Miracles.
It is in vain to deny the truth of a miracle on the ground that it is impossible, and contravenes the well-established laws of the universe. The power to create, implies the power to suspend; and as the performance of a miracle is the exercise of creative energy, it is just as easy to exercise it in one case as another. All efforts to demonstrate the impossibility of miracles have failed even in the hands of such men as Hume, because men reason on such subjects in a circle. Still it would be strange if there was no way to expose a false miracle, especially where the results claimed from it are calculated to lead men into error. When some unusual and extraordinary event which amounts to a miracle is said to have occurred one hundred years ago, at a time when intelligent and inquisitive minds were around, and no notice is taken of it by them in giving an account of their own times, nor by any one else, it is safe to conclude that it never did take place, and that those who assert it for the first time at the end of the hundred years are engaged in an attempt to impose some fraud on their fellow-men.
From the death of Christ, A.D. 33, to some time near A.D. 140, we claim that no writer of profane or church history makes mention or speaks of the miracles described in the first three Gospels, and not those of the fourth until long afterwards. It is by negative testimony alone that we can arrive at the truth. In the first place, did the great Apostle of the Gentiles perform the miracles that are ascribed to him in the Acts? It is stated that at Lystra he cured a man who had been crippled from his birth by his simple word; he exorcised the evil spirit that was in Lydia; he raised Eutychus, who had fallen from a window; cast from his hand, unhurt, the deadly viper; and such miraculous powers did he possess, "that from his body were brought unto the sick handkerchiefs or aprons, and the diseases departed from them, and the evil spirits went out of them." (Actsxix. 12.)
Paul, in his epistles, does not mention or refer to any of these wonderful things, and does any man suppose, if true, he would fail to make some allusion to them? He neither mentions the miracles ascribed to himself, nor those described in the four Gospels. Perhaps he did not disbelieve in the possibility of miracles, for such belief was common to the age; but to believe them possible, and believe that one has been performed, is another thing. "Truly the signs of an Apostle were wrought among you in all patience, in signs and wonders, and mighty deeds." (2Cor. xii. 12.) The signs and wonders here spoken of were made to appear to the Corinthians alone, and have no reference to miracles described in the New Testament, nor do we know what they were, for no notice of them is taken in the Acts. In the 18th chapter and 9th verse, he says that he had a vision which told him not to be afraid to speak, and not hold his peace. The "mighty deeds" refers to his works as an Apostle, and the "signs and wonders" rather to the fruits of his preaching than to any display of miraculous power.
Had Paul possessed the power attributed to him in the Acts, it would have been easier for him to have converted the world than to make the few converts he made after the labor of a life. There were those living who in the course of nature might have seen Lazarus, or heard of his resurrection, and had it been in the power of Paul to have cited his case, or any of the miraculous cures claimed for Christ or any of his disciples, the conversion of mankind would have been as rapid as the movements of the earth. Every pagan temple and altar would have been deserted, and their priests have fallen prostrate at the feet of Paul. A few pretended miracles and revelations on the part of Mahomet established his claim to be the prophet of God, and were the means, backed by the scimitar, of fixing the faith of millions. Paul is silent on the subject of the miracles. Barnabas was a companion and fellow-preacher with Paul.
No document extant to-day which relates to the Apostolic age is entitled to more, if as much confidence and credit, as the epistle which bears his name. For some reason, it bears less evidence on its face of fraudulent manipulation than any other writing of that time, and it is this evidence of its purity which excludes it from the list of canonical Gospels this day. It has been referred to by a long list of fathers, commencing with Origen, and coming down to writers of our day, as the genuine production of the companion of the great Apostle. No one, not even the Apostles themselves, had more faith in Christ than he, and it seems to be the burden of his epistle to prove that he was the Saviour who had been foretold by the prophets, and whom the Jews were anxiously expecting. Had Christ, in his ministry among men, done or performed any act out of the course of nature which proved him superior to other men in his power over the laws of nature—anything like command over diseases, sickness, to say nothing of death—Barnabas would not have failed to dwell upon everything of the kind with energy and zeal, because such powers would establish what he aimed to prove: that is, that Christ was the one spoken of by the prophets. But, while he makes the most labored application of the prophecies to Christ, he makes no allusion to any wonderful work he performed while he was on the earth. He has not one word to say on the subject of the miracles ascribed to Christ in the Gospels.
Much may be inferred from the silence of Apollos on the subject of miracles. The intercourse between the Jews at Alexandria and Judea was constant. Nothing of importance could occur in Jerusalem without its being known in a short time on the banks of the Nile. The history of John the Baptist, the works he did at the Jordan, and the manner of his death, were all known to Apollos from some source, before Josephus wrote his history of the Jews; but it seems he had never heard of Christ or any of his wonderful works. (Actsxviii.) After his conversion he taught that Christ was the one expected by the Jews, and he undertook to prove it by the prophecies in the Old Testament. It would have been far easier to establish this by the mention of the one-half the miracles ascribed to Christ in the Gospels than by arguments drawn from prophecy, which were vague, obscure, and doubtful. But he had never heard of the resurrection of Lazarus, nor of the miracles of the loaves and fishes, nor of the wonderful things that happened to the swine in the country of the Gadarenes.
There are now extant, writings which learned men refer to the Apostolic age, which have no value except as they may throw some light on the age in which they were written. We may mention the epistle of Paul to the Laodiceans; the epistles of Paul to Seneca, with Seneca's to Paul, and the Acts Paul and Thecla. In none of these writings is any mention made of the miracles of Paul, or those of the New Testament, and the silence of such works is only of consequence as it shows the universal ignorance of antiquity, or the Apostolic age, on the subject; for it is not to be supposed that those things which were standing themes for discourses and books in the second century, would be unnoticed in the first, if they did exist, as well at one time as the other. How can we account for the silence of the fathers of the church on this subject? Ignatius and Polycarp were so near to the time of Paul and the disciples, and even Christ, that nothing which concerned any one of them was unknown, and if the miracles ascribed to them had been real occurrences, nothing could be more effective in the hands of these fathers for the spread of the religion of Christianity.
But there is not only no mention by any one of them of the miracles, but the Gospels have not yet appeared. Up to the beginning of the first century, there is no mention or reference made in any writing, either to the Gospels, or the miracles they describe. Allusions are made in some cases to the Scriptures, in the most general terms; and as the Old Testament writings were called Scriptures, and there was the Hebrew Gospel of Matthew, and the epistles of Barnabas, James, Peter, and Paul, to which the term Scripture might apply, the reference is of no value in fixing the date of the Gospels. The first distinct and unequivocal notice of the first three Gospels is found in Justin MartyrsApology; and he, who speaks of them for the first time, dilates on their contents, and refers to Matthew, Mark, and Luke each by name: to Matthew nineteen, to Mark four, and to Luke fourteen times. From this time to the present hour, every book abounds in references to these Gospels.
As yet the Gospel of John had not appeared. What is remarkable in the Gospels, referred to by Justin, who makes a most elaborate disquisition on the prophecies, citing many passages to prove that Christ was a divine person, whose advent had been predicted, he does not make mention of any of his miracles, or of those of any of his disciples. He speaks of Christ's birth from the Virgin Mary, his miraculous conception, and all the leading acts of his life, as described in Matthew and others, but seems to have had no knowledge of the miraculous works he performed.
The silence of Justin on the subject of miracles, and his extended notice of the prophecies, can only be explained by the fact that there was nothing said about them in the Gospels, and that they were inserted at a later day. As the quarrels among Christians in the second century intensified, and as the authority of the church grew to be paramount as we approach the dark ages, no doubt the Gospels underwent a revision, and the miracles were added as a means to excite the awe and command the belief of the Pagan world. The spirit for the creation of miracles commenced in the church before the end of the second century—was encouraged by it, and has been continued down to our own times, and formed the most effective weapon for the conversion of the hordes of the North, and for the final overthrow of the followers of Arius. Each age had its own miracles, in each of which was apportioned the amount of divine energy required to subdue the obstinacy and unbelief to be overcome.
The silence of what are called profane writers on the subject of the miracles is equally unaccountable—if they are to be regarded as real occurrences in history—and none as much so as that of the Jewish historian, Josephus. Of sacerdotal extraction, and of royal descent, Flavius Josephus was born A.D. 37. He was alive in A.D. 96, but the time and manner of his death is unknown. His works comprise a complete history of the Jews, and omit nothing that was worthy of notice. He was a youth of great ability and promise, and says of himself, "When I was a child, and about fourteen years of age, I was commended by all for the love I had for learning, on which account the high priest and principal men of the city came frequently to me together, in order to know my opinion about the accurate understanding of points of law." (Life of Josephus, sec. I.)
Here we have a historian of the right kind, living so near the time that he must have seen and conversed with those who had seen and known Christ and his disciples. How are we to regard his silence? Had Christ been the character which many suppose he was, a teacher endowed beyond all other men, with a divine genius to declare the doctrines which are to govern man in his relations towards the Creator and towards each other, we can well understand why, in A.D. 93, when Josephus wrote the history of the Jews, he failed to notice him. His ministry extended through a period of only one year, at a time when the Jewish people were chafing under the yoke of the Romans, and were preparing for a final struggle with the conquerors. At such a time, the presence of such a person as Christ, who taught men to forgive their enemies, to love their neighbors as themselves, and to cultivate feelings which dispose mankind to peace and charity, would most likely pass unnoticed. If Christ was more than a great teacher—if he were the second person in the Godhead, who condescended to visit the earth to instruct mankind, and while here performed the wonderful works spoken of in the Gospels, then there is no way in which we can account for the silence of the Jewish historian. We are forced to admit that the Son of God, who took up his abode among men to convince and instruct them, failed to make his presence known and felt so as to attract the notice of him who undertook to give a minute account of what happened at the time, and in the country where he preached and taught.
The attempt in the fourth century to force into history, between the regular course of events, a passage intended to break the force of total unconsciousness on the part of Josephus that there was such a person as Christ, to the eye of the critic is infinitely more damaging than complete silence. A quarrel, which led to a sedition, sprang up in Jerusalem, about the use made by Pilate of sacred money, to bring water into the city. "About the same time, also, anothersad calamity happened, which put the Jews into disorder." A Roman woman called Paulina, through the connivance of some of the gods of Isis, was seduced by a person of the name of Mundus. (Antiq., book xviii. chap. 3.) Between these two events, is wedged, or forced in, a paragraph which contains all the great historian has to say of Christ, and the events of his life. Twenty-nine lines are taken to tell about the troubles growing out of the misapplication of the sacred money; one hundred and thirty-one about Paulina and her misfortunes, andsixteenare all that the historian requires to inform us of all he knows about Christ. Much better had he said nothing.
If Josephus makes no mention of Christ and his miracles, where must we look? It is in vain to search among the writers of Greece and Rome. Out of the nine reasons given by Dr. Lardner for believing the passage from Josephus in relation to Christ spurious, the first is sufficient: it was never quoted, or referred to, by any writer previous toEusebius, who wrote in the fourth century.
Epistle of Paul to the Hebrews.
THIS epistle has been the source of more controversy than any other book of the New Testament. It has been the cause of much useless labor and unprofitable research. In the first place, was Paul the author? Tertullian ascribes it to Barnabas; Grotius to St. Luke, and Luther the reformer thought it was written by Apollos, mentioned in the Acts; but the testimony of ecclesiastical antiquity is all in favor of Paul as the author. Allusions are made to it in the epistles of Ignatius about A. D. 107. It is also referred to by Polycarp, Bishop of Smyrna in the year A. D. 108.
Internal evidence, supplied by the epistle itself, is conclusive that Paul was the writer. No one better than he understood the veneration in which the Levitical law was held by the Jewish people, and the tenacity with which they adhered to it. As he believed that this law had passed away, and that the Lord had made a new covenant with the Jewish nation, it was natural for him to labor to open the eyes of his countrymen, and bring them under the light of the new dispensation. It was for this reason, when he entered into a place for the first time, that he always began to teach in the synagogue. If Paul wrote to the Hebrews at all, it would be just such an epistle as the one ascribed to him, except certain portions, which were clearly written after the Pauline period of Christianity had passed away.
Again, it has been a question as to the language in which this epistle was first written. At the time of Paul, the original Hebrew was understood by few, and had ceased to be the language of the Jews. The original Hebrew was broken in upon by several dialects—such as the East Aramæan, or Chaldee, and the West Aramæan, or Syriac. The universal language of the day was Greek, and no doubt Paul adopted it in writing to the Hebrews, who were dispersed over Europe, Asia, and parts of Africa.
As the initiatory formula usual in the epistles of Paul is wanting in this, it has been questioned whether it was really an epistle, or only a discourse intended for the general reader. The want of the usual formula can be easily accounted for, when the mind becomes convinced that the first chapter is not the production of Paul. That it was written as it now stands by the forgers of the second century admits of no doubt. The design of the writer is exposed in the very first and second verses of the first chapter. "God, who at sundry times and in divers manners spake in time past unto the fathers by the prophets, hath in these last days spoken unto us by his Son, whom he hath appointed heir of all things,by whom also he made the worlds."
Here Christ is made the Creator by whom the worlds were made. Again: "Who being the brightness of his glory, and theexpress image of his person, and upholding all things by the word of his power, when he had by himself purged our sins, sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high; being made so muchbetter than the angels, as he hath byinheritanceobtained a more excellent name than they. For unto which of the angels said he at any time, Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten thee? And again, I will be to him a Father, and he shall be to me a Son? And again, when he bringeth in the first-begotten into the world, he saith, And let all the angels of God worship him." (Heb. i. 3-6.)
Here we find condensed into a few verses, and declared in the most pointed language, theGodshipof Christ, first proclaimed by the men of the second century, and which is in direct conflict with the remainder of the Epistle, and with what Paul taught during his whole life.
Commencing at the ninth verse of the second chapter, Paul says: "But we see Jesus, who was made a littlelowerthan the angels for the suffering of death, crowned with glory and honor; that he by the grace of God should taste death for every man." "For verily he took not on him the nature of angels; but he took on him the seed of Abraham." (Chap. ii. 16.) "Wherefore, holy brethren, partakers of the heavenly calling, consider the Apostle andHigh Priestof our profession, Christ Jesus; who was faithful to him who appointed him, as also Moses was faithful in all his house. Forthis manwas accounted worthy of more glory than Moses, inasmuch as he who hath builded the house hath more honor than the house. For every house is builded by some man;but he that built all things is God." (Chap. iii. 1-5.)
On the fifth, sixth, seventh and eighth verses of the second chapter, Paul declares that to angels "is given the government of the world to come;" and to man, who was made butlittle lower than the angels, was consigned the government of the earth. All men, according to Paul, like Jesus, were born but little lower than the angels—and Christ by him is put on a level with all humanity. It is evident that the first chapter, as written by Paul, has been suppressed, and the one which has descended to us is made to take its place. It is not possible that Paul wrote the first and second chapters as they now stand. In the one case Christ is mademorethan the angels; and in the other case he is madeless. In the one case he is the Creator of the world, "upholding all things by the word of his power;" in the other he is a High Priest of the order of Melchisedec, and one of the descendants of Abraham. In the first chapter he formed the world, and in the third chapter it is said, "He who built all things is God." The doctrines here declared are unreconcilable, but it is not difficult to distinguish between those of Paul and those of the men of the second century.
Paul speaks of three orders of the priesthood: that of Melchisedec, that under the Levitical law, and that under the new covenant, with Christ at the head. What was the character of the priesthood of the order of Melchisedec, Paul does not say—nor do we know where to look for information on the subject. He was "without father, without mother, without descent, having neither beginning of days, nor end of life; but made likeunto the Son of God: abideth a priest continually." (Chap. vii. 3.) When we are informed in the same chapter that Christ is a priest after the order of Melchisedec, "who is made, not after thelaw of a carnal commandment, but after the power of an endless life" (ver. 16), we detect the insidious and subtle poison of the Johannian school.
Here we have a Logos, who was in the beginning, and who would continue through all time, which could never be true of any of the descendants of Abraham. The priesthood under the Levitical law, Paul claimed, had passed away, and was succeeded by a much better one with Christ as its head. The last was superior to the old because it would "continue forever, an unchangeable priesthood." (Chap. vii. 24.) In this new and better dispensation, Christ is as superior to Moses and Aaron, as the new covenant is superior to the old. Christ is called a High Priest, "a minister of the sanctuary, and of the true tabernacle, which the Lord pitched, and not man." (Chap. viii. 2.)
If Christ was the Son of God, born of a virgin, when Paul was instructing his countrymen in the mysteries of the new covenant, and was pointing out to them the relation which Christ bore to the same, as compared with Moses under the old, how happened it that he fails to make mention of this important fact altogether? How can we account for the silence of Paul at such a time on a subject of such vital importance? He was a man of learning, and well versed in all that was written by the Hebrew prophets; and if the fourteenth verse of the seventh chapter of Isaiah had any application to Christ, or any other prophecy in the Old Testament, why did he not point them out to his countrymen, and in this way prove that Christ was not only superior to Moses, but to the angels? Why call him a High Priest, and admit his Jewish descent, from the father of the Hebrew nation? Who so well as Paul could define thestatusof Christ under the new covenant? His numerous visits to Jerusalem, not long after Christ's death, his intimacy with all the disciples, gave him every and ample means for information; and the deep interest he took in every particular which related to Christ stimulated inquiry; and whatever he found that was important to be known as a part of the new faith, he would not fail to proclaim in tones of thunder, from the Euphrates to the Tiber.
We can well imagine his astonishment when the doctrines of the Greek school first began to make headway in his little churches. We can form some idea of his feelings by reading the eleventh and twelfth chapters in the second epistle to the Corinthians: "Would to God ye could bear with me a little in my folly: and indeed bear with me. For I am jealous over you with godly jealousy: for I have espoused you to one husband, that I may present you as a chaste virgin to Christ. But I fear, lest by any means, as the serpent beguiled Eve through his subtilty, so your minds should be corrupted from the simplicity that is in Christ. For if he that cometh preachethanother Jesus whom we have not preached, or if ye received another spirit, which ye have not received, or another gospel, which ye have not accepted, ye might well bear with him." (2 Cor. xi. 1-4.) Rendered into plain language, he says: Would to God you would pardon my zeal and anxiety on your account. Having instructed you in the religion of Christ, I am jealous and over-anxious that you should stand as examples of pure Christianity, and not surrender your pure and virgin faith in Christ, carried away by the subtle doctrines of cunning men. If any one speaks of Christ, and claims that he is anything different from what I have taught you—or if any one has preached to you a different religion or a different gospel, from that which you learned of me, you show your forbearance if you do not visit your anger upon them, who thus labor to mislead and deceive you.
Throughout these two chapters Paul shows deep sorrow on account of the progress of the new faith, and with his expressions of regret, he mingles words of reproof. The troubles growing out of it followed him through life. They harassed him in his prison. He lived to see all Asia turned away from him. With an aching heart he makes one last request of Timothy: "And the things that thou hast heard of me among many witnesses, the same commit thou to faithful men, who shall be able to teach others also." (2Tim. ii. 2.)
The controversy between Ptolemæus and Irenæus as to thelength of Christ's ministry.—Christ was in Jerusalem butonce after he began to preach, according to the first threeGospels, but three times according to John.—If thestatements made in the first three are true, everythingstated in the fourth could only happen after the death ofChrist.
It will be remembered that Ptolemæus asserted that the time of Christ's ministry did not exceed the period of one year. This drove Irenæus to claim that it continued for the space of ten years, on the authority of a tradition derived from John. The precise time when, and what, Ptolemæus wrote, we have no means in our day of finding out; for his writings, like all those of the Gnostics, doubtless perished under the destructive edict of the Emperor Constantine. We are at liberty to conclude that he wrote before the fourth Gospel appeared, as he limits the time to one year, which agrees in that respect with the Synoptics. Had he had any knowledge of the fourth Gospel, he might, by adopting the mode of reasoning on this subject used by the orthodox, have made the time three years instead of one. It will be noted that Irenaeus, in his controversy with Ptolemaeus, makes no mention of the fourth Gospel, but falls back on a tradition. In a dispute with a sharp-witted adversary, he found it safer to rely on a tradition, as evasive as the mirage of the desert, than the authority of the fourth book of John. The reason for this preference will be readily seen when the subject is understood. According to Matthew, after the temptation in the wilderness, Christ returned to Nazareth, in Galilee. He left Nazareth and came and dwelt in Capernaum, in the borders of Zabulon and Nephthalim, as spoken by Esaias: "The land of Zabulon and the land of Nephthalim, by the way of the sea, beyond Jordan, Galilee of the Gentiles. The people which sat in darkness saw great light; and to them which sat in the region and shadow of death light is sprung up.From that time Jesus began to preach, and to say, Repent: for the kingdom of heaven is at hand." (Chapter iv. 15, 16, 17.)
Here the place where Christ commenced to preach is clearly defined; and as the spot had been pointed out by Isaiah seven hundred years before, there could be no mistake, unless the inspiration of the great Hebrew prophet was at fault. Mark and Luke substantially agree with Matthew; so, according to all three, Christ began his labors at Capernaum. The precise time in the year we cannot tell, but it must have been shortly after the fourteenth of March (Nisan), when the celebration of the Passover commenced. At the following festival, as we will show, Christ was put to death. In the meantime he had performed the greater part of his work, which would require not much less than a year. That Christ should go to Jerusalem to celebrate the first Passover after he began to preach is not only probable but almost certain. Everything shows that he did. The laws of Moses commanded every Jew to observe this feast; and although no place is specified, all deemed it the highest religious duty to go to Jerusalem for that purpose. On such occasions "an innumerable multitude came hither out of the country—many beyond its limits," according to Josephus. Hence the great destruction of the Jewish people, who had come up to the holy city to celebrate, when it was destroyed by Titus. Christ could hardly fail to be present at the first celebration after he began to preach, especially as he was accustomed to go every year from childhood with his parents, according to Luke. If Christ attended the first festival after he began his work, his ministry continued for less than one year, for he went there but once after he began to preach. The early part of his career was solely passed in Galilee, according to Matthew, Mark and Luke. His labors were confined to his own country, mostly in the neighborhood of the sea of Tiberias. At length, as the time for the celebration of the Passover approached, his thoughts were directed toward the city of David. At Cæsarea Philippi he concludedat lastto go to Jerusalem. "From that time forth began Jesus to shew unto his disciples how that he must go unto Jerusalem, and suffer many things of the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and be raised again the third day." (Matt. xvi. 21.) At length he "departed from Galilee and came into the coasts of Judea beyond Jordan." (Chap. xix. I.) "And when he was come into Jerusalem all the city was moved, saying,Who is this?" (Chap. xxi. 10.) Would that question have been asked if he had been there the year before? That this was Christ's first visit to Jerusalem, according to the first three Gospels, will not admit of a doubt. Here he taught and preached until he was handed over bound into the hands of Pilate. He never after this left the city until his immortal spirit took its flight from Calvary. The itinary of Christ, as we have it in the first three Gospels, renders it impossible that he made any visit to Jerusalem except the one above mentioned. We can trace him, step by step, from the beginning to the end of his career. He began to preach at Capernaum, and from there he traveled all over Galilee. In the meantime he delivered his divine Sermon on the Mount. From the Mount he returned to Capernaum. From here he entered a ship and rebuked the sea. He next crossed over to the country of the Gadarines. From there he recrossed the sea and went into his own city.
Once more he travels over Galilee, preaching, and healing diseases. On the shores of Tiberias he delivered the parable of the sower, and again went back to his own country. While there he heard of the death of John the Baptist; when he crossed over the sea of Tiberias, and on the east shore fed the multitude. After events which are fully declared, he and his disciples crossed the sea and went to the land of Gennesaret. From there he departed unto the coast of Tyre and Sidon. He returned unto the sea of Galilee, and went up into a mountain and again fed the multitude. From here he went unto the coast of Magdala, and from there to Cæsarea Philippi, when he made up his mindat lastto go to Jerusalem. In the meantime it was not possible for him to have made a visit to the Holy City. He had not even been in Judea. According to John, Christ did not manifest his divine power at Capernaum, but at Cana. This was not a great while before the feast of the Passover, for he went from Cana to Capernaum, where he remained "not many days" but went to Jerusalem to celebrate. As John and the writers of the first three Gospels have Christ attend the first festival after he began his ministry, it follows, according to John, that Christ at that time had just begun to teach; while, if we believe the other three writers, he had nearly performed his work, and came to Jerusalem to meet his death. The Gospel of John causes Christ to make three distinct visits to Jerusalem: first, soon after the miracle at Cana, the same mentioned by Matthew, Mark and Luke; the second, when he attended a feast of the Jews, which Dr. Robertson and other learned writers claim was the Passover; and a third, when he went to witness the feast of the Tabernacle.Now, if the first three Gospels are true, then everything stated in the fourth as the works of Christ must have been performed after his death!Every day, from the time he set out from Capernaum to teach, to his first and last entrance into Jerusalem, is accounted for in the first three Gospels. This second visit was not without a special significance.
So strong was the proof in the last half of the second century that John had never been to the western coast of the Mediterranean, that Irenæus and others of that century dare not assert that the fourth Gospel was written by him in Asia Minor. On this point the great criminal is silent. But, in the Gospel itself, there is an evident effort made to have it appear that it was written before the fall of Jerusalem. Even the learned Basnage and Lampe were betrayed into this belief, and so were others. Lardner fixes the date in the year 68, Owen 69, and the learned Michaelis in 70. That such men should have fallen into this belief is truly wonderful, for its fallacy is apparent at first view. This Gospel, as none dispute, was written in reply to the Gnostics, and as none of that sect, as will be shown, was known to be in existence until the second century, it at once disposes of the question. Chrysostom, Epiphanius, Mills, Fabricius and Bishop Tomline, with others, saw the dilemma, and fixed the date of the Gospel at a later period—some at 97, and others at 98.
That part of this Gospel by which Dr. Lardner and others were misled is as follows: "Now there is at Jerusalem, by the sheep-market, a pool which is called in the Hebrew tongue Bethesda, having five porches." From the language here used, they conclude that Jerusalem was standing when the Gospel was written, as the present is used instead of the past tense. Few things troubled the Catholics of the second century more than to find a convenient date for John's Gospel. If it was written before the fall of Jerusalem, where there was a sheep market having five porches still standing, it was too early, by many years, for Corinthus and other leading Gnostics. If its date were fixed at the end of the century when John was in Asia Minor, Catholics were met with proof that John never was there. The story of the angel, and the man who had an infirmity for eight-and-thirty years, was a clumsy invention to make way for the deception as to the early date of the Gospel. If there was in fact such a pool as represented, whose medical properties were dependent upon the visitation of an angel, and which had properties to cure all diseases, it was the only one of the kind, or anything like it, ever known to man; its fame would have spread far and wide, and Jewish historians, who delight to dwell upon anything which belongs to their country, would have emphasized a phenomenon like the pool of Bethesda, as proof of divine favor shown to their nation. It excites the anger of commentators, and Doddridge among the rest, that Josephus has failed to notice it; and among the extraordinary motives assigned for his silence is a fear that he "would disgust his pagan readers"! The same commentator says: "It is probable that the miracle was not wrought for any length of time, and perhaps ceased on this occasion. This may account for the surprising silence of Josephus in a story which made so much for the honor of his nation. He himself was not born when it happened, and, though he might have heard the report of it, he would,perhaps (in the modern way), oppose speculation and hypothesis to fact." Jenks, another commentator, says: "It is true the Jewish historians, who are not sparing in praise of Jerusalem, do none of them mention this pool, for which, perhaps, this is the reason: that it was taken as a presage of the approach of the Messiah, and,therefore, they who denied him to be come industriously concealed such an indication of his coming." No one has ever pretended to have found this pool, although pious travelers have found every other spot consecrated by the life and death of Christ. Helena, the mother of Constantine, as early as A. D. 326, made a pilgrimage to the Holy City to discover the places made sacred by scenes in the life of the Saviour; and when human energy and skill failed, she called to her assistance the aid of the miraculous. But the powers that enabled her to find the true cross, after a waste in the earth of over three hundred years, and detect the place of the Lord's sepulcher, and other sacred spots which Infidel hatred vainly attempted to obliterate, failed to discover the place where the angel of mercy found ground to rest her feet when she descended from heaven, loaded with blessings for the blind, halt and withered.
It is admitted by all writers, and especially Michaelis (vol. iii. part I, p. 280), that the Gospel of John was written in answer to the Gnostics, and especially Corinthus, who lived in the last years of the first century. It was possible to spin out the life of John to the end of the century, and thus bring him near the time when Corinthus flourished; but it is fatal to the claim, set up by Irenaeus and others, that John was the author of the fourth Gospel, that the quarrels which grew out of the writings of Corinthus failed to attract notice until some time about the middle of the second century. You may look in vain among all the writings of the Fathers and others of the first century to find the name of Corinthus or any of his writings, although we can trace Gnosticism, in its primitive stages, as early as the first years in the second. Still, it assumed but little importance in its contests with Christianity until some time after the year A. D. 117. Buck says that "Many persons were infected with the Gnostic heresy in the first century; though the sect did not render itself conspicuous, either for numbers or reputation, before the reign of Adrian, when some writers erroneously date its rise? There was no call or demand for the fourth Gospel until Christians and Gnostics commenced their quarrels, which was long after John's death, even admitting that he lived to be a hundred years old. There was no help in the emergency which then arose, but to antedate the fourth Gospel, to confound the time when Cerinthus wrote with the time when the spread of his doctrines created discussion among Christians."
The phase assumed by Christianity in the fourth Gospeldemanded a new class of miracles from those given in thefirst three.—A labored effort in this Gospel to sink thehumanity of Christ.—His address to Mary.—The temptation inthe wilderness ignored, and the last supper between him andhis disciples suppressed.—Interview between Christ and thewomen and men of Samaria.—A labored effort to connectChrist with Moses exposed.
When the incarnation became a leading feature of Christianity, its whole spirit underwent a change from what it was in the first three Gospels. The miracles which they describe are too tame for the new phase which Christ is made to assume. None of the five, except one, in the Gospel of John, are mentioned in the first three, for the apparent reason that those in the Synoptics all fall short of upholding the claims set up for Christ in the fourth. The subsidence of the sea at Tiberias, at his command, was some proof that he held control of the wind and waves, but a lucky coincidence might account for part, and ocular deception for the rest. But, in that case, the constituents of the water were not changed. Not so with the water at the feast at Cana. The restoration of the widow's son at Nain, and of the daughter of Jairus, might admit of doubt, for the first had not shown signs of decided death, and the latter may have been a case ofcoma—"For the maid is not dead, but sleepeth." (Matt. ix. 24.) But in the case of Lazarus there could be no mistake. For four days the seal of death sat upon his brow, and flesh and blood were fast returning to their native dust. Christ, in the first three Gospels, heals diseases and cures the blind; but how much was to be referred to his power as a god, and how much to the skill of aThera-peutæ, might invite discussion. But in the cases of the man who had an infirmity for eight-and-thirty years, and the one born blind, there could be no ground for dispute. The miracles selected proved all that was claimed for Christ in the first part of the Gospel. He was master of the elements, death heard and obeyed his voice, and he held the avenues which led from fife to the grave. The miracle of the loaves and fishes is the only one in the first three Gospels repeated by John, because it proved his power over nature; for if he did not change the elements, as he did at Cana, he multiplied them. We see in this Gospel a studied effort to avoid anything like a human parentage for Christ, as stated in the first three Gospels. The trip to Bethlehem, the birth in the manger, the journey of the wise men from the East, are all omitted. The name of Mary in this Gospel is studiously kept in the background. She is barely mentioned twice, once at the feast of Cana: "And when they wanted wine, the mother of Jesus saith unto him, They have no wine; Jesus saith unto her,Woman, what have I to do with thee?" The true answer intended by the question was—nothing. Christ could not be entirely oblivious of earthly ties. He had lived under the same roof with Mary. He had received from her many acts of kindness; and if nature was allowed her empire over the heart; he must have felt for her the affection of a son. For him she had all the feelings of a mother. She followed and stood by him at the cross. As she stood and wept in his sight, the only words of consolation and endearment he could give her were as cold and heartless as a Lapland wind: "Woman, behold thy son"! The word "woman" was ever on his lips. When he recommends her, at the last scene, to the care of the disciples, he is studied and guarded in his language: "Then saith he to the disciple, Beholdthy mother." The scenes at the cross were too solemn to permit the studied purpose of an artful bigot to muzzle the voice of nature. Truth turns away from the story.
The design of this Gospel to keep out of view the carnal nature of Christ, as it appears in the first three Gospels, is marked with Jesuitical cunning. He who was born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, but of God, must be so constituted as to be above the weaknesses and frailties of those who are born of earth. The temptations in the wilderness, which supply the most remarkable scenes in the life of Christ, and, as given in the first three Gospels, proved the power of the Son of God over the Powers of Darkness, are wholly unnoticed in the Gospel of John. He who was all God, without a link to connect him with humanity, must be so superior to Satan as to be above his arts of seduction. John will not allow Christ to be tempted, because he was above it; but, in sinking his humanity to favor a dogma, he keeps out of sight the most sublime and god-like portion of his character—the power to rise above the allurements of wealth, power, and dominion. It was by such things he proved himself a god. The design of the fourth Gospel is overdone. In making Christ all God, no chord of sympathy is left between him and man. Even in the last supper, dwelt upon with so much tenderness by Matthew, Mark and Luke, we detect, by the silence of John, the spirit of the Jesuit. He makes no mention of it. Who can mistake the reason of this silence? The tender scenes of this last interview between Christ and his disciples are sacrificed to make way for a senseless and heartless dogma. In the last supper, given in the Synoptics, the bread and wine are mere symbols of the death and sufferings of Christ. It was this symbolic character of the sacrament that the writer of John wished to avoid. As the Lord's supper is with John a real sacrifice, each repetition is a fresh atonement, and the bread and wine, by a miraculous conversion, are made flesh and blood. There could be no sacrifice of the body of Christuntil death, and, for that reason, the last supper between him and his disciples before the crucifixion is omitted. This miraculous conversion of the elements has been one of the holy mysteries of the Church for ages past. It has been the bigot's wand. Millions have fallen down before the Host. It led the crusades. The fair fields of Europe and Asia have been whitened by the bones of its victims. In fine, it has been the armory in which fanaticism has forged her most fatal and dangerous weapons. With John, the body of Christ is never dead—the grave cannot hold it; but it exists in a mysterious union with the Church, so that every time the devout believer eats of the bread, or touches the sacred cup to his lips, he partakes of the flesh and drinks the blood of the Son of God. Such is the dogma which took its rise in the last half of the second century, the offspring of a bitter, heated controversy which demands that reason be strangled to make room for faith. It is the fate of this dogma, as it is of all like it, to be associated with others equally false and absurd. It can have no fellowship with truth. Speaking of Christ, John says: "The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by him, and without him was not anything made that was made." (Chap. i. 2, 3.) Christ says of himself: "For I came down from heaven, not to do mine own will, but the will of him that sent me." (Chap. vi. 38.) He was on earth thirty-three years. In what business was this creator of worlds engaged for thirty years of this time? If anything, so far as we can know, it was the business of a carpenter. Did he do his Heavenly Father's business all this time? This is what he says himself he was sent to do. The first proof he gave of the power of a god, while here, was at Cana. It was here that he first manifested forth his glory, and inspired his disciples with faith. The first three Gospels leave Christ to his humanity to the time the angels took charge of him, and subject him, like other mortals, to human employments. In John, a god with power to create worlds is bound up in the fate of mortals for thirty years, and only escapes thralldom when the spell is broken at the marriage feast. Would he, who was with God in the beginning, whose word was sufficient to create worlds, submit to a fate like this?
The interview between Christ and the woman of Samaria affords abundant evidence of the spurious character of the fourth Gospel, and that the writer was some Greek who was ignorant of the religion of Moses and the Jews.
The temple of Jerusalem being destroyed by Nebuchadnezzar, the Samaritans proposed to join the Jews after their captivity in rebuilding it; but the Jews refused the coalition. (Ezraiv. 1-3.) This gave rise to other causes of dispute, until the most inveterate hatred grew up between the two peoples. At length, by permission of Alexander the Great, the Samaritans erected a temple at Mount Gerizim, in opposition to the one at Jerusalem. The same worship was observed in both cities, and both people avoided the idolatry of surrounding nations. All the followers of Moses in Judea shared alike in the calamities which befell the Jewish people; so all shared a common belief that God would at some time, by the hand of a deliverer, restore to them all they had lost. If by the hand of Cyrus the power of the Assyrian empire had been torn down, the Temple rebuilt, and the Jews and Samaritans placed back in their homes in Judea; so, if some like calamity should befall them, the same hand would again restore them to liberty and the land of their inheritance. The Jews and Samaritans, though divided on some things, were alike the chosen people of God, and the promises made to one were made to both. At the time Christ made his appearance in Samaria, the people of that country had settled convictions as to what they might expect from the promises made to them by Jehovah through Moses, their great lawgiver and prophet. These convictions, like the concretion of ages, had solidified, and made up the Jewish and Samaritan character. Whatever might befall them, they had no expectations of a spiritual deliverer of any kind. They recognized no spiritual bondage growing out of the sins of the first parents, like the believers in Christianity, for Moses taught nothing of the kind. A personal sacrifice, like that of Christ, to save men from the condemnation of a broken law, never entered into the mind of either Jew or Samaritan. Neither was cosmopolitan, and with them a deliverer was a deliverer to the Jews and not the Gentiles. After Christ had convinced the woman at the well that he was a prophet, by telling her past life, she is made to say: "I know that Messiah cometh which is called Christ; when he is come he will tell us all things. Jesus saith unto her, I that speak unto thee am he." It is said that the woman believed; if so, did she understand him? With Christ, he was the Son of God, equal with the Father; was with him in the beginning, and by him the universe was made—he was the Creator. We ask again, did the woman believe in such a Messiah, and did she believe that he who spoke to her, and told her how many husbands she had had, was that august Being? If there is room in the breast of any people for a hope or expectation of such a person as Christ claimed to be, not a shade of either could be found in the hearts of the followers of Moses. Let a belief in such a Being have made its way into the Jewish mind, and the whole structure, as it was reared by their great leader, would fall like a baseless tower. Strike out the Semitic idea which was thundered from Sinai, and that very thing which cost the Jews ages of persecution would with it be thrown away.
The woman was convinced by the arts of a fortune-teller, some of the Samaritans by what befell the woman, and others, because of what they saw and heard themselves, believed "that Christ was the Saviour of the world!" Here we reach a climax: did the Samaritans, in so short a time, renounce Moses and the institutions of their fathers? Christ claimed before the Jews that he lived before Abraham. This they could not stand, but took up stones and cast them at him, and, because he preached the end of the Mosaic law, they crucified and put him to death.
There are still some of the descendants of the Samaritans at Naplosa (the ancient Shech-em), at Gaza, Damascus and Cairo, who still retain the faith held by their fathers in the time of Christ—a living protest against the truth of the story of the women and men of Samaria. Let him who wishes to be convinced go among the remnant of this persecuted race, witness their poverty, their sad and careworn faces, the work of centuries of injustice and oppression, and ask them if they believe the story of the woman at the well. They will point you to two thousand years of suffering for their Mosaic faith, enough to "bring tears down Pluto's wan cheeks," and ask you, with a look of scorn, if the ancestors of such a people could ever be apostles.
In talking to the Jews, Christ is made to say: "For had ye believed Moses, ye would have believed me: for he wrote of me. But if ye believe not his writings, how shall ye believe my words?" (Johnv. 46,47.) Christ here undertakes to make the Jews believe that he was the one who had been foreseen and spoken of in ages past, and especially by the great prophet of the Hebrew people. Had any Jew in the time of Moses set up the claim that at some future day there would arise one among his people who would be equal with God, but who would suffer death at their hands, as a ransom for the salvation not only of the Jews but of the Gentiles, he would have ordered that such a prophet be stoned to death. By him and \ the Jews no such Saviour was expected or required. Adam and Eve were the first to break the law, but God pronounced judgment upon them before they left the Garden. The earth was cursed with thorns and thistles, for Adam's sake. By the sweat of his brow he was bound to eat of its fruits in sorrow all his days. Upon Eve were imposed the pains and sufferings of childbirth, and the duty of obedience. All this endured, both were to return to the dust from whence they came. This was all the punishment and all the atonement God demanded. He asked no more. With Moses, death was the end of punishment. Those who committed the first sin made their own atonement, and so have all their descendants, in the eyes of Moses and the Jews. "Had ye believed in Moses, ye would have believed in me." Reverse this, and we have the exact truth: If ye believe in Moses, it is impossible to believe in me. How could they? "Moses wrote of me." What did he write? To connect Christ with prophecy, language of the most indefinite character is selected from all parts of the Hebrew scriptures. "The seed of the woman shall bruise the serpent's head." Christ of the fourth Gospel is not of the seed of the woman. "The Word was made flesh?" and "was not born of blood, nor the will of the flesh, nor the will of man, but of God." "The scepter shall not depart from Judah, nor a lawgiver from between his feet, until Shiloh come." (Gen, xlix. 10). The Jews ceased to be an independent people, and the scepter departed from Judah at the time Pompey invaded the country, seized upon the Temple, deposed Aristobulus, the high priest, and put Hyrcanus in his place. (Josephus,Wars, Book I. chap. vii. sec. 6.) He deprived the Jews of all their conquests, restored the conquered, and placed Syria, togetherwith Judeaand the country as far as Egypt and Euphrates, under the command of Scaurus. (Ibid, sec. 7.)
In view of these events, Josephus bitterly laments the results, and says: "We lost our liberty', and became subject to the Romans, and were deprived of that country which we had gained by our arms from the Syrians, and were compelled to restore it to the Syrians. Moreover, the Romans exacted of us, in a little time, above ten thousand talents." (Josephus,Antiquities, Book XIV. ch. iv. sec. v.) When did the Jews, after the conquest of Pompey, shake off the yoke of the Romans? Between his conquest and the birth of Christ at least sixty-seven years had intervened. In the meantime Caesar crossed the Rubicon, was assassinated in the senate; the empire was distracted by civil wars; Mark Antony and Augustus tried the fortune of battle with Brutus and Cassius, on the field at Philippi, and the first of the Roman emperors had nearly completed a long reign of four-and-forty years. When Christ was born, the scepter had departed from Judea, and the Jews were a nation of slaves.
Space will not allow us to pursue this subject farther. Throughout the Gospel of John we discover the most studied and labored effort to connect Christ with the religion of Moses, so that it may appear that in himself he is only the response to the many prophesies contained in the Hebrew scriptures. This Gospel is full of instances where the Jews, upon Christ's bare word—and sometimes not even that—gave up everything, and followed him, even to the cross. The day following the baptism, as John stood by the side of the disciples, Jesus walked by, when the Baptist exclaimed: "Behold the Lamb of God!" This was sufficient to induce two of the disciples to follow Christ, and one of them was so carried away that he hunted up his brother, who was Peter, and told him theyhad found the Messiah, who was the Christ. On the next day, Christ went to Galilee, and found Philip, whom he directed to follow him; and soon Philip found Nathaniel, and told him, "We have found him of whomMoses, in the law, and the prophets, did write." They had found no such thing. The conversion of Paul formed a new era in religious history. We may well say, that when he left Judaism, he left the twelve disciples behind him, for they could neither climb over or break down the wall of circumcision which separated the Jews from the Gentiles. Paul quarreled with and then left them, but took along with him enough of the Mosaic faith to keep up a connection between the old and new religion, so that we can trace the features of the child in those of the parent. He carried with himMonotheism, but it was qualified in the glare of his vision at Damascus so that, in some sense, Christ was the Son of God. Here was a clear departure from Moses, for which the Jews always despised him. Then followed Paul's tug with the Greeks. In spite of him, they established a dual government in Heaven.The Son was equal with the Father, At this point there should have been an eternal separation between Jewry and Christianity. For nearly two thousand years, the Jews have protested against an alliance, while, on the other side, Christians have striven to maintain it. The two parties, in the meantime, were kept separate by an ocean of blood which flowed between. No bridge could ever span it—no bridge ever can. In conclusion of this branch of the subject, we repeat, that great efforts are made to have it appear in this Gospel that Christ is in harmony with Moses and the prophets, whereas there is scarce a word in it which declares his equality with the Father (and it teaches little else) not met with a denial from Sinai, amid "thunders and lightnings" and "the voice of the trumpet": "Thou shalt have no other gods before me?" Moses is sublime in threats and denunciations against those who depart from the true andonlyGod. The men of the second century knew nothing of the spirit of the Mosaic faith, or they never would have stultified themselves by such a work as the fourth Gospel.