. Here the difference between
such false brethren and the apostles is palpable.
Would Paul have undertaken to explain his gospel to
these " false brethren," lest he should run in vain ?
Rather would he, as he did, sternly resist them. But
the refusal of Paul to circumcise Titus is used as an
argument to disprove the historical truth of the cir
cumcision of Timothy. It is.r said that Paul would
not have done at one time what he absolutely refused
to do at another. But why did he refuse to circum
cise Titus ? First, because he was a heathen by birth,
and secondly, because his circumcision was demanded
on doctrinal grounds, so that to yield would have
been to give up at once the rights of the GentUes and
justification by faith. But Timothy was the son of
a Jewish mother, and he was circumcised for a totally
different reason from that for which the circumcision
of Titus was demanded, Timothy was circumcised
out of respect to unconverted Jews, not converted
Judaizers. His circumcision neither imperilled the
rights of the Gentiles, nor clashed with the doctrine
of Justification. In this act, Paul simply made him-

234 PARTIES IN THE APOSTOLIC CHURCH.
self " a Jew unto the Jew," on his maxim of making
himself all things to aU men — so far as no principle
was violated.1 There is, then, no inconsistency such as
is charged by the Tubingen critics. The circumcision
of Timothy as truly accords with the principles of
Paul, as the circumcision of Titus would have con
tradicted them. Having mentioned the circumstances
concerning Titus, Paul now returns to his conference
with the apostles : " But of those " — from those —
"who seemed to be somewhat," — that is, were re
garded with most respect — here Paul breaks off the
sentence by throwing in this parenthetical remark :
" whatsoever they were, it maketh no matter to me ,
God accepteth no man's person ; " and then he adds :
"for they who seemed to be somewhat, in conference
added nothing to me." The mode of characterizing ,
the apostles as "those who seem to be somewhat,"
is misinterpreted when it is supposed to contain a
tinge of irony. Nothing of that sort belongs to the
phraseology. It is the equivalent of the earlier ex
pression — "them which were of reputation." And
as to the parenthetical clause, it must be remembered
that Paul's enemies were endeavoring to disprove his
claim to be an apostle, and to represent that the
older apostles were possessed of superior authority.
His purpose is to express, as against this disparage
ment, his consciousness of a perfect equality in respect
to rights and claims, with the other apostles. And
1 1 Cor. ix. 20 seq.

baur's theory. 235
having been led to aUude to the high estimation in
which they stood, he adds a cautionary explanation
which would exclude the inference that he considered
himself in any degree subordinate to them. " What
ever they were— however high may be the standing
of men, God is not thereby rendered partial towards
them." The last clause in the quotation above, is,
however, the most important. Paul says of the
apostles, that in conference they added nothing — ¦
ovdsv %Q06av's-Q-tvT0 — to him. He had shortly before
said that on his arrival in Jerusalem he " communica
ted" — dvs&s/ur]v is the word — to the apostles the
gospel he had preached. And now he says that they
—ovdsv nooGavs-d-tvro — had nothing to add to that
gospel by way of correction or supplement. They had
no fault to find with it, no new principles to suggest ;
" but contrariwise " they — what ? for everything turns
on the statement that is to follow — " they gave to me
and Barnabas the right hands of fellowship." Seeing
that Paul had been successful in converting the
Gentiles as Peter had been successful in converting
the Jews, and heeding this instruction of Providence ;
seeing, moreover, the " grace that was given " to Paul,
the other apostles — who seemed to be pillars, or,
rather, were esteemed as the leaders and supporters,
of the Jerusalem church — Peter, James, and John,
gave the hand of fraternity and fellowship, it being
understood that in accordance with the plain sugges
tions of Providence, Paul and Barnabas should labor

236 PARTIES IN THE APOSTOLIC CHURCH.
in heathen countries, whUst the other apostles should
" go unto the circumcision." These statements, in
stead of supporting, utterly demolish Baur's theory.
To say as he does, in effect, that this union was on
the outside — was, in fact, a peaceable division and
schism in the church, in which those who affirmed the
necessity of circumcision and those who denied it,
being unable to walk together, concluded to divide
without an open quarrel, is to offer as gross a mis
interpretation of a Scriptural passage as can weU be
conceived. The Apostle Paul expressly says that the
other apostles had nothing to add to the principles
which governed him in his preaching. He implies,
and intends to convey the idea, that Peter, James,
and John, were satisfied with the gospel which he
preached. The imputation that Paul gave the right
hand of fellowship to those who maintained, to use his
own language, "another gospel," when neither he
nor they felt that they were brethren, holding a com
mon faith and engaged in a common work, is wholly
inconsistent with his known character, and would
reflect upon him and them the deepest dishonor. That
the feUowship was cordially meant is proved in a
manner which no audacity of denial can gainsay, by
the reasons which Paul assigns for the act, — the
perception, namely, that a great work of God had
been done among the Gentiles, and that Paul was
himself endued with heavenly grace for the work of
an apostle. The same thing is rendered still more

Paul's rebuke of peter. 237
evident by the circumstance that the Jerusalem apos
tles requested Paul and Barnabas to remember the
poor at Jerusalem and collect for them contributions —
to which request they willingly agreed. Of the zeal
with which Paul addressed himsetf to this work of
charity and fellowship, we have abundant evidence.1
Did Peter, James, and John, seek for the money of
heretics and heretical teachers ? Did Paul and Barna
bas labor to minister to the wants of Judaizers — ¦
"dogs," as Paul plainly calls them in the Epistle to
the PhUippians? No! the fellowship of the Jewish
and GentUe teachers was genuine and cordial: and
so the underpinning of the whole Tubingen theory falls
away. It would argue, however, not only an ignorance
of the subsequent history, but also an ignorance of
human nature, to suppose that this friendly and
fraternal interview and the decisions of the apostolic
convention would avaU either to define, in aU points,
the relation of the two branches of the church, or to
suppress permanently the judaizing faction. That
1 It had been a custom of the Jews scattered in foreign lands to
send up gifts to the capital, expressing thus their sense of the pre
eminence of the Judaean church gathered about the centre of their
religion. Ewald associates this old custom with the record of the
repeated contributions sent from the Gentile churches to the mother-
ohnrch at Jerusalem. These were, to be sure, only voluntary tokens
of love. Tet the Jewish Christian would naturally be reminded
of the old custom we have mentioned. Hence the fact of the send
ing of these contributions would be a peculiar sign of respect as well
as fellowship. See Ewald's Geschichte, &c, B. VI. b. 438.

238 PARTIES IN THE APOSTOLIC CHURCH.
this faction was still alive and influential, was shown
by the transactions at Antioch which Paul proceeds
to explain. Peter had not hesitated to eat Avith the
GentUe converts there ; to break over thus the restric
tion which the Jew placed upon himself, as to inter
course with the heathen.1 But on the arrival of
certain Jewish Christians from Jerusalem, he changed
his course and withdrew from them ; the other Jewish
converts and even Barnabas following his example.2
This conduct of Peter roused the indignation and call
ed forth the plain and earnest rebuke of Paul. In
mingling freely with the Gentile Christians, Peter
acted in keeping with the liberal views which he had
acquired in connection with the conversion of Corne
lius and had expressed at the apostolic convention.
This convention had not defined what course the
Jewish Christians were to take on the point in ques
tion. We cannot say, therefore, that Peter, in case
he had abstained from eating with the Gentiles, would
have violated the terms of that arrangement. It is
not remarkable that in the conference at Jerusalem
1 See Luke xv. 2 ; 1 Cor. v. 11.
3 These Christians from Jerusalem are said (ver. 12) to have come
drro 'laKaflov — that is, to have been sent by James. The business on
which they were sent, we know not, just as we know not the partic
ular object of Peter's visit. There is no intimation that James had
given any sanction to the course which they chose to take with
respect to the Gentile believers. To suppose that he had, would b«
as unwarrantable as to infer, from the course which Peter had first
taken, that he had been sent, or had come, expressly to eat with the
Gentiles and live as one of them.

Paul's rebuke oe peter. 239
this particular question was not settled or considered ;
and although this freedom of intercourse which swept
down aU the old barriers between Jew and heathen
might be a logical deduction from the spirit of that
agreement, it is not remarkable that Jewish believers
— even those of a liberal turn and in favor of the
feUowship concluded upon at the convention — should
faU to perceive at once the propriety of such a prac
tice. Pecuhar embarrassments, as we shaU hereafter
more fuUy point out, lay in the way of such a conces
sion. We must not forget the force of a life-long,
hereditary prejudice which is intrenched among relig
ious beliefs. Simple abstinence from this kind of
feUowship with the Gentile Christians could not,
therefore, be regarded as an absolute breach of the
covenant which secured to' them their rights and the
recognition of their Christian standing. There were
still two branches of the church. But the offence
which Paul charged upon Peter was threefold. He
was guilty of an inconsistency in departing from the
course which he had pursued before the arrival of
the Jewish Christians ; of hypocrisy, since in thus
altering his conduct, he acted against his real convic
tions and from fear; and of the virtual attempt to
lead the Gentile converts to judaize, or to make them
feel that they ought to be circumcised. Peter was not
accused of an error of doctrine, but of an error in
conduct. He behaved in a manner inconsistent with
his real views, just as Barnabas did, and there is just

240 PARTIES IN THE APOSTOLIC CHURCH. .
as little ground for imputing to Peter a judaizing
principle on account of his conduct on this occasion,
as there is for imputing the same principle to Barna
bas. Peter acted from the same cowardly feeling
which had once moved him to deny his Master. If
Paul had complamed that Peter held a false principle,
that he did not understand the rights of the GentUes,
this controversy might be urged in support of Baur's
theory. But inasmuch as the censure of Paul pre
supposes an essential agreement between himself and
Peter in their views upon the matter in question,
Baur's theory not only gains no foothold, but is effec
tually overthrown by the record of this conflict. We
simply add that Paul's reasoning on this occasion is
a most forcible exposition of the principal ground of
his unflinching opposition to the laying of the cere
monial law upon the Gentiles. Such an act would
derogate from the sufficiency of Christ as a Saviour,
and imply that when a man believed' on him, he had
not secured his salvation, but was still in his sins.
" If righteousness come by the law, then Christ is
dead in vain." l
The continuance of a judaizing party after aU
these events, and notwithstanding, the feUowship
between the apostle to the heathen and " the pillars "
at Jerusalem, is not to us a cause of wonder. Re
member how ingrained was the prejudice that must
be removed before the requirement of circumcision
1 Gal. ii. 16-21.

REFUTATION OF BAUR. 241
could be dispensed with! And how inveterate was
the obstinacy of the pharisaical Jew, who had been so
trained as hardly to distinguish between the moral
and ceremonial precept, in respect either to sacredness
or perpetuity, and who had accepted the Messiah,
having no thought that the law or any portion of it
was to pass away ! And the rapid spread of Gentile
Christianity, a fact which threatened to reduce
ultimately the party of the ritual to a hopeless minori
ty, would naturally rouse them to adhere more
zealously to their position, and to put forth fresh
efforts to obtain for it a triumph.
The objections of Baur to the narrative of Luke
disappear in the hght of the preceding review. As
to Peter, the fellowship he extended to Paul (Gal. ii.
9), and his liberahty in reference to the Gentile Chris
tians at Antioch — with the exception of the temporary
infidelity to his real convictions — were the proper
sequel of his vision in the case of Cornelius. There
is nothing in Peter's course, which throws the .least
doubt upon the record of that event. We must sup
pose, indeed, that in the interval of about fifteen years,
between the affair of Cornelius and the apostohc
convention, the judaizing spirit had grown stronger,
rather than weaker, in the Jerusalem church. This
was natural. Pharisees (Acts xv. 5) had become
convinced of the Messiahship of Jesus, and had
brought into the church their zeal in behalf of a strict
16

242 PARTIES IN THE APOSTOLIC CHURCH.
adherence to the Mosaic ritual. And we have only
to imagine the situation of that church, to perceive
the difficulties that beset this whole subject. The
Jewish Christians themselves kept up the observance
of the old forms. They frequented the temple, hke
other devout IsraeUtes. That they should give up the
ceremonial law had not been claimed or suggested.
As patriotic Jews, they could not break away from
the national customs. But a religious motive bound
them to the old observances until these should be
repealed, or until they should discern that the gospel
had virtuaUy supplanted them. Luther's doctrine
of justification carried with it logicaUy the abohtion
of a great part of the existing ritual of the church.
But it was only by degrees that the Wittenberg
reformers felt the incongruity, and shook themselves
clear, so to speak, of forms whose vitality was gone.
And yet these forms were of merely human institution.
But if the Jewish Christians would observe the law,
how could they break over it in their intercourse with
the GentUes ? How should they adjust their relations
to the heathen converts ? The state of things, as we
gather it from Luke, is just what we should expect to
result from this anomalous situation. On the one
hand, there is rejoicing in the mother-church at the
conversion of the Gentiles. It is seen that they have
become recipients of the Spirit. There is a thankful
acknowledgment of them as fellow-believers. Yet
the question of freely mingling with them — of treating

REFUTATION OF BAUR. 243
them in all respects as Jewish brethren were treated—
was encumbered with the difficulties we have men
tioned. A bigoted but influential faction strenuously
contended against the lawfulness of eating with
heathen converts, and sought to impose on them
circumcision and the other points of the ritual. The
apostles, and the church acting as a body, refused
this last demand, and shook hands with Paul, the
determined defender of the rights of the GentUes.
Peter, enlightened by the teaching of the Spirit, could
not refuse to eat with his GentUe brethren ; yet
yielded for a time at Antioch to the pressure of
judaizing opinion. The affair of Cornelius, if it
excited discontent at Jerusalem, and had no perma
nent effect on the judaizing element which rather
grew than declined in strength, left a lasting impres
sion on his mind, and led him at the apostohc con-
' vention to take the side of the GentUes.1
It is easy to understand, we observe further, how
there might be many who had no sympathy with the
Judaizers in then* requirement that the heathen con
vert should be circumcised, but were stUl unprepared
for that degree of liberahty in intercourse with their
GentUe brethren which Peter had exhibited at
1 For good remarks on the topics touched upon in the paragraph
above, see Ewald's Ges. d. Volkes Israel, B. vi. s. 226 seq., 426 seq.
We may add that the narrative of the conversion of Cornelius in the
Acts is full of graphic details. Persons, places, and times, are
exactly designated. If it be a fiction, it is an example of the " lie
circumstantial."

244 PARTIES IN THE APOSTOLIC CHURCH.
Antioch. We have among us a numerous and re
spectable body of Christians — a friend has suggested
the iUustration — who believe that baptism is an essen
tial prerequisite of communion, and that immersion
alone is baptism ; who, therefore, decline to sit at the
Lord's table with those whom they cordiaUy love as
feUow-Christians, and whose labors in spreading the
gospel they look upon with heartfelt sympathy. The
Baptist does not deny the name of Christian brother
to those from whom he is obUged to withhold certain
forms of fellowship. So it was, we doubt not, with
many Jewish Christians.1
As concerns Paul, the narrative of Luke is equaUy
reUeved of difficulties. That Paul, in Galatians ii.,
does not mention the public conference, which Luke
describes, is easily explained. It was no part of his
purpose to give a complete history of the proceedings
at Jerusalem. The particular point to which his
mind was directed, was his relation to the other apos
tles. Had the public transaction modified, in any
essential particular, the result of his private interview
with them, he might have been caUed upon to speak
of it. Such, however, was not the fact. He could
conscientiously say that nothing was added — ovdtv
TtQOGavsdsvro — to his gospel. The conclusions of
the convention, founded as they were on a desire to
It hardly need be said that we imply here no judgment as to
the justice or injustice of the position which the Baptist takes. The
illustration is pertinent, whether he be right or wrong.

REFUTATION OF BAUR. 245
put no needless obstruction in the way of the spread
of the gospel among the Jews, and accompanied by
an express acknowledgment of the rightful exemption
of the Gentiles from the yoke of the law, were fully
consistent with Paul's position. But if Paul was not
caUed upon to allude, in Gal. ii., to the' pubhc pro
ceeding on the occasion of his visit to Jerusalem, the
purpose he had in view rendered it inappropriate that
he should do so. His immediate purpose was to
guard against the impression that he stood, in any
sense, in a subordinate position with reference to the
other apostles. An allusion to the arrangement of
the convention might have furnished his enemies with
a pretext for the unfounded charge of a dependence
on his part upon " the pUlars " at Jerusalem.
It is objected to Luke's narrative of the conven
tion, that the decision which is said to have been
made there would infallibly have been referred to by
Paul in 1 Cor. viii., where the matter of eating flesh
. offered to idols is considered. In answer to this
objection, we remark that the apostle in this passage
does oppose the practice referred to, and on the same
general ground as that assigned in the Jerusalem
letter; namely, a regard for those who thought the
practice wrong (comp. Acts xv. 21 and 1 Cor. viii.
9 seq.). His aim was to instU a right feeling -into
the minds of the Corinthians, and to inculcate a
principle on which they could act intelhgently. An
appeal to authority — or what would be taken for

246 PARTIES IN THE APOSTOLIC CHURCH.
authority — would have defeated this design. Besides,
it was not the danger of giving needless offence to
the Jews, but it was the consciences of weak Gentile
brethren which Paul had to consider. Moreover, the
arrangement at the conference applied to the churches
of Syria and CUicia, in particular to Antioch and to
the dissension that had broken out there. After
Gentile Christianity had become widely prevalent,
after Paul had fully entered, as an independent
laborer, into his own pecuhar field, and when, espe
cially, the Jewish Christians (of the Judaizing type)
kept up their mischievous efforts to deprive the
Gentiles of their liberty, it may weU be assumed that
the arrangement in question, based, as it was, on a
psudential consideration, had become obsolete. It
had been made to meet an emergency. When Paul
had founded numerous churches, and churches, too,
made up chiefly of Gentile converts, that recommen
dation, adopted for the sake of sparing the feehngs
of the Jews and of preventing the inference that the
Gentiles were enemies of the Old Testament religion,
would cease to have any validity. It had no resem
blance to the decree of a later councU. It was a
fraternal recommendation sent to Antioch, through
SUas and Judas Barsabas (Acts xv. 22), the substance
of it being also put into a letter which they carried.
There was not a judicial proceeding, but a consulta
tion of brethren.1 They did not come together to
1 See, on this subject, Neander's Pflam. u. Leit. d. Kirche, B. I.,'

GENUINENESS OF THE ACTS. 247
give law to the Church, but to quiet a particular
disturbance. We are now prepared to consider the question of
the genuineness of the Acts. If we have shown that
the representation which is there given of the respec
tive positions of Paul and Peter, and of the mutual
relations of the Jewish and GentUe Christians, is not
discordant either with the statements of Paul or with
the probabUities in the case, we have destroyed the
sole argument of any weight against the genuineness
of the book. For on this imaginary discordance the
objection to the early composition of the Acts is
founded. But, in our judgment, the genuineness of
this book can be fully established, and the attack
which has been made upon it shown to be groundless.
1. The testimony of the author, direct and inci
dental, when we consider the form in which it is
given, is a strong proof of the genuineness of the
book, and in the absence of counteracting evidence,
a convincing proof.
We assume, what is now a conceded fact, that
the third Gospel and the Acts have the same author.
Independently of the evidence afforded by the preface
to the Acts, the resemblance of the two books in
language and style is conclusive. Now the third
Gospel purports to be written by one personaUy
s. 422 seq., Lekebusch, s. 314 seq., Bleek's Einl in d. AT. T., s'. 371
seq., Meyer, Gal. Einl. § 3, Apostelgeschichte, s. 280.

248 PARTIES IN THE APOSTOLIC CHURCH.
acquainted with the apostles. He records what he
had received from " eyewitnesses and ministers of the
word" (Luke i. 2). The Acts, addressed to the same
TheophUus, and referring in its preface back to the
Gospel, is the sequel of the latter work. The author
of the Acts, therefore, claims to be an acquaintance
of the apostles. And we may observe — though- the
remark might properly be made a special topic of
evidence — that, since all the proof of the early date
of the Gospel tends equaUy to establish the early date
of the Acts, and since we have internal proof that the
Gospel was written not later than about the date of
the destruction of Jerusalem, the genuineness of the
Acts is a necessary inference. Proving that Luke
wrote the Gospel, we have proved that he wrote the
Acts also. And the phraseology in the prologue of the
Gospel obliges us to suppose either that the writer
is a conscientious and weU-informed historian, or con
sciously and basely false. He declares that he writes
in order that Theophilus may be assured of the certain
ty, the unassaUable reality — rr)v aGcpdXscav — of the
truths of Christianity in which he had been instructed.
But not to dwell on the connection of the Gospel with
the Acts, and considering this last book by itself, we
are happily provided with an incidental testimony
of the most convincing character. We allude to the
passages in which the writer speaks in the first person
plural, thus including himself among the participants
in the events he records. This use of the "we"

GENUINENESS OF THE ACTS. 249
begins with Paul's leaving Troas (xvi. 11), and con-
tinues in the account of his stay at PhUippi. It is
resumed on the return of Paul to Phihppi (xx. 5-15)
— thus ^raising the presumption that the author of
these passages had in the interval tarried at that
place. The remainmg passages in which this pecu
liarity appears, are xxi. 1-18, xxvii. 1 — xxviii. IY.
Now, what is the explanation of this, phenomenon ?
Only two hypotheses are open to disqjpssion among
those who ascribe the book to Luke. The first is the
old, generaUy received, and, as we think, weU sus
tained view that Luke was himself, in these places,
the attendant of Paul. The second is the hypothesis
of Schleiermacher, variously modified by other writers,
that Luke here introduces, without formal notice,
a ' document emanating, as they commonly suppose,
from Timothy, or, as some have thought, from SUas.
This last form of the hypothesis, that Silas wrote the
passages in question, is supported by no argument
worthy of attention, and is fuUy refuted by the cir
cumstance that in connection with at least one of the
passages (see Acts xvi. 19-25), Silas is mentioned in
the third person. But the theory that Timothy is the
author of these passages,- though adopted by so able
and candid a writer as Bleek, has been, as we believe,
effectually disproved.1 This theory does not, to be
1 The examination of the " Timothy-hypothesis" by Lekebusoh
(s. 140-167), is one of the finest parts of his excellent treatise. We
present the more prominent considerations bearing on the topic.

250 PARTIES IN THE APOSTOLIC CHURCH.
sure, shake the general credibUity of the book, or the
fact of its being composed by Luke. But how stands
the evidence in regard to it ? We read (in Acts xx.
4, 5) : " And there accompanied him [Paul] into
Asia, Sopater of Berea; and of the Thessalonians,
Aristarchus and Secundus ; and Gaius of Derbe,
and Timotheus ; and of Asia, Tychicus and Trophimus.
These going before tarried for us at Troas." If, under
the term "^Jiese," all who are named before are
referred to — which is the most natural interpretation1
— the so-called Timothy -hypothesis faUs to the ground.
In connection with this piece of evidence, it deserves
remark that the absence of all detaU — the summary
style of the narrative — in passages directly connected
with those under consideration, and covering a portion
of Paul's career in which Timothy bore an equal part,
is against the supposition that Luke had at his com
mand a diary of this apostohc helper. But the
decisive argument against the Schleiermacherian hypo
thesis, is the wrong view of the general structure and
character of the book which that theory imphes.
Were it true that the book presents the appearance
of being a compUation of documents imperfectly fused
together — left in a good degree in their original state
— it might not unreasonably be assumed that the
author had taken up a document from another's pen,
without taking care to alter the pronominal feature
which we are discussing. This idea of the book was
1 See Meyer, ad loc.

GENUINENESS OF THE ACTS. 25]
a part of Schleiermacher's theory. But a more
thorough examination of the Acts has made it clear
that, from whatever sources the author draws his
information, it is one production, coherent in plan;
its different parts connected by references forward and
backward ; uniform in style ; and flowing from a
single pen. If Luke took up into his work a docu
ment of Timothy, he could not have given it the com
plete harmony with his own style which it exhibits,
without changing its form and phraseology to such an
extent as renders it impossible to suppose the retention
of the " we " to be artless or accidental. Memoranda
of Timothy, if Luke had such, were rewritten by him ;
but this leaves the retaining of the "we," with no
explanation, an insoluble fact. We infer, then, with
confidence, that Luke, in these passages, professes to
speak in his own person.1 This fact ZeUer and the
other Tubingen critics admit ; and their conclusion is,
that whUst the author of the Acts, writing in the
second century, used a previously written document,
he intentionaUy left the " we " as it stood — although
the document in other parts was materially wrought
1 There remains, to be sure, the unanswered question, why Luke
does not more expressly state the fact of his joining Paul, but leaves
it to be gathered from this use of the pronoun. But this difficulty
is, to say the least, not greater than the difficulty of supposing him
to introduce a document of this sort without notice and without
altering the pronominal form. The book was written for a private
individual. Of the circumstances of Luke's companionship with
Paul, Theophilus may have known something before.

252 PARTIES IN THE APOSTOLIC CHURCH.
over by him — in order to produce the false impression
that he was the contemporary and associate of Paul !
This refined fraud is attributed, and it is thought
necessary to attribute, to the author of the Acts ! But
if we are not prepared to adopt this theory, we have
no alternative but to accept the testimony of the
author concerning himself ; that is, to ascribe his work
to a contemporary and companion of the apostles.
2. The assumption that the book of Acts is spu
rious, and its contents in great part fictitious, is irre
concilable with the moral spirit that characterizes the
work. The presumption adverse to Baur's theory/
which is raised by the author's own testimony re
specting himself, is confirmed by the moral tone of
the book. It is true that every well-meaning book
is not thereby proved to come from the writer from
whom it pretends to emanate. Nor would we contend
that the ideas of antiquity, and of Jewish antiquity in
particular, in regard to this matter of authorship
accorded in all respects with the ethical feeling of a
modern day.1 Apocryphal and other ancient works
are extant, which bore the name of some revered
person of an earher time, and which, notwithstanding
this groundless pretension, were designed to promote
the cause of religion. But an elaborate outlay of
cunning for the purpose of creating a false impression
in respect to the real author of a book, especiaUy
when the motive is to promote the interests of a party,
1 This Lekebusch frankly allows.

GENUINENESS OF THE ACTS. 253
deserves reprobation, whether the book be ancient or
recent. An effort of this kind must always have been
considered a piece of knavery. Where there is plainly
discovered an earnest regard for the law of veracityj
we are cut off from supposing anything like a pious
fraud. In this case, we must give credit to the testi
mony which the book itself offers respecting its author.
Much more are we precluded, in that case, from
considering a large part of the narrative a deliberate
fiction. Now there is manifest throughout the book
of Acts a penetrating discernment of the sacredness
of truth and the obligation of veracity. He who set
down the record of the sin and punishment of Ananias
and Sapphira was incapable of palming off, as a
veritable history of the apostles and of the manner in
which they were guided by the Holy Spirit, a series
of fictitious stories invented by himself. Dropping
for the moment the question of the general verity of
the narrative, let us observe the amount of duplicity
which the above-described theory of Zeller imputes to
the author of the Acts. The retention of the " we "
in a document which he has recast and recomposed — •
a retention deliberately resolved upon, we are told,
for the sake of deceiving the reader into the belief
that the author lived long before — is certainly equiva
lent, in a moral point of view, to the insertion of this
pronoun by the writer for the same end.1 If the
author, writing, it is supposed, in the second century,
1 See Lekebusch.

254 PARTIES IN THE APOSTOLIC CHURCH.
were charged with inserting this word, here and there,
in his own composition, the duplicity would not be
worse. How foreign this refined method of self-
advertisement is from the universal habit of apocryphal
writers, who are apt to blazon their assumed names
on the front of their works, wiU strike all who are
acquainted with this species of hterature. A writer
capable of such a trick as is charged upon the author
of the Acts, would almost infallibly have introduced
the passages which contain the " we " with an exphcit
declaration that here he joined Paul, or became a
participant in the events that follow. But the partic
ular point on which we now insist is the incompati
bility of such detestable deceit with the pure and
truthful air of the historian, and his recognition of the
law of veracity.
3. An irrefragable argument for the genuineness
and credibUity of Acts is afforded by the relation in
which it stands to the Pauline Epistles.
The coincidences and diversities are each an im
pressive proof of the correctness of the old and ac
cepted view concerning the book. As to the former,
the pecuharity of them, as Paley, in the Horae Paulince,
has very ingeniously shown, is that they are unde
signed. There are such correspondences with the
data furnished by the Epistles as could not have been
contrived, for they can only be detected by searching.
The omissions in the Acts are an equally remarkable
feature. We learn from the Epistles various facts of

GENUINENESS OF THE ACTS. 255
importance respecting Paul, which a writer of the
second century would certainly have worked into a
history or historical romance in which the Apostle was
to figure so prominently. Thus, for example, we have
no notice in the Acts of the sojourn of Paul in Arabia,
shortly after his conversion, which he himseU mentions
(Gal. i. 17). Luke describes him as preaching in
Damascus, and, " after that many days were fulfiUed,"
as flying from the machinations of the Jews to Jerusa
lem. For aught that appears, the author of the Acts
is ignorant of the fact of his visiting Arabia. But a
later writer, with the Epistle to the Galatians in his
hand, would not have faUed to show, at least, his
knowledge of an event so distinctly stated by the
Apostle himself. The three shipwrecks, and most of
the other hardships which Paul had endured (2 Cor.
xi. 24 seq.), are not mentioned in the Acts.1 And if
we look at what is actually narrated by Luke, although
Baur's theory of an inconsistency between the general
representations of the Acts and the Epistles is false,
yet the former shows itself an independent narrative.
It is not built up on the basis of information derived
from the writings of Paul. These are not made use
of in its composition. Now, this fact demonstrates
the early date of the Acts. Suppose that a GentUe
Christian of the second century had conceived the plan
of writing a work for the purpose which Baur attrib-
1 The shipwreck recorded in the Acts was subsequent to the
writing of this Epistle.

256 PARTIES IN THE APOSTOLIC CHURCH.
utes to the author of this book: his very first act
would have been to resort to the Epistles for the
materials out of which to construct his work.. Con
scious that a comparison of his production with these
well-known documents would be inevitable, he would
guard against the semblance of contradiction. He
would seek throughout to dovetail his work with the
authentic records of the apostohc age. Hence, - in
laboring to sweU their Ust of discrepancies between the
Acts and Paul, the Tubingen critics are unconsciously
beating down their own theory.
/ 4. Baur's theory is not sustained, but is over
thrown, by a candid view of the contents of the Acts.
Lekebusch has shown that the alleged paraUelism in
the career of Peter and of Paul is chiefly in the
imagination of the critics, and that the differences in
their respective deeds and fortunes are vastly more
numerous and more conspicuous than the points of
resemblance. In truth, there are no such resem
blances which are not accidental and to be expected
in the case of the two leading apostles, both of whom
were engaged in the same work and exposed to like
perils. That, in the Acts, Paul is said to have ad
dressed himself, in the places he visited, first to the
Jews and then to the heathen, rather confirms than
weakens the authority of Luke ; for such was unques
tionably the historical fact. An opposite course would
have been in the highest degree unnatural. The
gospel was a means of salvation " to the Jew first,

GENUINENESS OF THE ACTS. 257
and also to the Greek" (Rom. i. 16); and if Paul
was the Apostle to. the Gentiles, this meant simply that
his field of labor was in Gentile countries. But there
are passages, in the Acts which a writer having the
end in view which Baur imputes to the author of the
book would never have admitted. He is, by the
supposition, a Pauline Christian, and designs to make
it appear that Paul was a recognized apostle, on a
footing of perfect equality with the original disciples.
Yet he begins, in the very first chapter, by describing
the choice of an apostle, at the instance of Peter, to
fiU up the number of the twelve. He must be,, said
Peter, one who " has companied with us " through the
whole life of Christ, from the baptism of John, and be
ordained " to be a witness with us of his resurrection "
(Acts i. 21, 22). In treating of the Apocalypse,
Baur — without reason, as we think — regards the aUu
sions to " the twelve " apostles as an indirect thrust
at the Apostle Paul, and a sign of the judaizing char
acter of the book. Yet here we have a Pauline Chris
tian faUing into a similar style ! A partisan of Paul,
inventing history for the purpose of exalting his equal
apostolic claims, it is safe to say, would never have
introduced the passage in question.
But let us turn to the . narrative of the last visit
of the Apostle Paul to Jerusalem — that visit which
was so important in its results, and is so fully de
scribed by the author of the Acts. It is one main
design, they say, of this author to extenuate and hide
17

258 PARTIES IN THE APOSTOLIC CHURCH.
from view the mutual opposition of the two branches
of the Church, and to produce the impression that the
body of Jewish Christians agree on the ritual question
with Paul. Now, what do we find in the midst of
this very passage in which Paul is brought into con
tact with the church at Jerusalem and the Jewish
Christians who thronged the city ? Why, James and
the elders at Jerusalem are reported as saying to
Paul : " Thou seest, brother, how many thousands " —
literally myriads, /uvqiddtg — " of Jews there are which
believe ; and they are all zealous of the law ; " and
they were all jealous of Paul on account of the informa
tion they had received that he was in the habit of
dissuading Jews from observing the Mosaic law and
circumcising their chUdren. That is, a writer, who is
inventing and altering history for the purpose of
hiding a fact, gives to that fact a conspicuous place in
his narrative! Baur has no other solution than the
remark that the writer here " forgets the role he is
playing." But the answer is, that supposing so
shrewd a writer as he is represented to be, to forget
anywhere the design he had in view, he could not
forget it in the crisis of the whole history, when Paul
met the Jewish-Christian Church for the last time, and
when this very point of the authority of the ritual, and
the views and feelings of the Jewish believers, is the
theme of the narrative..1
1 Baur more than insinuates that the Jewish Christians took
part in this violent attack upon Paul, and that Luke is at pains to

GENUINENESS OF THE ACTS. 259
We have adverted above to the manner in which
the author of the Acts -begins his work. Not less
incompatible with the Tubingen theory is the manner
in which he concludes. The reader must bear in
mind that, according to Baur and ZeUer, a main aim
of the writer is to represent the Apostle in a friendly
attitude towards his Jewish countrymen. A GentUe
Christian holds out the oliye-branch to the Jew. But
how ends this " reconciling " and " pacifying " pro
duction ? It winds up with a denunciation from Paul
against the unbelief of the Jews, in which, using the
stern words of the prophet Isaiah, he charges upon
them a judicial blindness, and adds : " Be it known
therefore unto you, that the salvation of God is sent
unto the Gentiles, and that they will hear it." That
is, the divine rejection of the Jews and choice of the
GentUes is the last word from Paul which the reader
hears ! How would that sound in the ear of the
zealous Judaizer whom this book was to concUiate,
and win to the esteem of Paul and of his type of
doctrine? Is it not plain that the "tendency"
ascribed to this work is read into it by the critics?
Their interpretation is not drawn from an unprejudiced
examination of the contents of the book, which are
flatly inconsistent with it, but from the demands of a
suppress the fact. If we are to believe Baur, then, the same writer
who so flagrantly " forgets his part " as to make mention of the zeal
of '' many thousands " of believers for the law, recovers his memory
so fully as to falsify in the very next breath 1

260 PARTIES IN THE APOSTOLIC CHURCH. ¦
preconceived, and, we beUeve, unfounded historical
theory of their own contriving.
The neglect of the writer to avail himself of the
most natural means of promoting his alleged purpose,
is, also, a proof that this purpose belongs only to the
critic's brain. A single example of this negligence, un
accountable on Baur's theory of the design of the book,
is the omission of the writer to bring Paul and Peter
together in Rome, where, according to a belief then
current, they both perished as martyrs in the Neronian
persecution.1 What would the writer of an irenical
fiction lay hold of so soon, as the supposed conjunction
of the two apostles in the capital of the world, and
their common fate ? How easUy might a tale be spun
out of this meeting of the leaders of the two branches
of the Church, which would effectually promote the
author's plan ! Yet the book closes abruptly — the
author seeming at last to hasten to the conclusion
— with no mention of Peter's visit to Rome, con-1
nection with the GentUe capital, or interview with
Paul. 5. The unfitness of such a work as the book of
Acts to secure the end for which, according to Baur,
1 Eor proof that the report of Peter having suffered martyrdom
at Bome is met with prior to the date assigned by the Tubingen
critics to the Acts, see Gieseler's Church Eistory, B. I. s. 27, N. 6.
In truth, there is no sufficient reason for disbelieving the tradition
so early and widely current. Eor a full examination of the .point,
see Dr. Schaff s Eistory of the Apostolic Church, p. 372 seq. See
also Bleek's Einl, s. 563.

GENUINENESS OF THE ACTS. 261
it was composed, stands in the way of the acceptance
of his theory.
Here, tf we are to believe the Tubingen critics,
was a great division in the Church. Jewish Christians,
on the one hand, following the doctrine of Peter, re
quired circumcision and a compliance with the ritual
as a condition of feUowship with the GentUe Christians.
The latter, on the contrary, following the authority of
Paul, as decidedly refused to yield to this demand.
Efforts are at length made from different sides to bring
about an accommodation. And this writer composes
an historical romance for the purpose of spreading
such a conception of the apostolic history as shall
remove, especially, the Jewish-Christian prejudice
against communion with the heathen believers. To
this end he represents Peter as tolerating the Gentiles
in their uncircumcision, as taking part in the recep
tion of Cornelius into the Church, and as resisting the
imposition of the yoke of ritual observances upon the
Gentiles. But how would the judaizing party relish
this representation of their great Apostle? Were
they so httle wedded to their principles as to abandon
them the moment they were told by some writer, pre
tending to be an associate of Paul, that their views
relative to the course taken by Peter and in respect
to his doctrine were contrary to the truth ? Had they
only to be told, in a book falsely purporting to come
/rom a Pauline Christian of a former day, that Peter
reaUy fraternized with Paul and was in favor of the

262 PARTIES IN THE APOSTOLIC CHURCH.
immunity of the GentUe converts? And simUar
inquiries are pertinent when we consider how such a
work would be received by the foUowers of Paul. If
this great Apostle had, in truth, forbidden circumcision
altogether, as the Baur school pretend, and if his
disciples were rooted in their attachment- to his
principles, as they were certainly familiar with his
writings, how would they be satisfied with the narra
tive of the circumcision of Timothy and the other
examples of conformity to the law, recorded in the
Acts ? Would they not have spurned this misrepre
sentation of the principles and conduct of their great
leader, and made their appeal to the very passages in
his Epistles on which the Tubingen critics found their
thesis as to his real position ? It is unaccountable
that a work which flies in the face of the cherished
opinions and traditions of the two rival parties, should
pass uncontradicted, and even contribute to secure
a most important change in the platforms on which
they respectively stand. Yet this unknown writer in
the first quarter of the second century, audaciously
perverting the facts of history and adding incidents
which sprung from his own invention, succeeded, if
we are to believe the Tubingen critics, in this unex
ampled imposture. To this extent do these critics
task our credulity.
To what desperate shifts the Tubingen critics are
driven, in their effort to read into the Acts a deep-laid
plot which has no existence outside of their own

GENUINENESS OF THE ACTS. 263
suspicious fancy, may be seen from one or two exam
ples. Luke records' a contention between Paul and
Barnabas which led to their separation from each
other. Will it be believed that he is pharged by Baur
with making this record of a comparatively "unim
portant " dispute, in order to divert the thoughts of
his readers from the more serious quarrel with Peter,
which he is desirous of covering up? As if his
readers, with the Epistle to the Galatians in their
hand, could be kept in ignorance of this dispute with
Peter ! As if the aUusion to one conflict could sup
press the recollection of another ! Why, as Lekebusch
inquires, should he not rather pass over in silence the
minor .quarrel also, provided his aim were such as
Baur imagines ? The earlier prominent record of the
friendship of Paul with Barnabas, that " distinguished
and meritorious member of the Jerusalem church,"
is attributed to the apologetic or conciliatory design
of the author of the Acts. Yet the same author now
describes a sharp controversy between them ! The
simple truth is, that the conflict with Barnabas is
mentioned because it had an influence on the history
of the missions to the Gentiles and of the spread of
Christianity among them, which it is the leading pur
pose of Luke to narrate. The controversy with Peter
had no such influence. It was merely an example of
the inconsistency of Peter, which Luke, tf he Avas
informed of it, had no occasion to record.1
1 See Lekebusch, s. 305.

264 PARTIES IN THE APOSTOLIC CHURCH.
Another Ulustration of that strange, morbid sus
picion which is a prime quality of the Tubingen
criticism, is the charge that the journey of Paul to
Jerusalem (Acts.xi.), which the Apostle in Gal. ii. does
not mention, was invented by Luke for the purpose
of bringing Paul as often as possible into intercourse
with the Jerusalem apostles ! Now if we look at
Luke's narrative, we find that all he says of that
journey is in one verse (v. 30) : " and they sent it
[a contribution for the poor] to the elders by the hands
of Bamabas and Saul." If Luke had the purpose of
which he is accused, whv should he confine himseU to
a bare mention of the fact of ' the journey ? Would he
not infallibly have given detaUs of the interview?
Would he not, at least, have stated that Paul met the
other apostles and conferred with them ? Would he,
as he does, make it known that Peter, the Jewish-
Christian leader, was at that time in prison, so that
he and Paul could not have met ? Luke describes,
with some detaU, the occasion of the contribution.
Agabus, one of the prophets who had come from
Jerusalem, predicted a dearth, and the Antioch Chris
tians accordingly determined to send relief to their
brethren in Judea. We are required, then, to suppose
that Luke took pains to invent aU this to serve as a
preface to the bare, solitary remark that Saul was sent
to Jerusalem with the money. This, says Lekebusch,
is to make Luke buUd up mountains that a mouse
may come forth. We have no warrant for supposing

GENUINENESS OF THE ACTS. 265
that Paul intended to record in Galatians aU the visits
he had made to Jerusalem.1 In fact, we do not know
that on the occasion referred to by Luke, in Acts xi.,
Paul entered Jerusalem. He. was indeed sent with
Silas, but, as Luke says nothing further, it is not
improbable that he was prevented, for some reason,
from going so far as the city. In any event, the
treatment of this topic by Baur and his followers is a
fair example of that hyper-criticism which finds an
occult, and generally a bad, motive underneath the
simplest historical statement.
The historical discrepancies aUeged to exist be
tween Luke and the other authorities, whether sacred
or secular — which discrepancies, were they made out,
cannot be shown to imply any design, any tendency,
on the part of the author — afford no help to the
Tubingen cause. The consideration of them, in case
the subject of inquiry were the nature and extent and
the proper formula of inspiration, would be pertinent ;
but admitting them to be insoluble, they are not suffi
cient to affect the general credibility of the historian,
which is the question under discussion. Take, for
example, the reference to Theudas (Acts v. 36), and
suppose him to be the same Theudas whom Josephus
refers to (Antiq. xx. 5, 1), and that Luke is therefore
guUty of an anachronism ; or, suppose an error in the
reference in the Gospel to a taxing under Cyrenius
1 naKiv (again, another time), not Seirepov, is the word he uses
% 1).

266 PARTIES IN THE APOSTOLIC CHURCH.
(Luke ii. 1), and that the cause which drew Joseph
and the mother of Jesus to Bethlehem is mistakenly
given — that their visit to Bethlehem Avas occasioned
by some other tax, and that Luke's chronology on this
point is at fault : would his general credibility as a
historian be impaired? If so, there is no secular
historian who does not fall under a like condemnation.
There was a traditional belief that Martin Luther was
born during a visit of his mother to a fair in Eisleben.
The statement is found in so good an authority as
Seckendorf, AArho doubtless derived it from what he
considered an authentic source ; and after him it is
found in a multitude of writers. It is now known,
however, that the parents of Luther had removed
their abode to Eisleben before the birth of Luther, and
that no fair was held in the place at that time ! Shall
the former historians of Luther be for this reason con
victed of carelessness or wUful falsification ? Or wiU it
be denied, on account of their discrepancy with later
biographies, that Luther was bom in Eisleben ? This
would be paraUel to the course taken by Strauss and
his friends, even tf the chronological difficulty in Luke
were proved to be insoluble. Macaulay attributes the
epithet Silent, attached to the name of WUliam, the
founder of the Dutch Commonwealth, to his taciturn
habit ¦} although the truth is that he had no such habit,
and acquired this title from his prudent reticence on a
single occasion. The same historian probably con-
1 Macaulay's Life of William Pitt, in the Encyclopaedia Britannica.

GENUINENESS OF THE ACTS. 267
founded George Penn, a pardon-broker, with WUUam
Penn the Quaker. This may, perhaps, suggest the
possibUity of there being more than one Theudas
But however this may be, who wUl charge the Eng
hsh historian with being careless in his researches and
uninformed in the matters whereof he writes ? It may
be said that in Luke the difficulty is enhanced by the
occurrence of the reference to Theudas in a speech of
Gamaliel. But — on the supposition, again, that an
error here were proved — is absolute correctness in the
report of a public speech, and in all the historical
references it may contain, so very common ? Suppose
that GamaUel was known to have referred, in his
address to the Sanhedrim, to various factions which
had aU proved to be short-lived, and • that in the
version of the speech which reached Luke, the name
of Theudas had erroneously crept in, owing possibly
to the circumstance that his name was often linked, in
common speech, with that of Judas of GalUee, whom
Gamaliel had reaUy mentioned : we affirm that analo
gous examples of inaccuracy can be found in the most
approved and trustworthy historians. These aUeged
discrepancies, and aU others, should, each by itself, be
made the subject of fair and searching investigation.
But the apologist and the skeptic both err when the
latter claims, and the former consents, to stake the
credibility of the New Testament, much more the
cause of supernatural Christianity itself, upon the
possibUity of harmonizing all minor diversities. To

268 PARTIES IN THE APOSTOLIC CHURCH.
the antagonist of revelation we say, Grant that it
cannot be done ; even grant that the saCred historians
stand in aU respects upon a level with uninspired
writers of equal qualifications for ascertaining the
truth and of equal integrity in communicating it ; yet
you are as far as ever from succeeding in your attack
upon revelation. Were it our purpose, in this Essay,
to go beyond the special objections characteristic of
the Tubingen school, we might dwell upon the num
berless allusions in tne Acts to points of geography
and history, to existing features of law and govern
ment, to customs and manners, most of which are
incidental and such as only a contemporary writer
could weave mto a narrative. It is not too much to
say that the general correctness of Luke in these
manifold particulars has been positively established.
The passage, for example, relating to the voyage and
shipwreck of St. Paul, has been subjected to a most
thorough scrutiny, and the pathway of the ship
followed from point to point. The result is a striking
verification of Luke's narrative. He is shown to be,
by this passage in his narrative, an observing and.
truthful writer.1
- * See Smith's Voyage and Shipwreck of St. Paul; also the excel
lent Life of St. Paul by Conybeare and Howson. A beautiful
instance of Luke's candor is Acts xxi. 29. Describing the rage of the
fanatical Jews from Asia, and their cry that Paul had introduced
Greeks into the temple, he adds, parenthetically : " For they had
seen before with him in the city, Trophimus, an Ephesian, whom they
supposed that Paul had brought into the temple.'''' The effect of this
remark of Luke is to palliate their guilt in offering violence to Paul.

GENUINENESS OF THE ACTS. 269
The speeches recorded by Luke in the Acts have
been a favorite subject of skeptical attack. But the
force of this attack is broken when it is conceded that
the language in which the speeches are presented, is,
generaUy speaking, that of the historian. Some of
them were not made in the Greek, but in another
tongue ; and in regard to the rest, it must be in fair
ness, and may be with safety, alfoWed that the form in
which they are recorded is given them by Luke. This
accounts for their resemblance in phraseology to the
ordinary style of Luke's narrative. Ancient historians,
as all scholars "know, were in the habit of throwing
into the direct form — the oratio directa — or the form
of quotation, what a modern writer presents in form as
well as in fact in his own language. But when we
look at the contents of the speeches in the Acts, they
are found to harmonize with the known characters of
the various persons to whom they are ascribed, and
with the circumstances in which they were severally
uttered. As an offset to the complaint that Paul's
peculiar doctrine is missing from his speeches, and
from the book gene/ally, we may put the judgment of
Luther that the principal purpose for which the book
was written was to " teach all Christendom the great
They had drawn a false inference from seeing Trophimus with Paul
in another place. With his usual felicity, Bengel points ont the
accordance of this circumstance of Paul's association with Trophimus,
with the Apostle's character : " Paulus Trophimum non introduxit
in templum : neque eum tamen plane vitavit Judaeorum causa."
Gnomon (Acts xxi. 29).

270 PARTIES IN THE APOSTOLIC CHURCH.
fundamental Christian doctrine" of justification by
faith alone.1 The reader has only to recall such pas
sages as the direction given to the trembling jailer who
inquired what he should do to be saved, to be convinced,
of the groundless nature of this piece of criticism.
The speeches of Paul have been made the subject
of a special, instructive discussion from the pen of
Tholuck.3 The principal part of his article is taken
up with a comparison of the fareweU address of the
Apostle to the elders of Ephesus, at MUetus, with the
writings of Paul — the purpose being to show the
correspondence of that address with the Apostle's
character and modes of thought. That the reader
may be enabled to follow out this investigation for
himself, we furnish here a very brief outhne of most
of the points in the comparison. The address is
contained in the twentieth chapter of Acts. Paul's.
description of his pastoral fidelity (vs. 18-21), is
shown to harmonize strikingly with allusions to the
same topic in 1 Thess. ii. 10 and 2 Cor. vi. 3, 4. It
is the habit of Paul frequently to appeal to his own
life and conduct, partly in answer to calumnies, and
partly to excite other Christians to follow his example,
as in 2 Cor. i. 12 ; 1 Cor. xi. 1 ; Phil. iii. 15. The
mention of his tears, in the address (ver. 31), brings
out a characteristic of Paul which is also discovered
from 2 Cor. tf. 4, where the Apostle says that he Avrote
to the Corinthians with " many tears." In each case
' Quoted in Lekeb., s. 235. " In the Stud. u. KHt., 1839, II.

• GENUINENESS OF THE ACTS. 271
it is tears of love and of yearning over them for whose
spiritual safety he is anxious. A little, , yet striking
mark of the authenticity of Luke's report is Paul's
allusion (ver. 19) to what he had suffered at Ephesus
from " the lying in wait of the Jews ; " since in his
narrative Luke had not mentioned any such persecu
tion, but only the tumult raised by Demetrius. Had
the address been invented by Luke, there would
almost certainly be in the narrative an explanatory
passage. In ver. 20, Paul reminds the elders of his
preaching in private as well as in public ; which falls
in with 1 Thess. ii. 11, and with his exhortation to
'Timothy (2 Tim. iv. 2) to preach " in season and out
of season." His boldness in preaching and his free
dom from the fear of man (ver. 27), are the same
qualities to which he adverts in 2 Cor. iv. 2 and 1
Thess. ii. 4, professing in the last passage that he did
not speak " as pleasing men, but God which trieth our
hearts." In ver. 22, he anticipates persecution in
Jerusalem; in Rom. xv. 31, he expresses the same
fear. How accordant is the Apostle's expression of
the cheap estimate he puts upon ltfe, if he might
finish the ministry committed to him by the Lord
Jesus (ver. 24, to be compared with xxi. 13), with
the expression of self-sacrifice in PhU. ii. 17, and of
triumph in 2 Tim. iv. 7 J The presage of future
dangers to the Church (vs 29, 30) may be compared
with 1 Tim. iv. 1, and is shown by the Epistle to the
Ephesians to have been verified. The same dUigence

272 PARTIES IN THE APOSTOLIC CHURCH.
and tenderness with which he had warned the Ephe
sians (ver. 31), we find him claiming to have exercised
in regard to the Thessalonians, to whom he says (1
Thess. ii. 11), "ye know how we exhorted and com
forted and charged every one of you, as a father does
his children." The commending of the elders to God
and the word of His grace, which was able " to buUd
them up '' (ver. 32), chimes with the benediction in
Rom. xvi. 25, beginning: "Now unto Him that is
able to estabhsh you." In ver. 33, we hear the
Apostle remind the elders how, coveting no man's sil
ver, or gold, or apparel, he had sustained himself and
his attendants by the labor of his own hands. His'
motives for pursuing this course are not explained
here, but must be learned from the Epistles, in 1
Thess. ii. 9 ; 2 Thess. iU. 7-9 ; 1 Cor. iv. 12, ix. 12;
2 Cor. xi. 8. Especially worthy of note is the expres
sion " these hands " — al ^slqig avrat (ver. 34) —
words requiring us to suppose a gesture to accom
pany them. Still more deserving of remark is the
quotation of a saying of Christ not elsewhere re
corded : " it is more blessed to give than to receive "
(ver. 35). The saying itseU is worthy to emanate
from Christ, and is conformed to the spirit and style
of his teaching. Coming in so simply and naturaUy,
it seems to bear witness to the truth and fidelity of
the entire report of the Apostle's discourse.
In the preceding observations we have employed
for the purpose of refuting the- Tubingen hypothesis—

GENUINENESS OF THE ACTS. 273
except in the last remarks on the speeches of Paul —
only the four Pauline Epistles accepted by Baur. But
when we inquire for the grounds on which the
genuineness of the remaining canonical Epistles
ascribed to this apostle is denied, we find that the
principal reason is the inconsistency of their repre
sentations with the theory which the four are supposed
to authorize. On this ground, chiefly, even the Epis
tles to the Colossians and Philippians, which were
never before doubted, and the marks of whose Pauline
authorship are so irresistibly evident in their style and
contents, are declared to be spurious ! One would
think that the inconsistency of these documents with
Baur's theory would raise in his mind a strong pre
sumption, not against them, but against that. But
when we discover that his theory is overthrown by
the testimony of the very documents on which he
chooses to rely, and that his main objection to the
genuineness of the other leading Epistles of Paul is
thus taken away, we may resort to them for further
illustration of the view which the Apostle took of the
Jewish Christians. We find him, in the Epistle to the
Ephesians, teUing the GentUes that they are no more
" strangers and foreigners, but fellow-citizens with the
saints, and of the household of God," and " buUt
upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets"
(Eph. ii. 19, 20). How fuUy does this harmonize
with the spirit of the beautiful passage in the Romans,
where Paul compares the GentUes, in their relation to
18

274 PARTIES IN THE APOSTOLIC CHURCH.
Israel, to the wild olive-tree grafted upon the native
olive and partaking of its " root and fatness " (Rom.
xi. 17) ! We find him in the 1st Epistle to the
Thessalonians, saying : " for ye, , brethren, became
followers of the churches of God which in Judea are in
Christ Jesus -. for ye, also, have suffered like things of
your own countrymen, even as they have of the Jews "
— the Jews, who likewise " forbid us to speak to the
GentUes that they might be saved " (1 Thess. ii. 14
seq.). The Thessalonians, in the heroic spirit with
which they had met persecution, had resembled their
Christian brethren in Judea, whose firmness under
such trial was weU known. This one expression of
honor to the faithful Christians of Judea, joined, as
it is, with reprobation of the conduct of the unbe
lieving Jews, destroys the theory of Baur.1
1 The attack of the Tubingen school upon the genuineness of
most of the Pauline Epistles, resting as it does upon false assump
tions, should not be allowed for a moment to affect the judgment
wMch is founded on positive, abundant proofs. Take, for example,
the 1st Epistle to the Thessalonians. Its Pauline authorship was
never doubted until it was doubted by Baur. It is not only re
cognized by the great church teachers in the second half of the
second century, but is found in the Syrian version, in the canon
of Muratori, even in the canon of Marcion. Its language is Pauline.
Its tone and spirit are Pauline. Its contents are adapted to a
state of the Thessalonian church which may well be supposed to
have existed. It has correspondences with the Acts, which are
obviously uncontrived, yet exact. Compare 1 Thess. iii. 1, 2 with
Acts xvii. 15, xviii. 5. And if the passage — iv. 15, 17 — express a
hope or an expectation of the napovaia during the Apostle's lifetime,
it demonstrates the Pauline authorship, since no writer of tlie sec
ond century would attribute ,*uch a disappointed expectation to

FIRST EPISTLE OF PETER. 275
There are three other documents in the New
Testament canon which throw important light upon the
subject of this Essay. These are the 1st Epistle of
Peter, the Epistle to the Hebrews, and the Apocalypse
Paul. The objections of Baur to the Pauline origin of this Epistlo
are of no weight, and mainly rest upon misinterpretation.
There are thirteen canonical Epistles bearing the name of Paul.
No criticism — save that of the Baur school — which by any stretch of
charity can be called sober, pretends to deny the genuineness of the
Epistles to the Philippians, to the Colossians, the two Epistles to the
Thessalonians, and the Epistle to Philemon. The Pauline authorship
of the Epistle to the Ephesians may be said to have been completely
vindicated against the doubts suggested by De Wette and others. In
fact, one of the main grounds of doubt — the absence of personal
greetings — is an argument for the genuineness of the work ; since,
though we can only conjecture the cause of this peculiarity, it is
one which a forger would last of all have permitted to exist. Of
the Pastoral Epistles, the 2d of Timothy and the Epistle to Titus are
folly proved to be Pauline, and recognized as such by unprejudiced
critics, like Bleek and Meyer, who hold themselves at liberty to
judge with perfect freedom of the claim of a book to a place in the
canon. Of the 1st Epistle to Timothy, Neander says that he is not
convinced of its genuineness with the " same assurance that he has
in reference to the authorship of the other Pauline Epistles." Pflann.
u. Leitung. B. I. s. 538. N. Such misgivings, however, in -respect
to 'either of the Pastoral Epistles, are not shared by critics of equal
candor and penetration ; for example, by the late Dr. Arnold'. As
to the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews, a point about which the
opinion of the ancient Church was divided, he is now generally con
ceded to have been, not Panl himself, but a disciple of Paul. This
was the opinion, also, of Erasmus, Luther, and Calvin. It is the
view of Neander, Bleek, Meyer, and, in fact, of all or nearly all the
German critics. Its early date is, however, established ; and if not
written by Paul, it has the same relation to him as the writings of
Luke have, and the same right in the canon as the second and third
Gospels and the Acts.

276 PARTIES IN THE APOSTOLIC CHURCH.
The 1st Epistle of Peter is reckoned by Eusebius
among the Homologoumena — the writings of undis
puted genuineness. Among the witnesses to its
authenticity are Papias and Polycarp.1 It is addressed
•apparently to the first generation of converts from
heathenism, and not to their chUdren or grandchildren
(e. g. 1 Peter i. 14). It purports to come from "a
witness of the sufferings of Christ " (1 Peter v. 1) ; a
fact introduced so briefly and naturally as to convince
Schleiermacher that the expression was not put into
the mouth of Peter, but was truly his own. It is
addressed to " the strangers scattered throughout Asia
Minor ; " and yet the contents of the Epistle make it
clear that Gentiles are meant ; so that in this designa
tion of them as diuGTtood, the metropolitan character,
so to speak, of Judaean Christianity is assumed in a
manner natural to Peter. It was written from Baby
lon — the literal, as we think, and not the mystical,
Babylon — where Jews were so numerous, and where
Peter would naturally be drawn in the prosecution of
his missionary labors. A suitable occasion for his writ
ing was afforded by the journey of Silas (1 Peter v.
12), formerly a member of the Jerusalem church and
afterwards concerned with Paul in founding and train-
* Eusebius, iii. 39, iv. 14. Those who deny the genuineness of
the 2d Epistle of Peter, must yet place it not later than the begin
ning of the second century ; and hence the testimony of this docu
ment (2 Peter iii. 1) to the 1st Epistle, as a work of Peter, is val
uable. See on this and the other points of proof, Bleek's Einl, s.
565 seq.

EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS. 277
ing the very churches to which he now carried this
letter. In these churches there were those who, as we
learn from Paul in his later Epistles, had, through the
influence of Judaizers, begun to fear that they had
not received the true gospel. Now Peter reassures
this class by simply saying at the close of his letter :
"I have written briefly, exhorting and testifying that
this is the true grace of God wherein ye stand!' It is
an expression of confidence and fraternal sympathy
from the Apostle "to the circumcision," written
within a few years preceding the destruction of Jerusa
lem and shortly before his own death.
Another most interesting monument of the state
of things at that critical time, is the Epistle to the
Hebrews. It was wrritten while the temple was yet
standing, but not very long before the siege and cap
ture of the city by Titus. It was addressed to Jewish
Christians, and, as we believe, to the Palestinian
Christians. It was written to keep them from apos
tasy — from lapsing into mere Judaism. This, every
one must see, was the great danger so long as the
Jewish Christians continued to cling to the ritual. It
would seem that there were some of this class who had
ceased to meet with their brethren (Hebrews x. 25).
It is probable that with the rapid growth of the Gentile
branch of the church, which was attended by a grow
ing indifference to the ceremonial law still sacred to
the native Jew, the disaffection of the Jewish Christians
increased ; and it is not improbable that in that class

278 PARTIES IN THE APOSTOLIC CHURCH
who are described as "forsaking the assembling of
themselves together " is to be recognized the germ of
heretical judaizing sects which become known to us at a
later day. The great aim of the author of the Epistle
is to persuade the Jewish Christian that in Christ the
ritual is fulfilled ; that in Him aU that he had in the
law is, retained in a perfect and satisfying form.
Not less interesting as a memorial of the state of
things which we are attempting to depict, is the
Apocalypse. The Apocalypse was written — this fact,
we take it, is now established, notwithstanding the
continued dissent of a critic here or there — shortly
after the Neronian persecution, and shortly before the
destruction of Jerusalem. The Apostles Peter and
Paul had been put to death. The bitter fanaticism of
the Jews and all the signs of the times foretokened
the judgments soon to faU upon the Jewish state. The
condition of the churches in Asia Minor, coupled, we
may well beUeve, Avith the persecuting animosity of his
countrymen " according to the flesh " in Jerusalem,
had drawn the Apostle John to Ephesus. The pre
ponderance of proof, in our opinion, is in favor of the
more common opinion that the Apostle is the author
of the Apocalypse. But if not his work, it was
certainly written by some one who belonged to his
school and his neighborhood. Baur, who holds that
the Apostle himself wrote it, has most unsuccessfully
attempted to find in it a judaizing and anti-Pauline
character. The distinction put upon the twelve apos-

THE APOCALYPSE. 279
ties (Rev. xxi. 14) is one of his arguments. If this
have any force, then Acts was written by a Judaizer
(see Acts i. 21 seq.) ; and Luke's Gospel also (see
Luke xxii. 30), which Baur considers especially Pauline
in its spirit. Baur even discerns in the reference to
false or pretended apostles (Rev. ii. 2) a side hit at
Paul! Ewald, with just as little reason, considers
them Judaizers. It is probable that they were leaders
of the Nicolaitans, who seem to have been a sect of
antinomian, gnostical libertines — abusing their freedom
in the Ngospel by joining the heathen in Ucentious
pleasures, and blending a sort of gnosis, which the
writer designates a knowing of " the depths of Satan "
(Rev. in. 24) ; using, perhaps, the term Satan, as in
the other phrase — the synagogue of Satan — where
they would use God. A judaizing spirit is inferred by
Baur from the distinct mention of the " hundred and
forty and four thousand" from the tribes of Israel
(Rev. vn. 4) who were among the redeemed. How
Ul-founded is this conclusion we see when we further
read that those gathered from " all nations, and kin
dreds, and people, and tongues," instead of being a
definite, symbohcal to be sure, yet hmited, number,
were " a great multitude which no man could count "
(ver. 9). But the Apocalypse affords a happy con
firmation of the historical truth of the apostohc conven
tion. Having aUuded (Rev. ii. 20) as he had dona
before (ver. 14) to the obligation to abstain from forni
cation and from meat sacrificed to idols, the writer

280 PARTIES IN THE APOSTOLIC CHURCH.
adds (vs. 24, 25), " I wiU put upon you none other bur
den .- but that which ye have already " — namely, the
true faith — "hold fast tUl I come." Here the context
requires us to suppose that "burden" signifies injunc
tion ; and thus we are obliged to explain the passage
by referring back to what he has said on the two
points of duty above mentioned. In the requirement
to abstain from fornication and from flesh offered to
idols, he would add no other burden — dXXo /Sdgog —
the very word used in the rescript of the apostolic con
vention (Acts xv. 21) ! 1 To our mind, this passage
affords a striking corroboration of the narrative of
Luke. A portion of the Asia Minor Christians had
neglected the warnings of Paul, had abused their free
dom, making it an obedience to lust, and had mingled
with the heathen in their licentious feasts. Hence the
need of imposing the old restraints, and the Apostle
revives the rules suggested by that early conference in
which he had himself taken part.
We may sum up in a few words the main points
in the view we have taken. The apostles and most
other Jewish Christians kept up the observance of the
ceremonial law, and felt bound so to do untU Christ
should appear to abrogate that law, or in some other
way should explicitly declare the old ritual abolished.
Peter was divinely instructed in the affair of Cornehus,
1 The interpretation we have given above is sanctioned by high
critical authority, including that of Dusterdieck (in Meyer) and
Alford.

THE APOCALYPSE. 281
that free mtercourse with the GentUe convert was no
sin. This lesson by him was not forgotten. At
Antioch he ate with the GentUe believers, except when,
under temptation, he was false to his convictions. The
Jewish believers, seeing that the GentUes had actually
become Christians and received the Spirit without hav
ing been circumcised, cordially and thankfully acknowl
edged them as brethren, and refused to yield to the
judaizing faction which required that they should be
circumcised. At the same time there was' a difficulty
in overstepping the legal restrictions upon intercourse
with them as long as the law continued to be observed.
They could not cast aside all these restrictions without
casting aside the law itself — a step for which they were
not prepared. Hence the door was open for the efforts
of the active party of Judaizers. These efforts, how
ever, had not the sympathy or countenance of "the
pillars " of the Jewish-Christian church. The funda
mental error of Baur, as we believe, is the doctrine that
the Jerusalem apostles required the circumcision of the
Gentile converts. In supporting this error, he is
obhged not only to attack the genuineness of the Acts
and the moral character of the author, but also to do
violence to the positive testimony of Paul himself in
Gal. ii. The progress of the Gentile church led to the
sharpening of the opposition from the side of the
judaizing party, and probably to an augmentation of
its strength. Only great providential events could
clear the Christian Church of its connection with the

282 PARTIES IN THE APOSTOLIC CHURCH.
Old Testament system. These events at length came ;
first, the capture of Jerusalem by Titus, after the Jew.
ish Christians had mostly fled to the neighborhood of
the Dead Sea : then, after the insurrection by Bar-
chochebas, the absolute prohibition by Hadrian (a. d.
135) of the temple- worship in the city, to which he
gave the Roman name of ./Elia Capitohna. This last
event was the crisis that determined the fate of Jewish
Christianity. Henceforward only a church on GentUe
foundations could exist in Jerusalem. That portion
of the former church which could not abandon the
ritual became resolved into the heretical sect which
lingered for centuries under the name of Ebionites, but
consisting of two main subdivisions — one that of Ebio
nites proper, who refused to recognize the Gentiles as
Christians ; the other that of the Nazarenes, who clung
with patriotic attachment to the ceremonies of the law,
not denying, however, the Christianity of the GentUes
for not joining them in its observance. The head
quarters of the Ebionite party was the region on the
eastern border of Palestine, whither the Jewish Chris
tians had originaUy taken refuge. The apostasy which
to the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews was an
imminent danger, actually occurred in the case of no
smaU fraction of the Jerusalem church. And thus the
saying of the Apostle John had a new and pathetic
verification: "He came unto his own, and his own
received him not."

ESSAY V. '
BAUE ON EBIONITISM AND THE OBIGIN OF CATHOLIC
CHEISTIANITT.
The rise of the ancient Catholic church, ,that
church, which, with its unity in doctrine and creed,
its type of theology too legal to be strictly Pauline, and
its hierarchical order, emerges to view in the latter half
of the second century, is one of the most interesting
problems of history. If we take our stand at the time
of Irenaeus, we find that genuine Christianity begins
to be recognized as confined to one visible body, having
for its great centres the churches supposed to be
founded by the apostles, among which Rome, the see
of Peter and of Paul, especially of Peter the head of
the apostles, has the preeminence in dignity and
respect^-the potiorem principalitatem, to use the
phrase by which Irenaeus affirms the distinguished
reliabtfity of its traditions.1 Beyond the pale of this
Catholic church there is no salvation. The outlying
parties have no title to the blessings of the gospel.
The church is comparatively pure in doctrine and free
in government ; yet the incipient and germinant Papal
system is clearly discernible. 1 Iren., Lib. hi. c. 3.

284 ORIGIN OF CATHOLIC CHRISTIANITY.
By what steps did simple, unorganized, apostolic
Christianity attain to this new form ? What agencies
effected the transformation ? Such is the problem to
which we refer. It involves the whole question of the
character of the Christianity of the apostolic age, as
well as the nature of the changes it afterwards under
went. It has drawn to itself of late, in particular
since the rise of the neAv Tubingen school of historical
critics, the zealous attention of scholars.
One principal topic, the consideration of which
involves the most important inquiries connected with
the whole subject, is Ebionitism. Ebionitism is the
general designation of that judaizing Christianity
which existed during the first centuries, in several
distinct parties, in separation from the Catholic
church. The strict Ebionites — the vulgar Ebionites,
as they are called in the classification of some German
writers — not only observed the Mosaic ritual, but
refused to fellowship any Avho failed to do likewise.
The Nazarenes, another party, though observing the
law themselves, willingly left the GentUes to the enjoy
ment of their freedom. The former party was hostile
to Paul and his doctrine ; the latter was not. Both
made use of Hebrew or Aramaic versions of the
Gospel of Matthew, differing somewhat, however, from
that Gospel, as they differed someAvhat from each
other. There was a third party, also, of theosophic or
gnostical Ebionites, described by Epiphanius and
represented in the Clementine HomUies, a spurious

EBIONITISM. 285
work of the latter part of the second century. It is
an old and often-repeated assertion that primitive,
apostolic Christianity — that Christianity which was
established and fostered by the immediate foUowers
of Christ — was Ebionite. This proposition was
maintained by Socinian writers of a former day, who,
considering the Ebionites to have been Unitarians,
inferred that the early Christians held the humanita
rian view of Christ's person. Hence the character
and opinions of the Ebionite parties' come up for
discussion in the polemical writings of Bull, who
combats the views of Zwicker, and in the spirited
controversy, in the last century, of Horsley with
Priestley. The subject was handled in a special
dissertation by Mosheim, in an early essay of great
merit by Gieseler, and has been- further illustrated by
Neander and the other masters in the department of
church history. Of late the historical speculations of
Baur have provoked new and fruitful investigations in
the same field, and have caUed forth numerous publica
tions, both from his followers and opponents.
In stating the theory of Baur upon this subject
and upon early Christianity in general, we may remark
at the outset that he agrees with the old Socinians in
the statement that the Jewish Christianity of the
apostohc age was Ebionite. But, unlike them, he
holds that we find within the canon a great departure
from, and advance upon, this humanitarian doctrine
of Christ's person. He professes to discern in the

286 ORIGIN OF CATHOLIC CHRISTIANITY.
New Testament the consecutive stages of a progress,
which, beginning with the Unitarian creed, terminates
in the doctrine of Christ's proper divinity. To be
sure, a considerable portion of these canonical writings,
including all those which contain this last tenet, he
pronounces post-apostolic and spurious. But he
differs very widely from the Socinians in his exegesis ,
of them, and approximates nearer, especiaUy in regard
to the sense of the Avritings of John, to the ordinary
orthodox interpretations. Baur's general theory
proceeds on the foundation of the hostUity conceived
to exist, in the apostolic age, between the Pauline and
Petrine parties. In the study of the Epistles to the
Corinthians, he supposed himself to have discovered
that the long prevalent idea of the relation of Paul to
the rest of the apostles, and of his doctrine to theirs, is
mistaken ; and for this new view he found support, as
he thought, in the Epistle to the Galatians.1 WhUe
the original apostles insisted that the Gentile* converts
should be circumcised and keep the law, Paul looked
on circumcision as involving a forfeiture of the benefits
of the gospel. Baur carries out his novel thesis with
relentless consistency. He denies the Pauline author
ship of aU of the epistles usually ascribed to Paul,
except four, and the genuineness of all the other books
of the New Testament, except the Apocalypse. The
1 Eor an interesting account of the growth of his critical theory
in his own mind, see Baur's posthumous Geschichte des 19tn. Jahrh.,
b. 395 seq.

baur's theory. 287
Gospels, as to a part of their contents, are either
monuments of this great division in the Church, or of
the attempts to heal it. The Gospel of John is a
fictitious product of the early part of the second
century. The Acts is the work of a Pauline Chris
tian of about the same date, who misrepresents the
apostolic history for the sake of reconciling to each
other, the partisans of Peter and of Paul. At the close
of the apostohc age, or at the death of these lead
ers, the Church had been left in this divided state.
The GentUe or Pauhne Christians, and the Jewish
Christians, formed two opposing camps.1
We cannot enter into a detailed refutation of these
fundamental positions of Baur, without repeating what
Ave have said in another place. The assumption that
the older apostles required that the heathen converts
should be circumcised, and that Paul directly resisted
the observance of the law by Jewish Christians as
inconsistent with the Christian faith, is unproved and
groundless. The mutual ahenation of the Jerusalem
apostles on the one hand, and of Paul on the other, is
a figment of the imagination ; as is shown by the
direct testimony of Paul himseU in documents which
even Baur admits to be his.2 The main objection to
the credibUity of the Acts is thus annulled. The
positive proof of the genuineness of this book, as weU
1For the fall and final statement of Baur's positions, see his
Christenthum in d. drei ersten Jahrh., 2 A. I860.
2 Gal. ii. 9, 10; 1 Cor. xv. 9, xvi. 1, et al.

288 ORIGIN OF CATHOLIC CHRISTIANITY.
as of the rejected epistles of Paul, is abundant. The
historical speculations of the Tubingen school, being
built upon a false foundation, faU of themselves.
There were, indeed, strong peculiarities belonging
severally to the two branches of the Church in the
lifetime of Paul ; but with the exception of the
judaizing party, there was no hostility between them.
On the contrary, especiaUy among the leaders, there
was a cordial fellowship.
But at present we are concerned with the Tiibin
gen theory so far as it relates to the Church of the
sub-apostolic age. Baur pretends that after the death
of Paul, there ensued the process of reconcUiation
between the two belligerent parties, to promote which,
as we have explained above, most of the New Testa
ment books were contrived. The Jewish Christians
gave up circumcision, being satisfied with baptism,
when regarded as necessary for salvation. Exactly
how and when this remarkable step was taken, we
are not informed. But most of the concessions were =
from the Pauline side. In fact, there occurred at the
end, or before the end, of the apostolic age, a reaction
of the Jewish Christianity, which with Baur is iden
tical with the judaizing or Ebionite element, and this
type of Christianity prevailed through the larger part
of the second century. In the church of Asia Minor,
little or no value was set upon the authority and the
doctrine of Paul, which were supplanted by the
Ebionite views of Christianity. The same was true

BAUR'S THEORY. 289
of the Roman church, which Baur claims to have
been, even at the beginning, chiefly composed of
believing Jews. The diffusion and reception of the
doctrine of the authority of tradition, of legal justifica
tion, of the saving efficacy of rites, of the superior
merit of ascetic piety, of the clergy as a priestly class,
of the primacy of Peter, and of other elements of
Catholic theology, the Tubingen critics attribute to
the great reaction and partial triumph of the Jewish-
Christian, anti-Pauline party. So tenacious of life,
we are told, was Judaism, that the powerful influence
of the Apostle Paul was, to a large extent, neutralized
and overcome by the revived power of the judaical
element inthe Church. Not that the Pauline element
was ineffective. It was not without its representatives,
and played a not unimportant part in the ferment
from which Catholic theology resulted. Of course,
these views of Baur affect his construction of the
history of the doctrines concerning the Person of
Christ and the Trinity. The first view of the Church
respecting Christ was humanitarian. Then foUowed,
according to Baur, the other form of Monarchianism,
the Patripassian theory. The Logos doctrine was the
intermediate, compromising theology, which was finaUy
developed into the dogma of the Saviour's true and
proper divinity, and the Nicene formulary.1
The topics which we propose to examine in the
1 On this branch of Baur's theory, besides his " Christianity in the
first Three Centuries," which has been referred to abovo, see his
19

290 ORIGIN OF CATHOLIC CHRISTIANITY.
remarks that follow, are, first, the aUeged Ebionite
character of the period immediately subsequent to
the apostohc age, and then, in particular, Baur's
representation of the early doctrine concerning
Christ. I. One marked vice of the Tubingen critics is the
habit of attributing to a distinctly Jewish-Christian
party or influence phenomena which more commonly
originate in other causes. The tendency to regard
Christianity as a system of laws, is not pecuhar to the
Jews and to Judaism alone. This tendency develops
itself in other ages, even within the bounds of
Protestant Christianity. Hence, when this spirit
appears in an early Christian writer, to charge it
forthwith to Ebionitism is an obvious fallacy. The
same may be said of the overvaluing of external rites.
A tendency to formalism may spring up independently
of Jewish influences ; in the nineteenth century as
well as the third, in modern Oxford as weU as ancient
Rome. To say that religious phenomena, because
they resemble each other, are historicaUy connected, is
a rash, and frequently unfounded, inference. This
neglect to discriminate between what springs from a
distinctively judaic party, and what merely bears some
hkeness to judaic principles, but only indicates an
extensive work on the History of the Doctrine of the Trinity, Die
Christi. Lehre v. d. Dreieinigieit u. Menschwerdung Gottes in ihrer
geschichtlichen Entwickl. (18-41), B. I. ; and his Dogmengeschichte,
2 A. (1858), s. 104-112, 126-130.

REFUTATION OF BAUR. 291
analogous way of thinking, runs through much of
the Tubingen criticism, as we shaU hereafter Ulustrate.
But what are the proofs by which Baur would
subvert the established views of early Christian history
and verify his own hypothesis? In foUowing the
Tubingen critics through their classification of the
ancient writers, we are constantly struck with the
arbitrary character of the procedure. To make out
that the Ebionite type of doctrine belongs to an early
lather, they are under the necessity of ignoring
expressions which are at war with such a view, and
of magnifying the significance of artless phrases to
which no emphasis is properly attached. One sign
of the justice of our remark is the fact that these
critics differ so widely among themselves in respect
to the^place to be assigned to the different writers —
even to such a writer as Justin Martyr. Baur is
constantly obliged to mediate between his two
disciples, Schwegler and Ritschl, and to interpose
the weight of his decision where these younger doctors
disagree. Let us examine the proofs and witnesses
which are adduced to establish the predominantly
Ebionite character of the early Church. Even Cle
ment of Rome, or the first epistle which bears his name,
but which, whoUy without reason, is denied by the
Tubingen critics to. be genuine, is made to stand on a
neutral or half-way position between the Ebionite and
Pauline doctrine — Clement, who speaks of justification
as " not by ourselves, neither by our own wisdom, or

292 ORIGIN OF CATHOLIC CHRISTIANITY.
knowledge, or piety, or the works which we have done
in the holiness of our hearts; but by that faith by
which God Almighty has justified all men from the
beginning ; '*' * who aUudes to the epistle which " the
blessed Paul the apostle had written to the Corinthians
before ; " 2 and whose view of Christ is so dissonant
in spirit from that of the Ebionite ! It is true that
he associates Peter, as a martyr to be held in honor,
with Paul.3 And why shoiUd he not? It is true
that Clement lays stress upon the practical duties of
Christians, and often connects obedience with faith.4
But the reason of this is found in the disturbed state
of the Corinthian church, and the disaffection towards
its officers.5 Whoever will read the epistle from
beginning to end wiU see that here is the motive for
the enforcing of practical obligations, in conjunction
with passages obviously derived, though not verbally
cited, from the. Epistle to theJIebrews.
Papias, in the fragments cited by Eusebius, is
another of Baur's witnesses for the Ebionitism of the
early Church. It is thought to be highly significant
that in the scriptural books which are mentioned by
Eusebius as having been cited by Papias, the Pauline
epistles are not found ; nor is it stated that Papias
made mention of Paul. As if Eusebius professed to
give all the canonical books to which Papias made
reference, or Papias made reference to aU the canonical
1 C. 32. 3 C. 47. 3 C. 5.
4 0. 10, 11, 12, et passim. « See 0. 1, 48, etc.

REFUTATION OF BAUR. 293
books which he received ! Of Polycarp, in like
manner, Eusebius says that he made use, in his Epistle
to the PhUippians, of the 1st Epistle of Peter ; 1 but
we know, though Eusebius does not mention the fact,
that he also made abundant use of the Epistles of
Paul.2 Eusebius had reasons of his own for specifying
certain books in these allusions to the use of the
Scriptures by earlier writers. We are not authorized
to suppose that he intends to give an exhaustive Ust.
The insinuation of a hostUity to Paul on the part of
Papias hardly merits a serious refutation. If he did
not. explicitly mention this apostle in his "Exposition
of the Oracles of the Lord "• — and whether he did or
not we have no means of deciding — it would not be
strange, since his aim was to gather up unrecorded
reminiscences of the life and teachings of Jesus. His
chUiasm, or mUlenarianism, is very far from proving
him an Ebionite. He shared this doctrine not only
with Justin Martyr and Irenaeus, but even with
Barnabas, whom all the skeptical writers put on the
Pauline side. Although chUiasm cannot be shown to
have been the universal belief of the Church in the
next age after the apostles, it was, without doubt, a
very widely diffused opinion. It is not at all confined,
however, to writers of a single school. In truth, as
Dorner has clearly shown and we may stop here to
observe, chUiasm, whatever may have been the first
1 Euseb., Lib. iv. c. 14.
* See, for example, in Polyc. ad Philip., c. v. (1 Cor. vi. 9, 10).

294 ORIGIN OF CATHOLIC CHRISTIANITY.
source of the belief, was widely diverse from the
current Jewish expectation of a temporal reign of the
Messiah.1 The earthly reign of Christ after the second
advent, even in the view of those inclined to conceive
of the miUennial period in too material a way, was a
limited time, and was to be foUowed by a spiritual,
heavenly life, to continue forever. But — rto return to
Papias— we need no other proof that he was not an
Ebionite and had no inimical feeling towards Paul,
than his friendship with Polycarp,2 and the circum
stance that Irenaeus, and Eusebius after him, with the
writings of Papias before them, have no quarrel with
him, except that Eusebius, as we should expect,
objects to his chiliastic notions, and considers him,
probably on account of them, a man of hmited under
standing.3 Indeed, the circumstance which Eusebius
mentions, that Papias made use of testimonies from
the 1st Epistle of John and the 1st Epistle of Peter, is
of itself conclusive against the Tubingen judgment
concerning him.
StUl more reliance is placed by Baur and his
followers on the evidence drawn from the fragments
of Hegesippus. This earliest historian of the Church
came to Rome about the middle of the second century.
He was an Ebionite, it is claimed; and as he had
1 Dorner's Entwiekelungsgeschichte d. Lehre v. d. Person Christi,
B. L s. 240 seq. See especially s. 240, N. 76.
. ' Irenaeus calls Papias a friend (iralpos) of Polycarp.
'Euseb., Lib. iii. c. 39.

REFUTATION OF BAUR. 295
traveUed extensively for the purpose of visiting the
churches-, and had found them, according to his own
statement, agreeing in doctrine,, it is confidently
asserted that the churches east and west, including
the Roman church, which he especially commends,
were also Ebionite. This deduction might be just,
were the premise estabhshed. But what is the proof
that Hegesippus was an Ebionite ? In the first place,
much is\made of the description, quoted by Eusebius,
of the character of James, the head of the church at
Jerusalem, in which he is made out a punctUious
observer of ceremonies.1 That this fictitious por
traiture accords with Ebionite taste, is granted. It
is probable, however, that Hegesippus derived it from
an Ebionite tradition. That he himself foUowed such
a pattern of Ufe, there is no more reason to think
than there is to suppose the same of Gregory Nazian
zen, who gives a simUar description of Peter, and
Clement of Alexandria,, who gives a simUar description
of Matthew, both of which Avere also probably bor
rowed from Ebionite sources.2 But Hegesippus
reports that in every city "the doctrine prevails
according to what is declared by the law, and the
prophets, and the Lord;;"3 and this statement? is
seized upon as an undoubted sign of Ebionitism in
the author ! Hegesippus was zealous, against the
1 Euseb., Lib. ii. c. 23.
' See Schliemann, Die Clementinen, s. 429.
' Euseb., Lib. iv. o. 22.

296 ORIGIN OF CATHOLIC CHRISTIANITY.
Gnostics, and this mention of the Old Testament,
which, however, would not be remarkable in any case,
was very natural, it being a part of his testimony to
the freedom of the churches from the taint of gnostical
heresy. But there is another passage from Hegesippus
which was quoted by the Monophysite, Stephen Go-
barus, and is found in Photius, in which he says that
those who affirm that " eye hath not seen nor ear
heard, nor hath it entered into the heart of man, the
good things prepared for the just," maintain what is
false and that this declaration is itself foolish. Here,
we are assured by the Tubingen critics, is a direct
condemnation of an expression of the Apostle Paul,
and a condemnation of the apostle himself. Sup
posing Hegesippus to be quoted right, it is still not
easy to judge of the real intent of a passage which is
thus torn from its connection. There is little reason
to doubt, however, that Hegesippus is attacking a
gnostical interpretation or application of the passage,
as was long ago conjectured. In the sense in which
the Gnostics employed the expression, he might caU it
foolish. That he could not have designed to attack a
statement of Paul, is demonstrated, first by the
circumstance that Paul himself quotes the passage in
question from Isaiah, and a censure of the apostle
would involve a rebuke of the prophet ; and, secondly,
by the fact that in Clement's epistle to the Corin
thians, which is approved by Hegesippus, this identical

REFUTATION OF BAUR. 297
passage of Scripture is also found.1 Hegesippus is
rather, a witness against Baur's theory. He says
that the Church was united and unpolluted by heresy
untU the apostles and the generation taught by them
had passed away.2 How does this accord with the
idea that the church of the apostolic age was rent in
twain, and that Paul was considered then by the
Jewish Christians to be a leader of heresy ? " If there
were any at aU," adds Hegesippus, " that attempted to
subvert the sound doctrine of the saving gospel, they
were yet skulking in dark retreats." The surmise of
Baur, that this expression relates to Paul, is so plainly
a desperate effort to escape from a difficulty, that it
requires no answer. How far from Ebionitism
Hegesippus was, though probably a Hebrew Christian
by birth, is evinced by his tracing even the gnostical
heresies to a Jewish origin, by his approval of Cle
ment's epistle to the Corinthians, and by his testimony
that the church of Corinth, to which Clement wrote,
had " continued in the true faith." The same thing
is proved incontrovertibly to the sober student of
history by the simple fact that Eusebius, himself
hostUe to Ebionitism, and surely not less able to
detect its presence than any critic of the Tubingen
school, and with the whole work of Hegesippus before
him, speaks of this old writer with entire respect and
approbation. Against Hermas the charge of Ebionitism can be
1 Clement, I. Cor. c. xxxiv. " Euseb., Lib. iii. c. 32.

298 ORIGIN OF CATHOLIC CHRISTIANITY.
made with more plausibUity ; but even with reference
to him it cannot be sustained. Although he does in
terms make faith the parent of aU Christian virtues,
yet in his far-fetched and long-drawn allegories the
gospel is generally presented in a legal aspect, as a
system of commands, on obeying which salvation
hinges. Moreover the idea of fasting as a meritorious
act, and a general tendency to asceticism, correspond to
certain features of Ebionitism. But we have here to
reiterate the observation that was made before, that
legalism and asceticism spring up in the Church from
other causes than the influence of Judaism. Such is
the fact in the case of Hennas and of the Church in
the second century so far as it sympathized with his
type of thinking. In Hernias there is no exaltation of
the Jews as a nation, no recognition of their national
pretensions, no ascription to them of a preeminence in
privileges and hopes. Hence, however he may resem
ble the Ebionites in sundry points of doctrine, he is
whoUy distinct from them in historical position. A
decisive proof that Hermas is not an Ebionite, is the
doctrine he holds concerning Christ, to whom he
attributes preexistence and a part in the creation of
the WT>rld. Another very striking proof of the same
thing — a, proof that his ritualism did not spring from
an Ebionite root- — is his notion that the Old Testament
saints wiU have to be baptized by the apostles in the
underworld, in order to be saved ! J
1 Pastor Eermae, Liber III. Simil. ix. 16. "Hermas male intel-

REFUTATION OF BAUR. 299
We come now to the main prop, of the Tubingen
criticism, the Pseudo-Clementine HomUies. There
existed from the beginning of the second century, in
parts of Palestine and the neighborhood; a Jewish-
Christian party caUed Elkesaits. They were composed
of Ebionite sectaries, who had probably faUen under
the influence of the Essenes, and whose creed was a
compound of their old belief and their newly-gained
ascetic tenets.1 The Spirit of God had united itself,
they held, with Adam, constituting thus the true
prophet, and afterwards with a series of individuals — ¦
Enoch, Noah, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses, Jesus—
who aU taught in substance the same truth. Chris
tianity was thus regarded as the restoration of the
primeval religion, with whiclv also, primitive and pure
Judaism was identical. The Elkesatf.3 abjured the
eating of flesh, and discarded sacrifices,, which were
ligens verba Apostoli I Petr. 3. 19 haec scripsisse videtur," says
Hefele in his note, p. 424.
1 Gieseler attributes the theosophic ingredients of the Elkesait
system to the influence of the Essenes. Schliemann, following
Neander, would account for the same by the fusion of oriental
elements with Judaism. But according to Neander, as Gieseler
points out, Essenism itself is partly the product of this very fusion.
See Gieseler's K. G., B. I. § 32. n. 9.
The best edition- of the Homilies is that of A. Dressel (1853)..
This edition contains the last two Homilies, which are not found in
the edition of Cotelerius. A very thorough monogram on the whole
subject of the Pseudo-Clementine writings: is "Die Clementinen"'
of A. Schliemann (1844), Ublhorn, the author of a later work on
the same subject, gives a condensed statement of his views in Her-
zog's Eeal-Encyc, Art. Clementinen.

300 ORIGIN OF CATHOLIC CHRISTIANITY.
held to have come in through a corruption of the true
religion. They advocated the obligation to renounce
riches. The forgiveness of sins was procured by
baptism, which, as it would appear, was often
repeated. They rejected, among other scriptures, the
Pauhne Epistles.
The Pseudo-Clementine Homilies, which were
written by some Roman towards the end of the second
century, bring forward, with additions and modifica
tions, the same tenets. The work falsely pretends to
emanate from Clement, the first bishop of the Roman
church after the apostles, who, being confounded,
doubtless, with Elavius Clement, the relative of Do
mitian, is represented as a cultivated Roman of rank.
Impelled by a thirst for truth, which he had sought in
vain, he journeys to the east, and through the agency
of Barnabas is introduced to Peter, whose instruction
fully satisfies his mind, and who is made, in the room
of Paul, the real apostle to the Gentiles, the founder
and first bishop of the Roman church. Peter is
portrayed as the antagonist of aU sorts of errors,
especially of the Gnostics in the person of Simon
Magus. He combats, also, ChUiasm, the Hypostatic
Trinity, and Montanism. Paul, though not mentioned
by name, is made the adversary of Peter, and is
regarded with hostility. Peter is made to teach the
Elkesait doctrine of a primitive religion which was
afterwards corrupted ; of the identity of the true
Mosaic system with Christianity ; of the seven men,

REFUTATION OF BAUR. 301
together with Jesus, in whom the true prophet was
manifest ; of opposition to sacrifices, abstinence from
eating flesh, voluntary poverty, and frequent fasts and
baptisms. In conjunction with these views, other
notions are found. The earthly kingdom with Satan,
its head, is set in antithesis to the heavenly kingdom,
both forming together a pair ; and a similar contrast
or coupUng is carried, in a series, through the whole
history of the world and of man. Thus, Adam was
endowed with aU intellectual and moral gifts, but from
him proceeded the woman, the source of sensuousness
and weakness. So, along with the true prophet, false
prophets are always found to pervert the truth. The
hierarchical theory is decidedly supported, but chili-
asm is opposed. Interwoven with the work is a not
unattractive story, embracing the personal fortunes of
Clement ; and the whole is commended to credence
by accompanying vouchers : a letter of Peter entrust
ing his discourses to James at Jerusalem, who is
represented as the head-bishop of the whole Church ;
an attestation that the trust was faithfully discharged
by James ; and a- letter of Clement to James, purport
ing to be written after the death of Peter, and trans
mitting the work which Clement had composed by his
direction. At a later period, it seems to have been thought
that the Homilies were a work actually composed by
Clement, but corrupted and interpolated by heretics.
Accordingly, early in the third century, some one,

302 ORIGIN OF CATHOLIC CHRISTIANITY.
probably an Alexandrian, undertook to clear them
of supposed interpolations and restore them to the
original form. The product was the so-called Recog
nitions of Clement. The Epitome is the result of a
stiU later revision.1
Strange to say, the Clementine HomUies, a spu
rious production, the work of an unknown writer, and
abounding in fantastic, anti-Christian ideas which
could never have gained the assent of a sober-minded
Christian, is made by Baur a sort of text-book for the
illustration of the opinions of the Roman church, and
of the churches generally, in the second century. Its
authority is deemed sufficient, on many points, to
outweigh the testimony of the approved writers who
have heretofore been depended on by scholars of all
theological affinities. Because this work is Ebionite
and anti-Pauline, such must have been the prevailing
Christianity of the time !
But the Clementine HomUies represented the
opinions of an individual and not the sentiments of
any important body of Christians. Not until after the
HomUies were written did the party whose notions
were, to a considerable extent, embodied in them,
obtain adherents in Asia Minor, Cyprus, or Rome.
Hence Origen, who was acquainted with the church
at .Rome, as well as with the churches elsewhere,
speaks of this party as having " lately arisen." 2 The
1 See Gieseler's K. 67., B. I. s. 285.
* Origen in Euseb., Lib. vi. c. 38. .

REFUTATION OF BAUR. 303
most plausible and best supported hypothesis which
we have met with, concerning the origin of this unique
work, is that presented by Gieseler. The Roman
church, as is weU known, in the early centuries was
far more practical than speculative. Instead of
originating theological discussions, it gave a hearing
to the more inteUectual and versatUe theologues of the
East. In the second century in particular, Rome was
the place to which theological sectaries resorted in
order to gain, tf possible, countenance from the
influential church of the metropolis. In such a state
of things it was natural that many should become
unsettled in their faith and unable to satisfy them
selves upon disputed questions. Among these was a
young Roman, educated in philosophy, who deter
mined to resort to Palestine, and seek for the truth
among the remnants of the original, Judaean church.
Falling in with the Elkesaits, he conceived himself to
possess in their tenets a satisfactory system, and one
on which divergent parties could be united. In
opposing Gnostics and other parties with whom the
Elkesaits had not come in contact, he was naturally
led to amplify and modify the doctrine which he had
learned, and to blend with it the results of his own
speculation. This mode of accounting for the Homilie
has the merit of being consistent with the known
facts, and the bare statement of it wUl suggest how
entirely exaggerated is the Tubingen estimate of the
significance of the work.

304 ORIGIN OF CATHOLIC CHRISTIANITY.
The method which these critics adopt in dealing
with the authorities from which the early history of the
Church is to be deduced, we may illustrate by a
modern parallel. Towards the close of the American
Revolution, there appeared in London a history of
Connecticut, from the pen of Rev. Samuel Peters,
who had been a missionary in Hebron in that State,
but had left the country in consequence of the
unpopularity he had incurred by taking the side of
the English Government. This work, though pref
aced by protestations of fidelity and painstaking, is
an odd mixture of fact and fiction. Among other
fabulous stories, Peters promulgated the notion that
unrecorded laws, which are styled " blue laws," of an
ascetic and whimsical severity, were in force among
the early Puritans of the colony. This singular,
mendacious chronicle is thought worthy to be cited,
though not without some expressions of distrust, by
so recent an author as the learned Dr. Hessey in his
Bampton Lectures upon the history of the observance
of Sunday. Now what would be thought of an
historical critic, who at some time in the remote
future should take Peters for the governing authority
in his investigation of the ancient history of Connecti
cut ? Other documents, let it be supposed, are extant,
which have been universally regarded as authentic.
But these, together with historians like Bancroft and
Palfrey, who lived much nearer the events and were in
possession of a great amount of traditionary and docu-

REFUTATION OF BAUR. 305
mentary evidence which has since perished, he chooses
to set aside. Such a course would match, that taken
by the critics who would convert the Clementine fiction
into an authority sufficient to override the firmest
historical testimonies.
That a judaizing party had sway in the Roman
church in the next period after the apostohc age, is a
declaration made in the face of convincing evidence to
the contrary. Baur has contended that the church ©f
Rome was made up, at the outset, chiefly of Jewish
converts. But this proposition is refuted by the
complexion of Paul's Epistle to the Romans, The
fact of his writing an epistle to this church, which he
had not personally planted and had never visited, is
itself a strong presumption that the church was
predominantly GentUe. The various expressions in
the first chapter, relative to his calling to preach to the
Gentiles and his willingness to fulfil it even at Rome
(vs. 5, 6, 14, 15), would be out of place in an address
to born Jews. And how unnatural is the hypothesis
that the first eight chapters were written merely to
serve as an introduction to the two chapters which
foUow ! The observances of the Roman church were
anti-Jewish. The custom grew up there of fasting on
Saturday, or of continuing the fast of Friday through
the following day, whUst Sunday was made a joyous
festival. The Roman church, in the discussions of the
second century concerning Easter, took ground against
conforming to the Jewish calendar or continuing the
20

306 ORIGIN OF CATHOLIC CHRISTIANITY.
Jewish festivals. These are undeniable facts. They
are met by the uncertified conjecture, that they indi
cate a Pauline reaction against the judaizing spirit
which is assumed to have prevailed before ! But this
rejoinder is a subterfuge. If arbitrary conjectures of
this kind are to pass for evidence, there might as. well
be an end of historical study.
The effort to trace the hierarchical theory and
system to a distinctively Jewish-Christian and Petrine
party, is not less unsuccessful. There was, without
doubt, the transfer of the idea of the Jewish priest
hood to the Christian clergy. The analogy of the Old
Testament system was at once a model, and to some
extent a motive, which detennined the rank and func
tions of the Christian ecclesiastics. But the Jewish
prejudice was peculiarly a national feeling. It was a
feeling of pride in race and blood. This peculiar
feeling, and the demands connected with it, hardly
admit of being satisfied by the ascription of priestly
prerogatives to Gentiles — by a seeming revival of the
old religious system, attended, however, by the total
loss of national preeminence. Jewish Christians, to
be sure, might be liable to confound Old Testament
with Christian ideas, and transform the preacher into
the priest. This tendency, however, is to be distin
guished from the technically judaizing spirit, which
had its roots in a national jealousy. But even the
Jewish-Christian feeling which was not judaizing, was
far from being the controUing cause of that change in

REFUTATION OF BAUR. 307
Christian views which paved the way for the hierar
chical system. Tendencies to such a system sprung
up on heathen soU. EspeciaUy might this be the fact
where the Old Testament, with its Levitical system,
was in the hands of Christians, and when the question
of the distinctive character of justification under the
gospel no longer excited a living interest or continued
to stir up controversy. , The growth of the hierarchy,
as a part of doctrinal belief and as a practical system,
was imperceptible. It was rather due to the fact that
the Church had become obhvious of the points of
doctrine on which Paul insisted, or of the principles
which underlie them, than to any distinct exertion or
influence of an Ebionite party.
But how shall we explain the exalted rank which
was given to Peter, and the position ascribed to him,
of principal founder of the Roman church? These
views, we reply, were not inspired by any anti-Pauline
party. The whole tradition of Peter's visit to Rome
and martyrdom there, as well as the later story of his
episcopal supremacy in the Roman church, is attribu
ted by the Tiibingen critics to Ebionite partisanship.
But as to the doctrine of Peter's headship among the
apostles, it was not the offspring of an anti-Pauline
theology. The idea of the hierarchy involved the need
of an apostolic centre and head. And this place was
naturally assigned to Peter. The reading of the
Gospels and the Acts made the impression that Peter
was the foremost of the apostles and was constituted

308 OKIGIN OF CATHOLIC CHRISTIANITY.
their leader. Nor was this impression — however false
the doctrine of an essential difference of rank between
Peter and the rest may be — whoUy unfounded. Even
Paul in more than one place seems to regard Peter as
the principal apostle, though a position hardly inferior
seems to be held by James.1 But the tradition of the
visit of Peter to Rome and of his death there, ante
dates the hierarchical pretensions of the Roman
church. Moreover, had the story been originated by
a Petrine party in order to depress the consideration of
Paul, as Baur pretends, it would have found instant
contradiction from the Pauline party at Rome, instead
of being attested, as it is, by the Presbyter Caius, him
self a Christian zealous for the honor of Paul.2 In
truth, the idea that Peter helped to found the Roman
church, and the association of his name with Paul in
this work, is a sign that no partisanship respecting the
merits and claims of these apostles- existed. The
notion that Peter was the first bishop of the Roman
church, is something different from the tradition of his
concern in founding it, and was probably set in cir
culation by the Pseudo-Clementine writings ; first by
the HomUies, but especiaUy by the Recognitions,
which passed for a genuine work. The inroads of
Gnosticism and Montanism, and other agencies, con
tributed to combine orthodox Christianity into a more
compact body. As the result of a variety of causes,
the deepest of Avhich lie in inherent tendencies of
1 Gal. i. 18, ii. 7, 8. » Euseb., Lib. II. c. 25.

REFUTATION OF BAUR. 309
human nature, an externalized conception of Chris
tianity began more and more to prevail. The great,
metropolitan church, in the city where Paul and Peter
had died, the only church in the west claiming to be
established and guided by an apostle, towered above
all other western churches and even above all other
apostolic sees. The idea of an apostolic primacy on
the part of Peter insensibly connected itself with the
story of an episcopal duty sustained by him in the
Roman church. In these changes of doctrine and
organization, we recognize, to be sure, the establish
ment of a system analogous to that of the Old Testa
ment, and, in a great degree, with more or less con
sciousness, modeUed after it ; but we discern no evi
dence of the presence of a distinct, controlling Ebionite
or judaizing party.
In the foregoing remarks we have not taken into
view those important writings, the epistle of Barnabas,
the epistle of Polycarp, and the Ignatian epistles,1 the
prevaUing drift of Avhich is confessed to be distinctly
Pauline.2 It has been possible, as we think, com-
1 We may observe that the genuineness of the shorter Ignatian
epistles — though they may have suffered interpolation— is not now
impugned by judicious scholars. After the discovery of the Syrian
version of three of these epistles, Bunsen came out with the hasty
statement that only these, or so much of them as the Syrian version
contained, are genuine. The Syrian translations, however, have
been proved to be the product of an abridgment of the Ignatian
originals, and to afford no evidence whatever against the genuine
ness of the remaining four.
2 See Schwegler's Kachapostolisches Zeitalter, B. I.

310 ORIGIN OF CATHOLIC CHRISTIANITY.
pletely to refute the position of the Tubingen school
by a plain analysis of their own evidence. Nor have
we thought it necessary to answer the criticism which
is quick-scented enough to detect in Justin Martyr a
modicum of the judaizing leaven. Justin speaks
mildly of the more liberal Ebionites who sought not
to interfere with the freedom of the heathen con
verts ; 1 and in the same spirit Paul would have
spoken. Whoever will read with an impartial eye
what Justin says of salvation by faith — that Abraham
was justified " for the faith which he had being yet
in uncircumcision" 2 (a statement doubtless borrowed
from Paul), or peruse what he says of the sabbaths
and fasts of the JeAVs,3 or attend to his doctrine con
cerning the exalted dignity of Christ, avUI need no
argument to convince him that Justin had no affinity
with Ebionitism.
The Church in the era foUowing the apostolic age
was not swayed by Ebionitism. There was no party,
save a party known and recognized as heretical, which
was hostile to the Apostle Paul or called in question
his right to be considered an apostle. However the
Church may have gradually lapsed from his interpreta
tion of the gospel, there was among orthodox Chris
tians no conscious and wUful opposition to his doc
trine. The whole theory of an anti-Pauline, Ebionite
1 Dial c. Tryph., c. 47.
* Dial. c. Tryph., c. 23.
5 E. g. Dial. c. Tryph., c. 19 seq.

THE EBIONITE PARTIES. 311
Christianity in the second century, is not only unsup
ported by any sohd evidence, but is positively proved
to be false. Rather is it true that judaizing Chris
tianity shrunk away and fell into a powerless sect, in
the presence of the wide-spread establishment of the
gospel among the heathen, and when Jerusalem, the
sacred seat of the ancient worship, became a heap of
ruins. Pauline Christianity achieved the victory ; and
then in GentUe churches themselves there sprung up
conceptions of religion at variance with the spirit and
tenor of the great apostle's teaching.
II. We proceed to the second topic which we
proposed to consider — The Early Views concerning
Christ, and the Doctrine of his Divinity.
In common with the older Socinians, Baur seeks
to prove that the humanitarian view of the person of
the Saviour was the original doctrine, or the doctrine
of the Jewish Christians, partly on the ground that
the Ebionites of the post-apostolic period, the remnant
of the Judaean church, adhered to this conception,
and were unitarians of the humanitarian type.
In order to test the validity of this argument, we
shaU have to state, as concisely as we can, what is
known respecting the rise and character of the early
Ebionite parties.1
1 On this subject, there is nothing to supersede the lucid, master
ly dissertation of Gieseler in Staudlin u. Tzschvrner's Archiv fur
Kirchengeschichte, iv. 2. Later investigations of Neander, Schliemann

312 ORIGIN OF CATHOLIC CHRISTIANITY.
There is no doubt, as we have said above, that
there were in the apostolic age two branches of the
Church. The Gentiles, or the churches composed of
the disciples of Paul, and " they of the circumcision",
were distinguished by the fact that the latter kept up
the observance of the Old Testament ritual. It is a
false ppsition of Baur, as we affirm once more, that
James, Peter, and the other Jerusalem apostles,
together with the body of the Judaean church, were
disposed to disfellowship Paul and his disciples. Yet
there was a party of Jewish Christians — the Judaizers
— imbued Avith. a pharisaical spirit, and including
many former members of the pharisaical sect, who
were bent on making circumcision obligatory upon the
heathen converts, and were inimical to the Apostle
Paul. There is reason to believe that the judaizing
party grew in numbers in proportion as the GentUe
branch of the church gained in strength, and that
their attachment to the ritual became more and more
fanatical. At the destruction of Jerusalem, the Jewish
Christians had taken refuge for the time in PeUa and
in the adjacent regions of eastern Palestine. But in
consequence of repeated insurrections of the Jews,
they were at length forbidden by Hadrian (a. d. 135)
to enter the new city which he established on the site
of Jerusalem ; and the celebration of the Mosaic ritual,
(in the work already noticed), Dorner, and others, have rectified,
however, the representations of Gieseler in certain particulars, and
have brought forward some new information.

THE EBIONITE PARTIES. 313
whether by Jews or Jewish Christians, was interdicted.
Thenceforward the Christian church at Jerusalem
ceased to observe the ceremonial law, and was exter
nally, as well as in spirit, in fuU accord with the Gen
tile churches.
Not far from the time when this decree was issued,
we find Justin Martyr1 distinguishing between two
classes of Jewish-Christian sectaries, with one of
whom he can have no communion, while he looks
upon the other with charity. The first class observe
the ceremonial law and insist that GentUe Christians
shall observe it ; the second class, though observing
the law themselves, which Justin counts a weakness,
yet freely tolerate their Gentile brethren and make no
attempt to put the yoke of circumcision and sabbaths
upon them. It is plain that Justin has in mind the
two parties which are known to later writers as
Ebionites and Nazarenes ; both however being fre
quently merged under the common name of Ebionite.
Justin immediately proceeds to consider the opinion
which was entertained by some Christians, that Christ
did not preexist, but is a man, not essentially dis
tinguished from other men ; and his language renders
it clear that Jewish Christians are referred to.
Irenaeus (who first uses the name Ebionites) and
Tertulhan treat Ebionitism as a heresy, and bring up
the fact of the enmity of the sect to the Apostle Paul.
This antagonism to Paul, however, belonged, as we
1 Dial. c. Tryph., 47, 48.

314 ORIGIN OF CATHOLIC CHRISTIANITY.
know, only to the strict Ebionites, and was not shared
by the milder party of Nazarenes. Origen explicitly
distinguishes these two divisions of the Ebionite class.
The former, he says, deny and the latter accept the
miraculous birth of Christ from the Virgin.1 Eusebius
describing both parties under the common designation
of Ebionites, yet distinctly states that a portion of
them did not deny " that the Lord was born of the
Virgin by the Holy Ghost."2 From Jerome and
Epiphanius, in the latter part of the fourth century,
we derive a more full explanation of the characteristic
tenets of the different judaizing sects. Epiphanius
describes a third class of Ebionites, who had mingled
with their judaizing tenets theosophic or gnostical
speculations and thus concocted a distinct and pecu
liar scheme of doctrine. One phase of this eclectic
theology, as we have already explained, is presented in
the Pseudo-Clementine Homilies.3 The HomUies, it
wUl be remembered, along with other elements which
separate their system from the dogmas of either of the
two parties which we have just described, are yet
Ebionite in their hostUity to the Apostle Paul, their
rejection of the doctrine of Christ's, divinity, and in
various other points. Jerome, who lived in the
neighborhood of the Jewish Christians and held
intercourse with them, is our best authority, especially
so far as the Nazarenes are concerned. Both these
1 Origen, e. Celsum, v. 61, also c. 65.
" Euseb., Lib. III. c. 27. 3 Epiph., Eaer. xxx.

THE EBIONITE PARTIES. 315
parties made use exclusively of the Gospel of the
Hebrews, a gospel in the Aramaic dialect, which
bore a near resemblance to the canonical Gospel of
Matthew. The Ebionites proper, however, unlike the
Nazarenes, rejected the first two chapters. Both ob
served the requirements of the ceremonial law. It is
clear that the Ebionites proper considered Jesus to be
a mere man, begotten by a human father ; a prophet,
receiving the messianic call at his baptism, and endued
at that time with the Holy Spirit for the discharge
of his office. Without circumcision, there was no
salvation. Christ would come again to establish his
throne at Jerusalem and bring aU nations into subjec
tion. Whether the Nazarenes held the chiliastic, or
sensuous miUennial, doctrine of the stricter Ebionites,
we cannot determine.1 But in many .features the
Nazarenes were broadly distinguished from this party
of radical Judaizers. They rejected the pharisaical
traditions . and spirit. They believed that Jesus was
conceived of the Holy Ghost and born of a virgin.
They cherished a fraternal feeling towards the GentUe
Christians. They honored the Apostle Paul. They
waited, with longing, for the conversion of their Jewish
countrymen to the faith in Christ.
Such, in brief, was the character of the Jewish-
Christian sects, as it is gathered from the fragmentary
information to be gleaned from the Fathers. We
cannot fail to recognize in the Ebionites proper the
1 See, on this topic, Schliemann, s. 457.

316 ORIGIN OF CATHOLIC CHRISTIANITY.
descendants of the party of Judaizers who, during the
life of Paul, displayed a fanatical opposition to his
principles and person. Nor do we err in regarding'
the Nazarenes as the successors of that milder party
of Judaean Christians, who, under the lead of the
apostles, observed, to be *sure, the laws and customs
of their people, but were in fraternal union with Paul
and his GentUe churches. The territorial situation of
these post-apostolic sects, in Palestine and the vicinity,
together with all the rest of the knowledge we possess
concerning them, corroborates this view. When and
how did these parties separate from each other and
form the rest of the church ? We are not Avithout the
means of answering this question. Hegesippus, to
wards the end of the second century, states expressly
that during the lifetime of the apostles, and down to
the times of Trajan, there was no heresy or division in
the Jerusalem church, and that the first movements of
this sort occurred after the death of Simeon, the suc
cessor of James, or about the year 108. Up to this
time the Church had remained a pure and unspotted
virgin — a mode of expression signifying the absence
of heretical parties.1 It may be that little reliance is
to be put upon the statement that an individual
named Thebuthis was the first fomenter of schism, or
that personal rivalry lay at the bottom of it ; but as to
the main chronological fact, there is no good reason
for doubt. When the final decree expelling the Jews
1 See Heinichen's note (8) to Euseb., Lib. III. 32.

THE EBIONITE PARTIES. 317
and Jewish ritual from Jerusalem, was issued, a large
number of Hebrew Christians abandoned the ceremo
nies of the law and identified themselves with the
GentUe church.1 But the Jewish Christians who were
Qot prepared to take this step and were likewise un
prepared to give up their Christian faith altogether,
were thrown into the position of separate sects. The
precise relations of the two divisions of the judaistic
party to each other, it is not so easy to determine.
But this we know, that the name of the Nazarenes had
been applied from the beginning, by the Jews, to
Christians generally;2 and that the Nazarene party,
in their principle relative to circumcision and their
feeling towards Paul, harmonized with the liberal
Jewish Christians of the apostolic age and were bitterly
hated by the stricter Ebionites. It is natural, there
fore, to suppose, with Gieseler, that the Ebionites
proper — the strict Judaizers — broke off from the
Nazarenes at the time when Hegesippus states that
heresy and division began. When the Epistle to the
Hebrews was written, or shortly before the destruction
of Jerusalem by Titus, the judaizing party had shown
signs of withdrawing itself from their more liberal
1 Gieseler/s Essay (in Staudlin u. Tzschirner), s. 325. His refer
ences are to Epiph. de Pond, et Mens. § 15, and Sulpicius Severus,
Hist. Sacr. II. 31. Where there is so great an inherent probability
that the fact was as they state, these authorities may be considered
sufficient. J Paul was called by his Jewish accusers " a ringleader of the sect
of the Nazarenes." Acts xxiv. 5.

318 ORIGIN OF CATHOLIC CHRISTIANITY.
countrymen and brethren. Here was the germ of the
stricter Ebionite party. That the word Ebionite is
derived from a person bearing the name of Ebion, a
founder of the sect, is probably a fancy of TertuUian,
since no mention is made of such an individual by
Origen, Irenaeus, or any other previous writer. That
the word signifies the narrow standpoint of the law,
or the low views entertained concerning Christ, both
of which interpretations are given by Origen, is equally
improbable. It is more likely that it was one of the
names of opprobrium early affixed by the Jews tc
believers in Jesus, on account of their actual poverty
and social 'inferiority; though this poverty did not
spring, as Baur would have it, from ascetic principles.
This name continued to be applied to Jewish believers
by then: unbelieving countrymen, and was gradually
appropriated, at least in Christian use, more speciaUy
to one branch of the Jewish separatists.
The unsoundness of the argument drawn from the
opinions of the Ebionites, against the supposition that
the divinity of Christ was a part of the faith of the
apostolic church, is easUy exposed. In the first place,
it is not true that the Nazarenes — the only portion of
the Ebionites whose opinion on the subject is pertinent
in the discussion — professed the humanitarian doc
trine. The Fathers unite in attributing to them a
higher conception of Christ than was entertained by
the more bigoted faction. They believed in his mira
culous generation through the Spirit of God. We do

THE EBIONITE PARTIES. 319
not find, indeed, that the hypostatic preexistence of
Christ was an article of their creed ; but the absence
of this tenet from a theology not fully defined or de
veloped, is very different from the distinct rejection of
it. Dorner cogently defends the ground which was
formerly taken by Horsley, that the Nazarenes are not
to be counted among the disbelievers in the Saviour's
divinity.1 He shows that when Christ is styled, in a
passage of their gospel, the Son of the Holy Spirit, it
is not the Holy Spirit, the Sanctifier, but the spirit of
God in the more general sense, or God himseU, that is
meant:2 Dorner holds that their view, though unde
fined, had more resemblance to Patripassianism. But,
in the second 'place, if the Nazarenes of the second
and third centuries were humanitarians, it would be
entirely unwarrantable to infer that the body of Jeru
salem Christians in the apostolic age were of the same
mind. The Ebionites did not represent the type of
faith and feeling which belonged to Peter, James,
John, and their disciples. We might as weU infer
that the faith of the Congregationalists of Boston. at
the end of the seventeenth century, must correspond
to the faith of their descendants at the end of the
eighteenth. Great changes of doctrine imperceptibly
occur ; and this is more easily the fact where doctrines
are not scientifically defined. We have historical
1 Dorner's Entwickelungsgeschichte d. Lehre v. d. Person Christi,
B. I. s. 307 seq.
* Schliemann misinterprets these poetical expressions.

320 ORIGIN OF CATHOLIC CHRISTIANITY.
proof that such a change occurred in the case of the
Jewish Christians. The Epistle to the Hebrews,
written to Palestinian Christians a short time before
the capture of Jerusalem by Titus, is a warning
against these tendencies, of which actual apostasy on
the part of some, and heretical Ebionitism on the
part of others, were the proper fruit. Side by side
with his arguments against keeping up the Mosaic
ritual, the author of the Epistle lays stress upon
the exalted nature of Christ. It appears altogether
probable that the disposition to take a lower than
the apostolic view of the person of Christ, as weU
as a tenacious clinging to the obsolete ritual, were
manifest dangers which the writer of this epistle
endeavors to meet and to avert. When the crisis
occurred Avhich compelled a choice, a portion of the
Judaean Christians gave up the law and cast in their
lot with the Gentile Christians. ( The Ebionites were
degenerate Hebrew Christians. If there was an
advance on the part of their brethren, on their part
there was retrogression. Not only were they opposed
to a logical and legitimate progress, they feU back from
the tone and spirit of apostohc Christianity and a
large portion of them settled down upon a lower view
of Christ, according to which he was only a human
prophet "and lawgiver.
We are now prepared to judge of the truth of the
oft-repeated statement that Christianity in its first
stage was Ebionite. If this statement signify that

baur's wrong exegesis. 321
the apostles and the church, as a body, at Jerusalem,
required heathen converts to be circumcised, it is false.
If it signify that they were humanitarians in the doc
trine of Christ, it is likewise unfounded. If it mean
that they were inimical to Paul, it is equaUy destitute
of truth. If it mean that they made poverty a duty
and were a band of ascetics, it is not less contradicted
by the evidence. If it be intended simply that the
Jewish Christians continued to worship in the temple
and, for themselves, to observe the law, so much is
true. In the proper and ordinary acceptation of the
term, they were not Ebionites ; and this appellation
can be rightly applied only to schismatical parties of
a later date.
When we follow Baur into the province of exege
sis, Ave find his statements still more faUacious. We
allow that Christ is not presented in just the same
aspect in the various books of the New Testament,
whether gospels or epistles. To say nothing of other
grounds for a variety of representation, it is true of
every great character in history, that the impression he
makes on different persons varies with their varying
individuality. One is taken up with a side whicl
another partly overlooks. The Gospels do differ
though they do not dissent, from each other. Th'*
Synoptics dwell more on the special proofs of messiah
ship and on the future disclosure of Christ's exalted
rank in the exercise of his- office of judge. In John,
21

322 ORIGIN OF CATHOLIC CHRISTIANITY
the glory of Christ to be exhibited at the end of the
world retreats more into the background, whUst the
fact of his preexistence is distinct and prominent. But
essentiaUy the same conception of Christ is common
both to the Synoptics and to John. The same under
lying unity is also characteristic of the remaining por
tions of the New Testament.
1. Matthew, who is confidently claimed as a repre
sentative of the humanitarian view, reaUy contains the
same lofty conception of the person of Christ which is
met with later in the New Testament. The Christ of
Matthew is not merely a teacher and lawgiver, not
simply a channel for conveying truth to men. He
himseU, as the head of the new kingdom, a central
object of faith and love, stands in the foreground. The
faith of the centurion in his supernatural power is
applauded ; the little faith in him, on the part of the
disciples, when the lake is tossed by the tempest, is
rebuked; the fervent faith confessed by Peter, or
Peter as the representative and embodiment of this
faith, is declared to be the rock on which the Church
is built. Christ is to be loved more than father or
mother. All men are to come to him to find rest.
In his name the GentUes are to trust. Into his name,
or fellowship, they are to be baptized. He is greater
than Jonas, greater than Solomon, Lord of the Sab
bath-day. It is undeniable that the title of " Son of
God," especiaUy when associated, as it is, with the
antithetical title of " Son of Man," is not only used

baur's wrong exegesis. 323
with a physical import, as referring to his miraculous
birth, and an official import as an honorary title of the
Messiah, but denotes, also, a metaphysical relation to
God— a higher, divine nature. " My Father," is the
usual and, as we think, the deeply significant mode in
which Christ alludes to the relation of himseU to God.
Moreover, in the background of the eschatology in
Matthew is the conception of Christ as divine. He
is to come in the clouds of heaven, in the glory of his
Father, attended -by a retinue of angels, the most
exalted of created intelligences. He is to summon
together and to judge the entire race of mankind.
How shaU this be done without omniscience ? To
our mind, the impression which this whole representa
tion is fitted to make, is wholly incongruous with the
humanitarian doctrine. Very significant, as teaching
that " Son of David " designates but one side of his
being, and as likewise containing an implication of his
preexistence, is the question to the Pharisees : if David
(in the 110th Psalm) call him Lord, how then is he
his son ? There are not wanting passages, even in
Matthew, which closely resemble, even in language,
the Johannean representation : " 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 ; " 1 or, as it reads in Luke, " No man
knoweth who the Son is but the Father, and who the
Father is but the Son, and he to whom the Son wil
1 Matt. xi. 27.

324 ORIGIN OF CATHOLIC CHRISTIANITY.
reveal him." 1 How evident that " Son " is here not a
mere official designation ! Christ is the sole Revealer
— in the language of John, the Logos or Word ! He
and the Father mutuaUy know each other; and from
the direct knowledge of either, all other beings are
precluded! Here is presented a necessary incident,
one of the constituent elements, we had almost said,
of the Saviour's divinity. It is true that Christ is
subordinate to the Father. The historical Christ, the
Word made flesh, both in the New Testament and in
the creed of the Church, is subordinate to the Father.
A land of subordination, not inconsistent with full and
proper divinity, belongs even to the preexistent Christ,
as the Nicene formularies, in agreement with the New
Testament, imply.
2. The Epistles of Paul which Baur chooses to
consider genuine, teach the same doctrine concerning
Christ as do the Epistles which he rejects. According
•to Baur, the principal peculiarity of Paul's doctrine is
the ascription to Christ of a sort of celestial humanity,
whereby he is distinguished from Adam. Dropping
the interpolated 6 xvqtog from the text in 1 Cor.
xv. 47, he holds that Paul sets the earthly, psychical
nature of the first Adam, in which the germs of sin
and death were inherent, in contrast with the second
Adam, who, instead of springing from the ground, is
constituted, so to speak, of a higher, heavenly stuff.
Now Paul does, to be sure, in conformity with
1 Luke x. 32.

BAUR'S WRONG EXEGESIS. 325
Genesis, ascribe mortality to the unfaUen Adam, the
exemption from that lot having been the destined,
but forfeited reward of obedience.1 But his whole
theology is utterly opposed to the conception of sin as
originating in a physical imperfection and as forming a
necessary stage in the development of humanity. Sin
is man's act ; it is naqdnrafia — transgression of a
law, holy, just, and good. Sin with Paul is ethical,
not physical. And as to the declaration respecting
Christ, the second Adam, that he is from heaven
(eg ovqavov), it means either that thence he is to
appear in his glorified body (comp. Phil. iii. 20) — such
is the interpretation of Meyer; or, that he is a man
supernaturally introduced into the race.2 Baur's
interpretation is not legitimately drawn from the pas
sage, but read into it. In 1 Cor. viii. 6, the pre
existence of Christ is distinctly and undeniably assert
ed, and with it the creation of the universe by him :
" one Lord Jesus Christ, by whom are all things." .To
refer this expression to the moral creation, or the
redemptive work of Christ, as Baur does, though not
without evident misgivings, is arbitrary and forbidden
by the context — the " all things " in this clause being
obviously identical with the " all things " of the clause
1 Compare with these passages of Paul, Gen. iii. 19, 22, 24. The
Scriptural doctrine respecting the connection of sin with death,
together with the sense of 1 Cor. xv. 46 seq., is the subject of an
able discussion in Julius Muller's Lehre v. d. Sunde, B. II. s. 400 seq;
2 This last meaning Neander prefers, in his posthumous Commen
tary on the Epistles to the Corinthians.

326 ORIGIN OF CATHOLIC CHRISTIANITY.
preceding, where the creation is attributed, in opposi
tion to polytheism, to one God. In 2 Cor. viii. 9, is
another undeniable assertion of the preexistence of
Christ and of the incarnation : " Ye know the grace
of our Lord Jesus Christ, that though he was rich, yet
for your sakes he became poor, that ye through his
poverty might be rich." The descent of Christ from
a preexistent glory to a state of humihation is here
definitely declared. The blessings of salvation come
to us because Christ, from being rich, consented to
become poor. It cannot mean, as Baur would have
it, that in order to enrich us with grace, Christ, who
was rich in grace, was in a condition of poverty ; for
if this were the sense, Ave must understand, if we
would save the text from confusion of thought, that he
became poor in grace! On the question whether Paul
held to any real preexistence of Christ, in any other
way than as the typical man and as aU types ideaUy
preexist, Baur is undecided but leans to the negative.
The preexistence of Christ in Paul, he says, " is vague
and ambiguous." x On the contrary, we affirm that
these passages, not to mention what other Epistles,
falsely called spurious, furnish to the same effect,
exhibit in different language the equivalent of John's
doctrine of the Logos.
Baur finds in these other Epistles an advance
upon the conception in the accepted four, but still a
form of doctrine below that of John. He misinter-
1 Das Christenthum, etc. s. 314.

REFUTATION OF BAUR. 327
prets, however, Phil. ii. 6 — a text containing a view
of Christ identical with that of the passage last com
mented on. " Who being in the form of God," says
Paul, " thought it not robbery to be equal with God,
but made himself of no reputation " — literaUy, emptied
himself — " and took upon him the form of a servant."
Here Baur confesses that preexistence and a near
relationship to God are predicated of Christ. But the
equality with God — expressed in the iGa Osa — was
not possessed, Baur claims, until he had passed
through thehumUiation of an earthly life and the cross,
and had been raised from it to that pitch of exaltation.
But that the true and proper Divinity, expressed in
the phrase just quoted, is predicated of the preexistent
Christ, is evident from the expression, " in the form
of God," contrasted as it is with " the form of a ser-
vant" which he assumed. He was in the form of
God ; his mode of existence was divine ; the attributes
and glory of God pertained to him. In purposing to
descend to save man, he chose not to appear in the
glories of Divinity ; he let go his condition of equality
with God instead of being eager to keep hold upon it,
or — as he is figured in the act of parting with it — to
lay hold of it, and assumed humanity. Is there not
here the precise equivalent of the Johannean doctrine
of a relinquished divine glory, in which he is after
wards reinstated ? 1
The Epistle to the Hebrews and the Apocalypse
' John xvii. 5.

328 ORIGIN OF CATHOLIC CHRISTIANITY.
are ranked by Baur between the Epistles of Paul which
he considers genuine, and the rest which bear his
name.1 They contain a doctrine, Baur says, between
the humanitarian view and that highest view of
Christ's person which he finds in the Gospel and the
first Epistle attributed to John. But in the descrip
tion of Christ, in the Epistle to the Hebrews, as the
Brightness or Effulgence of God's glory, and the ex
press image of his person, and as sitting down, after
he had purged away our sins, at the right hand of the
Majesty on High (Heb. i. 3), there is presented the
same conception which we have found in PhU. ii. 6.
And as to the Apocalypse, when Baur allows that in
this book Christ " not only shares with God the same
power and dominion and the same homage, but is also
clothed with predicates which seem to leave room for
no essential distinction between him and God," 2 he
virtuaUy aUows the validity of the orthodox inter
pretation, and his subsequent, halting attempts to
qualUy and invalidate this admission faU of their end.
In regard to the theological doctrine of the Person
of Christ in the post-apostolic age, Baur is brought
by .his philosophy into an important disagreement
with the older Socinians. Baur considers the Homo
ousion of the Nicene creed to be the logical and legiti-
1 We may observe that one of the Tubingen leaders, Hilgenfeld,
has retracted his denial of the genuineness of the Epistle to the
Colossians and the 1st Epistle to the Thessalonians. So mutable
is "criticism." 2 Das Christenthum, etc. s. 315.

REFUTATION OF BAUR. 329
mate development of the Christian idea, The forms
in which the doctrine was stated — the Logos termino
logy, in particular — were taken from the Alexandrian
Jewish phUosophy. But the mature Christian doc
trine, as to its contents, was not a conglomerate of
behefs before existing. It was not, as Socinians have
charged, a theft ' from Platonism. Yet the reader
would be deceived if he supposed that Baur regards
Christ as the Nicene Fathers regarded him. The
Homoousion, in his theory, does not represent an ex
clusive and peculiar distinction of Christ. He, by
the impression he made on men, only gave occasion
to the process of speculation which terminated in the
Nicene formula. This formula has value to Baur,
only as a symbol expressive of the union of the finite
and the infinite, the pantheistic oneness of man and
God. With us the Homoousion only defines what
Christ was in reality — the rank that belonged to him
in distinction from all other sons of men. The process
of theology was the effort .to state the impression pro
duced by the person of Christ and by his declarations
concerning himself. It did not add to the contents
of the earliest faith ; it simply evolved that faith in a
scientific form. The Homoousion was not the mere
climax of a course of thought, of which the historica]
Person of Christ was the moving spring but which
passed above and beyond the starting point. Christ
•was aU that he was seen to be in the disciples' faith
and declared to be in the mature form of the creed.

330 ORIGIN OF CATHOLIC CHRISTIANITY.
Connected with the false position of Baur that the
earliest doctrine — the first step in the metaphysical
process — was humanitarian, are historical statements
either unfounded or exaggerated. The prevaUing
view of Christ which was taken in the Roman church
through the greater part of the second century, Baur
holds to have been Ebionite. This theory about the
opinions of the Roman church has been thoroughly
refuted. The intimate fellowship of Irenaeus with
that church, as Neander has remarked, is sufficient to
create the strongest presumption against Baur's
hypothesis. But the Artemonites, Baur reminds us,
affirmed that then: doctrine, which was monarchianism
in the humanitarian form, had been the doctrine of
the church of Rome up to Zephyrinus. So they
affirmed that their doctrine was that of the apostles,
John included; for they received his Gospel. But
Eusebius, to whom we are indebted for this informa
tion, adds that their declarations were denied and
were met by appeals to the early writers and ancient
hymns, in which the divinity of Christ was said to be
attested.1 Moreover, thanks to the newly discovered
Hippolytus, it is not only ascertained that Zephyrinus
was a Patripassianist, holding thus to an extreme
formula of Christ's divinity, but it is now settled that
1 Euseb., Lib. V. c. 28. In refutation of the statement that the
humanitarian doctrine had prevailed up to Zephyrinus it was urged,
as Eusebius states, that Victor his predecessor had expelled Theo
dotus the Currier from the church, for holding that opinion.

REFUTATION OF BAUR. 331
one, if not two, other bishops of the Roman church
about that time, adopted the same doctrine. Patripas-
sianism, of which the Sabellian theory is the offspring,
could never have sprung from Jewish or judaizing
influences. It is the antipode of the humanitarian
doctrine. Yet the fact is, that whUe adherents of the
latter doctrine gained no foothold at Rome, the Patri
passianist leaders found great favor and even won over
two, if not three, bishops to their opinion. It is thus
demonstrated that the anterior opinions at Rome were
in no sense Ebionite.1 Indeed, we learn from Hip
polytus — from whom it is ascertained that Zephyrinus
embraced the Patripassianist doctrine — that the Trini
ty in the form of hypostatical subordinationism, in
which, also, he is himself a believer, was the mode of
view previously prevailing at Rome.
Baur would reverse the usual view of the course
which history took. He claims that humanitarian, or
Ebionite, monarchianism (for he confounds the two)
was the first behef. This was followed by a Patri-
passian monarchianism. The Logos doctrine mediated
between the two and culminated in the spurious gos
pel of John, while Artemonism or the humanitarian
1 We should not forget to remind the reader that the human
itarian monarchianism differed from the ordinary Ebionite view in
giving no such exaggerated importance to the baptism of Jesus and
the endowments which he was thought to have then received.
Neither unitarianism springing up within the Catholic church, nor
ritualism there, is to be confounded, either historically or doctrinally,
with Ebionitism.

332 ORIGIN OF CATHOLIC CHRISTIANITY.
party at the end of the second century, was a reaction
in behalf of the original belief. But, apart from
explicit proof of the early and widely diffused Logos
terminology, how impossible that Patripassianism
should have been the child of the humanitarian view
lying at the opposite extreme ! How impossible that
Patripassianists should have been pacified and satisfied
with the Logos doctrine ! How singular that Patri
passianists in seeking to support their own theory
against it, should have appealed to this very gospel of
John, a recent fiction of their adversaries ! In truth,
there is decisive proof that monarchianism sprung up
by the side of the Logos theology, from the difficulty
felt by certain minds in respect to the immanent
Trinity ; the humanitarian form among persons of a
rationalistic turn ; the Patripassian among those who
were disposed to exalt Christ to the utmost.
In the study of ante-Nicene writers on the ques
tion of Christ's divinity, it is above aU things impor
tant to understand the true principle of theological
development. There is not an addition to the contents
of Scripture nor to the truth embraced in faith ; but
theology is the scientific statement of the teaching of
Scripture and of the objects of faith. The scientific
statement may be, and at the outset is likely to be,
defective. Some essential element is omitted. Some
incongruous element is introduced. Subsequent in
vestigation and the light shed by controversy, remedy
the fault ; and the doctrinal statement advances nearer

REFUTATION OF BAUR. 333
to an exact interpretation of the Christian faith.1
Controversialists on both sides 'have erred in overlook
ing this distinction. They have either hastily inferred
that an ante-Nicene Father is Arian, because his
phraseology is inexact and might indicate Arian opin
ions, if uttered two centuries later, when the line
between the Arian and Athanasian doctrine had been
sharply drawn ; or they have attempted to strain these
defective statements into coincidence with the' Nicene
Avatchwords. From this last error, in consequence of
ignoring the true principle of doctrinal development,
so great and deeply learned a writer as Bull is not
free. For ourselves, we are convinced that the ante-
Nicene writers not only believed in the incarnation
and the preexistence of Christ, but also exalted him,
in their faith, above the category of creatures. This is
true when they are not consistent in then- language,
and faU into phraseology which clashes, not only with
other statements of their own, but with the truth
Avhich they had at heart. " As concerns the church
doctrine respecting the Son of God, the Church from
the beginning has recognized in the person of Christ,
as he had appeared on earth, a superhuman, yea,
divine manifestation, nature, power, glory. This was
even their pecuhar doctrine — -the object round which
1 For good remarks . on the distinction to be made between cor
rectness of faith and correctness in the statement of it, see Dr.
Shedd's Eistory of Doctrine, Vol. I. p. 246 seq.

334 ORIGIN OF CATHOLIC CHRISTIANITY.
all their thoughts clustered. At first, just as was the
case with the apostles, the foundation of this ideal
apprehension of Christ rested more in feeling and in a
living necessity of their nature, and the thought was
grasped and held in a diversified, free form." x Such
is the conclusion of one of the most impartial and
thoroughly learned of the recent writers on the history
of doctrine. He proceeds to add that the parties, in
the first two centuries, who caUed in question this
cardinal truth, were either, like the Ebionites, outside
of the pale of the Church, or, Uke the Artemonites,
alien from its spirit. As Neander has said, there was
a consciousness that the Redeemer was he from whom
the creation proceeded, through whom aU things were
made that were made. In the doctrine of the Son, or
the Word, as the revealer of the invisible God, and of
the necessity for such a mediator, the essential ele
ments of the orthodox conception are reaUy involved.
" No man hath seen God at any time." As He is in
himself, He is not directly visible, cognizable, to any
creature. The Revealer must be, of course, another
than God ; and yet not another as a creature is
another, because in this case he would, by the supposi
tion, stand at a distance from the being whom he is to
reveal, instead of really bringing that being to the
knowledge and contact of created intelligences.
These remarks wUl be found to be verified by a
candid examination of the early Fathers. Even
1 Baumgarten-Crusius, Dogmengeschiehte, B. II. s. 143.

EARLY DOCTRINE OF THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 335
Hermas, a Roman Christian, who is thought by some
to be so infected with Ebionite tendencies, ascribes
to Christ an existence prior to that of any creature,
and a participation in the work of creation : " filius
quidem Dei omni creatura antiquior est ita ut in
consilio Patri suo adfuerit ad condendam creaturam." *
How emphatically are the Saviour's preexistence and
divinity asserted in that gem of the early hterature,
the anonymous epistle to Diognetus ! 2 It is still
doubted whether in Justin Martyr the preexistent
Word is hypostatic — personal — before God's purpose
to create is about to be carried into effect ; but Jus
tin's idea of emanation takes the Word out of the
category of creatures, even though, now and then, he
may fall into expressions which are not logicaUy cohe
rent with this position. When he attributes all true
knowledge of divine things, even among the heathen,
to the enlightenment that proceeds from the Word,
1 Hermas, Lib. HI. simil. IX., XII. The use, in the early writers,
of such terms as " Spirit " and " Holy Spirit,"' sometimes to designate
the preexistent Christ as an equivalent of Logos, and sometimes in a
general sense for God, or the operative energy of God, has given rise
to many mistakes. It has been erroneously concluded that the Holy
Spirit, i. e. the Sanctifier, was not held to be an hypostasis distinct
from the preSxistent Christ, and that the personality of the Holy Spirit,
i. e. the Sanctifier, was not an article of belief. These mistakes are
admirably exposed and explained by Baumgarten-Crusius, in a pas
sage of his Dogmengeschichte, B. II. s. 178 seq.
2 0. 7, 8. See aiso Clem. 1 Cor. cc. 36, 60, 16, 22 ; Barnabas, c.
6 (the comment on Gen. 1 : 261 ; Ignatius, ad Phil. c. 9 ; ad Magn. c.
8 ; ad Polyc. c. 3 ; Polyc, ad PhU. c. 3, c. 7 (where is quoted John
iv. 3).

336 ORIGIN OF CATHOLIC CHRISTIANITY.
and makes the preexistent Christ the divine subject in
the theophanies of the Old Testament, who speaks to
the patriarchs and to Moses out of the fire, there
naming himseU the seU-existent I am} the character
of Justin's theology is evident. The Nicene creed, be
it remembered, though denying (against the Arians)
that the Son had a beginning of existence, and pre
dicating of him coequal divine perfections, did not
rejects all subordination. It denied that sort of sub
ordination which would imply that the Son is not truly
and properly divine, and would reduce him to the rank
of a creature. In Irenaeus and TertuUian we discover
the continued endeavor to- grasp and combine the
various elements that were involved in the Christian
faith. A oneness of the Son with the Father, which
is yet not an identity — an elevation of the Son above
aU creatures, above all things made — which yet shall
not intrench upon a pure monotheism, are obviously
aimed at in their doctrinal constructions. Origen
contributes one important element, a clear statement
of the timeless character of the generation of the Son.
Finally the Nicene Fathers, having before them the
opposite errors of Arius and Sabellius, hit upon a
statement which excludes both.
There is no proof that the humanitarian doctrine
of Christ — that type of monarchianism — ever prevaUed
extensively in the Church or at any time was the
creed of more than a minor party, who were out of
1 Apol^ l m.

EARLY DOCTRINE OE THE PERSON OF CHRIST. 337
sympathy with the general faith. Justin Martyr, in
arguing with the Jew, mentions that some, whom the
connection tf not the proper reading of the text shows
to have been converted Jews, considered Christ to be
a mere human prophet. But the whole tone of the
passage implies that they constitute a small party in
dissent from the great current of belief. TertuUian, in
the well-known passage in which he says that the
unenlightened, who always compose the majority of
Christians, are inclined to monarchianism, being per
plexed by the economical or hypostatic trinity — a
passage which even Hase wrongly applies to the
humanitarian class: — unquestionably has in mind the
Patripassianists, against whom his treatise is directed.
The same is true of certain passages in Origen, which
have been sometimes quoted to prove the prevalence
of a humanitarian theology.1
1 Tertullian, adv. Praxeam, c. 3 : "Simplices quique, ne dixerim
imprudentes et idiotae, quae major semper credentium pars est,
quoniam et ipsa regula fidei a pluribus diis saeculi ad unicum et verum
Deum transfert, expavescunt ad olKovopiav," — the hypostatic trinity.
" Monarchiam, inquiunt, tenemus." Neander justly understands this
passage and corresponding statements of Origen, as referring to the
Patripassian class of Monarchians. See his Church Eistory (Am.
transl.), vol. I. p. 578. The erroneous remark of Hase is in his
Kirchengeschichte, s. 100.
The word idiotae has often been mistranslated. Even Horsley
fell into the error of rendering it idiots— a. slip which Priestley was
not slow to remind him of, and which Horsley defended as well as
he could. Bentley caught Collins in a similar error. See Bentley's
PMl. Lips., in his collected Works, Vol. III. p. 263. Idiota means
originally a private person, in distinction from one in public station ;
22

338 ORIGIN OF CATHOLIC CHRISTIANITY.
On the whole, we must conclude that the historical
theory of Baur, although he has brought uncommon
learning and ingenuity to the support of it, is an
example, not of historical divination, but rather of
arbitrary, artificial construction. It is one more
iUustration of the power of a preconceived theory to
distort the perceptions of a strong understanding.
Unquestionably, new light has been thrown upon the
origin of the Church, but nothing has been brought
forward which tends to alter essentiaUy the received
conception of early Christian history.
then an unenlightened person — a man of plebeian understanding.
Idiot stands in Wicliffe's translation, in 1 Cor. xiv. 16, where
unlearned is found in our version. People of this sort, Tertullian
says, found it hard to see the difference between hypostatic trinity
and tritheism. They preferred the Patripassian view because it was
easier. The word was probably suggested by the Greek iftiarns in
Acts iv. 13, 1 Cor. xiv. 16, 23, 24, 2 Cor. xi. 6.

ESSAY VI.
THE MYTHICAL THEOET OF STEAUSS.1
The peculiar form of unbelief which in our time
has been brought forward to invalidate the testimony
to the miracles of the Gospel, is the Mythical Theory ;
and the leading expounder and advocate of that theory
is David Frederic Strauss. The Life of Christ, by
Strauss, is an extensive and elaborate work. The
author, if not a man of the profoundest learning, is
nevertheless a trained and well-read theologian.
Adopting a theory which, at least in the breadth of
its application, is a novel one, he yet skilfully avails
himself of everything which has been urged in the way
of objection to the truth of the Gospel history from the
side of ancient or modern skepticism. He knows how
to weave into his indictment charges drawn from the
most opposite quarters. He is quite ready to borrow
aid from Woolston, the Wolfenbuttel Fragmentist, and
other deistical writers, whose phUosophy in general he
repudiates. Thus, in his work, there are brought
1 Das Leben Jesu, kritisch bearbeitet, von Dr. David Friedrich
Strauss. 4 A. Tubingen: 1840.
Streitschriften sur Vertheidigung, &c, von Dr. David Friedrich
Strauss. Tubingen: 1841. '

340 MYTHICAL THEORY OF STRAUSS.
together and braided together the difficulties in the
NeAV Testament history which aU past study had
brought to light, and the objections which the
ingenuity of unbelievers, from Celsus to Paulus, had
found it possible to suggest. It is the last and
strongest word that skeptical criticism wiU be able
to utter against the evangelical narratives. In the
arrangement and presentation of his matter, the work
of Strauss is distinguished by a rhetorical skiU that is
rarely surpassed. He knows what it wUl do to assert
roundly, what is best conveyed by an insinuation,
what is more effectively suggested in the form of an
inquiry. He knows how to put in the foreground
whatever seems to favor his position, and to pass
lightly over considerations having a contrary tendency.
The currency obtained by the work of Strauss, and its
influence, are very much due, also,, to the transparency
of his style. In the exhibition of the most complex
details, the remarkable clearness and fluency that
belong to his ordinary composition are fully preserved.
It will not be denied that Strauss has presented the
most plausible theory which can be presented from the
unbelieving side, and has made it as captivating as the
nature of the case will admit. This theory we now
proceed to examine.1
Although Strauss undertakes to construct a hfe of
1 In connection with Strauss's principal work, the Streitschriften,
or polemical tracts in reply to his reviewers, which he himself col
lected into a volume, will receive attention.

MYTHICAL THEORY OF STRAUSS. 341
Christ, it is plain that the great question before his
mind is the question of the truth or falsehood of the
narratives in the New Testament which record mira
cles. Strange to say, he lays down at the beginning
the critical canon that a miracle is never to be believed,
and that the narrative in which it is found is, so far at
least, unhistorical. That is to say, he begs the ques
tion which it is one prime object of his book to discuss.
His entire work is thus a petitio principii. From a
scientific point of view, therefore, it has, strictly speak
ing, no claim to consideration. When we call to mind
the names on the roU of science which are counted
among the believers in miracles, such as Pascal, Kep
ler, Sir Isaac Newton, not to speak of names propor
tionally eminent among scientific men at the present
day ; and when we think how much of the loftiest in-
teUect the world has seen has likewise put faith in
these New Testament narratives ; when, moreover, we
remember that mankind have generally believed, and
do now believe, in miraculous events of some, sort, we
must pronounce the pretended axiom that miracles
are impossible, to be, in every sense of the word, an
assumption. We waive this point, however, and pro
ceed to consider the positive theory of Strauss.
What is a myth ? A myth is, in form, a narra
tive ; resembling, in this respect, the fable, parable,
and aUegory. But unlike these, the idea or feeling
from which the myth springs, and which, in a sense, it

342 MYTHICAL THEORY OF STRAUSS.
embodies, is not reflectively distinguished from the
narrative, but rather is blended with it ; the latter
being, as it were, the native form which the idea or
sentiment spontaneously assumes. Moreover, there is
no consciousness on the part of those from whom the
myth emanates, that this product of their fancy and
feeling is fictitious. The fable is a fictitious story,
contrived to inculcate a moral. So, the parable is a
similitude framed for the express purpose of represent
ing abstract truth to the imagination. Both fable and
parable are the result of conscious invention. In both,
the symbolical character of the narrative is distinctly
recognized. From the myth, on the contrary, the ele
ment of deliberation is utterly absent. There is no
questioning of its reahty, no criticism or inquiry on
the point, but the most simple, unreflecting faith. A
like habit of feeling we find in chUdren, who, delight
ing in narrative, improvise narrative. It is difficult for
us to imagine that chUdhke condition of mind which
belonged to the early age of nations, when the crea
tions of personifying sentiment and fancy were endued,
in the faith of those from whom they sprung, with this
unquestioned reality. It is almost as difficult as to
reproduce those states of mind in which the fundamen
tal peculiarities of language germinate ; peculiarities in
respect to which the philological explorer can only say
that so mankind in their infancy looked upon things
and actions. But there is no doubt as to the fact that
the mythologies had this character. They are the

NATURE OF A MYTH. 343
spontaneous growth of chUdlike imagination, originated
and cherished in the fuU, because unthinking, behef in
their reality. So the Greek mythology sprung into
being.1 The popular imagination, unhindered by any
knowledge of laws and facts which science could not
suggest, because science was not born, peopled the
groves and mountains, the sea and air, with divinities,
whose existence and whose deeds, forming the theme
of song and story, were the object of universal faith.
The ablest of the modern writers upon antiquity, such
as Ottfried Muller and Mr. Grote, have made it clear
that frequently there was no historical basis for these
mythological stories, and that, in the absence of expli
cit evidence, we have no right to assume a nucleus of
fact at their foundation. They may have been — fre-
1 The reader will perhaps be reminded of the beautiful lines of
Wordsworth :
"In that fair clime the lonely herdsman, stretch'd
On the soft grass, through half a summer's day
With music lull'd his indolent repose ;
And, in some fit of weariness, if he,
When his own breath was silent, chanced to hear
A distant strain, far sweeter than the sounds
Which his poor skill could make, his fancy fetch'd
Even from the blazing chariot of the sun
A beardless youth, who touched a golden lute,
And fill'd the illumined groves of ravishment.
The nightly hunter, lifting up his eyes
Towards the crescent moon, with grateful heart
Call'd on the lovely wanderer, who bestow'd
That timely light to share his joyous sport :
And hence a blooming goddess and her nymphs."

344 MYTHICAL THEORY OF STRAUSS.
quently, at least, they were — the pure creation of the
mythopoeic faculty ; the incarnated faith and feeling of
a primitive age, when scientific reflection had not yet
set bounds to fancy. Science brought reflection. The
attempt of Euemerus to clear the mythical tales of
improbabUities and incongruities, and to find at the
bottom a residuum of veritable history, and the
attempts of, both physical and moral philosophers
to elicit from them an allegorical sense, are, one and
all, the fruit of that skepticism which culture brought
with it, and proceed upon a totally false view of the
manner in which the myths originate. When these
theories came up, the spell of the old faith was already
broken. They are the efforts of Rationahsm to keep
up some attachment to obsolete beliefs, or to save
itself from conscious irreverence or popular displeasure.
A state of mind had arisen, wholly different from that
which prevailed in the credulous, unreflecting, child
like period, when a common fear or faith embodied
itself spontaneously in a fiction which was taken for
fact.1 1 Upon the nature of the myth, see K. 0. Muller's Prolegomena
zu emir wissenschaftlichen Mytholagie (1825). The recently pub
lished lectures of Schelling on the Introduction to Mythology (see
Schelling's Sammtliche Werke, II. Abth. I.), are a very able and
elaborate discussion. Schelling examines at length the various
theories which have been proposed to account for the origin of
mythology, including those of Heyne, Hermann, Hume, Voss, Creu-
zer, and others. He disproves all the irreligious hypotheses and
expounds in an interesting and profound way his own view, which is
the same in spirit as that of Muller, although the latter, in the opin-

ORIGIN OF MYTHOLOGY. 345
As we have implied, back of the authentic history
of most nations lies a mythical era: And whenever
the requisite conditions are present, the mythopoeic
instinct is active. The middle ages furnish a striking
example. The fountain of sentiment and fancy ih the
uncultured nations of Europe divaricated, so to speak,
into two channels, the religious myth and the myth of
chivalry. When we have eliminated from the immense
mass of legendary history which forms the lives of the
Saints what is due to pious frauds (though these pre
suppose a ready faith), and what is historical, being
due to morbid or otherwise extraordinary psychological
states, and, if the reader so pleases, to miracle, there
ion of Schelling (p. 199), has not applied his theory to the first
origination of the conceptions of the gods, but rather to their mytho
logical doings — the mythological history. Schelling applauds the
remarks of Coleridge on this subject, and says that he gives the
latter a dispensation for the alleged free borrowing from his writings,
in return for the single word which Coleridge has ' suggested as a
proper description of myths. They are not o&gorical, says Cole
ridge, but fawiegorical. Schelling also maintains that the primitive
religion of mankind was "relative monotheism," that is, the worship
of one God who is not known in his absolute character. Thence
polytheism arose, so that this one God was only the first of a series.
We may also refer the reader to the sixteenth and seventeenth
chapters of the first volume of Grote's Eistory of Greece. Mr. Grote
shows the spontaneity that characterizes the origin of myths. In
some other important respects, his view is defective. No theory
that does not explicitly take account of the truths expressed by Paul
in Bomans, i. 21, and Acts, xvii. 23 seq., can he considered satisfac
tory. A religious nature in man and a fall from the communion of
the one living God, must be presupposed, if we would explain the
mythologies.

346 MYTHICAL THEORY OF STRAUSS.
stUl remain a multitude of narratives involving super
natural events, which last have no foundation whatever
in fact, but were yet thoroughly believed by those from
whose fancy, enlivened and swayed by religious senti
ment, they emanated.
Strauss was not the first to suggest that portions of
the biblical history are myths ; but Strauss it is who
has applied the mythical theory in detaU and at length
to the Gospel narratives, and with the aid of this
theory has attempted to divest the life of Christ of all
supernatural elements,- — all these being pronounced
mythological. Strauss opposes, on the one hand,
behevers in the miracles, and, on the other, the advo
cates of the so-caUed " natural exposition," of whom
Paulus was the chief. Paulus was the German Eue-
merus, holding the New Testament narratives of
miracles to be erroneous conceptions and amplifica
tions of historical events which really fell within the
sphere of natural law. Thus, the healing of the blind
was accomplished by Christ through an efficacious
powder applied to their eyes — a circumstance which
was unnoticed or omitted by the lovers of the mar
vellous whose reports we have ; the fact at the bottom
of the record of the transmuting of water into wine,
was the gift of a large amount of wine, which Christ,
since he was to be attended by several disciples,
brought with him to the wedding : instead of being
expected to find a coin in the mouth of the fish, Peter
was to obtain it by selling a fish in the market, and

MYTHICAL THEORY OF STRAUSS. 347
the Gospel narrative sprung from a mistaken view of
the transaction : Christ did not walk on the water, as
was supposed, but walked along the shore : the so-
called transfiguration was the effect on the disciples of
seeing Christ on a higher mountain-peak which was
white with snow. Strange as it may seem, abundant
learning and the utmost painstaking were expended in
the support of this theory, which, however, had few
adherents when Strauss gave it the final death-blow.
Equal hostility is professed by Strauss to the form of
infidelity which had charged the apostles and their
Master with being wilful deceivers. He joins with
the Christian believer in denouncing the coarseness
and shallowness of that species of unbelief which found
reception among pretended philosophers of the last
century. He wUl propound a theory which involves
no such condemnation of the founders of Christianity.
He wiU propound a theory, moreover, which leaves
untouched that inner substance of Christianity which
is alone valuable to the philosopher. His construction
wiU have the merit of sparing the sensibilities of the
believer who is offended at hearing those whom he
reveres, branded as impostors, and, at the same time,
of relieving the men of the nineteenth century from
giving credence to events which, it is quietly assumed,
modern science pronounces to be impossible.
Omitting minor details, some of which we shall
have occasion to bring forward in the progress of the
discussion, the principal points in the doctrine of

348 MYTHICAL THEORY OF STRAUSS.
Strauss may be briefly stated, There existed in
Palestine, at the time when- Jesus grew up to man
hood, a Avide-spread expectation of the coming of the
Messiah. There was also a defined conception, the
result of the teaching of the Old Testament and of
later speculation, of the character of his work. Among
other things, he Avas to work miracles, such as the
opening of the eyes of the blind, the healing of the
sick, the raising of the dead ; ahd he was, generaUy,
to outdo the supernatural works ascribed to Moses and
Elijah and the other prophets of the former time.
Jesus, who. had been baptized by John, became at
length persuaded that he Avas the promised Messiah.
Endowed with lofty qualities of mind and character,
he attached to himseU disciples who shared in his
belief concerning himself. He taught with power
through the towns and viUages of Palestme. But,
encountering the bitter hatred of the ruling classes on
account of his rebuke of their iniquities, he was seized
upon and put to death under Pontius Pilate. Over
whelmed with grief and disappointment, his disciples,
who had expected of him a political triumph, were
finally comforted and inspirited by the mistaken belief
that he had been raised from the dead. Hence the
cause of Jesus was not crushed, but gradually gained
strength. And out of the bosom of the young com
munity, filled with enthusiastic attachment to their
slain and (as they believed) risen Lord, there sprung
the mythical tales which we find in the Gospels. Be

MYTHICAL THEORY OF STRAUSS. 349
lieving Jesus to be the Messiah, they attributed to him
spontaneously the deeds Avhich the prophecies had
ascribed to that personage. In these mythical crea
tions, the formative idea was the Old Testament
description of the Messiah. This idea, coupled with
the faith in Jesus, generated the Gospel history of
Christ, so far as that is miraculous, and even exerted
a very important influence in shaping and coloring
ctfcumstances in the narrative which are not super
natural. The Christ of the New Testament is thus
the ideal Messiah. He is Jesus of Nazareth, glorified
in the feeling and fancy of disciples by the ascription
to him of supernatural power and supernatural deeds,
such as lay in the traditional, cherished image of the
Messiah. It should be observed that Strauss does not reject
the supposition of a conscious invention in the case of
certain features in the New Testament reports of mira
cles, notwithstanding his general disavowal of an intent
to impeach the moral character of their authors ; but
he claims a very mtfd judgment for a certain kind of
artless, though not wholly unconscious, poetizing — the
arglose dichtung of simple souls.1 But how far Strauss
and his school are able to adhere to their canon, which
excludes wilful deception from a part in producing the
miraculous narratives of the Gospel, will be considered
on a subsequent page.
The denial of the genuineness of the four Gospels
1 Leben Jesu, B. I. s. 95.

350 MYTHICAL THEORY OF STRAUSS.
is an essential part of Strauss's theory. They cannot
come, he maintains, from " eyewitnesses or well-informed
contemporaries." The apostles could not be deceived
to such an extent as we should be compelled to assume,
if we granted that the Gospels exhibit their testimony.
On the subject of the origin of the Gospels, Strauss is
neither fuU nor clear; but this is affirmed, that they
are the production of later, non-apostolic writers. This
position he strives to establish by a critical analysis and
comparison of these documents. The attempt is made
to prove upon them such inconsistencies with each
other, as weU as violations of probability, as render it
impossible to suppose that they came from the hand, or
bear the sanction, of the immediate followers of Christ.
The credibility of the Gospels is attacked, partly as
a means of disproving their genuineness. And the
method of the attack is to press the point of the im
probabUity of the miracles, whUe, at the same time, the
untrustworthy character of the narratives is elaborately
argued on other grounds. The Gospels are dissected
with the critical knife, their structure and contents are
subjected to a minute examination, for the purpose of
impressing the reader with the conviction that, inde
pendently of their record of miracles, these histories
are too inaccurate and self-contradictory to be relied
on. Their alleged imperfections are skUfully connected
with the improbable nature of the events they record,
so that the effect of both considerations may be to break
down their historic value.

DISPROVED BY THE APOSTLES' FAITH. 351
Having thus stated the main points in the theory
of Strauss, we proceed to set forth the reasons Avhy the
mythical hypothesis is untenable.
I. The belief of the apostles and of Jesus himseU
that he was the Messiah, cannot be accounted for on
the theory of Strauss, and could not have existed, were
the assumptions of that theory sound.
Strauss puts his doctrine into a kind of syUogism.
There was a fixed idea that the Messiah would work
these various miracles ; there was a fixed persuasion in
the minds of the disciples that Jesus was the Messiah;
hence the necessity that the mythopoeic faculty should
attribute these miracles to him.1 These, we are told,
were the conditions and forces by which the myths
were generated. But if it was a fixed expectation that
the Messiah would work these miracles, how could the
disciples believe in Jesus in the absence of these indis
pensable signs of Messiahship ? Recollect that this
persuasion concerning the Messiah is represented to be
so deep and universal as to move the imagination of the
disciples of Jesus, after his death, to connect with him
all these fictitious miracles. How, then, were they
convinced of his claim to be the Messiah — so convinced
that their faith survived the disappointment of some
of their strongest and fondest anticipations relative
to his kingdom, and survived even the shock of his
judicial death ? It must be manifest to every candid
man that Strauss is thrown upon a dUemma. ' Either
1 Leben Jesu, B. I. s. 94.

352 MYTHICAL THEORY OF STRAUSS.
this previous ideal of the Messiah was not so firmly
engraved upon the minds of the disciples, in which
case the condition and motive for the creation of myths
are wanting ; or being thus firmly fixed, their faith in
Jesus through his lifetime proves that miracles were
really performed. A similar remark may be made of
Jesus himself, since he is supposed to have shared, on
this point at least, in the common expectation respecting
the characteristic works of the Messiah. How could
he maintain this unswerving faith in his messianic
calhng and office, in the absence of the one principal
criterion, the exercise of supernatural power ? To
avoid one difficulty, the advocate of the mythical
hypothesis creates another which no ingenuity can
remove. It is not to be supposed that Strauss ignores this
difficulty. He endeavors to answer the objection.
The impressiveness of the character 'and teaching of
Christ supplied, in a measure, the place of miracles so
long as he was bodily present. But this consideration
is evidently felt to be quite inadequate, and hence
Strauss makes prominent what he seems to consider a
concession. Jesus, we are informed, did calm and
relieve certain persons afflicted with nervous disease,
which Avas thought to be the fruit of demoniacal
possession. This effect was wrought, however, only by
psychological influence — the natural influence of a
strong and calm nature. Hence, it was only in cases
where the type of the disease was mild and chiefly

DILEMMA OF STRAUSS. 353
mental in its origin that such cures were effected.
The cure of a case like that of the maniac of Gadara,
or the child at the foot of the Mount of Transfiguration,
would be a miracle, and is, of course, excluded.1
Moreover, Strauss finds it convenient to maintain that
the cure of so-caUed demoniacs was produced by others ;
•that, in fact, it was not so uncommon. He appeals to
the instance narrated by Josephus, of the cure effected
in the presence of Vespasian,2 and to the question of
Christ : "by whom do your children cast them out ? "
So that, after all, this relief of less aggravated forms
of nervousness is not a distinguishing act of Christ
which could serve to attest his Messiahship. There
is obviously no reason, beyond the necessities of a*
theory, why it should be allowed that Christ relieved:
this kind of infirmity, to the exclusion of all the other
instances of heahng, together with the raising of the
dead to life, which are equally well attested. Nor are
we assisted to understand how the disciples were so
easUy satisfied with the omission of all the other forms
of miracle which they beheved to be indissolubly con
nected with the Messiah's appearance. When they
saw Jesus pass by the blind, the lame, the dumb,
the leprous, even the severe forms of demoniacal frenzy,
and do nothing greater than to quiet the less afflicted
subjects of nervous hallucination, which others were in
the habit of doing as well, how could they consider.'
1 Leben Jesu, B. I. s. 106 ; B. II. s. 43, 45.
2 Jos., Antiq. VIII. 2, 5.
23

354 MYTHICAL THEORY OF STRAUSS,
him the Messiah? We cannot avoid perceiving that
the same cause which is thought to have led irresistibly
to the forming of imaginary miracles, would have
effectually precluded a faith not sustained by miracles
which were real.
II. The mythical theory is fuUy disproved by the
fact of the absence of any body of disciples to whom
the origination and dissemination of the myths can be
attributed. The advocates of this theory prefer to use vague
terms and phrases in speaking of the source whence
the so-called Christian mythology came. It sprung,
says Strauss, from the enthusiasm of the infant church.
But when he is caUed upon to explain his meaning
more precisely, he admits that neither the apostles nor
the community which was under their immediate guid
ance could have been the authors of these fictitious
narratives. That the foUowers of Christ, who had
attended him through his public life, could mistakenly
suppose themselves to have been eyewitnesses of the
series of miracles which the Gospels record, is too
much for Strauss to believe. He claims that the
apostles in their Epistles, or in such as he concedes to
be genuine, do not bring forward the prior miracles,
but dwell on the Resurrection of Christ. So far as
they do not speak of the earlier miracles, the circum
stance is readily explained, if we suppose them to have
been familiar to the churches to whom the apostles

NONE TO ORIGINATE MYTHS. 355
wrote, and remember that, in the view of the apostles,
the grand fact of the Saviour's Resurrection stood in the
foreground, eclipsing, as it were, the displays of super
natural power which had preceded it. In the discourses
of the apostles, recorded in Acts, these prior miracles
are appealed to. But Strauss, be it observed, contends,
and is obUged to contend, that the apostles were igno
rant of any such miraculous events as these which the
evangehsts record. The myths did not originate with
in the circle of their oversight and influence. This
would be evidently true, whoever were disposed to
deny it ; but Strauss concedes and claims that such is
the fact. Where, then, did these myths grow up?
Who were their authors ? To this fundamental ques
tion the advocates of the mythical theory vouchsafe
only the briefest response. Yet Strauss does say that
they grew up among the dwellers in more secluded
places in Galilee where Christ had tarried but a short
time, and among those who had occasionally, or at sea
sons, companied with him.1 There was, then, if we are
to give credit to the mythical hypothesis, a community
of Jewish-Christian disciples in Palestine, separate from
the apostles and the Christian flocks over which they
presided, and in that community, within thirty or forty
years after the death of Christ, this extensive and
coherent Cycle of miraculous tales originated. We say
a community, because a myth is not the conscious in
vention of an individual, or a conscious invention at aU,
1 Leben Jesu, B. I. s. 72. Streitschr., s. 46.

356 MYTHICAL THEORY OF STRAUSS.
but an offshoot of the coUective faith and feeling of a
body of people.1 If, in certain cases, it proceeds from
the fancy of an individual, it is presupposed that he
stands in the midst of a sympathetic and responsive
community who receive without scrutiny whatever falls
in with the current of their feeUngs. We say " with
in thirty or forty years after the death of Christ," be
cause in this period Strauss himself places the bulk of
the so-caUed myths which are found in the Nev? Testa
ment.2 Now, in reference to this extraordinary solu
tion of the enigma as to the authorship of the myths,
we offer several remarks.
In the first place, it must strike the reader as a
singular fact that there is no evidence whatever of the
existence of such a non-apostolic Christian community
in the midst of Palestine. The assumption that a set
of behevers of this description existed in GalUee, re
moved from the knowledge and guidance of the apos
tles, is not supported by the slightest proof, and is in
the highest degree improbable. The disciples of Christ,
at the time of his death, were not very numerous.
There was a sense of unity among them. They formed
one body. Everything tended to draw them together.
And the apostles were their recognized heads. It is
certain, and wUl hardly be questioned by any one, that
1 So Strauss. It is most essential to understand, he says, that at
the foundation of the myth lies— "kein individuelles Bewusstsein,
sondern ein hoheres allgemeines Volksbewusstsein, (Bewusstsein
einer religiosen Gemeinde.") Leben Jesu, B. I. s. 89.
2 Streitschr., s. 52.

NONE TO ORIGINATE MYTHS. 357
the other disciples looked up to " the twelve " as their
guides, and leaned on them for support and counsel.
But how could persons in the situation attributed
to these obscure disciples, come to believe, or remain
in the behef, that Jesus Avas the Messiah? We have
shown the improbability that the apostles beheved
without miracles. But the difficulty of supposing
these other hearers of Christ to have believed, in the
absence of such evidence of his divine commission, is
much greater. It is a part of the hypothesis that they
knew comparatively little of Jesus, for to allow them
an intimate knowledge of him would put them in the
same category, as to the possibility of framing myths,
with the apostles themselves. They had seen little of
Jesus ; they had seen none of the supernatural signs
expected of the Messiah ; he had whoUy disappointed
their idea that the Messiah was to be an earthly prince ;
and, finaUy, he had perished by the death of a culprit,
which he endured without resistance, God not appear
ing to deliver him. Is it not inexplicable that casual
hearers of Christ, who were thus placed, having seen,
be it remembered, no miracle for their faith to rest
upon, should continue to believe — believe, too, without
a misgiving, with the childish simplicity and enthusi
asm which are requisite for the creation of mythological
tales ?
Such hearers must have originally cherished the
ordinary expectation concerning the Messiah, that he
would sit, in the character of a temporal Prince,

358 MYTHICAL THEORY OF STRAUSS.
upon the throne of David and bring into subjec
tion the heathen nations. The myths they would
frame, if they framed any, would be in keeping with
this expectation. A radical change in their conception
of the Messiah would require us to suppose, at least,
that they were weU acquainted with the actual career of
Jesus. But here, again, an acquaintance of this sort
with the real facts of his history shuts out, by Strauss's
own admission, the possibUity of then- connecting with
his ltfe a cycle of myths.1
But if we admit what is incredible, that a class
of disciples of this character existed, and existed in
such circumstances that they actuaUy produced through
the mythopoeic faculty, and set in circulation, the nar
ratives of which we have a record in the New Testa
ment, we are not then clear of half of the difficulty.
How can we suppose all this to be done with no
knowledge or interference on the part of the apostles
and other weU-informed contemporaries to whom the
facts of the life of Christ were weU known ? It will
not be claimed that this mass of mythological narrative
was shut up in the nooks and corners where it came
into being. This pretended seclusion of the Ul-informed
believers in Christ, could hardly have been kept up for
the whole generation during which the apostles traversed
1 In this paragraph and in several remarks in the paragraphs
which immediately follow under this head, we have been anticipated
by Professor Norton, Internal Evidences of the Genuineness of the
Gospels, ch. i. He is one of the few writers in English who have
correctly apprehended Strauss.

THE GOSPEL AS RECEIVED BY THE GENTILES. 359
Galilee and ministered to the church. The Jewish
Christians continued to come up to Jerusalem to the
great festivals ; did these GalUean believers stay away
from them ? How happens it, we beg to know, that
this type of belief, so foreign from that of the eyewit
nesses and authorized apostles of Jesus, found no con
tradiction or exposure ?
But an objection still more formidable remains to
be stated. Erom whom did the Gentiles receive Chris
tianity, and what type of Christianity did they receive ?
The new religion had been carried from Jerusalem to
Rome before the death of Paul and Peter. Was it
from the simple folk whose imagination is credited with
the origin of the miracles — was it from them who
knew so little of Christ as to indulge in these uncerti
fied fancies, and too little of the apostles to have their
self-delusion corrected — was it from these obscure dis
ciples that Christianity went forth to the Gentile world?
Did they have the energy to assume the missionary
work confided to the apostles, while these and all the
well-informed followers of the Messiah rested in idle
ness ? And had they the ability to command a hear
ing and to crown the new religion with rapid and
glorious success ? It woidd be preposterous, in the
face of ^probability and against all the evidence we
possess, to assert this. The Christianity of the GentUe
churches was apostolic Christianity. Their teachers
were such as Peter and John, Paul and Barnabas,
Silas and Timothy. Their conception of tlie history

360 MYTHICAL THEORY OF STRAUSS.
of Christ on earth was derived from the apostles and
the Christian believers associated with them. Now,
all of the canonical Gospels, except the first, are Gen
tile Gospels. The third was written by a Gentile, aud
this, together with the second and fourth, were written
for GentUes. Gentile Christianity did not flow from
that quarter — that terra incognita — where the myths
are said to have sprung up and been received. How
then shall we account for the character of the Gentile
Gospels, and, in particular, for the representation of
the life of Christ which they contain ! The conclusion
is inevitable that this representation, including the
narratives of miracles, was a part of that Christianity
which the apostles believed and taught. But when
this admission is made, the mythical theory breaks
down ; since, as we have before mentioned, Strauss
admits that, in case these narratives are false, apostles
and others who were well acquainted with Christ could
neither have originated them nor have been persuaded
to lend them credence.
III. The genuineness of the canonical Gospels, the
proof of which it is found impossible to invalidate, is
a decisive argument against the mythical theory.
Considering the importance of the subject, the
observations of Strauss upon the authorship and date
of the Gospels are very meagre. He denies, indeed,
that we can prove a general circulation of Gospel
histories during the lifetime of the apostles, or that

GENUINENESS OF THE CANONICAL GOSPELS. 361
our present Gospels were known to them.1 At one
time he was inclined to admit that John was the author
of the fourth Gospel, but seeing, probably, the fatal con
sequences resulting to his theory from this concession,
he withdrew it in a subsequent edition. But the propo
sition that John wrote the Gospel which bears his name,
is supported by such an array of external and internal
evidence as must convince an unprejudiced mind of
its truth. In respect to this Gospel, Strauss and his
friends are obliged to abandon the mythical hypothesis
and to pronounce its contents the deliberate fabrica
tions of a pretender who chose to subserve a doctrinal
interest by assuming the character of John. The
needless audacity which would lead a literary impostor
in the second century to present a view of the course
of Christ's life, which when compared with the previous
established conception, is, in many respects, so original
and peculiar, and his complete success in winning the
confidence of the churches in all quarters of the Roman
world, are mysteries not to be explained. The patristic
testimonies to the genuineness of the Gospels of Luke
and of Mark, as well as to the relation in which they
severally stood to Paul and Peter, cannot be success
fully impugned. Luke's preface to his Gospel har
monizes with the tradition of the church concerning
him. His informants, he there states, were immediate
disciples of Christ. He had acquired from the original
sources " a perfect understanding " of the matters on
1 Leben Jesu, B. I. s. 72.

362 MYTHICAL THEORY OF STRAUSS.
which he wrote. Of Mark and his Gospel, we have
an early account in the fragment of Papias, whose birth
feU within the apostolic age, and who drew his infor
mation from the contemporaries and associates of the
apostles.1 When Papias states that Mark, having been
the interpreter of Peter, and derived his knowledge of
Christ from him, wrote down " the things spoken or
done by our Lord," though not observing, as to the
discourses at least, the historical order, he describes,
Avithout doubt, our second Gospel.2 If there are criti
cal questions pertaining to the authorship of the first
Gospel, about which even believing scholars are not
yet agreed, it is even more evident concerning this
than any of the others that it emanates from the bosom
of the apostolic Church. Of this, the evidence, exter
nal and internal, leaves no room for doubt.3
Renan, in his recent Life of Christ, has the
1 Whether Papias was, or was not, acquainted with the Apostle
John himself, is a disputed point. Irenaeus affirms it, but Eusebius
is inclined to consider his statement an uncertain inference from the
language of Papias. Euseb., Lib. III. c. 39.
a Whether the want of historical order is attributed by Papias to
tbe record of the "things said" alone, or of "the things done " as
well, depends on the sense of XSyia in the passage — a question which
we have elsewhere considered.
3 The critical questions to which we allude, are clearly stated by
Meyer in the Einl to his Com. on Matt., and Bleek in his Einl in d.
K T. These questions do not affect the date of the Gospel, nor its
origin in the apostolic Church. Meyer's view depends on his restric
tion of the sense of \6yia — in the ra \6yia owfTa^aro of Papias—
which is not made out. On the other hand, Bleek's hypothesis leaves
the early tradition concerning the authorship unexplained.

renan's concessions. 363
candor to acknowledge the early date of the evangelical
histories, and, in general, though his views are here
not free from inconsistency as weU as error, their
apostohcal origin. He says that the composition of
the Gospels was " one of the most important events
to the future of Christianity which occurred during the
second half of the first century} As to Luke, " doubt
is hardly possible." 2 " The author of this Gospel is
certainly the same as the author of the Acts of the
Apostles. Now the author of the Acts is a companion
of St. Paul, a title perfectly suited to Luke." " One
thing at least is beyond doubt, that the author of the
third Gospel and of the Acts is a man of the second
apostolic generation." " Chapter xxi., inseparable from
the rest of the work, was certainly written after the
siege of Jerusalem, but soon after!' "But tf the
Gospel of Luke is dated, those of Matthew and Mark
are also ; for it is certain that the third Gospel is pos
terior to the first two, and presents the character
of a compilation CredactionJ much more advanced."3
1 P. xiv. 3 P. xvi.
8 Although we have more fully discussed these questions in other
parts of this volume, we may observe here that whatever Papias
meant by the \6yia of Matthew — whether the discourses alone, or the
narratives also — Kenan errs decidedly in saying that the Matthew
which was known to Papias was simply the discourses (in Hebrew).
When Papias says that the \6yia were wi-itten in Hebrew and
rjpprjvevae o" aiira a>s r/Sivaro eKaaros, he speaks of things in tbe past.
It is certain that Papias had the first Gospel in its complete form, in
the Greek. (See Meyer's Einl s. Matt., s. 11. N.) It is certain that
tho first Gospel had its present form before the date of the destruc-

364 MYTHICAL THEORY OF STRAUSS.
Mark, we are told, " though not absolutely free from
later additions, is essentiaUy as he wrote it." " He is
tion of Jerusalem. (Meyer, Einl. z. Matt., s. 21.) But Eenan con-
aedes that the second Gospel is " but a slightly modified reproduc
tion" of "the collection of anecdotes and personal information which
Mark wrote from Peter's reminiscences." P. 22. There is no
proof whatever that Mark's work has undergone any " modification,''
if we except one or two passages which are thought by critics to be
interpolated. The school of Baur have, to be sure, made Papias
refer to an " Ur-Markus," a work supposed to be prior to, and the
basis of, our second Gospel. But our Mark corresponds to the des
cription given by Papias ; so that the sole argument of the Baur
school for their view is unfounded. The writers of the second cen
tury know nothing of any other work ascribed to Mark except our
second Gospel. It is an incontrovertible fact that this Gospel was
composed by John Mark, an associate of the apostles. The Baur school
have made an attempt, which we are justified in terming desperate,
to bring down the date of the writings of Luke to the early part of
the second century. But apart from all the other -evidences in the
case, Baur's own method of argument requires him to suppose, and
he does suppose, that the generation — yevea — spoken of in Luke xxi.
32, still subsisted when the Gospel was written. But this term will
not bear the loose sense which he gives it. We have set forth in
another Essay the proof of the early date of the Acts. It is enough
to state here, that the circumstance of the writer's making no use of
the Epistles of Paul, in composing his work, is an insoluble fact on
Baur's theory. It is an incontrovertible fact that the third Gospel
and the Acts were written by Luke, an associate of Paul. The con
jecture of Eenan that the first two Gospels gradually borrowed
anecdotes from each other, would be inconsistent with the agreement
in the copies of each which were extant in the different parls of the
world in the third century, and is, moreover, supported by no proof.
But in holding that Luke was composed about the year 70, that Mark
remains substantially as he wrote it, and that both Matthew and
Mark are earlier than Luke, Eenan admits all that we ask in the
present discussion.

RENAN S CONCESSIONS. 365
full of minute observations coming without doubt from
an eyewitness. Nothing opposes the idea that this
eyewitness, who evidently had foUowed Jesus, who had
loved him and known him intimately, and who had
preserved a lively image of him, was the Apostle Peter
himself, as Papias says." x If the view presented by
Renan concerning the origin of the fourth Gospel is
less satisfactory, it is yet sufficient for the refutation of
the leadmg propositions of Strauss. He holds that
" in substance this Gospel issued, towards the end of
the second century, from the great school of Asia Mi
nor, which held to John — that it presents to us a version
of the Master's life, worthy of high consideration and
often of preference." 2 If the work was not by John,
there is " a deception which the author confessed to
himself" — a hterary fact, says Renan, unexampled in
the apostolic world. The Tubingen doctrine of its
being " a theological thesis without historical value " is
not borne out, but rather refuted, by an examination
, of the work.3 In a "multitude of cases," it sheds
needed Ught upon the Synoptics. " The last months
of the Ufe of Jesus, in particular, are explained only by
John." The school of John was "better acquainted
with the external circumstances of the ltfe of the
founder than the group whose memories made up the
synoptic Gospels. It had, especially in regard to the
sojourns of Jesus at Jerusalem, data which the others
did not possess." 4 The conclusion appears to be that
1 P. xxxviii. a P. xxv. s P. xxix. * P. xxxiii.

366 MYTHICAL THEORY OF STRAUSS.
the narrative portions of the fourth Gospel are from
the pen of John ; and as to Renan's opinion of the
origin of the discourses, we are left in doubt, for now
he attributes them, and now denies them, to John
As to the last point, the record of the discourses is
obviously from the same pen that wrote the rest of the
Gospel and, also, the first Epistle which bears the
name of John, the genuineness of which Renan will
not deny. The statements of Renan in respect to the
origin of the Gospels approximate to the truth. They
are the admissions of a man of learning and a skeptic.
They demolish the mythical theory as defined by
Strauss. The evidence which proves the Gospels to be
the productions of the apostles or their associates, at the
same time subverts an essential part of that theory.
In truth, every argument for the genuineness of the
Gospels is just as strong an argument for their credi
bility. IV. The mythical hypothesis falls to the ground
from the lack of a sufficient interval between the death
of Christ and the promulgation, in a written as well as
oral form, of the narratives of miracles.
We were led, under the last head, in speaking of
the genuineness of the Gospels, to allude to the subject
of their date. There are grave difficulties connected
with the twenty-fourth and twenty-fifth chapters of
Matthew, but the apologist has, perhaps, a compensa
tion in the demonstration afforded by them that the

NO TIME FOR A MYTHOLOGY TO ARISE. 367
document of which they are a part was composed in
its present form before the destruction of Jerusalem.
The date of Luke, as before observed, is not far from
that of Matthew. But we discover on inspection that
a large portion of the matter contained in each of the
first three Gospels appears, frequently in identical lan
guage, in the other two. Among the various hypothe
ses suggested to account for this peculiarity, it is held
by some that Matthew was the earhest written of the
three, and that a portion of Matthew was incorporated
by Mark and Luke in their Gospels ; while others
maintain that Mark was the original Gospel and fur
nished the other two with the matter that is common
to all. It has besn, however, contended with much
force of argument, that prior to the composition of
either of the three, an original gospel, containing the
matter to which we refer, must have existed, and existed
in a written form. This earlier record of the teachings
and miracles of Christ antedates, therefore, our present
Gospels, and is a written monument standing stUl nearer
the events. But whether this he, or be not, the true
solution of the peculiarity in question, We have from
Luke decisive proof of the early composition of written
histories of Christ, in which the miracles had a place.
"Many" such histories of what was "surely believed"
in the apostolic church, Luke states, had already been
composed. The Hebraized diction of various parts of
his Gospel, differing from his own style, is a sufficient
proof that he wrought into it portions of prior records.

368 MYTHICAL THEORY OF STRAUSS.
This information, which comes from Luke, be it remem
bered, only a few years after the death of Paul,
implies that there had been a desire among Christians
for authentic lives of Christ, and that numerous narra
tives had been written to meet the want. ' It has been
made probable, we may add, that the Apostle Paul
made use of a written gospel, and although we cannot
affirm that this document was more than a collection
of the sayings and discourses of Christ,1 yet the exist
ence of it is an indication of the necessity that must
have been felt for authentic records of the life of the
Lord, and, also, of the ease with which, owing to the
spread of Greek culture, this demand could be satisfied.
For, as Neander observes, this was not the age of the
rhapsodist, but an age of written composition.
We are thus, through the testimony of Luke, in
our search for written narratives of the miracles of
Christ, brought back into the heart of the apostolic age
and to a point of time not far from the events
themselves. We are obliged to allow that the New
Testament miracles were not only believed by the
generation of Christians contemporary with the apostles
and under their guidance, but were, also, within twenty
or thirty years, at the longest, after the death of Jesus
recorded in written narratives. Now this interval is
altogether too short for the growth of a Christian
mythology. Unlike something made by the wiU, this
1 See Neander's Leben Jesu, s. 10. Pflanz. u. Leit. d. Kirche, s,
173 seq.

DISPROVED BY THE CHARACTER OF THE TIMES. 369
must be the fruit of a long brooding over the incidents
in the career of Christ- and the prophecies relating to
him. We cannot conceive this cloud of myths to
arise, when the real circumstances in the ltfe of Christ
had just occurred and were fresh in the recoUection of
those who had known him. The sharp outlines of fact
must first be effaced from memory before the humble
career of Jesus could be invested by the imagination
with a misty, unreal splendor. The sudden ascription
to him of these numerous acts of miraculous power
would be a psychological wonder. Strauss is not
insensible to the force of this objection. His answer
is that these narratives were, in a sense, prepared in
the messianic expectations of the people, and it was
only needful that they should be connected with Jesus.
1 But there is a wide gulf between the general anticipa
tion that the Messiah, when he should come, would
heal the different forms of disease and outdo the works
of the old prophets, and the concrete, circumstantial
narratives which we find in the Gospels. Strauss fails,
therefore, to evade the force of the objection, and it
stands, an insurmountable obstacle in the way of his
theory. V. The mythical theory is incompatible with the
character of the times in which Christ appeared.
It was an historical age ; that is, an age in which
history is studied, historical truth discriminated from
error, evidence weighed ; an age in which skepticism
24

370 MYTHICAL THEORY OF STRAUSS.
is found; in which, also, written records exist. It
was the age of Tacitus and Josephus ; the age when
the influence of Greek culture and Roman law were
felt to the remotest bounds of the empire. It was
moreover, an age when history had seemingly run its
course and the process of decay had set in. Hoav
unlike the periods when a people, given up to the
sway of sentiment and imagination, builds up its
mythologic creations, never raising the question as
to their truth or falsehood ! Let us hear Mr. Grote
upon the characteristics of a myth-producing age.
" The myths," writes the historian, " were generaUy
produced in an age Avhich had no records, no phUoso-
phy, no criticism, no canon of belief, and scarcely any
tincture of astronomy or geography ; but which, ¦ on
the other hand, was fuU of religious faith, distinguished
for quick and susceptible imagination, seeing personal
agents where we only look for objects and laws ; — an
age, moreover, eager for new narrative, accepting with
the unconscious impressibUity of children (the question
of truth or falsehood being never formaUy raised), all
which ran in harmony with its preexisting feehngs,
and penetrable by inspired poets and prophets in the
same proportion that it was indifferent to positive
evidence."1 It is true that, the operation of the
mythopoeic faculty is not absolutely extinct in a more
cultured time ; yet its peculiar province is the chUd
hood of a people. As Grote elsewhere says, " to
1 Grote, Vol. I. p. 451.

CHARACTER OF A MYTHICAL ERA. 371
understand properly the Grecian myths, we must
try to identify ourselves with the state of mind of the
original mythopoeic age ; a process not very easy,
since it requires us to adopt a string of poetical
fancies not simply as realities, but as the governing
realities of the mental system ; yet a process which
would only reproduce something analogous to our own
chUdhood." Of the point of view from which the
myths were looked upon by the Greek, -he adds :
" Nor need we wonder that the same plausibility
which captivated his imagination and his feelings was
sufficient to engender spontaneous belief; or rather
that no question as to the truth or falsehood of the
narrative suggested itself to his mind. His faith is
ready, literal, and uninquiring, apart from all thought
of discriminating fact from fiction." If we turn to the
age of Augustus, we find a condition of society at a
world-wide remove from this primitive era of sentiment
and fancy. Some are deceived by the supposed
analogy of the middle ages, which, however, were
wholly different, and more resembled the ancient
nations in their period of immaturity. The Greek
and Roman hterature and science had passed away.
Christianity, with its doctrines and miracles, had been
received by the fresh, uncivUized peoples of Europe,
and these, full of the new sentiments and beliefs which
were awakened by Christianity, dweUing, so to speak,
in an atmosphere of the supernatural, created' the mass
of mythical stories Avhich fill up the voluminous lives

372 MYTHICAL THEORY OF STRAUSS.
of the saints. It was the work of unlettered, imagina
tive, uninquiring peoples, on the basis and under the
stimulus of the miraculous history of the Gospels.
" Such legends," says Mr. Grote, " were the natural
growth of a religious faith, earnest, unexamining, and
interwoven with the feelings at a time when the reason
does not need to be cheated. The lives of the saints
bring us even back to the simple and ever-operative
theology of the Homeric age." x Totally different was
the state of things among the old nations at the advent
of Christianity. We must not forget that, so far as
intellectual development is concerned, along with the
downfall of ancient civUization the tides, of history
rolled back. New nations came upon the stage and
a period of chUdhood ensued. Dr. Arnold, writing
to Bunsen, points out the anachronism involved in
Strauss's theory. " The idea," exclaims Arnold, " of
men writing mythic histories between the time of Livy
and Tacitus, and of St. Paul mistaking such for reali-
1 Grote, Vol. I. p. 471. As to the loose habit of observation and
great inaccuracy of mediaeval writers in describing ordinary objects,
which justly excite incredulity in regard to their stories of miracles,
see Dr. Arnold's Lectures on Eistory, p. 128. He gives an instance
of this carelessness from Bede, who was reputed the most learned
man of his age. " I cannot think," says Arnold, " that the unbeliev
ing spirit of the Eoman world was equally favorable to the origina
tion and admission of stories of miracles with the credulous tenden
cies of the middle ages." (P. 129.) No doubt bodily austerities,
vigils, fastings, and the like, together with the spirit of unbounded
credulity, might produce extraordinary phenomena, which could
easily be mistaken for miracles.

CHARACTER OF A MYTHICAL ERA. 373
ties ! " 1 Strauss labors hard to create a different
impression in respect to the character of the age of the
apostles. He appeals to the occasional mention of
prodigies by Tacitus and Josephus — as the super
natural sights and sounds attending the capture of
Jerusalem. But if current reports of this sort of
preternatural manifestation convict an age of an unhis
torical spirit, there is no state of society that would
not be liable to this charge. Even skeptics, like
Hobbes, have not escaped the infection of superstitious
fear. These passages in Josephus and Tacitus are
chiefly remarkable as being exceptions to the ordinary
style of their narratives. Strauss endeavors to make
much of the two alleged miracles of Vespasian, at
Alexandria, which are noticed by Tacitus and also by
Suetonius. But whatever may have been the fact at
the bottom, the circumstances in the narrative of
Tacitus afford a striking exemplification of the histor
ical spirit of the times, and, thus, of the falsehood of
Strauss's general position. When the application was
made to Vespasian by the individuals on whom the
cures are said to have been wrought, he laughed at
their request and " treated it with contempt." 2 The

1 Life and Correspondence of Arnold, p. 293, N.
a Vespasian behaved like William of Orange, who sneered at the
old practice of touching for the king's evil. This behavior of AVilliam
gave great scandal to not a few. (See Macaulay 's Eist. of England,
Harper's ed., Vol. III. p. 432 seq.). Many invalids resorted to the
king to be touched. Yet who will infer that the age of William was

374 MYTHICAL THEORY OF STRAUSS.
apphcants being importunate in their request, and
pretending to make it by the direction of the god
Serapis, Vespasian had a talk with the physicians, who
stated the nature of the diseases and were quite non
committal on the question whether the Emperor could
effect a cure in the manner desired. The entire
passage in Tacitus shows at least a fuU consciousness
that the event is wholly anomalous and not to be
accepted without satisfactory proof. The truth is,
that the creative period in the ancient nations when
the mythological religions sprung up, had long ago
passed by. Even the belief in them was fast crum
bling away and yielding to skepticism. This engen
dered, to be sure, a superstition to fill up the void
occasioned by the destruction of the old belief. Hence
magic and sorcery were rife. The professors of the
black art, to use a more modern phrase, drove a
lucrative business, and found credulous followers, as
the apostles discovered in their missionary journeys.
But this despairing superstition was a phenomenon
lying at the opposite pole from that action of the
mythopoeic tendency which belongs, as we have
explained, to the freshness of youth. Pilate spoke

not an " historical " age, or suppose that a mythology could have
arisen in England in the seventeenth century and established itself in
the popular faith ?
It is remarkable how often the cures by Vespasian have been
made to figure in skeptical 'treatises. Hume dwells on them in his
Essay on Miracles.

-THE AGE OF THE GOSPELS NOT MYTH0P03IC. 375
out the feelings of the cultivated Roman in the
skeptical question, What is truth? Nor is Strauss
more successful in the attempt to find among the
Jews, in particular, a condition of society suitable for
the origination of myths. Prophecy had long since
died out. A stiff legalism, with its " traditions of the
elders," had chilled the free movement of religious
life. Nor is it true that among the Jews, in the time
of Christ, a miracle had only to be stated to be be
lieved. Miracles (unless exorcism be reckoned one)
were not supposed to occur. They were considered
to belong to an era of their history long past. A
miracle was an astounding fact. " Since the world
began," it was said (John ix. 32), " was it not heard
that any man opened the eyes of one that was born
* blind." x The Gospels are full of parables, allegories,
showing a state of mind, in teacher and hearer, incon
sistent with the production of myths. In the parable,
the idea is held in an abstract form, and a fiction is
contrived to represent it. Otfried Muller, in answer
to the question, how long the myth-building spirit
continues, explains that the fusion or confounding of
idea and fact, which constitutes the myth, could take
place only so long as the habit did not exist of pre
senting the one apart from the other — either idea
apart from narrative, or narrative apart from the
mythopoeic idea. But when ideas are apprehended
as such, in an abstract form, or veracious history is
1 See also Matt. ix. 33.

376 MYTHICAL THEORY OF STRAUSS.
written, the mythical era is gone.1 So far from there
being a reign of credulity, there existed, in the Sad
ducees, an outspoken skeptical party who regarded
with coldness and suspicion the supernatural elements
in their own religion. How could myths arise among
those who listened to debates like that which Matthew
records between Christ and the Sadducees, " who say
that there is no resurrection ? " 2 So far from there
being among the Jews in the time of Christ an irre
sistible tendency to .glorify the object of reverence by
attributing to him miraculous works, it is a fact, of
which the advocates of the mythical theory can give no
plausible explanation, that no miracles are ascribed to
John the Baptist, though he was considered in the early
Church to be inferior to no prophet who had preceded
him. If there was this unreflecting and credulous
habit which is imputed to the Jewish Christians, why
is no instance of miraculous healing interwoven in the
description which the Gospels give us of the career of
the forerunner of Jesus ? He was supernaturaUy ena
bled to designate the Messiah, but, he himself, though
he is characterized in terms of exalted praise, is not
represented as endowed with supernatural power. It
is, also, significant that the life of Jesus, up to the
time of his entrance upon his public ministry, is left
an almost unbroken blank. Had the disciples given
1 Prolegomena, s. 170.
2 Matt. xxii. 23 seq. Julius Muller refers to this passage in his
cogent review of Strauss, in the Studien u. Kritiken, 1836, III.

THE AGE OF THE GOSPELS NOT MYTHOPCEIC. 377
the reins to their imagination, as the theory of' Strauss
supposes, they would almost infaUibly have filled up
the chUdhood of Christ with myths, after the manner
of the spurious gospels of a later date.1 But Mark
and John pass over in silence the whole of the prepara
tory period of thirty years. Matthew passes immedi
ately from his birth and infancy to his public ministry,
while Luke interposes but a single anecdote of his
chUdhood. Why this remarkable reticence, unless the
reason be that the apostles chose to dwell upon that of
which they had a direct, personal knowledge ?
It may be objected to the foregoing remarks, that
the original authors of the mythical narratives are sup
posed to be persons aloof from the great world and
beyond the influence of its culture — Galileans of hum
ble rank. The existence of a class of disciples, cut off
from the guidance of the apostles, has before been dis
proved. But apart from this, the supposed authors of
the myths were reflective enough to discriminate between
the parable and the abstract relations represented under
it. They were acquainted with the questions debated
between the Sadducees and their opponents. Besides,
it is undeniable that a spirit of opposition to Christ and
his cause existed, and must have existed, wherever he
had preached. The vindictive hostUity of the Pharisees
and rulers caused his death. In GalUee, as weU as
1 The Apocryphal Gospels were generally the offspring of pious
fraud. They were composed, for the most part, to further the cause
of some heretical doctrine or party.

378 MYTHICAL THEORY OF STRAUSS.
Jerusalem, he had to encounter unbehef and enmity.
Aside from the fact that the pharisaic influence rami
fied through the land, it appears _ that at Capernaum,
Chorazin, Bethsaida, Nazareth, there were unbelievers
and opposers.1 There was a strong disposition among
these to disprove the messianic claim of Jesus and to
invalidate, in some way, the proofs on which it rested.
There could be no disciples of Jesus — to say the least,
no considerable number of disciples — who would not
be instantly called upon to make good their cause in
the encounter with objections and cavils. This
necessity, if nothing else, would force them to
reflection, and would thus break up the attitude of
unquestioning fancy and bhnd credulity. They must
give a reason for the faith that is in them. They must
do this to the very persons among whom the incidents,
on which their faith was grounded, were alleged to
have recently occurred. The mythopoeic faculty can
not work, it is clear, under a cross-examination.
Fancy cannot go on with its creations in the midst
of an atmosphere of doubt and unfriendly scrutiny.
The state of the Church was the very opposite of that
repose on which alone a mythology can have its birth.
It holds true that the application of the mythical theory
to the testimony of the early disciples, is a gross ana
chronism. 1 It is one theory of the TubiDgen school that the Pharisees
followed Jesus into Galilee and that the hostility they felt to him
was provoked there.

DISPROVED BY THE RESURRECTION. 379
VI. The mythical theory is unable either to
account for the faith of the apostles in the Resurrec
tion of Christ, or to disprove the fact which was the
object of this faith.
Strauss finds it impossible to deny that the apos
tles, one and aU, believed that Jesus had risen from the
dead and that they had held various interviews and
conversations with him. This miracle, at least, it
must be admitted that they received. Without this
faith, their continued adherence to the cause of Jesus
would hardly be explainable. And this fact was a
main part of their preaching and testimony. It
was immovably lodged in their convictions. More
over, the Apostle Paul, in an Epistle whose genuine
ness is not disputed, is a witness to the existence of
this behef and testimony on the part of the other
apostles. He knew them ; he had spent a fortnight
with Peter in his own house. He had declared to the
Corinthians, he says, that Christ died " and was
buried, and that he rose again the third day, accord
ing to the Scriptures ; and that he was seen of
Cephas, then of the twelve : after that he was seen
of above five hundred brethren at once, of whom the
greater part remain to this present, but some are
fallen asleep ; after that he was seen of James ; then
of all the apostles." The whole manner of Paul indi
cates that he is giving the result of a careful inquiry.
That the apostles believed, with a faith which no oppo
sition could shake, that they had thus beheld the risen

380 MYTHICAL THEORY OF STRAUSS.
Jesus, there is, therefore, no room for doubt. The
main question is, how came they to this persuasion ?
The Gospel narratives furnish the explanation by de
scribing his actual reappearance, and repeated confer
ences with them. Rejecting the miracle, Strauss
is obliged to undertake the task, by no means a light
one, of accounting for their unanimous belief in it ; for.
the belief, also, of the assembly of more than five
hundred disciples to whose testimony Paul refers.
The principal points in Strauss's attempted expla
nation are the following : 1 Christ had more and more
impressed the disciples with the conviction that he was
the Messiah. His death, so contrary to their previous
conceptions of what the Messiah's career would be,
for the time extinguished this conviction. But after
the first shock was over, their previous impression
concerning Christ revived. Hence the psychological
necessity of incorporating into their notion of the
Messiah the idea that he was to suffer and die. But
as comprehending a thing, among the Jews of that
time, only signified the deriving of it from the Holy
Scriptures, the apostles resorted to these to see whether
there might not be in them intimations that the Mes
siah Avas to suffer and die. This idea, Strauss affirms,
Avas foreign to the Old Testament ; nevertheless, the
apostles would find the intimations, which they wished
to find, in all the poetic and prophetic passages of the
Old Testament, as Isaiah liii., Psalm xxii., in which
1 Leben Jesu, s. 636 seq.

THE THEORY OF STRAUSS STATED. 381
the men of God were represented as persecuted even
to death. This obstacle surmounted, and having now
a suffering, dying Messiah, it followed next that Christ
was not lost, but stUl remained to them : through
death, he had only entered into his messianic glory, in
which he was invisibly with them, always, even to the
end of the world. Having advanced so far, they
would be moved to ask themselves how it was possible
that he should refrain from personaUy communicating
with them ? And how could they, in the warmth of
feeling kindled by this unveUing to them of the
Scriptural doctrine of a suffering and dying Messiah,
avoid regarding this new discovery as the effect of an
influence exerted upon them by the glorified Christ,
" an opening of their understandings " by Him — ¦
"yea" adds Strauss, "as a discoursing with them?"
These feelings, in the case of individuals, especially
women, rose into an actual (apparent) vision. In the
case of others, even of whole assemblies, something
objective, visible, or audible, perchance the sight of an
unknown person, made the impression of a revelation
or manifestation of Jesus. But another step in the
psychological process Avas yet to be taken. If the
crucified Messiah had reaUy ascended to the highest
state of blessed existence, then his body could not
have been left in the grave ; and since there were Old
Testament expressions, like Psalm xvi. 10, " thou shalt
not leave my soul in Hades, neither suffer thy Holy
One to see corruption," and Isaiah liii. 10, in which

382 MYTHICAL THE0EY OF STRAUSS.
the slain servant of Jehovah was promised a long life
aftenvards, the disciples could keep their previous
notion that " Christ abideth forever " (John xii. 34),
by means of the thought of an aclual reawakening of
the crucified ; and, inasmuch as it was a messianic
function to raise at a future day the bodies of the
dead, the return of Jesus to lUe must be an actual
anastasis — a resurrection of the body.
What shall be said of this chain of conjectures?
We freely admit that all whicli Strauss asserts on this
subject is possible. That the foUoAvers of Christ came
to beheve in his resurrection in the way above
described, without the objective fact to excite this
belief, is not absolutely beyond the bounds of possi
bility. It is not pretended that the fact of the miracle
is susceptible of strict demonstration. Nay, we con
cede that if a man holds a miracle, under the circum
stances, in connection with the establishment of Chris
tianity in this world, to be more improbable than any
method, which is not literaUy irrational, of explaining
it away, he may accept the above solution of Strauss
But even he cannot shut his eyes to the tremendous
difficulties which attend that solution. In order to
set forth some of these difficulties, we must restate'
the hypothesis of Strauss, adding other particulars in
his vieAv, some of which have not been mentioned. A
young man — such is the theory of Strauss — comes to
the baptism of John with the same motive which led
others to the prophet, and takes his place among his

THE THEORY OF STRAUSS. STATED. 383
disciples. After John is thrown into prison, he begins
himself to teach. He draws about him a band of
disciples. GraduaUy he comes to believe himself not
merely a prophet, but even the expected Messiah.
But at first, though inculcating spiritual truth, he
shares in the political theory of the Messiah's kingdom
until the unfavorable reception accorded to him and
his doctrine modified the view he took of the charac
ter and prospects of that kingdom. He may, not
unlikely, have anticipated that the opposition excited
against him would, at no very distant day, result in
his death. But when seized by the Jewish rulers, he
was not looking for an immediate death. This is a
point which Strauss is obliged to maintain in order to
avoid conceding to Christ supernatural knowledge.
On a sudden he is seized in the midst of his foUow
ers, and executed as a culprit. All their expectations
had been disappointed. They had expected the Mes
siah to work miracles ; but they had witnessed none.
They had looked for a political Prince, and been
encouraged in their view, for a time, by Jesus himself ;
but behold their imaginary Prince nailed to the cross !
He is solemnly adjudged to death by the rulers of the
nation, by those who sat in Moses' seat ! And the
civU power of the Romans carries out the sentence
He dies, receiving no succor from God, apparently
incapable of offering resistance ! Add to this that
they, as was natural, dispersed in terror. Can we,
adopting Strauss's interpretation of the previous

384 MYTHICAL THEORY OF STRAUSS.
history of Jesus, think that the souls of the disciples
were enthraUed to that degree that they stUl clung to
their faith in him ? If Strauss were willing to admit
that Jesus had before exhibited supernatural powers
and had performed the miracles recorded of him in the
Gospels, it would be less difficult to account for a
mistaken belief of his disciples in his resurrection ;
but in that case, the motive for discrediting the reality
of the miracle would no longer exist. But the theory
of Strauss respecting the previous life of Christ disables
him from explaining hoAV a myth of this portentous
character could spring up and obtain universal cre
dence among his disciples. There was nothing in the
Master's career to prepare their minds to believe, much
less anything to predispose their minds to . originate,
such a report. And then the idea of all of them, with
none to dissent, reviving from theh? terror and despon
dency ; changing essentially their notion of the Mes
siah to suit the circumstances ; attributing their new
interpretations of the Old Testament to an inspiration
from Christ ; conceiving themselves, on this account,
to be holding personal intercourse with him, then pro
ceeding to the further inference that his body had
been awakened to life ! Add to this that on the
strength of this faith, the offspring of a series of the
veriest delusions, they went forth proclaiming the
resurrection of Jesus, and this with a courage they
had never before manifested or felt — went forth —
these Uliterate visionaries — to the spiritual conquest

THE THEORY OF STRAUSS EXAMINED. 385
of the world ! Notwithstanding the inventions of
Strauss to account for it, the revolution in the feelings
of the apostles so soon after they had " mourned and
wept," having thought that the kingdom would be
restored to Israel, and hid themselves out of " fear of
the Jews," remams, unless we suppose a great objec
tive transaction to produce the change, an unexplained
marvel. Eor in their deep dejection of mind, there
was nothing that could awaken a vision such as
Strauss imagines. Misery does not beget enthusiasm.
But if we admit for the moment that his conjec
tures on this point are weU founded, he is immediately
confronted by another difficulty, to surmount which he.
is obUged to set at defiance the testimony in the casev.
The most of. the interviews with the risen Christ,,
which Strauss caUs visions, took place in Jerusalem..
There they met him — first, individuals, and then the-
eleven together, on the day but one after he had been*
' laid in the tomb. They had the means of testing;
whether his body was, or was not, still in the embrace
of death. They would certainly have made inquiry.
They would certainly have gone to the tomb. Sen
sible of this difficulty, Strauss takes it upon him to
transfer the scene of these interviews to GalUee. In
Matthew, where the account bears all the marks of
being an abbreviated summary, Jesus appears to
" Mary Magdalene and the other Mary" on the first
Sunday, and the disciples are directed to go into Gali
lee to meet him there. There Strauss places the scene.
25

386 MYTHICAL THEORY OF STRAUSS.
of the supposed visions.1 But in taking this view he
is obliged to contradict the more fuU narratives of the
other evangelists, including John. They are con
firmed, in this particular, by the unquestioned testi
mony of Paul. Eor he states that the reappearance
of Christ was on the third day after his burial. The
commemoration of Sunday in the apostolic age, of
which the New Testament affords convincing evidence,
proves the same thing. There is no plausible explana
tion of the constant affirmation of the disciples that the
resurrection occurred on the third day, unless we sup
pose that Jerusalem was the place of his reappearance
to them: The next declaration of Paul^ that " He was
seen of Cephas," falls in with the statement incident
ally made by Luke (Luke xxiv. 34), of the appearance
of Christ " to Simon " on the Sunday of the resurrec
tion ; and it is natural to identify the interview with
the twelve, which Paul mentions immediately after in
the same verse, with the interview mentioned by Luke
as taking place in the latter part of the same day (v6r.
36). So that the denial by Strauss that these inter
views, whether real or imaginary, took place in Jerusa
lem and soon after the burial of Christ, is in the teeth
of unimpeachable testimony.2
1 Strauss throws aside, however, Matthew's account of the inter
view of Jesus with the two Marys. It is one of a multitude of
instances in which Strauss follows an evangelist just so far as, and
no farther than, it suits his convenience.
2 Baur, the Prince of the Tubingen critics, appears to give up the
Straussian notion that the disciples forsook Jerusalem. " It proves,"

THE THEORY OF STRAUSS EXAMINED. 387
But to remove the theatre of the so-called visions
to Galilee does not suffice. It wUl not do to allow
that the apostles began so soon to believe and to preach
their dream as a reality for which they were ready to
lay down their lives. Eor this inward change, time
was required. There must be, in their GalUean seclu
sion, a sUent preparation — a stille Vorbereitung. To
secure this advantage for his theory, Strauss does not
hesitate to contradict the statement of Luke, in. the
Acts, that within a few weeks from the Master's death,
on the day of Pentecost, they preached with great
power and proclaimed his Resurrection.1 Observe
that the author of the Acts is not credited with a
myth, but is charged with conscious deception.
But all this violent criticism is really insufficient,
because, apart from the testimony of the evangelists,
the testimony of Paul makes it evident that it was not
visions, but interviews and conferences, which the
apostles had with the risen Christ. Strauss, indeed,
tries to show that Paul's own sight of Jesus was only
he says, " the great strength of their faith and a greatly strengthened
confidence in the cause of Christ, that the disciples immediately after
his death neither scattered outside of Jerusalem, nor assembled in a
remoter place, but in Jerusalem itself had their permanent centre."
See Das Ohristenthum, etc. s. 41. He gives up the attempt "to
penetrate by psychological analysis into the inward spiritual forces,"
Dy which the unbelief of the apostles at the death of Christ was
supplanted by the faith in his resurrection : s. 40. In this particu
lar, then, Baur seems to repudiate the long-drawn hypothesis of

1 Leben Jesu, B. II. s. 639.

388 MYTHICAL THEORY OF STRAUSS.
a vision, or a seeming vision, and then leaps to the
inference that the other interviews of the disciples with
Christ, after his death, were of a like nature. But
Paul evidently regarded the appearance of Christ to
him at his conversion, to which he here refers, as an
objective, visible, actual manifestation. This late
manifestation of the ascended Christ, he connects with
the appearances of Christ to the other apostles before
his ascension. There is no warrant, therefore, either
for the assertion that Paul, in his own case, was refer
ring to a vision, or, even if he were, that the manifesta
tions of Christ to the other disciples were of this kind.
If it were admitted that Paul's sight of Jesus was an
iUusive impression, a seeming vision, as Strauss pre
tends, yet that implies psychologically a state of feeling
on his part, whether it were inereduUty or incipient
faith, which nothing but the proclamation of the resur
rection of Jesus by the apostles could have produced.
And their supposed visions, at least, no prior fact of
this kind can help explain. But this theory of visions
is excluded by the fact that he was seen, as Paul
declares, more than once by the whole company of the
apostles simultaneously, and stUl more by the fact of
his appearance to an assembly of more than five hun
dred disciples at once. The simultaneous imaginary
vision of Christ by so large a number would be unac
countable. The nature of those meetings of the disci
ples with Christ, which Paul records with so profound
a sense of the vital importance of them, feeling that

DISPROVED BY THE BOOK OF ACTS. 389
" if Christ be not risen, our faith is vain," is set forth
in the more circumstantial narratives of the evangehsts.
It was fact, not fancy, on which the preaching and the
unconquerable faith of the apostles were founded;
VII. The mythical theory is inconsistent with the
book of Acts.
We have just aUuded to one point in this testi
mony. The book of Acts is the continuation of the
third Gospel by the same author. It was written for
the benefit of the same Theophilus to whom the Gos
pel was addressed (Acts i. 1). It is a work of a person
who was the beloved companion of the Apostle Paul
during a part of his missionary journeying.1 The
testimony of the Acts is of the highest value and im
portance. We here see the apostles, a few weeks after
the death of Christ, proclaiming in Jerusalem his
resurrection. We find them referring in their dis
courses to " the miracles, and wonders, and signs,"
which Christ had performed " in the midst " of the
people to whom they spoke (Acts ii. 22). We find
that the apostles themselves were endowed with power
to work miracles.2 The Acts prove, thus, that the
earher miracles of Christ were believed and preached
by the apostles.- They furnish the most decisive proof
of the supernatural events connected with the founding
of Christianity. 1 Col. iv. 14 ; Acts. xvi. 10-17, xx. 5-15, xxi. 1-18, xxxii. 1 seq.
' Besides passages in the Acts, see on this point Eom. xv. 19 ;
2 Cor. xii. 12 ; Hebrews ii. 4.

390 MYTHICAL THEORY OF STRAUSS.
Strauss, in his Ltfe of Christ, prudently abstained
from considering at any length the testimony of the
Acts. Other adherents of the Tubingen school,
especiaUy Baur and Zeller, have endeavored to supply
this deficiency. But the mythical theory proves
insufficient. It is found necessary to charge the
author of the Acts with intentional fraud and false
hood. In defiance of the explicit, as weU as incidental,
evidence afforded by the Gospel, both works are re
manded to the early part of the second century, while
the passages in the Acts in which the " we " occurs,
are declared to have been thus left for the purpose of
deceiving readers into the belief that the date of its
composition was earlier. So the old infidelity is
brought back again. Candid men wUl sooner put
faith in the direct statements, made by the author of
the third Gospel and of the Acts respectmg himseU,
fully corroborated as they are by internal evidence of
an incidental nature which could not have been man
ufactured, and confirmed, too, by the authority of the
early Church, than accept the theory that we owe
these precious histories of Christ and the apostles to
a cheat. VIII. The mythical theory is proved untenable by
the fact that the supernatural elements in the hfe of
Christ, are inseparably connected with circumstances
and sayings which are plainly historical.
The advocates of the mythical theory undertake to

THE SUPERNATURAL BLENDED WITH THE NATURAL. 391
dissect the Gospel histories, and to cast out everything
supernatural. Out of the residuum they wUl construct
the veritable life of Christ. Now if it be true that
the natural and the supernatural, the historical and
the (so-caUed) fabulous, are incapable of this divorce,
but that both are parts of each other, so that if one be
destroyed the other vanishes also, then the miracles
must be allowed to stand. And such is the fact.
These narratives will not suffer the decomposition that
is attempted upon them. The two elements, the
natural and the miraculous, will not admit of being
thus torn apart. We have space for only a few proofs
and illustrations of our proposition ; but these, it is
hoped, are sufficient to show its truth. The first
iUustration we have to offer is the message of John the
Baptist from his prison, to inquire of Jesus, " Art thou
he that should come, or do we look for another ? " J
The two disciples of John witnessed the various mira
cles of heahng performed by Christ. Jesus then said
to them : " Go and shew John again these 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 : and blessed is he who
soever shall not be offended in me." The messengers
departed ; and Jesus proceeds to speak, with earnest
smotion, to the people who are present, of the sacred
character and the position of John. Now it is obvious
' l Matt. xi. 2 seq. ; Luke vii. 18 seq.

392 MYTHICAL THEORY OF STRAUSS.
that if one part of this narrative is given up, the rest
faUs with it. There is no way of escaping the mira
culous, as the procedure of Strauss evinces, except by
denying the whole — -denying that John sent the mes
sage. But how irrational to suppose that the disciples
of Christ would have falsely attributed to John the
doubt as to the Messiahship of Jesus, which occasioned
the message.1 Had Strauss no theory to maintain, he
would be the last to assume a thing so improbable.
We have, then, an example in which the miracles are an
indissoluble part of a transaction undeniably historical.
We proceed to another iUustration. The evangel
ists record four instances of the miraculous healing of
aggravated diseases on the Sabbath, each of which led
to a conversation, inseparable from the incident that
provoked it, and yet manifestly historical.2 Let us
briefly notice one of these instances— that of. the man
healed of the dropsy. On this occasion, in reference
to the lawfulness of heahng on the Sabbath-day, Christ
put to the lawyers and Pharisees the question:
" Which of you shall have an ass or an ox fallen into
1 That such was the motive of the message seems clear. See •
Meyer on Matthew, s. 244. The momentary uncertainty of John
may have been owing to the circumstance that Jesus remained in
retiracy and gave no signs of inaugurating any political change, from
the expectation of which John was, perhaps, not wholly free.
2 1. The case of the man with a withered hand, Matt. xii. 9 seq.
(Luke vi. 6 seq. ; Mark iii. 1 seq.). 2. The man afflicted with dropsy,
Luke xiv. 5 seq. 3. The woman bowed down with a chronic
infirmity, Luke xiii. 10 seq. 4. The lame man at the pool of
Bethesda, John v. 2 seq.

THE SUPERNATURAL BLENDED WITH THE NATURAL. 393
a pit, and wiU not straightway pull him out on the
Sabbath-day ? " Strauss cannot bring himself to deny
that Jesus proposed this question. The expression,
both in doctrine and in form, is too characteristic of
his method of teaching. Nor can he avoid admitting
that it was spoken in connection with some act of
Jesus in ministering to the diseased. He even con
cedes that the inquiry would be inappropriate unless
the case were that of a person rescued from a great
peril. After making various suggestions which faU to
satisfy himself, Strauss is at length inclined to fall
back upon the (so-called) natural exposition, which he
is wont to handle, in general, so unmercifully.1 If
Jesus ministered among his disciples to bodily as weU
as spiritual infirmities, and had been giving remedies
on the Sabbath, the question may have been put by
way of self-defence. After foUowing Strauss in the
perpetual attack he makes, with logic and satire, upon
the interpretations of Paulus, which, to be sure, are
equaUy destitute of reason and taste, one cannot help
being struck with surprise to find him resorting, in
order to avoid the miracle, to one of that critic's
favorite notions. Nothing could more clearly indicate
the stress of the difficulty which is created by the
evident verity of the New Testament report.
The evangelists state that on numerous occasions,
after working a miracle, Jesus directed that the fact
should not be noised abroad. Not only would he be
1 Leben Jesu, B. II. s. 118, 119.

394 MYTHICAL THEORY OF STRAUSS.
concerned to avoid a premature conflict with the
Jewish rulers, which might cut him off before his
work was finished, but the prohibition was with
reference to the eagerness of the people for a political
Messiah, and in order that the number of his disciples
might not be SAveUed by a multitude on whom no deep
spiritual impression had been made; who would,
therefore, abandon their faith as soon as their carnal
expectation should be balked. In some instances, the
evangelists inform us, the injunction of Christ on
this point was not complied with. That Christ should
utter these prohibitions, was in itself a remarkable
circumstance. It must fix itself, and did fix itsetf, in
the recollection of his disciples. But if the miracles
are dropped, what becomes of the prohibition to report
them ? Strauss's talent for conjecture is here put to a
severe test. He concludes that Christ, after he began
his -public ministry, at first regarding himseU as only a
forerunner like John, and only by degrees indulging
the idea that he is himself the Messiah, was, so to
speak, struck with fear at hearing that distinctly sug
gested from without which he hardly, in his own
bosom, dared to conjecture, or had only shortly before
come to beUeve ! That is, in homeher phrase, Christ
wished nothing to be said on the subject tUl he had
made up his own mind ! We need offer no comment
on this theory, save to remind the reader that it does
not touch the proof that this injunction most frequent
ly had reference to miracles.

THE SUPERNATURAL BLENDED WITH THE NATURAL. 395
StUl another example of the truth that the natural
and the supernatural are bound up together in the
Gospel history, is afforded by the narrative of the
Saviour's agony in Gethsemane. This disclosure of
the sinking of his heart in the near prospect of death,
and of the struggle through which he passed, is felt
by the reader to be historical. Least of aU would
Strauss be expected to impeach the verity of it. His
axiom is that the disciples were swayed by a desire to
glorify their master. He strangely attributes the
circumstance that the disciples are said to have faUen
asleep, even here in the garden, and on the Mount of
Transfiguration, whUe Christ was awake, to a secret
desire to ascribe to him a certain superiority. How,
then, could they have been prompted to falsely repre
sent him in a state of feehng, which, in the judgment
of the world, however superficial that judgment may
be, is less noble and worthy than the placid manner
of a Socrates ? And yet Strauss, after long criticisms
of the several Gospel narratives, pronounces the whole
story of the agony of Jesus in the garden unhistori
cal ! x He has, moreover, a reason for this judgment.
This agitation, whatever causes produced it, was con
ditioned by the knowledge that death was at hand.
Now, as the plot was a secret one, to admit that Jesus
was possessed of this knowledge would be tantamount
1  " jener ganze Seelenkampf, weil auf unerweislichen Vor-
aussetsungen ruhend, aufgegeben werden muss." Leben Jesu, B. II.
s. 454.

396 MYTHICAL THEORY OF STRAUSS.
to the acknowledgment of his supernatural foresight.
Strauss makes a laborious endeavor to show that none
of the words of Jesus in the record of the institution
of the Supper, imply an expectation of an immediate
death. Thus, to. avoid the supernatural, he strikes
out of the history of Christ a passage which bears the
most unmistakable stamp of being historical, and
which his own fundamental postulate forbids him to
reject !
Other proofs of a more than human knowledge on
the part of Christ, are left upon the Gospel page.
Christ predicted the destruction of Jerusalem, the
overthrow of the Jewish state, and the forfeiture of its
rank and privilege, as the seat of the worship of
Jehovah. When the city stood in all its strength and
splendor, he set the date of its downfaU within the
lifetime of the generation then on the stage. He fore
told, what is even more impressive to a thoughtful
mind, the progress of the Christian cause to a universal
triumph. In the parables of the mustard-seed and the
leaven, he depicted the smaU beginnings and the
future extent and power of the Christian rehgion.
What a gaze was that which thus looked far down the
stream of time ! The unaided faculties of no man, in
the situation of Jesus, could have thus forecast the
drama of history.
IX. The arbitrary and sophistical character of the
criticism apphed to the contents of the Gospels in

SOPHISTRY OF STRAUSS. 397
order to prove them untrustworthy, is conclusive
against the mythical theory.
The method of Strauss, as we have indicated
before, is to overthrow the credibUity of the Gospels,
to the end that he may disprove their genuineness.
He wishes, by an analysis of the testimony, to show
that it cannot emanate from eyewitnesses or quahfied
contemporaries. Hence, the greater part of his book
is taken up with the detaUed examination of the Gos
pels, his aim being to show them to be destitute of
historical authority. Strauss has forgotten the admo
nition of his countryman, Lessing : " if Livy, and
Dionysius, and Polybius, and Tacitus, are so candidly
and UberaUy treated that we do not stretch them upon
the rack for a syUable, why should not Matthew, and
Mark, and Luke, and John be treated as weU ? " We
characterize his criticism as generally unfair and
sophistical. His manner is precisely that of a sharp
advocate who sets himseU to pick to pieces the testi
mony of a company of artless, but honest and compe
tent witnesses. Variations are magnified and harped
upon ; whatever is stated by one and omitted by
another is laid to some occult motive either in the one
or the other, or in both ; meanings are read into the
record which never occurred to those who gave it ; and
by other arts famUiar to the advocate the impression
is sought to be produced that the testimony is entitled
to no credit. To fan suspicion is the prime object of
Strauss. His method would destroy the credibUity

398 MYTHICAL THEORY OF STRAUSS.
of aU history. A parody, where the subject is an
established, notorious historical fact, is the most
effective method of refuting this criticism which rests
on suspicion. If Whately's Life of Napoleon is not a
valid refutation of Hume, inasmuch as no natural fact,
however unexampled, can be put in the same category
with a supernatural fact, this httle work, nevertheless,
weU iUustrates with what facility doubt may be cast
upon sound and credible testimony. A clever parody
upon Strauss was written in Germany, in the form
of a Life of Luther.1 The fact of " two birthplaces,"
for example, Bethlehem and Nazareth, which, at the
outset, caUs out the skepticism of Strauss, is put by
the side of circumstances equaUy surprising in the case
of Luther, whose parents, before he was born, had
come from Mohra to Eisleben, and shortly after that
event moved to Mansfeld. An able writer2 has finely
parodied the reasoning of Strauss through which he
aims to impeach the credit of the evangehsts, by try
ing the same method upon the ¦ ancient testimonies
describing the assassination of Julius Caesar. And he
proves that Caesar was never killed, by the same
species of argument which Strauss employs to disprove
the healing of the Centurion's son, or the transfigura-
1 The title is as follows : " The Life of Luther, critically treated
by Dr. Casuar Mexico, 2836." (Tubingen: 1839. The work was
written by Wurm). A learned doctor, a thousand years hence, takes
up the documents pertaining to the life of the Eeformer, and, follow
ing strictly the method of Strauss, proves their un'crustworthiness.
! Professor Norton, in his Internal Evidences of the Genuineness
of the Gospels.

SOPHISTRY OF STRAUSS. 399
tion. The one effort is just as successful as the other.
The advocates of the mythical theory are very zealous
in their repugnance to forced harmonizing, but forced
^'sharmonizing is surely not less unworthy. What is
the issue raised by Strauss ? It is not the question
whether the Gospels are free from discrepances ; nor
is it the question whether these narratives are inspired,
or what kind and degree of inspiration belongs to
them ; nor is it, in general, the question how far they
may, or may not, partake of imperfections, from which
competent and credible witnesses are not expected to
be whoUy exempt. But the essential truth of these
narratives is the proposition which he impugns, and
which, as we affirm, he utterly fails to overthrow.
A great many causes besides error, either innocent
or wilful, may introduce modifications into the form of
a narrative. Of this all are aware who have pursued
historical investigations, or are conversant with courts
of law, or even observant of ordinary conversation
Where brevity is aimed at, not only an omission, but
some modification, of features of a narrative is often
required. A pecuhar interest in one element of a
transaction may have the same effect, or may lead a
reporter to change the order of circumstances. Eor
the sake of making a transaction inteUigible to a par
ticular person or class, some addition or subtraction
may be necessary. At one time, an event may be
stated in the dryest form ; at another, the same event
may be pictured to the imagination. Two reports of

400 MYTHICAL THEORY OF STRAUSS.
the same transaction wUl often seem irreconcUable, but
a new fact, coming to light, removes the contradiction.
These are universaUy acknowledged principles. To
hold living witnesses, or documents, to a mathematical
accuracy of statement, or to an absolute completeness,
on the penalty of being cast out of court, is disreputa
ble sophistry.These are grave charges against the critical method
of Strauss, and we proceed to substantiate them by
examples. On account of the demand made by the
Pharisees that Jesus should give them "a sign," or
" a sign from heaven " 1 (Mark vni. 11, 12 ; Matt. xii.
38 seq., xvi. 1 seq. ; Luke xi. 29 seq.), and the refusal
of Jesus, Strauss . affirms that Christ is here said td
disclaim the working of miracles ! That is, the evan
gelist, in each case, so stultifies himseU as to put on
the same page with the record of miracles such a
disavowal by Christ ! The simple truth is, that the
" sign " was a pecuhar manifestation in the sky, ex
pected to attend the advent of the Messiah, and which
the Pharisees demanded in addition to aU the other
miracles.2 Strauss says that Jesus, in forgiving the
sins of the paralytic (Matt. ix. 2), recognized the
Jewish doctrine of the aUotment of evU in this life in
exact proportion to the sin . of the individual.3 Yet
1 Leben Jesu, B. II. s. 4.
2 See Neander on John vi. 30 (Leben Jesu) ; Meyer on Matt
xvi. 1.
3 Leben Jesu, B. II. s. 75 seq.

SOPHISTRY OF STRAUSS. 401
this doctrine is plainly inconsistent with what Christ
said on hearing of the GalUeans " whose blood Pilate
had mingled with their sacrifices ; " with the declara
tions in the Sermon on the Mount ; with the parable
of the Rich Man and Lazarus, and with the statement
in respect to the man born blind (John ix. 3). That
an opposite doctrine is expressly taught in several of
these passages, Strauss aUows. It is only needful to
suppose that in the particular case of the paralytic, his
disease was directly occasioned by some sin,1 or that
Jesus saw that his conscience was troubled.2 On how
slender a foundation is a gross inconsistency charged
upon the Great Teacher, or upon the historians wha
report him !
A specimen of numerous minor perversions of the^
sense of Scripture, is the remark of Strauss upon Matt..
xxi. 7, where it is said that the disciples " brought
the ass and the colt, and, put on them their clothes-,
and they set him thereon." The last word, the
translation of indva aviav, Strauss refers to the
animals, and strives to make the evangelist utter
nonsense ; 3 whereas the pronoun refers to the clothes : 4
and even tf the construction of Strauss were correct,
he could only in fairness convict the evangelist of using
a loose, coUoquial expression. A similar instance of
quibbling is the effort to foist upon John the error of
1 So Meyer, ad loc. * So Neander and Meyer.
5 So Bleek, Synopt. Erkl s. 75. * Leben Jesu, B. II. s. .274„
26

402 MYTHICAL THEORY OF STRAUSS.
supposing that the High Priesthood was an annual
office, because he alludes to an individual as " High
Priest that year." 1 In the narrative of John, Peter is
made to go firstinto the sepulchre, according to Strauss;
out of respect to the vulgar notion concerning Peter ;
and John must be made out to be the first to beUeve in
the Resurrection.2 But why not rather give to Peter
the last distinction, or to John the first ? Is it possi
ble for criticism to be more arbitrary and groundless ?
The relation, we are told, in which John is placed to
Peter, in the fourth Gospel, is "suspicious"3 —
verdachtig is a favorite word with Strauss — but the
position of John among the . disciples is attested not
only in the Acts but also by Paul, who styles him,
Peter, and James, the piUars of the church at Jeru
salem.4 Peter's confession of faith (Matt. xvi. 16)
is construed into a proof that even the disciples had
not before taken Jesus for the Messiah. But the
fervor and depth of Peter's faith, the pecuhar source
of it, and perhaps, the glimpse of the higher nature of
Jesus involved in it, together with the fact that it was
uttered at the moment when others were deserting
him, constitute its peculiarity and explain the marked
commendation by Christ. To what reader of the
passage did the notion of Strauss ever occur ? Who
ever felt any difficulty of the sort ? Noteworthy is
the timidly- asserted imputation of an admixture of
1 Leben Jesu, B. II. s. 361. ' Leben Jesu, B. II. s. 582.
' Leben Jesu, B. I. s. 582. 4 Leben Jesu, B. I. s. 497.

SOPHISTRY OF STRAUSS. 403
political elements in the plan of Jesus.1 The abstain
ing from every effort to organize a political party, the
explicit abjuring of a design to found a kingdom of
this world, the acknowledgment of earthly magistrates,
the essentially spiritual character of all the doctrines
and precepts of Christ, are not denied. One would
think that this were enough to acquit him of the
slightest participation in the current Jewish notion of
a political Messiah. All that Strauss brings to sup
port his charge from the words of Jesus, is the promise
that the. disciples should sit on twelve thrones, judging
the twelve tribes of Israel. But this was to be at the
naXiyysvsGia — in the future spiritual kingdom of the
new heavens and the new earth. If this proves a
temporal idea of the messianic kingdom, then the
declaration of Paul that the saints shaU judge the
world, would prove that he held ' the same. The
promise of Christ presents, in a tropical form, the
reward of an ultimate participation in his own hea
venly glory. The insinuation of Strauss that the
entrance of Christ into Jerusalem, riding on an ass,
was a claim for pohtical recognition, does not merit
a reply. Under this head may be mentioned the neglect of
Strauss to adhere to his own theory, in the frequent
implication of a wilful deception on the part of the
evangelists. This peculiarity of his criticism is worthy
of marked attention. He is perpetuaUy crossing the
1 Leben Jesu, B. I. s. 518 seq.

404 MYTHICAL THEORY OF STRAUSS.
line that separates the mythical from the mendacious.
He thus proceeds frequently upon a theory which he
professes to reject. A consciousness on the part of an
historian that his statements are not conformed to the
truth,. makes him gutfty of intentional falsehood. Then
we have not myth, but lie. When Strauss says that
the cases of the healing of the bhnd are much more
numerous than the instances of the healing of lepers,
because the former admit of a greater variety of cir
cumstances ; x when he states that the heahng of the
impotent man (John v. 1 seq.) was framed on the basis
of narratives in the other Gospels, and made to take
place on the Sabbath, because the words " take up thy
bed and walk," would furnish the most suitable text
for the dispute, that foUows, about the observance of
the Sabbath ; 2 when he says that the prediction by
Christ of the mode of his death wras attributed to him
from a desire to reUeve the feeling which was ex
cited by the shameful character of the cross ; when
he affirms that the foreknowledge of the treason of
Judas was falsely ascribed to Jesus from a Uke motive; 3
when he says that the reference in John (John xvUi.
26) to a kinsman of Malchus is artificial and. unhis
torical, being put in simply to fix Malchus immovably
in the narrative;4 when he charges that the account
of PUate's washing of his hands, sprung from a desire
of Christians to make the innocence of Christ seem
' Leben Jesu, B. II. s. 64. 2 Leben Jesu, B. II. s. 122.
s Leben Jesu, B. II. s. 371. l Leben Jesu, B. II. s. 475.

SOPHISTRY OF STRAUSS. 405
clear and certain; J and in numerous other places, some
of which have been touched upon under former topics,
Strauss virtuaUy accuses the sacred writers and early
disciples of conscious falsehood. He thus faUs back
upon a scheme of infidelity which the advocates of the
mythical theory are fond of decrying as obsolete and
as supplanted by their own more refined and charitable
view. Of the unwarrantable attempt to fix a contradiction
which shah impair their credit, upon the Gospel writers,
where no contradiction really exists, there is a multi
tude of examples in Strauss. Thus, in comparing the
healing of the paralytic in the record of Matthew
(Matt. ix. 1 seq.,) with the narrative of the same event
in Mark and Luke (Mark ii. 3 seq. ; Luke v. 18 seq.),
he intimates that the two latter, in saying that a mul
titude came to Christ, start with an exaggeration of the
simpler story of Matthew; although Matthew closes
the account of the miracle with the words, " and when
the multitude saw it, they marvelled." 2 It Would seem
no great inaccuracy in Luke and Mark to mention at
the beginning what Matthew mentions at the end of
the narrative. If one evangelist is more circumstantial
than another, the additional matter is at once pro
nounced a later, fictitious addition. In the healing of
the Centurion's son, because Matthew abbreviates the
incident, omitting to mention the messages sent by the
1 Leben Jesu, B. II. s. 37.
" Leben Jem, B. II. s. 503.

406 MYTHICAL THEORY OF STRAUSS.
Centurion, these are at once set down as exaggerations
of the original story.1 As tf a writer were bound, in
aU cases, to give details ! The main points — the faith
of the Centurion and the heahng from a distance —
are clearly presented in Matthew ; and these are the
essential points in the incident. On simUar grounds
the charge of exaggeration is brought against Mark
and Luke (Mark v. 22 seq. ; Luke viii. 41 seq.), on
account of the narrative of the cure of the daughter
of Jairus, which Matthew (Matt. ix. 18 seq.) also gives
in an abbreviated form. Such criticism upon secular
history would be scouted. Strauss labors hard to make
out a contradiction between certain statements in John
concerning Judas (John xiii. 27-30), and the statement
of the synoptical writers, that he had previously bar
gained with the priests ; but John says nothing incon
sistent with this. So Strauss would set the other
evangelists in opposition to John, in reference to the
statement of the latter, that Judas went out from the
Supper, although the fact is that they say nothing
about it one way or the other. A baseless charge of
contradiction is founded on the statement of John that
Christ bore his cross, and the statement of the othei
evangehsts that, on the way to the place of crucifixion,
it was laid upon a man named Simon.2 It is a poor
cause which requires such perverse interpretation to /
prop it up. 1 Leben Jesu, B. II. s. 94 seq.
* Leben Jesu, B. II. s. 509.

FALLACIES OF STRAUSS. 407
Besides the artificial interpretation in the work of
Strauss, his criticism is marked by a pervading fallacy.
He reasons in a circle, using now the authority of the
Synoptics to disprove a statement in John, and now
the authority of John to disprove a statement of the
Synoptics. He is ever calling back this or that wit
ness whom he has himself driven out of court, and
seeking to make out a point by the use of his testi
mony. Another faUacy runs through Strauss's work and
vitiates much of his reasomng. He is continually
ascribing features jn the Gospel narratives to the desire
or tendency of the disciples "to glorify their master."
This tendency or desire is assumed without proof. Be
ing thus arbitrarUy assumed, it is freely used to throw
discredit on the narratives, whUe it is only on the
foundation of the assumed falsehood of the narratives
that the existence of such a desire or tendency is
supposed !
X. The connecting of the various portions of
the Gospel history with predictions and incidents
which, it is aUeged, served as a spur and model for
the mythopoeic faculty, is generally far-fetched and
forced. If Strauss faUs in his negative work of proving the
falsity of the New Testament history, his failure to
account for the construction of it is not less signal

408 MYTHICAL THEORY OF STRAUSS.
If Christ was to heal the sick, some degree of resem
blance between his miracles and those wrought by the
Old Testament prophets was to be expected. Yet
Strauss seldom finds a resemblance near enough to
render the assertion plausible that one event could have
stimulated the fancy to the production of the other.
In various cases, where there is a palpable difficulty in
applying his theory, he takes refuge in the arbitrary,
unsupported affirmation that features originaUy belong
ing to the Gospel narrative have been effaced and other
features substituted for them. In regard to other mi
raculous occurrences described in the Gospels, he is
unable to fasten decidedly on anything which could
have put the imagination of the disciples upon framing
them. But, of course, one test of his theory must be
its applicabUity to the details of the New Testament
history. The justice of the preceding remarks may be eA'inced
by illustrations. Strauss makes the healing of the
Centurion's son a myth, founded on the healing of
Naaman by the prophet Elisha (2 Kings v. 8 seq.).1
But only in the one circumstance, that the prophet did
not go out personaUy to meet Naaman, do the two
miracles resemble each other ; and even here there is
the marked difference, that in the case of Naaman a
message promising a cure was sent to the diseased
person himseU. Moreover, the Centurion's son was a
paralytic, while Naaman was cured of the more terrible
1 Leben Jesu, B. II. s. 3.

ORIGINALITY OF THE NEW TESTAMENT MIRACLES. 409
disease of leprosy ; but a leading canon of Strauss is
that the messianic miracle wiU be an exaggerated copy
of the Old Testament original. The healing of the
withered hand (Matt. xii. 10 paral.) is said to be a
fancy-copy of the healing of Jeroboam's hand (1 Kings
xiii. 6). But the prominent point, which would not •
have been forgotten, in the latter narrative, is the
character of the king thus healed. He stretched out
his hand unrighteously, and could not draw it back.
For the miracle of calming the sea, Strauss vainly
searches for some Old Testament paraUel. He is
obhged to faU back on passages (Ps. cvi. 9 ; Nahum i.
4 ; Ex. xiv. 16, 21), aU of which relate to the drying
up of the sea} Whence the extraordinary deviation in
the Gospel narrative ? Strauss can think of no other
solution than the fact that, being in a ship, Christ
could not be well conceived of as making bare the bed
of the sea ! But tf there was this difficulty, could not
the myth-makers have taken care to place him in a
more convenient position ? The account of the mirac
ulous draught of fishes in John (c. xxi.), is pronounced
a mythical combination of Luke v. 4 seq. and Matt.
xiv. 22 seq. But Strauss is embarrassed by faUing
into conflict .with two of his own axioms, one of which
is that the later account has most of miracle, and that
in John, especiaUy, the miraculous is carried to the
highest point : whereas, in the case before us, John
represents Peter as swimming to the shore, whUe, in
1 Leben Jesu, B. II. s. 166.

410 MYTHICAL THEORY OF STRAUSS.
the earlier narratives, he walked on the sea. The mir
acle of the transfiguration occasions Strauss great
trouble. There is, indeed, the account of the shining
of the face of Moses, although this was after his descent
from the mountain, and of the voice out of a cloud; but
it happens that the chronology of this miracle of the
transfiguration is so definitely fixed, the event is so
connected with things before and after, that the his
torical character of the narrative cannot weU be
doubted.1 Eor the miracle of the stater in the mouth
of the fish, no antecedent prophecy or incident can be
found. The same is true of the miracle of the healing
of the ten lepers ; .and Strauss resorts to the supposi
tion that a parable has here been mistaken for a fact.
It is only by searching the Old Testament and the
Rabbies, and combining one scrap here with another
there, as the necessities of each case demand, that
Strauss is able to make any practical application of
his theory. The most that he shows, when he is
most fortunate, is that a given narrative might possi
bly have grown out of this or that story or predic
tion. But, possibly not ; possibly the narrative is the
record of a fact. A probability is what Strauss fails
to make out.
We leave here the special criticism contained in
Strauss's work. But there remain to be presented
several considerations of a more general character.
1 See Bleek's Synopt. Erlcl, B. II. s. 56-67.'

CHARACTER OF THE FOUNDERS OF CHRISTIANITY. 411
XI. The mythical theory is inconsistent with a fan-
view of the temper and character of those immediately
concerned in the founding of Christianity.
Christ chose twelve disciples to be constantly with
him, in order that an authentic impression of his own
character and an authentic representation of his deeds
and teaching, might go forth to the world. We find
them, even in Paul, designated as " the Twelve," and a
marked distinction is accorded to them in the early
written Apocalypse.1 The nature of their office, even
if, contrary to aU reason, the testimony of the Gospels
were rejected, is made abundantly clear by those writ
ings of Paul which are acknowledged by the skeptical
school to be genuine. Their function was to testify of
Christ. Understanding their office, it was natural that,
as Luke relates, they should feel called upon, after the
defection of Judas, to fill up their original number by
selecting a person who had " companied " with them
through the public ltfe of Christ, to be, as they said,
" a witness with us of his resurrection." 2 A doubt
of this last fact, in Paul's estimation, was equivalent
to charging the apostles with being false witnesses?
1 1 Cor. xv. 5 ; Eev. xxi. 14. The Eevelation, it is allowed by the
Tubingen school, was written about a. d. 70.
1 Acts i. 21, 22. Passages adverting to this office of the apost
les are, as we should expect, numerous in the history, given in the
Acts, of their preaching. Among passages elsewhere to the same
effect are Luke i. 2, xxiv. 48; John xv. 27 ; 1 Peter v. 1 ; 1 Cor.
xv. 15.
8 1 Cor. xv. 15.

412 MYTHICAL THEORY OF STRAUSS.
The disciples were not enthusiasts, but sober-mind
ed witnesses, distinctly aware that they held this
position. But the principal remark we have to make under
this head strikes deeper. There is one quality which
pervades the teaching and the rehgion of Christ, and
that is holiness. This attribute is, also, a marked
element of the Old Testament religion, in distinction
from the religions of the GentUe world. The Sermon
on the Mount touches the deepest chords of moral
feehng. It speaks to the conscience. They who were
drawn to Christ strongly enough to persist in following
him, were brought face to face with moral obhgations
and with the infinite consequences depending on moral
tempers. But holiness must affect the inteUectual
operations. It introduces the principle of truthfulness
into the soul. It puts an end to the vagaries of fancy.
It opens the eye to realities. Holiness becomes, in
this way, the safeguard against self-delusion. Now,
in the case of the Master himself, it is irrational to
think that he whose holiness was free from the alloy of
sin, could cherish a miserable, self-exalting illusion
concerning himself. Could that holiness which rebuked
the least admixture of sin in the motives and spirit of
his dearest foUowers, be so mixed with the wildest
enthusiasm ? His disciples, not the twelve alone, but
aU who were willing to incur the peril and'the odium
of permanently attaching themselves to his cause, must
have partaken of his spirit. The distinction of good

CHARACTER OF THE FOUNDERS OF CHRISTIANITY. 413
and evU, of truth and falsehood, was everything in
their eyes. The comparison of the beauty-loving
Greek with the truth-loving Hebrew, even when we
are treating of an earlier age, involves an evident
faUacy. Much more is the comparison of the Hebrew
on whose ear not only the decalogue but the holy doc
trines and precepts of Christ had faUen, with the
Greek of a primitive age, fitted only to mislead. In
the New Testament writings we breathe an atmosphere
of truth and holiness. We are in contact with men
who feel the solemnity of existence. We are contin
ually impressed with the tremendous issues depending
on the right use of the powers and faculties of the
mind. We are among those who are solicitous, above
all things, to be found faithful. Is it an error to
expect from the holy a clearer discernment of truth ?
Is it an error to suppose that holiness clarifies the
vision ? that hohness wUl save men from confounding
the dreams of fancy with fact ? If this be an error,
then the nature of man was made to be an instrument
of deception and delusion. Then we must deny that
"tf the eye be single, the whole body shall be full of
hght." Whoever looks into the Gospels wUl see that the
pardon of sin is the great blessing promised and sought.
It was they who craved this blessing who came to
Christ, and remained behevers, when those who had
followed from a lower motive forsook him. But the
sense of unworthiness, and enthusiasm, do not coexist.

414 MYTHICAL THEORY OF STRAUSS.
The feeling of guilt may engender unfounded fears,
and run into superstition ; but nothing is more foreign
from that play of the imagination which is imphed in
the theory we are opposing. - That conviction of per
sonal unworthiness, growing out of setf-judgment and
moral thoughtfulness, which led men to Christ, is
wholly averse from enthusiasm. The desire to see
miracles was not the deepest feeling in those who
adhered to Christ. Rather was it the destfe of for
giveness and salvation. The miracles Avere a welcome
proof that Christ "had power on earth to forgive sins ;"
but the moral and spiritual benefit was uppermost in
their esteem. They stood on a plane altogether above
that occupied by a people in their inteUectual childhood
when the, higher faculties are in abeyance, and the
understanding is under the absolute sway of fancy and
the craving for the marveUous.
XII. Christ and Christianity receive no adequate
explanation from the skeptical theory.
This theory makes the character of Christ, as
depicted in the New Testament, to be largely the
product of the imagination of his disciples. The con
ception of that character, so excelling everything known
before or since, combining all perfections in an original
and unique, yet self-consistent, whole, the unapproached
model of excellence for the ages that were to foUow,
must be accounted for. The features which the skep
tical theory must tear from the portraiture are essential.

CHRIST AND CHRISTIANITY NOT EXPLAINED. 415
Take them away, and there is left only a blurred,
mutUated image of one in whom good and evU, truth
and pitiful error, were strangely mixed. If the Christ
of the Gospels, says Julius Muller, be the creation
of the disciples, if from their souls emanated this
glorious and perfect conception, we must, then, revere
them as the redeemers of the world !
But Christianity— this mighty and enduring move
ment in the world's history — how is that explained by
the Straussian theory ? The New Testament writings
bear witness on every page to the depth and power
of the movement. It was a moral and spiritual revo
lution, reaching down to the principles of thought and
action, and leading thus, of necessity, to a transforma
tion of the entire life of men. It was literally a new
creation in Christ Jesus. In the case of the Apostle
Paul, for example, we see that there was not merely a
behef in the messianic office of Jesus. But Paul has
become a new man, in the sentiments, purposes, mo
tives, hopes, which constitute his inward being. A
community sprung up, in whom old things had passed
away and aU things had become new* And how shall
we explain the effect of this movement upon history
for so many centuries ? It will not do to say that the
Amazon, rolling its broad stream for thousands of
miles, and spreading fertility along its banks, is all
owing to a shower of rain one spring morning. The
mind demands a cause bearing some just proportion to
the effect. There are movements which affect only the

416 MYTHICAL THEORY OF STRAUSS.
surface of society. There are movements which pro
duce a wide commotion at the outset, but are soon
heard of no more. But Christianity is no superficial,
no temporary, no short-lived, movement. On the con
trary, its beginning is humble and noiseless. Even
the most impressive natural phenomena, which are yet
transitory, are no adequate symbol of the deep and
permanent operation of Christianity. It is not hke the
tempest which, after a day or a week, is found to have
spent its power. It is rather to be likened to the
great, silent force of gravitation, exerting, age after
age, its unexhausted energy. Now this movement,
beyond what is true of almost every other in history,
emanates from a single person. Whatever the pre
vious preparation, whatever the attendant circumstances
were, Christianity proceeds from Christ. The force
that must Ue back of this prodigious movement, in
heres in him. He introduced and set in motion the
energies that have wrought the whole effect. Let the
reader try to form an estimate of this effect, in its
length and breadth, as far as history has yet revealed
it, and then turn to the solution of it offered by the
skeptical theory. It was all produced, we are told, by
a Aveak young -man — an untaught GalUean Rabbi, who
brought under his influence for one, or two, or three
years, a few unlearned Jewish laborers ! We say " a
weak young man," for only great weakness or great
depravity can explain the monstrous delusion that is
imputed to him. Now, is this an adequate solution ?

THE FALSE PHILOSOPHY OF STRAUSS. 417
In view of the power which has been exerted by
Christianity to subvert rival and long established
systems of behef, to command the homage of the
highest inteUect, to reform and mould society ; in view
also of the adaptation of Christianity to the human
mind and heart, of its harmony with natural religion
while providing for great wants which reason discovers
but cannot supply, an eloquent writer has justly said :
" it seems no more possible that the system of Chris
tianity should have been originated or sustained by
man, than it does that the ocean should have been
made by him." l
XIII. The Straussian theory is connected with a
false and demoralizing scheme of phUosophy.
At the conclusion of his work, Strauss describes
the apparently ruthless and destructive character of
his own criticism. He confesses that in appearance he
is robbing humanity of its chief treasure. But all
this he pretends to be able to restore in another form.
Christianity is the popular expression of phUosophical
truth. This last he has no intention of sacrificing, but
he wUl return to the believer aU that he has wrested
from him, though he wUl return it in a different form.
Proceeding to inquire wherein lie the substance and
power of Christianity, Strauss examines the various
definitions given by the older Rationalism, and discards
1 Evidences of Christianity, by President Hopkins, Section VII.
27

418 MYTHICAL THEORY OF STRAUSS.
them. It is not as a collection of ethical precepts, it
is not as a legal system, he holds, that Christianity has
its characteristic quality and .power over mankind.
Tins distinguishing quality and power inhere in Chris
tianity as a religious system, and proceed from the
great central doctrine of a union of God and man in
Jesus Christ. This branch of his discussion is carried
forward with a penetrating analysis. How, then, does
he propose to modify Christianity? What is the
philosophical truth underlying this popular conception
of the unity of divinity and humanity in Jesus Christ ?
The real truth, answers Strauss, is, not that God and
man are one, or God becomes man, in a single individ
ual, but rather in mankind coUectively taken. That
is to say, God is in each individual, in each the infinite
becomes the finite, yet not fuUy or exclusively in any
one ; but for the indwelling and full expression of the
infinite, all the members of the race are required. In
plainer language, there is no Divine Person, with a
self-consciousness separate from the consciousness of
men. There is no being higher than man, who can
hear prayer. If a man prays, he pi-ays to himseU.
God is man, and man is God. Jesus Christ is divine,
so far and in the same sense as every other individual
of the race is God. Men are the transitory products
of the evolution of impersonal being. Ereedom, sin,
accountability, personal immortality, are merged and
lost in an aU-engulfing necessity. Such is the apothe
osis of man and denial of God which constitute the

FALSE PHILOSOPHY OF STRAUSS. 419
t
phUosophy of Pantheism, and which we are invited to
accept as an equivalent for the living personal God and
the incarnate Redeemer ! The demorahzing tendency
of this necessitarian and atheistic philosophy is obvious
to every serious mind. Strauss gives a specimen of the
fruits of his phUosophy by no means fitted to recommend
it, when he elaborately justifies the continued preaching
of the facts of Christianity, including the resurrection
of Christ, by those who have espoused his interpreta
tion of them, and, therefore, disbelieve in their historical
truth. We can scarcely suppose that Strauss is in
earnest in pronouncing his speculative dogmas the sum
and substance of Christian doctrine. He is rather
paying a decorous outward respect to history, in which
Christianity has performed so mighty a part, and to
the Church whose faith he has assaUed. But let it be
observed that his work is an attack upon the truths of
Natural as weU as of Revealed. Religion. That God is
a Person, that man is free and accountable, that sin is
the voluntary and guilty perversion of human nature,
are denied not less than the miracles attending the
establishment of Christianity. The postulates, on which
the need of revelation is founded, being thus put
aside, it is natural that' Christianity itself, and the
miracles which attest it, should receive no credence.
A clear perception of the primary truths which God
has written upon the heart, might have induced in
Strauss an appreciation of the Christian system and
its founder, such as led Thomas Arnold to feel that

420 MYTHICAL THEORY OF STRAUSS.
miracles are but the natural accompaniments of Chris
tian revelation ; accompaniments, the absence of which
would have been far more wonderful than their pres

ence.1

1 Arnold's Lectures on Eistory, Lecture II.

ESSAY VII.
STEATJSS'S EESTATEMENT OF HIS THEOEY.1
Strauss has weU-nigh outlived his own theory,
His restatement is to a large extent a retraction.
He stUl holds, indeed, that myths are found in con
siderable number in the Gospel histories. But as an
exclusive, or even predominant, mode of explanation,
he gives up his old hypothesis and adopts another
which in form and spirit is wholly diverse from it.
Yet, anxious to retain the name of myth, he contrives
a new definition of the term. Thus he partially dis
guises his "change of base," and gives his new position
a verbal identity with his old.
This change is due to the influence of Baur. Baur
has been ready to sanction the negative and destructive
portion of the labors of Strauss. He gives Strauss
the credit of showing that the several Gospel narratives
are incapable of being reconcUed with one another or
depended upon as authentic histories. But for the
positive construction of Strauss, Baur manifested less
respect. He pointed out the logical impossibUity of
convicting the Synoptics of error by appealing to the
1 Das Leben Jem fur das deutsche Yolk, &c. 1864.

422 strauss's restatement of HIS THEORY.
authority of John, and, at the same time, John of
error by appealing to the authority of the Synoptics.
Strauss was in truth continually seeking to prove his
points by witnesses whom he was himself continually
impeaching. Baur said rightly that the relative au
thority of the several documents must first be deter
mined, and some firm standing-place be found, before
anything could be proved or disproved by means of
them. Then he also denied the general applicability
of the mythical hypothesis to the contents of the Gos
pels. How could the fourth Gospel, which emanated
from a single author who professes to be an eyewitness,
be composed of myths, when myths are explained to
be the involuntary creation of the enthusiastic fancy of
the young Christian community? Baur supplanted
the mythical theory by the so-caUed tendency-theory.
A great portion of the narratives of miraculous events
were declared to be the product of invention, and con
scious invention in the interest of one or another of
the theological parties which, as it was held, divided
the early Church. In this way, the whole Gospel of
John, no small part of the Gospel of Luke and the
Acts (which were both declared to be moulded and
colored to subserve a theological motive), and a less
but not inconsiderable part of the Gospels of Mark
and Matthew, were declared to have originated. Mat
thew was pronounced by Baur to have more of the
character of a faithful record than either of the other
Gospels, and was taken, therefore, for a starting-point

HIS CHANGE OF POSITION. 423
and the chief authority in the criticism of the evangel
ical history. Now Strauss has adopted these doctrines
of Baur, and to this extent has relinquished his own
theory. At first, he apparently welcomed these new
discoveries of the Tiibingen master, or at any rate
cheerfully adopted them. But in the present work, he
chafes under the censures of Baur which have appeared
in the posthumous writings of the latter, and gives
vent to his dissatisfaction. Yet he does not withhold
his assent from the conclusions of his more learned and
sturdy compeer, and refashions his theory in accordance
with them.
How can wUfuUy invented narratives be styled
myths ? Strauss meets the exigency by proposing that
this term be used with more latitude. He will changed
the sense of it so as to include under the denomination'
of myths all narratives which spring out of a theologi
cal idea, even though they are the deliberate fabrica
tions of an individual. He argues that theologians;
need not abide by the meaning which classical scholars-
now give to the word. The motive of this innovation,
and wide departure from his own previous definition,
is obvious. Strauss will still be the father of "the
mythical theory," even if he must baptize a new chUd,
a very different sort of child, with the old name.
But names are comparatively of Uttle consequence.
It is more interesting to remark that Strauss has aban
doned, as far as much of the Gospel history is concerned,
his fundamental conception, and espoused; a conception;

424 strauss's restatement of his theory.
which he had formerly repudiated. Of intentional
falsification he professed to acquit the Gospel authori
ties. The originators of the narratives which they
contain, were artless, enthusiastic devotees, carried
away by a common enthusiasm and unwittingly mis
taking fiction for fact, the products of their own imagin
ation for veritable occurrences. Now they are made
to be skUful theologians, bent upon pushing forward
certain tenets or allaying some doctrinal strife, and not
scrupling to resort to pious fraud to accomplish then-
end. This is a change of ground which no alteration
of the significance of words wUl avail to cover up. The
old infidelity is exhumed, with the difference that the
mendacity imputed to the Gospel writers is attributed
to another motive, and the attempt is made to disprove
the genuineness of the canonical histories for the sake
of disconnecting them from the apostles and thus
avoiding the necessity of directly impugning their
testimony, which would be an inconvenient, as well as
ungracious, task.
Eor this reason, that part of the new Life of
Jesus for the German People which is most enti
tied to examination, is the part relating to the
origin of the New Testament historical documents.
Most of what Strauss has to say on this topic has been
directly or indirectly answered on preceding pages of
this volume. He has set himseU to supply the defect
of his previous work, where, strange to say, the dis
cussion of the sources of knowledge concerning the

HIS TREATMENT OF THE DOCUMENTS. 425
ltfe of Jesus is extremely brief and meagre. His
present treatment of this important subject is in the
spirit of a partisan, and not in that of a conscientious
scholar. When he says that "in those times every
thing passed for genuine that was edifying," and that
dogmatical grounds with the Eathers, among whom he
expressly mentions Eusebius, determined everything, he
makes a statement which every well-informed student
knows to be false. Every scholar knows that Eusebius,
Origen, and the earlier writers, as Clement of Alexan
dria, Tertullian, and Irenaeus, did not govern them
selves by any such canon as that which Strauss imputes
to them. Every scholar knows that each of these Ea
thers depended on historical evidence and inteUigently
submitted to this test the writings which claimed to be
apostolic, some of which they accepted and others they
rejected. Strauss takes particular notice of the testi
mony of Papias, who says of Matthew that he " wrote
the oracles (jd Xoytd) in the Hebrew tongue, and
every one interpreted (or translated) them as he could."
This passage is construed into an imphcation that
every one altered or recomposed the Hebrew Matthew
to suit his own taste, and then the inference is pro
claimed that on the basis of an original Hebrew Gos
pel, containmg we know not what, our Greek Matthew,
the apocryphal Gospel of the Hebrews, and various
other works, were composed. There is not a syUable
in Papias which remotely implies that any such hberty
was taken with the work which he describes as the

426 strauss's restatement of his theory.
original of Matthew. If one, writing among English
men and giving an account of Strauss's former Life of
Jesus, says that it was written in German and every
one translated it as he was able, who would understand
him to imply that various persons had altered and
essentiaUy recomposed that work? Whether Papias
be right or wrong in supposing that the Greek Gospel
of Matthew which he and his contemporaries had in
their hands was the translation of, a Hebrew original,
the meaning of his language is clear. He means that
at first Greek readers had to use the Hebrew Gospel,
as all men now have to use an untranslated book in
a foreign tongue. They have to render it into their
vernacular as weU as they can. That Papias was not
acquainted with our Mark is deduced from his state
ment that Mark did not set down his matter "in
order " (iv rdgei) ; a conclusion in itself most pre
carious, and entirely precluded when it is remembered
that no mention of any other Gospel of Mark than
that of the canon is to be found in any ancient writer.
Strauss has the boldness to tell his readers that Luke
does not pretend to have received his information from
apostles, although in the proem of his Gospel he
exphcitly includes himseU among those to whom the
eyewitnesses had delivered their knowledge of the
Master's life, and in the Acts impliedly places himself
among the attendants of Paul. In reference to the
passages in the Acts, from which we derive this fact,
Strauss takes refuge in the untenable theory that they

HIS TREATMENT OF THE DOCUMENTS. 427
are a quotation. Justin is admitted to have made use
of the first three Gospels. Respecting the Gospel of
John, Strauss is more than usually sophistical. In the
first edition of his former work, he had expressed
doubts of its genuineness. Afterwards, in deference
to the arguments of LTlmann and Neander, he retract
ed these doubts and declared his behef that John was
the author. Sthl later, perceiving the fatal effect of
this concession on his whole theory, he recaUed it and
went back to his old opinion. Among other obser
vations in the present book, Strauss brings forward
the alleged silence of Papias concerning a Gospel by
John as a proof that such a work was not known to
him. In the first place, we know not that Papias was
thus silent ; it is an uncertain inference from the cir
cumstance that Eusebius does not speak of any refer
ence by him to this Gospel. In the second place, he
may not have had occasion to refer to or quote the
Gospel of John, even though he used it. But, in the
third place, he did, according to Eusebius, make • use
of the 1st Epistle of John, and the attempts of Strauss
both to cast suspicion upon the correctness of Euse
bius in this particular and to call in question the evi
dent community of the Gospel and Epistle as to
authorship, are ahke futUe. Strauss is desirous of
showing that the Pseudo-Clementine Homilies in com
mon with Justin derived quotations, which are not
found in the first three Gospels, from the Gospel of
the Hebrews. In one place (p. 60), he expressly

428 strauss's restatement of his theory.
enumerates these four as the probable sources whence
the writer of the HomUies drew his citations. Now
Strauss knew that this writer had the Gospel of John
in his hands and quoted from it ; for on a subsequent
page (p. 69) Strauss expressly acknowledges the fact.
Why not make this acknowledgment earher? Was it
because the author of the Homilies is thus proved to
have drawn the passage upon the necessity of being
bom again, from the Gospel of John, and not from any
apocryphal Gospel, so that the pretence that the simUar
passage in Justin did not come from John is deprived
of its fraU support? Other points in the remarks of
Strauss on John hardly require to be noticed. He
reiterates the objection that had Marcion been ac
quainted with the Gospel of John he would not have
rejected it, although Tertullian explains that Marcion
was misled by a false understanding of Gal. ii., and
rejected the other apostles from their supposed hostUity
to Paul. Strauss also does not scruple to deny the
correctness of 'Tertulhan when he says that Valentine
made use of the Gospel of John ; he parades the
opposition of the insignificant Alogi, who also rejected
the Apocalypse which Strauss himseU considers genu
ine : and he borrows from Baur the far-fetched hypo
thesis that the author of the fourth Gospel shaped his
narrative even to the extent of misdating the crucifixion
of Christ, for the sake of suggesting that He is the
true paschal lamb. The fourth Gospel saw the light,
according to Strauss, ten or fifteen vears after the

HIS TREATMENT OF THE DOCUMENTS. 429
controversy of Polycarp with Anicetus, or some time
between a.d. 160 and 175 ! He makes the Clement
ine HomUies one or two decades later than the prin
cipal works of Justin, or in the neighborhood of a. d.
160; so that, if we are to beheve Strauss, the first
certain reference to the Gospel is found in the Homi
lies. It is demonstrable that very shortly after, this
date the Gospel of John is found in use throughout
the Christian Church, in every quarter of the Ro
man world, among the orthodox and among here
tics, as a revered and authoritative document, the un
doubted work of the Apostle, and handed down from
the generation contemporaneous with him. Irenaeus,
Clement, Tertullian, are among the witnesses to these
unquestionable facts. Moreover, Ire#eus was in the
vigor of life at the time when Strauss pretends that
the Gospel first appeared. And Polycarp, to whom
Irenaeus in his early youth had listened and from
whom he had heard personal recollections of John him
self, lived untU A. d. 169 or untU Irenaeus was not far
from thirty years old. We say nothing of the satis
factory testimony of Justin and other earlier writers.
The proposition of Strauss respecting the date of this
Gospel must be maintained, if maintained at all, in
reckless disregard of the evidence.
Having turned his back on the only authentic
sources of knowledge, how is Strauss to compose a Life
of Christ? Where is he to obtain the facts? It is
obvious that no resource remains to him but to draw

430 strauss's restatement of his theory.
on his imagination. In truth, his work might better be
entitled Conjectures concerning the Life of one Jesus by
a Disbeliever in the Authenticity of the Gospels and the
Existence of God. The aim is to frame a seU-consistent
account which shall exclude the supernatural. An
evangelist is foUowed or discredited according to the
exigencies of the moment. He is believed on one
point and disbelieved on another point, when he could
not be acquainted with one without knowing the
other. A scrap torn from its connection in one Gos
pel is connected with a scrap torn in like manner
from another, and the two, perhaps, are cemented by
a whoUy unproved conjecture. Strauss never hesi
tates to accept on the authority of the Gospels any
fact that suits lis need. There is nothing to satisfy
a conscientious inquirer in this arbitrary proceeding.
There is no firm footing anywhere. We are only
provided with a mosaic of guess-work. There is no
need of foUowing Strauss into the detaUs of his criti
cism. This has been sufficiently done in the examina
tion of his earher work.
In tone and spirit the second Life of Jesus, when
compared with the first, gives evidence of a mournful
degeneracy. In that earlier production there was an
almost total lack of reverential, reUgious feeling. But
in addition to this defect, the present work is marked
by a bitter and scornful treatment of the fundamental
verities of religion. In the dedication to a brother
who, having been long an invalid, died before its pub-

HIS TONE AND SPIRIT. 431
Ucation, he expresses his pride and satisfaction that
the sufferer had endured his pains without resort to
any supernatural source of help and comfort, and
that in moments when the hope of the continu
ance of ltfe was extinguished, he had kept up
his courage and composure, "never yielding to the
temptation to deceive himseU by resting on a world
beyond." Stoicism is then the practical phUosophy
on which Strauss faUs back in lieu of Christianity.
The cold and barren spirit of endurance, where no
design and no use are attributed to the sufferings
which befaU us, is the substitute for the faith and
humility of the Christian. There is little danger that
this bhnd and hard philosophy wUl acquire a lasting
popularity. Christianity once overcame it and sup
planted it ; Strauss may weU apprehend that the same
result may foUow again.
A rancorous tone, especiaUy towards the Christian
ckvgy, is an unpleasant feature of the present work.
The author sees that Christianity remains in undimin
ished vigor, notwithstanding his supposed demolition
of it nearly a generation ago. He is obviously soured
by the disappointment, and he pours his resentment
and chagrin upon the heads of the ministers, in a tone
which, as he seems himself to anticipate, sounds
demagogical. He despairs of overthrowing their in
fluence untU faith in miracles shall be extirpated from
the minds of the people. To this class he now ad
dresses himself, in the hope to have better success with

432 strauss's restatement of his theory.
them than he had with the scholars and teachers.
No very deep reflection might suggest to Strauss that
this hold of the ministers upon the hearts of the
people, Avhich he thinks to be so deplorable, would be
impossible, were there not in the human soul an ine
radicable sense of religion and faith in the supernat
ural, and he might thus be saved from cherishing too
high expectations of the effect to be looked -for from
the influence of his books.

ESSAY VIII.
THE LEGENDAET TEEOET OF EENAN.1
M. Renan, in the opening of his learned work on
the History of the Semitic Languages, remarks upon
the characteristic traits of the Semitic branch of the
human family. He reckons among these traits an
inbred attachment to monotheism. This observation
illustrates at once the author's habit of incorrect, rash.
generalization, and the effect of his bias towards nat
uralism in warping his historical judgments. Witb
the exception of the Mohammedan movement among a<
single people, and the religion of the Jews, aU the
members of the Semitic race were involved in polythe
istic idolatry, and that commonly of a gross kind..
Among the Arabian descendants of Abraham, the
monotheistic faith of their progenitor had probably
never been utterly extinguished ; and as to the Jews,
we know from their own records that for ages they
were continuaUy lapsing into the corrupt worship of
theh neighbors. Take out these people who trace
their descent immediately to Abraham, and where is
the monotheism of the Semitic race ? Not among the
Assyrians, the worshippers of Baal and Astarte and'
1 Tie de Jesus par Ernest Eenan, membre de l'Institut. 1863..
28

434 the legendary theory of renan.
other divinities, nor among the Babylonians, the devo
tees of a like idolatry, in whose foul ritual prostitution
was a religious duty. Not among Syrians nor among
Phoenicians or their colonists, the Carthaginians, by
whom there was added to the lascivious cultus of the
more eastern peoples the service of Moloch, the " hor
rid king," who was propitiated in the best days of
Tyre and Carthage by casting chUdren alive into the
flames. In truth, the nation which, if we except the
descendants of Abraham, has made the closest, ap
proach to a monotheistic religion, namely, the Persian,
belongs not to the Semitic, but to our own Indo-
European stock. How, then, can it be contended
that the Semitic nations are naturaUy, by a law of
race, monotheistic ? The motive is obvious. The
design is to suggest the inference that the pure con
ception of God which the Hebrew Scriptures present,
was not supernaturally taught, but spontaneously
generated. Evidences of a Pantheistic mode of
thought are not unfrequently met with in the writings
of Renan. " Two elements," he remarks in one place,
" explain the universe ; time and the tendency to
progress." 1
Renan's Life of Jesus clearly betrays the influence
exerted by this naturalistic phUosophy in determining
1 See Eenan's article in the Bevue des Deux Mondes (Oct. 1863)
bearing the title : Les Sciences de la Nature et les Sciences His-
toriques. See, also, Frothingham's Translations from Eenan, entitled
Beligions Eistory and Criticism (New York, 1864), p. xxx. seq.

the origin of the gospels. 435
the author's theory of the origin of Christianity. The
comments we have to offer upon this production,
which, partly in consequence of its attractive style,
has had a wide circulation, wUl relate to four principal
topics : the author's estimate of the documents which
constitute the chief sources of knowledge ; his treat
ment of the narratives of miracles in the Gospels ; his
methods of interpretation ; and his conception of the
character of the personage whom he undertakes to
describe. 1. In respect to the date and authorship of the
four Gospels, Renan is, on the whole, much more
reasonable than most of the German unbelievers. He
says of the Gospels : " all, in my judgment, date back
to the first century, and they are substantially (a peu
pres) by the authors to whom they are attributed." '
This concession is important* but the value of it is
lessened by other remarks which stand in connection
with it. The precise opinions of the author, it is not
always easy to ascertain ; for, on this topic, he fre
quently advances an assertion only to retract or essen
tially modify it in the next sentence. He confidently
affirms that the title, the Gospel according to Matthew,
and the corresponding titles of the other Gospels,
originally denoted, not authorship, but rather the
source whence the traditions found in the several
Gospels were drawn.2 The Manichaean Eaustus is
said by Augustine to have broached the same idea,
1 Vie de JSsus, p. xxxvii. ' Vie de Jesus, p. xvi.

436 THE LEGENDARY THEORY OF RENAN.
and, as far as we know, he was the first to do so,
The phraseology of the titles admits of this hypothesis,
but the early Eathers without exception interpret them
as designating the authors, and such, in all probabUity,
was their primitive significance.1 Upon the authorship
of the Gospel of Luke, Renan is fully satisfactory
This Gospel, he says, is certainly written by the same
person who wrote the Acts of the Apostles. It is " a
regular composition, founded on authentic documents,"
and having " the most perfect unity." The author
was a companion of St. Paul, was thus a man of the
second apostolic generation, and wrote the Gospel
" after the siege of Jerusalem, and soon after." 2 In
regard to the fourth Gospel, the position of Renan is
somewhat vacillating. Yet he admits that without
the light derived from this Gospel, important portions
of the Life of Jesus could not be understood. His
conclusion, after suggesting various conflicting hypo
theses, seems to be that- the narrative parts of the
Gospel are the w7ork of John, and that the discourses
emanate from his disciples, who modified and ampli
fied what they had heard.3 Renan deserves credit for
his emphatic contradiction of the Tubingen theory
respecting the fourth Gospel, and for his decided
affirmation, which is well supported by proofs, that
the Gospel had the early date which is commonly I
1 Bleek, Einl in das If. T, p. 87 ; De Wette, Einl. in das K T.
(5 A.) p. 130.
2 Vie de Jesus, pp. xvi., xvii. a Vie de Jesus, p. xxiv. seq.

THE ORIGIN OF THE GOSPELS. 437
assigned to it. It is plain that his misgivings in
regard to the discourses in John are wholly subjective,
and are incompatible with the external evidence for
the genuineness of the Gospel, which he himself ad
duces. A great part of the discourses in John are
linked inseparably with incidents in the narrative. If
the discourses are given up, the narrative must share
their fate. In his comments on Matthew and Mark,
Renan has committed the gravest errors. He as
sumes that the discourses recorded in the first Gospel
formed the basis of the work, to which the narrative
matter was afterwards added ; and, likewise, that the
Gospel of Mark has been enlarged since its first com
position. The collection of Discourses, he thinks,
took up narrative matter from the primitive Gospel
of Mark, and this Gospel in turn took up sayings of
Christ from the Discourse^. The theory is built on
the foundation of the testimony of Papias, and this is
done after Renan has expressly admitted that the
descriptions of this Eather " correspond very well to the
general physiognomy " of the first two Gospels in their
present form.1 This admission is just, as we have
shown in a previous Essay. If Papias did refer to an
original coUection of discourses, the basis of the first
Gospel, which is very improbable, yet it has also been
shown that he describes a state of things which lay in
the past, and that he himseU had in his hands the
same Greek Matthew that is found in our Bibles.
•Renan has allowed himself to be misled in this par-
1 Vie de Jesus, p. xix.

438 THE LEGENDARY THEORY OF RENAN.
ticular, in consequence of overlooking the aoristic form
in which the statement of Papias appears. The only
other ground on which Renan would infer this mutual
indebtedness of the two Gospels to one another, is the
well known frequent simUarity in the phraseology
employed. This proves, indeed, either that one of the
two was partly founded on the other, or that both
drew from a common source of information, either
oral or written. But either of these hypotheses is
more probable than the theory proposed by Renan.
At the same time, had he confined himseU to the
statements cited above, he would leave untouched the
substantial authenticity of the first two Gospels. He
only finds a part of Matthew in Mark and a part of
Mark in 'Matthew. But he finaUy gives to this bor
rowing system a far greater latitude. Pounding his
statement on the remark of a single individual, Papias,
concerning himself, and exaggerating the purport of
that remark, he affirms that in the early Church " little
importance was attached " to the written Gospels.
He proceeds to say that for a hundred and fifty years
the evangelical texts possessed little authority ; that
there was no scruple about inserting additions, com
bining them diversely, or completing some by others ; "
that the early Christians " lent these little roUs to one
another : each transcribed on the margin of his copy
the sayings and the parables which he found else
where and which touched him."1 Now these extra
ordinary propositions are not only without proof, but
1 V'p de Jesus n. xxxii.

THE ORIGIN OF THE GOSPELS. 439
can be demonstrated to be false. The habit of citing
passages inexactly and ad sensum, which belongs to
Justin and other writers of his time, proves nothing to
the purpose ; for this is not peculiar to them, but be
longs equally to Eathers of the next age, and Justin's
quotations from the Old Testament are marked by the
same kind of inaccuracy. Does Renan mean his
readers to beUeve that down to " the latter haU of the
second century," Christians individuaUy altered their
copies of the Gospels ad libitum by interpolations of
the character described ? This appears to be his de
sign. Yet conjectures of this nature have been proved
to be not merely uncertified, but inconsistent with
known facts.1 The number of copies of the received
Gospels in the early part of the second century must
have been great. These copies were early multiplied
and widely scattered over the Roman Empire, where-
ever Christians were found. Any essential variations
in the text of either of the Gospels would inevitably
have perpetuated themselves, and would appear in the
later transcriptions. The essential agreement of all the
manuscripts of the Gospels which are now extant,
demonstrates that no changes of the character sup
posed by Renan could have taken place. Besides,
he admits that Luke's Gospel is from a single pen,
and was composed about the time of the capture of
Jerusalem.2 Why did not Luke's Gospel undergo
1 See the argument of Norton, Genuineness of the Gospels, Vol. I.
' Vie de Jesus, p. xvii.

440 THE LEGENDARY THEORY OF RENAN.
similar transformations? What protected that from
the lot which befell its companions ? But Renan
involves himself in a labyrinth of inconsistencies on
this subject, for Luke is declared to be later than
Matthew and Mark, and " a compUation much more
advanced." x And the resemblance in phraseology
between the third Gospel and each of the first two
presents the same problem as does the resemblance
between the first and second.
Such is Renan's treatment of the question of the
origin of the Gospels. Compared with the theories
of the German skeptical critics, it deserves commenda
tion. The most serious defects of it are the vieAV
taken of the discourses in John, and the notion that
the Gospels, at least the first two, were long subject
to arbitrary changes in their contents ; a notion,
however, which is incongruous with Renan's own
previous concessions.
2. As concerns the history recorded in the Gos
pels, and especially the accounts of miraculous events,
Renan adopts what may be styled the legendary, in
distinction from the mythical, theory. These accounts
were rather the transfiguration of fact, than a pure
creation of pious enthusiasm. Renan is decided in
affirming that at least a great part of these accounts
emanate from the apostles themselves, and that acts
which passed for miraculous figured largely in the ltfe
of Jesus. On this point he cannot acquit the Master
1 Vie de Jesus, p. xviii.

THE NARRATIVES OF MIRACLES. ' 441
at the5 cost of' the disciples. He himseU permitted the
behef that he miraculously healed the sick and raised
the dead. Renan is driven to this conclusion by his
more sober view of the evangelical documents. What
explanation of the testimony of the Gospels and of the
extraordinary phenomena in the life of Christ, can be
given ? Renan replies that the Gospels are legendary-
narratives, hke the lives of some of the mediaeval
saints ; and that the events in the hfe of Jesus which
seemed miraculous, wore this character partly through
the blind enthusiasm of the apostles, and partly
through pious fraud in which they had an active,
and their Master a consenting, agency. In defend
ing his thesis, Renan declares that Jesus had no idea
of a natural order governed by laws, and was not
conscious of the distinction between the natural and
the supernatural, the normal and the miraculous. The
attentive reader of the Gospels will not need to be
assured that this proposition is devoid of truth.1 When
Jesus says that God makes the sun to rise and the
rain to faU, did he mean or does he imagine that the
shining of the sun, or a shower of rain, is a miracle ?
Did he not know full well that the growth of the grass
in the field is a totally different sort of event from the
multiplying of the loaves, albeit the power of God is
requisite for both ? Did he not understand that his
miraculous works belong in a different category from
the ordinary labors of the physician ? After the cure
1 See, on this point, J. Muller's Essay on Miracles, p. 33. N.

442 THE LEGENDARY THEORY OF RENAN.
of a dumb demoniac, Matthew records that " the mid-
titudes marvelled, saying, ' It was never so seen in
Israel.' " The miracles of Christ excited among the
witnesses the same kind of amazement which events
of a like character would occasion now.1 EquaUy
unfortunate is Renan's comparison of the company
of Christ with St. Erancis and his foUowers. We
have abeady, in the review of Strauss, pointed out the
mistake of transferring to the apostolic church the
characteristics of the mediaeval age. The disciples of
St. Erancis were fuU of the spirit of their master ; and
enthusiasm that falls below absolute madness, can rise
no higher than in the example of this monk. His
asceticism stopped short of no austerities which the
body could endure. His inward Ufe, hke his outward
career, was a continual romance. His mystic fervor
betrayed itself in his ordinary speech — in his apos
trophes to birds and beasts and even to inanimate
things. " His life," says Milman, " might seem a
rehgious trance. Incessantly active as was his hfe, it
was a kind of paroxysmal activity, constantly coUaps-
ing into what might seem a kind of suspended anima
tion of the corporeal functions." As to the witnesses
to the " wounds " of Christ on his person, one of
them testifies to seeing the soul of St. Erancis, after
his death, in its flight through the air to heaven!
And we are to beheve that the author of the Sermon
on the Mount and the Gospel Parables, together with
1 See, for example, John ix. 32 ; Mark iv. 41.

THE NARRATIVES OF MIRACLES. 443
the chosen disciples who sat at his feet, were the vic
tims of the same sort of hallucination ! But hallucina
tion, as Renan feels and frankly aUows, wiU not serve
to explain these events in the Gospels. They were
either miraculous, or there was fraud. He faces the
dilemma and does not scruple to call in the aid of the
fraus pia to account for them. The resurrection of
Lazarus was a pretended resurrection, which the
disciples contrived for popular effect, and in which
Jesus reluctantly, but knowingly and wUfuUy, played
his part ! It is a hateful supposition ; Renan himself,
notwithstanding the sentimental apologies which he
offers for the conduct of the parties to whom he
attributes a proceeding so low and deceitful, finds
his own theory ungrateful.1 Yet he adopts it because,
unable to believe in a miracle, he is fairly cornered by
the evidence, and knows no other escape. There is a
condition of mind in which devotional sentiment has
broken from its natural alliance with conscience, and
the moral sense is lost in the haze of an artificial
morahty, when a man may think he can serve heaven
by cheating his fellow-men even in the things of
rehgion. Pious frauds are the spawn of this terrible
delusion, that one may " lie for God." But who that
is not blind to the marks of simple, faithful, uncom
promising rectitude, can entertain for a moment the
suspicion that Jesus and his apostles were untruthful?
that they sought to forward their cause by means of
1 Vie de Jesus, pp. 265, 266.

444 THE LEGENDARY THEORY OF RENAN.
disgusting frauds ? The supposition is too irrational,
and will find few, tf any, to embrace it.
Renan's work, regarded from a scientific point of
vieAV, has the effect of an argument for the Christian
faith and for the verity of the Christian miracles. For
the alternative to which we are brought by his discus
sion is that of believing in the miracles or charging
Christ and his apostles with fraud. We have either
truth or gross cheating. Such is the real alternative,
and Renan has unintentionally done a service to the
Christian Church by iuvpaling unbelief upon this
dilemma. 3. The special criticism in Renan's work, if not
sophistical like much of the criticism of Strauss, may
be justly termed lawless. Starting with his unproved
assumption that the canonical Gospels are legendary
narratives, he seems to be governed in his beliefs and
disbeliefs, in his acceptance and his rejection of their
statements, by no fixed rules. This part of the narra
tive is accepted, and that thrown out, when frequently
there is no assignable reason beyond the critic's arbi
trary wiU. But in styling Renan's critical procedure
lawless, we had chiefly in mind his exegesis of the
NeAV Testament, and in particular his interpretations
of the teaching of Christ. It is often true that while
these interpretations are in some degree plausible, they
are unsound and false. The effect of them, not unfre
quently, is to foist upon Christianity and its author
doctrmes which he never taught. The reader must

INTERPRETATIONS BY RENAN. 445
>
permit us to vindicate this judgment by some Ulustra-
tions. Witness the mode in which Renan seeks to
support the false assertion that the Saviour enjoined
poverty and celibacy. We may first observe, however,
that the most which the Roman Catholic interpreters
have pretended to find in the Gospels, is a recom
mendation of these monastic virtues. They are placed
by the Roman Cathohc theology among the Evangelica
consilia, — as not being commanded, not essential to
salvation, but as qualities of the higher type of Chris
tian excellence. The charge that the renunciation of
property is required, as a condition of salvation, finds
no support in the invitations of Christ addressed to
the poor, in common with aU who were in suffering,
nor in the implication, which was the actual fact, that
a spiritual susceptibility, not usuaUy found in the more
favored classes, belonged to them. Confronted by a
fact like the discipleship of the wealthy Zaccheus, of
whom no surrender of his property was required,
Renan says that Christ made an exception in favor of
rich men who were odious to the ruling classes ! As
if Jesus could think that the sin of possessing Avealth
was washed out when the rich man happened to be
unpopular ! Renan's perverse interpretation of the
Saviour's rebukes of covetousness and an ungenerous
temper towards the poor, he supports by appealing to
the parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus. "After
wards," he says, " this was called the parable of the
'wicked rich man.' But it is purely and simply the

446 THE LEGENDARY THEORY OF RENAN.
parable of the ' rich man.' " x As if the rich man were
sent to a place of torment for being rich ! His desire,
we must infer, to return to the earth " to testify " to
his five brethren, was a wish to warn them not to
possess property ! But what of the response of Abra
ham : "If they hear not Moses and the Prophets,
neither wUl they be persuaded, though one rose from
the dead ! " Even Renan wUl not contend that the
Old Testament considers the possession of property a
sin. He would be much more apt to dUate on the
earthly character of the rewards promised there to
the pious. Renan derives from Matt. xix. 10-13, a
law of celibacy, instead of the lawfulness df celibacy
when spontaneously practised, as in the case of Paul,
for the sake of greater freedom in promoting the
progress of the kingdom of God, — which is the real
sense of the text. He is even disposed to follow
Origen in the revolting absurdity of literaUy construing
the phraseology (Matt. xix. 12) by which the Saviour
describes the condition of celibacy. In the context of
this very passage, the Saviour implicitly puts honor
upon, marriage. It Avas at a wedding that he first
manifested forth his glory. The married state and
the family are held sacred in the gospel. Yet Renan
does not hesitate to found upon the injunction to for
sake father and mother, in obedience to the higher
law of Christ, the charge that he required, as an indis
pensable condition of discipleship, the rupture of all
1 Tie de Jesus, p. 175.

INTERPRETATIONS BY RENAN. 447
the ties of kindred ! These preposterous interpreta
tions are refuted by numerous places in- the Gospels
themselves and by the whole history of the primitive
church. But these inconvenient passages it is easy
for Renan to ignore or summarily cast out. Other
examples of arbitrary and unfounded assertion in Re
nan's work are the statement that the Eucharist origin
ated long before the Last Supper ; that Judas was led
to betray Christ out of jealousy of the other disciples;
that John exhibits in his. Gospel a feeling of rivalship
towards Peter, — though Renan must have observed
that Peter and John are frequently brought into con
junction in the Acts as weU as in John's Gospel ; that
Christ had not the least idea of a soul as separate from
the body, — as if he did not speak of " both soul and
body," and imply the same distinction in a hundred
passages besides ; that Jesus, for the moment, thought
of using force- to prevent his arrest, — an interpretation
which, tf it came from anybody but a professed orient
alist, would be held to indicate a singular incapacity to
understand the tropical method of instruction, which
was habitual with Christ, and, in this case, was em
ployed to impress on the disciples the change in theh
situation, involving dangers to which they had not
before been exposed. These examples of baseless
criticism might be indefinitely multiplied.
4. The impossibihty of forming a consistent con
ception of Christ, when the supernatural is rejected, is
strikingly shown by the abortive essay of Renan. The

448 THE LEGENDARY THEORY OF RENAN.
most incongruous assertions are made concerning
Christ. Now he is credited with sublime attributes
of intellect and heart, declared to be the greatest of the
sons of men, a character of colossal proportions, and
now he is charged with a vanity that is flattered with
the adulation of the simple people who followed him ;
is accused of weakly yielding to the enthusiasm of his
disciples, who were anxious that he should be reputed
a miracle- worker, and is said to have given way to a
gloomy resentment and to a morbid, half-insane relish
for persecution and martyrdom. He is thought — this
highest exemplar of mental and moral excellence, of
wisdom and goodness, that has ever appeared or ever
avUI appear on earth — to have not only cherished the
wildest delusion concerning himself, his rank in the
universe, and his power to revolutionize the Jewish
nation, but he is also said to have declared against
civU government and the family ties, and thus to have
attempted a movement, most impracticable and mis
chievous, for the virtual disorganization and overthrow
of society ! Renan describes under the name of Jesus
an impossible being. Although incompatible actions
and traits are imputed to him without necessity, even
upon the naturalistic theory, yet the prime, the insur
mountable obstacle in the way of the task which Re
nan has undertaken, lies in the impossibility, so long
as the supernatural elements of the narrative are re
jected, of attributing to Jesus the exceUence which
undeniably belongs to him.

ESSAY IX.
THE OEITIOAL AND THEOLOGICAL OPINIONS OF
THEODOEE PAEKEE.
Theodore Parker will be known, not as the
inventor, but as a bold expositor and propagator, of
new opinions. His Theology was a not very well
digested compound of doctrines drawn from various
and conflicting schools of Naturalism. Notwithstand
ing his robust inteUect and his wide knowledge of
books, his discriminating admirers will hardly claimi
that he was either an accurate scholar, or a consistent
thinker. In a review of the second edition of the Life
of Jesus by Strauss, which Parker pubhshed in April,.
1840,1 he takes a tone of opposition to that writer,
imphes his own belief in the resurrection of Christ
and in other miracles, and welcomes the partial ad
mission of the genuineness of John which Strauss
then made, but afterwards recalled. In May of the
next following year, Parker delivered the noted Ser
mon, in which he avowed his disbehef in the Gospel
miracles. Afterwards, in his Discourse of Religion
and elsewhere, he adopts the Tubingen theories
1 Christian Examiner, Volume XXVIII.
29

450 THE OPINIONS OF THEODORE PARKER.
concerning the Gospels and the canon — but scarcely
undertakes to support them by regular argument.
His critical remarks, unconnected as they are, and
resting on no independent researches, are possessed
of little scientific value. Of the canonical Gospels, he
says, " we must reject the fourth as of scarcely any
historical value. It appears to be written more than
a hundred years after the birth of Jesus, by an
unknown author, who had a controversial and dogmatic
purpose in view, not writing to report facts as they
were ; so he invents actions and doctrines to suit his
aim, aud ascribes them to Jesus with no authority for
so doing." x " The Gospel ascribed to John is of small
historical value, if of any at all."2 Of Matthew, he
says that " the fragmentary character of this old Gos
pel " is clear ; 3 and of the Synoptics generaUy, that
we know not " when they were written, by whom, or
with what documentary materials of history." i These
are the famUiar propositions of Baur and his foUowers,
and have been sufficiently examined on preceding
pages of this volume. From his premises Parker
deduces the proper inference that the Gospels are
untrustworthy and full of errors.5
If this be so, what are we to believe respecting
Jesus ? The answers to this question are indecisive
and self-contradictory. Now we are told that the
1 Discourse of Beligion, p. 236. 2 Ibid., p. 258.
• Ibid., p. 237. 4 Ibid., p. 236.
6 Ibid., (e. g.) pp. 231, 339.

PARKER ON MIRACLES. 451
Gospel writers " would describe the main features of
his hfe, and set down the great principles of his doc
trine, and his most memorable sayings, such as were
poured out in the^ highest moments of inspiration."
In the same breath it is affirmed that no stress can be
laid on particular events recorded in the narratives ;
that they are a mass of truth and error, collected about
a few central facts.1 In his practical use of. the docu
ments, Parker is not less arbitrary than his Tubingen
compeers. He believes where it suits him to believe,
and elsewhere the authority of the evangelists goes for
nothing. Eor example, though he holds that the Gos
pel Avriters have egregiously erred in reporting the
sayings of Jesus, and, among other things, in the
application of general predictions, wishes, or hopes to
specific times or events,2 he stiU confidently appeals to
some of these predictions, to prove the fallibility of
Jesus. There is one entire class of events which form no
small part of the Gospel histories, which Parker pro
nounces whoUy fictitious. It need not be said that
we aUude to the miracles. He agrees with Strauss
in styling the narratives of supernatural events
" mythical stories ; " 3 and like Strauss he deviates
from the mythical theory to make room for the diverse
hypothesis of Baur. But why should Parker deny the
truth of t-his portion of the Gospels ? Unlike Baur
1 Discourse of Beligion, p. 233, and Note.
• Ibid., p. 233. ' Ibid., p. 234.

452 THE OPINIONS OF THEODORE PARKER.
and Strauss, he professes to be a Theist, and to be
lieve that miracles are possible. Why should he not
believe them actual ? Absence of competent testimony
cannot be the reason, for it is plain that disbelief in
the miracles is the real cause, and not the consequence,
of his impeachment of the testimony. To render a
satisfactory answer to this question, attention must be
directed to Parker's theological principles. It will
appear that the denial of miracles is part and parcel
of the denial of Revelation, and that the latter springs
from a failure to perceive the ground of the need of
Revelation. The fundamental point of Parker's theology is his
doctrine of the absolute religion. With his eloquent
paragraphs on the universality of the religious sentiment,
and on the indestructible power which religion exerts
over mankind, we cordially sympathize. They consti
tute a fine refutation of the Positivist assumption that
religion is an excrescence to be lopped off in the pro
gress of the race from childhood to maturity. But
our concern now is with the doctrine about the abso
lute religion. Absolute religion, or religion in its
pure, complete form, is sometimes described by Parker,
in accordance with the Kantian definition, as obe
dience to the moral law regarded as the wiU of God,1
and sometimes as love to man from love to God, or
simply as love to God and man. Probably he would
modify Kant's definition by introducing the element
1 Discourse of Beligion, p. 43.

THE ABSOLUTE RELIGION. 453
of love. Religion, then, is declared to be expressed
in the law enjoining love to God and love to man.
The wonder is that Parker should seem to suppose
that this definition is in any sense original or peculiar.
There is hardly a symbol, catechism, or systematic
treatise on theology, from any branch of the church,
whether Latin, Lutheran, Reformed, Socinian, or
Quaker, which does not set forth the same truth. The
greater wonder is that Parker should suppose that
Christianity, as generally understood, is superseded by
this idea of religion. Christianity is a method of
redemption from evU, and evil is the control acquired
in the hearts of men by the principle antagonistic to
this law. That is to say, Christianity is the means of
salvation. To hold up the idea of the absolute religion
in the midst of a world under the sway of ungodliness
and selfishness, can only be compared to the conduct
of one who, when the plague is raging, runs about
with an excellent definition of health. Parker is
naturally gratified at seeing the law in its simple form ;
hut Paul's reply is : " the law worketh wrath ; " " we
know that the law is spiritual," we subscribe to all
your laudation of it, " but I am carnal, sold under
sin," " for what I would, that do I not, but what I
hate, that I do ; " " who shall deliver me ? "
Thus, Parker's rejection of revealed rehgion (which
is only the disclosure of the divine redemptive system)
is logicaUy and practically connected with his rejection
of the Christian doctrine of sin. If the Bible doctrine

454 THE OPINIONS OF THEODORE PARKER.
respecting the present moral condition of mankind is
false, the falsity of the Gospel is the proper coroUary.
But Parker's shallow apprehension of the great fact
of the bondage of mankind to evU, which heathen
religions as well as Christianity acknowledge, and to
which not Paul alone, but earnest and discerning men
in every age, have borne painful witness, is the fatal
defect in his theology. He could see the outbreakings
of sin in oppressive institutions and the selfish con
duct of individuals, and these particular expressions of
sin he denounced without stint. But he attained to
no deep and large apprehension of the principle of sin,
which pertains exclusively to no individual and no
class of men.
The consequences of this fatal ignorance are easily
traced. The attribute of holiness was almost stricken
from the conception of the divine character. Justice
was hardly distinguished from the personal passions
of hate and revenge. Hence, the Bible representation
of the character of God excited the strongest feehng
of repugnance. This narrow view prevented Parker
from attaining to any just appreciation of the Old
Testament. He stuck in the phraseology, and was
never weary of scoffing at the idea of a "jealous" or
an " angry " God. But the New Testament, in its
doctrine of the desert and penalty of sin, was scarcely
less offensive. How Jesus, whom he professed to
consider the highest embodiment of love and excel
lence, could be all this at the same time that he

PANTHEISM IN HIS THEOLOGY. 455
cherished these obnoxious ideas and feelings, is a prob
lem which is left unsolved.
Though he was professedly a Theist, and though
a volume of his prayers has appeared in print, Parker's
theology is strongly tinctured with Pantheistic modes
of thought. In the first place, his expressions in
regard to the nature and origin of sin are more Pan
theistic than Pauline. He speaks of sin as the trip
ping of a child who is learning to walk ; that is, a
necessary, and, if his iUustration holds, an inculpable,
stage in human progress. The idea that sin is a phase
in the development of the soul and of the race, and
is ehminated by the operation of a physical law, is
only consonant with a feeble impression of the gutft
of sin, and properly belongs in a system of Pantheism.
The confounding of natural law with ethical law, and
constitutional imperfection with moral transgression, is
a mode of thought which Christianity regards with
intense antipathy. Iniquity and innocent infirmity
belong in totally different categories. The Pantheistic
doctrine virtually caUs evU good, and good evU, puts
darkness for light and light for darkness, puts bitter
for sweet and sweet for bitter. The free and responsi
ble nature of man is really denied, and admitted only
in words. If sin is not a voluntary apostasy from
obedience to a law which commands but constrains
not, the foundation of the Christian system is gone,
and the superstructure must of course suffer a like
fate. In the second place, Parker discusses the ques-

456 THE OPINIONS OF THEODORE PARKER.
tion of the history of religions in a Pantheistic spirit
He adopts the Positivist speculation, tracing Mono
theism to Polytheism, and Polytheism back to Feti-
chism.1 That is, the most degraded type of religion
was first. This doctrine is agamst history, , which
gives no instance of a nation spontaneously exchanging
Polytheism for Monotheism. Polytheism may gene
rate skepticism, as in Greece, but does not lift itseU to
a better faith. Heathenism generally brutifies and
degrades humanity. But the hypothesis of such an
upward progress is consistent with the general theory
that the mutations of religion obey a natural . law of
progress, and that religion is one effect of civiliza
tion, so that in the infancy of mankind heathenism,
and the lower forms of it, necessarUy prevailed. In
the third place, when Parker comes to define his con
ception of God, he differs httle from Spinoza. There
is no definite ascription to God, of the distinctive ele
ments of personality, seU-consciousness and setf-deter-
mination. " We talk of a personal God. If thereby
we deny that He has the Umitations of unconscious
matter, no wrong is done." " God must contain in
Himself, potentiaUy, the ground of consciousness, of
personality — yes, of unconsciousness and imperson
ality." " AU mental processes like those of men are
separated from the idea of Him."2 His language
imphes not creation, but emanation' — a development
1 Discourse of Eeligion, Chapter V.
' Ibid., pp. 152, 153, 158.

VACILLATION BETWEEN THEISM AND PANTHEISM. 457
of the world out of a prior potential existence. Par
ker's doctrine appears to come to this, that God is the
infinite essence of which matter and spirit are the
divine manifestations. He does not express himself
Avith plhlosophical precision or strict consistency. But
this appears to be the prevaUing representation at
the bottom of his remarks. It is the proposition of
Spinoza. In fact, from Spinoza and Schleiermacher
the principal ideas of Parker on this subject appear
to have been learned.
It is true that in other places in the writings of
Parker, expressions hardly consistent with that repre
sentation, and decidedly theistic in their purport, may
be met with. But this is just the characteristic of his
position — an uneasy equUibrium between the two
systems. Had Parker been thorough in his theism,
he would have attained to profounder views on the
subject of sin, and might have advanced to the proper
coroUary, the need of supernatural redemption. Had
he been thoroughly logical in his Pantheism, other
elements in his system, especially his practical dealing
with the evUs of the day, would have been sensibly
modified. As it was, he walked in neither path with
firmness and consistency; and therefore, though his
popular influence was large, he will leave no durable
mark on scientific theology.
It would not be difficult to show that generous
ideas of philanthropy have no stable foundation
except in the Christian doctrine respecting man and

458 THE OPINIONS OF THEODORE PARKER.
human sin. Theories of the origin of heathenism and
of the origin of evU, such as are broached by Parker,
have a close affinity with the phUosophy which treats
portions of our race as semirhuman, or at least hope
lessly degraded. Slavery and other sorts of barbarity
seek in this phUosophy their theoretical support. But
let the doctrine of Paul that paganism is the fruit
of a faU and degeneracy be held ; let his solemn
arraignment of the human famUy in the opening of
the Epistle to the Romans be heartily subscribed, and
the connected principle that " God has made of one
blood aU men " wUl not be given up. Only in the
pure atmosphere of Christian theism, can the law of
human brotherhood take root and flourish.

ESSAY X.
IN EXAMINATION OF BAUR AND STRAUSS ON THE
CONVEESION OF THE APOSTLE PAUL.1
When we speak of the conversion of the Apostle
Paul, we mean not only the adoption by him of new
religious tenets which he had before denied, but like
wise the moral revolution in his tempers of feehng and
principles of action. We refer to that great transfor
mation which rendered him "a new creature." He
was convinced that the crucified Jesus of Nazareth
' was in truth the Messiah ; but his conversion also
induced and included a new moral spirit and an aU-
absorbing consecration to the cause which he had
previously hated. This entire change Naturalism at
tributes exclusively to the operation of physical and
psychological laws.
The theory propounded by Baur in his Life of the
Apostle Paul is reiterated with some variations in the
last Life of Jesus by Strauss.2 A zealot for the Phar-
1 Lord Lyttelton's little work on the Conversion of St. Baul is a
sound argument. It is largely taken up, however, with proving that
Paul was no impostor ; and the remarks to show that he was not an
enthusiast, though judicious, are not adapted to meet the more recent
skeptical theories.
' Leben Jesu fur d. deutsche VolTc, p. 33.

460 THE CONVERSION OF PAUL.
isaic type of religion, Paul was irritated and alarmed
at the progress of a sect which held the ceremonies of
the law to be of subordinate consequence, and pre
tended that their crucified Master was the promised
King of Israel. His vehement spirit impeUed him to
active measures of persecution. Yet the nobler feel
ings of his nature could not faU to be touched by the
demeanor of the dying Stephen ; nor could he whoUy
suppress the misgivings which the unfaltering tes
timony of the disciples to the resurrection of Jesus
stirred up in his breast. To him, a Pharisee, it was
no impossible event ; and if it were true, the difficulty
occasioned by the ignominious death of Christ was
removed or aUeviated. Ir> this divided state of feehng,
when the wUl was maintaining a half-conscious struggle
with the better impulses which rose agamst his present
determination and his life-long convictions, and his
soul was agitated with contending forces, he seemed to
' himself to behold in a vision Jesus rebuking him for
the conduct for which he had begun to rebuke himself.
Perhaps he was struck by lightning whUe on an errand
of persecution; and this circumstance, together with
the physical effects that followed, may have been the
immediate occasion of the imaginary vision. Strauss
argues that an infirmity of the nervous system proba
bly belonged to Paul and partly accounts for remark
able experiences which he attributed to a supernatural
cause. Baur, especially in his earlier discussion of the
subject, dilates upon the tendency of the mind to pass

THEORY OF STRAUSS AND BAUR. 461
from one extreme to the opposite. The more ardently
and thoroughly a man enters into an erroneous system,
the more likely he is, we are told, to be awakened to
the falsehood of his position. In proportion to the
intensity of his zeal is the force of the self-induced
reaction. To the credit of Baur it must be added that after
wards he appears to have become dissatisfied with his
own solution. In the last edition which he -prepared,
of his History of Christianity in the First Three Cen
turies, he says that " neither psychological nor dialecti
cal analysis can explore the mystery of the act in
which God reyealed to him his Son." He even says
that in the conversion of Paul, " in his sudden trans
formation from the most vehement adversary into the
most resolute herald of Christianity, we can see
nothing short of a miracle (wunder)."1 And the same
word he soon after apphes again to the same event,
If we are not at Uberty to suppose that Baur admits
in this case a strictly supernatural agency — an admis-
r
sion which would fundamentally alter his whole theo
logical system— -yet it is something to find him willing
to use the obnoxious word, and to acknowledge the
impossibUity of accounting for the conversion of Paul.
Baur explains that, however mysterious the transaction
was, the turning-point in the great change which took
place in the mind of Paul was a new view of the death
of Jesus. He came to understand that his death
: Baur, das Christenthum, etc. (2 A.) p. 45.

462 THE CONVERSION OF PAUL.
might be the transition to a more exalted ltfe. With
this new view, his prejudice against a crucified Messiah
vanished, but with it his Jewish particularism disap
peared also ; since the Christ in the heavens was
raised above the narrow Jewish conception of the
Messiah, and their exclusive, carnal theory of his office
and relation to men fell to the ground. What portion
of truth is contained in these interesting suggestions
we shaU inquire in the course of the remarks which
follow. 1. It is important to notice the testimony of the
authorities and to compare the statements of Strauss
and Baur with that. The conversion of Paul is three
times circumstantially related in the book of Acts, once
by Luke himself (c. ix.), and twice by the Apostle —
the first time, in his address to his countrymen at
Jerusalem (c. xxii.), and again in his speech before
Agrippa (c. xxvi.) The variations in these three nar
ratives relate to slight matters of detail, and are unim
portant. Yet Strauss, as might be expected, expends
upon them his trivial criticism. Paul -was journeying-
towards Damascus for the purpose of seizing Christian
men or women whom he might find there, and dragging
them to Jerusalem. Suddenly a bright and dazzling
light shone down upon him and his attendants. The
whole company were filled with consternation. But
the "trembling and astonished" Paul distinctly heard
the words that were addressed to him. Then foUowed
his blindness and his conjunction with Ananias at

THE TESTIMONY. 463
Damascus, each having been supernaturally guided to
the other. The skeptical critics do not scruple to
avail themselves of any circumstances from Luke which
fit into their scheme. Thus, the presence of Paul at
the murder of Stephen is a fact of which Luke is the
only witness. Strauss even supposes an effect on Paul
from disputations with Christians, whUe the only evi
dence he offers that such disputation took place is
Acts ix. 29, where Paul's disputing with the Jews after
his conversion is alone mentioned. In the Acts we
have the testimony of one who had been for a time
associated with Paul, and who had resorted for his
information (see Luke i. 5) to the authentic sources.
But we cannot here enter into the question of the
credibUity of Luke, which, as we believe, has been
fully vindicated in a previous Essay. Happily we have
the testimony of the Apostle himself, in his undoubted
Epistles, to several of the main facts, if not to the
special circumstances, of his conversion. He teUs us
that prior to that event he had " beyond . measure per
secuted the church of God and wasted it" (Gal. i. 13).
He says that he deserves not to be called an apostle,
because he had " persecuted the church of God" (1
Cor. xv. 9). He had made himself famous among the
churches of Judea as a persecutor (Gal. i. 22, 23).
He had outrun the Jews about him in his fanatical
zeal (Gal. i. 14.) He was unquestionably a furious
enemy of the disciples and their cause. A Pharisee,
he had entered with aU his heart into the measures of

464 THE CONVERSION OF PAUL.
his party for exterminating the infant Church. More
over, it is undeniable from his own statements in the
Epistles that his conversion was sudden. It was the .
result, as he declares, of a revelation of Jesus Christ to
him. And when he connects with his claim to be
an apostle the declaration that he too had seen Christ
(1 Cor. ix. 1), it is rendered in a high degree probable
that his conversion was one of the occasions when this
occurred. The most of what has just been said, the
skeptical critics allow. They generally concede that
Paul's conversion resulted from a vision in which he
supposed himseU to behold Christ. They would. only
resolve this vision into a mere subjective impression,
the product of intense mental excitement.
2. The skeptical theory assumes without evidence
and against the evidence, that the mind of Paul before
his conversion was deeply exercised with misgivings
as to the rectitude of his course. The naturahstic
solution requires the supposition that an inward tumult
and conflict of this sort prevaUed in his , soul. This
hypothesis not only lacks support, but is positively ex
cluded by- the proofs. It is founded on the words of
Christ, in Acts xxvi. 14 — the same passage in Acts ix.
5 is interpolated — " it is hard for thee to kick against
the pricks." The " pricks " are the goad With which
the ploughman from behind urged forward the oxen.
The phrase was a proverbial one, and is thus correctly
explained by Dr. Hackett : " the meaning is, that his
opposition to the cause and will of Christ must be un-

HIS PREVIOUS FEELING. 465
avaihng ; the continuance of it would only bring
injury and ruin on himself."1 The Ulustrative pas
sages from Wetstein establish this interpretation.
There is no implication that the Apostle was struggling
against conscientious impulses : the opposite rather is
indicated. He was engaged in a resolute, pertinacious,
but ineffectual endeavor to stop the progress of the
Christian cause. When we turn to Paul's own words
we find satisfactory evidence that he was disturbed by
no misgivings, but was whoUy absorbed in the work
of persecution. He had been, he says, a blasphemer
and persecutor, but found mercy because he " did it
ignorantly, in unbelief."2 He says again -." T verily
thought with myself that I ought to do many things,
contrary to the name of Jesus of Nazareth." 3 He was,
sincere and perfectly confident that he was striking at
a heresy. When he "made havoc of the church,"
entering into private houses and hurrying to prison;
women as weU as men, and when he left Jerusalem to
hunt down the fugitive disciples in other cities, he had:
no doubt that he was performing an acceptable service
to God. The idea that he rushed into extreme meas
ures of cruelty to drown the rebuke of conscience is
pure fancy. Everything shows that it was the depth
and ardor of his conviction that stimulated him to out
do his Pharisaic brethren in his exertions to crush
1 Hackett, Commentary on the Acts, p. 402. See,, also, Meyer and :
De Wette, on Acts xxvi. 14.
2 1 Tim. i. 13. Acts xx.vi..9-.
30

406 THE CONVERSION OF PAUL.
the new heresy. The foundation of the skeptical solu
tion of the problem of his conversion is therefore taken
away. 3. Baur's conjectural explanation of the change in
the religious ideas of Paul is essentiaUy defective.
The earlier notion that great zeal in a bad cause natu
raUy leads the subject of it to reverse his course, will
obtain little applause. We do not find that Torque-
mada was converted to Protestantism and to gentleness
by the excess of his own cruelty in managing the
Spanish inquisition. Nor will it avail to answer that
Paul was of a milder and more generous nature. As
Neander has remarked, there were among those who
beheld the burning of Huss many good men who saw
in the spectacle nothing but the just punishment of
a contumacious and mischievous heretic. There is no
ground for supposing that the death of Stephen made
a different impression on Paul.
Baur is right in holding that the conversion of
Paul from narrow Pharisaism to the broadest Chris
tianity, however that conversion may have begun, in
volved a process. It was a rational change of princi
ples and views. He attained to a new conception of
the nature of religion, as not consisting in the punctil
ious observance of ceremonies, nor ultimately in any
works of legal obedience, but in faith which worketh
by love. Unquestionably he saw, as Baur affirms, a
meaning and use in the death of the Messiah, which
rendered that event no longer repugnant but grateful

DEFECT OE BAUr's THEORY. 467
to his feelings. The proximate cause of this change.
however, was the awakening of a sense of sin and a
conviction of the utter inadequacy, from a legal point
of view, of that obedience which he had been able to
render. His feeling respecting the death of Christ
was the correlate of his consciousness of sin and of the
helpless condition into which sin had brought him.
But all this peculiar experience, as far as we are able
to ascertain, was posterior to that revelation of Jesus
as the Messiah, Avhich first broke up his feeling of self-
satisfaction. Reflection upon the death of Jesus, as
long as Paul was imprisoned in his Pharisaic conception
of the Messiah, could only serve to confirm him in
his opposition to the Christian cause. That Jesus had
suffered death was of itself sufficient proof that his
pretensions were false and his foUowers heretics and
apostates. Not until Paul was convinced of the reality
of the resurrection of Jesus, could he put faith in his
claims and become reconciled to the fact of his death.
This is aUowed by Strauss ; and now the question is,
how Paul became convinced that Jesus had really risen
from the grave. Strauss conjectures that Paul was
overcome by the testimony of the disciples, the event
to which they bore witness being one which he, as a
Pharisee, must admit to be possible. But Strauss
ignores the essential circumstance that the whole career
of Jesus, terminating as it did in the crucifixion, con
stituted in the judgment of Paul an overwhelming
presumption against the probabUity of his resurrection

468 THE CONVERSION OF PAUL.
and against the credibility of his disciples' testimony.
Moreover, it is clear from the Apostle's own language
that it was not the weight of human testimony, in the
first instance, that caused him to believe, but a super
natural revelation, or something which he supposed to
be this. There, is not a shadow of proof that he had
begun to consider with himself whether the testimony
of the disciples might not be true. On the contrary,
he thoroughly disbelieved it, and, inspired with the
fanatical hatred of an inquisitor, he was eager to exter
minate the new sect. The naturahstic criticism in
vain casts about for some explanation of this sudden,
total revolution of opinion which was attended by a
revolution equally signal in character and conduct.
4. There is no proof that the revelation of Christ,
which caused the conversion of Paul, was a vision; and
if it were, there is no explanation of it save on the
supposition of its reality.
In a vision, through a powerful impression made
on the mind there is a real or supposed direct percep
tion of objects not presented to the senses. • Were the
event which changed the career of Paul shown to be a
vision, not a step would be taken towards proving it
an Ulusion. For the skeptical criticism wtfl not be
permitted to assume that the human mind cannot be
supernaturaUy acted upon, and that the visions recorded
in the Bible are the product of an excitement having
its origin exclusively in the mind itself. It has been
shown already that this criticism has whoUy faUed to

HIS SIGHT OF CHRIST ACTUAL. 469
point out any psychological preparation in Paul for
such a deceitful exercise of imagination. A vision
even -though it be unreal, cannot spring from nothing.
Little is gained, therefore, were we to concede that
Paul's first conviction of the resurrection of Jesus was
through a vision.
But even this concession there is no warrant for
making. It is true that Paul at various times in his
life, after his conversion, had visions, as he himself
relates. But it is also true that he makes no mention
of his conversion as one of these, since the vision to
which he refers in 2 Cor. xii. 1-4 occurred fourteen
years prior to the time of his writing, whereas his con
version was at least twenty years before the date of
the Epistle. Nor is there reason to think that Paul
could not distinguish between the phenomena of a
vision and an affection of the outward senses.1 We
find this distinction explicitly made by Luke in Acts
xii. 9, where it is represented that Peter who had fol
lowed the angel out of the prison was in such pertur
bation of -mind that he " wist not that it was true
which was done by the angel, but thought he saw a
vision (pqafxa)." That which was " true " (dXrj-d-sg),
or actual, is expressly discriminated from the vision, or
subjective impression. Peter knew not for the instant
whether his liberation had been supernaturaUy repre
sented to his mind with the vividness of reality, or
1 For valuable remarks on this topic, see Beyschlag's Article, Die
Bekehrung des Apostels Paulus, Studien u. Kritiken, 1864. 2.

470 THE CONVERSION OF PAUL.
whether he had been actuaUy set free. There is no
warrant for supposing that the strong understanding of
Paul did not make the same distinction between vision
and external fact. And when' he says that he, as well
as the other apostles, had seen Jesus, and connects his
apostleship with this circumstance (1 Cor. ix.), we
properly conclude that he refers to something besides
a purely spiritual, inward perception, or such a percep
tion as a vision could vouchsafe. Peter had seen Jesus
in his bodUy presence, and Paul puts himseU in this
regard on a level with Peter.1 And the objective real
ity of this transaction on the road to Damascus can be
disproved only by discrediting the thrice-repeated nar
rative in the Acts.
1 Beyschlag shows that the argument of Paul for the resurrection
of believers (1 Cor. xv.), which is founded on the resurrection of
Jesus, implies a perception of Christ in his bodily presence. A sense
of the presence of Christ, however vivid it might be, which did
not exhibit him in the body, could not constitute a basis for this
argument.

ESSAY XI.
THE NATURE AND FUNCTION OF THE CHRISTIAN
MIRACLES.
There are those who find it hard to believe in a
miracle, because the word is associated in their minds
with the notion of a capricious act, or of a makeshift
to meet an unexpected exigency. They conceive of a
mhacle not as an event planned and fitting into an
established order, but as done in obedience to a sud
den prompting, as a kind of desperate expedient to
prevent the consequences of a previous neglect or want
of forecast. Such an act, they properly feel, cannot be
attributed to God. Anxious to remove the prejudice
just described, another class of writers set up defini
tions of a miracle which destroy the distinction be
tween a miracle and an event occurring in the course
of Nature. In flying from one error, they plunge into
another lying opposite. The mistake in the conception
which they would correct can be exposed without
confounding a miracle with a natural event, or strip
ping the former of the distinguishing attributes that
constitute its value as a proof of divine revelation. A
miracle belongs in a wholly different category from
natural events ; yet it forms no element of discord, is

472 THE CHRISTIAN MIRACLES.
due to no mistake in the structure of the world, which
requires to be remedied, and it conspires with natural
events to produce harmony in the whole system.
In this Essay we shaU make the attempt to define
the nature, and determine the appropriate and ap
pointed use, of miracles. Objections and errors of
recent origin call for a fresh discussion of this impor
tant subject. And if the path of our inquiry leads
in part through a field not unfamiliar ; yet more pre
cise conceptions of accepted truth are sometimes of
hardly less value than new discoveries. For the sake
of greater clearness, the remarks that follow will be
arranged under a series of special topics.
WHAT IS THE IDEA OF A MIRACLE?
In answering this question we reject at the outset
what the Germans caU the relative nature of the mira
cle, or the notion that the miraculous quality of such
an event is merely relative to human feeling and ap
prehension. This definition does not go beyond the
etymology of the term. But an event which excites
wonder in an extraordinary degree is not thereby con
stituted a miracle. The authority of Augustine has
often been pleaded in favor of this faulty definition.
He says that a miracle is not contrary to Nature, but
only to that Nature which is known to us. The or
dinary operations of Nature, he says, were they un-
famUiar, would excite not less amazement, and are in
reality not less wonderful, than miracles. But in

THE IDEA OF A MIRACLE. 473
Augustine's view, which results from his anti-mam-
chsean philosophy, all the operations of Nature are
immediate exertions of the Divine wUl. In this re
spect, therefore, he can place miracles ih the same cate
gory with the every-day operations of Nature, whUe he
holds, at the same time, that the miracle, when re
garded from another point of view, is an altogether
exceptional event.1 Spinoza, identifying God with
Nature, is consistent in denying that any distinctive
characteristic of an objective kind belongs to a miracle.
This term, he says, has respect only to the opinions
entertained by men, and signifies ¦ no more than this,
that we, or at all events they who narrate the occurrence
in question, are unable to explain it by the analogy of
any other event famUiar to experience. On Spinoza's
scheme, a miracle in the proper sense is a complete
absurdity.2 Schleiermacher, never whoUy able to es-

1 Augustine, De Civ. Dei, xxi. 8, 2. Omnia quippe portenta con
tra Naturam dicimus esse : sed non sunt. Quomodo est enim contra
Naturam, quod Dei fit voluntate, cum voluntas tanti utique Oondito-
ris conditae rei cujusque natura est ? The will of God — the voluntas
of the Creator — is Nature.
a Spinoza devotes c. vi. of the Tract. Theolog-Polit. to the subject
of miracles ; and further considers the subject in his Letters— Epist.
xxi. and xxiii. He says (in the chapter above referred to) : " Ex his
—sequitur, nomen miraouli non nisi respective ad hominum opiniones
posse intelligi, et nihil aliud significare, quam opus, cujus eausam
naturalem exemplo alterius rei solitaa explicare non possumus, vel
saltem ipse non potest, qui miraculum scribit aut narrat." With
Spinoza leges naturales are one and the same with Dei natura. See
the context of the passage.

474 THE CHRISTIAN MIRACLES.
cape from the atmosphere of Pantheism, comes no
nearer the true idea, when he says that any event,
even the most natural, may be styled a miracle, pro
vided the rehgious view of its origin is spontaneously
awakened in the mind, with a forgetfulness of the
proximate natural causes.1 The relative notion of the
1 Wunder ist nur der religiose Name fur Begebenheit : jede, auch
die allernatiirlichste, sobald sie sich dazu eignet, dass die religiose
Ansicht von ihr die herrschende sein kann, ist ein Wunder. Mir ist
alles Wunder, &c. Eeden (6 A.) s. 106. See, also, N. 16, s. 145.
Schleiermacher's views are more fully set forth in his System of
Theology — the Glaubenslehre — § 14 Zusatz, § 34, 2, 3, and § 47.
Though not rejecting the New Testament miracles, as historical oc
currences, he still professes his agreement with those who hold "dass
Gott die Wunder auf eine uns unbegreifliche Art in der Natur selbst
vorbereitet gehabt." B. I. s. 240. But his reasoning to prove that a
divine act must be performed through the system of Nature and
be provided for in that system, is unsound and of a Pantheistic
tendency. Schleiermacher has again discussed the subject of miracles in his
Lectures upon the Life of Jesus, published lately for the first time.
He has taken, however, no new positions. In his endeavor to refer
the miracles of Jesus to energies belonging to Nature, he is perplexed
by the control which Christ exercised over inanimate existence, as in
stilling the tempest, multiplying the loaves of bread; and raising the
dead. (See p. 223.) Such events, he perceives, can be attributed to no
mysterious natural energy, which is supposed to have enabled him to
produce extraordinary effects — for example, in healing— in contact
with living men. Tet the miracles of the class mentioned above are
historically as well attested as any of the rest. This fact Schleier
macher is constrained to allow, and hence finds it impossible to extri
cate himself from the difficulty into which he is thrown, and which
is due to the false assumption as to the relative nature of the miracle,
with which he sets out.
A view homogeneous with that of Schleiermacher has been at-

THE IDEA OF A MIRACLE. 475
miracle fails to separate it objectively and reaUy from a
natural event — an event occurring by natural law,
Neither the degree of astonishment with which events
are regarded, nor the question whether they can be
referred to a previously ascertained law, nor, again,
the question whether they are attributed spontaneously
to the power of God, forms the defining characteristic
of a miraculous occurrence. An attentive observation
of the common phenomena of Nature, as Augustine
and after him Luther and many others have forcibly
pointed out, may well kindle wonder, and in a reU-
tributed to Stanley on the foundation of passages in his work on the
Old Testament History, and is styled the providential theory. (See
Frances Power Cobbe, Broken Lights, p. 31). Events recorded in
Scripture are said to be neither strictly natural nor strictly supernat-
- ural, but specially providential. They are such as to suggest impress
ively the agency of God, and are related to each other as parts of a
great, consistent plan. This theory seems not to differ essentially
from that of Schleiermacher. Whether it be justly ascribed to Stan
ley's interpretation of the Old Testament History, we do not assume
to determine. That the miracles of Christ could not have been performed by
any power embosomed in Nature — as, for example, by an energy
belonging naturally to preeminent human virtue — would seem to be
an obvious truth. Tet a recent writer (Furness, Veil partly Lifted,
p. 216) takes this position, even respecting the resurrection of Jesus.
Aside from the tremendous difficulty of supposing such anomalous
events, as the miracles recorded in the Bible, to be due to any power
latent in human nature, we are cut off from that supposition by the
testimony of Christ himself, and are obliged to refer them to a super
natural author. It is true respecting some, though not respecting the
writer last referred to, that this theory springs from a reluctance to
admit the agency of a living, personal God.

476 THE CHRISTIAN MIRACLES.
o-ious mind wiU carry up the thoughts to God. But
such phenomena are not, on this account; to be
deemed miraculous.1
In defining a miracle we pledge ourselves to no
particular theory concerning the constitution of Nature.
If the new doctrine of the persistency of force — the
correlation of forces, Mr. Grove calls it — should be
established ; if all the phenomena of matter should be
found to be due to varieties of motion — to be varied
mantfestations of one essence ; our present discussion
would not be sensibly affected. If occasionalism be
adopted as the true philosophy ; if it be maintained
that the operations of Nature proceed immediately -
from the volitions of God, the efficiency of second
causes being denied, or even that the phenomena of
Nature are indistinguishable from these volitions, what
we have to say, would, with some verbal modifications,
hold good. For occasionalism does not question the
reality of the facts of Nature ; nor does it scruple to
admit the sequences of Nature, the system in which
these facts conjoin. We proceed, however, upon the
position which is commonly taken by theists, that
secondary causes are real — that matter is an entity
manifesting forces, though requiring the direct sus
tenance and co-working of the power of God. The
t
1 For good remarks on the relative notion of a miracle, see the
valuable Essay of Julius Muller on the subject of Miracles, to which
we shall again refer, c. iv. Eelativa quam vocant miraculi notio
examinatur.

THE IDEA OF'A MIRACLE. 477
forces resident in Nature subsist and act, but they
subsist and act, not without the Divine preservation—
the concursus Dei.
A miracle is an event which the forces of Nature,
' or secondary causes, operating thus under the ordinary
i Divine preservation, are incompetent to produce.1 Sec-
;i ondary causes may be concerned in the production of a
miracle. Eor a miracle (except in the case of creation
de nihilo) is wrought in Nature, or in the realm of
second causes ; but these are insufficient to explain it.
It is an event which only the intervention of the First
Cause is adequate to produce. Beyond the constant
upholding of Nature in the normal exercise of its
powers, there has been an interposition of God to
effect that which otherwise could not have taken place.
Pascal has exactly hit the true nature of a miracle,
I when he terms it a result exceeding the natural force
'of the means employed. If the axe floats on the
water, some power is exerted above the powers of
Nature. They, if left to themselves, would necessarily
carry it to the bottom.
1 In this definition we use the term. Nature as a synonym for the
sum of second causes, or the creation in distinction from God. If
the term be taken less comprehensively, as embracing only man and
the material universe, or that portion of the material universe of
which he has any knowledge, then in order to differentiate a miracle
from other supernatural events — events, for example, which it may
be thought possible for superhuman, created intelligences to bring
to pass— we must add another element to the definition and explicitly
connect the miracle with a volition of God.

478 THE CHRISTIAN MIRACLES.
is A MIRACLE TO BE CONSIDERED A SUSPENSION OR
VIOLATION OF NATURAL LAW?
More commonly this question has been answered
in the affirmative. Yet the point is one on which
theologians are not yet agreed. For example, Dr. N.
W. Taylor, whose discussion of the general subject is
marked by his wonted acuteness, styles a miracle a
" deviation " from some law of Nature, and appears,
also, to sanction the statement that miracles may
involve a violation of natural law.1 On the contrary,
Dr. Julius Muller considers the statement improper
and unfounded.2
The difference is really due to the different mode
in which the phrase, " law of Nature," is defined by
the parties respectively. Dr. Taylor means by a law
of Nature " that established course, or order, of things
or events, which depends solely on the constitution,
properties, or nature of any created thing, and which
admits of no deviation by any created power." The
stated connection between a given event and a certain
set of physical antecedents, which that event is ob
served invariably to follow, is taken as the idea of a
law of Nature. Under this conception, a miracle is
properly said to involve a counteraction, or suspension,
or violation of natural law ; for in the case of the
miracle the presence of a given set of physical -antece
dents is not followed by the usual event. When a
1 See Dr. Taylor's Moral Government, Vol. II. pp. 388, 390.
2 Milller's Essay on Miracles, Caput III.

MIRACLE AND NATURAL LAW. 479
leper is healed, as the effect of a word uttered by a
human voice, the connection usuaUy observed to sub
sist between physical antecedent and consequent, is
dissolved. If the law of Nature be this stated connec
tion, then of course the natural law is suspended or
violated^ But there is another and more exact meaning to
be given to natural law, which does not involve this
consequence. What is natural law but the method in
which a force or energy is observed to operate ? The
laws of Nature are the method of the operation of the
forces which inhere in Nature. Such laws are not a
norm for an energy that is outside of Nature, or is
imported from without. We need not affirm — we are
not authorized to affirm — that a miracle involves a
change in the constitution of matter or mind, or in the
law under which they act. And if it did involve such
change — so that matter, for example, were transformed
into something different from matter — even then the
miraculous event would be no violation of the laws of
matter, since matter, by the supposition, has ceased to
exist, and has been displaced by a substance endowed
with diverse properties. Suppose the axe to float
miraculously upon the water. There is here no viola
tion of the laws of Nature. For the extraordinary
event is not due to the abnormal action of the energies
that belong either to the water or to the iron ; but is
owing rather to the introduction of a new and extrinsic
cause which operates according to a law of its' own.

480 THE CHRISTIAN MIRACLES.
There is no more violation of natural law than if the
axe were upheld upon the water by the human hand.
The effect which a given antecedent, or sum of ante
cedents, would otherwise produee, may be counter
acted by the presence of other forces which are also
natural. This is done whenever a stone is thrown into
the air, or water raised by a pump, or lightning di
verted from a building by an iron rod. In these cases
there is not, as we conceive, any violation of natural
laws. For the law of gravitation is not properly stated
when it is made to involve the bringing to the earth of
a stone in those circumstances under which we observe
the stone to rise ; and the same is true of the other
examples of a supposed infringement of natural law.
So the resurrection to life of a man who has once died
is an effect which the natural causes connected with
the event could not have produced, but, acting by
themselves, must have excluded. But this change of
event is not to be ascribed to an alteration of the norm
under which they act, but whoUy to the introduction
in connection with them of a new and supernatural
cause. The effect which the physical antecedents, if
left to themselves, would have produced, is set aside —
in consequence, however, of an added antecedent, the
Divine power supernaturaUy exerted.
We conclude, therefore, that a miracle, .strictly
speaking, is neither a suspension nor a violation of
natural laws, but rather an event which would be this,
Avere it not for the fact that with the physical ante-

MIRACLES AND EXPERIENCE. 481
cedents there has been associated a supernatural
agency. The English writer who deserves credit for clearly
refuting the idea that a miracle suspends or violates
the laws of Nature, is the Scottish phUosopher, Brown.1
However he may err in unwarrantably extending the
sense of the term Nature (a point on which Dr. Tay
lor animadverts), and however defective may be his
general theory of causation, his observations on the
particular topic before us appear to be conclusive.
IS A MIRACLE CONTRARY TO EXPERIENCE ?
Here, likewise, attention is required to the mean
ing of terms. If experience be a synonym for the
course of things as deduced from observation, then a
miracle is contrary to experience. If we are told that
a leper is cured by a word from human lips, we are
told of an event which is contrary to experience — that
is, inconsistent with Avhat has heretofore been observed
to follow upon the same natural antecedents. If we
submit the case to experiment and reiterate the trial,
using the utmost scientific caution in applying the test,
no such event is observed to foUow.
But if the opposition to experience that is predi
cated of a miracle be understood to involve the idea
that in asserting a miracle we ascribe to the same set
of causes an event different from that which they have
1 Brown's Inquiry into the Belations of Cause and Effect. Ap
pendix, Note E.
31

482 THE CHRISTIAN MIRACLES.
always been observed to produce, then a miracle is not
contrary to experience. For a miracle, we repeat,
implies no contradiction to the maxim that the same
effect is to be expected to follow the same causes. A
mhacle is, by the supposition, an event resulting from
the association of a new -cause with a given set of
physical antecedents. It is true that (save in the
cases, the reality of which is under discussion) we have
no experience of this association of the supernatural
agency with the physical antecedents. But this last
fact is better expressed by the statement that a miracle
is , above or beyond experience — transcends experience
— than by the statement that it clashes with experi
ence. That a miracle should occur when the power
of God is specially exerted in connection with physical
agencies, does not clash with experience.
THE POSSIBILITY OF MIRACLES.
The possibUity of a miracle is the next topic to be
considered. Is it necessary to argue this point before
a believer in God ? Is omnipotence incompetent to
produce events that outreach the capacity of created
Nature? Has He who gave existence to second
causes, exhausted His resources of power in the act
of producing and sustaining them ? Was not the pro
duction of these causes itself a stupendous miracle ?
, There is nothing in our knowledge of the constitu
tion of matter, and of the internal processes of Nature,
of which only the phenomena are presented to our

THE POSSIBILITY OF MIRACLES. 483
observation, to afford the shadow of a support to the
presumptuous proposition that events like the recorded
miracles of the Bible are inherently' impossible to be
effected. How in the regular course of nature the
handful of grain multiplies itself in the harvest which
springs from it, is an insoluble problem. It is an
•inexplicable fact which, after the closest observation
of the successive phenomena attending the change, we
stUl find to be a mystery. That the five loaves should
be multiplied by an agency both different from that of
Nature and superior, so as to furnish food for five
thousand, is another mystery, but a fact which none
but the atheist can consistently declare impossible. A
man who would otherwise sink in death is restored to
health by a medicinal agent administered by a physi
cian's hand. We can only point out the visible ante
cedents of the effect. How they do their work in the
hidden laboratory of Nature, we cannot go far in ex
plaining. We cannot pierce through the veil that
hides the interior process from our eyes. In this
respect, we beheve where we cannot see or explain.
But if it be asserted that the invalid can be restored in
a briefer time and by the exertion of a power different
from any remedial agent in the natural world— say, by
the direct volition of God — who is bold enough to
affirm, who has the shghtest ground for affirming, that
the thing is impossible ?
That a miracle is possible is a proposition com
mended to credence by the survey of the actual phe-

484 THE CHRISTIAN MIRACLES.
nomena of Nature in its various kingdoms. We see
that higher forces so far control the action of lower
that the latter cease to produce the effects which would
result from their exclusive activity. Mechanical forces
are subordinated to chemical attraction. Inorganic
nature is subjected to the operation of vital forces.
Vegetable, and animal existences are endued with
powers AA'hich are, so to speak, superior to the forces
of unorganized matter. The force of gravitation, for
example, gives way, or is apparently overborne, by a
heterogeneous and superior agency. If we could sup
pose ourselves divested of all knowledge of organic
Nature, we should then have the same right, no less
and no more, to deny, on account of the force of gravi
tation, the possibility of the upward growth of a tree,
as the skeptic has now to deny the possibUity. of a
miracle. The former event would be not less foreign
to experience, not less unprovided for in the existences
which Ave had beheld, and in the causes whose opera
tion Ave had observed, than is the instantaneous cure
of blindness by a vohtion, or the raising of a dead
man to life. Nature is the spectacle of realm above
realm, where the subordinate order is taken up and
embraced within ^the superior. Ascending from one
grade to another, we meet with new and diverse phe
nomena, and with a seeming reversal of the laws which
operate on the plane below. This change is due, how
ever, to the incoming and modUying agency of a new
and heterogeneous class of causes.

THE POSSIBILITY OF MIRACLES. 485
StUl more suggestive is the relation of the inteUi-
gent wUl of man to the forces of the uninteUigent
creation. Here, Avithin the domain of Nature, effects
are produced analogous to the miracle. The will in
relation to the matter with which it is connected and
over which it has power, is a heterogeneous and super
natural cause. The changes in matter which it pro
duces take place, to be sure, in agreement with the
laws of matter, yet they are changes and effects which
originated not in the sphere of matter, but in a motor
outside and above material forces. A gesture of the
hand is the result of a train of causes — as the action
of the brain, the nerve, the muscle— a train, however,
which begins in a volition. It is true, there is no
analogy, as far as we can judge, between the influence
of the will upon existences exterior to it, and the exer
tion of creative power. The will, in its action on mat
ter, can modify that which already existed, but cannot
caU into being what is not. Here the limits of human
power are reached. A miracle that involves creative
power has no paraUel, as far as we can judge, with any
possible exertion of man's voluntary agency. But with
this exception, the control of the human wUl over
matter bears a striking resemblance to the more potent
operation of the Divine will, and exhibits impressively
the possibUity of such a miraculous operation.

486 THE CHRISTIAN MIRACLES.
THE PROBABILITY OF MIRACLES : THE PRESUMPTION
ADVERSE TO THE OCCURRENCE OF MIRACLES.
That a miraculous event, looked at by itself, is
improbable, needs no proof. The incredulity which
the report of such an event awakens in an educated
mind, implies an anterior presumption opposed to its
occurrence. There are some defenders of Christianity
who are inclined to put a miracle, in regard to the
proof required to establish it, on the same footing with
an ordinary event. They take, as we conceive, an
untenable position, and one that is likely to harm more
than it helps their carse. It is freely admitted that a
presumption lies against the occurrence of a miracle.
But before we can measure the strength of this pre
sumptive disbelief, Ave must inquire mto the sources
of it. This presumption is founded in our belief in the
uniformity of Nature. But what is the nature and
ground of this behef ?
It is not, as some philosophers have held, an in
stinctive faith that things will continue to be as they
are — that the future will reproduce the present.1 For
our belief in the uniformity of Nature points back
ward, as weU as forward. It relates to what has oc
curred in the past, not less than to what is expected to
occur hereafter. Moreover, the supposed axiom is
* Just objections to this form of statement are presented by J. S.
Mill, in his Logic.

THE PROBABILITY OF MIRACLES. 487
inexact in leaving room for the assumption of a kind
of sameness in the recurrence of physical phenomena,
which experience disproves. For example, the climate
of our latitude has not always been what it is now ;
nor is it now- what it wUl be hereafter. The globe and
the whole physical universe, by the mere operation of
physical causes, have undergone vast and various
changes. New and before unobserved phenomena
have sprung into being. The saying, that things will
be what they are or have been, describes no original
belief of the mind, or is, at best, a vague and inaccu
rate statement of any such belief.
The presumptive disbelief of the educated mind in
miracles is founded in our conviction that there is a
system of Nature. Scientific investigation has inspired
a belief in the sway of general laws, as opposed to
preternatural intervention. The progress of science,
from Thales downward, has largely consisted in the
elimination of supposed divine interferences and in
the disclosure of . an established order. One depart
ment -of Nature after another has been brought within
the circle of ascertained law. Phenomena, seemingly
capricious, have been found to recur with a regularity
not less unvarying than the succession of day and
night. Events that were once thought to be whoUy
owing to a preternatural cause can be predicted in
advance by a process of mathematics. Not two cen
turies ago, leading ministers of New England consid
ered a comet to be a special messenger from God to

488 THE CHRISTIAN MIRACLES.
forewarn men of punitive calamities which Avere im
pending over them.1
The conviction which is excited by the results of
scientific investigation, relative to the unvarying con
trol of natural law, is not without support from another
quarter. Such an arrangement, generally speaking,
best harmonizes with our ideas of the wisdom and
majesty of God. We should expect that He would
stamp regularity upon the operations of' Nature.
Moreover, the uniformity of Nature — the exemption,
in general, of Nature from supernatural intervention —
is a most benevolent arrangement. The fixed course
of Nature is a vast and indispensable blessing . to man.
It is essential that we should be able to count upon
the future ; to anticipate the rising of the sun at a
given hour ; to foresee that the bread which we take
for the nourishment of life will not turn out to be
poisonous ; to be certain that when vitahty is gone
there is no hope of revoking the principle of life.
Were it not for the order of Nature, aU human calcula
tions would be baffled, human judgments left without

1 See, for example, Dr. Increase Mather's " Koprjroypafaa, or a
Discourse concerning Comets, wherein the Nature of Blazing Staes
is enquired into," &c, &c, with "two Sermons occasioned by the
late Blazing Stars." Boston : 1683. We have quoted but a small
fraction of the title. In the Discourses are stated "the horrible
massacres, fires, plagues, tempests, hurricanes, wai-s, and other judg
ments " which have followed the appearance of Comets in all ages.
It is an amusing instance of the fallacious confounding of the propter
hoc with the post hoc.

PRESUMPTION AGAINST MIRACLES. 489
a foundation to rest upon, and infinite disorder and
confusion everywhere prevail. The ends of a wise
benevolence are best met by marking out the course
of Nature and leaving it to move on the appointed
track. Such is the force of these considerations that we
*' unhesitatingly reject the testimony by which most
aUeged miracles are supported. In reading early
historians, like Herodotus, or mediaeval chroniclers,
like Gregory of Tours, or in listening to the modern
necromancers, whenever we perceive, and in propor
tion as we perceive, that an event which they report
involves a miracle, we instantaneously disbelieve the
1 narrative. Such disbelief is felt to be the dictate of
reason. And this aversion of the mind to give credence to
a miracle is augmented by the necessity under which
the historical student is placed, of rejecting so vast an
amount of miraculous narrative. It may be said, to
be sure, that the evidence from testimony is defective ;
for such is the truth in numberless instances of pre
tended miracle. Yet, in some cases, were the events
which are too much for our faith, unmiraculous, we
should deem the testimony on which they rest to be
sufficient. In -these cases we deny credence simply
and solely on the ground of a rational reluctance to
beheve in miracles. For example, we credit Herodo
tus in a thousand places, where the proofs — apart from
the character of the events reported — are no greater

490 THE CHRISTIAN MIRACLES.
than those which he brings forward in relating the
miraculous. We fully concede, then, that there is an antecedent,
rational presumption against the truth of a narrative
involving miracle, a presumption resting proximately
upon the experience of the uniformity of Nature, and
ultimately upon our conviction of the wisdom and
desirableness of such an arrangement ; and acquiring
additional force from the knowledge, which history and
observation afford, of the creduhtv of mankind and the
prevalence of superstition.
HOW MAY THE PRESUMPTION ADVERSE TO MIRACLES BE
REMOVED ?
The uniformity of Nature, in the sense of excluding
supernatural intervention, is not an intuitive truth— a
truth of reason. That like causes will produce like
effects is indeed — as far as the physical world is con
cerned, for we leave out of consideration the wtfl — an
axiom of reason. But the uniformity of Nature in
volves another proposition, namely, that the sum of
forces operating in Nature remains the same — with no
introduction of supernatural power. And our behef in
the uniformity of Nature has no greater strength than
belongs to the presumption that supernatural interposi
tion wiU not occur.
But every theist knows that supernatural interposi
tion has occurred in the past ; that aU things which
he beholds owe their existence to such an exertion of

THE PRESUMPTION REMOVED. 491
the Divine wUl. For he traces them aU to an act of
creation. Moreover, science affords a kind of historical proof
that acts of creation have occurred. The origination
of aU the types or species of living beings found on the
earth, requires the supposition of a creative act, since
Geology points back to a time when no germs of ani
mated being existed on the globe. If the old doctrine
of the original distinctness of existing species be still
held, which no facts have thus far disproved, we are
led to the necessary assumption of a series of creative
acts. The uniformity of Nature is thus seen to be no
absolute truth.
But for what end does material Nature exist ?
Surely not for its own sake. The end for which Na
ture exists must be sought outside of Nature itself.
Nature is only a part of a more comprehensive system.
Nature is an instrument, not an end. The moral
administration of God is superior and aU-comprehen-
sive. The fixed order of Nature is appomted to pro
mote the ends of wisdom and goodness. The same
motive which dictated the establishment of this order
may prescribe a deviation from it ; or rather may have
originally determined that the natural order should
at certam points give way to supernatural mani
festation. That is to say, if the object to be secured is suffi
ciently commanding, or, in other words, tf the benefit
to result outweighs aU the evUs which may be sup-

492 THE CHRISTIAN MIRACLES.
posed to attend a Divine intervention, the antecedent
presumption against the miracle is set aside and over
borne. Supposing an end worthy of the intervention of
God, a miracle is perfectly consistent with the immu
table character of the Divine administration. This lies
in the unity of the end. The same end is pursued,
but the means of attaining it are varied. Now He
makes use of natural law, and now of special interven
tion. There is no disturbance of the grand harmony
that pervades the Divine administration. The acts of
Divine Providence, both natural and miraculous, form
together one consistent whole. A commander, who
commonly issues his orders through subordinates, does
not interfere with the ends he has in view, if he
chooses, now and then, to ride over the field and per
sonally convey his commands. He is guUty of no
fickleness, if he alter the disposition of his forces to
suit a new set of circumstances. This alteration may
even have been embraced in his foresight. Nor is the
Ruler of the country inconsistent with himseU, when
he augments, or diminishes, or whoUy disbands, the
mUitary force which he has himseU organized. For
this force does not exist for its own sake. It was
created for a special end outside of itseU, and is
moulded with sole reference to the benefit sought. A
miracle is not a prodigy, a mere wonder (riqceg),
fulfilling no moral end, a' disturbance of the natural
order, carrying with it no advantage. But a miracle

IMMUTABILITY OF GOD. 493
is also a sign (Grjfisiov), signifying something, fulfill
ing an idea, and serving an end.1
Hence, a miracle .imphes no afterthought on the
part of God — as if he resorted to a measure which He
had not originally purposed. In the plan of this
world, miracles not less than natural events had then-
appointed place. The Divine Being as truly deter
mined to exert supernatural poAver at the points where
miracles occur,/as to act elsewhere through general
laws. In short, miracles are fully accordant with the
laws of the Universe, or of the universal system which
includes God. A departure, in one sense of the terms,
from the law of Nature, they are yet harmonious with,
and required by, the laws of the Universe. The
higher law prescribes their occurrence.2
1 Of the three terms used in the New Testament to designate a
miracle, ripas corresponds to miraculum and denotes the subjective
effect on the mind ; onpelov denotes the significance of the event; and
hwdpeis the supernatural energies to which it must be due.
3 It is a relief to turn from the vagueness of many modern writers
to the greater precision of the Schoolmen. Thomas Aquinas (Sum
ma, P. I. Quaest. 105, Art. 6) handles the question whether God can
do anything praeter ordinem rebus indutum. He explains that every
order, is dependent upon a cause, and that one order may be subject
to another that is higher and more comprehensive : as the family
which is dependent on the father is embraced in the city, which, in
turn, is included in the kingdom. A miraele is no violation of the
order of things, as dependent upon the First Cause.
In another passage (P. I. Quaest. 110, Art. 4), Thomas discusses
the question utrum angeli possint facere miracula. He admits that
superhuman creatures can bring to pass events which are miracles
quoad nos ; that is, events which surpass the power of any created
sauses with which we are acquainted. But he responds to the ques-

494 THE CHRISTIAN MIRACLES.
It wUl be objected that we are unqualified to say
Avhen a moral emergency that caUs for a miracle is
constituted. To a certain extent, this may be granted.
We cannot take into view the entire Divine system.
We may be disposed to set up a claim for the inter
vention of God in cases where a wiser being would be
of another mind. This, however, may fairly be de
manded of every theist, that as he believes in an inter
vention of God at the successive epochs of creation, so
he shall be prepared to expect a similar intervention at
epochs equally momentous in the new spiritual crea
tion, or the redemption of mankind from their bondage
to evil. The antecedent presumption against the
occurrence of miracles may exist in different degrees
of strength. It may, in a given set of circumstances,
be greatly weakened without wholly disappearing.
But a crisis can be conceived to exist, an exigency can
be conceived to arise, where this presumption wholly
vanishes and even yields to an expectation of the oppo
site character. The need of Revelation, and of mira
cles to verify and give effect to Revelation, constitutes
an occasion justifying the Divine intervention.
THE FALLACY OF HUME'S ARGUMENT.
The preceding remarks suggest the proper answer
to the reasoning of Hume against the possibUity of
tion negatively, because a miracle, properly speaking, is praeler ordi
nem totius naturae creatae -something, therefore, which only God
can do.

FALLACY OF HUME'S ARGUMENT. 495
proving a miracle. He ignores the fact of a supernat
ural moral government over the world of Nature and
of men. Our belief both in the constancy of Nature
and in human testimony, says Hume, is founded on
experience. In regard to the former point, this expe
rience is umform (since the cases of supposed miracle,
being under discussion, are not to be assumed as
exceptions). In respect to the credibUity of testimony,
however, if we suppose apparently credible testimony
to be pUed never so high, nothing more is required for
believing it to be falsely given than to suppose a viola
tion of natural law ; that is, of the laws connected with
the giving of credible testimony. But if we accept the
testimony, and believe the fact it alleges, we are
obliged to assume the same thing ; namely, the viola
tion of natural law. In other words, we are required
by the reporters of a miraculous event to accept one
miracle in order to avoid another ! We have stated
the gist of Hume's argument. The fallacy does not
consist in the postulate that a miracle is contrary to
experience ; for there is a logical propriety in this pro
visional assumption. But the fallacy lies in the
assumption that a miracle is just as likely to occur in
the one place as in the other ; that we may as ration
ally expect a miracle to be wrought in the matter of
testimony, whereby the laws of evidence are miracu
lously converted into a vehicle for deceiving and mis
leading mankind, as to suppose a miracle in the physi
cal world, like the healing of the blind. Hume's

496 THE CHRISTIAN MIRACLES.
argument is valid only on the hypothesis that God is
as ready to exert supernatural power to make truth
ful men falsify, as to perform the miracles of the Gos
pel. Introduce the fact of a personal God, a moral
Government, and a wise and benevolent end tp be sub
served through miraculous interposition, and Hume's
reasoning is emptied of all its force.1
THE SPECIAL FUNCTION OR USE OF MIRACLES.
This is a topic deserving of more full examination.
Why is Revelation attended with miracles ? What
particular end is subserved by supernatural manifesta-
1 Most of the opponents of Hume have failed to overthrow his
reasoning. Assuming that the uniformity of Nature is ascertained
from testimony, they have claimed that testimony does not prove
this uniformity to be unvarying, and that Hume, in taking the oppo
site position, begs the question in dispute. If they are correct, there
is no greater a priori improbability of a miracle than of a natural
event ; and the same amount of proof which satisfies us that a man
has sunk in the water, suffices to prove that he has walked on the
water or subdued the billows with a word. If they are correct, an
event inexplicable by natural laws is as credible as the every-day
phenomena of Nature. They forget that the uniformity of Nature is
a legitimate generalization from experience. It is not- a bare record
of facts and observations, but an authorized (though not absolute)
generalization on the basis of them. It is true that J. S. Mill and philos
ophers of the Positivist type, who exclude an a priori element from
induction, have no good warrant for any generalization — any dictum
more comprehensive than the cases actually observed. Hume, to be
sure, is logically involved by his philosophical theories in the same
embarrassment. But on a sound philosophy, we are obliged to admit
a presumption against miracles, which requires to be removed.

THE FUNCTION OF MIRACLES. 497
tion in connection with Christianity ? These are the
questions to be considered.
It has been sometimes thought that the miracles
of Christ were to prove His Divinity. But this, in our
judgment, is an error. The miracles of Christ do not
differ in kind from those which are attributed to the
prophets of the Old Testament. By the prophets the
sick were healed and the dead revived. Nothing in
the quality of the works wrought by Christ, therefore,
can authorize us to put this interpretation upon them.
If we look at the teaching of the New Testament, we
discover that neither Christ nor the apostles attach
this peculiar significance to His miraculous works. On
the contrary, they are explicitly said to be performed
by the Father, or by the Father through Him. They
are said to be effected by a power which, though it
permanently abide in Him, was yet given Him of
God. They are sometimes preceded by the offering
of prayer to the Father. They are declared to be a
manifestation of the power and majesty of the Father.
And in keeping with these representations is the
circumstance that no miraculous works proceeded
from Jesus prior to the epoch of His baptism and
entrance on His public ministry. The Divinity of
Jesus is a truth which rests upon His testimony and
that of the apostles, and not upon the fact that He per
formed works exceeding human povrer.1
1 The scriptural proof that the miracles of Christ were not to
prove his Divinity, is presented more in detail in tho Essay of Muller.
32

498 THE CHRISTIAN MIRACLES.
The old view that miracles are to authenticate the
divine mission of a religious teacher, is the correct
view. They are a proof which God condescends to
afford, that the person by whom they are wrought is
clothed with an authority to speak in His name. This
being their special office, Christ never performed
miracles for the promotion of His own personal com
fort. That miracles are in this way a testimony of
God, is declared by the Saviour. " The works which
the Father hath given me to finish, the same works
that I do, bear witness of me, that the Father hath
sent. me!' 1 " 'If thou be the Christ, tell us plainly.'
Jesus answered them, ' I told you and ye believed not ;
the works that I do in my Father's name, they bear
witness of me.' " 2 We need not cite the numerous
passages in which the miracles are set forth as the
proper signs of Messiahship. An emphatic example
is the response of Jesus to the messengers who came
from John the Baptist with the question whether He
was indeed the Christ. The miracles of Christ, then,
See Mark vii. 34 ; John xi. 41, 42, v. 36, ix. 25, 33, xiv. 10, xi. 40 ;
cf. Luke ix. 43. See also Aots ii. 22, cf. Acts x. 38. There is only
one passage (John ii. 11) which could be thought to suggest a differ
ent view. But the 8o'£a which Christ manifested forth by the mira
cle at Cana was the messianic glory, implying, indeed, in the view of
John, divinity (see John i. 14) ; yet not identically the 6d£a for which
Christ prays in John xvii. 5. Hence John ii. 11 cannot be consid
ered as inconsistent with the general tenor of the New Testament
representations on this subject, which is seen in the passages above
cited, many of which are from John.
1 John v. 36. 2 John x. 24, 25.

IMPORTANCE OF MIRACLES. 499
are the testimony of God to His supernatural, divine.
mission ; and the miracles of the apostles have a sim
Uar design and import.1
Is this end unimportant ? Surely, tf the Christian
religion is important, it is essential that its authorita
tive character should be established. Whether the
doctrine is of God, or Christ speaks of himself;
whether the Gospel is only one more experiment in
1 Muller has attempted, successfully, as we think, to show that
the miracles of Christ were also intended to he symbolical of His spir
itual agency, and of relations in His spiritual kingdom. The miracles
of healing symbolized, and commended to faith, His ability to cure
the soul of its disorders. The feeding of the multitude set forth the
possibility, through Him, of accomplishing great things in His cause
by apparently insignificant means. His resurrection from the dead is
a standing symbol, in the writings of Paul, for the spiritual awaken
ing from the death of sin.
j That the miracles of Christ, besides the principal end of authen
ticating his mission, had other collateral motives and ends, is not
questioned. ' They undoubtedly serve to impress the mind with the
fact of the personality of God. They are thus an antidote to Pan
theistic sentiment, as well as to the Deism which puts God far off.
They are, also, a natural expression of the compassionate feelings of
Christ towards all in distress. Says Chastel, in his excellent Etudes
Eistorigues, upon the Influence of Charity in the early Church, p.
30, " Cest parce que Jesus aimait que, tout en publiant la nouvelle
du royaume des Cieux, il guerissait, dit l'historien, les maladies et les
langueurs du peuple (Matt. iv. 23, 24). Cette meme compassion qui
le saisissait a, la vue de la foule errante et sans guide (Matt. ix. 36),
I'attendrissait aussi sur d'autres souffrances ; il allait de lieu en lieu
faisant du bien et laissant partout des marques de son inepuisable
sympathie." This is true ; yet there was another, which was, also,
the principal motive— the attestation of His messianic mission and
office.

500 THE CHRISTIAN MIRACLES.
speculation, one more effort of erring reason to solve
the problems of life, is surely a question of capital
importance. Every sober and practical mind desires,
first of all, to know if the Gospel can be depended
upon. The authority and certainty of the Christian
system are of inestimable value ; and these are guaran
teed by miracles.
Just at this point we encounter one of the most
popular objections to the attestation of a Revelation by
miracles. A miracle, it is urged, is an exertion of
power. But how can a display of power operate to
convince the reason or quicken the sense of obligation ?
The binding force of a moral precept lies in its intrin
sic character. Obedience on any other ground is
worthless. Now can a miracle add to the obhgation
to foUow that which is right ? or create a sense of
obligation which the law itself faUs to excite ? Is not
a miracle in such a case something heterogeneous,
impertinent ? The objection is equivalent to the
discarding of the principle of authority in religion
altogether. We answer, that as far as Christianity is
preceptive, the force of authority is a distinct motive
superadded to the perceived rectitude of the law, and
is both a legitimate and effective motive — as truly as
I parental authority, including the whole influence of a
parent's wiU and a parent's love, is a proper influence
in the heart of a child. As far as Christianity is a
testimony to truth which the human mind cannot dis
cern or cannot to its own full satisfaction prove, every-

THE FUNCTION OF MIRACLES. 501
thing depends on having this testimony fully estab
lished. And, in general, there is a fallacy in the sup
position that religious truth must be either discerned
intuitively and with perfect clearness, or be cast aside
as of no use. ' Reason may be educated up to the
understanding and appreciation of what was once
comparatively dark and unmeaning. The outward
reception of that which is commended by authority
may be foUowed by insight. . This is that elevation of
reason to the level of revealed truth which Lord Bacon
declares that we are bound to accomplish. We recog
nize the principle of authority whenever we devote
ourselves to the study of a scientific treatise which we
know to be true, but have not yet mastered. Every
boy who engages in the study of Euclid, does this
with the prior conviction that his text-book contains
truth, but truth which he can appropriate to himself
not without strenuous exertion. The Gospel system,
when attested by miracles, makes an analogous claim
upon the soul. It calls for obedience, consecration ; it
rewards these with apprehension, insight. The creden-
• tials which attest it put the mind in the right attitude
for inwardly receiving its lofty and inspiring lessons.
While it is the office of the Christian miracles to
verify the supernatural, divine mission of Christ, we
are far from considering that they are the exclusive, or
even the foremost, proof of this great truth ; or even
that, by themselves, they are adequate to the produc
tion of an inward faith. But of their relation to the

502 THE CHRISTIAN MIRACLES.
other sources of Christian evidence, we shaU speak
more fully under another head.
A recollection of the end for which miracles are
wrought, will expose the faUacy of the current skep
tical objection that miracles would imply a flaw in the
constitution of material Nature, which needs to be
repaired through a special intervention. The need of
miracles is not founded on the existence of any defect
in Nature. The system of Nature is good and is
worthy of God. It is fitted, in itself considered, to
disclose the attributes of the Creator and to call forth
feelings of adoration in the human mind. The defect
is not in Nature. But the mind of man is darkened
so that this primal revelation is obscurely discerned ;
his character, moreover, is corrupted beyond the power
of seU-recovery, in consequence of his apostasy from
God. Now, if God shall mercifully approach with new
light and new help, why shall He not verify to man
the fact of His presence, by supernatural manifestations
of His power and goodness ? In this case, Nature
is used as an instrument for an ulterior moral end.
The miracle is not to remedy an imperfection in Na
ture, but is, like the Revelation which it serves to
attest, a product of the condescension of God. He
condescends to address evidence to the senses, or to the
understanding through the senses, in order to open a
way for the conveyance of the highest spiritual blessing
to mankind. Material Nature, be it remembered,

MIRACLES AND MORAL EVIDENCE. 503
does not include the end of its existence in itself. It
is a subordinate member of a vaster system, and has
only an instrumental value.
Of a piece with the objection just noticed, is the
vague representation that something sacred is violated
by a miracle. Hume styled a miracle a transgression
of natural law — skUfuUy availing himself of a word
which usually denotes the infringement of a moral law,
and so carries with it an association of guUt.1 Several
recent writers have more directly propounded a like
notion. Such views may be pertinent under a scheme
of sentimental Pantheism where Nature is deified.
Only he who holds, with Spinoza, that Nature is God,
can deem a miracle repugnant to the attributes of God.
When the attempt is made to connect such notions
with any higher theory of the universe, they deserve
no respect, but rather contempt. As if it were derog
atory to the Divine Being to save a human hfe by
any other than physical agencies, even when the prin
cipal end to-be attained is the verification of a heaven-
given remedy for the soul and for the disorders which
sin has brought into it !
THE RELATION OF MIRACLES TO THE MORAL PROOFS OF
CHRISTIANITY.
The question has often been discussed whether the
strongest proof of the divine origin of Christianity is
found in its doctrine or its miracles. Some have gone
1 Hume's Essays, Vol. II. Appendix, K.

504 THE CHRISTIAN MIRACLES.
so far as to say that the doctrine proves the miracles,
not the miracles the doctrine. The truth on the subject
has been more properly set forth in the aphorism of
Pascal : " Doctrines must be judged by miracles .-
miracles must be judged by doctrines."
It is plain that a doctrine which the unperverted
conscience pronounces immoral or inconsistent with
the perfections of God, cannot be received on the
ground of aUeged or supposed miracles attending it.
This principle is declared in the Bible itself, in a mem
orable injunction given to the Israelites.1 We must
conclude, to be sure, that all wonders which the
teacher of such doctrine performs, are "lying won
ders ; " that they are either the product of jugglery or
are wrought by supernatural evil beings whose force
surpasses that of men, and who are, therefore, able to
counterfeit the works of Divine power.
In accordance with the tendency of this principle,
is the reply of Jesus to the charge, that his miracles
Avere wrought by the power of Satan. He does not
deny that works, surpassing the power of men, may
be done through the aid of devUs ; but he responds to
the charge by a moral consideration. Ah evil being
Avould not work against himself and exert power against
his oAvn minions.
So much is clear, then, that a doctrine must be
negatively unobjectionable on the score of morality or
of moral tendency, in order to challenge our faith,
1 Deuteronomy xiii. 1-4.

MIRACLES AND MORAL EVIDENCE. 505
whatever wonderful works may attend the annunciation
of it. But a still more positive and important place be
longs to doctrine in the evidence for the divine origin
of Christianity. The foregoing discussion has evinced
that in order to prove miracles, the anterior presump
tion adverse to their occurrence must be set aside.
' The necessity of Revelation and of a method of salva:
tion which man is unable to originate, partially pre
pares the mind to expect miracles. But the contents
of the professed Revelation are of not less moment in
their bearing on this anterior expectation. The more
exceUent the doctrine, the more it seems to surpass the
capacity of the unaided human faculties, the more it
appears adapted to the necessities of our nature, in
fine, the more worthy it is to have God for its author,
so much the more credibility is given to the miracles
which, it is claimed, have accompanied it. The doc
trine and the miracles are two mutually supporting
species of evidence. The more the mind is struck
with the divine excellence of the doctrine, the more
likely does it seem that this doctrine should be attend
ed with miracles. If the doctrine is noble and worthy
and sufficient, we naturaUy look for miracles, and only
require that they shaU be recommended to belief by
faithful testimony.
In these remarks we have compared'?/^ doctrine
with the miracles, as sources of proof. The moral
proofs of Christianity, however, comprehend much

506 THE CHRISTIAN MIRACLES.
more than what is understood by Christian doctrine.
As affecting the presumption relative to .the occurrence
of miracles, we must take into view the character of
Jesus, the entire spirit and plan of his hfe, aU the
circumstances connected with the planting of Christian
ity in the world. It is unwarranted and unwise to
isolate one element of Christianity, as the miracles, or
the doctrine, from the other elements which are con-^
nected with it, and form, as it were, one vital whole.
Christ and Christianity, as they are presented in the
New Testament Scriptures, stand out as one complex
phenomenon, which we are called upon to explain.
Nothing can be appreciated by itseU, but everything
(must be looked at in its organic relation. The moral
evidence of the supernatural origin of Christianity in
cludes the teaching of Christ and the Christian system
of doctrine, but it embraces much more — much that
is inseparably associated with the doctrine.
Farther stiU, we are required to consider Christian
ity in the light of a mighty historic movement, begin
ning in the remote past, extending in a continuous
progress through many ages, culminating in the advent
and life of Christ, and in the establishment of his
Church, but flowing onward in its effects, through aif
ever-widening channel, clown to the present day. We
have to contemplate the striking peculiarity of this
great historic movement, which embraces the unfold
ing, through successive stages, or epochs, of a religion
distinct in its spirit as well as in its renovating power

MIRACLES AND MORAL EVIDENCE. 507
from aU other rehgions known among men. And Ave
have to connect with this view a survey of its subse
quent diffusion and leavening influence in human so
ciety. Comparing this rehgion with the native charac
teristics of the people among whom it appeared, and
from whose hands the priceless treasure was at length
delivered to mankind, we are to ask ourselves if this
rehgion, so pure and salutary, so 'enduring and influen
tial, so strong as to survive temporary eclipse and
withstand through a long succession of ages, before the
fuU light appeared, an adversary as powerful as human
barbarism and corruption, can be the product of man's
invention. And whatever reason there is for rejecting
this supposition as irrational, is so much argument for
the Christian miracles.
It deserves remark that miracles appear especiaUy
at the signal epochs in the progress of the gradually
developing system of religion. This circumstance has
been pointed out by Christian apologists.1 In connec
tion with Moses, who marks an era in the communica
tion of the true religion ; then, after a long interval, in
connection with the prophets, who introduce an era
not less peculiar and momentous, and then, after a
long suspension of miraculous manifestation, in con
junction with the final and crowning epoch of Revela
tion, with the ministry of Christ and the founding of
the Church, the supernatural is seen to break into the
course of history. There is an impressive analogy be-
1 See Dr. A. P. Peabody's Christianity, the Eeligion of Nature.

508 THE CHRISTIAN MIRACLES.
tween the spiritual creation or renewal .of humanity,
and the physical creation, Avhere successive eras are
inaugurated by the exertion of supernatural agency in
the introduction of new species, and after each epoch
history is remanded, as it were, to its natural course
in pursuance of an established order. Miracle would
seem to be the natural expression and verification of
an opening era in the >spiritual enlightenment of man
kind, when neAv forces are introduced by the great
Author of light and ltfe, and a new development,
sets in.
In this place may be noticed a criticism which is
frequently heard, in these days, from the side of disbe
lief. Miracles, it is said, are put forward as the
evidences of Revelation, but miracles are the very
thing which require to be proved. " Miracles," it is
triumphantly asserted, "instead of affording satisfactory
proof of anything, are now usually found in the dock
instead of the witness-box of the court of criticism." 1
To this we reply, that when the testimony of a witness
is such as to conclude the case, and that witness is
impeached, of course the main effort is turned in the
direction of establishing his credibility. When a mes
senger brings a communication of a momentous nature,
the character of his credentials becomes a question
of vast consequence and draws to itseU a proportionate
degree of attention. Are these credentials genuine,
the contents of his message wUl command respect.
1 Mackay, The Tubingen School, &c, p. 56.

MIRACLES AND MORAL EVIDENCE. 509
Are the credentials fabricated, his message is devoid
of authority. To scrutinize the credentials and, in
case they are worthy of credit, to remove the doubts
of the skeptical, is thus a matter of prime importance.
But the faUacy of the objection implied in the quota
tion above, does not rest on this consideration alone.
If miracles attest the Christian Revelation, they are
also a part — one side — of that Revelation itself. They
are constitutive of Revelation, so that in proving them
we are establishing not so much a collateral circum
stance as a part of the main fact. They are one ele-N
ment in the immediate manifestation of God. The
doctrine is divine, but the works also are divine.
The presumption in favor of the miracles, that is
created by the excellence and credibUity of the doctrine,
does not supersede the needjjfjniracles, nor does it \j
supersede the need of faithful testimony to their occur
rence. He has a poor understanding of logic who
does not know that two sources of evidence may lend
to each other a mutual support. The excellence of the
doctrine sustains the testimony to the miracles ; the
proof of the miracles establishes the divinity of the
doctrine. It is sometimes urged that if miracles are necessary
in the original communication of Christianity, they are
not less to be expected in the propagation of it. And
the question is asked why we refuse to give credit to
reports of more modern miracles, or why such miracles

510 THE CHRISTIAN MIRACLES.
are not wrought now in conjunction with missionary
labor? We do not consider the supposition that
miracles have been wrought since the apostolic age to
be so absurd as many seem to regard it. So thorough
a historical critic as Neander hesitates to disbelieve the
testimony to the miracles said to be performed by
that devout and holy preacher, St. -Bernard, and so
great a man as Edmund Burke takes the same ground
in respect to the miracles attributed to early Saxon
missionaries in Britain. But there is generaUy a defect
in the character of the testimony, in the habits of
careful observation, or of trustworthy reporting, which,
apart from other considerations, prevents us from
giving credit to the Catholic miracles. It is remark
able that some of the most eminent mediaeval mission
aries disclaimed the power of performing miracles.
This is true of Ansgar, the famous apostle of the North
of Europe, and of Boniface, the stUl more celebrated
apostle of Germany. They were ready to give cre
dence to the pretensions of others, but for themselves
professed to be endued with no supernatural powers.
Besides this, however, there is another consideration
of almost decisive weight. The origination of Chris
tianity, a method of salvation, is beyond human power;
'not so the propagation of the religion which is once
communicated. We agree that the general method of
the Divine government is that of leaving men to dis
cover for themselves what the unaided human faculties
are competent to find out. The laws of astronomy,

POST-APOSTOLIC MIRACLES. 511
the physical structure and history of the globe, with
all the sciences and arts which belong to civUization,
it is left for human investigation, in the slow toil of
centuries, to develop. But the true knowledge of God
was practically inaccessible ; salvation was something
which fallen man could not achieve of himself. It
accords, therefore, with the method of God to leave the
diffusion of the blessings of Christianity, when they
are once communicated, to the agency of men, with
holding miraculous (though not supernatural) assistance
to their endeavors.1 It is plain that in the Divine ad
ministration there is what has been called an economy,
or sparing use, of miracle. The Saviour's whole man
ner of speaking on the subject, as weU as the course
Avhich he pursued, appears to indicate that miracles
are an accommodation to human weakness, and are
granted in response to an unwonted exigency. Com
paring ourselves, or any heathen nation, with the age.
contemporary with Christ, we find ourselves in posses
sion of other proofs derived from the operation of
Christianity in the world, which may weU stand in the
room of any ocular demonstration of its heavenly
origin. 1 That supernatural agency of God which is not manifestly super
natural, but which is so connected with the operation of natural
causes that its presence is not palpable, we do not style miracu
lous. To this supernatural, but not miraculous, agency, belongs the
Regeneration and Sanctification of the soul. Providential answers
to prayer may fall under the same head— to prayer, for instance, for
the restoration of the sick.

512 THE CHRISTIAN MIRACLES.
The foregoing remarks wUl prepare the reader for
the observation that miracles are an inferior species of
proof, compared with the moral evidence of the divine
origin of Christianity, and, independently of the im
pression, made by this last kind of evidence, must
fail to convince. Such is undeniably the rank assigned
to miracles by the Saviour himseU. Apart from
miracles, there was proof of his divine mission, as he
considered, which ought to satisfy the mind. But tf
this proof left the mind still skeptical, he pointed to
the miracles. "Believe me that I am in the Father,
and the Father in me ; or else believe me for the very
works' sake." 1 A weak faith, an inchoate faith, miracles
might confirm. Where there was a receptive temper,
some degree of spiritual susceptibility, miracles were a
provocative and aid of faith. But where there was an
entire insensibility to the moral side of the gospel, or
¦ an absence of any such craving for the truth as gave
it a degree of self-evidencing power, the Saviour
refused to work miracles. Miracles have for such
minds no convincing efficacy. They would be referred
either to occult natural causes or to diabolical agency.
Miracles could develop and reinforce the faith which
moral evidence had partiaUy awakened. They could
not create that faith outright. They could not serve as
a substitute for the proofs which touch directly the
reason and conscience. They could not kindle spiritual
ltfe under the ribs of death. They were an appeal to
1 John xiv. 11.

MIRACLES AND MORAL EVIDENCE. 513
the senses, symbolizing the spiritual operation of the
gospel, and subordinately aiding the confidence of the
darkened soul in the divine reality of the gospel. All
the teaching of Christ concerning the place and use of
his miracles, and concerning the comparative value and
dignity of the proof from miracles and from the moral
evidence of his divine mission, corroborates the doc
trine we have laid down, that the former are subsidiary
and secondary, and are due to the condescension of
God, who affords an extraordinary prop, and one we
have properly no right to demand, to that hesitating,
incomplete faith which has been excited by the superior
appeals flowing directly from the Christian system itself
and the character of its Author.
It was the tendency of the school of Paley to give
the greatest prominence in the Evidences of Revela
tion, to the miracles. The internal argument in their
hands often received less than justice. Belief was
sought to be produced by the constraining influence
of authority through the medium of supernatural
.interposition. In that reaction against this school, of
which Coleridge more than any other individual was
the efficient promoter, the position of the two sources
of proof was reversed. It became common to speak of
the evidence from miracles in disparaging terms, as tf
it was deserving df no respect. This tendency of
course found support from such as rejected the super
natural altogether from any concern in the origin of
Christianity. In some quite recent writers, the pen-
33

514 THE CHRISTIAN MIRACLES.
dulum osculates again to the former place. The
sound view, in our judgment, hes between the two
extremes, and this view has the sanction of the Saviour
himseU.

ESSAY XII.
• THE CEEDIBILITY OF THE TESTIMONY OP JESUS CON
CERNING HIMSELE.
Pharisees on a certain occasion taunted Jesus with
pretending to be a witness to his own claims. A record
which he bore of himself, they said, deserved no credit,
on the accepted principle that a man cannot be wit
ness in his own case. He replied that his testimony,
although it related to himself and his own pretensions,
was nevertheless true and credible. To be sure, there
was, besides, an. objective proof answering to the sub
jective witness of his own consciousness, and vertfying
that witness to others, if not to himself. There was,
namely, the testimony which i God gave through the
works which Jesus wrought ; works which man with
out GodVmld not have done. Yet his own testimony,
the testimony of his own consciousness, his inward con
viction or intuition relative to his mission, and to the
office that belonged to him among men, he justly held
to be of itself, under the circumstances, a valid proof.1
' John viii. 14 : " Though I bear record of myself, yet my record
is true." Only in verbal opposition to this affirmation is John v. 31.
" The seeming contradiction between the present declaration and the
former concession of Jesus is explained, if we suppose that he there

516 CREDIBILITY of the testimony OF JESUS.
To develop and support this proposition is the pur
pose of the present Essay.
In respect to the contents, or proper interpretation,
of the testimony of Jesus regarding himself, there is,
of course, some difference of opinion. But the points,
to which we now draw attention, certainly formed a
part of it, as all sober criticism must allow. In- the
first place, Jesus claimed to act in virtue of a special
divine commission. He had been sent into the world
in a sense altogether peculiar, and for the discharge
of a mission which was of strictly supernatural origin.
This was the primary, the generic, the often-repeated,
claim of Jesus, which it were idle to attempt to fritter
away or to resolve into a figure. - He was • preeminently,
and by supernatural appointment, the Messenger of
God in this world. In the second place, he affirmed
of himseU a lofty and pecuhar relationship to God.
We need not here say all that we believe upon this
point. It is sufficient for our present argument to
notice his claim to a knowledge of that invisible Being,
thought proper to follow the common human rule, and to adduce the
testimony of others in his behalf; whilst here, on the contrary, he
proceeds in conformity with the higher principle that the Divine can
only he testified to and proved by itself. Besides, tbere is in the
thing itself no contradiction. His self-testimony, resting upon the
consciousness of his divine mission, corresponds in a sense to the
testimony of his works (John v. 36), inasmuch as these always pre
suppose such a consciousness." (De Wette on John viii. 14). See,
also, Meyer (on John v. 31), where Euthymius is quoted to the effect
that in this passage Jesus is merely anticipating the objection of the
Jews — not uttering his own sentiment.

CLAIMS OF JESUS. 517
which in kind and degree surpasses that possessed by
all other men, and to a spiritual union with Him as
intimate as language is capable of expressing. He
professes to stand in this exalted, mysterious feUowship
with God; to be- a partaker of divine prerogatives;
and, after departing from the world, to sit on the
throne of universal dominion. In the third place, he
assumes towards men an office the most elevated which
imagination can conceive. He claims to be the moral
Guide and Deliverer of mankind. He does not hesi
tate to style himself, in this relation, the Light, or the
Illuminator of the world ; taking the same place in the
kingdom of souls that belongs to the Sun in the mate
rial system. In the exertion of the office committed
to him, he forgives sin. This awful prerogative, which
it were impious for a mortal to take upon himself, he
does not hesitate to exercise. He invites the world of
men, in their conscious infirmity and guUt, to rest
upon him. He undertakes to procure for them recon
ciliation with God. He bids them pray with confi
dence, in his name. He promises, even, to work within
them moral purification through potent agencies of
which he is the prime mover. In short, he assumes
to be the Deliverer of the souls of men from their
bondage to sin and exposure to retribution. How
exalted, how unparaUeled the claim ! And to crown
all, judgment over the race is lodged in his hands. He
is the arbiter of destinies. " Before him shall be
gathered all nations."

518 CREDIBILITY OF THE TESTIMONY OF JESUS.
In this sketch of the extraordinary claims of Jesus,
we have exaggerated nothing, but rather have pur
posely stopped short of their fuU magnitude. They
are aU included within his consciousness. That is to
say, his conscious relation to God involved aU this.
" I know" he said, " whence I come, and whither I
go." Back of all these claims was a full, inward per
suasion or intuition of their reality.
Now the question is, Was this consciousness of
Christ veracious or deceptive ? Did it represent the
reality, or was it the fabric of enthusiasm? Plainly
such is the alternative to which we are brought.
It is understood that we leave out of sight for the
present, the miracles — the objective verification of
the consciousness and the claims of Christ. Is
this consciousness — for so we may be aUowed to
style the intuitive conviction to which we refer — of
itseU, in the case before us, trustworthy ? Or, have
we in these claims an instance of unexampled self-
delusion ?
We proceed to offer reasons why this last hypo
thesis cannot rationally be entertained.
One very remarkable feature of the Gospel history,
which has an important bearing on the present in
quiry, we must notice at the outset. The peculiar
claim of Jesus was most deliberately made, and was
made persistently in the face of aU the opposition
and scrutiny which it underwent. Moreover, the
utmost stress was, laid upon it by Jesus himself. It

CONSCIOUS GREATNESS OF HIS CLAIMS. 519
cannot be said that he was not distinctly aware of
the momentous import of the claim which he put forth.
This he understood in all its length and breadth.
It is plain that he had a calm, yet fuU and vivid,
appreciation of its nature. Had he needed any spur
to reflection, this would have been furnished by the
unbelieving and mimical attitude of almost aU around
him. Never were pretensions more constantly and inge
niously chaUenged. Think how assured his own spirit
must have been, to pass through this life-long ordeal
without sharing, in the faintest degree, the misgivings
and distrust of the surrounding world ! Among the
rulers and leaders of the nation, among his own kin
dred, on every side, there was pitying or scornful dis
behef. Yet he did not doubt himself ! Moreover — -
and this is a point of especial significance — he made
this behef in him the cardinal requirement, the turning-
point, and test. His extraordinary claims and asser
tions respecting himself and his mission are not left
in the background. On the contrary, they stand out
in bold relief. Confidence in them is the one great
demand, the first and fundamental duty which, in the
preaching of his rehgion, men are called upon to per
form. How much do we read about belief and unbe
lief on the pages of the New Testament ! The same
question was agitated then, even in the very presence
of Christ, that is discussed now. Was he, or was he
not, worthy of belief ? Was he, indeed, sent from
God, or did he speak of himself ?

520 CREDIBILITY OF THE TESTIMONY OF JESUS.
Now it is adapted, we cannot but feel, to make a
strong impression on every thoughtful mind, to reflect
that this question of believing or disbelieving in him
was clothed, in the estimation of Christ himself, with
all the importance that justly attaches to it. However
vast his claim, he knew and felt how vast it was.
Not only did he stake his all, and sacrifice all, in the
maintenance of it, but he concentrated, so to speak,
his whole system in it, by making the full assent to
this claim the one foremost and essential requirement.
" This is the work of God, that ye believe on him
whom He hath sent." He examined his disciples as
to the view which they took of his person and office.
Who think ye that I am ? was his question to them.
He was acquainted Avith the various theories concern
ing him that were entertained by his contemporaries.
When there was everything to excite seU-questioning,
the consciousness of his divine mission was not in the
least disturbed. Through all denial of him, under the
frown of men in poAver as well as the fierce outcries
of the fanatical mob, in view of his apparently unsuc
cessful career, even amidst the terrors of death, the
consciousness of his divine mission remains a deep,
immovable conviction. It was a conviction which
reflection — self-knowledge — had no tendency to
•Weaken. Self-deception, in a matter like this, is incompatible
with the transcendent holiness and goodness of Christ.

HOLINESS OF CHRIST. 521
It would argue such a degree of self-ignorance and
self-exaggeration as could spring only from a deep
moral perversion.
We shall not enter into an elaborate argument to
prove the spotless character of Christ. It is enough
to convince us of his sinless purity, that whUe his
moral discernment was so penetrating and sure, and
his ideal of character absolutely faultless, and his
deahng with others marked by a moral fidelity so
searching, he had yet no consciousness of sin. When
the tempter came he found nothing in him — no province
in his heart, no strip of territory, which he could call
his own. The teaching of Christ presents the purest
description of rectitude and holiness. Every man
finds in it practical rebukes of sin — of his own sin — ¦
which are more pointed and awful than he can find
elsewhere. His precepts are the embodiment and ex
pression of a pure conscience. Yet the feeling of self-
reproach never entered the heart of Jesus. It is im
possible to account for this, except on the supposition
that he was absolutely free from sin. Without dweU-
ing on the exceUence of Christ, on that blending of
piety and philanthropy, that union of the active virtues
with the passive graces of character, that exquisite
combination and harmony of virtues, we may stiU
advert to one or two special features in which his per- '
fection shines out. Men who rise far above the
common level of character are still frequently open to
temptation from two sources, ambition and friendship.

522 CREDIBILITY OF THE TESTIMONY OF JESUS.
In each of these particulars, Jesus affords an example
of stainless virtue. The love of power and worldly
advancement was kept far away from his heart. He
was proof against self-seeking in this enticing form of
personal aspiration. Even more difficult is it to resist
subtle temptations to yield something of truth or duty
for the sake of friendship. But Jesus, though patient
and tender towards all the erring, is unsparingly faith
ful in dealing with his most intimate disciples. There
is no exception, no tacit indulgence, no accommodation
of the moral standard, out of favor to them. The
foremost of them, when he would suggest to Jesus a
departure from the hard path of self-sacrifice, is sternly
rebuked under the name of Adversary and Tempter.1
Even their resentment at injuries offered to him brings
upon them his disapprobation.2 He tolerates in the
best loved, and in the seclusion of private intercourse,
no temper of feeling which is repugnant to the prin
ciple of goodness.3
Now we aver that the holy character of Christ pre
cludes the possibUity of a monstrous self-delusion such
1 Matt. xvi. 23. = Luke ix. 55.
3 Among the delineations of the character of Jesus, the pregnant
aphorisms of Pascal in the Bensees have, perhaps, never been sur
passed. UUmann's little work on The Sinlessness of Christ (much;
enlarged and improved in the later editions) is convincing and im
pressive. The Christ of Eistory, by John Young, a Scottish writer,
is a forcible argument on the same general subject. As an extended
portraiture of the excellence of Christ, the chapters in Horace Bush-
nell's Nature and the Supernatural, on " the Character of Jesus,"
besides tbeir eloquence, are full of instructive suggestion.

THE HUMILITY OF JESUS. 523
as must be attributed to Mm in case his claims are
discredited. The soul is not so made as to faU a
victim to this enormous seU-deception, whUst the moral
part is sound and pure. The principle that tf the eye
be single the Avhole body is full of light, is applicable
here. There is a shield for the judgment in thorough
moral uprightness. God has not made the intelligence
of man to "mislead him so fearfiUly, provided he abides
in his integrity. The mind is a witness to the truth,
and was made for that end. . To assume that the in
most consciousness of a holy, unfallen soul, in the full
communion of God, is no criterion of truth, would be
almost equivalent to supposing that the world is made
and governed by an evil being. We found the
credibility of the consciousness of Christ on his perfect
goodness. This conclusion is fortified when we consider, in
particular, the humility of Jesus. Notwithstanding the
extraordinary dignity to which he lays claim, humility
marks his whole demeanor. He is careful to keep
within the bounds of his calling ; for himself, regarded
apart from the relationship he sustains to God and
from his office, he exacts nothing ; from every symptom
of an elated mind, from every feehng of self-glorifica
tion, he is utterly exempt ; while, in his intercourse
with his feUow-men of every rank, there appears a
winning lowliness of heart. This mixture of humUity
with so lofty claims — elements seemingly incongruous,
yet in the evangelical portraiture of Jesus so naturally

524 CREDIBILITY OF THE TESTIMONY OF JESUS.
uniting — makes his character altogether unique. As
serting for himself a station so exalted, he is yet the
impersonation of self-renouncing regard for others.
The singular humility of Christ, emanating, as it does,
from the very core of his character, renders it well-nigh
inconceivable that he could have been bewildered and
blinded by a self-exalting delusion respecting his rank
in the universe and his authority among men. Such
an impression, if it be false, must have its roots in an
immoderate self-estimation. Nothing short of a most
inordinate self-love could breed a persuasion of this
nature, if there was in truth no foundation for it. But
if this occult misleading principle had been operative,
other and offensive manifestations of it would have
appeared. On the contrary, a rare humility before
God and men is one of the striking characteristics of
Jesus. It would seem as if he were desirous of requir
ing for himself the least that he could require in con
sistency with truth. And even this he requires, not
from any personal love of honor or power, but rather
in the interest of truth, and as compeUed in the faith
ful performance of the work which it was given him to
do. Had he been a lover of power, conspicuity, au
thority, rule, we might possibly account for the rise in
his soul of a delusive sense of personal importance.
But in one who was actuated by motives wholly antag
onistic, in whose eyes the doing of the humblest act
of love was nobler than to wear a coronet, in him who
was "meek and of, a lowly heart," the existence of a

CONFUCIUS. 525
setf-magnifying illusion of this nature is psychologicaUy
insoluble. No case analogous to that of the founder of Chris
tianity can be cited from the abundant records of reli
gious enthusiasm. It is true that multiplied examples
of such enthusiasm exist in the past. There have been
professed prophets and founders of religions, who have
believed in their own pretensions, which were yet the
offspring of a morbid imagination. But none of these,
in respect to character and to surrounding circum
stances, resembles Christ, or helps us to explain his
consciousness. There is this radical difference, that
none of these have been exempt from the corrupting
operation of sin. The effect of that deranging, disturb
ing force, has been experienced not only in the char
acter, its immediate seat, but also in the intelligence.
Because they who are groping in the dark lose their
path, it foUows not that such wUl be the lot of him who
walks in the day. Point us to the prophet or saint who
can claim the unclouded vision which is the attribute of
the unfaUen soul, and we admit the parallel. But let
us glance at some of these leaders whose names are
sometimes flippantly coupled with the name of Jesus.
Confucius cannot be placed in the category of reli
gious teachers pretending to a divine mission. He was
simply a teacher of moral and pohtical axioms ; enti
tled to credit, indeed, for certain commendable features
in his ethical doctrine, but disclaiming any special

526 CREDIBILITY OF THE TESTIMONY OF JESUS.
knowledge of the invisible world. He laid claim to no
higher character than that of a sage, drawing from no
other fountain than human wisdom. Buddha was
likewise a moral reformer, a true philanthropist,
the propounder of humane ethical precepts. Though
subsequently invested by his foUowers with a halo of
supernatural glory, it is not ascertained that this monk
and mystic himself claimed to be the organ of a divine
revelation. His work, as far as it Was religious, was
chiefly negative, consisting in the dehverance of his
followers from the slavish superstition of the brahmin
ical system, by denying the reality of the objects of
their previous worship. The speculative part of his
system was his own discovery, and was atheistic. Of
Zoroaster too little is known to enable us to judge
intelligently of his mental characteristics. If he
claimed to have received communications from heaven,
we know too little of his history to determine the shape
and extent of this pretension. How far he was really
infected with a mystic enthusiasm, and how far the
supernatural elements in the traditional accounts of his
career have sprung from the fancy of later generations,
we are not in a situation to decide.1 Skeptics have
sometimes endeavored to draw a parallel between
' A tolerably full, and doubtless in the main authentic, account
of Zoroaster and Buddha, and of the wide-spread religious systems'
called respectively by their names, may be found in Duncker's
Geschichte des Alterthums (Vol. I.), a work which offers a consecutive
and readable, as well as learned, exhibition of the results of modern

APOLLONIUS : MOHAMMED. 527
ApoUpnius of Tyana and the author of the Gospel.
But the earliest life of Apollonius, the work of Philos
tratus, was not written until a hundred years after he
lived, and the resemblance of his pretended miracles
to the miracles of the Gospel is probably, for the most
part, a designed parody of the Saviour's history. Of
ApoUonius we know little more, than that he was one of
the more famous of the roving magicians and dealers in
the preternatural, who, in that epoch of spiritual dis
traction, found a ready hearing in the Roman world.
The appeal to1 Mohammed, as a notable example
of sincere but unfounded confidence in one's own
divine mission, has been urged with more frequency
and persistency. HappUy the investigations which have
been made into the history of the Arabian prophet,
have furnished the explanation of his remarkable setf-
delusion. This solution is found in a great degree in
his peculiarly morbid physical constitution. Subject
from his youth to a form of epilepsy, and combining
with this nervous infirmity a mystic fervor of reUgious
aspiration, he conceived the impression that the extraor
dinary states of body and soul into which he occasion-
aUy fell, were due to the action of celestial beings, and
at length came to consider himself the organ of a
divine revelation. His zeal for a rigorous monotheism
inflamed the fanaticism of his fiery temperament, and
finaUy impeUed him to missions of conquest ; though
investigation in the department of oriental history. It is understood
that the more recent researches into the Zoroastrian system yield
important fruit.

528 CREDIBILITY OF THE TESTIMONY OF JESUS.
it seems to be admitted that after his establishment at
Medina, and with his advancing success, he lost much
of the comparative sincerity and singleness of his
motives. A large alloy of base ambition became min
gled up Avith the enthusiasm of the zealot. In the case
of Mohammed, there were present all the materials
which are needful for the composition of an enthusiast.
His hot blood, his morbid temperament, his inward
yearnings and conflicts, the seasons of hallucination
through which he passed, his solitary vigils and self-
mortification, are sufficient to explain the origin of the
delusion which gained possession of his mind.1
1 The best biography of Mohammed is the late work of Dr.
Sprenger, who has had the command of wider materials than were
before accessible. He describes with much fulness the maladies tc
which Mohammed was subject. In the portions of this copious work
which we have read, the author makes the impression of great
knowledge on the subject, but of small literary skill, with a tendency
to prolixness. The English biography of Mohammed, in best repute,
is the recent work of Mr. Muir. In one of his articles in the Calcutta
Beview (which are incorporated into his subsequent work), Muir
discusses " the Belief of Mohammed in his own Inspiration." He
traces with plausibility the psychological origin of this belief.
" How far," says Muir, "the two ideas of a Kesolution subjectively
formed, and involving a spontaneous course of action, and of a
Divine Inspiration objectively imparted and independent of his own
will, were at first simultaneously present, and in what respective
degrees, it is difficult to conjecture. But it is certain that the con
ception of a divine commission soon took entire and undivided pos
session of his soul; and, colored though it often was by the motions
and inducements of the day, or mingled with apparently incongruous
desires, retained a paramount influence until the hour of his death."
(P. 320.) Of Mohammed at Medina, Muir says (p. 330) : " Ambition,

PYTHAGORAS : SOCRATES. 529
But there were men, we are sometimes told, in the
ancient world, of another make and of a different order
of mind from this, who were yet believed by themselves
to be charged wdth a divine mission. Pythagoras was
one. Unfortunately, the earliest extant biographers of
Pythagoras, Porphyry and his pupil, Jambhchus, did
not write untU seven or eight hundred years after the
philosopher whom they commemorate, flourished ; and
the best of the biographers whom they cite date no
further back than about two centuries after their mas
ter's death. In the absence of contemporary witnesses,
the knowledge we possess both of the mental and
moral character, and the pretensions, of Pythagoras,
is scanty and, to a considerable extent, inferential. It
would be nothing strange if a man hke him, at that
time, imagined that natural gifts of knowledge were
imparted to him by a special inspiration of the divinity..
It is difficult to see how anything can be gathered un
favorable to the claims of Christ, from the example of "
a heathen mystic so indistinctly known, and standing,,
withal, at the dawning period of scientific thought.
There is, however, one man of antiquity, who, in
some other -respects, has not unfrequently been set in-
comparison with Jesus, and the conjunction of whose
name Avith that of Christ may give a less shock to
reverential feeling. Yet, in the points in which the
rapine, assassination, lust, are undenied features of his later life,
openly sanctioned by an assumed permission, or even oommand, fromi
the Most High 1 "
34

530 CREDIBILITY OF THE TESTIMONY OF JESUS.
position of Socrates is more usually compared with
that of Christ, Socrates is better likened to the fore
runner of Christ; as, indeed, he was styled by the
Platonist of Florence, Marsilius Ficinus, the John the
Baptist of the ancient world. The Socratic philosophy
prepared many noble minds for the reception of the
gospel, by its congenial tone, and by the cravings which
it awakened but faded to satisfy.
But Socrates believed himself to have been entrusted
with a divine mission, and believed that he enjoyed an
inward supernatural guidance. We are quite willing
to consider this persuasion on the part of the greatest
man of the ancient heathen world, for the reason that
a careful consideration of the character of this behef
of Socrates and of the nature of his pretensions gen
erally, will serve to corroborate strongly the argument
Avhich has been presented on the foregoing pages.
Socrates, like all the Greeks of the time, save indi
viduals here and there who may have disbelieved in
anything divine, thought that the gods made known
their counsels through the medium of dreams and
oracles. This wiU be caUed a superstition. So, he
thought that the study of physical science, when car
ried beyond the smaU stock of knowledge indispen
sable for the practical pursuits of life, was an impiety
¦ — a meddling with what belonged to the gods. This,
too, was a superstition. Such views simply indicate
that we are not to look, even in Socrates, for a imracu-
lous degree of enlightenment. But we are concerned

SOCRATES. 531
here with the view which he took of himself and his
mission. And here it is to be observed that in refer
ence to the opportunity of being taught by dream and
oracle," and the like, he claimed nothing more for him
self than what he attributed to others. In this matter
aU stood on the same footing. The gods heard
prayer, he held, and gave answer in these ways. In
respect to the work to which he devoted himself,
the verdict of the /Delphian oracle in favor of his pre
eminent wisdom doubtless had an important influence
in leading him to the career which he embraced of a
public interrogator and exposer of pretended knowledge,
and teacher of such as cared to learn of him. And
this work he considered a calling, in the literal sense,
which he was not at liberty to forsake. He supposed,
also, that an inward monitor, whose restraining impulse
he experienced on various occasions, was given him
to hold him back from a mistaken or injurious course
of action. For the office of the demon, according to
what must be considered the statement of Socrates
himself, in the Apology, was negative — never suggest
ing what to do, but simply, on occasions, interposing
resistance to stay him from unwise action.1 Now, it
1 Apologia, c. xix. Socrates says of the inward voice : del dno-
rpimi pe tovtov, o hv piXKo nparreiv, irporpeirei Se ovirore. Compare,
also, c. xxxi., where Socrates says that through all the legal proceed
ings in his case, the voice in his soul had interposed no check to the
course he was taking, and where he defines the function of the
supernatural Monitor in the same way. The representations of
Xenophon in the' Memorabilia (I. 1, 4, et al), as is well known, are

532 CREDIBILITY OF THE TESTIMONY OF JESUS.
may be held, that this supposed demon was the intui
tive moral impulse of Socrates himself, which, in the
promptitude of its action, struck him as the voice of
another in his soul ; or, in common with some of the
Christian Fathers, and with others whom it were harsh
to tax with credulity, we may even suppose, that super
natural enlightenment was not withheld from this man
by the Being before whom those in every nation who
fear Him — even though their knowledge of Him be
imperfect — and work righteousness, are accepted.
But when we look at the claims of Socrates respecting
himself, we find that he is far from assuming preemi
nence or authority. It is true that he considered his
work an important one, and himself not a harmful but
a needed and useful citizen. But this was the limit
of his pretensions. He distinguished himseU from
other men, not through any superiority of knowledge
which he thought himself to possess, but through that
consciousness of ignorance which belonged to him and
which they lacked. He, like them, knew nothing,
but, unlike them, he knew that he knew nothing. He
asserted for himself no greater knowledge, and no
more certainty of knowledge respecting the future life,
than other men had. He claimed to exercise no au
thority over the opinions or the conduct of others. If
less accurate ; and those contained in the Theages (like the work
itself) come not from Plato. Yet in this Dialogue it is stated, in
conformity with the Apology, that the demon oniy forbids, never
instigates.

SOCRATES. 533
the demon negatively guided him, he received thereby
no authority or wisdom for the control of other men.
He was simply a man among men ; a humble searcher
for truth ; .pretending to the exertion of no authority
save that which was willingly accorded to the force of
his reasonings. In fact, a principal charm of Socrates
is his humble sense of the narrow boundaries of human
knowledge, and his waiting for more Ught.
Let us now change the picture which history pre
sents of this remarkable man. Let us suppose that
Socrates had claimed to be invested with all power in •
heaven and on earth, had required the acceptance of
his doctrines on his mere authority, had demanded of
all men an imphcit obedience to his wiU, had styled
himself the lord and master of his disciples, had
assumed to pardon impiety and transgression, had pro
fessed an ability to aUot to men their everlasting desti
nies, besides delivering them from the bonds of death,
and had declared himself to be the constituted judge
in the future world of the entire race of man. The
question we put is, whether assumptions of this char
acter, notwithstanding acknowledged virtues of Socrates,
would not evince either a demented understanding or
an ingrained, monstrous self-love and self-exaggeration,
only to be explained on the supposition of a deep
moral perversion ? Should we not be driven to con
clude that claims so extravagant and presumptuous in
a sane mind imply that character is off its true foun
dations ? How else could self-deception and self-exalta-

534 CKEDIBILITY OF THE TESTIMONY OF JESUS.
tion reach this height ? And would not complacency
for certain traits and actions of Socrates be lost in the
repugnance we should feel for this aitogancy of pre
tension ? An enthusiast is ordinarily looked upon with
compassion by sober minds. But when enthusiasm
leaps so high, and leads to the usurping of a rank far
beyond the allowance of truth and the moral law, it
inspfres a feeling of moral aversion.
Had Jesus stood forth simply in the character of a
promulgator of some high, and, perhaps, forgotten
truth in theology or morals, with which his whole
being was penetrated, we might look upon the mis
taken belief in a supernatural mission with a less
unfavorable judgment. It is conceivable that the
light which flashes on the intelligence should ' be
wrongly attributed to a supernatural source, that the
intuition should be taken for miraculous revelation,
and that a glowing, absorbing conviction should be
held to come from above in a supernatural way. Such,
we should be willing to grant, was the principal source
of Mohammed's original faith in his own inspiration.
The feebly recognized truth of the sovereign control
in this world of one almighty will came home to his
soul with a vividness which nothing, in his view, but
preternatural influence could account for. In this, or
some simUar way, a man comes to recognize himself
as the chosen repository of a great, vital truth, and
the chosen instrument for propagating it. And such a
conviction is even consistent with humility, so long as

CHRIST NOT SELF-DECEIVED 535
the truth is kept uppermost and the function of the
prophet is felt by himself to be merely subordinate and
ministerial. Nay, the very contrast between the sub
limity of the truth of which he has been made the
recipient, and his own poor merits, may intensify the
feehng of personal unworthiness. The prophet or saint
feels abashed at being made the channel for conveying
the divine communication. It is true that pride ever
stands near, and seU-flattery and arrogance gain easy
admission. The humUity is apt to be retained only in
semblance, whUe it is really supplanted by a principle
wholly antagonistic. StiU more important is it to
remember that even this sort of self-deception belongs
to men, who, whatever maybe thought of their earnest
ness and relative excellence, partake of the sinfulness
of humanity. If they fall into the error of supposing
that they are speciaUy chosen agents of heaven when
they are not, this is among the delusions which are due
to the darkening influence of the sin that is common
to mankind. Apart from this consideration, there was,
in fact, no one idea of religion to which the mind of
Jesus was surrendered, and in which he was swallowed
up. The fertility, the variety, the consistency, and
symmetry of his teaching, not less than its Avhole tone
and temper, forbid this hypothesis respecting him.
But the decisive answer to the suggestion that he was
an enthusiast of this description is gathered from what
was said in the beginning of the extent of his claims.
These claims are far from being satisfied when he is

536 CREDIBILITY OF THE TESTIMONY OF JESUS.
looked upon as the simple repository and organ of
a divine communication. His exalted claims, then, in
case they are not aUowed, must be credited to the self-
seeking which corrupts the simplicity of the enthusiast,
and moves him to put himself before his truth.
Pride and ambition, however hidden and subtle in their
working, are at the root of this gross, unwarranted
self-elevation. We are brought back to the dilemma which was
proposed in the earlier part of this discussion. The
unbelief of the time professes to reject all claims of a
supernatural sort which were put forward by Jesus, at
the same time that it loudly professes admiration for
his personal excellence. It is true that Renan throws
out the suggestion that he was guUty of a tacit concur
rence in pious frauds ; but, as far as we know, Renan
stands alone in a view which is repugnant to the
common sense of every sober-minded student, whether
infidel or believing, of the evangelical history. And
even Renan allows that Jesus had full faith in his own
Messiahship. Infidelity must take the ground, and,
at the present day, almost universally does take the
ground, that Jesus was a religious enthusiast. His
ethical . system and, perhaps, a part of his religious
teaching, are praised, but his distinctive claim to be
the Messiah of God is rejected as decidedly as it was
by the Jewish elders who crucified him. As tf to
make up for this dishonor put upon his pretensions,
abundant laudation is bestowed, as we have said, upon

INCONSISTENCY OF SKEPTICS. 537
the character of Jesus. Skeptical writers of the present
day have much to say of the fine balance and equipoise
of his faculties. Even Strauss, in his latest work,
pays homage to the harmony of his nature. But these
writers frequently go farther ; they describe him as the
embodiment of whatever is pure and good, the highest
exemplar of moral excellence.
We deny the consistency of their position. We
deny the justice of this judgment concerning Jesus, if,
indeed, as they tell us, his extraordinary claims were
founded in Ulusion. We are obUged with aU solemnity
to affirm, that the indulgence of the thought that these
awful claims were the fruit of self-deception, carries
along with it, as a necessary consequence, a feeling
towards Jesus quite opposed to the reverence and
abundant admiration which they are still disposed to
lavish upon him. In other words, the cherishing of a
delusion of this character is incompatible with that
moral soundness, that clear and thorough truth of
character, the lack of which debars one from being the
legitimate object of such reverence and admiration.
In short, the skeptical view of the claims of Christ
strikes indirectly, but with equal effect, at his character.
It is impossible to stop with attributing to him the
weakness of an enthusiast. Such a delusion, though
it be unconscious, can have no other ultimate source
than moral infirmity. That profound truth of char
acter, which ensures self-knowledge, clarifies the intel
lect, and keeps a moral being in his own place, can no

538 CREDIBILITY OF THE TESTIMONY OF JESUS.
longer be supposed. A sentiment of mishke — of aver
sion — must take the place of moral reverence. In
ordinary life, any one who dreams himseU entitled to
more of honor and deference than belongs to him, and
more of control than he has a right to exert, excites a
natural disesteem. Men divine that false pretensions,
even when they are unconsciously false, spring from
some occult fault of character. And when claims are
mistakenly put forth which would lift the subject of
them to a higher than earthly pinnacle of dignity and
power, the same verdict, with proportionally augmented
emphasis, must follow.
The supernatural claims of Jesus are thus identified
with the excellence of his character. Both stand or
fall together. Trust in him has a warrant in his trans
cendent goodness. He could not be self-deceived,
and therefore his testimony respecting himself is
credible. He who lived and died for the truth was
not himself enslaved by a stupendous falsehood. But
respecting himself, not less than in respect to the other
great themes of his teaching, he. saw and uttered the
truth. " To this end," he said, " was I born, and for
this cause came I into the world, that I should bear
witness unto the truth. He that is of the truth
heareth my voice."

ESSAY XIII.
THE PEESONALITY OF GOD : IN REPLY TO THE POSI-
TIVIST AND THE PANTHEIST.
The truth of the Personality of God is impugned,
in these days, by two diverse and mutually repugnant
systems, Positivism and Pantheism. Agreeing in this
negation, they stand at a world-wide remove from one
another, as to the grounds on which it is based.
Positivism is hardly to be called a Philosophy unless
Ave abandon the ancient and proper sense of this much
abused term.1 It rather disdains phUosophy, in the
usual acceptation of the word, as a fictitious and now
obsolete phenomenon in the progress of thought. It
cannot be denied that M. Comte has displayed con
siderable ingenuity in framing his classification of the
Sciences, though in this task he is far from being
without rivals to dispute with him the palm of merit,
if not of originality ; and so far as his classification of
the objects of science ascends above unintelhgent
nature and draws in men and society, it is open to
the essential objections which lie against his system in
general. Man, as an individual, is placed under the
1 See Hamilton's Metaphysics (Am. Ed.) p. 45. It will be under
stood that we refer, in these remarks, exclusively to the philosophy
of Comte. J. S. Mill aud Herbert Spencer, whose systems pass under
the general designation of Positivism, oppose Comte's depreciation
of Psychology.

540 THE PERSONALITY OF GOD.
head of Physiology ; and if the social man is honored
with a separate rubric, no better reason is assigned
than that every animal develops a distinct set of
qualities in intercourse with his kind. Mental philoso
phy, in its recognized ends and methods of obtaining
them, Comte not only casts out of his scheme, but
treats with scorn as a pretender to the name of science.
The old and often refuted pretension, by which the
impossibility of Psychology is sought to be demon
strated, that the introspective act of consciousness puts
a stop to the mental operation which consciousness
would observe, Comte parades anew with the air of
a discoverer. He acknowledges, in his principal work,
that he has not read Kant, Hegel, and other great
modern writers in the field of Metaphysics.1 The great
business of the human inteUect, according to Positivism,
is to observe facts and to register them by the rules of
chronological sequence and of simUarity. That false
imaginations are nqt to oe suffered to cloud the mind
of the inquirer, so as to hinder him from a full and
unprejudiced investigation of the phenomena presented
to experience, is in truth a legitimate lesson of the
Baconian system, and of high practical importance,
especiaUy in the physical sciences. Nor is Positivism
to be denied the merit of having brought prominently
forward this valuable truth. The mischief is that this
truth is presented in both an exaggerated and one
sided form. For even in physical studies the inquirer
1 Cours de Bhilosophie Positive, T. I. p. xxxvi.

PHILOSOPHY OF COMTE. 541
is pUoted by that scientific imagination which awakens
hypotheses in respect to the producing and final
causes of phenomena ; and it was in the light of
theories which were conjectural until observation had
estabhshed them, that some of the finest discover
ies, in Astronomy and Chemistry, for example, were
made. Hypothesis, in the sense just defined, like a
torch, has lighted the explorer on his path. Of this
fact, ignored by the Positivist school, WheweU has
given some noteworthy illustrations. But the Positiv
ist is generaUy one-sided in the application of his
favorite maxim. There are phenomena in the moral,
religious, and aesthetic experience of man which are
undeniable, and which are, as they have always been,
most potent in their influence, which yet are tacitly
ruled out of the realm of truth acknowledged by the
votaries of this school. If we are to be confined to
the observation of facts, let not that observation be
narrowed down to that single class of phenomena of
which the, senses take cognizance. Otherwise Posi
tivism is nothing better than materialism under a less
odious name.
But the fatal defect in Comte's handling of the
axiom to which we have adverted, and the vice, at the
same time, of his whole system, is his denial of efficient
and final causes.1 The universe is the sequence of
1 Phil Positiv., T. I. p. 14, and passim. J. S. Mill states (West
minster Eeview, April, 1865), that Comte does not deny the exist
ence of causes beyond phenomenal antecedents, but that he simply

542 THE PERSONALITY OF GOD.
phenomena which are connected, as far as we know, by
no causative agency, and related to no intelhgible
ends. The felicity of him who explores into the causes
of things, which has heretofore been deemed his
strongest incentive and best reward, is no more to be
affirms that they are inaccessible to us. Comte's language is that
the Positive Philosophy considers, " comme absolument inaccessible
et vide de sens pour nous la recherche de ce qu'on appelle les causes,
soit premieres, soit finales." But the question is whether there be
causation — causative agency — dependence of one thing on another,
such as invariable sequence, or, to adopt Mill's improved formula,
" unconditional invariable sequence," does not express. On this
point, all the language of both Comte and Mill seems to imply a
negative answer. The inquiry into causes Comte abandons " a
l'imagination des thehlogiens, ou aux subtilit§s des metaphysiciens."
Philosophy knows of nothing but sequences of phenomena. Mill, in
bis Logic, notwithstanding his general disclaimer, constantly implies
that the belief in causation (beyond stated sequence) is without
scientific warrant. "Nothing," he says, "can better show the
absence of any scientific ground for the distinction between the cause
of a phenomenon and its conditions than," etc., (Mill's Logic, B. II.
c. v.). " Force " and "attraction " (the former, as well as the latter)
applied to the earth, he pronounces logical fictions. He declares
that the relations of succession and similarity among phenomena are
the only subject of rational investigation. He protests (c. xxi) against
taking necessity of thinking as a criterion of reality. Events, he
thinks, may be conceived of as occurring at random. The law of
causation is a generalization by simple enumeration. In distant parts
of the stellar system, he says, the law of causation (uniformity) may
not prevail. If we remember right, he derides the notion of " a
mysterious tie" between the cause (antecedent) and consequent.
The essential question is whether there be such a thing as
efficiency, and whether this is the peculiar property of a cause in the
strict sense of the term. And on this question, Mill's position is
sufficiently clear. His theory has little advantage over that of
Hume.

THE PRINCIPLE OF CAUSATION. 543
looked for. He may find out what is, but must abjure
the thought of seeing a rationality in what is.1 Now
as far as the first point in the Positivist skepticism is
concerned, the denial of the validity of the principle
of causation is the rejection of one of the necessary
deliverances of the human mind. We are under the
necessity of thinking that every change is mediated
by the exertion of power, is connected with a force or
agency existing in its antecedents. If the necessity of
thought is not. to be accepted here as the criterion of
truth, then Comte has nothing on which to rest his
faith in the reahty of the external world. The alterna
tive, in fact, is universal skepticism. Now, that our
belief in efficient causation is necessary, can be made
plain. Let any one suppose an absolute void, where
nothing exists. He, in this case, not only cannot
think of anything beginning to be, but he knows that
no existence could come into being. He affirms this
¦ — every man in the right use of reason affirms it — with
the same necessity with which he affirms the impos-
sibUity that a thing should be, and not be, contem
poraneously. The opposite, in both cases, is not only
untrue, but inconceivable — contradictory to reason.
1 Comte admits that besides the practical and economic use of
positive science, there is a higher advantage from it. We are under
the necessity of having some arrangement of facts — for example, to
escape the painful feeling of astonishment which a disconnected
phenomenon produces, and to keep off metaphysics and theology !
This verily reduces the ideal interest of scientific study to a
minimum. See Phil. Positiv., T. I. pp. 63, 64.

544 THE PERSONALITY OF GOD.
Such is the foundation of the principle, ex nihilo nihil
fit. But tf a phenomenon is wholly disconnected from
its antecedents, if there be no shadow of a causal
nexus between it and them, we may think them away,
and then we have left to us a perfectly isolated event,
with nothing before it. In other words, it is just as
impossible to think of a phenomenon which, stands in
no causal connection with anything before it, as it is
to think of an event, or even of a universe, in the act
of springing into being out of nothing. FutUe is the
attempt to empty the mind of the principle of efficient
causation ; and were it successful, its triumph would
involve the overthrow of all assured knowledge,
because it would be secured at the cost of discrediting
our native and necessary convictions.
Not less ill-founded is the Positivist opposition to
the doctrine of Final Causes. One may cavU at par
ticular forms of statement in which this doctrine has
been embodied ; but that, in the various kingdoms of
Nature, there is a selection of means with reference to
ends, is a truth which is irresistibly suggested to the
simplest as well as the wisest ; as the reception of it
by mankind, in all nations and ages, sufficiently attests.
Speculation cannot dislodge this conviction from the
human mind, for it will return again with every fresh
view of the objects of nature. It has been the clue, as
is well known, to important discoveries, for instance in
Animal Physiology. The use of a given organ, its fit
ness to an end, its designed office in a system, has en-

comte's PHILOSOPHY. 545
abled the naturalist to anticipate observation and com
plete the fragmentary animal structure. Witness the
remarkable discoveries of Cuvier. Of the place of the
doctrine of Final Causes in the argument for Theism
we shall speak hereafter. Here we simply affirm that
the fact of a singular adaptedness of means to ends,
such as cannot be fortuitous, but must be the fruit of
selection, is estabhshed by universal observation, and
is not shaken by any arguments from? the Positivist
side. What inference we are authorized to make as
. to the being of God, is a question reserved for a sub
sequent part of this Essay.
Comte's weU-known description of the stages of
human progress, of which the first is the Mythological,
the next the Metaphysical, and the last the Positivist,1
though at the first sight it strikes one as ingenious, will
not bear the historical test, and is moreover vitiated by
an underlying fallacy. There is no proof that the
principal nations of the Indo-germanic and the Semitic
stocks ever practised fetish-worship, in the lower sense
of this term, or that they ascended from the meanest
types of mythological religion to something higher.
All. the proof is the other way. There is no proof that
mankind were originally on the lowest stage of relig
ious knowledge and feehng. Apart from revelation
even, the hypothesis of a faU and degradation from a
primitive state which was moraUy more elevated, is
equaUy rational, and, in our judgment, far better sus-
i Phil Positiv., T. I. p. 3 seq. and Tome v.
35

546 THE PERSONALITY of god.
tained, than the supposition of a gradual ascent from
a moral and spiritual life little superior to that of the
brutes. The phenomena of conscience, Avhich the
philosopher has no right to overlook, sustain the Chris
tian hypothesis and are incompatible with its opposite,
while the existence of a law of progress, such as the
anti-Christian theory assumes, cannot be inductively
established, but. is rather disproved by the facts of
history and observation. Comte's imaginary, law of
succession is inconsistent also with facts in one other
particular. The three eras, to use his own phraseology,
the Mythological in which personal deities are beheved
in, the Philosophical in which notions, such as essence,
cause, and the like, are substituted for them, and the
Positivist or the era of facts, are not found to succeed
each other in this fixed order. Comte allows, to be
sure, that one may overlap the other; but this conces
sion falls far short of the truth. Who will venture to
affirm that a metaphysician like Hegel belongs in an
earher era of inteUectual progress than his contem
porary, Comte ? In the case of the former, there is
not only the supposed advantage of living in the same
advanced period with the latter, but of being immense
ly superior in mental power and in the range of his
acquisitions. Who will affirm that Kepler and New
ton believed in God, either for the reason that Positiv
ism had not been announced, or because they were
too unphilosophical to receive it ? Skepticism and
disbelief in the supernatural are not peculiar to

comte's philosophy. 547
modern times. They have appeared and re-appeared
in the world's history ever since men began to specu
late. This generalization of Comte is, therefore,
hasty and incorrect.
But a most glaring error connected with this
theory of Comte is the assumption that the mytholo
gies sprung from the scientific or intellectual motive.
The mythological epoch is pronounced the earliest
effort of the human mind to explain the changes occur
ring in nature. The religious motive, the instinct of
worship, the yearning ibr the supernatural and divine,
is for the most part, or wholly, left out of the account.
How strangely superficial this view of the religions of
the world is, no thoughtful scholar needs to be told.
As if religion, with aU its tremendous power in human
feeling and human affairs, were simply a form of knowl
edge, the crude offspring of curiosity ! Were the
Positivist to look deeper into human nature and his,-
tory, he would see that religion, even in the perverse
and corrupt forms of it, rests on other foundations;
and this perception would uncover the groundlessness
of his whole hypothesis. For if the rehgions of the
heathen have their root in the constitution of the soul,
and spring from ineradicable principles in our nature,
it foUows that, although they may pass away, religion
wUl not cease, but will survive this avUc! outgrowth,
in a life undying as the soul itself. The advancement
of science has no more tendency to extirpate religion
than it has to extirpate morality. A better under-

548 the personality of god.
standing of nature may enlighten religion and tend to
purify it from certain errors, but to destroy it — never.
One might as well contend that the progress of. Art
tends to annihUate the sense of beauty, or that clearer
and truer conceptions of the famUy relation tend to
eradicate the domestic affections.
Positivism is Atheism. It would bind human
knowledge down to a bare registry of facts, and
chiefly to facts which the senses obsqrve and arith
metic calculates. Other facts, the most real, the most
precious, and the most influential upon human happi
ness and human destiny, it scornfully throws aside.
Instead of offering an answer to the great problems
which we cannot banish from thought without a con
scious abasement of our nature and a choice of indtf-
ference and torpor instead of a noble disquiet, this
system bids us cast them away as unpractical and
fictitious. If Paganism be, as Positivism asserts, the
lower plane of knowledge, one may still be pardoned
for preferring to stand upon it, and for exclaiming, in
view of a system so unsatisfying as this
— " I'd rather be
A Pagan, suckled in a creed outworn,
So might I, standing on this pleasant lea,
Have glimpses that would make me less forlorn ;
Have sight of Proteus rising from the sea,
Or hear old Triton Now his wreathed horn."
More fascinating to a mind of a speculative cast,
because more rich in contents and more coherent and

PANTHEISM DEFINED. 549
a self-consistent in form, are the later systems of Panthe
ism. Pantheism, negatively defined in its relation to
rehgion, is the denial of the Personality of God.
Pantheism is the doctrine that God is synonymous
with the totality of things, and attains to self-con
sciousness only in the finite consciousness of men. It
is the doctrine that all things are the forms, or mani
festations, or developments of one being or essence.
That being is termed God. Monism, or the identify
ing of the world as to its substance with God, is the
defining characteristic of Pantheism.
PhUosophy early started in quest of a common
ground or essence of all existence. Ancient systems,
one after another, suggested their crude solutions of
the problem. The Pythagoreans, for instance, were
1 disposed to find the groundwork of all being, or the
one originant and pervading principle, in numbers.
These early theories which are so fuUy handled in the
great work of Cudworth, as well as by later historians
of philosophy, we have no call at present to examine.
The founder of modern Pantheism was Spinoza.
Assuming the monistic doctrine, he laid down the
proposition that the one and simple substance is
known to us through the two Attributes of infinite
thought and infinite extension. Neither of these
Attributes implies personality, the essential elements
of which are denied to the Substance.1 The latter is
1 In the interpretation of Spinoza's system, the difficult point is
the relation of the Attributes to the Substance. Does he mean that

550 THE PERSONALITY OF GOD.
self-operative, according to an inward necessity, with-
out choice or reference to ends. All finite existences,
whether material or mental, are merely phenomenal.
Spinoza also laid down the famous axiom : omnis
determinate est negalio ; or all predication is limita
tion. To attach predicates or qualities is to reduce to
finitude. In this notion, whether consciously or not,
Spinoza was following in the track of Christian
theology itself, which, as represented by Augustin aiid
other Platonic theologians, had claimed that Deity is
exalted above the distinction of essence and attribute.
Some had even maintained that God is hyperousian,
or that the term essence or substance is inappro
priately applied to the Being who is truly Ineffable.
It need not be said that, with the exception of that
anomalous product of the ninth century and marvel
in the history of philosophy, John Scotus, theology
had never organized itself into Pantheism, from which
these Attributes belong objectively to the Substance, or are they
only relative to the intellect of the individual beholding it ? The
.ast is the more usual interpretation of Spinoza. So says Erdmann,
Geschichte der Neuern Phil, I. (2) 59 seq. ; Hitter, Geschichte der
Christ. Phil, vii. 224 ; Ulrici, Geschichte der Neuern Phil, I. 44 seq. ;
Schwegler, Geschichte der Phil, s. 107, and other ^critics. The oppo
site interpretation is upheld by another class of writers. Passages
favoring the former opinion may be quoted from Epistles of Spinoza,
especially Ep. xxvii. It also harmonizes better with the maxim,
omnis determinatio, etc. The second interpretation, however, better
accords with the mathematical character which Spinoza endeavors
to give to his system, in the Ethics. In whatever way this question
may be decided, it is plain to all that the " infinite thought " which
is attributed to the Substance excludes self-consciousness and choice.

SYSTEM OF SPINOZA. 551
all the great teachers of the Church would have shrunk
with horror. Their object in these statements Avas to
elevate God to the greatest . imaginable height by
affirming His incomprehensible nature. The system
of Spinoza is buUt up, with an attempt at mathemati
cal demonstration, on the primary assumption respect
ing the one and simple substance — the una et unica
substantia. Of course, the personahty of God, a
supernatural Providence, miracles in the proper sense,
and Revelation, are given up. Of the effect of the
Spinozistic system upon the conception of moral liberty
and responsibility, we shaU speak hereafter.
Although Spinoza borrowed his definition of sub
stance from Des Cartes, he is original in the main
features of his scheme. He is the forerunner of the
later German systems, as some of their leading repre
sentatives, including Hegel, have aUowed. Yet these
systems would not have arisen, but for the impulse
communicated from an intervening thinker, himself
a firm believer in the principles of theism, the foremost
phUosopher of modern times, Immanuel Kant. In
undertaking to criticise the knowing power, and to
determine how far knowledge is a product of the sub
jective factor, a resultant from the operation of the
mind itself, Kant took hold of a great problem of
phUosophy. He set out to dissect knowledge, and to
separate its constituent elements according to their
origin whether subjective or objective. This involved
an inquiry into the nature of things — the nature of

552 THE PERSONALITY OF GOD.
being — the object as well as the subject of knowledge.
The question to be determined Avas, what is given to
the knowing organ and exists independently of it, and
what does this organ itseU contribute. The conclusion
of the theoretical philosophy was that we are assured
of nothing save the bare existence of the object which
sets in motion the mechanism of thought. AU else
that constitutes knowledge is of subjective origin.
Space and time are a priori forms of sensuous intuition
— the frame in which objects are set by the perceiving
subject. The so-called categories— substance and acci
dent, cause and effect, and the rest — are the a priori
forms of the judging faculty, a description of the
nature of the understanding, not of the nature of
things.' The ideas of Reason, the ultimate concep
tions presupposed in the three forms of logical judg
ment, or the three phases of the unconditioned —
namely, the Soul as a thinking substance, the World
as a whole, and God, the highest condition of the
possibUity of aU things — are only the rubrics under
which the categories are reduced to unity. Not
having an empirical, but an a priori, origin, they do
not admit of an application to external objects, nor
can they be assumed to represent realities ; and if this
be done, the antinomies, or logical contradictions, that
inevitably result, Avam us that Reason is out of its
province, and that the undertaking is illegitimate. The
objective factor was thus reduced to a minimum. In
this department of his philosophy Kant stopped only

KANT AND FICHTE. 553
one step short of universal skepticism. Eor of what
avaU that a-priori truth is supported, against Hume,
by the criteria of universality and necessity, if this
truth is after aU endued with no objective validity ?
Of what value is a subjective certainty which simply
reveals a law of thought, but contains no assurance of
a corresponding law of things ? The practical philoso
phy of Kant rescued his system from the consequences
so fatal to religion. But the theoretical philosophy
was the starting-point of the subsequent systems.
Fichte took the short step which Kant steadfastly
refused to take. He drew the object itseU, whose
bare existence was all that is known concerning it,
within the subjective sphere. If the object is assumed
merely as a cause to account for states of consciousness,
whUe the principle of causation is itself purely subjec
tive, merely a law or mould of thought, then Idealism
seemed to be logically inferred.
The Ideahsm of Fichte evolves the external world
(so caUed) from the thinking subject. All things which
constitute the objects of thought are modifications of
consciousness which are wholly due to the seU-activity
of the subject. The impression of externality results
from the check put upon this self-activity by its own
inward law. It is not, however, from the particular,
individual ego, that all existence thus issues forth,
but rather from the absolute, impersonal Ego, which
evolves at the same time the individual subject, and
the object which is inseparably related to it. The

554 THE PERSONALITY OF GOD.
relativity of consciousness, in which the ego and the
object of thought stand in correlation, belongs to the
finite subject, and not to the Absolute Being ; yet the
Absolute is viewed as a subject and denominated the
Ego.1 Schelling modified Fichte's conception of the Abso
lute. The Absolute, the root of aU particular exist
ences, is no more to be called subject than object.
It belongs equally to the thinker and the thing. In
truth, it lies equidistant from both poles of con
sciousness, the subjective and the objective. It is
the indifference-point between them. That is to
say, both the external world and the percipient
subject are identical in essence and in origin. They
flow from the same fountain, which is the absolute,
impersonal being. Connected with this view, was
ScheUing's dynamical conception of Nature. Nature
is made up of forces. Nature is' pervaded through
and through with rationality. For this reason, it is
possible for Nature to be an object of knowledge. The
mind and Nature are bound to each other by the
closest affinities. The knowledge of Nature is Nature
itself attaining to self-consciousness. For knowing is
a form of being — of the identical being of which Nature
is a lower expression. But how to cognize the hypo
thetical Absolute ? Relation and dependence cleave
inseparably to conscious thought, and the thinking sub-
1 The different phases or modifications of Fichte's system we do
not here attempt to describe.

SCHELLING AND HEGEL. 555
ject can escape from itsetf — get behind itseU — only by
abolishing thought. ' But this does not secure the
end, for the cessation of thought is not the cognition
of the Absolute. Hence Schelling supposed a pecu
har organ of Intellectual Intuition, by which the soul,
freeing itself from the ordinary bonds of consciousness,
gains a direct vision of the Absolute. He took refuge
in a mystical theory, which reminds us of Plotinus.
It is no wonder that the rigorous inteUect of Hegel
was dissatisfied with this mode of bridging the gulf
between finite and infinite being. Accepting the
general notion of the Absolute, as defined by ScheUing,
Hegel professed to set forth the process in which the
entire universe is necessarily evolved. Thought and
being are identical: hence the universe, including
God, nature, seU, is resolved into a thought-process,
or a chain of concepts self-evolved through an inward
necessity, and comprising and exhausting in themselves
aU reality. Indeterminate being, the notion first in
order, necessary and self-supported, implies, or, accord
ing to the Hegelian language, changes into, another
notion, and the two in turn are merged in a third
which is more specific than either ; and so the process
goes forward untU all concrete existences take their
places in the series of concepts. To the phUosophic
eye aU reaUty is summed up in this realm of concepts.
But the philosophic view is the last stage in the
development of consciousness. It is interesting to
inquire what account Hegel gives of sense-perceptions

556 THE PERSONALITY OF GOD.
as they are found in the common consciousness of
men. ScheUing was not a Berkleian. Notwithstand
ing his dynamical, idealistic theory of Nature, and his
monism, the object had not less reality, in his system,
than the subject. The external world was real, as well
as the mind that perceives it. The same is affirmed
by Hegel. Yet he constantly speaks of a transmuta
tion of consciousness from the state of perception to
that of conception, and of the transmutation of the
thing also, which is the object of perception, into the
mental concept. It is plain that with Hegel both
subject and object, thinker and thing, are engulfed
in the logical thought-process, and that both coalesce
and are identified in the Absolute. The object has
nothing more than a transient reality. The ordinary
sense-perception is only the first stage in a movement
which soon liberates consciousness from this impression
of a distinct externality in the object, and in the con
summation of which both object and subject resolve
themselves into the one, identical, absolute being.
Then all reality is fathomed, and thence, as from a
new starting-point, the universe is reconstructed by
the philosopher, or rather rises of itself, by its own
inherent and necessary movement, in his consciousness
This process as it takes place in the consciousness of
the philosopher, is the self-unfolding of the innermost
nature of things. In it and through it Deity attains
to self-consciousness.1
1 Among the multitude of German dissertations which have a

THE HEGELIAN THEOLOGY. 557
The Hegelian school pretended to find an equiva
lent for the objects of Christian faith and the proposi
tions of Christian theology in the dogmas of their
system. The latter were said to be the pure and final
rendering of that which Christianity presents in a
popular form. The substantial contents of both were
averred to be identical. The Trinity, the Atonement,
and the other doctrines of the orthodox creed had now
— -so it was claimed — received a phUosophical vindica
tion ; and the vulgar Rationahsm which had flippantly
impugned these high mysteries, was at length laid
low. These sounding pretensions could only mislead
the undiscerning. A phUosophy which denies the
distinct personality of God, and consequently must
regard prayer as an absurdity, can by no legerdemain
be identified with Christian doctrine. The appearance
of the Life of Christ by Strauss, and the subsequent
productions of Baur and his school, through the appli
cations which they made of the Hegelian tenets to the
New Testament history and the teaching of the
apostles, placed this conclusion beyond a doubt.
Having thus noticed the leading forms of Panthe
ism, we offer some remarks Avhich may serve to evince
the untenable character of this phUosophy.
1. The fundamental assumption of Pantheism that
bearing on the origin and character of the new philosophy, we may
refer here to one, the beautiful Essay of Schelling uber die Quelle der
Ewigen Wahrheiten, which was read in the Berlin Academy in 1850,
See Schelling's Works (II. Abth. I.), p. 575.

558 , THE PERSONALITY OF GOD.
all things are of one substance, whether taken in the
Spinozistic sense, or in that of the later German phi
losophers — is not supported by evidence, but is con
trary to the truth.
The doctrine of one Substance, this grand postu.
late of Pantheism, is an uncertified dogma for which
no proof is vouchsafed. Yet it forms the foundation
on which the Pantheistic systems rest.
There is the best reason for concluding that the
objects of perception are essentially distinct from the
percipient mind. These objects are seen face to face,
and known as external. In their manifestations they
are totally diverse from the characteristics of mind,
Avhich are revealed in consciousness. It is a just
inference that materialism and idealism, the two forms
of the monistic theory, are alike false.
As concerns the Hegelian scheme, Schelling, in his
new system, has suggested a sufficient refutation. If
the logical development in Hegel were allowed to be
throughout coherent and demonstrative, we have only
a string of abstractions. We have only a theory, or
ideal framework, of the universe, but no reality, no
real being. If there are no realities corresponding to
the idea and known through experience, the universe
is still a void. It were as rational to confound the
plan of a castle with the actual edifice, as to identify
a concept with a real being, or the aggregate of con
cepts with a universe of realities. Therefore, Hegel's
logic at best describes only the possibility of things.

PANTHEISM UNTENABLE. ' 559
It is a merely negative philosophy. If this phUosophy
were all, and if real being were not brought to om
knowledge through experience, the result would be
NihUism. Thought and being are distinct, and with
the admission of the truth of this proposition, Panthe
ism falls to the ground.
2. The Pantheistic dogma, even though it were
admitted, does not solve the problem which it pre
tends to explain. Knowledge is not accounted for by
being wholly resolved into self-knowledge ; for self-
knowledge is a phenomenon not a whit less mysterious
and inexplicable than the. knowledge of not-self. The
Pantheist takes it for granted that the knowledge of
anything distinct in substance from the knower, is out
of the question : as if the knowledge which the knower
has of himself Avere a thing more easy to understand.
¦ 3. The Pantheistic conception of the Absolute is
self- contradictory and false.
We believe in an Absolute Being, that is, in a
being for whose existence no other being is necessary,
or who stands related to no other being, as a condition
of existence. But the Pantheistic Absolute includes
in itself and develops out of itself the relative. Here
is the contradiction. The Absolute is placed in a
necessary relation to finite, relative existences. They
emanate de necessitate naturae from the bosom of the
Absolute. The conception of the latter is thus directly
violated ; and this inconsistency cannot be removed
from the Pantheistic scheme.

560 THE PERSONALITY OF GOD.
4. The deduction of finite existence from infinite
being the Pantheist fails to make conceivable.
How cogitative and incogitative existences' are
developed out of the characterless substance, Spinoza
wholly fails to render inteUigible. How is the world
and all things in it to issue forth from unlimited,
uncharacterized being? What is the moving force,
and what the modus operandi ? Hegel, in his system,
is obliged at the outset to proceed on the supposition
that motion or activity belongs inherently to the primi
tive notion, and thus introduces a quality with which
we become acquainted through experience; but even
then the transition from being without attributes to
being specially characterized, from nothing to some
thing, is effected by sleight of hand.
5. The Pantheist's conception of God does' not
satisfy his own description of the infinite and absolute
being. The God of the Pantheist is dependent on a pro
cess of development for the realization of his own
being. It is only in the last stage of. this progress
that self-consciousness is reached; and then in no
individual, but only in the human race coUectively,
through the course of its history. But what kind of
God is that which must emerge by slow gradations
from a merely potential existence to the manifestation
and comprehension of his own being ?
6. At the same time, the objections of the Panthe
ist to the theistic conception are groundless.

PANTHEISM UNTENABLE. 561
(1) The Pantheist objects that self-consciousness
cannot belong to God in Himself considered, because
for the awakening and development of consciousness
an external object is required. But this statement is
an unauthorized inference from what is true of person
ality in man. We are connected with a materml
organism, and placed in a relation of dependence upon
it for the unfolding of our spiritual natures. But we
have no right to conclude that this peculiarity attaches,
as a necessary condition, to all personality. The
uncreated, eternal spirit is subject to no such condi
tion. (2) Nor does personality clash with infinitude of
perfections. God is infinite, because all conceivable
perfections belong to Him, and belong to Him without
limit in their measure. Infinity is a negative pre
dicate. As applied to a given quality in God, it
means that this quality is not partially possessed, but
possessed in the fuUest conceivable measure. As;
appUed to the sum of excellencies, it denotes that this
sum admits of no addition.
.(3) Nor is the existence of the world as distinct
in its essence from God, inconsistent with His being
the Absolute. If the world were a necessary exist
ence, if God would not be God without the world,
if He were constrained . to give being to the world,
then indeed the assertion of the Pantheist might be
true. But the limitation which God puts upon him
self in creation is voluntary. It is a self-limitation ...
36

562 THE PERSONALITY OF GOD.
Creation is no wise essential to the realization of His
attributes, but is a most free act, performed in the
exercise of benevolence.
We have touched upon the weakness of Panthe- '
ism when regarded from a speculative point of view.
There is another objection of a different kind, but
of decisive weight, against all the Pantheistic sys
tems. 7. Pantheism runs counter to our moral intuitions.
This is a practical objection, an objection to the
consequences of the Pantheistic philosophy, but not
the less pertinent and valid on that account; for a
system which involves among its legitimate con
sequences the denial of known truth, is thereby effec
tually disproved.
Every Pantheistic scheme is, and must be,
thoroughly necessitarian. The world is not a creation,
but a necessary development. AU events take place
by the same rigid necessity. A holy or a sinful act
must be when and where it is, just as a star must
revolve or a plant grow. Moral liberty, as appre
hended by the common understanding of men, is
iUusive. The distinction between physical and ethical
experiences of the soul is extinguished. Even per
sonality itself is only phenomenal. Evil is not evU,
save to finite apprehension ; seen from a loftier plane
it is a form of good. The one is equally essential
and desirable with the other. Crime, remorse, the
self-approval of virtue, are robbed of their essential

PANTHEISM UNTENABLE. 563
significance. Moral responsibility, in the deep and
true sense in Avhich conscience affirms it, has no place.
These consequences, though sometimes disguised
under an obscure or sounding terminology, inevitably
attend Pantheism in all its forms. The ablest advo
cates of this philosophy, including both Spinoza and
Hegel, have involuntarily betrayed the embarrassment
which these conclusions are well fitted to awaken
Against them the moral sense of every unperverted
mind will forever lift an indignant denial. But the
irresistible protest of conscience tells with equal effect
against the whole system with which they are insepa
rably connected.
The Pantheistic systems of philosophy which have
appeared in Germany since Kant, regarded as exer
tions of intellectual power, have hardly been surpassed
since the best days of the Greek philosophy. But
they are built upon a false foundation, and hence,
though they contain materials of high and lasting
value, they are structures which cannot stand. Their
splendor is like the deceptive lustre of that "fabric
huge " which was reared by the faUen spirits, where
" from the arched roof,
Pendent by subtle magic, many a row
Of starry lamps and blazing cressets, fed
By naphtha and asphaltus, yielded light
As from a sky."
There are two generic opinions among Christian
theologians respecting the origin of our belief in God

564 THE PERSONALITY OF GOD.
By some it is considered to be implanted in the mind
and spontaneously developed ; by others it is thought
to be imported into the mind, or to be the result of a
process of reasoning. Perhaps the difference might be
resolved into a verbal one ; since the first class gen
erally aUow that this native belief is educed by training
and the view of the works of God, and the second
confess that an original tendency to believe in God
belongs to the human soul. And such an original
tendency is hardly distinguishable from a nisus — a
germinant belief. This disagreement in regard to the
genesis of our faith in God is generally connected with
differences in Psychology, or in the mode of stating the
functions and the early operations of the mind. It
must be conceded that those Avho hold that the knowL
edge of God is intuitive, have often faUed to state
their doctrine with clearness, or to set it in connection
with acknowledged principles of mental phUosophy.
Our own position is that the belief in God does .
not originate in external, traditionary teaching, like a
v fact in history or science, which is handed down from
one generation to another ; it does not originate,
properly speaking, from the view of the objective
manifestations of God, for instance in the works of
Nature, or the course of history ; nor does it flow from
any empirical source. But this belief is potentially
inherent in the mind, and is obscurely present in the
earliest operations of intelhgence. Dependent for its
full explication upon instruction, and upon the various

FAITH IN GOD. 565
proofs which corroborate at the same time that they
explicate and develope it ; subject, also, in common
with the moral sense, with which it is vitally connected,
to the darkening and perverting influence of evil, faith
in God is yet seminally native to the soul, and is
seldom, if ever, so extinguished that it may not, in
favoring circumstances, again revive, and even assert
itself against every attempt of the wiU to eradicate it.
The tremendous hold which religion has had upon
mankind in all nations and ages forbids the supposi
tion that it owes its origin to tradition merely, to
processes of argument, or even solely to a perception
of the marks of design in Nature. A phenomenon so
deep and universal must be due to a profounder cause,
and a cause more directly operative. The shaUow
theory which ascribed religion to the craft of priests
and lawgivers was long ago exploded. The theory,
which is only a httle less superficial, that religion took
its rise from the alarm excited by startling occurrences
in Nature, is . also well-nigh obsolete. Impressions
from this source are fleeting, and impressions of terror
are quickly effaced by those of a different character,
which are awakened by opposite aspects of Nature.
Faith, moreover, is too deeply imbedded in the moral
feelings to be accounted for by this external and acci
dental cause. If it be said that religion is due to the
personifying imagination of uncultured men, we have
the same answer. This may account to some extent
for the form which heathen religions take ; but without

566 THE PERSONALITY OF GOD.
a prior belief in the supernatural and yearning for it,
without the principle of worship, and the sense of
accountability to a higher Being, the religions of
Paganism could never subsist. Nor is the argument
from design, important as this argument is in its place,
to be considered either the primary source, or the
principal ground, of the belief in God.
It may be objected that the belief in a supernat
ural Power is not universal, and that religion in some
peoples is feebly manifested. The Chinese are said to
be such a people. But if the religious feelings are
susceptible of decay, the same is true of the moral
feelings, the sense of ethical justice and ethical truth.
If the feebleness and corruption of conscience does not
militate against the doctrine of a native and universal
principle of rectitude, the same is true of a similar low
state of reUgious convictions. In both cases, the
seeming exception establishes the rule.
The two essential characteristics of the human
mind are self-consciousness and seU-determination.
The one is indispensable to the other ; for tf the deter
mination of the wiU is a conscious act, it is not less
true that if the voluntary power were absolutely inact
ive or wanting, that distinct separation of self from
the world Avithout, which ¦ is involved in self-conscious
ness, is not supposable. Now, for the realizing of
self-consciousness, the mind is thus dependent upon
the existence of the world without us, and in our
mental states are ahvays found elements derived from

FAITH IN GOD. 567
this outer world to which we are so closely united. In
this dependence, we have decisive proof that the soul—
the spiritual part — is not seU-originatecl. At the same
time we know equally well that it is not derived from
material nature, for it is toto genere distinct from the
world of matter, and in the sphere of Nature the law
holds that like produces like. In this twofold con
viction lies the first suggestion of an infinite personali
ty, the living creator and God, from whom our finite
soul derives its being. Intimately connected with this
presage or incipient faith, is the conscious subjection
of the will to an authoritative law which yet the will
does not impose upon itself, but which is identified
with the will of the Being from whom the soul
springs, whUe at the same time through this law, his
holy character, if not clearly discerned, is indistinctly
divined. Thus in the background of our moral and
spiritual natures, God is immediately revealed, the
ground of our being, at once our Creator and Lord.
Thus we can understand hoAV, with every fresh
awakening of conscience, God is vividly present to the
consciousness ; and the natural voice of guilt, as well
as of dependence, is prayer.1
1 The doctrine of the preceding paragraph is presented, in sub
stance, by Julius Muller, Lehre von der SiXnde, I. 101 seq. Compare
the argument of Hugo of St. Victor from the existence of the soul,
and the similar argument of Locke (Essay on the Understanding,
B. iv. c. 10). The main proposition of Locke is that cogitable exist- v
ence cannot be produced out of incogitable, the minor premise
being that the human mind is a cogitable existence.

568 THE PERSONALITY OF GOD.
It should be observed that we have not been
framing an argument to prove the existence of God.
What we have said is rather an analysis of conscious
ness for the purpose of unfolding the elements that
enter into it, and of showing that the consciousness of
self involves as a condition, not only an immediate
knowledge of the external world, but equally a faith in
God. The world, self, and God, are the three factors,
which are the elements of our personal consciousness.1
It is the prevailing habit of German writers to
describe our immediate faith as the consciousness of
God [Gottes-bewusstsein]. We are said to be con
scious of that which is the object of immediate knowl
edge. That we are conscious of the outward world,
or the objects of sense-perception, is phraseology
sanctioned in the philosophy of Sir WiUiam HamUton.
That we are conscious of self, or phraseology equiva
lent to this, is current in speech. The external object
so directly manifests itself to us that we know that it
exists. Thus, also, self or the conscious ego, is so
manifested in consciousness that we know that we
exist. The analogous fact respecting the Divine being
is denoted by the term God-consciousness, or conscious
ness of God.
The phenomena of our religious consciousness
would be imperfectly described, if we pointed out sim
1 That faith in the unconditioned being is " an original factor of
our thinking," not derived from the law of causality, but implied in
it, is well shown by Ulrici, Gott und die Natur, p. 606.

THE ROOT OF FAITH IN FEELING. - 569
ply the belief in God which is awakened in the man
ner delineated above. Vitally associated with this
awakening faith, is the attraction towards communion
with God, or the inward gravitation of the soul towards
the Being in whom it lives, which forms an essential
foundation of prayer and worship.
Attention is also required to the fact that faith in
God is primarily a matter of feeUng. They who are
wont to consider the mind a congeries of faculties, in
which thought, feeling, and will are coordinate, find it
hard to comprehend this.1 But when we look to the
genesis of our ideas, to the process in which intelli
gence is developed, we discover that feeUng is antece
dent. In regard to the knowledge we have of the
outer world, sensation, in which the mind is acted upon,
precedes perception. Now the feeling of God, or, to
use a more expressive term, the sense of God, precedes
the distinct idea. The recognition of God, though
including an activity of the inteUigence, is grounded
in, and pervaded by, feeling. The error of Schleierma
cher did not consist in his founding piety in feeling, as
a psychological fact, but it lay in his confining piety to
the incipient stage of faith. He would shut up the
mind, as far as the exercise of piety is concerned, to
the consciousness of its own state, with no reference
1 "Eine Psychologie, die aus Erkennen, Begehren und Eilhlen
drei coordinirte Eormen des Bewusstseins macht, hebt alle Mog-
lichkeit auf, in dieser Sache etwas zu erklaren." Nitzsch, System d.
Christ. Lehre, p. 23. Compare the note on p. 27, in reply to
Schwartz.

570 THE PERSONALITY OF GOD.
of that state to a distinct personal object. It is just
as if we were to stop with simple sensation, instead of
through sensation advancing to the perception of the
world without us. We are supposed to be conscious
of a certain mental state, the feeling of dependence, as
we are sensible of an ache in a limb, and there, as far
as piety is concerned, the matter ends. Schleiermacher
was also wrong in resolving piety whoUy into the
feeling of dependence; since the yearning for com
munion with God, not to speak of the feeling of obli
gation, is an equally essential element; but this is
comparatively a venial error. The mystic, who makes
feeling directly percipient, is stiU more at fault. As
we humbly conceive, the truth is that the mind is
affected in certain ways, in the department of feehng,
by the great Being in whom we live and move, just as
self and the outward world make themselves felt in
consciousness ; and the states of consciousness thus
originating from God involve and beget an immediate
faith in His existence — a faith, however, in which feel
ing, as it is the root, is likewise the predominant ele
ment. Eor example, remorse of conscience includes
a sense of accountability, and this implies a sense of
God. The feeling itself is God's work in the soul,
and is felt to be so. ' God is beheved in, through this
feehng, not by a process of argument, but immediately.
He is, literally speaking, manifesting Himself to the
soul. It is true that men may discredit the manifesta
tions of God in the soul, and disbelieve in him. So

ORIGIN OF FAITH IN GOD. 571
they may speculate themselves out of the belief in the
reality of the external world, or even of their own
existence. They may deny, and have denied, tbe
reality of a moral law binding on the conscience, and
quench this hght that is in thern. The behef in
God is, also, largely dependent on the state of the wUl ;
in this respect, that the alienation of the will and heart
from that Being may weaken ahd weU-nigh deaden
this faith. Nor should we overlook the truth that it
is also dependent upon the will of God, who may
withdraw or intensify those manifestations of Himself
in which it originates. Unquestionably, the effect of
sin is to reduce this implanted faith, so that in most
men it appears as an obscure yearning after an object
distant and dimly conceived. This state of the sinful
mind is described in Scripture as a feeling after God.
Men grope, as in the dark, for Him " who is not far
from every one of us," but whom we " did not choose
to retain in our knowledge." 1
It is remarkable that in Germany almost all theN
writers of note, of all schools in philosophy, unite in
regarding belief in God as an immediate act of the
soul, and as rooted in feeling. This is conceded even
by the Hegelians. They allow that such is the charac
ter of this faith in the primitive stage, and only con
tend, in accordance with their system, that such faith
1 Clear psychological explanations relative to our primitive reli
gious faith or feeling may be found in the excellent work of TJlrici,
Gott und die Natur, pp. 610, 620. The entire chapter is valuable".

572 THE PERSONALITY OF GOD.
is only a -rudimentary condition of consciousness, to be
supplanted by its maturer development. Theologians
who, though influenced by Schleiermacher, have con
structed their systems in an independent spirit, such
as Nitzsch and Twesten, Julius Muller and Rothe, in
common with Trendelenburg, Ritter, Ulrici, and other
philosophers of various schools, substantiaUy agree in
the doctrine that religion originates in an immediate
faith, and emanates from no empirical source. Such,
in fact, is the old doctrine of theology. An obscure
knowledge of God — a notitia dei — was held to be im
planted in the soul, and to be the immediate witness
to God's existence. Such is the doctrine of Calvin
and Melancthon, to say nothing of their forerunners
and foUowers.1
What now is the purport and the force of the
several arguments for the existence of God? We
reply that these proofs are the different modes in
Avhich faith expresses itseU, and seeks confirmation.
1 Calvin pronounces it an incontrovertible truth that " the human
mind, even by natural instinct, has some sense of Deity " — divinitatis
sensum. He affirms that " men universally know that there is a
God ; " that '' some sense of the Divinity is inscribed on every heart."
"Unde colligimus," he adds, " non esse doctrinam quae in scholis
discenda sit, sed cujus sibi quisque ab utero magister est." There is a
natural "propensity to religion" in men, says Calvin, and an ine
radicable knowledge of G-od, which manifests itself in the worst men
in spite of their will. See the Institutes, B. I., cc, ii. and iii. Me
lancthon says : " vult enim deus agnosci et celebrari ; et fnlsisset
illustris et firma notitia Dei in mentibus hominum, si natura homi
num mansisset integra." Loci Communes, I. De Deo.

THE ONTOLOGICAL ARGUMENT. 573
In theni, faith, or the object of faith, is more exactly
conceived and defined ; and in them is found a cor
roboration, not arbitrary but substantial and valuable,
of that faith which springs from the soul itself. Such
proofs, therefore, are neither, on the one hand, of them
selves sufficient to create and sustain faith, nor are they,
on the other hand, to be set aside as of no weight.
The arguments for the being of God are capable of
being classified in various ways. We shaU consider
them here under the three heads of the ontological,
the cosmological, and the teleological arguments — the
moral argument being embraced under the teleological,
where it properly belongs.
1. The Ontological proof proceeds from the idea
of God, attempting to deduce therefrom the truth of
His existence. The germ of this proof is in Augustin.
It appears in its riper form in the celebrated argument
of Anselm. The objection that the idea of the most
perfect being imaginable is after all only an imagina
tion, Anselm endeavored to parry by the statement
that this idea is far from being an arbitrary notion, hke
the image which fancy forms of the lost island (the
illustration of GaunUo), but is strictly a necessary idea,
in the sense that' the mind cannot escape from enter
taining it. The argument of Anselm stands in vital
connection with his Realistic phUosophy.1 But he
1 A being in the mind and a being in re, require the supposition
of a genus— hence a being, according to Realism— embracing both.
The true sense of Anselm's argument is best appreciated by Bitter.

574 THE PERSONALITY OF GOD.
fails to show that existence in re is an attribute enter
ing into a concept, and falls into the error of inferring
the existence of a thing from the definition of a word.
Des Cartes assumed the existence of God to account
for the presence in the human mind of the idea of
the infinite and perfect being. As much reality, he
thought, must belong to the cause as is found in the
effect ; and this holds good where the effect is an idea.
The idea of the infinite and perfect God cannot be
produced in the mind by the things that surround us
in the world. It implies, therefore, for its cause the
Being himself. This reasoning does not1 carry full
conviction ; and if the additional fact of a yearning to
break through, the bonds of our finite being and to
commune with a, higher Power, be introduced, we are
brought back to the original faith which precedes
logical argument.
Yet the ontological argument, even though it be
faUacious, is not without an indirect value. It pre
sents a true conception of God, regarded as a possible
being. The being than whom no higher can be con
ceived, in case He exists, exists necessarily.
Geschichte d. Christ. Phil, III. 337. The validity of Anselm's argu
ment is maintained by the Cambridge Platonist, Henry More, in the
early part of his Antidote to Atheism. It should be observed that
Anselm's argument is to be found in the Proslogium, and in the Keply
to Gaunilo. The earlier form of the argument in the Monologium
resembles more nearly the argument of Augustin. Yet it is import
ant as showing the Eealistic foundation on which the later argument
rests.

THE COSMOLOGICAL ARGUMENT. 575
2. The Cosmological argument starts from the con
tingent character of all things presented to observation.
Their changeful and dependent character implies the
existence of an unchangeable and independent Being,
The principle of causation unquestionably involves a
belief in a First Cause, or a Cause which is not at the
same time an effect : otherwise existences are traceable
to no cause, and the principle of causation is made
void. An eternal series is an absurd hypothesis, since
it would be a series of effects without a cause. EUm-
inate the element of time (which is not a cause), and
the series becomes like a single momentary event,
which would be an event without a cause. We are,
therefore, compeUed to believe in something which is
eternal and independent. The defect of the argument
is that it contains no strict proof of the personality of
this eternal Being. It does not carry us necessarUy
beyond the Absolute of Pantheism.
This is the defect of Dr. Samuel Clarke's attempt
ed demonstration of the being of God from the attri
butes of necessary existence. When he would prove
the inteUigence of the necessary being, he falls back
upon the a-posteriori proof from marks of design in
the world. Thus the cosmological argument establishes the
existence of an eternal being, the cause or ground of
aU things, but does not fuUy satisfy the mind that He
is intelligent and free.
3. The Teleological argument is the proof from

576 THE PERSONALITY OF GOD.
final causes. We discern, for example in the struc
ture of our own bodies, and in the material existences
around us, features which, as we involuntarily feel,
presuppose the agency of a free and inteUigent cause.
Through the action of our minds and the works of
man, we are made famUiar with the operation of intel
ligence ; and when we are confronted by phenomena
strikingly analogous to the known expressions of our
intelligence, Ave are authorized to attribute them to a
like cause.
The theory of a plastic force, or blindly working
agency in Nature, similar to the supposed working of
instinct in an animal or of the principle of growth in
the plant, is sometimes brought forward in opposition
to the doctrine of final causes. The objection is falla
cious ; since the admitted " blindness " of that which
is conceded to operate with the wisdom and precision
of intelligence, is the very circumstance which carries
us beyond the secondary cause and inspires the belief
in a free and inteUigent Power.
Sir WUUam HamUton affirms that the argument
from final causes is not vahd, unless it be presupposed
that the human mind is a free inteUigence.1 It is true
that if the human mind itself be the product of an
unintelligent force, as materialistic theories imply, the
external world might not irrationally be thought to
emanate from the same source. Both man and nature
might be thought to be due to a common cause. It
1 Hamilton's Metaphysics (Am. Ed.), p. 22.

THE TELEOLOGICAL ARGUMENT. 577
should be added, however, that the impression made
by external Nature is a sign of our inbred conviction
that we do indeed originate our actions, in the exer
cise of inteUigence and freedom ; and under this suppo
sition, the argument from final causes in Nature retains
its force. To set before it ends and choose means for
attaining them is the distinctive act of mind.
The physico-theological proof, or the proof from
design in the works of Nature, is one of the oldest,
most universally impressive, and justly convincing of
the various arguments for a personal God. It has
been set forth by a series of writers from Socrates and
Cicero to Paley, and. acquires fresh illustration with
every new discovery in physical science. It is brought
forward in the Scriptures, as being sufficient to render
ungodliness a sin. The devotional parts of the Bible
abound in appeals to the testimony to the existence of
God which his works present.1
The validity of this argument is not destroyed by
the Darwinian theory that all living species are des
cended from a common parentage ; unless indeed this
theory is aUowed to run into materialism by bringing
the human soul into the same category with animal and
vegetable life. Were the Darwinian speculation estab
hshed as a truth of science, the physico-theological
proof would stUl be good. For if all species are re-
' One of the most impressive discussions of the subject of Final
Causes is the chapter on the Zweck, in Trendelenburg's Logische
Untersuchungen (revised ed.).
37

578 THE PERSONALITY OF GOD.
duced to one, the same marks of design stUl remain in
that one comprehensive species ; and however far back
Ave go in tracing the genesis of living things, the signs
of the agenCy of a superior inteUigence are indelibly
stamped upon the whole system.
Yet it must be confessed that the physico-theologi
cal argument, considered in the light of a strict proof,
lacks completeness. In the first place, it rather
suggests the idea of a builder or moulder of matter,
than of an original Creator. To be sure, the Being
who constructed Nature must have a profound knowl
edge of the properties of matter ; but then there have
been philosophers, ancient and modern, who have held
that matter itself is eternal.1 In the second place,
Nature is at best a finite product, and we are not
authorized, in strict logic, to infer an infinite wisdom
and power in its Maker. To identify omnipotence
with exceedingly great power as Paley does, is to rea
son loosely and to abandon the proper conception of
God. We will not dwell on seeming infeUcities which
meet us in the constitution of Nature, and which occa
sion perplexity. Finally, it is possible, without any
violation of logic, to consider Nature to be the product
of unintelligent forces operating in pursuance of an
inherent law. The Pantheistic hypothesis is logically
admissible. 1 Yet, this objection of Kant proceeds on the notion of a possible
separation of matter and force, which science does not favor. See
Ulrici, Gott und die Natur, p. -401.

THE TELEOLOGICAL ARGUMENT. 579
The office of the physico-theological aigument,
therefore, is, first, to educe and, secondly, to corroborate
the faith in God which, as we have before explained,
is an original possession of the human soul. It is a
probable argument, deriving its probabUity from the
anticipating faith which is defined and fortified through
these outward manifestations of God in Nature.
There is a teleology in History, as weU as in
Nature. Events conspire, through long periods of
time, for the accomplishment of certain ends. All
things are seen to work' together for the securing of
these ends. The thoughtful student of History is not
less impressed with the proofs of forecast and far-
reaching providential control, than the thoughtful
student of Nature is struck with the traces of creative
wisdom and wUl in the material world.
The moral argument is put by Kant in the follow
ing form : we are made for two ends, morality or
hohness, and happiness. These two ends, in the
present state of existence, frequently faU to coincide ;
the former is chosen at the expense of the latter.
Hence we are obliged by the practical reason to sup
pose a future state, 'and a God by whom the system is
adjusted or completed, and righteousness connected
with happiness.
Far more impressive is the proof which lies in the
more direct evidences of a moral administration over
this world. The distribution of natural good and evil,
even though the system of moral government is

580 THE PERSONALITY OF GOD.
unfinished in this life, is sufficient both to prove the
existence of a divine Governor, and to evince, as
Butler has cogently argued, that He approves of virtue
and condemns vice. History is the record of judg
ments exercised over beings endued with a free and
responsible nature. Rewards and punishments are
allotted to individuals and( nations, and the spectacle
is one which is adapted to convince reflecting minds
that God reigns.
Yet this argument is not one that compels acquies
cence. It is possible for the mind to rest in the
theory of a self-executing moral system or moral order,
to the exclusion of the agency of a personal being.
Nor are there wanting adherents of such a theory.
True, it seems untenable save on a necessitarian phi
losophy in which moral liberty is sacrificed. Yet the
theory is one from which its adherents can be driven
by no compulsion of logic. As in the case of the
previous arguments, we have to faU back on the im
mediate feeling of the mind. Faith is elicited and
confirmed, but not begotten, by the traces of a
righteous moral administration, which are observed in
the course of this world's history. ¦

SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES.

FIRST NOTE TO ESSAY II. X
The Epistle of Clement of Rome is of too early a date
to contain any allusion to John's Gospel. The negative infer
ence drawn from its silence, by Volkmar, rests on his ground
less assumption that it was written about a.d. 125. It is
placed by most scholars about the end of the first century.
It is remarkable that Keim, an opponent of the genuineness of
the fourth Gospel, finds traces of it in the Epistle of Barnabas,
which he places as late as 120 to 130." Most critics, even of
the skeptical schools, regard it as earlier. Hofstede de Groot
also considers that the author of the Epistle of Barnabas
made use of the Gospel.3 But this must be pronounced quite
doubtful. Keim also thinks that Hermas was acquainted with
John's Gospel as well as Epistle. He dates " The Shepherd"
at 140-150. Hilgenfeld concedes that John is cited in two
passages of Ignatius ; he dates the Ignatian Letters at about
the middle of the second century. But they are genuine,
although not free from interpolation ; they, therefore, must
have been written prior to 115. In the preamble of a manu
script of the Gospels, in the Vatican Library, these words
occur: "The Gospel of John was composed and delivered to
the Churches by John when he was still living " (evidently
after the other Apostles were dead), " as Papias, surnamed
Hierapolitan, the beloved disciple of John, recounted in his
five exoteric, that is, his last five books. He wrote the Gospel
exactly as John dictated it to him." This preamble was writ
ten on the manuscript not earlier than the ninth century ; but
1 In preparing this note, I have received aid from M. Godet's Article,
"Les Discussions relatives aux temoignages ecclesiastiques sur le Quatrieme
Evangile." — Bulletin Theologique, 25 Avril, 1869.
2 Geschichte Jesu von Nazara, Zurich, 1867.
3 Basilides, als erster Zeuge fur Alter und Autoritat neutestamentlicher
Schriften. Leipzig, 1868.

582 SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES.
the preamble itself, Tischendorf considers to belong before
the time of Jerome. The word " exegetic " should probably
be read for " exoteric." The sentence about the dictation of the
Gospel, it is worthy of note, is not ascribed to Papias. It is
claimed by Tischendorf that the writer of the preamble had
the work of Papias in his hands. This work was still extant
in the Middle Ages.1 The silence of Eusebius respecting a use
of the fourth Gospel by Papias does not, as Ave have said, prove
that it was unknown to this Father. He does not refer to the
use of the Apocalypse by Papias. He mentions that 1 John
and 1 Peter were used by Polycarp, but we knoAV likewise
that he cites the Synoptists and the Epistles of Paul. Eusebius
only mentions the Apocalypse as cited by Theophilus of An
tioch, and says nothing of his well-known testimony to the
fourth gospel. Eusebius had regard to doubts and questions
which existed in his own time. And supposing Papias to have
been silent respecting the fourth Gospel, he had no special
occasion to speak of the authorship of it ; its author was too
well known. But Irenoeus (v. 36), citing the opinions of old
Presbyters who had known the Apostle John, refers to the
interpretation attached to John xiv. 2. It is not improbable
that Irenaeus quotes from the work of Papias ; if not from
him, from the Presbyters who were his cotemporaries and
associates. (See, on the use of John's Gospel by Papias,
Lange's Commentary on John, American edition, note by Dr.
Schaff.) Keim is most decided in his affirmation that Justin
Martyr cites passages from the fourth Gospel, and shows the
influence of it in his whole system of ideas. Hofstede de
Groot has attempted to show that, from what Hippolytus tells
us of the pretended relation of Basilides' doctrine to the
Apostle Matthias and to Glaucias, " Secretary of Peter,"
that Gnostic must have been born as early as 60-70. What
ever degree of weight belongs to this argument, it is certain
that Basilides flourished in the early part of the second cen
tury. That it is he, and not his pupils alone, who is repre
sented by Hippolytus as citing from John's Gospel, is conceded
and asserted by Keim. As to the relation of the Gospel to the
Valentinians, Hilgenfeld in his work on the Canon ¦" virtually
1 See Hofstede de Groot, p. 113. 2 P. 169.

SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES. 583
retracts his former statement that the Gospel is to be explain
ed by means of the Valentinian Gnosticism. Volkmar and
Scholten have sought to assign to Heracleon a later date than
that usually assigned to him.1 But he is called by Origen,
"OvaXevnvov yvtapip,os, an acquaintance of Valentine ; for this
is the sense of the term. Both Volkmar and Scholten had
affirmed that Heracleon is not mentioned by Irenaeus ; a mis
take which Tischendorf exposes by referring them to Iren.
ii. 4. Keim admits that there is no serious reason to distrust
the statement of Tertullian, that Marcion rejected the Gospels
of the Apostles — that is, Matthew and John. He also admits
that the fourth Gospel is cited in the Clementine Homilies.
Keim's work is remarkable for the candor of its concessions ;
but his own theory is, in an extraordinary degree, strange and
untenable. He thinks that the fourth Gospel was written at
some time from 110 to 115. John, the Apostle, a strict ad-
herent^of the Judsean Christianity, had long been dead. The
real author of the Gospel was a Jewish Christian, living prob
ably in Asia Minor, and with friendly feelings towards the
Gentiles. He assumed to be John in order to give weight
to his words. He also wrote the first Epistle of John ; but
the Apocalypse was written by John the Presbyter ; the only
John, according to Keim, whom we know to have resided
in Asia Minor. Irenaeus has confused the two Johns, and
imagined that Polycarp- was speaking of the Apostle when he
was really referring to the Presbyter ! But the fact of John's
residence in Asia Minor does not rest on this testimony of Ire
naeus alone ; although this is ample proof of the fact. Poly
crates (in Eusebius), Clement of Alexandria, Apollonius, are
among the witnesses to the same fact. It was an established,
unquestioned tradition in the region of Ephesus, where he
had taught and where he was buried. The traces of John's
influence in the churches of Asia Minor were deep and per
manent. His contemporaries, old Presbyters there, were alive
in the time of Irenaeus, and testified to the Apostle's residence
among them. Keim objects that Papias, in his enumeration
of the Apostles does not place John first ! It is remarkable
that Papias follows the order in which they are brought before
1 Scholten, Die Ultesten Zeugnisse, etc., 1867.

584 SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES.
us in John's Gospel ; a circumstance suggesting that he was
acquainted with it. Keim brings up, also, the silence of the
Acts respecting John's abode in Asia Minor. But the Acts
does not record the death of Peter or Paul. It ends with the
arrival of Paul in Pome. Its silence on that point, there
fore, is not of the slightest weight. If tbe Acts purported to
be a full biography of the Apostles, and if it had been written
long after the death of Peter and Panl, the objection might
have some force.
Holtzmann has undertaken, in two numbers of Hilgenfeld's
Journal,1 to show a dependence, as to phraseology and matter,
of the fourth Gospel upon the other three, especially upon
Luke. After a careful perusal of these articles, we must con
fess that his proofs seem to be quite insilfficient. It is difficult
to conceive how the author of the fourth Gospel, whoever
he was, could have proceeded as Holtzmann's theory assumes
that he must have done. Such a mingling of servile imitation
and dependence with the boldest freedom and even license,
and with the utmost fertility of invention, is not imaginable.2
SECOND NOTE TO ESSAY II.
The Paschal controversies in the early Church afford, in
the opinion of the Tubingen critics, a conclusive argument
against the Johannean authorship of the Fourth Gospel. The
recent literature on this topic is fully given by Dr. Abbot un
der the article " John, Gospel of," in the American edition
of the "Bible Dictionary." The thorough monograph of
Weitzel, Die christliche Passahfeier der drei ersten Jahrhun-
derte (1848), the articles on this subject by the same author in
the Studien u. Kritiken (1848), and the publications of Steitz
(Herzog's JReal-JEncyc. der Theologie, Art. Pascha; Studien
u. Kritiken 1856, 1857, 1859 ; Jahrb. fur deutsche Theol.,
1861), present fully the evidence in the case, and confute
the Tiibingen arguments.
The most important document is the letter of Poly-
' 1869. I. II. " Das schriftstellerische Verhcltniss des Johannes zu den
Synoptikem." i
2 Meyer thinks it impossible to sustain Holtzmann's hypothesis. See the
last edition of Meyer on John, p. 8, note. v

SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES. 585
crates, Bishop of Ephesus, written in 190, and given by Euse
bius (v. 24). From Eusebius's account of the origin of the
controversy, in the preceding chapter, it is clear that, at thid
time, a principal ground of complaint against the Quartode
cimans was their habit of terminating their fast by celebrating
the Eucharist on the evening of the 14th Nisan. They ob
served a day, namely, the 14th of Nisan, which the Ro
mans and others did not observe ; for these commemorated
the Saviour's resurrection on Sunday, and Avere controlled in
the arrangement of their observances by this fact : the com
memoration of the Lord's death being on the Friday preced
ing Easter. The Quartodecimans, on the contrary, were gov
erned by the day of the month, and not at all by the days of
the week, on which the closing events of the Lord's history
had occurred. But in the second century it was the Quarto-
deciman habit of terminating their fast at the end of the day,
the 14th Nisan, which Avas especially complained of.
The question is, what did the body of Quartodecimans
profess to commemorate by their fast, and by the Eucharist at
its close ? The Tubingen critics say, the Last Supper, and
infer the disagreement of the Asia Minor Christians with the
chronology of John's Gospel.
If the Tubingen view is correct, the Churches of procon
sular Asia, besides other adjacent Churches, fasted in commem
oration of the day of the Last Supper — the day on which it
occurred, but suspended their fast at, the close of it, and fasted
not on the day on which the. crucifixion took place. This
would surely be unexpected. A judaizing party, or a party
which supposed itself bound to keep up the observance of the
Jewish passover, might feel bound to celebrate this festival on
the day appointed in the law ; and if they silpposed the Last
Supper of Jesus to have been in connection with the passover
meal, their commemoration might be of a half-J ewish. half-
Christian character. But that the body of the Christians of
Asia in the second century had this judaizing spirit, or were
charged with having it, there is no proof. In the transactions
withRorne, in which Polycarp aud Polycrates had part, there
is no trace of such an accusation. It is improbable, then, at
the outset, that this great aud important branch of the Church

586 SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES.
had no commemoration of the death of Christ and of his fin
ished work of redemption, and tbat they differed so radically
from their fellow-Christians as to suspend their fast, cease
from the expression of grief and mourning, before the day of
the crucifixion.
Whether the body of the Quartodecimans commemora
ted in their Fast the Last Supper or the Crucifixion, must bs
decided by the view taken of what is called the Laodicean
phase of the controversy. This Laodicean discussion was in
170. In it Melito, bishop of Sardes, and Apollinaris, bishop of
Hieropolis, took part. The opening sentence of Melito's
book is given by Eusebius (v. 24). The book of Clement on
the same subject Avas occasioned by Melito's work (e£ nmos
tov MeXtWis ypa^s) (Euseb. v. 24). The fragments of Hip
polytus (Paschal Chronicle I. 12 seq., and Ref. om. Haer.,
vii. 18) harmonize with those of Apollinaris and Clement, and
are directed against the same party. This party professed
to observe the 14th Nisan because Jesus had kept the Jewish
passover with his disciples on tbat day, and according to
Apollinaris (Ghronicon Pasc. I. 6. a), tbey quoted the Gospel
of Matthew in support of their statement and their chro
nology. Apollinaris, Clement, and Hippolytus, on the con
trary, affirm that the 14th Nisan was the day of the cruci
fixion, when the true lamb, Jesus himself, of whom the
Passover lamb was the type, was slain. The Tubingen critics
affirm that the Laodicean party was one and the same with
that defended by Polycarp and Polycrates, and that the
discussion there was due to the fact that Apollinaris had
been won over to the Occidental view. Hence, say the critics,
the Quartodecimans maintained a chronology in opposition
to the fourth Gospel; and as they -appealed to the authority
of John, this Gospel cannot have been by him. But there
are strong reasons for believing that the Laodicean party was
composed of schismatical Quartodecimans, at variance with
the body of their fellow-Christians in that region and observing
the Jewish passover, perhaps after the Jewish manner, — in
imitation, it is claimed, of Jesus who kept the Passover with
his discipes on the evening before his death.1
1 It is clear that the Laodicean party took ground agamst the idea that

SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES. 587
Melito is known, by the statement of Polycrates, to have
been an orthodox Quartodecirnan. He and Apollinaris are
ranked together by Eusebius as prominent men in the Church
of Asia, and as having composed Apologies for the Christian
faith (iv. 26). There is not a hint that they were divided on
this question and appeared in the field as combatants on op
posite sides. This is not at all implied in the statement respect
ing Clement, that his work was occasioned by that of Melito.
The fragments preserved from Melito's writings (Routh,
Reliq. Sacr., p. 124) indicate a habit, not of adhering to the
ceremonial observances of the Mosaic economy, but
of finding a fulfilment of the types of the Old Testa
ment in the events of Christ's history. " In the Lord,"
he says, in the third fragment, "the lamb Avas as the
ram which Abraham beheld caught in the bush sabek, but
the bush signified tbe cross, and that place Jerusalem, and
the lamb the Lord bound for the slaughter." (See Weitzel,
p. 26.) But a strong consideration, in our judgment, going
to show that the Laodicean Quartodecimans whom Apol
linaris opposes, were a side party distinct from the orthodox
Quartodecimans about them, is found in the manner in which
Apollinaris characterizes them.1 We translate the first of the
fragments in tbe Paschal Chronicle (I. 6. c.) "There are
therefore those who stir np strife about these matters, owing
to their ignorance — a condition of things which they deserve
indulgence for falling into, for ignorance does not admit of
Jesus was crucified on the day on which the passover meal was eaten. But
whether this was their only peculiarity ; whether, in particular, they con
ceived themselves to be observing the Jewish, as well as the Christian, ritej
and therefore ate a lamb at their meal, is not so clear. They do not seem
to be accused of Judaizing, except so far as their chronological view involved
an overlooking of the fact that Christ was himself the Paschal Lamb.
Weitzel may have gone farther than the evidence warrants in pronouncing
them Ebionitic and Judaizing. This Professor Milligan supposes in his able
article (Contemporary Review, Sept., 1867).
1 "Eio-1 toiW ol Si frycoioi' <pi\oveiKov<ri irepX roiruv, avyyvmirrbv irpaypa
wexovSoTes • ayvoia yap ov Kxrnyopiav avaUxerat, a\\a SiSaxns rpoaSeiTai '
Kal \4yovmv on Tp iS' rb irpofraTov pera. ruv /io&tjt&V e^icye v Sxiptos, tj 5e
neya\T) ripepa tuv api/iuv aires eiradei', Kal Striyovvrai MaTdaiov ttSra \4yeiy
Sis rcvoiiKaaiv ¦ t&ev i.avii<pav6s re v6pu y v6i)<ris abrSiv Kal trrairidCeiv Sokci
Kar avrovs Ta eiiayyeAia.

588 SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES.
reprehension, but needs further instruction. And they say
that on the fourteenth, the Lord ate the lamb with his
disciples, but that he himself suffered on the great day of un
leavened bread ; and they declare that Matthew so speaks as
they have understood the matter [or in accordance with their
view]. Whence their opinion is at variance with the law, and
the Gospels seem according to them to disagree with one
another." There is a difference of opinion as to tbe proper
rendering of this last statement respecting the Gospels, and
the consideration of this point we defer for the present, as
not involved in the topic immediately before us. It Avill be
observed that Apollinaris characterizes the party opposed to
him as persons who " stir up strife " and as chargeable with
an ignorance, which is venial, to be sure, but which needs
enlightenment. He speaks, in a consciousness of superior
knowledge, of his opponents as litigious persons who deserve
pity for their want of knowledge. Is it credible that he
would thus characterize all the churches of proconsular
Asia ? Let the reader mark the style in whicb the Quarto-
deciman cause is represented ten years after by Polycrates,
the venerable bishop of Ephesus — the same cause, be it also ob
served, which Polycarp had defended ten years before the date
of this book of Apollinaris. Polycrates appeals to the example
and authority of the Apostle Philip " who sleeps at Hierap-
olis " — the very city where Apollinaris was bishop ; to the
authority of the Apostle John, to Polycarp of Smyrna, to
Thraseas of Eumenia, to Sagaris, bishop and martyr, ''who
rests at Laodicea," the place where the conflict in which
Apollinaris took part, occurred, — to Papirius, to Melito, to the
traditions of his own family at Ephesus, to the whole synod
of Asian bishops whom Polycrates had assembled to consider
the controversy with Rome. It cannot be doubted that at
the time when Apollinaris wrote, the Quartodeciman opinion
and practice were universal in that whole region, that they
included among their adherents bishops of the highest
eminence, both living and dead. Is it credible that Apol
linaris would apply to these the terms in which he describes
his opponents ? If not, then he was himself a Quartodeciman
of the orthodox type, his work was directed against a faction

SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES. 589
newly arisen and differing from the view prevalent in that
quarter, and the festival of the orthodox Quartodecimans
was a commemoration of the crucifixion and not of the Last
Supper.1 The more we reflect upon the position of the Tubingen
critics in regard to this whole subject, the more destitute of
plausibility does it appear. They assume that John's Gospel
directly contradicts the ordinary Quartodeciman view, and
was composed for the purpose (partly) of contradicting it.
Yet we find that Polycrates, in terms which prove incon-
testably his acquaintance with John's Gospel, refers to the
Apostle as an authority for the Quartodeciman practice, and
we find no record of any appeal to this Gospel against him.
How could this Gospel be received by the Christians of Asia,
if, as is pretended, it was fabricated and introduced among
them, partly for the purpose of overthrowing their cherished
views on this subject ? We cannot but think that the weight of
evidence is decidedly in favor of the conclusion that the Laodi
cean party was a new party and a minority in the Church of
Asia, while the Quartodecimans proper followed the Apostle
Paul in looking on Christ himself as the true Paschal lamb,
whose death was commemorated by a Fast which was followed
the same day, in remembrance of his finished redemption, by
the Eucharist. Rome and the other Churches differed from
them in not terminating the period of fasting until Easter
Sunday, when the Lord's supper was celebrated with rejoicing.
It is true that in the fourth century, the orthodox Quarto
decimans were reproached for following the custom of the
Jews ; but only in this respect, that they were governed by
the Jewish calendar in fixing the day of their observance.
It was not charged that their festival was Jewish in its
character or was the Jewish passover continued. When
Epiphanius wrote, most of the Christians of Asia had attached
1 Moreover, Apollinaris laid stress upon " the fourteenth," as a Quarto
deciman naturally would. In the second fragment, he says :¦ " The fourteenth
is the true Passover of the Lord, the great sacrifice, instead of the lamb the
Son of God .... who was lifted up upon the horns of the unicorn.
. . . . and who was buried on the day of the Passover, the stone
having been placed upon his tomb."

590 SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES.
themselves to the Occidental rite. It was after the Nicene
Council when uniformity had been established as a law of
the Church. Hence, the remnant of Quartodecimans are
treated as schismatics, just as Victor would have treated
them all at the close of the second century, against the
remonstrances of Irenaeus.
The first fragment of Apollinaris, of which a translation is
given above, proves that John's Gospel, in his time, was one
of the authoritative Gospels, recognized as such by him and
his contemporaries. It is true that Baur gives a different
translation of the closing sentence. He interprets it as
meaning, that " their opinion is at variance with the law, and
the Gospels [also] seem [or would be] in disagreement with
the law." Philologically this rendering is barely admissible ;
it is unnatural and improbable. The word o-rao-ta£eu' often
denotes a disagreement with one another, where there is a
natural or preexisting unity. If Baur's rendering were
correct, Ave should expect Apollinaris to say that \the
Gospel or Matthew — not the Gospels — is at variance with
the law, since it was to Matthew that his opponents appealed,
as he had just stated. 1 Nor can we adopt tbe other
possible rendering of tbe last clause: "and the Gospels
seem to be opposed to them." There is scarcely an instance,
if there be one, in which Kara is used with, the signification
against, after a-rao-id^eiv. The preposition would be -n-pos.
We are convinced that the rendering Ave have gi\ren is the
true one. Apollinaris means to say that if his adversaries
were right in their appeal to Matthew, John and Matthew
would be in contradiction to one another. We are confirm
ed in this opinion by the proof afforded in the second
fragment of Apollinaris— on the reference to the water and
blood — that he was familiar with the fourth Gospel. How,
indeed, can this be doubted when his cotemporary, Theo
philus of Antioch, refers to John's Gospel as a part of the
Holy Scriptures ?
Was the interpretation which Apollinaris, Clement, and
1 Baur's rendering is given up by his pupils ; it is given up by
Hilgenfeld. See Riggenbach, Die Zeugnisse fur das Ev. Johann., etc.
Basel, 1866.

SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES. 591
Hippolytus gave to John's Gospel, as to the date of the
last supper, correct? Does John place it on the evening
prior to the passover meal ? The first passage relating to
this point is ch. xiii. 1., — 7rpo Se T>)s lop-rijs tov irdxrxa, etc. This
has been thought to be a decisive declaration tbat the
Supper was on the day previous to the passover. Such
is Meyer's confident declaration. We think, however,
that the phraseology is consistent with the supposition
that John refers to a point of time immediately antecedent
to the meal referred to in the next verse. Jesus, then,
" knowing " — rrpo t^s eoprijs may be connected with ciSus —
" that his hour was come," loved his disciples to the end, and
gave them a testimonial of love by rising from the table —
SeiWvou -yivopipou — as supper was to begin, and washing their
feet. The mind of the writer from the beginning is on this
act, and this may explain the chronological statement at the
outset. This interpretation does not vary materially from
that of Norton, who gives the passage as follows : — " But
Jesus, before the feast of the Passover, knew that the hour
had come for him to pass from the world to the Father ;
and having loved his own who were to remain in this world,
he loved them to the last." There is nothing, however, to
require this interpretation. Supposing tbe supper (v. 2.) to
have been .the day previous to the passover, we see nothing
abrupt in the mention of it. The article is wanting ; it is
" a supper," not the supper ; and were it the passover meal,
the article would more naturally be expected. In our
judgment, this passage has little weight on either side, but
rather favors the idea that another supper, prior to the
passover, is referred to. John xiii. 29 is the second passage.
Here again " the feast " for which it was thought Judas had
gone to buy provisions may be the feast then going forward
and unfinished. This interpretation is thought to be favored
by the direction (v. 27), " that thou doest, do quickly." It
must be admitted, however, that it is more natural to refer the
et9 ttjv koprqv to the passover meal to occur a day later, than
to apply it to the meal then in progress, or to any sub
sequent meal distinct from that at which the lamb was
eaten. " Those things that we have need of against the

592 SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES. __
feast," — all the provisions for a meal seem to be included.
In John xix. 14, the day of the crucifixion is called "prepara
tion of tlie passover1' — Trapao-Kevrj tov iruo-xa. ; in v. 31, "pre
paration " — -n-apaa-Kairj, and the following day, the Sabbath,
is termed a high day, — i^eydhq rj r/p-epa ; in v. 42 the " Jews'
preparation day," — rrjv Trapao-Kevrjv twv 'lovSaiosv. It is said
that " preparation " — napao-Kern] — had come to be a name for
Fi-iday, the day before the Sabbath, that v. 31 simply means
that it was Friday of passover week, and that Saturday was
an high, or highly important day, as being at once the Sabbath
and one of the days of the grand yearly festival. All this is
possible. But allowing that Trapao-Kem) may mean Friday,
the interpretation of -jrapao-Ke-n) tov irdo-xa. is scarcely probable.
The passover meal , might fall on any day of the week, so
that there could be no day known as "Passover Friday;"
and there seems no reason for John's stating in this place
that it was in the passover week — a fact already evident to
his readers. As there was a preparation ibr the passover
meal, it seems more natural to suppose that John has that in
mind. So, if we suppose that Saturday was at once the weekly
Sabbath and the first and principal day of the Festival, we
have, at least, the readiest and most natural explanation of the
statement that it was " an high day." But the passage of
most importance is John xviii. 28. Here we are. told that
they went not into the judgment-hall of Pilate iva fir] puav3wo-iv
d.W iva (bdyioo-c to Trdtr^a. Dr. E. Robinson, Tholuck, Wieseler,
and others, would make this refer to the chagigah, or a
meal in connection with offerings on the day next after the
passover meal — in this case, Friday. But there is no instance
where the phrase — tpaydw to ird\rxa — means any thing but
" to eat tbe passover meal." Professor Milligan would make
it refer to the unfinished repast, which he supposes those
active in the crucifixion had left, in order to do their work.
But this interpretation seems even more difficult. In
attempting to explain the other passages as referring to the
passover meal, one is conscious of rowing against the tide ;
and this feeling becomes stronger when the same attempt is
made in regard to the passage before us. The fact that
there are no circumstances in John's narrative of the Supper-

SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES. 593
which tend in the remotest degree to identify it with the
passover meal, lends some support to the conclusion that he
intends to describe a supper on the day before.
We are inclined, therefore, to coincide with Ellicott and a
majority- of the German critics, including Neander, Bleek, and
Meyer, in the opinion that John dates the crucifixion on the
morning next prior to the legal Passover meal of the Jews.
At the same time, this conclusion cannot be so confidently
asserted as it is asserted by Meyer. A defence of the opposite
interpretation is given by Wieseler in his Chronologische
Synopse der vier Evangelien and in his recently published Se
quel to that work, Peitr'dge zur richtigen TVurdigung der
Evangelien und der evangelischen Geschichte (1869) ; by Tho
luck in his Commentar zum Evangelium Johannis (1857) ; by
Dr. E. Robinson inthe Biblical Repository ; by Norton in the
¦Notes to his Translation qf the Gospels (Vol. II.) ; and by An
drews in his learned and able Life of our Lord (1862). A full
survey of the various interpretations of the Evangelists, with
the arguments that have been adduced in behalf of each, may
be found in Holtzmann's Essay on the subject, in Bunsen's.
Bibel- Werk. NOTE TO ESSAY III.
Since the foregoing Essay was first published, much has b-eem
written upon the testimony of Papias respecting the Gospels-
of Mark and Matthew. . The arguments which Ave have brought-,
forward in opposition to the restricted interpretation of the
term Logia in the passage from Papias, still appear to us per
tinent and forcible. It is questionable, however, whether
their force is not neutralized by the internal evidence-offered
by a critical examination of the First Gospel by itself and in
its relation to the Second and Third. Certain it is;, that the
verdict of critics of various and conflicting schools of theolo
gical opinion is tending at present to the conclusion that at
the basis of the First Gospel, there does lie a collection of
Discourses of the Lord from the pen of the Apostle Matthew. _
The Griesbachian hypothesis, of which Bleek- is one of the
latest eminent adherents, made Mark the last of the three
and closely dependent on its two predecessors.. The critics

594 SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES.
of the Tubingen school have generally adopted this opinion,
assigning the priority to Matthew. The currrent of judicious
criticism, however, now sets strongly in the opposite, direc
tion, and the precedence is more and more conceded to
Mark. As illustrative of this fact, the opinions of two of
the ablest of the living critics, Holtzmann and Meyer, may
be briefly described.
Holtzmann thinks that at the foundation of all three Gos
pels is a prior Document, designated A, Avhich is fully re
produced in our Mark, and is least used by Luke ; that a
collection of the Discourses of Jesus, designated A, was used,
in the same Greek form, by our Matthew and Luke, — by the
latter more than the former ; that a number of smaller writ
ten documents were also used by the Evangelists ; that
these also drew from oral tradition. Our Gospel of Mark is
explained by supposing at the foundation of it only one
prior Document, A. Our Gospel of Matthew- is founded on
A, but also draws largely from A, as well as other minor
sources. Matthew is not dependent on Luke, or Luke on our
Matthew ; but Luke is founded largely on written docu
ments, A and A and other documents of much importance.1.
The results of Holtzmann's examination, as far as they bear
on the date of the present Gospels, we have presented in the
Introduction to the present edition of this volume.
Meyer coincides with Holtzmann's ascription of prece
dence, as to age, to the Second Gospel. He denies, however,
that there is ground for assuming a primitive Mark of which
the present Gospel is an amplification. The Second Gospel
was formed under the influence of Peter, Mark making use
of but one prior document, the Logia of Matthew. This last
Document lies at the foundation of the First Gospel, the
author of which made use also of the Gospel of Mark.
Luke used our Mark, and either our Matthew or the Logia, —
probably the former. Our Matthew and Luke have availed
themselves of other documents of less compass and import
ance, and also of oral tradition.2
1 Holtzmann, Die Synopt. Evang. S. 162 seq.
2 Meyer's hypothesis is given in the Introductions to his Commentaries
on the first three Gospels.

SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES. 595
The investigations of both of these learned scholars bring
them to results strongly averse to the "tendency- criticism " of
the Tubingen School in its application to the Synoptical Gos
pels,, and highly favorable to their historical trustworthiness
and value. NOTE TO ESSAY IV.
The questions considered in the foregoing Essay are taken
up in one of the ablest and most satisfactory of the recent
commentaries, — Lightfoot on the Epistle to the Galatians.1
Especially is the dissertation (III.) on " St. Paul and the
Three " an eminently candid and convincing review of the po
sitions of the Tubingen school.
The principal point of attack on the credibility of Luke
is the narrative of the councilor congress, in Acts xv. But
the alleged discrepancies Avith the Epistle to the Galatians
vanish on examination. Luke says that Paul was sent to
Jerusalem by the Antioch church ; Paul, that he went up by
revelation. The two statements are perfectly consistent, as
will.be seen by reference to Acts ix. 29, 30, compared with
Acts xxii., 17 ; by reference, also, to Acts xiii., 2-4, and xv.
28.2 Luke does not mention the private conference, of which
he may have known little, and which it was not his province
to record — the public transaction being the event in which he
and his readers were interested : he reports what Paul and
Barnabas did as official representatives of the Antioch church.
Paul, on the contrary, is discussing his relations to the Twelve,
in reference to attacks upon him, and thus had occasion to
refer to his private conference with them. But — and this is
the point of special consequence— his language implies a pub
lic conference also. He says : dveSepi-nv avrols, Kar ISiav 8k rots
SokoiW. Here d/rois designates the Christians generally, in
contrast with the Apostles, and implies that a public interview
with the Church was preceded by a private conference with
its leaders. The correctness of this interpretation is proved
by Lightfoot and Meyer. Why Paul does not refer to the
1 St. Paul's Epistle to the Galatians. A revised text, with introduction,
notes, and dissertations. By J. B. Lightfoot, D.D., Hulsean Prof, of Divinity
and Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge. Second edition, revised. London
and Cambridge : Macmillan & Co., 1866. 2 See Lightfoot. p. 124.

596 SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES.
so-called decree of the convention, in his later Epistles to
Gentile churches, is understood Avhen it is remembered that
the missive of the convention was addressed to the churches
of Antioch, Syria, and Cilicia, had respect to a particular dis
turbance, ahd could not be regarded by Paul as binding on
churches organized in distant places and composed almost ex
clusively of Gentiles. Renan, in his recent life of St. Paul,1
by a very strange and erroneous interpretation (in which, how
ever, he is supported by Riickert and a few others) holds that
Titus was actually circumcised, and that Paul means to say
so ! Renan, though questioning the historical fidelity of Luke,
does nevertheless, in his account of the Apostolic convention,
give credence for the most part to Luke's narrative ; although,
in regard to the decree, he takes back in the note (p. 90)
what he admits in the text. Of the thirteen Epistles ascribed
to Paul, Renan makes five classes : (1) those whose genuine
ness is undenied and undeniable, — the Epistle to the Galatians,
the two Epistles to the Corinthians, and the Epistle to the
Romans; (2) Epistles surely genuine, though grave objec
tions have been brought against them, — the tvro Epistles to
the Thessalonians and the Epistle to the Philippians; (3)
those whoso authenticity is probable, though gravely ques
tioned, — the Epistle to the Colossians, and the Epistle to
Philemon ; (4) a doubtful Epistle, — that to the Ephesians ;
(5) Epistles not genuine, — the two to Timothy and the
Epistle to Titus. The noteworthy point in ' this classifi
cation is the rejection of the pastoral Epistles. But the
difficulties attending them and the Epistle to the Ephesians,
and the grounds for accepting these three Epistles as genuine,
have long been familiar to theological scholars.
As in his "Life of Jesus," so in his work on the Apostles,2
Renan holds to the correct opinion, in opposition to Baur,
that the author of the Acts was Luke, and that Luke was an
attendant of Paul in some of his missionary journeys. This
book he justly pronounces a continuation of the third Gospel.
" The third Gospel and the Acts form one work very well
constructed, composed with reflection, and even with art,
1 Saint Paul. Avec une carte des voyages do Saint Paul par M. Kiepert,
de l'Academie de Berlin. Paris. 1869.
2 Les Apotres, par Ernest Renan, Membre de l'Institut. Paris, 1866.

SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES. 597
written by the same hand and according to a consecutive
plan." Hence the supposition that the book comes from a
later writer, by whom the passages in which " we " occurs
are cited, is with good reason rejected. Renan thinks that
the third Gospel was written very soon after the capture of
Jerusalem by Titus, and as the sequel is of a later date, he
places it about the year 80. This, however, is a conjectural
date, and, in our judgment, the work was composed several
years earlier, and shortly after the date assigned to the Gos
pel. As to the credibility of Luke, there are two points in
Renan's remarks which require attention. He considers the
first twelve chapters to be of inferior authority to the last six
teen, in which Paul's missions are described, and to be, in short,
in many things untrustworthy ; and he takes up the Tubingen
doctrine that Luke accommodated his narrative throughout
to a theological purpose — that of reconciling parties in the
Church. As regards the first point of the impeachment of
Luke, it must be observed that Renan goes further than to
impute occasional inaccuracies to the historian in the earlier
part of the Acts ; he attributes to these chapters a somewhat
low degree of historical value. The opinion is closely con
nected with the borrowed Tubingen theory respecting the
design and structure of the entire book, and his arguments in
favor of both propositions are mingled together. It is strange
that Renan should take this last theory under his patronage.
As he follows the narrative of Luke in detail, he seldom, if
ever, postulates pure invention on the part of the historian,
but adheres to his own favorite notion of a legend, an illu
sion or hallucination. Baur made the Acts a product of the
second century, and denied it to be a veritable composition
of Luke. A theological fiction could, with more plausibility,
be supposed to have been written . after so long an interval
from the death of the Apostles Peter and Paul. But among
various insuperable difficulties in the way of Baur's theory,
the omission by the author of the Acts to make use of the
Pauline Epistles, where material subservient to his' alleged
design Avould naturally first have been sought, is decisive.
Renan lays hold of a part of the Tubingen hypothesis — a
part which cannot stand by itself. He couples the imputa-

598 SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES.
tion of a theological tendency, leading to much invention
as well as distortion, with an admission of the genuineness
and early date of the book. He Avould have us belieA'e that
Luke — a trusted companion of Paul, a cotemporary of the
other Apostles, an earnest believer in the Gospel — made up
stories concerning Peter and Paul for the sake of pacifying
contention among their respective disciples ; and that, only
ten years after the death of these Apostles, in the midst of
a multitude who had known both, these radical misrepresen
tations were accepted without a question ! Baur himself
was too discerning and too consistent to give his assent to
so improbable a view. He justly considered tbat the denial
of the genuineness of the work is essential to the denial of
its credibility. In proof of his charge against Luke, Renan
states that, contrary to Paul's own assertion (in Gal. i. 11
seq.), Luke represents that the Apostle went up to Jerusa
lem immediately after his conversion, and lived on a footing
of cordial intimacy with the other Apostles, preaching to the
Hellenist Jews. The design of Luke, according to Renan,
in this false representation, was to exhibit Paul in relations
of friendship and equality with the rest of the Apostles.
First, let us inquire into the pretended discrepancy in regard
to the date of this visit of Paul to Jerusalem. Luke says
(Acts ix. 23) that it was "after that many days were fulfilled."
Paul himself states that it was " after three years " (Gal. i.
18). It is said that the expression " many days" cannot be
taken to cover so long a period. But Paley furnishes us an
example from the Old Testament, showing that the phrase
may cover just this interval. In I Kings ii. 38, 39, we read :
" And Shimei dwelt in Jerusalem many days. And it came
to pass at the end of three years, tbat two of the servants of
Shimei ran away," etc. As to the length of Paul's stay, on
this occasion, at Jerusalem, he states himself that he abode
with Peter fifteen days, meeting also James, the Lord's
brother (Gal. i. 18, 19). If the language of Luke in ch. ix.
is such, in itself considered, as to lead us to^suppose that he
would make the visit of Paul of longer duration, an opposite
impression is made' by his second reference to this same
visit (Acts xxii. 17, 18), where Paul is reported as saying:

SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES. 599
" it came to pass that when I was come again to Jerusalem,
even while I prayed in the temple, I was in a trance, and
saw Him saying unto me, 'Make haste and get thee quickly
out of Jerusalem ; for they will not receive thy testimony
concerning me.' » Paul confirms Luke in several of the
statements in Acts ix., for he says (Gal. i. 21-23) : " After
wards I came into the regions of Syria and Cilicia,"— Luke
states (Acts ix. 30*) that he went to Tarsus by the way of
Caesarea—" and was unknown by face unto the churches of
Judea, which were in Christ ; but they had heard only that
he which persecuted us in times past now preacheth the
faith which once he destroyed." The churches had no
acquaintance with him ; they had merely heard a report of
his conversion. WhateA-er difficulty may be found with
the statements of Luke in Acts ix. 26-30, whatever opinion
may be held in regard to his correctness in minor particu
lars, there is nothing in the passage to lend the slightest
support to Renan's accusation. No position, with reference
to Peter and the other Apostles, is attributed to Paul,
different from that which his own words imply, when he
says (Gal. i. 18) that he abode with Peter fifteen days.
Renan (following Baur) further charges that Paul (Gal. i.
and ii.) expressly excludes every journey to Jerusalem be
tween Acts ix. 26 and Acts xv. 2 ; that Luke, therefore,
moved by the same desire to connect Paul with the other
Apostles, interpolates a journey (Acts xi. 30, xii. 25), which
was never made. Luke having stated (Acts xi. 27-29) that
prophets who had come to Antioch from Jerusalem had
predicted a famine, and that the Antioch disciples deter
mined to send relief to their brethren, adds (ver. 30) that
they actually " sent it to the elders by the hands of Barna
bas and Saul." The next chapter of Acts is mostly filled
Avith a narrative of the imprisonment and miraculous release
of Peter, which led to his departure to Caesarea, and Avith
an account of the death of Herod. At the close of the
chapter (ver. 25), stands the brief remark : — " And Barnabas
and Saul returned from Jerusalem, when they had fulfilled
their ministry, and took with them John, whose surname
was Mark." Thus, all that is said of the messengers is that

600 SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES.
they went to Jerusalem and returned. Now Baur and
Renan do not impute to Luke in this place an inaccuracy,
in following, for example, a tradition which mistakenly
joined Paul and Barnabas in this affair ; but they charge the
historian with intentional falsifying. We must then believe
that the story of the famine and of Agabus, the occasion of
the mission, was likewise invented, and that having taken
such pains to bring Paul to Jerusalem and to the Apostles
there, Luke is so stupid as to interpose the statement that
Peter had gone to Caesarea, so that, of course, Paul could
not meet him, and to confine himself to the bare remark tbat
the messengers Avent and returned ! But Avhat of the al
leged contradiction with Paul? The latter does not say
that his journey to Jerusalem, seventeen years after his con
version, on the occasion of the Apostolic Convention, was
the journey following the first after his conversion, there
being no intermediate visit. His language is: — "Then
(ttoXw), fourteen years after I went up again to Jerusalem."
If the journey recorded in Acts xi. 30, xii. 25, was a hasty
one, affording no opportunity of conference upon matters of
doctrine with the other Apostles — Peter was certainly ab
sent — Paul may not have thought himself called upon to
notice it in this passage of the Epistle to the Galatians.
Something may have prevented him at that time from enter
ing the city. Some little circumstance unknown to us might
instantly remove all appearance of discrepancy. The re
maining objections of Renan to tbe historical fidelity of
Luke, have already been sufficiently noticed. -
NOTE TO ESSAY V.
A valuable Essay, from the pen of Beyschlag, on the char
acter of the Roman Church and the design of the Epistle of
Paul to the Romans, is found in the Studien und Kritiken,
1867, (iv). The evidence in favor of the position that the
Roman Church was not formed predominantly of native Jews,
is really conclusive. At the same time, it has not been easy
to account, in a satisfactory manner, for the plan and tone of
Paul's Epistle, on the supposition that this church was made

SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES. 601
up. of converts from heathenism. The hypothesis, that in this
one Epistle, the Apostle, with no special reason, undertook a
systematic exposition of Christian doctrine, not only implies
a deviation from his usual practice, but fails also to explain
the manner in whicb the body of the Epistle is made to relate
to Jewish tenets and prejudices, and especially the chapters
(ix.-xi.) in which the Apostle directly considers the rejection
of the Gospel by the Jews, and pours out his feeling with ref
erence to them. Hence, expositors of late have felt the
need of presupposing a state of things in the Roman Church
which called for this strain of remark. There must have been
difficulties or objections which Paul had in mind, not only
while composing these chapters, but also in the preceding
part of the discussion which culminates in. them. It is worthy
of note, moreover, that Baur, in the last edition of his work on
the Apostle Paul, drops various precarious arguments for the
alleged Judaism of the Roman Church, and holds that the
Roman Christians went not for excluding the Gentiles from
participation in the privileges of the Gospel, but merely for
maintaining the primacy of the Jewish people. There has
been thus a mutual approach of the opposite schools of inter
preters towards one another. Beyschlag, in the Essay above
mentioned, proposes to solve the difficulty which is suggested
by tbe contents of the Epistle, by the hypothesis that the Ro
man Church was composed predominantly, of Christians of
Gentile birth, but Jewish in their way of thinking ; in short,
of Roman proselytes to Judaism. They Avere Christians
Avhom Paul would naturally address ; but they were perplexed
by the spectacle of the general unbelief of the Jews. The ar
guments of Beyschlag are not without force. Baur himself
is compelled to concede that there were Jewish Christians
who did not partake of the hostility to Paul and the jealousy
towards the Gentile converts, which are exhibited in oppo
nents of Paul who are brought before us in the Epistle to the
Galatians. The Epistle to the Romans really . contains, on his
own interpretation of it, a.powerful argument against his gen
eral position. It shows that Jewish Christian Avas not synony
mous with fanatical Judaizer. Beyschlag, in another arti
cle (Studien und Kritiken) has attempted to prove that

602 SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES.
the "Christ-party" at Corinth was made up of extreme Ju
daizers, who are thus expressly distinguished from the Peter-
party, and that the latter were of the moderate type who
stopped short of hostility to Paul and the rejection of his
uncircumcised converts.

NOTE TO ESSAY VI.
Whoever reads Josephus must be struck with the distrac
ted condition of society and the deeply distracted state of men's
minds in Palestine, at the time when Jesus appeared. Every
thing testifies of a pervading uneasiness, agitation, conflict.
The character and life of Jesus present a strange and impres
sive contrast with the picture of tumult and discord which the
Jewish historian has left us. It is like a star in the midst of
a dark, tempestuous night. In such a condition of things, it
is impossible that a series of myths should spring up. " The
very chaos of that time," says a late writer, " the heteroge
neous character of the Jewish sects, the perplexed state of po
litical relationships, the variety of forces at work in society,
the absence of simple, spontaneous movements and social im
pulses — in short, the general alertness and multitudiousness of
the time — was fatal to the growth of such a series of legends
as those which Strauss has indicated. The age of the Apostles
was more critical and reflective than spontaneous and impul
sive. There was doubt and hesitation, as well as expectancy,
in the general mind. Enthusiastic idolatry of men Avas rare,
hero-worship almost unknown." " Long prior to the advent of
Christ, the Jewish mind had reached a high-water mark of
intellectual vigor. Palestine had been divided for generations
into opposite philosophical schools, led by astute and learned
rabbis ; and during the lifetime of our Lord a hot controver
sy raged between the pure theism of the Pharisees and the
materialism of a sect which boldly denied the supernatural."1
Mri Lecky has introduced into his late work on the His
tory of European Morals from Augustus to Charlemagne
(1869), remarks on the early spread of Christianity in the
Roman Empire. He appears to think that the rapid progress
1 North British Review, July, 1869. Art. I.

SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES. 603
of. Christianity is easily accounted for, and dwells on the cre
dulity and superstition of the time, which made it easy for
alleged miracles in the post-apostolic age to obtain credence.
As to tbe truth or falsehood of the New Testament miracles,
he does not commit himself. Mr. Lecky writes in an attractive
style. He derives aid chiefly from French rather than Ger
man authorities, — in this respect resembling Buckle — and bis
works suffer in consequence. In his History of the Rise and
Influence of the Spirit of Rationalism in Europe (1866), he
refers such phenomena as the disappearance of religious per
secution, and the belief in witchcraft, to the " declining sense of
the miraculous ; " and this is ascribed to a vague and mysterious
law of intellectual progress. Changes of opinion and senti
ment which are really owing to the softening and enlightening
influence of Christianity upon the barbarous nations of Eu
rope are fallaciously and gratuitously attributed to this mys
tical . origin. The drift of both of Mr. Lecky's works is
decidedly naturalistic. We notice here his statements rela
tive to the early conquests of Christianity. In this path Gibbon
had preceded him. The causes of the rapid progress of Chris
tianity, which Gibbon assigns in his 15th chapter, — for exam
ple, the virtues of the early Christians — are seen, when
examined, to be the effects of Christianity itself. We are
thus brought to the result, that the progress of Christianity is
due to its own intrinsic power and excellence. That the spread
of Christianity was not magical, that it was providentially pre
pared for and was aided by circumstances of the age, is true ;
and the secondary causes which contributed to its progress
have not only been pointed out by skeptical writers, but have
been set forth, also, with full emphasis, by historians of a dif
ferent temper. But when the impression is made that the
Gospel had a smooth path, and that the obstacles in its way
were not so great as to render its progress and triumph a
truly wonderful event, history is misrepresented. Neander
has very effectively shown how the very influences that might
favor the reception of the Gospel could turn themselves into
formidable hindrances in its way. What furthered its pro
gress, also retarded it. It is a historical fact that it had to
contend against the pride and contempt of the educated

604 SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES.
class, and the fanatical anger of the populace. Where there
was a superstitious readiness to believe in miracles, magicians
and necromancers must be driven from the field before the
teachers of the Gospel could hope for a hearing. This grand
fact stands out, that the Gospel demanded an inward, moral re
formation, which men in all ages reluctantly fulfil ; and in that
corrupt condition of society, when the espousal of Christianity,
too, Avas likely to be attended with heavy sacrifices and penal
ties, the rapid conquests which it made are truly wonderful.
What we wish to do now, however, is to express dissent
from the remarks of Mr. Lecky upon the unquestioning cred
ulity of this early period. He allows, it is true, that the
first century stood somewhat better in this respect than did
the times that followed. We have only to remember
how Aristotle's writings had been, for more than three
centuries, familiar to educated men ; how Thucydides, a
century earlier, had illustrated the historical spirit ; how
Epicureanism with its bare recognition of the existence
of gods, united with contempt for the doctrine of a
special Providence, was the prevailing philosophy ; how
Roman law was administered throughout the civilized world ;
how the philosophical treatises of Cicero exhibit the utter
infidelity, as to the mythological religion, of the statesmen
of the time ; how a man like Julius Caesar could avow in the
Roman Senate, without protest or contradiction, his disbelief
in the existence of the soul after death ; how antagonists of
Christianity, like Lucian and Celsus, treated its claim as to mir
acles — we have only to remember such facts as these, in or
der to be assured that the intellectual state of the ancient
world Avas one far removed from childish credulity.
NOTE TO ESSAY VIII.
The second work1 of M. Renan, under the general title,
Histoire des Origines du Christianisme, is Les Apotres
(Paris, 1866). He writes from the same point of view — that
of a vague, sentimental Pantheism — which characterizes his
" Life of Jesus." " The historical sciences," he says in one
place, " presuppose that no supernatural agent disturbs the

SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES. 605
course of humanity ; that there is no being superior to man
to whom one can attribute an appreciable part in the moral
conduct, more than in the material conduct, of the universe.
For myself, I think that there is not in the universe an intel
ligence superior to that of man ; that the absolute of justice
and reason manifests itself only in humanity. Viewed outside
of humanity, this absolute is only an abstraction. The in
finite exists only when it puts on a form." J
Of Christianity as a method of deliverance for man from
the darkness and bondage of sin, Renan has no appreciation.
This essential peculiarity of the religion of Christ, it is hard
ly an exaggeration to say that he passes over in silence. The
bearing of the Gospel upon the moral nature, and the rela
tions of the Gospel to the profoundest necessities of the soul,
to the sense of guilt, and the yearning for freedom from the
sway of vicious inclination, are almost entirely ignored. In
this particular, the writings of Renan are more shallow than
those of any other Rationalistic author of distinction with
whom we are acquainted. In giving an account of the his
torical preparation for Christianity, and of the successful
propagation of the Gospel in the Roman empire, he leaves
out this fact of capital importance. Starting with a specula
tive scheme which, in our judgment, is false and superficial,
and assuming that all testimony to miracles is at once to be
rejected — a strange ground for a philosopher to take who
professes to base every thing on observation — he can do
no less than attempt to resolve the events recorded in the
New Testament into hallucination or fraud. His critical pro
cedure is highly instructive. He admits that we have fre
quently the testimony of eye-witnesses. He alloAvs that in
many cases phenomena took place which impressed the par
ticipants and witnesses as supernatural. He is, moreover,
often perplexed and generally unsuccessful in devising a
plausible naturalistic explanation of the admitted facts. He
follows the Christian believer with his concessions up to the
point of allowing the miracle. Then he diverges, and the
ground of his divergence is obviously not the lack of evidence
in itself considered, but his notion that a miracle is essen-
1 Quoted by Pressense, J'esu Christ, sa Vie, etc., p. 12.

606 SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES.
tially and under all circumstances incredible. The real con
flict, then, is about the truths of natural religion. If there
ig no Creator "and Moral Governor of the world, no sinful
separation of man from Him, no need of reconciliation, no
need of an attested revelation, Renan is quite right, and
might have spared himself the trouble of a formal attempt to
destroy the belief in miracles.
Renan undertakes in the first two chapters of his work to
describe the origin of the disciples' faith in the resurrection
of Jesus. He takes it for granted, as might be expected,
that the event did not occur aud that the belief in its reality
was a delusion. But how shall we explain a delusive belief,
so new and startling, so fixed and universal, among the fol-
loAvers of the crucified Master ? Renan differs from Strauss
in adhering more closely to the New Testament narratives of
the appearances of Jesus subsequent to his burial, especially
to the record in John's Gospel and that given by Paul in 1
Cor. xv. 1. seq. He begins by admitting that the disciples
gave themselves up at first to despondency. But the " en
thusiasm of love" knows of no situation from which an
egress is impossible. Words of Christ relative to his second
advent might be recalled and taken in a wrong sense, as if
they referred, to his coming forth from the tomb. Enoch and
Elijah had not tasted death. It could not be possible that
He Avas subject to death. Heroes never die. They could
not consent that the adored Master should be left to perish
in the tomb. The' day following the crucifixion was filled
Avith such thoughts as these. Did He not say that he would
give salvation to the sinner, that He would live again in the
Kingdom of His Father ? Yes ! He will live once more !
He Avill roll away the rock from the tomb ! He will rise to
the Father ! We shall see him and hear his voice. At this
point in his animated picture, Renan pauses to say that the
Jews hardly conceived of the soul as separable from the body,
that this theory of man regarded as composed of two sub
stances was scarcely clear to them. But the Evangelist re
cords of Jesus that He said : " Father, into thy hands I
commend my Spirit," and that having said thus, " He gave up
the ghost." The passages in the Gospels in which the soul is

SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES. 607
distinguished from the body are too numerous to allow us to
admit the truth of Renan's observation respecting the cur
rent opinion. The disciples could have no difficulty in sup
posing that a soul was in heaven while' the body to which it
had belonged lay in the tomb. Early on Sunday morning,
says Renan, Mary Magdalene repaired to the sepulchre, but
found it empty. The body Avas no longer there. Her first
emotions were those of surprise and grief. Possibly a gleam
of hope entered her heart. She runs and makes her report
to Peter and John. They hasten to the tomb and find the
linen clothes and the napkin lying apart by itself. If they
did not utter the decisive words, " He is risen,'' it is easy to
see that this consequence must be drawn and that the founda
tion is laid for the great dogma of Christianity. Peter and
John retire from the garden ; Mary remains alone. She
longs to embrace the loved body in her arms. On a sudden
she hears a slight movement behind her. She believes that
it is the gardener and exclaims : " If thou have borne him
hence, tell me where thou hast laid him and I will take him
away." She hears herself addressed in return by her name,
uttered in the familiar voice of Jesus. " O my Master," she
cries. She desires to touch him. A sort of instinctive move
ment carries her to his feet. The vision withdraws itself, and
says to her, " touch me not ! " " Gradually the shade disap
peared. But the miracle of love is accomplished." " Mary
has seen and heard. The Resurrection has its first direct
witness." All this, Renan, of course, considers to have been
the product of Mary's excited imagination and glowing love.
The subsequent interviews of Jesus with other individuals
among the disciples and with the assembly of them on re
peated occasions when they fancied that they heard him speak
to them — His renewed intercourse with them in Galilee,
His appearance to an assembly of five hundred, His com
mandment, which they thought they heard him utter, to
preach the Gospel to all nations — were all the fruit of a like
hallucination. We should remark that what is said by Christ
in these interviews, Renan in almost all cases takes pains to
abridge. He feels the necessity of making the utterances
which the disciples, one and all, supposed themselves to hear

608 SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES.
from the lips of their Master, as brief as he can. One prob
lem remains. What became of the body of Jesus ? This
question Renan pronounces insoluble. The Jews thought the
disciples had carried it away by stealth. This explanation
fails fully to satisfy our author: One can hardly admit, he
remarks; that the same persons, however undisciplined in re
flection, who had carried the body away, believed that it had
been raised to life. This little quantity of common sense is
conceded to the Apostles. What became of the body? It
is possible, answers Renan, that the body was removed by
some of the disciples and carried away to Galilee. The
others Avho remained at Jerusalem had ho knowledge of this
event. When the former afterwards heard the reports con
cerning the Resurrection, which had originated at Jerusalem
they would not have interposed a contradiction, and if they
had, there would have been no use in doing so. A late cor
rection in such a' case has no effect. This solution of the
difficulty is gravely brought foward by Renan, but it scarcely
requires a grave answer. That the body was removed with
out the privity of the Apostles; that, this being done, no
information of the fact was conveyed to them ; that the place
where it was finally deposited was not remembered or made
known; that the active agents inthe removal of the body
would never care to testify to ' the truth, or that, doing so,
their statements would have no hearing, — such are some of
the requirements of this. extraordinary hypothesis. Perhaps,
Renan also suggests, the body was taken away by the Jews
to prevent further tumults. Strange, if this were so, that the
Resurrection was not instantly disproved ! Strange5 too, that
the Jews should charge the disciples with stealing it ! . " Who
knows that the disappearance of the body was hot the. act of
the proprietor of the garden in which the tomb lay, or of the
gardener?" Here there is an objection in the. statement of
the Evangelist, that' the tomb belonged to Joseph of Arima
thea. This inconvenient assertion, which, however, relates
to a point that must have fixed itself in the recollections of
the disciples, Renan finds it easy to call in question. But the
careful disposition of the linen clothes and the napkin is, in
' this author's own view, a grave difficulty. This last circum-

SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES. 609
stance Avould lead to the supposition that the hand of a
woman had been employed upon them. Renan forthwith
turns to Mary Magdalene as the one who is probably respon
sible for the removal of the sacred body. Women, he ob
serves, being ruled by passion, are capable of the most gro
tesque illusions. It is not deliberate deception, he says ; it is
deception without reflection. We must bring into account
the exaltation of feeling and of faith, and also the defect
in Oriental education as regards sincerity. So that poor
Mary Magdalene, who a few pages before is lauded as the
subject of the first " hallucination," as the disciple who sup
posed that the risen Jesus called her by name, is now made
to bear the whole burden of that stupendous imposture which
the Jews charged upon the surviving followers of Jesus ! It
is only just to add that here, as before, M. Renan doubts his
own solution.
The reader will see that Kenan generally admits the phe
nomena in which Christians find evident proofs of superna
tural interposition ; he maintains that these phenomena are
subjective in their origin. With his view of the person,
character, and mission of Jesus, and with his scheme of phi
losophy, in which a personal God has no place, such a conclu
sion is inevitable. But all of his Avorks on the origin of
Christianity incidentally afford an impressive view of the
strength of that testimony of the Apostles on which the
Christian believer reposes. That the Apostles testified to the
miracles which the Gospels record, including the miracle of
the Resurrection of the Lord, the skeptic who will credit no
miracle that has not been repeated in Paris, allows. What
shall be done with this testimony? One hypothesis is, or
was, that the witnesses were knaves. Another hypothesis is,
that they were fools. The hypothesis of M. Renan is that,
they were fools with a mixture of a sort of knavery, which
by his standard of morals is judged innocent and even
amiable. In the thirteenth edition of his Vie de Jesws (1867), M.
Renan has introduced a new preface, devoted in part to the
Johannean question. He describes four opinions respecting
it : 1. The orthodox opinion, that the Gospel is wholly the

610 SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES.
work of the Apostle John, and is in all points true and au
thentic. 2. That the Gospel is, for substance, the work of
John, though edited and retouched by his disciples ; the dis
courses being often free compositions expressing rather the
spirit of Jesus than what he actually said. 3. That the
fourth Gospel is not by John, but was ascribed to him by
some one of his disciples about the year 100. The discourses
are mostly fictitious, but the narrative parts contain precious
traditions, emanating in part from the Apostle John. This
is tbe view of Weizsacker and Michel Nicholas. 4. That
the Gospel comes in no sense from the Apostle, It is not an
historical book, but a product of the imagination — partly an
allegory. This is the view of Baur, Schwegler, Scholten,
Reville, and others. In his first edition, Renan adopted the
second opinion ; in the present edition (the thirteenth), he
adopts the third. His change is, therefore, in a negative
and skeptical direction. In a concluding Essay (p. 477 seq.),
he examines the fourth Gospel in detail, refuting the Tii
bingen or allegorical theory, and frequently contending for
the historical character of the recorded events.
*
NOTE TO ESSAY X.
Renan, in his work on the Apostles (1866), resolyes, not
only the resurrection of Jesus, but also the descent of the
Holy Spirit and the gifts of the Spirit, into instances of hal
lucination. According to him, the Disciples were a band of
Aveak-minded, almost imbecile, visionaries, whose appropriate
home would be a mad-house. Tet they were the men whom
Jesus chose for his daily companions and the representative's
of his cause, whom he had trained for nearly three years,
who were capable of relishing his lofty teachings, who were
enabled to deny themselves and to lay down life for the cause
of truth and righteousness. Had the founders of Christianity
been the set of enthusiastic, silly children whom Renan
describes,. the movement would have perished at its very
inception. It could not have survived the shock of disap
pointed hopes or borne the brunt of contradiction and per
secution. The fact is that the Apostles were convinced, is

SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES. 611
their inmost souls, of the divine mission of Jesus ; and the
incredulity, which his humble life and judicial death engen
dered, was .overcome by evidences of supernatural power, the
reality of which even the skeptical Thomas found it impos
sible to deny. If Renan had done any justice to the moral
and religious elements which entered into the faith and the
preaching of the Apostles, and to their moral earnestness,
the picture of them Avhich he presents would have assumed
a totally different aspect. As if the superstitious dreams of
a few ignorant, bewildered people, bereft of a friend on whom
they have doted, aud unable to reconcile themselves to his
loss, could have kept Christianity alive and sent it on its con
quering, purifying mission around the globe !
Renan has found a physiological explanation of the con
version of Paul. After a sketch of his early career, he pro
ceeds to describe Paul's eventful journey to Damascus. His
mental excitement on this occasion, says Renan, was at its
height. At times he Avas troubled, shaken in his purpose.
" A passionate man goes from one belief to another directly
opposite ; only he brings to the latter the same heat. Like
all strong souls, Paul was near to Roving that which he hated.
Was he sure, after all, that he was not withstanding the
work of God ? " Perhaps the liberal ideas of his master Gar
maliel came to his recollection. Often these ardent souls ex
perience terrible reactions. He had been struck Avith the
demeanor of those whom he had persecuted. At times he
thought he saw the sweet figure of the Master who inspired
His disciples with so much patience, regarding him with an
air of pity and tender rebuke. In this agitated mood, he
pursues his journey towards Damascus. At length he conies
in eight of the city and perceives what are, perhaps, the
houses of his victims. This thought seizes on him and clogs
his steps. He would fain proceed no farther. He imagines
that he is withstanding a goad tbat urges him to an opposite
course. The fatigue of the journey, joined to this feeling,
overcomes him. Renan adds that Paul had an inflammation
of the eyes, perhaps incipient ophthalmia. Persons in this
region, we are told, are liable to be seized with fevers accom
panied by delirium. All that we can be sure of, in this case,

612 SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES.
is that a terrible stroke bereft Paul, in a single instant, of
what consciousness remained to him, and cast him upon the
earth, deprived of sense. What precisely this sudden stroke
was, M. Renan professes himself unable with certainty to
decide. There may have been a tempest and the lightning
may have struck him ; a fever and delirium may have been
suddenly induced by a sunstroke or by ophthalmia. But
these cerebral disturbances sometimes produce a retroactive
effect, we are assured, and completely derange the recollec
tion of the moments that preceded the crisis. In the midst
of the illusions to which all his senses were a prey, Paul
fancied that he saw the figure which had seemed to be pur
suing him for several days. He saw Jesus and heard him
say in Hebrew : — " Saul ! Saul ! why persecutest thou me ? "
Ardent natures pass in a moment from one extreme to an
other. Paul was converted in an instant ; but, says Renan,
" he had only changed his fanaticism." He was the same
fiery zealot that he was before. Made blind by the occur
rence, he was conducted by his companions to Damascus.
For three days he took no food. He had often heard of the
healing power possessed by the Christians. The idea that
the imposition of hands could relieve him took possession of
his mind. " His eyes were always very much inflamed."
Among the images that chased one another across his brain
was that of Ananias— a leading disciple of whom he had heard
the persons about him speak— in the act of entering and lay
ing his hands upon him. Now he is fully convinced that he
will owe his cure to Ananias. Ananias is sent for ; he
comes, speaks gently to the invalid, calls him " brother," and
places his hands upon him. From this moment, calm entered
the soul of Paul. " He believed himself cured, and since his
malady was chiefly nervous, it Avas true."
Such is Renan's description of the conversion of the
Apostle Paul. The leading elements of his theory are bor
rowed from Baur and Strauss. The first remark we have to
offer upon this theory is, that, as far as we know, the Apostle
Paul was subject to no bodily infirmity that tended to pro
duce the phenomena attending his conversion. - It has been
plausibly conjectured that his eyes were affected with some

SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES. 613
disease ; but there is no evidence that he suffered in this way
until a period later than his conversion, and no proof what
ever that his disease was that known by the name of ophthal
mia. Of whatever nature the infirmity was, there is not the
slightest evidence that it was connected with a disorder of
the brain or with a tendency to such a disorder. Paul was
remarkable for his presence of mind, for his unruffled self-
possession under alarming circumstances. This natural
quality he discovered even when he was struck to the earth,
in the response which he made to the supernatural voice, —
" Who art thou, Lord ? " The physical predisposition to
mental illusions of the sort supposed by Renan is attributed
to Paul without any warrant. Secondly, Renan ascribes to
the Apostle, just before his conversion, a state of feeling
which he is known not to have had. He represents that
Paul was full of painful misgivings as to the righteousness
of the course he was pursuing. But Paul declares that he
had no such misgivings. He verily thought that he was
doing God service. No inquisitor was ever more persuaded
that he was doing a good work in extirpating heresy, than
was Saul up to the moment when he was stopped, on the
way to Damascus. Renan appears to misunderstand tbe
sense of the words, — " It is hard for thee to kick against the
pricks." They no more have reference to any inward mis
givings or inward struggle in Paul's mind, than they have to
the precession of the equinoxes. The entire picture of Paul's
conflict of feeling, which Renan presents, is a figment of his
own imagination. The psychological, like the physiological,
hypothesis respecting Paul, is groundless. That men of an
ardent nature are liable to rapid fluctuations and sudden re
volutions of sentiment, is a remark that needs much qualifica
tion. It is not true where an energetic will is associated
with a strong emotive nature. Men of this stamp, on the
contrary, are the very ones to press through all difficulties
and pursue the goal which they have set before them with
an unfaltering purpose. This is eminently true when to this
ardor of feeling and energy of will there is united a strong
understanding. Toi such men hesitation and vacillation,
self-questioning and the habit of looking back — much more,

614 SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES.
sudden revulsions of feeling, leading to a total reversal of a
chosen course — are unusual. If Paul was the man wrhom M.
Renan figures, analogous revolutions of opinions might be
looked for after his conversion. But for thirty years, up to
the timeof his death, he " fought the good fight " and " kept
the faith." Thirdly, Paul's change of character, the moral
and spiritual change, not only receives from Renan no solu
tion, but is scarcely recognized. This illustrates the inferi
ority of Renan's method of handling these subjects when
compared with that of the leading German advocates of
Naturalism. The reader would infer from Renan's observa
tions that Paul had the same tempers of feeling after as be
fore his conversion. Is it true, then, that he continued to
" breathe out threatenings and slaughter " against all error-
ists ? Would he still have been inclined, had he possessed
the power, to drag men and women from their homes and
cast them into dungeons ? That Paul had noble traits be
fore he believed in Christ, and that these remained with him
afterwards, is acknowledged. It is equally true, however,
that his moral tempers underwent a transformation as radical
as it was beneficent in its operation. A writer who under
takes to treat of the conversion of Paul ought not to lose
sight of this momentous change. There are many other fea
tures of M. Renan's fancy-picture, that invite criticism. The
mode in which he imagines Paul to have come in contact
with Ananias and to have been cured by him of his blindness,
Avill hardly satisfy the candid reader.' How a thunderclap,
or a sunstroke, or a sudden fever, which, we are assured by
M. Renan, may be so easily supposed in those latitudes,
should be so unintelligible to the companions of Paul, as
well as to Paul himself, is a circumstance not explained. But
the fundamental error of Renan is the naturalistic prejudice
with which he starts, coupled with the singular failure to
appreciate or even to notice distinctly, the moral elements
in the Christian system and in the experience of its believers.
One would suppose, in reading his work, that the proper
place for a history of Christianity is in a treatise on the mor
bid affections of body and mind.

SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES. 615

NOTE TO ESSAY XII.
One of the latest efforts to detract from the originality of
Jesus is founded on researches in the Talmud. A writer in
tne Quarterly Review (No. 246), whose aim seems to be to
mystify his readers in regard to the Talmud more than to
enlighten them, and whose contributions to our knowledge of
*he subject are very small when compared with his preten
sions, insinuates that much of the doctrine of Christ was
drawn from the traditional Jewish teaching. His rather
favorable idea of the general character of the Pharisees is
contradicted both, by Josephus and the New Testament,
even if it be true that they were not, strictly speaking, a sect,
but rather the representatives of orthodox and patriotic Ju
daism in the type which it had assumed at that time.1 But
what is the date of the Talmud ? The Mishna was written
down not earlier than two centuries after Christ, and the
Gemara three centuries later. Who can prove that the
traditional teaching thus committed to writing, did not
gather up from Christian teaching these passages, the parallel
of which is found in tbe New Testament ? But admitting
that this is not the case, what are the alleged resemblances on
the ground of which it is claimed, or insinuated, that Chris
tianity is in part a borrowed system. One is the golden
rule. Gibbon, long ago, when commenting on the execution
of Servetus, charged Calvin with violating the golden rule,
" a rule," he says, " which I read in a moral treatise of Iso
crates (in Nicocle, tom. i. p. 93, ed. Battie) four hundred years
before the publication of the Gospel."" Gibbon did not
read it in Isocrates, because it is not there. Isocrates says :
" Do not to others what makes you angry when they do it
to you." That is to say, the precept is a negative one in tbe
Greek orator, and so in all the other ancient writers where it
occurs. In the Rabbis, as well as in Confucius, and in
every other heathen author to whom the golden rule has
1 See Reuss's Art., Pharisaer, in Herzog's Real Encyc. ; also, Winer's
Art. under the same title in the Real-Worterbuch, and J. A. Row, Tlie Jesus
of the Evangelists, p. 208, seq.
* Decline and Fall, VII., p. 60, Note.

616 SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES.
been attributed, the precept is either negative, or is applied
to some single relation, as that of parent and child. The
passages are to be found in Wettstein. As a positive and
universal injunction, it belongs to Jesus alone. But the
golden rule is not a part of the essence or distinctive con
tents of Christianity. It is given as a summary of the legis
lation bf the Old Testament. Separated from its relation to
the " first and great commandment," and from . the ideal of
excellence set forth in the Gospel, it is not even a safe rule
of conduct. It is given to brace us up on the weak side, — to
counteract the great obstacle to justice and charity, — inor
dinate self-love. The peculiarity of the Gospel lies in the
person, character, and work of Jesus, and in the inspiration
— the uplifting and purifying power emanating from this
source. The golden rule derives its .practical efficacy from
faith in Him.1 It is said also that two or three sentences of
the Lord's prayer were found in current forms of Jewish
devotion, existing before the time of Jesus. This seems to
be the case ; but in the Lord's Prayer, there is an organic uni
ty, a fusion of these parts into a living whole, which marks the
originality of Jesus quite as impressively as if every phrase
were originally contrived by Himself. " Longe abfuit,"
says Grotius, "dominus ab omni affectatione non neces-
sarise novitatis."" In this and in similar cases, we are
reminded of the saying that scattered straws are not a bird's
nest. Who detected these gems in the great heap of Rab
binical rubbish ? Who selected the grains of gold from the
mound of sand ? In literature, depreciative criticism of the
sort employed to detract from the originality of the Founder
of Christianity, is recognized as shallow and pedantic.
There is vastly more plausibility in the argument that might
be framed to convict Shakespeare of plagiarism than in
these insinuations against the Gospel. It does not require
scholastic researches — there is only need of a modicum of
taste and insight, and a moderate knowledge of history from
the year one — to see that if there was ever originality in the
deepest sense, it is found in the Author of Christianity,
1 See, on this subject, Tholuck, Die JBergpredigt, p. 453.
2 Quoted by Tholuck. Ibid. p. 365.

SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES. 617
alike in his words and life, and in the movement which He
established. The ethical precepts of Christianity do not
stand, and cannot be judged by themselves. They must be
looked at in the living unity in which they stand with the
whole system of religion. NOTE TO ESSAY XIII.
Comte, consistently with the fundamental principles of
his system, was an avowed atheist. If final and efficient
causes are set down as figments of the imagination, it is not
to be expected that room will be found for an intelligent
Creator. Mr. J. S. Mill states that it is open to a positivist
to. believe or disbelieve in the existence of God, and that
one's opinion on this point will be determined by the im
pression made on his mind by the analogies of design which
present themselves in nature. His own opinion he does not
express ; but it is difficult to find in his theory of causation
any warrant for assuming a Creator, or any sufficient
answer to the objections brought by Hume against the
argument from design. Herbert Spencer, adopting from
Hamilton and Mansel the doctrine of the relativity of
knowledge, concludes that, although there is a First Cause,
that cause is utterly unknowable. We can form no con
ception of him or it, and must remain in absolute ignorance
respecting its nature. This application of the doctrine of
the relativity of our knowledge, may well suggest caution
in the enunciation of such a tenet. The phrase is capable of
a meaning which leaves untouched the foundations of
knowledge and the truths of religion. But such is not the
meaning which is commonly attached to it at present. The
current doctrine amounts to this, that nothing is known as
it is, but only as it appears to me, the knowing subject.
This is equivalent to saying that the mind cannot know, in
the proper sense of the term ; that knowing involves such a
modification of the thing, that, in truth, we know not it, but
the object of knowledge is something else which is more or
less the creation of the knowing faculty. This is the doctrine
charged by Plato on certain of the Sophists. Kant, by

618 SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES.
laying it at the foundation of his theoretical system, organ
ized skepticism, and paved the way for all the subsequent
philosophies in which knowing is resolved into a process of
being. Sir William Hamilton, notwithstanding his adoption
of Reid's Natural Realism, and his distinction between the
primary and secondary qualities of matter, becomes — incon
sistently, it would seem — an advocate of the relativity
of knowledge, in the objectionable form of the doctrine.
By his doctrine respecting the principle of causation,
that it describes not a positive conviction, but a nega
tive impotency, Hamilton brought another disturbing
element into the sphere of Natural Theology. The mind, as
far as its range of knowledge extends, knows things as
they are — the Ling an sich / the necessity of belief is the
criterion of reality; the principle of causation is an
a-priori, positive conviction of the intelligence, — these are
principles which must be avowed by a sound philosophy.'
When final causes are asserted, it is not meant that any or
all of the last or ultimate ends for which the world exists
can be discerned. It is quite conceivable that these may be
hidden from our knowledge. But this is affirmed, that
wherever Ave turn our eyes, we discover an arrangement of
means with reference to ends, adaptation, order, design.
Philosophical theologians differ among themselves in
their mode of conceiving of the argument from final causes.
By some it is presented purely as an argument from
analogy. Here, on every hand, are processes and products
which have a striking resemblance to those which emanate
from human contrivance. The eye, for example, is adapted
to its office, as an optical instrument is to the use for which it
is designed. If the latter exists through the agency of intelli
gence which constructs it for a purpose, why not the former ?
We instinctively ascribe the eye to an intelligent author.
This instinctive recognition of design is universal among men.
But what is here attributed to an instinct, is just
ly considered by other thinkers to be the operation of an
1 The doctrine of the relativity of knowledge is analyzed and vigorously
controverted in the writings of Dr. McCosh, especially the Intuitions of the
Mind and the Defence of Fundamental Truth (against Mill).

SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES. 619
intuitive principle. This principle is, that wherever there is
order, the fitness of means to ends, there is presupposed an
intelligent agent. Order implies intelligence. This intui
tive truth is the major premise of the syllogism, of which the
minos is the observed adaptations in man and in the world
around us. So, for substance, the argument has been stated
by Buffier and by numerous other philosophers. There is a
union of an a priori conviction with observed facts.
There are philosophers, however, who consider our be
lief in final causes to be strictly a priori, and on a level
with the principle of efficient causation. They hold that
our knowledge of no object is complete, the appetite for
knowledge is not satisfied, until we ascertain, not merely
what a thing is and whence it is, but also what it is for.
A belief in the reality of final causes underlies the opera
tions of intelligence, as does a belief in efficient causes.
This belief is not a product of experience, but precedes it.
Its genesis is connected with the action of bur own minds,
as is the fact in regard to the principle of efficient causes
Both beliefs are suggested or awakened, both emerge into
consciousness, on the condition of our mental operations, yet
both are intuitive and necessary.1
Whatever special view is adopted, the validity of the
proof from final causes remains unshaken. This proof is
thought to be undermined by the substitution of the prin
ciple of the conditions of existence. This is declared to be
" the true positive transformation of the doctrine of final
causes."2 We are told that the fish is adapted to the sea
only in the sense that without the sea the fish could not
exist. The fish is the product of certain forces and condi
tions, among which the sea is included. The fact, how
ever, is, that we find a concurrence of conditions, " pro
ceeding from various and independent quarters ; " and
this it is which proves design. The human eye is fash
ioned, apart from the light, in the dark laboratory, where
it is " made in secret." This marvellous instrument does not
* This position is ably defended by Professor N. Porter, The Hitman In
tellect, P. IV. ch. vi.
2 Comte's Philosophy of the Sciences, by G. H. Lewes, p. 89.

620 SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES.
owe its existence to the light, yet only as related to the
light has it significance or value.1 Moreover, besides the bare
existence of the objects of nature, there are multiform special
provisions for beauty and for happiness. There are variations
of structure which serve to accomplish particular ends be-
yond-the mere existence and ordinary functions of the being.
It is difficult for those who reject final causes to
avoid admitting in their habitual language what they the
oretically deny. For instance, in describing the eye they
can hardly avoid implying that its several parts are for the
sake of certain ends. The marks of design are too obvious
and irresistible to be practically ignored, eA-en when they
are speculatively denied.
It need hardly be said that they who deny final causes
have no right to support their thesis by the authority of
Bacon. He only complains of the misplaced study of final
causes, wherein they are made to intercept or prevent the
investigation of physical or efficient causes. The reality of
final causes, and that they are a legitimate object of inquiry
and attention, he distinctly maintains. "And I say this,
not because these final causes are not true and worthy to be
inquired in metaphysical speculation, but because their ex
cursions and irruptions into the limits of physical causes has
bred a waste and solitude in that track. For otherwise if
they be but kept within their proper bounds, men are ex
tremely deceived if they think there is any enmity or
repugnancy at all between the two." " So far are physical
causes from withdrawing men from God and Providence,
that contrariwise,-those philosophers who have been occu
pied in searching them out, can find no issue but by resort
ing to God and Providence at the last." 2
' This illustration is forcibly carried out in Trendelenburg's admirable
chapter, Der Zweck, in the Logische Un'.ersuchv/ngen.
2 De Augment. Scient. B. Ill , c. iv. See also Bacon's Essays, xvi.

E,SSAYS
ON THB
SUPERNATURAL ORIGIN OF CHRISTIANITY,
AVITH SPECIAL REFERENCE TO THE THEORIES OP
REM, STRAUSS, AND THE TUBINGEN SCHOOL.
BY
Rev. GEORGE P. EISHER, M.A.,
PROFESSOR OF CUUKCH HISTORY IN TALE COLLEGE.
New "Fidition, with Important Additions.

One Volume 8vo., --.-... $3.00.

This work, a new edition of which is now ready, embraces a
full and fair statement, and a critical review of the theories by
which the various schools of Naturalism seek to account for the
origin of Christianity. The positions taken by Strauss, Baur,
and the other leaders of the Tiibingen school, and by Kenan,
are subjected to a thorough examination. The historical as
well as the philosophical argument for the Christian faith is
fully presented. The origin and authorship of the New Testa
ment writings are set forth, and the historical reality of the
New Testament Miracles is amply vindicated. *
The new edition of the work is not a mere reprint of the
former editions. In a full introduction and in elaborate sup
plementary Notes, leading topics are discussed anew, the recent
literature is reviewed, and the work brought down to the
present date.

CRITICAL NOTICES.

From the New York Tribune.
The author seems equally at home in every department of his subject
They are all treated with learning, with insight, with sense, and discrimi
nation. His volume evinces rare versatility of intellect, with a scholarship no
less sound and judicious in its tone and extensive in its attainments, than it is
modest in its pretensions. From the North American Review.
 the able and scholarly Essays on the Supernatural Origin of Christian
ity, in which Professor Fisher discusses such subjects as the Genuineness of
the Gospel of John, Baur's view of early Christian History and Literature,
and the mythical theory of Strauss.
From the Methodist Quarterly Review.
The entire work is one of the noblest, most readable, most timely and
effective contributions to our apologetic literature, which has appeared at the
present day. From the British Quarterly Review (Dr. Vaughan).
We know not where the student will find a more satisfactory guide in
relation to the great questions which have grown up between the friends of the
Christian revelation and the most able of its assailants, within the memory of
the present generation. * * To all these topics the author has brought a
fulness of learning, a masculine discernment, and a sturdy impartiality which
we greatly admire. From the British and Foreign Quarterly Review.
The question as to the origin and historic veracity of the Gospel narratives
is very ably and satisfactorily reviewed. '
From the American Presbyterian and Theological Review.
The work is timely ; the questions it raises are widely entertained, and are
of vital import. Professor Fisher handles them in the spirit of a true Christian
scholar. He understands them, he has studied them ; he knows their diffi
culties, and he is competent to grapple with them. The best view of some of
these topics to be found in English theological literature, for example the
theories of Baur, is contained in this volume. The author is eminently
candid, there is no evasion of difficulties, and his replies commend themselves
to the reader's most sober and reasonable convictions. Thestyle is lucid, and
the arrangement orderly. Professor Fisher has the rare art of saying and
doing just enough to establish his points, and not venturing into any rash and
needless positions., AVe heartily commend his work. It deserves a cordial
welcome and a wide circulation.
From the Biblical Repertory and Princeton Review.
The current objections tb Supernaturalism, *'. e. to Christianity itself, as they
have been voiced by Strauss, Baur, Renan, and Theodore Parker, are very
ably handled in this volume. The author constantly betrays the scholarship,
culture, metaphysical and theological insight, together with the judicial
mind, which1 the proper execution of the task he has undertaken, requires.

Critical Notices of Prof. Fisher's Essays on the Supernatural Origin of Christianity.
From the Bibliotheca Sacba (Prof. F. A. Park, D.D.)
These essays embody the results of careful reading as well as of discrimi
nating thought. They are suggestive and timely. So much has been said of
German skepticism, that we have long needed an intelligible exhibition of its
processes. Professor Fisher has described them candidly. He has thus
illustrated the massiveness of the argument for historical Christianity. * *
We regard the whole work as a highly important contribution to our theo
logical literature, and an honor to the American press.
From the New York Evangelist, (by Prof. H~. B. Smith, D.D.)
Professor Fisher has done a good service to the cause of Christian learning
by his able and elaborate account of the later critical schools in German
theology. It is such a book as has long been wanted. It gives a perfectly
fair and clear account of the systems and books he opposes, and a simple and
convincing reply to their hypotheses and arguments ; so that we have an im
partial summary and judgment of the facts in the case. *****
One commendable feature about this volume is, that though the subjects
are difficult, and remote from common thought, they are yet treated in so clear
and natural a way, that any reader interested in the themes can follow the
author without difficulty. There is no useless parade of learning, while it is
also evident that the writer is a learned man. Laymen as well as ministers
will find it for their account to read and study this work.
From the Christian Register (by Men. Rufus Ellis).
Having just finished a pretty careful reading of all except the last few
pages, I am exceedingly desirous that our students in theology, candidates for
the ministry, and teachers of advanced classes in Sunday-schools, should make
themselves familiar with the contents of a volume which is eminently timely
and singularly fitted to aid all those who are honestly inquiring into the
history of the New Testament canon. I am persuaded that some of our fair-
minded young students who have hastily given in to the confident assertion
that the historical evidences of Christianity, so far as they involve a recog
nition of the genuineness and authenticity of Gospel and Epistle, have been
hopelessly shattered, will see reason as they read these pages to retract their
assent to this negation. From the Round Table.
We cordially commend the volume as one of no ordinary interest and im
portance. The tone is that of a ripe scholar; there is no denunciation; no
appeal to unworthy motives ; no slurring over the points in dispute. Enough
is attempted, and , not too much. The statements throughout are clear, and
the style is simple and flowing, without any affectation or parade of foreign
terms. The author uses the ablest works on both sides of the controversy, but
exercises his own judgment both as to the arguments and their results. He
has performed a difficult task in a most creditable manner.
From the Springfield Republican.
These essays are characterized by breadth of research and vigor of
thought, not loss than by candor of tone and clearness of expression.

Critical Notices of Prof. Fisher's Essays on the Supernatural Origin of Christianity,
From the New York Observer.
In these essays, the paramount authority of the Bible is established, the
character of the conflict between Christian faith and skepticism is' unfolded,
the nature and function of miracles distinctly set forth,' and the personality of
God proved in reply to the positivist and the pantheist, and a thorough sifting
and refutation given to the theories of Strauss, and Baur, and Renan. The
book is extremely able, and is written in such a clear style, is of so practical
a character, and so well adapted to direct and govern thought upon themes of
vital importance in philosophy and religion, that we rejoice at its advent, and
heartily commend it to the Christian public.
From the Independent.
The work evinces extensive learning and decided ability, and successfully
exposes the sophisms and errors of what the author styles " The Tubingen
School." It should be in the hands of every clergyman, that he maybe pre
pared to meet and combat this popular and plausible form of infidelity, now so
widely disseminated. From the Congregationalist, (by Rev. J. P. Thompson, D.D.)
We are grateful that we can point to a thorough and masterly vindication
of the supernatural in Christianity from the pen of an American scholar, in
opposition both to the historical skepticism of recent schools of criticism in
Germany and to the materialistic skepticism of some recent scientists. * *
* * * * Yfhile the historical handling of the question of the Gospels
will be to many the freshest and most instructive portion of Prof. Fisher's
work, its deepest value lies in .the more philosophical chapters which treat of
the supernatural. From the Providence Journal.
The work is a most timely and important contribution to the theological
literature of the age. No layman could present his pastor with a volume which
would be more serviceable or acceptable.
From the New Haven Journal & Courier.
Professor'Fisher's style is very clear ; his positions are fortified by many
references and careful research, his statements of opposing views are candid
and discriminating, and the volume is one that will probably be accepted as
the most complete defence yet published of the orthodox theology against the
later forms of skepticism. From the National Baptist.
The Essays are all prepared in the spirit of a reverent disciple, yet with a
readiness to see every real difficulty, and to understand every honest doubt.
From the Christian Examiner.
Professor Fisher is entitled to the credit of stating frankly the fundamental
questions at issue in the chief religious controversy of the hojir, and of grap
pling, in a familiar way, with the most eminent masters of those schools of
criticism which he opposes.

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