THE PRINCIPAL WITNESS.--THE SOURCES OF HIS KNOWLEDGE RESPECTING THE BIRTH
OF CHRIST.
The question now arises, and I beg the reader to remember that it is the
question on which the author of "Supernatural Religion" stakes
all,--From what source did Justin derive this supernatural view of
Christianity?
With respect to the Incarnation, Birth, Life, Death, and Resurrection of
Christ, he evidently derives it from certain documents which he
repeatedly cites, as "The Memoirs of the Apostles" ([Greek:
Apomnêmoneumata tôn Apostolôn]). These are the documents which he
mentions as being read, along with the Prophets, at the meetings of
Christians.
On one occasion, when he is seemingly referring to the [bloody] sweat of
our Lord, which is mentioned only in St. Luke, who is not an Apostle, he
designates these writings as the "Memoirs which were drawn up by the
Apostles _and those who followed them_." [19:1] Again, on another
occasion, he seems to indicate specially the Gospel of St. Mark as being
the "Memoirs of Peter." It is a well-known fact that all ecclesiastical
tradition, almost with one voice, has handed down that St. Mark wrote
his Gospel under the superintendence, if not at the dictation, of St.
Peter; and when Justin has occasion to mention that our Lord gave the
name of Boanerges to the sons of Zebedee, an incident mentioned only by
St. Mark, he seems at least to indicate the Gospel of St. Mark as being
specially connected with St. Peter as his Memoirs when he writes:
[20:1]--
"And when it is said that he changed the name of one of the Apostles
to Peter; and when it is written in his Memoirs that this so
happened, as well as that He changed the names of two other
brothers, the sons of Zebedee, to Boanerges, which means 'sons of
thunder;' this was an announcement," &c. (Ch. cvi.)
With the exception of these two apparent cases, Justin never
distinguishes one Memoir from another. He never mentions the author or
authors of the Memoirs by name, and for this reason--that the three
undoubted treatises of his which have come down to us are all written
for those outside the pale of the Christian Church. It would have been
worse than useless, in writing for such persons, to distinguish between
Evangelist and Evangelist. So far as "those without" were concerned, the
Evangelists gave the same view of Christ and His work; and to have
quoted first one and then another by name would have been mischievous,
as indicating differences when the testimony of all that could be called
memoirs was, in point of fact, one and the same.
According to the author of "Supernatural Religion" Justin ten times
designates the source of his quotations as the "Memoirs of the
Apostles," and five times as simply the "Memoirs."
Now the issue which the writer of "Supernatural Religion" raises is
this: "Were these Memoirs our present four Gospels, or were they some
older Gospel or Gospels?" to which we may add another: "Did Justin quote
any other lost Gospel besides our four?"
* * * * *
I shall now give some instances of the use which Justin makes of the
writings which he calls "Memoirs," and this will enable the reader in
great measure to judge for himself.
First of all, then, I give one or two extracts from Justin's account of
our Lord's Nativity. Let the reader remember that, with respect to the
first of these, the account is not introduced in order to give Trypho an
account of our Lord's Birth, but to assure him that a certain prophecy,
as it is worded in the Septuagint translation of Isaiah--viz., "He shall
take the powers of Damascus and the spoil of Samaria," was fulfilled in
Christ. And indeed almost every incident which Justin takes notice of he
relates as a fulfilment of some prophecy or other. Trifling or
comparatively trifling incidents in our Lord's Life are noticed at great
length, because they are supposed to be the fulfilment of some prophecy;
and what we should consider more important events are passed over in
silence, because they do not seem to fulfil any prediction.
The first extract from Justin, then, shall be the following:--
"Now this King Herod, at the time when the Magi came to him from
Arabia, and said they knew from a star which appeared in the heavens
that a King had been born in your country, and that they had come to
worship Him, learned from the Elders of your people, that it was
thus written regarding Bethlehem in the Prophet: 'And thou,
Bethlehem, in the land of Judah, art by no means least among the
princes of Judah; for out of thee shall go forth the leader, who
shall feed my people.' Accordingly, the Magi from Arabia came to
Bethlehem, and worshipped the child, and presented him with gifts,
gold, and frankincense, and myrrh; but returned not to Herod, being
warned in a revelation after worshipping the child in Bethlehem. And
Joseph, the spouse of Mary, who wished at first to put away his
betrothed Mary, supposing her to be pregnant by intercourse with a
man, _i.e._ from fornication, was commanded in a vision not to put
away his wife; and the angel who appeared to him told him that what
is in her womb is of the Holy Ghost. Then he was afraid and did not
put her away, but on the occasion of the first census which was
taken in Judea under Cyrenius, he went up from Nazareth, where he
lived, to Bethlehem, to which he belonged, to be enrolled; for his
family was of the tribe of Judah, which then inhabited that region.
Then, along with Mary, he is ordered to proceed into Egypt, and
remain there with the Child, until another revelation warn them to
return to Judea. But when the Child was born in Bethlehem, since
Joseph could not find a lodging in that village, he took up his
quarters in a certain cave near the village; and while they were
there Mary brought forth the Christ and placed Him in a manger, and
here the Magi who came from Arabia, found Him. 'I have repeated to
you,' I continued, 'what Isaiah foretold about the sign which
foreshadowed the cave; but, for the sake of those which have come
with us to-day, I shall again remind you of the passage.' Then I
repeated the passage from Isaiah which I have already written,
adding that, by means of those words, those who presided over the
mysteries of Mithras were stirred up by the devil to say that in a
place, called among them a cave, they were initiated by him. 'So
Herod, when the Magi from Arabia did not return to him, as he had
asked them to do, but had departed by another way to their own
country, according to the commands laid upon them; and when Joseph,
with Mary and the Child, had now gone into Egypt, as it was revealed
to them to do; as he did not know the Child whom the Magi had gone
to worship, ordered simply the whole of the children then in
Bethlehem to be massacred. And Jeremiah prophesied that this would
happen, speaking by the Holy Ghost thus: 'A voice was heard in
Ramah, lamentation and much wailing, Rachel weeping for her
children, and she would not be comforted, because they are not.'"
(Dial. ch. lxxviii.)
Now any unprejudiced reader, on examining this account, would instantly
say that Justin had derived every word of it from the Gospels of St.
Matthew and St. Luke, but that, instead of quoting the exact words of
either Evangelist, he would say that he (Justin) "reproduced" them. He
reproduced the narrative of the Nativity as it is found in each of these
two Gospels. He first reproduces the narrative in St. Matthew in
somewhat more colloquial phrase than the Evangelist used, interspersing
with it remarks of his own; and in order to account for the Birth of
Christ in Bethlehem he brings in from St. Luke the matter of the census,
(not with historical accuracy but) sufficiently to show that he was
acquainted with the beginning of Luke ii.; and in order to account for
the fact that Christ was not born in the inn, but in a more sordid place
(whether stable or cave matters not, for if it was a cave it was a cave
used as a stable, for there was a "manger" in it), he reproduces Luke
ii. 6-7.
Justin then, in a single consecutive narrative, expressed much in his
own words, gives the whole account, so far as it was a fulfilment of
prophecy, made up from two narratives which have come down to us in the
Gospels of St. Matthew and St. Luke, and in these only. It would have
been absurd for him to have done otherwise, as he might have done if he
had anticipated the carpings of nineteenth century critics, and assumed
that Trypho, an unconverted Jew, had a New Testament in his hand with
which he was so familiar that he could be referred to first one
narrative and then the other, in order to test the correctness of
Justin's quotations.
Against all this the author of "Supernatural Religion" brings forward a
number of trifling disagreements as proofs that Justin need not have
quoted one of the Evangelists--probably did not--indeed, may not have
ever seen our synoptics, or heard of their existence. But the reader
will observe that he has given the same history as we find in the two
synoptics which have given an account of the Nativity, and he apparently
knew of no other account of the matter.
We are reminded that there were numerous apocryphal Gospels then in use
in the Church, and that Justin might have derived his matter from these;
but, if so, how is it that he discards all the lying legends with which
those Gospels team, and, with the solitary exception of the mention of
the cave, confines himself to the circumstances of the synoptic
narrative.
The next place respecting the Nativity shall be one from ch. c.:--
"But the Virgin Mary received faith and joy, when the angel Gabriel
announced the good tidings to her that the Spirit of the Lord would
come upon her, and the power of the Highest would overshadow her;
wherefore also the Holy Thing begotten of her is the Son of God: and
she replied, 'Be it unto me according to Thy word.'"
Here both the words of the angel and the answer of the virgin are almost
identical with the words in St. Luke's Gospel; Justin, however, putting
his account into the oblique narrative.
We will put the two side by side that the reader may compare them.
[GREEK TABLE]
Pistin de kai charan labousa |
Maria hê parthenos euangelizomenou |
autê Gabriêl angelou, hoti pneuma | Pneuma hagion epeleusetai epi
kyriou ep' autên epeleusetai, | se, kai dynamis hypsistou
kai dunamis hypsistou episkiasei | episkiasei soi, dio kai to gennômenon
autên, dio kai to gennômenon | hagion klêthêsetai Hyios Theou.
ex autês hagion estin Hyios Theou, | * * * * *
apekrinato, Genoito moi kata to | Genoito moi kaia to rhêma sou.
rhêma sou. |
Now of these words, _as existing in St. Luke_, the author of
"Supernatural Religion" takes no notice. Was he, then, acquainted with
the fact that Justin's words _in this place_ so closely correspond with
St. Luke's? We cannot say. We only know that he calls his readers'
particular attention to a supposed citation of the previous words of the
angel Gabriel, cited in another place:--
"Behold thou shalt conceive of the Holy Ghost, and shalt bear a Son,
and He shall be called the Son of the Highest, and thou shalt call
His name Jesus, for He shall save His people from their sins."
(Apol. I. ch. xxxiii.)
The ordinary unprejudiced reader would say that Justin here reproduces
St. Matthew and St. Luke, weaving into St. Luke's narrative the words of
the angel to St. Joseph; but our author will not allow this for a
moment. He insists that Justin knew nothing, or need have known nothing,
of St. Luke. He shows that the words of the angel, "He shall save his
people," &c., which seem to be introduced from St. Matthew, "are not
accidentally inserted in this place, for we find that they are joined in
the same manner to the address of the angel to Mary in the
Protevangelium of St. James."
But how about those words which succeed them in answer to the question
of the Virgin, "How shall these things be?" I mean those quoted in the
"Dialogue" beginning "The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee," &c. If ever
one author quotes another, Justin in this place quotes St. Luke. They
cannot be taken from the Protevangelium, because the corresponding words
in the Protevangelium are very different from those in St. Luke; and the
only real difference between Justin's quotation and St. Luke is that St.
Luke reads, "shall be called the Son of God;" whereas Justin has "is the
Son of God." Now in this Justin differs from the Protevangelium, which
reads, "Shall be called the Son of the Highest;" so the probability is
still more increased that in the quotation from the "Dialogue" he did
not quote the Protevangelium, and did quote St. Luke. However, we will
make the author a present of these words, because we want to assume for
a moment the truth of his conclusion, which he thus expresses:--
"Justin's divergencies from the Protevangelium prevent our supposing
that, in its present form, it could have been the actual source of
his quotations; but the wide differences which exist between the
extant MSS. of the Protevangelium show that even the most ancient
does not present it in its original form. It is much more probable
that Justin had before him a still older work, to which both the
Protevangelium and the third Gospel were indebted." ("Supernatural
Religion," vol. i. p. 306.)
Assuming, then, the correctness of this, Justin had a still older Gospel
than that of St. Luke; and we shall hereafter show that St. Luke's
Gospel was used in all parts of the world in Justin's day, and long
before it. Now Justin himself lived only 100 years after the
Resurrection; and this is no very great age for the copy of a book,
still less for the book itself, of which any one may convince himself by
a glance around his library. We may depend upon it that Justin would
have used the oldest sources of information. A book so old in Justin's
days may have been published at the outset of Christianity. The author
himself surmises that it may have been the work of one of St. Luke's
[Greek: polloi]. Anyhow it is an older and therefore, according to the
writer's own line of argument all through his book, a more reliable
witness to the things of Christ, and its witness is to the supernatural
in His Birth. Are we, then, able to form any conjecture as to the name
of this most ancient Gospel? Yes. The author of "Supernatural Religion"
identifies it with the lost Gospel to the Hebrews, in the words:--
"Much more probably, however, Justin quotes from the more ancient
source from which the Protevangelium and perhaps St. Luke drew their
narrative. There can be little doubt that the Gospel according to
the Hebrews contained an account of the birth in Bethelehem, and as
it is, at least, certain that Justin quotes other particulars from
it, there is fair reason to believe that he likewise found this fact
[28:1] in that work." (Vol. ii. p. 313.)
If, then, this be the Gospel from which Justin derived his account of
the Nativity, it seems to have contained all the facts for which we have
now to look into St. Matthew and St. Luke. It combined the testimonies
of both Evangelists to the supernatural Birth of Jesus.