Having thus cursorily reviewed the writings of the first five Fathers, who are usually, though unwarrantably, denominated "Apostolic," we will briefly examine

THEIR TESTIMONY TO THE GOSPELS.

The matter indeed might be summarily dismissed with the remark that they afford no testimony to the Gospels whatever. But so much stress is laid upon them in this respect by orthodox writers (and necessarily so, for if the so-called Apostolical Fathers testify not of the Gospels, there is no evidence of their existence until the latter half of the second century) that we must pause and examine how far they bear the burden that is laid upon them.

We have already seen that both the age and the authorship of every one of these works is of a most doubtful character. The names of every one of the twelve apostles, of Paul, of Ignatius, of Polycarp, of the Diognetus mentioned in Acts xvii, 34, of Clement, of Linus, and of other early Christians of repute, have been appended to the most unblushing forgeries. Among these so-called genuine remains, as found in Archbishop Wake's version and the Ante-Nicene Christian Library, those attributed to Barnabas and Hermas are almost as certainly forged. Of the epistles a.s.signed to Ignatius, Professor Andrews Norton says: "There is, as it seems to me, no reasonable doubt that the seven shorter epistles ascribed to Ignatius are, equally with all the rest, fabrications of a date long subsequent to his time" ("The Evidence of the Genuineness of the Gospels," p. 350, vol. i., 2nd ed., 1847). The second of the epistles attributed to Clement is recognised by most scholars as spurious. The only remaining doc.u.ments which we can at all allow to be genuine are the first epistle of Clement and that of Polycarp. Even these have not been undisputed. The former has been challenged as a forgery by Mr. J. M. Cotterill, in a curious work, ent.i.tled "Peregrinus Proteus," published by T. and T. Clark, Edinburgh, 1879; and the latter by Blondel, Schwegler, Hilgenfeld, Tayler, and others, and it is generally allowed to be interpolated.

Dr. Giles ("Christian Records," p. 109, 1877,) says: "The writings of the Apostolical Fathers labor under a more heavy load of doubt and suspicion than any other ancient compositions either sacred or profane.

In former times, when the art of criticism was in its infancy, these writings were ten times as extensive as they are now, and they were circulated without the slightest doubt of their authenticity. But, as the spirit of inquiry grew, and the records of past time were investigated, the mists which obscured the subject were gradually dispersed, and the light of truth began to shine where there had previously been nothing but darkness. Things which had chained and enslaved the mind for ages, dissolved and faded into nothing at the dawn of day, and objects that once held the most unbounded sway over the belief, proved to be unreal beings, creatures of superst.i.tion, if not of fraud, placed like the lions in the path of the pilgrim, to deter him from proceeding on the way that leads to the heavenly city of truth."

In another place Dr. Giles remarks in regard to the question of the age and authorship of the these Fathers: "The works which have been written on this question are almost as numerous as those which concern the age, authorship, and authenticity of the Gospels themselves, but the general issue of the inquiries which have been inst.i.tuted, has been unfavorable to the antiquity of these works as remains of writers who were contemporary with the Apostles, but favorable to the theory that they are productions of the latter half of the second century. That was the time when so many Christian writings came into existence, and all the records of our religion were sedulously sought out, because tradition was then becoming faint, original and even secondary witnesses had gone off the stage, and the great increase of the Christian community gave birth to extended curiosity about its early history, whilst it furnished greater safety to those who employed themselves in its service"

("Christian Records," chap, xi., p. 89).

If the Gospels were written by eye-witnesses of the miracles, and these so-called Apostolic Fathers had conversed with them, it is scarcely credible that they would have omitted to name the actual books themselves which possessed such high authority. This is the only way in which their evidence could be of real service to support the authenticity of the New Testament writings as being the work of Apostles. But this they fail to supply. There is not a single sentence in all their remaining works in which an unmistakeable allusion to the Gospels, as we have them, is to be found. It is in vain that Christian evidence-mongers appeal to their citations of certain sayings of Jesus or certain doctrines of Christianity. No one disputes that these were in general vogue early in the second century. But the point to be proved to the Rationalist is that the supernatural events of the four Gospels were testified to by eye-witnesses, who published their accounts at the time and in the place where the alleged supernatural occurrences took place.

And of this the Apostolic Fathers afford no sc.r.a.p of evidence. Of the supernatural history of Jesus they know no more than Paul. They neither mention his immaculate conception nor his miracles; nor do they refer to any of the circ.u.mstances connected with his alleged material resurrection. This especially applies to the possibly genuine writings of Clement and Polycarp. Hermas, as we have mentioned, has no reference to any of the acts of Jesus. Barnabas has an allusion to "great signs and wonders which were wrought in Israel," but he does not say what they were nor when they happened. Ignatius alone, in a probably spurious epistle to the Ephesians, chap, xix, alludes to the virginity of Mary, her offspring, and the death of the Lord as "three mysteries of renown;"

but the details he gives concerning the brilliant star which appeared, and how all the rest of the stars and the sun and moon formed a chorus to this star, and its light was exceedingly "great above them all,"

and how "every kind of magic was destroyed, and every bond of wickedness disappeared," show that the writer referred to other sources of information than those found in Matthew and Luke. In the full part of the ninth chapter of the epistle to the Trallians,' he gives almost the whole of the Apostles creed. This in itself would be sufficient evidence of its spuriousness.

Stress is laid by all writers on the external evidences upon certain alleged quotations from our gospels, which are said to be found in the early Fathers. But the question naturally arises, if they considered them to be of Apostolic authority why did they not mention them by name?

They say Moses says, but they never say Matthew, Mark, Luke, or John says. They cite the words of Jesus, but not of his Evangelists. They also say "The Lord _said_" rather than saith, which indicates they were rather indebted to tradition than to written accounts. Irenaeus says he heard Polycarp repeat the oral relations of John and of other hearers of the Lord, and Clement may have received his knowledge in the same manner. We shall see from the testimony of Papias that he at least preferred tradition to the books with which he was acquainted. Moreover, such quotations of the sayings of Jesus as occur are never given in the same words nor in the same order. Attempts are made to account for this by saying that they quoted loosely from memory. But is it likely they would quote loosely words which they believed to be written by the inspiration of the Holy Ghost? This does not say much for their intellectual ability. Clement and Polycarp, for instance, both give, "Be pitiful that ye may be pitied," word for word; while the Gospel shews, "Blessed are the merciful for they shall obtain mercy." Clement says, "Forgive that it may be forgiven you;" Polycarp, "Forgive and it shall be forgiven you." The nearest to which is, "For if ye forgive men their trespa.s.ses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you."

Such facts have constrained Mr. Sanday to admit in his work on the Gospels in the Second Century that "The author of Supernatural Religion is not without reason when he says they may be derived from other collections than our actual Gospels" (p. 87, 1876.) Canon Westcott himself in summing up the results says:-- "(1) No Evangelic reference in the Apostolic Fathers can be referred certainly to a written record. (2) It appears most probable from the form of the quotations that they were derived from oral tradition" (p. 63, 1881.) We shall see, however, that whether they went to other collections or relied upon oral traditions, their Evangelic references are never exactly the same as in our gospels.

They manifestly had other sources of information. Moreover it must be borne in mind that the Christian sayings very frequently crept into the text by way of gloss. An ill.u.s.tration of this kind of interpolation is found in the "Epistle of Barnabas," chap, xix., p. 133, where we read, "Thou shalt not hesitate to give, nor murmur when thou givest." "_Give to everyone that asketh thee_, and thou shalt know who is the good Recompenser of the reward." But for this supposed quotation being omitted in the oldest MS., the "Codex Seaiticus," it would be considered evidence that the writer of the epistle was quoting from Luke vi., 30. In copying ma.n.u.scripts there was no such strictness as in a modern printing-office, where "follow your copy" is the compositor's rule. If a transcriber at the time when our Gospels were in vogue (and be it remembered we have no ma.n.u.scripts either of the Fathers or of the New Testament older than the fourth or fifth century after Jesus) saw a quotation different from the way in which he had been accustomed to see it, he would not hesitate to alter it So that many of the alleged literal quotations from our Gospels may be only emendations of the scribes who found the quotations were wrong and put them right. Dr.

Donaldson, in the introduction to his Apostolical Fathers, chap, iii., p. 27, tells us how "Each transcriber, as he copied, inserted the notes of previous readers into the text, and often from his heated imagination added something himself." He also informs us (p. 28) "That we know for certain that even in the second and third centuries the letters of bishops and others were excised and interpolated in their lifetime." So pure is the stream through which our Gospels have descended!

The able and learned author of "Supernatural Religion" well puts the argument: "When, therefore, in early writings, we meet with quotations closely resembling, or we may add, even identical with pa.s.sages which are found in our Gospels, the source of which, however, is not mentioned, nor is any author's name indicated, the similarity or even ident.i.ty cannot by any means be admitted as proof that the quotation is necessarily from our Gospels, and not from some other similar work now no longer extant, and more especially not when, in the same writings, there are other quotations from sources different from our Gospels"

(vol. i., pp. 213, 214, 1879.) That citations similar to those found in our Gospels are not necessarily taken therefrom may be instanced from Ignatius, or the writer who used his name who in his Epistle to the Smyrnaeans, chap, iii., p. 242, says: "When, for instance, He came to those who were with Peter He said to them: 'Lay hold, handle me and see that I am not an incorporeal spirit.'" According to Jerome (Vir. Ill.u.s.t.

16) this quotation is from the Gospel of the Nazarenes. But for this direct statement, it would of course be a.s.signed by orthodox traditionalists to a quotation from memory of Luke xxiv., 39. Origen, however, quoted this self-same pa.s.sage from another work well known in the early Church, but since lost or destroyed, the "Preaching of Peter."

But whilst similarity would not prove their use, variation from the Gospels is the best proof that they were not used. Such pa.s.sages abound.

Clement, for instance, says: "Our Apostles also knew, through the Lord Jesus Christ, that there would be strife on account of the episcopate"

(chap, xliv., p. 38.) He says "it is written cleave to the holy, for those that cleave to them shall themselves be made holy" (chap, xlvi., p. 40.) He also quotes (chap. 1., p. 43) "I will remember a propitious day, and will raise you up out of your tombs," which is probably from the apocryphal fourth book of Ezra. Barnabas declares: "The Lord says 'He has accomplished a second fashioning in these last days. The Lord says I will make the last like the first'" (chap, vi., p. 3, Sinaitic.) He quotes as a saying of Jesus: "Those who wish to behold me, and lay hold of my kingdom, must through tribulation and suffering obtain me"

(chap, vii., p. 114.) And again: "For the Scripture saith, 'And it shall come to pa.s.s in the last days that the Lord will deliver up the sheep of His pasture and their sheepfold and tower to destruction" (chap, xvi., p. 129.) Other instances might be given. In the second Epistle of Clement there are at least five such pa.s.sages, but these suffice to show that other doc.u.ments than the Gospels were referred to, and that even where the sentiment is similar the expression is different It must be borne in mind also that we have it on the authority of Luke in his preface that already in his time _many_ had taken in hand to set forth in order a declaration of those things which were most surely believed among Christians.

Mosheim, in his "Ecclesiastical History" (pt. ii., chap. ii., sec. 17, p. 65, Stubbs' ed., 1863) speaks of "A variety of commentaries, filled with impostures and fables, on our Savior's life and sentiments composed soon after his ascent into heaven, by men who without being bad, perhaps were superst.i.tious, simple, and piously deceitful. To these were afterwards added other writings, falsely ascribed to the most holy apostles by fraudulent individuals." But these fraudulent individuals were Christians, and the purpose of their frauds was to subserve the interests of the Church. We have record of many other Gospels, not to mention Acts of Apostles and Revelations. Some of these were certainly anterior to our own. Such were probably the Gospel of Paul, whence Marcion's Gospel and Luke's were derived, the Gospel of Peter from which possibly Mark was compiled. The Oracles or Sayings of Jesus which probably entered into the construction of Matthew together with the Gospel to the Hebrews. The Gospel of the Egyptians, which we have already seen as quoted by Clement, the original of which C. B. Waite thinks "may have been in use among the Therapeutae of Egypt a long time before the introduction of Christianity, the pa.s.sages relating to Christ being afterwards added" ("History of the Christian Religion to the year 200," p. 77, Chicago, 1881.) According to Origen, Theophylact and Jerome, this Gospel was written before the Gospel of Luke, and many learned moderns have deemed it earlier than any of the Canonical Gospels. At least contemporary with these were the Gospel of James or Protevangelion, the Gospel of Thomas or Infancy, and the Gospel of Nicodemus or Acts of Pilate, all of which remain, although the Christian Church has lost the doubtless equally respectable Gospels of Matthias, of Philip, of Bartholomew, of Andrew, and even of Judas Iscariot.

IV.

We have thus far seen that the five earliest Fathers of the Christian Church have no claim to be considered Apostolic, and that, so far from bearing testimony to the authenticity of our canonical Gospels, their own age and authorship are disputed. We have noticed that their works never mention by name any of the writers of the New Testament with the exception of Paul; that the sayings they ascribe to Jesus, while often similar to those found in our Gospels, are never identical with them, and that they contain much that is evidently derived from other sources.

We have in addition seen that there were numerous Gospels current in the early days of the Christian Church; thus confirming the account of Luke that _many_ had taken in hand to set forth in order the things believed among them.

The early Christian ages were characterised by anything rather than by investigation, or even by accuracy of representation. Deception in literary productions appears to have been the rule rather than the exception. It was not only practised but defended. The author of "Supernatural Religion" says of these Fathers (pp. 460--1, vol. 1, 1879):--"No fable could be too gross, no invention too transparent, for their unsuspicious acceptance, if it a.s.sumed a pious form or tended to edification. No period in the history of the world ever produced so many spurious works as the first two or three centuries of our era. The name of every Apostle, or Christian teacher, not excepting that of the great Master himself, was freely attached to every description of religious forgery. False gospels, epistles, acts, martyrologies, were unscrupulously circulated, and such pious falsification was not even intended or regarded as a crime, but perpetrated for the sake of edification. It was only slowly and after some centuries that many of these works, once, as we have seen, regarded with pious veneration, were excluded from the canon; and that genuine works shared this fate, whilst spurious ones usurped their places, is one of the surest results of criticism."

Yet we are to suppose that while words written for edification were falsely ascribed to other Apostles, it was utterly impossible with regard to our four Evangelists. We shall be better able to judge this question upon examining the testimony of the first person who mentions the writings of the first two.

PAPIAS.

The first information we get concerning this Father shows him to have been acquainted with other stories than those found in our Gospels. It occurs in Irenaeus against Heresies (book v., chap. x.x.xiii., sec. 3 and 4, p. 146, vol. ix., _Ante-Nicene Christian Library_). Speaking of the rewards which will come in the flesh to Christians, he tells us that "elders who saw John the disciple of the Lord, related that they had heard from him how the Lord used to teach in regard to these times, and say: The days will come in which vines shall grow, each having ten thousand branches, and in each branch ten thousand twigs, and in each true twig ten thousand shoots, and in each one of the shoots ten thousand cl.u.s.ters, and on every one of the cl.u.s.ters ten thousand grapes, and every grape when pressed will give five and twenty metretes of wine.

And when any one of the saints shall lay hold of a cl.u.s.ter, another cry out, 'I am a better cl.u.s.ter, take me; bless the Lord through me.'"

Taking Smith's Bible Dictionary as authority for the value of a metrete, viz., eight and two-thirds of a gallon, it follows that the product of one millenial grape-vine will make a quant.i.ty of wine equal in bulk to the planet Mercury, and allowing to the thousand million of the earth's inhabitants enough to keep them constantly intoxicated, say two gallons of wine a day to each person, it would keep them all dead drunk for the s.p.a.ce of thirty thousand million years! What a jolly old Father was this! or, if he is to believed, what a jolly Jesus to promise and jolly John to report such a millenial prospect. It beats the Mahommedan Paradise. Irenaeus continues:--

"In like manner [the Lord declared] that a grain of wheat would produce ten thousand ears, and that every ear should have ten thousand grains, and every grain would yield ten pounds of clear, pure, fine flour; and that all other fruit-bearing trees, and seeds and gra.s.s, would produce in similar proportions; and that all animals feeding on the productions of the earth should become peaceful and harmonious among each other, and be in perfect subjection to man. Sec. 4. And these things are borne witness to in writing by Papias, the hearer of John, and a companion of Polycarp, in his fourth book; for there were five books compiled by him.

And he says in addition, 'Now these things are credible to believers.'

And he says that when the traitor Judas did not give credit to them, and put the question, 'How then can things, about to bring forth so abundantly, be wrought by the Lord? The Lord declared, They who shall come to these [times] shall see.'" Which, in evasiveness, is on a par with some of the utterances of Jesus in the Gospels. Dr. Donaldson ("Apostolical Fathers," p. 897,1874,) says: "There is nothing improbable in the statement that the Lord spoke in some such way, and it is not at all improbable that Papias took literally what was meant for allegory."

Dr. Giles seems to concur in the view that Papias repeated words of Jesus.

J. Jones (on the Canon, vol. i., p. 370,1827,) thinks Papias both the manufacturer of the doctrine of the Millenium and of this pa.s.sage ascribed to Christ calculated to support it. The idea he considers borrowed from the Jews. Perhaps it was, but it certainly finds some countenance in the Apocalypse.

The statement that Papias was a hearer of the Apostle John conflicts with the account in Eusebius (Ec. Hist, iii., 89), which implies that he received information from John the Presbyter after all the Apostles were dead. According to Eusebius (Ec. Hist, iii, 36,) and Jerome (De Viri Ill.u.s.t. xviii.), Papias was Bishop of Hierapolis, a city of Phyrgia.

He is supposed to have suffered martyrdom about 163 or 167. His work, in five books, was ent.i.tled "An Exposition of the Oracles (or Words) of the Lord." Eusebius, in the third book of his Ecclesiastical History, chapter 39, gives us most of our information about Papias. His estimate of him, as a man of very limited understanding, does not deter us from regretting the loss of his writings. The fragments which remain cast such radiance on some of the dark points of the Christian evidences.

Paley and all the school of evidence-writers cite him as proving the existence of our Matthew and Mark. But he is now generally seen to prove the very reverse.

Let us first examine his statement in regard to Matthew. As given on the authority of Eusebius, it reads that "Matthew composed the _logia_ [oracles or sayings] in the Hebrew dialect, and everyone interpreted them as he was able."

Now it is somewhat curious that Papias, probably in the second half of the second century, should be the first to give currency to the tradition that Matthew wrote a Gospel if that Gospel had been in existence 100 years.

But that the work referred to was not the same we now have is manifest from its name _logia_, discourses, sayings, or oracles. It would be an utter misnomer for an historical narrative beginning with a detailed history of the genealogy, birth and infancy of Jesus, and the preaching of John the Baptist, and concluding with an equally minute account of his betrayal, trial, crucifixion, and resurrection, giving all his movements and miracles, and which has for its evident aim throughout the demonstration that Jesus was the Messiah. Our Gospel, not written by, _but according to_ Matthew, has no such t.i.tle.

Moreover, ours is a Greek and not a Hebrew Gospel. The testimony of Papias on this point is explicit It is, moreover, confirmed by a consensus of all the Fathers: Irenaeus, Pantaenus, Origen, Eusebius, Cyril of Jerusalem, Epiphanius, Chrysostom, Augustine, and all others who allude to Matthew's Gospel declare that it was written in Hebrew.

Now our Gospel is considered by the most competent authorities an original doc.u.ment. There is no ground whatever for considering it a translation, even if we knew that Matthew's Gospel had been properly translated, instead of everyone interpreting it as he was able. Many of the quotations in it from the Old Testament are taken not from the Hebrew but directly from the Greek Septuagint. Its turns of language have the stamp of Greek idiom, and could not have come in through translation. So that there is no reason for even indirectly connecting our Canonical Gospel according to Matthew with the _logia_ which Papias had heard were composed by him.

This position is somewhat strengthened when we find in the Fragments of Papias, p. 442: "Judas walked about in this world a sad example of impiety; for his body having swollen to such an extent that he could not pa.s.s where a chariot could pa.s.s easily, he was crushed by the chariot, so that his bowels gushed out." Theophylact, after quoting this pa.s.sage, adds other particulars, as if they were derived from Papias. He says that Judas's eyes were so swollen that they could not see the light, that they were so sunk that they could not be seen, even by the optical instruments of physicians; that the rest of his body was covered with runnings and worms, etc.

If Papias knew from Matthew that Judas had already hanged himself, and further from the Acts of the Apostles that he had fallen headlong in a field and burst asunder, it was really too hard to inflict on poor oft-killed Judas these additional cruelties. Surely it were better _that_ man had never been born, though in that case we know not how Christian Salvation would have been brought to the world. It seems as if each new Christian writer felt himself at liberty to invent a new death for Judas, who was divinely appointed to bring about their redemption.

By Paul's saying Jesus appeared to the twelve (1 Cor. xv., 5), it is evident he knew nothing of Judas's suicide.

Among the fragmentary remains of Papias is one found in Eusebius, who tells us that: "He also relates the story of a woman accused of many crimes, which is contained in the Gospel according to the Hebrews."

It would thence appear likely that if Papias saw and quoted from any Gospel, though we have no other evidence than this that he did either, it was from the Gospel to the Hebrews, which some have thought the original of Matthew, and which would agree with the language in which he declares Matthew to have written. Orthodox writers endeavor to make out that here Papias alludes to the story found in the eighth chapter of John. But surely if Eusebius knew the story in John was the same he would not have ascribed it to another Gospel. In truth there is no evidence that John's narrative of the woman taken in adultery was extant even in the time of Eusebius. It is an undoubted interpolation contained in no ancient ma.n.u.script of value, and may have been taken from some tradition similar to that found in Papias, yet certainly not the same since Papias speaks of many crimes, John only of one.

We think the reader will agree with Dr. Samuel Davidson, who in his "Introduction to the Study of the New Testament," vol. i., p. 383, 1882, says: "There is no tangible evidence to connect the present Gospel with the Apostle Matthew." Even the orthodox apologist, Neander, admits "Matthew's Gospel, in its present form, was not the production of the Apostle whose name it bears, but was _founded_ on an account written by him in the Hebrew language, chiefly (but not wholly) for the purpose of presenting the discourses of Christ in a collective form" ("Life of Christ," cap. ii., sec. 4, p. 7). An admission sufficient to destroy the credit of any profane work much less a divinely inspired record of the sayings and doings of an alleged G.o.d.

The author of "Supernatural Religion," vol. i. p. 486, 1879, says: "It is manifest from the evidence adduced, however, that Papias did not know, our Gospels. It is not possible that he could have found it better to inquire 'What John or Matthew, or what any other of the disciples of the Lord.... say, if he had known of Gospels such as ours, and believed them to have been actually written by those Apostles, deliberately telling him what they had to say. The work of Matthew being, however, a mere collection of discourses of Jesus, he might naturally inquire what the Apostle himself said of the history and teaching of the Master. The evidence of Papias is in every respect most important. He is the first writer who mentions that Matthew and Mark were believed to have written any works at all; but whilst he shows that he does not accord any canonical authority even to the works attributed to them, his description of those works and his general testimony comes with crushing force against the pretensions made on behalf of our Gospels to Apostolic origin and authenticity."

We will now look at his testimony to Mark. "Mark," he tells us, "having become the interpreter of Peter, wrote down accurately whatsoever he remembered, though he did not arrange in order the sayings or deeds of Christ. For he neither heard the Lord nor accompanied him. But afterwards, as I said, he accompanied Peter, who accommodated his instructions to the necessities [of his hearers], but with no intention of giving a regular narrative of the Lord's sayings. Wherefore Mark made no mistake in thus writing some things as he remembered them. For of one thing he took especial care, not to omit anything he had heard and not to put anything fict.i.tious into the statements."

This description likewise shows that our actual second Gospel could not, in its present form, have been the work of the Mark referred to. Mark or Marcus was an extremely common name in the early Christian period.

In the first place, our Gospel is no more like a man's preaching than it is like an epic poem. It has, moreover, no Petrine characteristics. Mark does not give the important pa.s.sage about Christ's church being built upon Peter (Matt, xvi., 18); nor the distinguishing addition "called Peter," in the calling of Simon; nor the narrative of Peter's miraculous draught of fishes; of his walking on the sea; his being sent to prepare the Pa.s.sover, or the reproachful look of Jesus when Peter denied him. It also omits the expression "bitterly" when the c.o.c.k crew, and Peter wept.