WHO WROTE THE FOUR GOSPELS ?

S U P P L E M E N T TO “ T I L E L I T E R A R Y G U I D E , " J U L Y , 18 9 5 .

J e s u s of Nazareth is supposed to have died about the year 30 of the Christian Era ( c . e .). It is to be regretted that considerable delay took place before the issue of his biography. ¡So important a task as writing the life of the World’s Redeemer should have been proceeded with immediately after his withdrawal from the earth. A Committee of Apostles or Disciples should have been convened while the events of his career were fresh in the mind of the public. And the work of recording the wondrous story of Jesus should have been entrusted to a competent scribe or group of scribes. Within a year or two of the Crucifixion the work might have been circulated up and down the land of Palestine,and copies transmitted to Alexandria, Damascus, Athens, Rome, and other great civilised centres. The world would then have had a fair opportunity of pronouncing a verdict on the history of the alleged Son of God. But nothing of the kind was done. I f we take up a popular manual of chronology, such as J . C. Curtis’s “ Outlines of Scripture History,” we find the dates of the Four Gospels placed thus : Matthew, some time between 37 and 63 ; Mark, some time between 48 and 65 ; Luke, some time between 57 and 6 3 ; John, about 10 1 . Striking a rough average from these uncertain statements, we find popular Christian opinion confessing that some twenty years passed before the Synoptics (Matthew, Mark, and Luke) were issued, and seventy years before John obtained the necessary leisure to compose memoirs on the most important subject in the world’s history.

It is proposed in the present paper to examine the question of the origin of the Four Gospels with the aid of Dr. Samuel Davidson’s

“ INTRODUCTION TO THE NEW TESTAMENT.” * Dr. Davidson stands in the front rank of English Biblical scholarship. He neither bows to the authority of the Church, nor attacks the Bible out of mere lust for controversy. On the one hand, he believes that “ Christianity is an essential factor in the education of the human race, and deserves the most serious attention.” On the other hand, no false reverence stays his hand from exposing the real facts as regards the composition and date o f the Christian Scriptures.

In Dr. Davidson’s opinion, the chronological order of the Gospels runs as follows : Matthew, Luke, Mark, and John. We shall take these documents in the order named. First, then, we turn to

MATTHEW.

About the middle of the second century c . e . there lived a Christian teacher named Papias, of whose writings fragments have been preserved by the historian Eusebius. Papias wrote a work entitled “ An Exposition of Oracles of the Lord,” and in the preface Papias says : “ But I will not scruple also to put along with my interpretations for your benefit whatsoever in time past I learned well from the elders and remembered well, guaranteeing their truth. For I did not, like the many, take pleasure in those who say

* This work, in two vols., is published by Paul, Trench, Trtlbner, & C o ., at 30s. The third edition appeared in 1S94.

much, but in those who teach the truth ; nor in those who record foreign commandments, but such as were given from the Lord to the faith, and are derived from the truth itself. But if anyone came in my way who had been a follower of the elders, I inquired about the discourses of the elders— what was said by Andrew, Peter, or Philip, or by Thomas, James, John, Matthew, or any other of the Lord’s disciples; and what Aristion and the elder John, disciples of the Lord, say. For I did not think I could get so much profit from books as from a living and abiding voice.” So Papias seems to have spent much time in chatting with old people from whom he hoped to gather scraps of information about the early Christian movement; and he did not greatly value the evidence of documents. Is it likely, then, that Papias could have known of Four Holy Gospels which all Christian communities looked upon as truthful and inspired accounts of the career of Jesus Christ? Papias is also quoted as having stated: “ Matthew composed the oracles in the Hebrew dialect, and everyone interpreted them as he was able,” which apparently means that Matthew had made notes of Christ’s speeches in the popular Aramaic (not true Hebrew) tongue. The Gospel of Matthew, as we now possess it, is written in Greek. According to Jerome (400-450 c.e .), the Gospel of Matthew was composed in Hebrew. “ Matthew,” observes Jerome, “ also called Levi, who from being a publican became an apostle, first wrote a gospel of Christ in Judaea, in the Hebrew language and letters, for the benefit of those of the circumcision who believed. Who afterwards translated it into Greek is uncertain.” Jerome also tells us that the Nazarreans in Bercea, who had a copy of the original, allowed him to make a transcription of it. And it was this same Jerome who informs us that he translated a manuscript known as “ The Gospel according to the Hebrews.” Were these documents, the Aramaic biography of Matthew and the Gospel according to the Hebrews, one and the same? It is possible they were. But how are we to be reasonably sure that the present Greek Gospel of Matthew is a translation of the Hebrew record alleged to have been drawn up by Matthew ? It is probable that the Greek version was based upon the Aramaic. But when was the Greek version made, and by whom, and where ? There is no proof that it came from Matthew himself. The chapters which recite the Sermon on the Mount, and those which tell of the return of Christ on the clouds of heaven, and the end of the world, may have belonged to the first Aramaic document. Insertions were made by various hands, until, about the year 105, the Greek version was completed.

It is Dr. Davidson’s opinion that “ there are two elements in the gospel, of distinct and opposite tendency—the JewishChristian or primitive Ebionite one, which regarded the new religion as a reformed stage of the old, accepting the Messiahship of Jesus and the pure morality he proclaimed ; and a liberal element which viewed the Gentile world as the soil of Christianity. The latter acquired predominance after the destruction of Jerusalem and its Temple, when the field of the world was opened up to the new religion, and Judaism received its death blow.” Jewish features are to be noted in the following incidents :—Jesus said he was