DISCREPANCIES BETWEEN ST. JOHN AND THE SYNOPTICS.
The author of "Supernatural Religion" devotes a large portion of his
second volume to setting forth the discrepancies, real or alleged,
between the Synoptics and the Fourth Gospel.
In many of these remarks he seems to me to betray extraordinary
ignorance of the mere contents of the Fourth Gospel. I shall notice two
or three remarkable misconceptions; but, before doing this, I desire to
call the reader's attention to the only inference respecting the
authorship of this Gospel which can be drawn from these discrepancies.
St. John's Gospel is undoubtedly the last Gospel published; in fact, the
last work of the sacred canon. The more patent, then, the differences
between St. John and the Synoptics, the more difficult it is to believe
that a Gospel, containing subject-matter so different from the works
already accepted as giving a true account of Christ, should have been
accepted by the whole Church at so comparatively recent a date, unless
that Church had every reason for believing that it was the work of the
last surviving Apostle.
Take, for instance, the [apparent] differences between St. John and the
Synoptics respecting the scene of our Lord's ministry, the character of
His discourses, the miracles ascribed to Him, and the day of His
Crucifixion, or rather of His partaking of the Paschal feast. The most
ignorant and unobservant would notice these differences; and the more
labour required to reconcile the statements or representations of the
last Gospel with the three preceding ones, the more certain it is that
none would have ventured to put forth a document containing such
differences except an Apostle who, being the last surviving one, might
be said to inherit the prestige and authority of the whole college.
It would far exceed the limits which I have prescribed to myself to
examine the Fourth Gospel with the view of reconciling the discrepancies
between it and the Synoptics, and also of bringing out the numberless
undesigned coincidences between the earlier and the later account, of
which the writer of "Supernatural Religion," led away by his usual
dogmatic prejudices, has taken not the smallest notice.
The reader will find this very ably treated in Mr. Sanday's "Authorship
of the Fourth Gospel" (Macmillan).
My object at present is of a far humbler nature, simply to show the
utter untrustworthiness of some of the most confidently asserted
statements of the writer of "Supernatural Religion."
I shall take two:
1. The difference between Christ's mode of teaching and the structure
of His discourses, as represented by St. John and the Synoptics
respectively.
2. The intellectual impossibility that St. John should have written the
Fourth Gospel.
1. Respecting the difference of Christ's mode of teaching as recorded in
St. John and in the Synoptics, he remarks:--
"It is impossible that Jesus can have had two such diametrically
opposed systems of teaching; one purely moral, the other wholly
dogmatic; one expressed in wonderfully terse, clear, brief sayings
and parables, the other in long, involved, and diffuse discourses;
one clothed in the great language of humanity, the other concealed
in obscure, philosophic terminology; and that these should have been
kept so distinct as they are in the Synoptics, on the one hand, and
the Fourth Gospel on the other. The tradition of Justin Martyr
applies solely to the system of the Synoptics, 'Brief and concise
were the sentences uttered by Him: for He was no Sophist, but His
word was the power of God.'" [106:1] (Vol. ii. p. 468)
To take the first of those assertions. So far from its being
"impossible" that Jesus "can have had two such diametrically opposite
modes of teaching," it is not only possible, but we have undeniable
proof of the fact in that remarkable saying of Christ recorded by both
St. Matthew and St. Luke: "All things are delivered unto Me of My
Father, and no man knoweth the Son, but the Father; neither knoweth any
man the Father, save the Son, and he to whomsoever the Son will reveal
Him." (Matth. xi. 27). The author of "Supernatural Religion" has studied
the letter of this passage very carefully, for he devotes no less than
ten pages to a minute examination of the supposed quotations of it in
Justin and other Fathers (vol. i. pp. 402-412); but he does not draw
attention to the fact that it is conceived in the spirit and expressed
in the terms of the Fourth Gospel, and totally unlike the general style
of the discourses in the Synoptics. [107:1] The Fourth Gospel shows us
that such words as these, almost unique in the Synoptics, are not the
only words uttered in a style so different from the usual teaching of
our Lord--that at times, when He was on the theme of His relations to
His Father, He adopted other diction more suited to the nature of the
deeper truths He was enunciating.
Then take the second assertion:--
"One [system] expressed in wonderfully terse, clear, brief sayings
and parables, the other in long, involved, and diffuse discourses."
Again:--
"The description which Justin gives of the manner of teaching of
Jesus excludes the idea that he knew the Fourth Gospel. 'Brief and
concise were the sentences uttered by Him, for He was no Sophist,
but His word was the power of God.' (Apol. I. 14) No one could for a
moment assert that this description applies to the long and
artificial discourses of the Fourth Gospel, whilst, on the other
hand, it eminently describes the style of teaching with which we are
acquainted in the Synoptics, with which the Gospel according to the
Hebrews, in all its forms, was so closely allied." (Vol. ii. p. 315)
Now I assert, and the reader can with very little trouble verify the
truth of the assertion, that the mode of our Lord's teaching, as set
forth in St. John, is more terse, axiomatic, and sententious--more in
accordance with these words of Justin, "brief and concise were the
sentences uttered by Him," than it appears in the Synoptics.
To advert for a moment to the mere length of the discourses. The Sermon
on the Mount is considerably longer than the longest discourse in St.
John's Gospel (viz., that occupying chapters xiv., xv., xvi.). This is
the only unbroken discourse of any length in this Gospel. The others,
viz., those with Nicodemus, with the woman at Sychem, with the Jews in
the Temple, and the one in the Synagogue at Capernaum, are much shorter
than many in the Synoptics, and none of them are continuous discourses,
but rather conversations. And, with respect to the composition, those in
St. John are mainly made up of short, terse, axiomatic deliverances just
such as Justin describes.
Take, for instance, the sentences in the sixth chapter:--
"I am the bread of life."
"He that believeth on me hath everlasting life."
"I am that bread of life."
"This is the bread that cometh down from heaven, that a man should
eat thereof and not die."
"My flesh is meat indeed, and my blood is drink indeed."
"It is the spirit that quickeneth, the flesh profiteth nothing."
And those in the tenth:--
"I am the door of the sheep."
"I am the good shepherd: the good shepherd giveth his life for the
sheep."
"I am the good shepherd, and know my sheep, and am known of mine."
Then, if we compare parables, the passage in the Fourth Gospel most
resembling a parable, viz., the similitude of the Vine and the branches,
is made up of detached sentences more "terse" and "concise" than those
of most parables in the Synoptics.
The discourses in St. John are upon subjects very distasteful to the
author of "Supernatural Religion," and he loses no opportunity of
expressing his dislike to them; but it is a gross misrepresentation to
say that the instruction, whatever it be, is conveyed in other than
sentences as simple, terse, and concise as those of the Synoptics,
though the subject-matter is different.
We will now proceed to the last assertion:--
"One [system of teaching] clothed in the great language of humanity,
the other concealed in obscure philosophic terminology."
What can this writer mean by the "philosophic terminology" of our Lord's
sayings as reported in the Fourth Gospel? If the use of the term "Logos"
be "philosophic terminology," it is confined to four sentences; and
these not the words of Jesus Himself, but of the Evangelist. I do not
remember throughout the rest of the Gospel a single sentence which can
be properly called "philosophical."
The author must confound "philosophical" with "mysterious." Each and
every discourse in the fourth Gospel is upon, or leads to, some deep
mystery; but that mystery is in no case set forth in philosophical, but
in what the author of "Supernatural Religion" calls the "great language
of humanity." Take the most mysterious by far of all the enunciations in
St. John's Gospel, "Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of Man, and drink
His Blood, ye have no life in you." What are the words of which this
sentence is composed? "Eat," "flesh," "blood," "Son of man," "life." Are
not these the commonest words of daily life? but, then, their use and
association here is the very thing which constitutes the mystery.
Again, take the salient words of each discourse--"Except a man be born
again"--"be born of water and of the Spirit." "Whosoever drinketh of the
water that I shall give him shall never thirst." "As the Father hath
life in Himself, so hath He given to the Son to have life in Himself."
"All that are in the graves shall hear His voice and shall come forth."
"The bread that I will give is My flesh." "If ye believe not that I am
He, ye shall die in your sins." "As the Father knoweth Me, even so know
I the Father." "I am the Resurrection and the Life." "Whatsoever ye
shall ask in My name, that will I do." "If I go not away, the Comforter
will not come unto you but: if I depart, I will send Him unto you."
It is the deepest of all mysteries that one in flesh and blood can say
such things of Himself; but it is a perversion of language to speak of
these sayings as "philosophical terminology." They are in a different
sphere from all more _human_ philosophy, and, indeed, are opposed to
every form of it. Philosophy herself requires a new birth before she can
so much as see them.
I must recur, however, to the author's first remark, in which he
characterizes the discourses of the Synoptics as "purely moral," and
those of St. John as "wholly dogmatic." This is by no means true. The
discourses in the Synoptics are on moral subjects, but they continually
make dogmatic assertions or implications as pronounced as those in the
Fourth Gospel. In the Sermon on the Mount, for instance, the preacher
authoritatively adds to and modifies the teaching of the very Decalogue
itself. "Ye have heard that it was said TO them of old time" (for so
[Greek: errhethê tois archaiois] must properly be translated); "but I
say unto you." Again, Jesus assumes in the same discourse to be the
Object of worship and the Judge of quick and dead, and that His
recognition is salvation itself, when He says, "Not every one that saith
unto Me Lord, Lord, shall enter," &c. "Many shall say to me in that day,
Lord, Lord," &c., "then will I profess unto them, I never knew you,
depart from me all ye that work iniquity."
Take the following expressions out of a number of similar ones in St.
Matthew:--
"I will make you (ignorant fishermen) fishers of men" (implying, I
will give you power over souls such as no philosopher or leader of
men has had before you). (iv. 21.)
"Blessed are ye when men shall persecute you for My sake." (v. 11.)
"If they have called the master of the house (_i.e._ Jesus)
Beelzebub, how much wore shall they call them of His household." (x.
25.)
"He that loveth father or mother more than Me is not worthy of me"
(so that the holiest of human ties are to give way to His personal
demands on the human heart). (x. 37.)
"He that loseth his life for My sake shall find it." (x. 39)
"No man knoweth the Son, but the Father." (xi. 27.)
"In this place is One greater than the temple." (xii. 6.)
"The Son of man is Lord even of the Sabbath Day." (xii. 8.)
"In His (Christ's) Name shall the Gentiles trust." (xii. 21.)
"In the time of harvest I will say to the reapers," _i.e._ the
angels. (xiii. 30.)
"The Son of man shall send forth his angels." (xiii. 41.)
"I will give unto Thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven." (xvi.
19.)
"Where two or three are gathered together in My Name there am I in
the midst of them." (xviii. 21.)
"He, [God], sent His servants--He sent other servants--Last of all
He sent unto them His Son, saying, they will reverence My Son."
(xxi. 37.)
These places assert, by implication, the highest dogma respecting the
Person of Christ. Who is He Who has such power in heaven and earth that
He commands the angels in heaven, and gives the keys of the kingdom of
God to His servant on earth? What Son is this Whom none but the Father
knoweth, and Who alone knoweth the Father, and Who reveals the Father to
whomsoever He will? What Son is this compared with Whom such saints as
Moses, David, Elijah, Isaiah, and Daniel are "servants?" Those dogmatic
assertions of the first Gospel suggest the question; and the Fourth
Gospel gives the full and perfect answer--that He is the Word with God,
that He is God, and the Only-begotten of the Father. The Epistles assume
the answer where one speaks of "Jesus, who, being in the form of God,
thought it not a thing to be tenaciously grasped to be equal with God,"
and another speaks of God's own Son, and another compares Moses the
servant with Christ the Son; but the fullest revelation is reserved to
the last Gospel. And herein the order of God's dealings is observed, Who
gives the lesser revelation to prepare for the fuller and more perfect.
The design of the Gospel is to restore men to the image of God by
revealing to them God Himself. But, before this can be done, they must
be taught what goodness is, their very moral sense must be renewed.
Hence the moral discourses of the Synoptics. Till this foundation is
laid, first in the world, and then in the soul, the Gospel has nothing
to lay hold of and to work upon; so it was laid first in the Sermon on
the Mount, which, far beyond all other teaching, stops every mouth and
brings in all the world guilty before God; and then the way is prepared
for fuller revelations, such as that of the Atonement by the Death of
Christ as set forth in the Epistles of St. Peter and St. Paul, and the
revelation culminates in the knowledge of the Father and the Son in the
Fourth Gospel.
With respect to the assertion of the author of "Supernatural Religion,"
that the discourses in this Gospel are, as compared with those in the
Synoptics, _wholly_ dogmatic, as opposed to moral, the reader may judge
of the truth of this by the following sayings of the Fourth Gospel:--
"Every one that doeth evil hateth the light."
"He that doeth truth cometh to the light."
"God is a Spirit, and they who worship Him must worship Him in
spirit and in truth."
"They that have done good [shall come forth] to the Resurrection of
Life."
"How can ye believe who receive honour one of another, and seek not
the honour that cometh of God only?"
"If any man will do His will, he shall know of the doctrine whether
it be of God."
"The truth shall make you free," coupled with
"Whosoever committeth sin is the servant of sin."
"If I your Lord and Master have washed your feet, ye ought also to
wash one another's feet."
"A new commandment I give unto you, that ye love one another as I
have loved you."
"He that hath My commandments and keepeth them, he it is that loveth
Me."
These sayings, the reader will perceive, embody the deepest and highest
moral teaching conceivable.
One more point remains to be considered--the impossibility that St.
John, taking into account his education and intellect, should have been
the author of the Fourth Gospel. This is stated in the following
passage:--
"The philosophical statements with which the Gospel commences, it
will be admitted, are anything but characteristic of the son of
thunder, the ignorant and unlearned fisherman of Galilee, who, to a
comparatively late period of life, continued preaching in his native
country to his brethren of the circumcision.... In the Alexandrian
philosophy, everything was prepared for the final application of the
doctrine, and nothing is more clear than the fact that the writer of
the Fourth Gospel was well acquainted with the teaching of the
Alexandrian school, from which he derived his philosophy, and its
elaborate and systematic application to Jesus alone indicates a late
development of Christian doctrine, which, we maintain, could not
have been attained by the Judaistic son of Zebedee." (Vol. ii. p.
415)
Again, in the preceding page:--
"Now, although there is no certain information as to the time when,
if ever, the Apostle removed into Asia Minor, it is pretty certain
that he did not leave Palestine before A.D. 60. ... If we consider
the Apocalypse to be his work, we find positive evidence of such
markedly different thought and language actually existing when the
Apostle must have been at least sixty or seventy years of age, that
it is quite impossible to conceive that he could have subsequently
acquired the language and mental characteristics of the Fourth
Gospel."
This, though written principally with reference to the diction, applies
still more to the philosophy of the author of the Fourth Gospel. And,
indeed, from his using the words "mental characteristics," we have no
doubt that he desires such an application.
Now, what are the facts? We must assume that St. John, though "unlearned
and ignorant," compared with the leaders of the Jewish commonwealth, at
the commencement of his thirty years' sojourn in the Jewish capital, was
a man of average intellect. Here, then, we have a member of a sect more
aggressive than any before known in the promulgation of its opinions,
taking the lead in the teaching and defence of these opinions in a city
to which the Jews of all nationalities resorted periodically to keep the
great feasts. If the holding of any position would sharpen a man's
natural intellect and give him a power over words, and a mental grasp of
ideas to which in youth he had been a stranger, that position would be
the leading one he held in the Church of such a city as Jerusalem.
In the course of the thirty years which, according to the author of
"Supernatural Religion," he lived there, he must have constantly had
intercourse with Alexandrian Jews and Christians. It is as probable as
not that during this period he had had converse with Philo himself, for
the distance between Jerusalem and Alexandria was comparatively
trifling. At Pentecost there were present Jews and proselytes from Egypt
and the parts of Libya about Cyrene. There was also a Synagogue of the
Alexandrians. Now I assert that a few hours' conversation with any
Alexandrian Jew, or with any Christian convert from Alexandrian Judaism,
would have, _humanly speaking_, enabled the Apostle, even if he knew not
a word of the doctrine before, to write the four sentences in which are
contained the whole Logos expression of the Fourth Gospel.
St. John must have been familiar with the teaching of traditional
interpretation respecting the Meymera as contained in the Chaldee
paraphrases; indeed, the more "unlearned" and "ignorant" he was, the
more he must have relied upon the Chaldee paraphrases for the knowledge
of the Old Testament, the Hebrew having been for centuries a dead
language. We have a Chaldee paraphrase of great antiquity on so early
and familiar a chapter as the third of Genesis, explaining the voice of
the Lord God by the voice of the Meymera, or Word of the Lord God
(Genesis iii.).
The natural rendering of this word into Greek would be Logos. I repeat,
then, that, humanly speaking, if he had never entertained the idea
before, a very short conversation with an Alexandrian Jew would have
furnished him with all the "philosophy" required to make the four
statements in which he simply identifies the Logos with the Divine
Nature of his Lord.
Of course, I do not for a moment believe that the Apostle was enabled to
write the exordium of his Gospel by any such inspiration. There is not a
more direct utterance of the Holy Spirit in all Scripture than that
which we have in the prelude to the Fourth Gospel.
But in the eyes of a Christian the grace of the Holy Spirit is shown in
the power and explicitness, and above all in the simplicity of the
assertions which identify the human conception, if such it can be
called, of Platonism, or Judaism, with the highest divine truth.
I believe that if the Apostle wrote those sentences at the time handed
down by the Church's tradition, that is, when Cerinthian and other
heresies respecting our Lord's nature were beginning to be felt, the
power of the Holy Spirit was put forth to restrict him to these few
simple utterances, and to restrain his human intellect from overloading
them with philosophical or controversial applications of them, which
would have marred their simplicity and diminished their power. [117:1]