We are living at a time when territory
formerly deemed sacred is being traversed
by hosts of forbidding aspect
under the banners of natural science, of philosophy,
and of the psychology and history of religion.
The greatest foe of all, it has been
thought by some, has arisen within the household
of faith in the form of Biblical Criticism.
An eloquent American preacher, Dr. Richard
S. Storrs, has said that when Luther translated
the Bible into the vernacular, "the peasant's roof
was lifted to a level with the stars." Into every
home whose inmates could read there came,
with the Bible in their own tongue, the message
of divine love and redemption. With the freedom
to read the Bible came also the freedom to
study the Bible, to judge by its standard the doctrines
and usages of the church, to compare
Scripture with Scripture, and even to bring
Scripture itself with its credentials before the bar
of reason. Whatever the extremes into which
criticism may have run in an age in which the
Cartesian principle of doubt is applied to every
received opinion, the rights of Biblical Criticism
must be conceded as a legacy of the Reformation.
About the works of Homer, of Plato, of Dante
and of Shakespeare there has gathered a mass
of material in the way of commentary and discussion,
but it is safe to say that in recent years
the literary output in all of these departments of
study taken together is small in comparison with
that which centres around the Bible. The Biblical
critic has helped to attract to the Bible the
intellectual interest of our age, as well as to make
it the storm-centre of theological controversy.
He has made it a principal object of scholarly as
well as devotional interest, has thrown a flood of
light upon its pages from history, archæology,
philology and comparative religion, and has
challenged the devout Bible reader to a more
intelligent, minute and painstaking examination
of the fundamental documents of his faith.
The specialization of the age has assigned the
Old Testament and the New Testament to different
departments of study, and the problems of
each must be independently investigated. It is
evident, though, that the fortunes of the Old
Testament and the New are closely bound up
together. The same principles of criticism are
likely to be applied to both, and whether we begin
with naturalism or supernaturalism in the
Old Testament we shall probably end with it in
the New Testament. In both Testaments Babylonian
influence may be traced, and the twelve
apostles may follow the twelve patriarchs into
the limbo of myth. If no supernatural process
of redemption, in the way of history, prophecy
or revelation, can be discovered in the Old Testament,
it is unlikely that any will be discovered
at all. The Fourth Gospel as well as the Pentateuch
has been analyzed into documents, and
the same great historical transposition is seen in
both Testaments; Jewish monotheism is said to
have begun with Amos instead of with Abraham,
and Christianity in its distinctive features with
Paul instead of with Jesus.
The present state of discussion in the Old
Testament field indicates, to one not a specialist
in this department, that positions which have
been regarded as assured are not yet settled beyond
question. The literary analysis is ingenious
and plausible, but, as is shown in Orr's
"Problem of the Old Testament," the argument
is balanced. To offset the literary analysis and
the rearrangement of the history in accordance
with an evolutionary scheme, there are certain
considerations from history, archæology, and
common reason. No such analysis has been
ventured in the case of modern documents that
are confessedly composite, and in the case of
Homer, the nearest classical parallel, there is the
same uncertainty in the results.
Purely literary considerations, as Ramsay has
remarked, yield before other more objective and
historical data, and the literary theories are adjusted
to meet the new situation.[259] The temporary
popularity in the New Testament field of the
Baur-Tübingen theories, based on Hegelian principles
of development, and then their general
abandonment, suggest the need of caution before
we accept any concensus of criticism, based upon
literary and philosophical grounds alone, as the
last word upon the subject. Our special concern
in this lecture is with the problems of the
New Testament, and we may consider briefly,
I. The Pauline Epistles, II. The Acts, III. The
Synoptic Problem, and IV. The Johannine
Problem.
I. The Pauline Epistles
It is frequently said that the figure of the
Apostle Paul stands out against the background
of history in bolder relief and with individual
features more strongly marked than does any
other character in antiquity. Not only has his
public career been narrated by one who was apparently
his friend and companion in labours,
but he has left a large collection of letters, full of
profound teaching upon religion and ethics, and
abounding in autobiographic details and in intimate
revelations of character.
The school of Baur recognized as genuine only
the four central epistles, Romans, 1 and 2 Corinthians
and Galatians, making in bulk about
three-fifths of the writings, exclusive of Hebrews,
which have been assigned to Paul. The tendency
of criticism since the time of Baur has
been steadily in the direction of the acceptance
of other epistles as Pauline. Colossians, Philippians
and I Thessalonians have now been added
to the list of the generally accepted writings, and
it is only the fringe of Paul's writings that can
be said to be still in dispute. Of these "anti-legomena,"
2 Thessalonians, Ephesians and the
Pastorals, it is noticeable that two of them are
rejected largely on the ground that they resemble
so closely in ideas and vocabulary the admittedly
Pauline letters of I Thessalonians and Colossians,
while a Pauline nucleus is often acknowledged
in the Pastorals by those who do not assign the
epistles as a whole to Paul.
Students of Ephesians, moreover, are coming
to hear in it more and more clearly, if we mistake
not, the voice of the Apostle and the expression
of his mature Christian experience, and of that
doctrine of the church in which Royce sees the
essence of Paulinism. A. C. Headlam says that
it is the careful study of a book that will often
solve the question of its origin, and remarks:
"To me Ephesians is Pauline through and
through, and more even than Romans represents
the deepest thought of the Apostle."[260] The important
fact is that, when all the disputed epistles
are excluded, the progress of criticism has placed
beyond reasonable doubt the great body of the
Apostle's teaching and the bulk of his writings.
The practical question now at issue, as Ramsay
has observed, is not, "What did Paul write?"
but "What did Paul teach?"[261]
In Paul's acknowledged writings we have a
solid basis in fact from which to estimate the
Gospel narratives and the Acts. The epistles of
Paul carry us back into the circle of the earlier
apostles and of the Jerusalem church, and throw
light upon various events and aspects of the
life, character, words, death, and resurrection of
Christ.
II. The Acts of the Apostles
The book of Acts, while secondary in interest
to the Gospels, occupies a central place in New
Testament criticism. It is the bridge between
the Ascension and the time thirty years later
when Nero persecuted "a great multitude called
Christians at Rome." It covers the period in
which doctrinal evolution took place. Through
its authorship it bridges the gap between the Gospels
and the Pauline church among the Gentiles.
The course of the history in the early chapters
of Acts is so different from that which the imagination
of a later age would have pictured, that
it bears upon its face the marks of early origin
and of trustworthiness. To a later writer, without
contact with the actors, and writing after the
destruction of the Temple and the final breach
of the Christians with the Jews and the assured
success of the Gentile mission, it would seem
exceedingly improbable (1) that the apostolic
company should have continued to worship in
the Temple; (2) that they should at first have
found favour with the people; and (3) that they
should have remained in Jerusalem with no apparent
intention of leaving until scattered by
persecution; and perhaps (4) that the Sadducees
should have been the first to start the persecution.
The recorded history, improbable to a
later age, bears upon its face the stamp of truth.
The imagination of a post-Pauline writer would
have given us, we may be sure, a very different
picture of church history. It would scarcely have
conceived of the primitive Christology of Peter's
speeches, the use of the term, "child," or "servant"
of God (παῖς [pais]) in place of the Pauline term,
"Son of God" (υἱός [huios]), yet with the same attitude,
shared by Christians of earlier and later time, of
adoration, worship and love.
The presumption in favour of credibility is
strengthened by the author's full and detailed
treatment of persons and places. "A man who
would venture to introduce ninety-five persons
and a hundred and three places into a history of
his own times must have been pretty sure of his
ground. The majority of these persons were
still living when he wrote; into every one of
these places his volume shortly penetrated....
The correctness of his geography upholds the
truth of his history."[262]
A great many of the statements of the Acts
can be checked by comparison with Paul's
epistles, as has been shown by Paley's "Horæ
Paulinæ," and more recently, for the first part of
the Acts, by Harnack. In case of apparent conflict,
it has been said, "we are confronted by the
task of reconciling the differences between two
first-century documents, each of which has, admittedly,
very powerful claims."[263] More than
half of the Acts is taken up with the labours
of the Apostle Paul, and yet the Acts does
not mention or show knowledge of his epistles.
This fact, used by some to throw doubt upon
the genuineness of the epistles, may be an indication
of the early date of the Acts, and of so
close a relationship between the author and the
Apostle that the evidence of letters would be unnecessary.
Important alike in its bearing upon the questions
of credibility and authorship, is the evidence
of the so-called "we-sections." A prima facie
case is made out that the author of the Acts was
an eye-witness of some of the scenes it records,
and a companion in travel of the Apostle Paul.
This evidence has of late been greatly strengthened
by linguistic investigation. While critical
attempts are still made to divide the Acts into
documents, the "we-sections" (xvi. 10-17; xx.
5-15; xxi. 1-18; xxvii. 1-xxviii. 16), as Sir J. Hawkins
says, show an "immense balance of internal
and linguistic evidence in favour of the view that
the original writer of these sections was the same
person as the main author of the Acts and of the
Third Gospel."[264]
No living writers have done more to stimulate
interest in the book of Acts than have Sir W. M.
Ramsay and Harnack, and the writings of both
have materially strengthened the case alike for
its Lukan authorship, and, in the main, for its
historical accuracy. Ramsay, starting, as he says,
from the standpoint of the Tübingen school, "with
the confident assumption that the book was fabricated
in the middle of the second century, and
studying it to see what light it could throw on
the state of society in Asia Minor, was gradually
driven to the conclusion that it must have been
written in the first century and with admirable
knowledge."[265]
Harnack's defense, in his four monographs,[266]
of the Lukan authorship, integrity, historical reliability
(where the supernatural is not in question)
and early date of the Acts is the most outstanding
and significant achievement of the age
in New Testament criticism. Harnack's work
has been so thorough and convincing that it may
be said to have carried the theological world by
storm. At least his powerful argument for Lukan
authorship does not appear to have been successfully
met. The attempt to turn its flank by asserting
that the Paul of Acts, in making a vow,
shaving his head and entering into the Temple,
was not the defender of Gentile liberty who wrote
Galatians, and so that the author of the Acts was
not the companion of Paul, is met by Harnack in
the fourth of his monographs. Paul, he declares,
not only was a Jew, but remained so, whether
consistently or not. Harnack thinks that Paul
shrank back from taking the last logical step,[267]
but that in this the author of the Acts represents
the relation of Paul to Judaism precisely as do
his letters.[268] Stanton well remarks that the difficulty
of accounting for alleged discrepancies between
the Acts and the Epistles is equal or greater
on the supposition that the author wrote 100 a. d.,
or later, than if the author was the companion of
Paul.[269] The very fact, for example, that Luke
says that Paul worshipped in the Temple is an
indication that we have here no conception of a
later age to which such an act would have seemed
unnatural.
In his "Date of the Acts and of the Synoptic
Gospels" (IV), Harnack reverses his former opinion
and strongly defends a date for the Acts within
the lifetime of Paul and before the end of his trial
at Rome. Reviewing his former arguments for
a later date, he finds them inconclusive, and thinks
that the earlier date is required by the abrupt
close of the Acts. Minor considerations favouring
an early date are (1) the titles for Christ in
the early chapters, and for Christians, and the
description of the Jews as "the people of God";
(2) the fact that the Jews are the persecutors and
not the persecuted; (3) the absence of any indication
of the use of Paul's letters such as would
be expected in a later writer; (4) the use of the
"first day of the week," instead of the "Lord's
Day," and of the names of Jewish feasts, in which
Luke stands with Paul against later writers. And
(5) even the prediction, Acts xx. 25, which looks
primarily to Jerusalem, not Rome, would not have
been written, if the second imprisonment be accepted,
after its apparent falsification by I Timothy
i. 3 and 2 Timothy i. 18. H. Koch develops
these arguments independently,[270] and it
can no longer be said that the early dating of the
Acts is "a pre-critical theory which rests on sentimental
or subjective grounds."[271]
Why should the author follow so carefully the
fortunes of the Apostle on his voyage to Rome,
and describe so fully the initial stages of his trial,
and yet leave the reader in doubt concerning its
outcome? Commentators have been puzzled by
the seemingly inordinate space which Luke devotes
to the details of the voyage and shipwreck.
Sometimes it is said that the voyage marks the
final rejection of the Jewish people; or in the
description is seen a literary device intended to
intensify the suspense of the reader; or allegorical
interpretations are resorted to by those who
think that Luke would not thus descend from the
level of the philosophical historian to that of the
novelist.
In the minute description of the voyage and
shipwreck, Koch sees evidence that the writer's
experiences as Paul's companion on the voyage
were still fresh in his mind. The details would
scarcely have been remembered and recorded so
vividly after twenty-five years. Even if a journal
had been kept, it is still strange that the minutiæ
of the story should have been retained in the perspective
of the finished history. "The author
still stands under the fresh impression of the wonderful
divine guidance through which Paul, in
spite of all dangers and hindrances, reached his
long sought goal." "What interest would a
reader of later times have in details such as that
on an Alexandrian ship precisely two hundred
and seventy-six men were found?" In the seventh
or eighth decade more important contemporary
events would have stood in the foreground of interest.[272]
A striking parallelism has been observed
between the Third Gospel and the Acts,
while, supposing Paul's death to have occurred,
it is urged that Luke has missed "the finest—the
most essential—point of the whole comparison,
the death of Paul."[273]
The assumed intention of the author to write a
third treatise does not help the matter much. It
is absurd, Ramsay admits, to relate the earlier
stages of the trial at great length, "and wholly
omit the final result which gives them intelligibility
and purpose"; but his conclusion is that
"it therefore follows that a sequel was contemplated
by the author," a sequel which the "first"
(prôtos) of Acts i. 1 implies, if Luke "wrote as
correct Greek as Paul wrote."[274] But the intention
of writing a sequel does not explain the failure
to mention the outcome of the trial. Luke
would have no motive like the writer of a continued
story for keeping the reader in suspense,
and the simple addition of the words "until his
release or acquittal" would have relieved the
suspense, and given "intelligibility and purpose"
to the detailed description of the earlier stages of
the trial. The account of the Ascension is not
omitted from Luke's Gospel although given in
greater detail in the Acts. There is nothing un-philosophical
in the abrupt ending of a history
which brings the record down to the date of
writing.
The leading argument against an early date
for the Acts is drawn from the possible use by
Luke of the writings of Josephus, and the crux
of the question is in the words put into the
mouth of Gamaliel (Acts v. 36, 37). The coincidence
of the names of Theudas and Judas of
Galilee (Acts v. 36, 37; Antiq. xx. v. 1 and 2) is
striking and, if the two men named Theudas be
(1) Luke had from Paul, whether or not Paul
was present at the meeting of the Sanhedrin, the
best means of knowing what Gamaliel, his teacher
and the spokesman of the Pharisaic party, actually
said. (2) The assumption that Luke was
quoting Josephus is in itself very difficult when
we compare the passages. Luke speaks of about
four hundred under Theudas while Josephus
mentions a great part of the people; Luke speaks
of Judas while Josephus speaks of the sons of
Judas. To quote thus loosely from his assumed
authority and then to commit the further blunder
of making Gamaliel allude to an event which occurred
at least a dozen years later is, while possible,
strangely out of keeping with Luke's proved
care and accuracy in most of his historical allusions.
The difficulty is acknowledged by those
who make Luke dependent on Josephus. Why
did Luke diverge from a correct narrative if he
had one before him? Writers who affirm (Holtzmann)
and those who deny (Schürer) the dependence
on Josephus practically agree that if Luke
had read Josephus he had forgotten him. (3) In
the narrative of the death of Herod (Acts xii.
20 f.; Antiq. xix. viii. 2), where the two authors
most obviously come together, both are plainly
describing the same event, and yet seem to be
quite independent both in the use of words and
in the details of the description. (4) The cumulative
evidence of an early date for Luke weighs
heavily in the scale against the hypothesis of
dependence upon the "Antiquities" written
about 93 or 94 a. d.
The question of date cannot be said to be absolutely
settled, but the tendency of criticism as
illustrated by Harnack is to the acceptance of an
early date, as well as to that of the Lukan authorship
of the entire book. It is difficult to
see how Harnack, with his present defense of a
date before Paul's release from prison, can consistently
maintain his skepticism where the supernatural
events recorded in the Acts are concerned.
It is idle to say that his "revolution in
chronology" has no effect upon the question of reliability.
It is an established principle of historical
method that the nearer a tradition is to the event
it professes to describe, the more likely it is to be
trustworthy. The resources of Harnack's learning
have been used in support of the reliability
of Luke in his geographical and chronological
references,[275] and his treatment of persons and
reports of their speeches.[276] He has shown that
Luke was in touch with the leaders of the Jerusalem
church, and that his statements are abundantly
confirmed by the writings of Paul. If
Luke wrote within the lifetime of Paul, the Acts
was published while the main actors were still
living, and, by inference, it recorded events as
Peter and Barnabas and Apollos and Philip and
Mark thought that they happened. If further,
as Harnack argues, it was written during Paul's
imprisonment there seems no room for doubt
that it was written under the eye and with the
full endorsement of its principal actor, and that
we have thus the implicit guarantee not only of
Luke but of Paul also for the accuracy of its
record.
III. The Synoptic Problem
It has been said that the two most important
questions for religion are those of the rational
foundations of theism and of the trustworthiness
of the Four Gospels.[277] The Gospel records have
always been regarded as the citadel of the Christian
Faith. Not only do they contain the record
of works of power and words of grace, and of a
transcendent Personality, but they have always
been considered to have been themselves supernatural
in origin and character. They have been
regarded as "a house not made with hands"
(Robertson Nicoll), "a miracle of the Holy
Ghost" (Stier), "the heaven-drawn picture of
Christ, the living Word." The criticism of the
past century, in its quest for the historical Jesus,
has taken a very different attitude towards the
Evangelical records. By many critics they have
been regarded as a patchwork of traditions, a
work of pious but credulous men, whose idealization
and exaggeration, in the supposed interest
of faith, it is necessary to discount in order to
reach the bed-rock of historical fact.
The literary relation of the Synoptic Gospels
to one another has furnished to the New Testament
student a problem of great intricacy and
singular fascination. Its importance for our
present purpose is in its bearing upon the trustworthiness
of our canonical Gospels. The school
of Baur, under the influence of the Hegelian dialectic,
saw in Matthew, the Jewish Gospel, the
thesis; in Luke, the Gentile Gospel, the antithesis;
and lastly in Mark, the neutral Gospel,
the synthesis or last term of the development.
Criticism since the time of Baur has, with much
unanimity, seen in Mark not the latest but the
first of the Gospels, and has made Matthew and
Luke dependent upon Mark.
The theory which has for some years held the
field is the so-called "two-document" theory.
According to this Matthew and Luke, usually
regarded as independent of each other, are both
dependent, for much of their narrative portion
and for the framework of their history, upon
Mark, and, for the non-Markan discourse material
which they have in common, upon a collection
of the sayings of Jesus, formerly designated
as "the Logia" but now usually called by the
letter "Q." The importance of the Synoptic
Problem, for our present purpose, is in its
historical rather than its literary features. Assuming
the priority of Mark, and assuming that
Matthew and Luke were dependent upon him
alone in those parts of their narratives which
have Markan parallels, it is clear that we must
regard all deviations made by the other Synoptists
from the Markan narrative as of only secondary
value. Variations from Mark, if Mark be the
sole source, whether these consist of additions,
omissions or modifications in the narrative, obviously
add nothing to our knowledge of the
facts, but simply represent changes which the
later writers have made in their source from subjective
reasons. It is important, then, to ask
whether, in the present state of opinion upon the
inter-Synoptic relations, there is reason to believe
that Matthew and Luke are following Mark as
their sole authority for the narratives which have
Markan parallels.
There is now a quite general recognition of
the fact that the literary problem presented by
the Synoptic Gospels is exceedingly intricate,
and that the "two-document" hypothesis in its
simplicity has not solved all the difficulties. It
is recognized that it must be modified in one of
three directions.
(1) There may be said to be a growing appreciation
of the part which oral transmission has
played in the composition of the Gospels. This
is shown for example in the volume of Oxford
"Studies in the Synoptic Problem" (1911),[278] and
by the statement of Sir John Hawkins, who, in
the second edition of his "Horæ Synopticæ"
(1909), expresses the strong opinion "that at
least the Second and Third Evangelists had
provided themselves with written documents as
their main sources, but that they often omitted to
refer closely to them, partly because of the
physical difficulties which there must have been
in consulting manuscripts, and partly because of
the oral knowledge of the life and sayings of
Jesus Christ which they had previously acquired
as learners and used as teachers, and upon which
therefore it would be natural for them to fall back
very frequently."[279] It is natural to suppose,
with Schmiedel, that oral tradition continued for
a considerable time after the first documents
were written.[280]
(2) A considerable number of scholars, finding
that Mark condenses his account of such
incidents as the Baptism and Temptation of
Jesus and the discourse concerning Beelzebub,
and that Matthew and Luke are parallel in matter
which they add at these points to the Markan
account, have concluded that Mark must have
used Q, the assumed source of the Matthew-Luke
agreements. A moderate statement is that of
Dr. Sanday: "I do not think that Q was used
by Mark regularly and systematically, as the
later Evangelists use his own narrative; but he
must have known of its existence, and reminiscences
of it seem to have clung to him and from
time to time made their way into his text." [281]
(3) Another group of scholars, basing their
view on the agreement of Matthew and Luke
against Mark in matter with Markan parallels,
and on the difficulty of accounting for some
omissions from Mark in the later Evangelists
(such as the omission in Luke, where it would be
most appropriate, of the story about the Syro-Phœnician
woman), have framed a theory of
different recensions in Mark, one being used by
Matthew, a different one by Luke, and a final
recension, whether the work of the Evangelist
himself or of an editor, representing our canonical
Mark. This theory in different forms has been
advocated by Stanton in his "Gospels as Historical
Documents," Part II (1909), and more
recently by Holdsworth in his "Gospel Origins"
(1913). When the two-document theory is held
in this form, the priority of Mark belongs only
to the assumed earlier editions, for whose extent
and contents there is no objective evidence except
the assumed dependence, while our canonical
Mark is later than either Matthew or Luke.
There is a growing tendency to find secondary
elements in Mark as well as in Matthew or Luke.
Hawkins, it will be recalled, gives a list of passages
in Mark "which may have been omitted
or altered (by the other Evangelists) as being
liable to be misunderstood, or to give offense, or
to suggest difficulties."[282] Of the passages which
seem (a) to limit the power of Jesus, or (b) to be
otherwise derogatory to, or unworthy of Him,
the more noteworthy of the twenty-two instances
given by Hawkins are as follows: under (a),
1. Mark i. 32-34, "He healed many that were
sick." Matthew viii. 16, "He healed all"; cf.
Luke iv. 40, "Every one of them."
3. Mark vi. 5, "He could there do no mighty
work, save etc." Matthew xiii. 58, "He did not
many mighty works there because of their unbelief."
Under (b),
2. Mark i. 12, "The Spirit driveth him forth."
Matthew and Luke use words meaning to "lead."
4. Mark iii. 21, "They said he is beside himself."
This is omitted by Matthew and Luke.
10. Mark x. 17, 18, "Good Master" and
"Why callest thou me good?" appear in Matthew
xix. 16, 17 (R. V.) as "Master" and "Why
askest thou me concerning that which is good?"
Luke follows Mark.
Over against these passages may be placed
others where the change, if any, and whether
made unconsciously or for reasons of style or
with conscious tendency, would seem to be in
the other direction.
1. In the Parable of the Vineyard, Matthew
xxi. 37, "My son." Luke xx. 13, "My beloved
son." Mark xii. 6, "He had yet one, a beloved
son."
2. Matthew x. 42, "A cup of cold water only
in the name of a disciple." Compare Mark
ix. 41, "In name because ye are of Christ."
3. Luke xxiii. 47, "Certainly this was a righteous
man." Mark xv. 39, "Truly this man was
the Son of God," or "a son of God." Matthew
xxvii. 54 follows Mark.
4. (According to Bousset) Mark's abbreviation
of Q in iii. 27 makes it appear that it was
Jesus who bound the strong man, instead of
God.[283]
5. Matthew xiii. 55, "Is not this the carpenter's
son?" Compare Luke iv. 22, "Is not
this Joseph's son?" Mark vi. 3, "Is not this the
carpenter, the son of Mary?" Belief in the
Virgin Birth is perhaps safeguarded by Mark.
6. Mark x. 45, "The Son of man came not
to be ministered unto, etc." Here Bousset sees
a dogmatic working over of Luke xxii. 27, "I
am among you as one that serves."[284] Matthew
xx. 28 follows Mark.
So far as tendency to Christological heightening
is concerned, critics of the school of Bousset
are now especially severe against Mark. It appears
that "Luke's Gospel in the Passion history
has preserved a series of primary traditions
over against Mark."[285] Holdsworth finds a
number of secondary elements, mostly stylistic,
in Mark where the three Gospels have a common
narrative. Among these are the vivid
touches of the second Gospel, considered to be
"distinctly secondary features," the fuller descriptions
in many instances, and the use of the
noun "gospel" not found at all in Luke although
the verb is used, and not found in Matthew in
its absolute sense.[286]
Taking, then, the present state of opinion as
to the relation of our Mark to the other Gospels,
we see that while in general the "priority of
Mark" is in some sense defended, yet the relation
between any given passage in Matthew or
Luke and its parallel in Mark may be variously
construed. When Matthew, for example, deviates
from Mark, this modification according to
current theories may arise (1) from the first Evangelist's
fancy or his dogmatic tendency, and will
in either case be historically worthless. It may
arise (2) from reliable oral tradition, and in this
case be as worthy of credence as the Markan
source. It may be derived (3) from the source
Q, but may be for some reason omitted by Mark,
whose knowledge of Q is assumed. The deviation
in Matthew may (4) have been found in a
proto-or deutero-Mark, but have been omitted
in his final edition. The difference in this case
between Matthew and Mark is no greater than
that between two editions of the same work.
The point to be emphasized is that, in the
present state of opinion upon the Synoptic
problem, the difference of one Evangelist from
another does not in itself invalidate the testimony
of either. The Synoptic problem, while primarily
a literary problem, is indeed "fraught with momentous
issues which the Church, and not scientific
criticism only, is concerned to face";[287] but
in the present state of the discussion, the fact
that Matthew adds to or modifies the narrative
of Mark does not necessarily place the Matthean
modification upon a lower plane of credibility
than the Markan statement. The Matthean
modification may be an exact copy of an
earlier edition of Mark, or may be derived
from one of Mark's sources, Q, or may be
taken from that stream of oral tradition coming
from "eye-witnesses and ministers of the
word," which Luke in his preface evidently regarded
as the touchstone of historical truth,
whatever his use of written sources.
Passing over the vexed question of Q, we may
observe that the acceptance of Harnack's early
dating of the Acts and Luke would further complicate
the two-document theory. He agrees
that Luke was written before the Acts, and the
Acts before Paul's trial at Rome was decided;
further that Mark is one of the sources of Luke,
and that Mark was written at Rome. "Tradition
asserts no veto against the hypothesis
that Luke, when he met Mark in the company
of Paul the prisoner, was permitted by him to
peruse a written record of the Gospel history
which was essentially identical with the Gospel of
Mark given to the Church at a later time." Perhaps,
he intimates, "Luke was not yet acquainted
with Mark's final revision, which, as we can quite
well imagine, Mark undertook while in Rome."[288]
The priority of Mark, under this supposition, is
left hanging by a slender thread. It is highly
probable that Luke gathered the material for his
work (and a great part of it was certainly independent
of Mark) while in Palestine, and if he
did not see Mark's Gospel, or a rough draft of it,
until he was in Rome, it is improbable that the
Markan document was his primary and principal
source, as the two-document theory asserts.
Whatever the literary foundation of the two-document
theory, it cannot be said to have led to
any very important historical results. Those
who regard the portrait of Jesus in Mark as historical
see in the portrayal of Matthew and Luke
only a difference in the nuances of the narrative.
On the other hand, those who cannot accept the
picture drawn by the First and the Third Evangelists
are equally unable to accept that given to
us by Mark. The criticism of the sources, in its
usual form, has not revealed to us a Jesus who is
more historical than the Jesus of any of the
Synoptists; and it is necessary to pursue the
quest in the more problematical region of
"sources of sources." In this process Mark is
found to be as little historical as the other Synoptic
Gospels, or even as the Gospel of John.
The "dissonances of the Evangelists" appear
to be left practically where they were before the
present movement in Synoptic criticism began.
They remain what they always have been when
one Gospel is compared with another, and are
neither softened nor made more acute by any
certain results which have been reached in the
study of the Synoptic problem. Some, no doubt,
may say that the discrepancies are so great that
the Synoptic Gospels cannot be accepted as historical
records; while others will say, as does a
devout commentator on the Acts, that "such is
the naturalness of Holy Scripture that it seems as
though it were indifferent about a superficial consistency.
So it ever is with truth: its harmony
is often veiled and hidden; while falsehood sometimes
betrays itself, to a practised ear, by a
studied and ostentatious uniformity."[289] Others
again will appeal to the writers on historical
method, such as Langlois and Seignobos: "The
natural tendency is to think that the closer the
agreement is, the greater is its demonstrative
power; we ought, on the contrary, to adopt as a
rule the paradox that an agreement proves more
when it is confined to a small number of circumstances.
It is at such points of coincidence between
diverging statements that we are to look
for scientifically established historical facts."[290]
The inter-Synoptic differences are certainly, in
general, no greater than those which a single
author allowed himself in the accounts of the
same incident, as is shown in Luke's threefold
account of the conversion of the Apostle Paul.
IV. The Johannine Problem
It is scarcely surprising that the mystery which
surrounds the most mysterious Personality in
history should communicate itself to the records
which tell of His life, and even to the authors of
these records. If the Synoptic problem is a
"well," as Goethe said, the problem presented by
the "spiritual Gospel" usually assigned to the
Apostle John is equally fascinating and difficult.
The mystery of the Master has in part enveloped
the disciple whom Jesus loved.
The questions of the authorship and the historicity
of the Fourth Gospel are closely bound
together. If the Gospel is a theological romance
intended to give currency to the conceptions of
the Alexandrian philosophy, it is clear that its
authorship cannot be ascribed to one of the disciples
of Jesus. On the other hand, if it was
written by one of the Apostolic band, it must
certainly, whether reliable or not in its details,
contain a wealth of historical reminiscence which
will enrich our knowledge of the personality, the
words and the deeds of Christ.
It is an interesting fact that a strong defense
of the Apostolic authorship of the Gospel has
been made, in the present generation and in the
one which preceded it, by writers whose theological
position would incline them to an opposite
conclusion.[291] The strength of the evidence for
Johannine authorship lies in the testimony which
it receives from all parts of the early church,
whether divisions be made on geographical or
theological lines, and in the links of connection
which bind the witnesses to the alleged scene of
John's labours and to the Apostle himself.
If it be objected that John, as a Galilean fisherman
and an unlettered man, could not have produced
a work so profound in thought and so
polished in Greek composition, the objection
may be compared with that which is raised
against the authorship of the plays which go
under the name of Shakespeare. Andrew Lang
remarks with irony upon the surprising belief
that "a young man from a little country town,
and later an actor, could possibly possess
Shakespeare's vast treasures of general information,
or Latin enough to have read the Roman
classics."[292]
The external evidence for Johannine authorship
is strong and, with the exception of the
obscure sect of the "Alogi,"[293] is uniform. It is
"sufficient," and there can be little doubt that
it would be efficient in producing general belief
except for the theological interests involved.
Objections to the Apostolic authorship from the
side of the external evidence are based (1) upon
supposed indications that John was martyred
with James at Jerusalem and never lived in
Ephesus at all, and (2) upon the statement of
Papias, interpreted to mean that two men by the
name of John lived in Ephesus. (1) The evidence
upon the first point is confessedly late and
confused. It is contained in the statements of
Georgios Hamartolos, a ninth-century writer,
and in the so-called "De Boor Fragment," purporting
to contain an extract from a fifth-century
writer, Philip of Side. The former says that
Nerva, "having recalled John from the island,
dismissed him to live in Ephesus. Then, being
the only survivor of the twelve disciples, and
having composed the Gospel according to him,
he has been deemed worthy of martyrdom. For
Papias, the Bishop of Hierapolis, having been an
eye-witness of him, says in the second book of
the 'Oracles of the Lord,' that he was slain by
the Jews, having, as is clear, with his brother
James, fulfilled the prediction of Christ concerning
him, and his own confession and assent in
regard to this." He adds that the learned
Origen, in his commentary on Matthew, "affirms
that John μεμαρτύρηκεν [memartyrêken] (has borne witness, or suffered
martyrdom), intimating that he had learned
this from the successors of the Apostles."[294] But
Origen, in his comment on Matthew xx. 23, says
that "the king of the Romans, as tradition
teaches, condemned John, witnessing for the
truth, to the island of Patmos." If Georgios
Hamartolos thus incorrectly refers to Origen as
a witness to the martyrdom of John, less weight
attaches to his professed reproduction of the
statement of Papias.
The "De Boor Fragment" contains the statement
that "Papias, in the second book, says that
John the Divine and James his brother were
slain by the Jews."[295] This supports the statement
of the ninth-century writer in regard to the
second book of Papias, but the evidence, whether
for the martyrdom of John by the Jews, or for
the fact that John was put to death at the same
time with his brother James, as is sometimes inferred,
is exceedingly slight. Paul (Gal. ii. 9)
speaks of John at a time usually identified with
the Council at Jerusalem (Acts xv.), although
Ramsay would identify it with Acts xi. 30, thus
placing it immediately before the death of James
(Acts xii. 2). The statement of Georgios that
John lived in Ephesus at the time of Nerva also
negatives this supposition. Of the slightly attested
view that John was martyred at an early
date, Dr. Dawson Walker remarks: "It is difficult
to think that this latter hypothesis would
have met with so great favour if it had not been
such an effective instrument in excluding St. John
from any possibility of being the writer of the
Fourth Gospel."[296] The statements that John was
put to death by the Jews may possibly be an inference
from the prophecy, "The cup that I drink
ye shall drink, etc." (Mark x. 39).
(2) A mediating theory, based upon the well-known
statement of Papias[297] in which a "presbyter"
John may, with much probability, be distinguished
from the Apostle of that name, does
not deny the influence of the Apostle upon the
construction of the Fourth Gospel, while its ultimate
authorship is assigned to the "presbyter"
John. The hypothesis of the two Johns rests
upon the statement of Papias' fragment as interpreted
by Eusebius; but Eusebius, while suggesting
that the "presbyter" might have written
the Apocalypse, indicates no doubt of the Apostolic
authorship of the Gospel and the First
Epistle. The possibility that there were two
Johns, who were both in some sense disciples of
the Lord (as Papias describes the "presbyter"),
who both lived in Asia Minor, and who were
both more or less concerned in the writing of the
Fourth Gospel, cannot be denied. But it is also
possible that Papias has been misinterpreted, and
that, when he described the "presbyter" John,
the disciple of the Lord, he had only the Apostle
John in mind. In this case we should be freed
from the necessity, involved in the theory of authorship
we are considering, of supposing that
the Apostle had a mysterious alter ego of the
same name, who was with him alike in Palestine
and in Asia Minor, shared in a degree his authority
and published the substance of his teaching,
and so completely merged his personality in
that of the Apostle that in the Gospel record no
trace of a separate "presbyter" can be found,
and there is no mention of the name of either
John.
The First Epistle, supposed to be a sort of
supplement to the Gospel, is of importance in its
bearing upon the question of authorship. As a
recent writer says: "The persistent note of authority
which is overheard, rather than heard, in
the Epistles is the more impressive because it is
only implied. St. John assumes that his authority
is unquestioned and unquestionable by
those Asians who are loyal to the Christian
tradition. When we compare his letters with
those of his younger contemporaries, we conclude
that it was unquestionably because he was an
Apostle."[298]
Another mediating position, adopted by those
who do not accept the full Apostolic authorship,
is found in a theory of partition, which assigns
a portion of the Gospel to the Apostle. The
artistic unity of the Gospel and the qualities of
style which distinguish it from other writings
present a grave difficulty to any theory of partition.
As a sort of half-way house it will scarcely
be permanently tenable. Of Spitta's analysis,
which assigns a part of the Gospel to the Apostle,
it has been objected by a critic of more radical
sympathies that such an admission places him
outside the limits of scientific criticism.[299]
The stronghold of the evidence alike for and
against the Johannine authorship is to be found
in the facts of the Gospel itself. On the one
hand a powerful argument, such as that which
has been developed by Lightfoot and Westcott,
can be drawn to show that the author of the
Gospel must have been a Jew, a Jew of Palestine,
a disciple of Jesus, one of the inner circle of disciples,
and in fact none other than the "beloved
disciple" himself. The internal facts of the Gospel
are used in a different way by others to show
that the Fourth Gospel differs so radically in scene,
in the style of its discourses, and indeed in its entire
portrait of Jesus, that it cannot be accepted as
historical, or as the work of one of the disciples.
The difference in scene between the Galilean
Gospels and the Jerusalem Gospel presents no
great difficulty, but the crux of the problem is in
the difference in style and subject matter. The
Jesus of the Synoptics cannot, it is said, have
spoken in the style of the discourses in John.
Before this judgment can be accepted without
qualification, several points deserve to be noticed.
The difference in style is in part accounted for
by the difference in subject matter and in the
character of the audience. There are out-croppings
of the Johannine style in the Synoptics,
especially where the subject of discourse is similar.
The passage, Matthew xi. 25-30, which, as
we have seen, contains the essential teachings
found in John xiv., is a notable illustration. The
Jerusalem audience again was different from the
Galilean audience. If it be said that when the
Jesus of the Fourth Gospel speaks in Galilee
(John vi.) He uses the same mystical style as
when He speaks in Jerusalem, it should at least
be considered that the discourse in Capernaum
is not given as a sample of the usual synagogue
preaching of Jesus. The scene clearly marks a
crisis in the ministry, a crisis indicated in the
other Gospels by the northern journey for retirement
which immediately followed, but made more
intelligible by the supposition that the Capernaum
discourse was practically a clearer revelation
to the Galilean audience of the consciousness
of Jesus and the spiritual character of His work.
When we recall that such expressions, familiar
to John, as Logos, Lamb of God, propitiation for
sin, are never placed by John in the mouth of
Jesus, we have strong negative evidence that the
discourses of Jesus in the Fourth Gospel are not
the free composition of the author himself.
After all, the question of the style of the Fourth
Gospel is not so important as that of its contents.
Does it draw an essentially different picture of
Jesus from that of the Synoptic writers, or does
it help us to fill out and to interpret the Synoptic
portrait? Two considerations of a general nature
should be kept in mind. Ordinary readers
of the Gospels in all ages have seen no lack of
unity in the composite portrait of the four Gospels;
and recent criticism has shown that even to
the sharp sighted modern critic the harmony is
so great that one who rejects the historical character
of John's Gospel will also reject the Second
Gospel, which was written from the standpoint
that Jesus is the Son of God (so Bousset), and is
to be distinguished from the Fourth Gospel in
degree (graduel) rather than in essence. The
aim of Mark, and there is no reason to doubt
that he reaches his aim, is in fact the same as
that of John, so far as concerns his desire that
his readers may believe that Jesus is the Christ,
the Son of God (John xx. 31).
If what the Synoptic Gospels say is true as to
the words and the works and the claims and the
consciousness of Jesus, then we should expect
some such supplement as we find in John. We
should expect either more or less than we find
in the Synoptic Gospels. When we read of the
Divine Voice at the baptism and the transfiguration,
we ask, What did Jesus Himself conceive
His relation to God to be? The full answer is
in John. When we read, "Where two or three
are gathered together in my name, there am I in
the midst of them" (Matt. xviii. 20), we should
expect fuller teaching on the relation of Jesus to
the disciples. This we have in the last discourses
in John. When we read in the Synoptists accounts
of the teaching and the mighty works, we
turn to John for the full description of the Teacher
and Lord, and of the mighty Worker manifesting
His glory. The Synoptic Gospels tell us
of the authority of Jesus and of His office of
judgment and of His founding a Church. In
John we see the ground of His authority in His
relation to God and in His mystical relation
to the disciples. In the Synoptists we have
the Last Supper and general prophecies of the
future and commands for the guidance of the
Church. We should expect some more intimate
and personal revelation of His relation to the
disciples, such as is furnished by the Johannine
picture of the disciple whom Jesus loved, and in
the words, "Woman, behold thy son" (John xix.
26, 27); and in the intimate discourse of John
xiv.-xvi. When we read, once more, that Jesus
often retired for prayer, but in the Synoptic Gospels
have the record of only one or two of His
petitions: "Remove this cup from me....
Thy will be done" (see Luke xxii. 42 and compare
xxii. 32), we expect some such enrichment
of our knowledge of the prayer-life of Jesus as is
contained in John xvii.
The historical character of the Fourth Gospel
is shown alike by the light which it throws upon
the course of events in the public ministry and
by the more subtle resemblances between John
and the Synoptists, so different in emphasis and
shading that John's account cannot well have
been due to Synoptic tradition, and yet so much
in agreement as to give confidence that the same
course of events underlies both accounts. If we
look at the outward course of events under the
guidance of writers such as Askwith[300] or A. E.
Brooks,[301] we see that John's picture of the earliest
disciples in Judea may throw light upon the narrative
of the call of the four (Mark i. 16 f.). The
crisis in the ministry, indicated rather than explained
in the Markan narrative, is more intelligible
in the light of John vi. The hosannas
of the Triumphal Entry into Jerusalem, as well as
the settled determination of the rulers to put
Jesus to death, can be better understood with
the help of John's statements about Lazarus (see
John xii. 9-11); and the accusation of the witnesses,
"We heard him say I will destroy this
temple" (Mark xiv. 58), and the weeping of
Jesus over Jerusalem (Matt, xxiii. 37) are again
more intelligible in view of the Johannine statements
about the temple of His body (John ii.
20, 21), and the accounts of His frequent visits to
Jerusalem.
Relationships of a more subtle kind may be
found when John is compared with the Synoptic
Gospels. (1) The relation of Jesus to His mother
is the same in both. Compare Luke ii. 49,
"Knew ye not that I must be in the things of
my Father"; and John ii. 4, "Woman, what
have I to do with thee?" The relation with His
brethren is also the same, their right to influence
Him not being admitted. (2) The causes of
opposition are differently described, but are the
same in principle. In both Mark ii. and John v.,
the charges against Him are those of blasphemy
and Sabbath breaking, and in both cases are
made in connection with the miracle of healing.
His defense of His action in healing on the
Sabbath day is the same in principle but different
in detail. In both there is an à fortiori argument:
"How much then is a man of more value
than a sheep!" (Matt. xii. 12); "If a man receive
circumcision on the Sabbath ... are ye
wroth with me because I made a man every
whit whole on the Sabbath?" (John vii. 23). In
both cases His action is defended by reference to
His unique position, in the one case in His relation
to God, "My Father worketh hitherto"
(John v. 17); and in the other case in His relation
to men, "The Son of man is lord even of
the Sabbath" (Mark ii. 28). (3) The relation of
Jesus to various classes of people as described by
John is remarkably different in detail, but wonderfully
similar in essence, when compared with
the Synoptic record. In each with entire difference
of scene and circumstance He meets with a
woman that was a sinner, but the essentials of
penitence and the public expression of gratitude
are similar in both (Luke vii. 37 f.; John iv. 7 f.).
No narratives could be more independent of each
other than those of the conversation with Nicodemus
in John iii., and with the rich young ruler
in Mark x., yet in both cases the attitude of Jesus
towards an influential and upright and religious
man was the same. In spite of difference in
language also, the words to Nicodemus, "Ye
must be born again" (John iii. 7), do not differ in
their radical demands from the words addressed
to the ruler, "One thing thou lackest: go, sell
whatsoever thou hast and come, follow me"
(Mark x. 21).
The comparison might be continued indefinitely,
but only to show that the picture of Jesus
and of His relation to the Father, and to His
disciples, to publicans and sinners, to the Pharisees,
to women, and to the human race as Saviour
and Judge, is so different in John that it cannot
be due merely to the influence of the Synoptic
tradition, and yet so identical in substance that it
cannot possibly, with any regard for literary
probabilities, have been the free invention of the
writer.
It is generally agreed that the writer of the
Fourth Gospel took for granted in his readers an
acquaintance with the narrative or the tradition
of the Synoptic Gospels. He would not have
written unless he had some new light to throw
upon the figure of Jesus, or some deeper insight
into His personality and work. The photograph
and the portrait may not perhaps agree in their
mechanical measurements, but to one who knows
the subject the portrait may reproduce the original
as faithfully, and even more adequately, than
does the photograph. Each is useful for its own
purpose, but both together are needed to give us
the body and the soul, the exact features and the
expression, the total impression of the personality.
The criticism of the Gospels has thrown the
figure of Jesus into strong relief, not only against
the background of His time, but against the
background of humanity in general. In its recent
developments, it has left us practically with
the choice between the Christ of the four Gospels
or a shadowy figure to be found in none of them.
The true historical Jesus that criticism has brought
before us is clad in the coarse garments of Galilee,
but with the glory of the only-begotten of the
Father, full of grace and truth.
The searchlight of modern knowledge is the
fierce light that beats upon the throne. As nature
and the human soul and the relationships of
thought and the phenomena of religion and the
book of revelation are more fully studied, the
majesty and beauty of the central Figure in history
is more clearly revealed. Each age sees a
new glory in Jesus Christ. "It is one of the
evidences of the moral greatness of Jesus," says
Peabody, "that each period in Christian history,
each social or political change, has brought to
view some new aspect of His character and given
Him a new claim to reverence." The modern
age sees in Him and in His Cross of love and
sacrifice the guide and inspiration of its ethical
and social advance. It sees in Him and in His
Cross the solution, so far as ultimate solution
may be possible, of its deepest intellectual problems.
It sees in Him not merely a Guide and a
Revealer, but a Redeemer from sin and the Giver
of Eternal Life.
