Real

ties, but how then shall we explain the numerous discrepancies in structure and arrangement, or what reason shall we assign for so many gospels? The truth is, that the whole inquiry is to a great extent superfluous. The phenomena of resemblance among the three gospels are neither so uniform nor so striking as to necessitate the formation of such theories. Let three honest and intelligent men write the life of a friend and teacher, let it be their object to present a faithful literary portrait, and let it be considered necessary to such fidelity that a special account of his more remarkable sayings be given, and that the scenes and results of his most striking actions be described. Now, where might we expect similarity in three such biographies? Plainly when they record the sayings of their common Master, and when they describe the peculiarity of his most famous deeds. The case stands precisely so with the gospels. and direct similarity is found principally in their records of Christ's lessons and conversations. How could it be otherwise? If the three reports of their Master's teaching be faithful, need it surprise us that verbal similarity or identity is everywhere observed? Would not each strive to give the very words, or at least the general phraseology? Fidelity, therefore, required similarity in such simple and unadorned narratives; and if many of the addresses of Jesus were in the shape of replies to previous questions-were in short brief conversations then we should expect equal similarity in the recital of the words, as well of inquirers as of disputants; for such verbal coincidence is almost identical with truthfulness. In reporting the words of Christ and the words of others, the very idea of giving such words must create constant similarity. Now, in the Gospel of Matthew, the great majority of the instances of its agreement with Mark and Luke, occur in such recital of others' words, or the words of Christ, and so in respect to the other gospels. In the sections of simple narrative, where each evangelist was free to use his own diction, verbal similarity rarely occurs, except in the ordinary formulas which express common and daily acts, such as departures, journeys, embarkation, and temporary residence. Besides, the narrative part in these gospels is small in proportion to the other contents-about a fourth in Matthew, a half in Mark, and scarcely more than a third in Luke. If, then, three-fourths of Matthew, one-half of Mark, and two-thirds of Luke be filled with honest reports of the sayings of the great Teacher and of those with whom he came into contact, must there not be great and parallel similarity in their three statements? From the very nature of the case, then, we might expect no little verbal agreement, even more similarity than has actually occurred, for we meet with perfectly exact identity in

Sources of the Gospels.

431

a mere fraction of the gospels compared to the whole contents.* Why then should men have striven so restlessly to account by mere hypothesis for what must have been an anticipated and a necessary phenomenon?

It is plain that prior to the composition and publication of the canonical gospels, the early Christians must have possessed a pretty full and correct idea of the Lord's life and ministry. His career must have been a frequent and joyous theme of conversation and study. The discourses of the apostles must have often dwelt on the marvellous events of the life of the God-Man, reciting what he said and describing what he did, in order to prove his Messiahship, and by this means establish the faith, quicken the joys, and foster the hopes of the early converts. And the gospels must have embodied these memorabilia which were so familiar to the first Christians. Not that we can fully espouse the theory of De Wette, Olshausen, and others, who, without hesitation, trace to such a source the correspondences of the first three gospels. These coincidences need, as we have seen, no such explanation. Besides, not a few members of these first Christian communities seem to have reduced to a written

form their reminiscences of apostolic instruction. "Many," says Luke, "have taken in hand to set forth in order a declaration of those things which are most surely believed among us." These numerous authors seem to have comprised in their respective treatises what each one had caught and treasured up from the sketches given by the apostles, and from the general conversations of the believing brethren. That these sketches were brief, fragmentary, and without formal authority, is evident from their speedy disappearance. If they were correct brochures, then much of what they contained will be found in the canonical gospels. With these exceptions, therefore, that the three evangelists may have seen the earlier compilations of the "many," and that they must have embodied in their biographies much that was matter of common and current belief among the primitive churches, these histories of Jesus are separate and independent publications. Their testimony is that of witnesses to the same facts, without previous consultation; occasional sameness of language with occasional discrepance of arrangement, giving to their evidence the unmistakable stamp of intelligence and honesty, as that of men who could not be deceived themselves in circumstances so propitious to the formation of a right and mature judgment, and who were too pure and generous to be guilty of deceiving others.

And this quadriform biography of Jesus is full of wise and

* Norton's Genuineness of the Gospels, Vol. I.

benignant adaptations. Each of the four writers has his own special end in view in the construction of his narrative. Each exhibits the significance of Christ's life according to a preconceived plan, and in order to enjoy a full and symmetrical view, all of them must be consulted. Fulness of conception is thus obtained. For example, in Matthew's Gospel a new star leads Chaldean star-gazers to the infant Jesus, and their own science instructs those heathen worshippers of the new-born King. But it would be strange if no spiritual minds in Judea could detect the Messiah in the Son of Mary, and so Luke shews, how an angel, one of the Beings who appear so often in their early history, revealed the truth to the shepherds, and how Simeon and Anna welcomed the babe on his presentation in the Temple. Jew and Gentile alike are thus shewn to have an interest in him, and this completeness of view is found by a combination of the gospels.

The object of Matthew clearly is to prove that the Son of Mary is the promised Messiah, a species of proof specially intended and fitted to operate on Jewish mind. Chronological arrangement is not necessary to such an end. The first Gospel is constructed to shew that ancient prophecy is fulfilled in Christ. His savings and actions are therefore skilfully grouped together, and each group is followed up by a reference to the Old Testament in the ever recurring formula, "that it might be fulfilled." The method of Christ's teaching and the substance of it; the splendour of his miracles and their peculiar nature; his eventful life, with its sorrows and sympathies, and his character in its combination of meekness and heroism, of grace and majesty-these are so presented in the pages of the first evangelist as to convince every unprejudiced reader of the Old Testament that its Messianic predictions are realized in Him who was born at Bethlehem in "the fulness of the time." This is a purpose perfectly intelligible and consistently executed. And there is no wonder that the first gospel should be designed to bear primarily on Jewish minds, as the founder of the new faith, with his early and immediate heralds, belonged to the Jewish people, and they possessed a common ground of appeal and argument in their own national oracles. This Gospel, in its structure and purpose, bears thus a distant resemblance to Xenophon's Memorabilia.

But a question naturally arises, if Matthew wrote for Jews, did he not write in the Jewish tongue? This subject has been long and warmly debated, some affirming that the original gospel was composed in Hebrew or Aramaean, and that either the author wrote a second copy in Greek, or that our present Gospel is an anonymous translation. Our own view is that the cano

The so-called Aramaean Gospel of Matthew.

433

Having

nical Greek Matthew is the one original Gospel. carefully studied the evidence presented for an original Aramaean Gospel, we are compelled to say that the proof adduced appears to us to be essentially defective. Dr. Davidson devotes many pages to a statement and defence of the opposite view. He has indeed altered his opinion, having in his first published work advocated a Greek original.* We blame him not, we taunt him not, as others seem to have done, for changing his mind-we applaud his transparent candour and honesty, but we feel unconvinced by his arguments. His first thoughts on this subject are better than his second thoughts.

And first, the theory of a sole Aramaic original brings along with it consequences from which we instinctively shrink. We are not trying the question by dogmatic views-we are not refuting evidence by the negative power of polemics, but surely we are at liberty to point out conclusions which are not accidental, but essential and undeniable results. Dr. Davidson says, "In the present version we have Matthew's genuine production. It may be questioned, indeed, whether it be in all respects an exact representation of the original-probably additions were made by the translator." Again he says, he admits that the translator was under infallible guidance," but qualifies the statement by adding, that it was only "virtual inspiration" which was possessed by him. Now, these appear to us to be somewhat inconsistent conclusions. If the translator was under infallible guidance, then surely we have actual and not virtual inspiration; and it cannot be questioned that in such a case we must have an exact representation of the Aramaean copy. If, under that infallible guidance, he made additions to the original, he was virtually an evangelist as well as a translator. A good translator needs honesty and not inspiration; and how in this case can we distinguish the supplement from the original matter? But further, how know we that an anonymous and unauthorized translator had guidance of any kind, save his own taste and sense of fidelity? The idea of his infallible guidance is only a desperate expedient in the crisis, to give the version some air of authority, and to save us from the natural conviction, that a version made, no man can tell where, when, or by whom, cannot possess inspired credibility. The anonymous historical books of the Old Testament, such as Kings and Chronicles, stand on a wholly different foundation. If the supposed Aramaean original had been preserved, the Greek version of Matthew would have been only on a par with the English or French translations of the same book; and does it gain

* Lectures on Biblical Criticism, pp. 352.

any higher authority because the feigned original has been lost? Could the existence of an inspired and original Aramaean gospel be proved, we must take the theory, with all its consequences. We do not say that such results negative the theory; but surely a theory that undeniably leads to such consequences, involving really the question whether this be Matthew's actual gospel or not, must be looked on with distrust and suspicion. It is not because the so-called version is anonymous that we would doubt its inspiration, for there are several anonymous treatises in Scripture; nor do we reject it because it is a translation simply, for the Chaldee chapters of Ezra and Daniel would have been canonical though they had been given us in Hebrew-but because it is a version for whose fidelity there are no vouchers-no one testifying that he had compared the Aramaean with the Greek gospel, and no one being able to tell anything of its origin or publication. The Fathers forget not to tell us how the gospels of Mark and Luke, not being the composition of apostles, came into the Canon, but they are silent as to any apostolical sanction or patronage of a Greek translation of Matthew. Were we then forced to believe that an Aramaean gospel ever existed, we would be obliged to have recourse to the hypothesis of a double publication by the evangelist himself.*

Granting freely that Matthew wrote for Jews, there yet seems to be no valid reason to conclude that he was obliged for this purpose to write in Syro-Chaldaic. Even had he composed his gospel solely for Palestinian Jews, he was not obliged to use their Shemitic language. It has indeed been a debated point— what language was spoken in Palestine in Christ's time, and perhaps between the extremes of Pfannkuchef and Diodati,‡ -between the extreme of asserting that Aramaic was the only tongue, and the opposite extreme of maintaining that Greek had banished this ancient and national speech, the truth seems to be, that while Aramaic was the vernacular, and cherished as the mother tongue, Greek was extensively spoken, and all but universally understood. It was a tongue common to the Palestinian and Hellenistic Jews. It is said (Acts xxii. 2) of the mob in Jerusalem, when the Apostle Paul was about to address them, "when they heard that he spake to them in the Hebrew tongue, they kept the more silence." They were prepared to hear a

*This is the theory of Whitby, Bengel, Guerike, Townson, Horne, Olshausen, Bloomfield, Schott, and Kitto.

† Ueber die Palästinische Landes-sprache in dem Zeitalter Christi.—In Eichhorn's Allegm. Bibliothek der Bibl. Literatur, viii. 472.-Pfannkuche in this Essay was indebted principally to a tract of De Rossi-Della lingua propria di Christo-Parma 1772.

De Christo Græce Loquente-Neapoli 1767. Reprinted in London 1843.