offered up sacrifices of thanksgiving, and omitted nothing that was
prescribed by the law. For which reason he also ordered a good number of
Nazarites to be shaved." We here find that it was an act of piety
amongst the Jews to defray for those who were under the Nazaritic vow
the expenses which attended its completion; and that the phrase was,
"that they might be saved." The custom and the expression are both
remarkable, and both in close conformity with the Scripture account.
XXXI. [p. 474.] 2 Cor. xi. 24. "Of the Jews, five times received I forty
stripes save one."
Joseph. Antiq. iv. c. 8, sect. 21. "He that acts contrary hereto let him
receive forty stripes, wanting one, from the officer."
The coincidence here is singular, because the law allowed forty
stripes:--"Forty stripes he may give him and not exceed." Deut. xxv. 3.
It proves that the author of the Epistle to the Corinthians was guided
not by books, but by facts; because his statement agrees with the actual
custom, even when that custom deviated from the written law, and from
what he must have learnt by consulting the Jewish code, as set forth in
the Old Testament.
XXXII. [p. 490.] Luke iii. 12. "Then came also publicans to be
baptized." From this quotation, as well as from the history of Levi or
Matthew (Luke v. 29), and of Zaccheus (Luke xix. 2), it appears that the
publicans or tax-gatherers were, frequently at least, if not always,
Jews: which, as the country was then under a Roman government, and the
taxes were paid to the Romans, was a circumstance not to be expected.
That it was the truth, however, of the case appears from a short passage
of Josephus.
De Bell. lib. ii. c. 14, sect. 45. "But Florus not restraining these
practices by his authority, the chief men of the Jews, among whom was
John the publican, not knowing well what course to take, wait upon
Florus and give him eight talents of silver to stop the building."
XXXIII. [p. 496.] Acts xxii. 25. "And as they bound him with thongs,
Paul said unto the centurion that stood by, Is it lawful for you to
scourge a man that is a Roman and uncondemned?"
"Facinus est vinciri civem Romanum; scelus verberari." Cic. in Verr.
"Caedebatur virgis, in medio foro Messanae, civis Romanus, Judices: cum
interea nullus gemitus, nulla vox alia, istius miseri inter dolorem
crepitumque plagarum audiebatur, nisi haec, Civis Romanus sum."
XXXIV. [p. 513] Acts xxii. 27. "Then the chief captain came, and said
unto him (Paul), Tell me, Art thou a Roman? He said Yea." The
circumstance to be here noticed is, that a Jew was a Roman citizen.
Joseph. Antiq. lib. xiv. c. 10, sect. 13. "Lucius Lentulna, the consul,
declared, I have dismissed from the service the Jewish Roman citizens,
who observe the rites of the Jewish religion at Ephesus."
Ib. ver. 28. "And the chief captain answered, with a great sum obtained
I this freedom."
Dio Cassius, lib. lx. "This privilege, which had been bought formerly at
a great price, became so cheap, that it was commonly said a man might be
made a Roman citizen for a few pieces of broken glass."
XXXV. [p. 521.] Acts xxviii. 16. "And when we came to Rome the centurion
delivered the prisoners to the captain of the guard; but Paul was
suffered to dwell by himself, with a soldier that kept him."
With which join vet. 20. "For the hope of Israel, I am bound with this
chain."
"Quemadmedum cadem catean et custodiam et militem copulat; sic ista,
quae tam dissimilia sunt, pariter incedunt." Seneca, Ep. v.
"Proconsul estimare solet, utrum in carcerera recipienda sit persona, an
militi tradenda." Ulpian. l. i. sect. De Custod. et Exhib. Reor.
In the confinement of Agrippa by the order of Tiberius, Antonia managed
that the centurion who presided over the guards, and the soldier to whom
Agrippa was to be bound, might be men of mild character. (Joseph. Antiq.
lib. xviii. c. 7, sect. 5.) After the accession of Caligula, Agrippa
also, like Paul, was suffered to dwell, yet as a prisoner, in his own
house.
XXXVI. [p. 531.] Acts xxvii. 1. "And when it was determined that we
should sail into Italy, they delivered Paul, and certain other
prisoners, unto one named Julius." Since not only Paul, but certain
other prisoners were sent by the same ship into Italy, the text must be
considered as carrying with it an intimation that the sending of persons
from Judea to be tried at Rome was an ordinary practice. That in truth
it was so, is made out by a variety of examples which the writings of
Josephus furnish: and, amongst others, by the following, which comes
near both to the time and the subject of the instance in the Acts.
"Felix, for some slight offence, bound and sent to Rome several priests
of his acquaintance, and very good and honest men, to answer for
themselves to Caesar." Joseph. in Vit. sect. 3.
XXXVII. [p. 539.] Acts xi. 27. "And in these days came prophets from
Jerusalem unto Antioch; and there stood up one of them, named Agabus,
and signified by the Spirit that there should be a great dearth
throughout all the world (or all the country); which came to pass in the
days of Claudius Caesar."
Joseph. Antiq. 1. xx. c. 4, sect. 2. "In their time (i. e. about the
fifth or sixth year of Claudius) a great dearth happened in Judea."
XXXVIII. [p. 555.] Acts xviii. 1, 2. "Because that Claudius had
commanded all Jews to depart from Rome."
Suet. Gland. c. xxv. "Judeos, impulsero Chresto assidue tumultuantes,
Roma expulit."
XXXIX. [p. 664.] Acts v. 37. "After this man, rose up Judas of Galilee,
in the days of the taxing, and drew away much people after him."
Joseph. de Bell. 1. vii. "He (viz. the person who in another place is
called, by Josephus, Judas the Galilean, or Judas of Galilee) persuaded
not a few to enrol themselves when Cyrenius the censor was sent into
Judea."
XL. [p. 942.] Acts xxi. 38. "Art not thou that Egyptian which, before
these days, madest an uproar, and leddest out into the wilderness four
thousand men that were murderers?"
Joseph. de Bell. 1. ii. c. 13, sect. 5. "But the Egyptian false prophet
brought a yet heavier disaster upon the Jews; for this impostor, coming
into the country, and gaining the reputation of a prophet, gathered
together thirty thousand men, who were deceived by him. Having brought
them round out of the wilderness, up to the mount of Olives, he intended
from thence to make his attack upon Jerusalem; but Felix, coming
suddenly upon him with the Roman soldiers, prevented the attack.--A
great number, or (as it should rather be rendered) the greatest part, of
those that were with him were either slain or taken prisoners."
In these two passages, the designation of this impostor, an "Egyptian,"
without the proper name, "the wilderness ;" his escape, though his
followers were destroyed; the time of the transaction, in the
presidentship of Felix, which could not be any long time before the
words in Luke are supposed to have been spoken; are circumstances of
close correspondency. There is one, and only one, point of disagreement,
and that is, in the number of his followers, which in the Acts are
called four thousand, and by Josephus thirty thousand: but, beside that
the names of numbers, more than any other words, are liable to the
errors of transcribers, we are in the present instance under the less
concern to reconcile the evangelist with Josephus, as Josephus is not,
in this point, consistent with himself. For whereas, in the passage here
quoted, he calls the number thirty thousand, and tells us that the
greatest part, or a great number (according as his words are rendered)
of those that were with him were destroyed; in his Antiquities he
represents four hundred to have been killed upon this occasion, and two
hundred taken prisoners:(Lib. xx. c. 7, sect. 6.) which certainly was
not the "greatest part," nor "a great part," nor "a great number," out
of thirty thousand. It is probable, also, that Lysias and Josephus spoke
of the expedition in its different stages: Lysias, of those who followed
the Egyptian out of Jerusalem; Josephus, of all who were collected about
him afterwards, from different quarters.
XLI. (Lardner's Jewish and Heathen Testimonies, vol. iii p. 21.) Acts
xvii. 22. "Then Paul stood in the midst of Marshill, and said, Ye men of
Athens, I perceive that in all things ye are too superstitious; for, as
I passed by and beheld your devotions, I found an altar with this
inscription, TO THE UNKNOWN GOD. Whom therefore ye ignorantly worship,
him declare I unto you."
Diogenes Laertius, who wrote about the year 210, in his history of
Epimenides, who is supposed to have flourished nearly six hundred years
before Christ, relates of him the following story: that, being invited
to Athens for the purpose, he delivered the city from a pestilence in
this manner;--"Taking several sheep, some black, others white, he had
them up to the Areopagus, and then let them go where they would, and
gave orders to those who followed them, wherever any of them should lie
down, to sacrifice it to the god to whom it belonged; and so the plague
ceased.--Hence," says the historian, "it has come to pass, that to this
present time may be found in the boroughs of the Athenians ANONYMOUS
altars: a memorial of the expiation then made." (In Epimenide, l. i.
segm. 110.) These altars, it may be presumed, were called anonymous
because there was not the name of any particular deity inscribed upon
them.
Pausanias, who wrote before the end of the second century, in his
description of Athens, having mentioned an altar of Jupiter Olympius,
adds, "And nigh unto it is an altar of unknown gods." (Paus. l. v. p.
412.) And in another place, he speaks "of altars of gods called
unknown." (Paus. l. i. p. 4.)
Philostratus, who wrote in the beginning of the third century; records
it as an observation of Apollonius Tyanseus, "That it was wise to speak
well of all the gods, especially at Athens, where altars of unknown
demons were erected." (Philos. Apoll. Tyan. l. vi. c. 3.)
The author of the dialogue Philoparis by many supposed to have been
Lucian, who wrote about the year 170, by others some anonymous Heathen
writer of the fourth century, makes Critias swear by the unknown god of
Athens; and, near time end of the dialogue, has these words, "But let us
find out the unknown god at Athens, and, stretching our hands to heaven,
offer to him our praises and thanksgivings." (Lucian. in Philop. tom.
ii. Graev. pp. 767, 780.)
This is a very curious and a very important coincidence. It appears
beyond controversy, that altars with this inscription were existing at
Athens at the time when Saint Paul is alleged to have been there. It
seems also (which is very worthy of observation) that this inscription
was peculiar to the Athenians. There is no evidence that there were
altars inscribed "to the unknown god" in any other country. Supposing
the history of Saint Paul to have been a fable, how is it possible that
such a writer as the author of the Acts of the Apostles was should hit
upon a circumstance so extraordinary, and introduce it by an allusion so
suitable to Saint Paul's office and character?
The examples here collected will be sufficient, I hope, to satisfy us
that the writers of the Christian history knew something of what they
were writing about. The argument is also strengthened by the following
considerations:
I. That these agreements appear not only in articles of public history,
but sometimes in minute, recondite, and very peculiar circumstances, in
which, of all others, a forger is most likely to have been found
tripping.
II. That the destruction of Jerusalem, which took place forty years
after the commencement of the Christian institution, produced such a
change in the state of the country, and the condition of the Jews, that
a writer who was unacquainted with the circumstances of the nation
before that event would find it difficult to avoid mistakes, in
endeavouring to give detailed accounts of transactions connected with
those circumstances, forasmuch as he could no longer have a living
exemplar to copy from.
III. That there appears, in the writers of the New Testament, a
knowledge of the affairs of those times which we do not find in authors
of later ages. In particular, "many of the Christian writers of the
second and third centuries, and of the following ages, had false notions
concerning the state of Judea between the nativity of Jesus and the
destruction of Jerusalem." (Lardner, part i. vol. ii. p. 960.) Therefore
they could not have composed our histories.
Amidst so many conformities we are not to wonder that we meet with some
difficulties. The principal of these I will put down, together with the
solutions which they have received. But in doing this I must be
contented with a brevity better suited to the limits of my volume than
to the nature of a controversial argument. For the historical proofs of
my assertions, and for the Greek criticisms upon which some of them are
founded, I refer the reader to the second volume of the first part of
Dr. Lardner's large work.
I. The taxing during which Jesus was born was "first made," as we read,
according to our translation, in Saint Luke, "whilst Cyrenius was
governor of Syria." (Chap. ii. ver. 2.) Now it turns out that Cyrenius
was not governor of Syria until twelve, or at the soonest, ten years
after the birth of Christ; and that a taxing census, or assessment, was
made in Judea, in the beginning of his government, The charge,
therefore, brought against the evangelist is, that, intending to refer
to this taxing, he has misplaced the date of it by an error of ten or
twelve years.
The answer to the accusation is founded in his using the word
"first:"--"And this taxing was first made:" for, according to the
mistake imputed to the evangelist, this word could have no signification
whatever; it could have had no place in his narrative; because, let it
relate to what it will, taxing, census, enrolment, or assessment, it
imports that the writer had more than one of those in contemplation. It
acquits him therefore of the charge: it is inconsistent with the
supposition of his knowing only of the taxing in the beginning of
Cyrenius's government. And if the evangelist knew (which this word
proves that he did) of some other taxing beside that, it is too much,
for the sake of convicting him of a mistake, to lay it down as certain
that he intended to refer to that.
The sentence in Saint Luke may be construed thus: "This was the first
assessment (or enrolment) of Cyrenius, governor of Syria;"* the words
"governor of Syria" being used after the name of Cyrenius as his
addition or title. And this title, belonging to him at the time of
writing the account, was naturally enough subjoined to his name, though
acquired after the transaction which the account describes. A modern
writer who was not very exact in the choice of his expressions, in
relating the affairs of the East Indies, might easily say that such a
thing was done by Governor Hastings; though, in truth, the thing had
been done by him before his advancement to the station from which he
received the name of governor. And this, as we contend, is precisely the
inaccuracy which has produced the difficulty in Saint Luke.
_________
* If the word which we render "first" be rendered "before," which it
has been strongly contended that the Greek idiom shows of, the whole
difficulty vanishes: for then the passage would be,--"Now this taxing
was made before Cyreulus was governor of Syria;" which corresponds with
the chronology. But I rather choose to argue, that however the word
"first" be rendered, to give it a meaning at all, it militates with the
objection. In this I think there can be no mistake.
_________
At any rate it appears from the form of the expression that he had two
taxings or enrolments in contemplation. And if Cyrenius had been sent
upon this business into Judea before he became governor of Syria
(against which supposition there is no proof, but rather external
evidence of an enrolment going on about this time under some person or
other +), then the census on all hands acknowledged to have been made by
him in the beginning of his government would form a second, so as to
occasion the other to be called the first.
_________
+ Josephus (Antiq. xvii. c. 2, sect. 6.) has this remarkable message:
"When therefore the whole Jewish nation took an oath to be faithful to
Caesar, and the interests of the king." This transaction corresponds in
the course of the history with the time of Christ's birth. What is
called a census, and which we render taxing, was delivering upon oath an
account of their property. This might be accompanied with an oath of
fidelity, or might be mistaken by Josephus for it.
_________
II. Another chronological objection arises upon a date assigned in the
beginning of the third chapter of Saint Luke. (Lardner, part i. vol. ii.
p. 768.) "Now in the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius
Caesar,--Jesus began to be about thirty years of age:" for, supposing
Jesus to have been born as Saint Matthew and Saint Luke also himself
relate, in the time of Herod, he must, according to the dates given in
Josephus and by the Roman historians, have been at least thirty-one
years of age in the fifteenth year of Tiberius. If he was born, as Saint
Matthew's narrative intimates, one or two years before Herod's death, he
would have been thirty-two or thirty-three years old at that time.
This is the difficulty: the solution turns upon an alteration in the
construction of the Greek. Saint Luke's words in the original are
allowed, by the general opinion of learned men, to signify, not "that
Jesus began to be about thirty years of age," but "that he was about
thirty years of age when he began his ministry." This construction being
admitted, the adverb "about" gives us all the latitude we want, and more
especially when applied, as it is in the present instance, to a decimal
number; for such numbers, even without this qualifying addition, are
often used in a laxer sense than is here contended for.*
_________
* Livy, speaking of the peace which the conduct of Romulus had procured to
the state, during the whole reign of his successor (Numa), has these
words: "Ab illo enim profectis viribus datis tautum valuit, ut, in
quaaraginta deiade annos, tutam proem haberet:" yet afterwards in the
same chapter, "Romulus," he says, "septera et triginta regnavit annos.
Numa tres et quadraginta." (Liv. Hist. c. i. sect. 16.)
_________
III. Acts v. 36. "For before these days rose up Theudas, boasting
himself to be somebody; to whom a number of men, about four hundred,
joined themselves: who were slain; and all, as many as obeyed him, were
scattered and brought to nought."
Josephus has preserved the account of an impostor of the name of
Theudas, who created some disturbances, and was slain; but according to
the date assigned to this man's appearance (in which, however, it is
very possible that Josephus may have been mistaken), (Michaelis's
Introduction to the New Testament [Marsh's translation], vol. i. p. 61.)
it must have been, at the least, seven years after Gamaliel's speech, of
which this text is a part, was delivered. It has been replied to the
objection, (Lardner, part i. vol. ii. p. 92.) that there might be two
impostors of this name: and it has been observed, in order to give a
general probability to the solution, that the same thing appears to have
happened in other instances of the same kind. It is proved from
Josephus, that there were not fewer than four persons of the name of
Simon within forty years, and not fewer than three of the name of Judas
within ten years, who were all leaders of insurrections: and it is
likewise recorded by this historian, that upon the death of Herod the
Great (which agrees very well with the time of the commotion referred to
by Gamaliel, and with his manner of stating that time, "before these
days") there were innumerable disturbances in Judea. (Antiq. 1. 17, c.
12. sect. 4.) Archbishop Usher was of opinion, that one of the three
Judases above mentioned was Gamaliel's Theudas; (Annals, p. 797.) and
that with a less variation of the name than we actually find in the
Gospel, where one of the twelve apostles is called, by Luke, Judas; and
by Mark, Thaddeus. (Luke vi. 16. Mark iii. 18.) Origen, however he came
at his information, appears to have believed that there was an impostor
of the name of Theudas before the nativity of Christ. (Orig. cont Cels.
p. 44.)
IV. Matt. xxiii. 34. "Wherefore, behold I send unto you prophets, and
wise men, and scribes, and some of them ye shall kill and crucify; and
some of them shall ye scourge in your synagogues, and persecute them
from city to city; that upon you may come all the righteous blood shed
upon the earth, from the blood of righteous Abel unto the blood of
Zacharias, son of Barachias, whom ye slew between the temple and the
altar."
There is a Zacharias whose death is related in the second book of
Chronicles,* in a manner which perfectly supports our Saviour's
allusion. But this Zacharias was the son of Jehoiada.
_________
* "And the Spirit of God came upon Zacharias, the son of Jehoiada the
priest, which stood above the people, and mid unto them, Thus saith God,
Why transgress ye the commandments of the Lord that ye cannot prosper?
Because ye hive forsaken the Lord, he hath also forsaken you. And they
conspired against him, and stoned him with stones, at the commandment of
the king, in the court of the house of the Lord." 2 Chron. xxiv. 20, 21.
_________
There is also Zacharias the prophet; who was the son of Barachiah, and
is so described in the superscription of his prophecy, but of whose
death we have no account.
I have little doubt but that the first Zacharias was the person spoken
of by our Saviour; and that the name of the father has been since added
or changed, by some one who took it from the title of the prophecy,
which happened to be better known to him than the history in the
Chronicles.
There is likewise a Zacharias, the son of Baruch, related by Josephus to
have been slain in the temple a few years before the destruction of
Jerusalem. It has been insinuated that the words put into our Saviour's
mouth contain a reference to this transaction, and were composed by some
writer who either confounded the time of the transaction with our
Saviour's age, or inadvertently overlooked the anachronism.
Now, suppose it to have been so; suppose these words to have been
suggested by the transaction related in Josephus, and to have been
falsely ascribed to Christ; and observe what extraordinary coincidences
(accidentally as it must in that case have been) attend the forger's
mistake.
First, that we have a Zacharias in the book of Chronicles, whose death,
and the manner of it, corresponds with the allusion.
Secondly, that although the name of this person's father be erroneously
put down in the Gospel, yet we have a way of accounting for the error by
showing another Zacharias in the Jewish Scriptures much better known
than the former, whose patronymic was actually that which appears in the
text.
Every one who thinks upon the subject will find these to be
circumstances which could not have met together in a mistake which did
not proceed from the circumstances themselves.
I have noticed, I think, all the difficulties of this kind. They are
few: some of them admit of a clear, others of a probable solution. The
reader will compare them with the number, the variety, the closeness,
and the satisfactoriness, of the instances which are to be set against
them; and he will remember the scantiness, in many cases, of our
intelligence, and that difficulties always attend imperfect information.
CHAPTER VII.
UNDESIGNED COINCIDENCES.
Between the letters which bear the name of Saint Paul in our collection
and his history in the Acts of the Apostles there exist many notes of
correspondency. The simple perusal of the writings is sufficient to
prove that neither the history was taken from the letters, nor the
letters from the history. And the undesignedness of the agreements
(which undesignedness is gathered from their latency, their minuteness,
their obliquity, the suitableness of the circumstances in which they
consist to the places in which those circumstances occur, and the
circuitous references by which they are traced out) demonstrates that
they have not been produced by meditation, or by any fraudulent
contrivance. But coincidences, from which these causes are excluded, and
which are too close and numerous to be accounted for by accidental
concurrences of fiction, must necessarily have truth for their
foundation. This argument appeared to my mind of so much value
(especially for its assuming nothing beside the existence of the books),
that I have pursued it through Saint Paul's thirteen epistles, in a work
published by me four years ago, under the title of Horae Paulinae. I am
sensible how feebly any argument which depends upon an induction of
particulars is represented without examples. On which account I wished
to have abridged my own volume, in the manner in which I have treated
Dr. Lardner's in the preceding chapter. But, upon making the attempt, I
did not find it in my power to render the articles intelligible by fewer
words than I have there used. I must be content, therefore, to refer the
reader to the work itself. And I would particularly invite his attention
to the observations which are made in it upon the first three epistles.
I persuade myself that he will find the proofs, both of agreement, and
undesignedness, supplied by these epistles, sufficient to support the
conclusion which is there maintained, in favour both of the genuineness
of the writings and the truth of the narrative.
It remains only, in this place, to point out how the argument bears upon
the general question of the Christian history.
First, Saint Paul in these letters affirms, in unequivocal terms, his
own performance of miracles, and, what ought particularly to be
remembered, "That miracles were the signs of an Apostle." (Rom. xv. 18,
19. 2 Cor. xii. 12.) If this testimony come from Saint Paul's own hand,
it is invaluable. And that it does so, the argument before us fixes in
my mind a firm assurance.
Secondly, it shows that the series of action represented in the epistles
of Saint Paul was real; which alone lays a foundation for the
proposition which forms the subject of the first part of our present
work, viz. that the original witnesses of the Christian history devoted
themselves to lives of toil, suffering, and danger, in consequence of
their belief of the truth of that history, and for the sake of
communicating the knowledge of it to others.
Thirdly, it proves that Luke, or whoever was the author of the Acts of
the Apostles (for the argument does not depend upon the name of the
author, though I know no reason for questioning it), was well acquainted
with Saint Paul's history; and that he probably was, what he professes
himself to be, a companion of Saint Paul's travels; which, if true,
establishes, in a considerable degree, the credit even of his Gospel,
because it shows that the writer, from his time, situation, and
connexions, possessed opportunities of informing himself truly
concerning the transactions which he relates. I have little difficulty
in applying to the Gospel of Saint Luke what is proved concerning the
Acts of the Apostles, considering them as two parts of the same history;
for though there are instances of second parts being forgeries, I know
none where the second part is genuine, and the first not so.
I will only observe, as a sequel of the argument, though not noticed in
my work, the remarkable similitude between the style of Saint John's
Gospel and of Saint John's Epistle. The style of Saint John's is not at
all the style of Saint Paul's Epistles, though both are very singular;
nor is it the style of Saint James's or of Saint Peter's Epistles: but
it bears a resemblance to the style of the Gospel inscribed with Saint
John's name, so far as that resemblance can be expected to appear, which
is not in simple narrative, so much as in reflections, and in the
representation of discourses. Writings so circumstanced prove
themselves, and one another, to be genuine. This correspondency is the
more valuable, as the epistle itself asserts, in Saint John's manner,
indeed, but in terms sufficiently explicit, the writer's personal
knowledge of Christ's history: "That which was from the beginning, which
we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked
upon, and our hands have handled, of the word of life; that which we
have seen and heard, declare we unto you." (Ch. i. ver. 1--3.)Who would
not desire, who perceives not the value of an account delivered by a
writer so well informed as this?
CHAPTER VIII.
OF THE HISTORY OF THE RESURRECTION.
The history of the resurrection of Christ is a part of the evidence of
Christianity: but I do not know whether the proper strength of this
passage of the Christian history, or wherein its peculiar value, as a
head of evidence, consists, be generally understood. It is not that, as
a miracle, the resurrection ought to be accounted a more decisive
proof of supernatural agency than other miracles are; it is not that, as
it stands in the Gospels, it is better attested than some others; it is
not, for either of these reasons, that more weight belongs to it than to
other miracles, but for the following, viz., That it is completely
certain that the apostles of Christ, and the first teachers of
Christianity, asserted the fact. And this would have been certain, if
the four Gospels had been lost, or never written. Every piece of
Scripture recognizes the resurrection. Every epistle of every apostle,
every author contemporary with the apostles, of the age immediately
succeeding the apostles, every writing from that age to the present
genuine or spurious, on the side of Christianity or against it, concur
in representing the resurrection of Christ as an article of his history,
received without doubt or disagreement by all who called themselves
Christians, as alleged from the beginning by the propagators of the
institution, and alleged as the centre of their testimony. Nothing, I
apprehend, which a man does not himself see or hear can be more certain
to him than this point. I do not mean that nothing can be more certain
than that Christ rose from the dead; but that nothing can be more
certain than that his apostles, and the first teachers of Christianity,
gave out that he did so. In the other parts of the Gospel narrative, a
question may be made, whether the things related of Christ be the very
things which the apostles and first teachers of the religion delivered
concerning him? And this question depends a good deal upon the evidence
we possess of the genuineness, or rather perhaps of the antiquity,
credit, and reception of the books. On the subject of the resurrection,
no such discussion is necessary, because no such doubt can be
entertained. The only points which can enter into our consideration are,
whether the apostles knowingly published a falsehood, or whether they
were themselves deceived; whether either of these suppositions be
possible. The first, I think, is pretty generally given up. The nature
of the undertaking, and of the men; the extreme unlikelihood that such
men should engage in such a measure as a scheme; their personal toils,
and dangers and sufferings in the cause; their appropriation of their
whole time to the object; the warm and seemingly unaffected zeal and
earnestness with which they profess their sincerity exempt
their memory from the suspicion of imposture. The solution more
deserving of notice is that which would resolve the conduct of the
apostles into enthusiasm; which would class the evidence of Christ's
resurrection with the numerous stories that are extant of the
apparitions of dead men. There are circumstances in the narrative, as it
is preserved in our histories, which destroy this comparison entirely.
It was not one person but many, who saw him; they saw him not only
separately but together, not only by night but by day, not at a distance
but near, not once but several times; they not only saw him, but touched
him, conversed with him, ate with him, examined his person to satisfy
their doubts. These particulars are decisive: but they stand, I do
admit, upon the credit of our records. I would answer, therefore, the
insinuation of enthusiasm, by a circumstance which arises out of the
nature of the thing; and the reality of which must be confessed by all
who allow, what I believe is not denied, that the resurrection of
Christ, whether true or false, was asserted by his disciples from the
beginning; and that circumstance is, the non-production of the dead
body. It is related in the history, what indeed the story of the
resurrection necessarily implies, that the corpse was missing out of the
sepulchre: it is related also in the history, that the Jews reported
that the followers of Christ had stolen it away.* And this account,
though loaded with great improbabilities, such as the situation of the
disciples, their fears for their own safety at the time, the
unlikelihood of their expecting to succeed, the difficulty of actual
success,+ and the inevitable consequence of detection and failure, was,
nevertheless, the most credible account that could be given of the
matter. But it proceeds entirely upon the supposition of fraud, as all
the old objections did. What account can be given of the body, upon the
supposition of enthusiasm? It is impossible our Lord's followers could
believe that he was risen from the dead, if his corpse was lying before
them. No enthusiasm ever reached to such a pitch of extravagancy as
that: a spirit may be an illusion; a body is a real thing, an object of
sense, in which there can be no mistake. All accounts of spectres leave
the body in the grave. And although the body of Christ might be removed
by fraud, and for the purposes of fraud, yet without any such intention,
and by sincere but deluded men (which is the representation of the
apostolic character we are now examining), no such attempt could be
made. The presence and the absence of the dead body are alike
inconsistent with the hypothesis of enthusiasm: for if present, it must
have cured their enthusiasm at once; if absent, fraud, not enthusiasm,
must have carried it away.
_________
* "And this saying," Saint Matthew writes, "is commonly reported amongst
the Jews until this day" (chap. xxviii. 15). The evangelist may be
thought good authority as to this point, even by those who do not admit
his evidence in every other point: and this point is sufficient to prove
that the body was missing. It has been rightly, I think, observed by Dr.
Townshend (Dis. upon the Res. p. 126), that the story of the guards
carried collusion upon the face of it:--"His disciples came by night,
and stole him away while we slept." Men in their circumstances would not
have made such an acknowledgment of their negligence without previous
assurances of protection and impunity.
+ "Especially at the full moon, the city full of people, many probably
passing the whole night, as Jesus and his disciples had done, in the
open air, the sepulchre so near the city as to be now enclosed within
the walls." Priestley on the Resurr. p. 24.
_________
But further, if we admit, upon the concurrent testimony of all the
histories, so much of the account as states that the religion of Jesus
was set up at Jerusalem, and set up with asserting, in the very place in
which he had been buried, and a few days after he had been buried, his
resurrection out of the grave, it is evident that, if his body could
have been found, the Jews would have produced it, as the shortest and
completest answer possible to the whole story. The attempt of the
apostles could not have survived this refutation a moment. If we also
admit, upon the authority of Saint Matthew, that the Jews were
advertised of the expectation of Christ's followers, and that they had
taken due precaution in consequence of this notice, and that the body
was in marked and public custody, the observation receives more force
still. For notwithstanding their precaution and although thus prepared
and forewarned; when the story of the resurrection of Christ came forth,
as it immediately did; when it was publicly asserted by his disciples,
and made the ground and basis of their preaching in his name, and
collecting followers to his religion, the Jews had not the body to
produce; but were obliged to meet the testimony of the apostles by an
answer not containing indeed any impossibility in itself, but absolutely
inconsistent with the supposition of their integrity; that is, in other
words, inconsistent with the supposition which would resolve their
conduct into enthusiasm.
CHAPTER IX.
THE PROPAGATION OF CHRISTIANITY.
In this argument, the first consideration is the fact--in what degree,
within what time, and to what extent, Christianity actually was
propagated.
The accounts of the matter which can be collected from our books are as
follow: A few days after Christ's disappearance out of the world, we
find an assembly of disciples at Jerusalem, to the number of "about one
hundred and twenty;" (Acts i. 15.) which hundred and twenty were
probably a little association of believers, met together not merely as
believers in Christ, but as personally connected with the apostles, and
with one another. Whatever was the number of believers then in
Jerusalem, we have no reason to be surprised that so small a company
should assemble: for there is no proof that the followers of Christ were
yet formed into a society; that the society was reduced into any order;
that it was at this time even understood that a new religion (in the
sense which that term conveys to us) was to be set up in the world, or
how the professors of that religion were to be distinguished from the
rest of mankind. The death of Christ had left, we may suppose, the
generality of his disciples in great doubt, both as to what they were to
do, and concerning what was to follow.
This meeting was holden, as we have already said, a few days after
Christ's ascension: for ten days after that event was the day of
Pentecost, when, as our history relates, (Acts ii. 1.) upon a signal
display of divine agency attending the persons of the apostles, there
were added to the society "about three thousand souls." (Acts ii. 41.)
But here, it is not, I think, to be taken, that these three thousand
were all converted by this single miracle; but rather that many who
before were believers in Christ became now professors of Christianity;
that is to say, when they found that a religion was to be established, a
society formed and set up in the name of Christ, governed by his laws,
avowing their belief in his mission, united amongst themselves, and
separated from the rest of the world by visible distinctions; in
pursuance of their former conviction, and by virtue of what they had
heard and seen, and known of Christ's history, they publicly became
members of it.
We read in the fourth chapter (verse 4) of the Acts, that soon after
this, "the number of the men," i. e. the society openly professing their
belief in Christ, "was about five thousand." So that here is an increase
of two thousand within a very short time. And it is probable that there
were many, both now and afterwards, who, although they believed in
Christ, did not think it necessary to join themselves to this society;
or who waited to see what was likely to become of it. Gamaliel, whose
advice to the Jewish council is recorded Acts v. 34, appears to have
been of this description; perhaps Nicodemus, and perhaps also Joseph of
Arimathea. This class of men, their character and their rank, are
likewise pointed out by Saint John, in the twelfth chapter of his
Gospel: "Nevertheless, among the chief rulers also many believed on him,
but because of the Pharisees they did not confess him, lest they should
be put out of the synagogue, for they loved the praise of men more than
the praise of God." Persons such as these might admit the miracles of
Christ, without being immediately convinced that they were under
obligation to make a public profession of Christianity at the risk of
all that was dear to them in life, and even of life itself.*
_________
* "Beside those who professed, and those who rejected and opposed,
Christianity, there were in all probability multitudes between both,
neither perfect Christians nor yet unbelievers. They had a favourable
opinion of the Gospel, but worldly considerations made them unwilling to
own it. There were many circumstances which inclined them to think that
Christianity was a divine revelation, but there were many inconveniences
which attended the open profession of it; and they could not find in
themselves courage enough to bear them to disoblige their friends and
family, to ruin their fortunes, to lose their reputation, their liberty,
and their life, for the sake of the new religion. Therefore they were
willing to hope, that if they endeavoured to observe the great
principles of morality which Christ had represented as the principal
part, the sum and substance of religion; if they thought honourably of
the Gospel; if they offered no injury to the Christians; if they did
them all the services that they could safely perform, they were willing
to hope that God would accept this, and that He would excuse and forgive
the rest." Jortin's Dis. on the Christ. Rel. p. 91, ed. 4.
_________
Christianity, however, proceeded to increase in Jerusalem by a progress
equally rapid with its first success; for in the next chapter of our
history, we read that "believers were the more added to the Lord,
multitudes both of men and women." And this enlargement of the new
society appears in the first verse of the succeeding chapter, wherein we
are told, that "when the number of the disciples was multiplied, there
arose a murmuring of the Grecians against the Hebrews because their
widows were neglected;" (Acts v. 14; vi. 1) and afterwards, in the same
chapter, it is declared expressly, that "the number of the disciples
multiplied in Jerusalem greatly, and that a great company of the priests
were obedient to the faith."
This I call the first period in the propagation of Christianity. It
commences with the ascension of Christ, and extends, as may be collected
from incidental notes of time, (Vide Pearson's Antiq. 1. xviii. c. 7.
Benson's History of Christ, b. i. p. 148.) to something more than one
year after that event. During which term, the preaching of Christianity,
so far as our documents inform us, was confined to the single city of
Jerusalem. And how did it succeed there? The first assembly which we
meet with of Christ's disciples, and that a few days after his removal
from the world, consisted of "one hundred and twenty." About a week
after this, "three thousand were added in one day;" and the number of
Christians publicly baptized, and publicly associating together, was
very soon increased to "five thousand." "Multitudes both of men and
women continued to be added;" "disciples multiplied greatly," and "many
of the Jewish priesthood as well as others, became obedient to the
faith;" and this within a space of less than two years from the
commencement of the institution.
By reason of a persecution raised against the church at Jerusalem, the
converts were driven from that city, and dispersed throughout the
regions of Judea and Samaria. (Acts viii. l.) Wherever they came, they
brought their religion with them: for our historian informs us, (Acts
viii. 4.) that "they that were scattered abroad went everywhere
preaching the word." The effect of this preaching comes afterwards to be
noticed, where the historian is led, in the course of his narrative, to
observe that then (i. e. about three years posterior to this, [Benson,
b. i. p. 207.]) the churches had rest throughout all Judea and Galilee
and Samaria, and were edified, and walking in the fear of the Lord, and
in the comfort of the Holy Ghost, were multiplied. This was the work of
the second period, which comprises about four years.
Hitherto the preaching of the Gospel had been confined to Jews, to
Jewish proselytes, and to Samaritans. And I cannot forbear from setting
down in this place an observation of Mr. Bryant, which appears to me to
be perfectly well founded;--"The Jews still remain: but how seldom is it
that we can make a single proselyte! There is reason to think, that
there were more converted by the apostles in one day than have since
been won over in the last thousand years." (Bryant on the Truth of the
Christian Religion, p. 112.) It was not yet known to the apostles that
they were at liberty to propose the religion to mankind at large. That
"mystery," as Saint Paul calls it, (Eph. iii. 3--6.) and as it then was,
was revealed to Peter by an especial miracle. It appears to have been
(Benson, book ii. p. 236.) about seven years after Christ's ascension
that the Gospel was preached to the Gentiles of Cesarea. A year after
this a great multitude of Gentiles were converted at Antioch in Syria.
The expressions employed by the historian are these:--"A great number
believed, and turned to the Lord;" "much people was added unto the
Lord;" "the apostles Barnabas and Paul taught much people." (Acts xi.
21, 24, 26.) Upon Herod's death, which happened in the next
year, (Benson, book ii, p. 289.) it is observed, that "the word of God
grew and multiplied." (Acts xii. 24.) Three years from this time, upon
the preaching of Paul at Iconium, the metropolis of Lycaonia, "a great
multitude both of Jews and Greeks believed:" (Acts xiv. 1.) and
afterwards, in the course of this very progress, he is represented as
"making many disciples" at Derbe, a principal city in the same district.
Three years (Benson's History of Christ, book iii. p. 50.) after this,
which brings us to sixteen after the ascension, the apostles wrote a
public letter from Jerusalem to the Gentile converts in Antioch, Syria,
and Cilicia, with which letter Paul travelled through these countries,
and found the churches "established in the faith, and increasing in
number daily." (Acts xvi. 5.) From Asia the apostle proceeded into
Greece, where, soon after his arrival in Macedonia, we find him at
Thessalonica: in which city, "some of the Jews believed, and of the
devout Greeks a great multitude." (Acts xvii. 4.) We meet also here with
an accidental hint of the general progress of the Christian mission, in
the exclamation of the tumultuous Jews of Thessalonica, "that they who
had turned the world upside down were come thither also." (Acts xvii.
6.) At Berea, the next city at which Saint Paul arrives, the historian,
who was present, inform us that "many of the Jews believed." (Acts xvii.
12.) The next year and a half of Saint Paul's ministry was spent at
Corinth. Of his success in that city we receive the following
intimations; "that many of the Corinthians believed and were baptized;"
and "that it was revealed to the Apostle by Christ, that be had much
people in that city." (Acts xviii, 8--10.) Within less than a year after
his departure from Corinth, and twenty-five (Benson, book iii. p, 160.)
years after the ascension, Saint Paul fixed his station at Ephesus for
the space of two years (Acts xix. 10.) and something more. The effect of
his ministry in that city and neighbourhood drew from the historian a
reflection how "mightily grew the word of God and prevailed." (Acts xix.
20.) And at the conclusion of this period we find Demetrius at the head
of a party, who were alarmed by the progress of the religion,
complaining, that "not only at Ephesus, but also throughout all Asia
(i. e. the province of Lydia, and the country adjoining to Ephesus), this
Paul hath persuaded and turned away much people." (Acts xix. 26.) Beside
these accounts, there occurs, incidentally, mention of converts at Rome,
Alexandria, Athens, Cyprus, Cyrene, Macedonia, Philippi.
This is the third period in the propagation of Christianity, setting off
in the seventh year after the ascension, and ending at the
twenty-eighth. Now, lay these three periods together, and observe how
the progress of the religion by these accounts is represented. The
institution, which properly began only after its Author's removal from
the world, before the end of thirty years, had spread itself through
Judea, Galilee, and Samaria, almost all the numerous districts of the
Lesser Asia, through Greece, and the islands of the Aegean Sea, the
seacoast of Africa, and had extended itself to Rome, and into Italy. At
Antioch, in Syria, at Joppa, Ephesus, Corinth, Thessalonica, Berea,
Iconium, Derbe, Antioch in Pisidia, at Lydda, Saron, the number of
converts is intimated by the expressions, "a great number," "great
multitudes," "much people." Converts are mentioned, without any
designation of their number,* at Tyre, Cesarea, Troas, Athens, Philippi,
Lystra, Damascus. During all this time Jerusalem continued not only the
centre of the mission, but a principal seat of the religion; for when
Saint Paul returned thither at the conclusion of the period of which we
are now considering the accounts, the other apostles pointed out to him,
as a reason for his compliance with their advice, "how many thousands
(myriads, ten thousands) there were in that city who believed."+
_________
* Considering the extreme conciseness of many parts of the history, the
silence about the number of converts is no proof of their paucity; for
at Philippi, no mention whatever is made of the number, yet Saint Paul
addressed an epistle to that church. The churches of Galatia, and the
affairs of those churches, were considerable enough to be the subject of
another letter, and of much of Saint Paul's solicitude; yet no account
is preserved in the history of his success, or even of his preaching in
that country, except the slight notice which these words convey:--"When
they had gone throughout Phrygia, and the region of Galatia, they
assayed to go into Bithynia." Acts xvi. 6.
+ Acts xxi. 20.
_________
Upon this abstract, and the writing from which it is drawn, the
following observations seem material to be made:
I. That the account comes from a person who was himself concerned in a
portion of what he relates, and was contemporary with the whole of it;
who visited Jerusalem, and frequented the society of those who had
acted, and were acting the chief parts in the transaction. I lay down
this point positively; for had the ancient attestations to this valuable
record been less satisfactory than they are, the unaffectedness and
simplicity with which the author notes his presence upon certain
occasions, and the entire absence of art and design from these notices,
would have been sufficient to persuade my mind that, whoever he was, he
actually lived in the times, and occupied the situation, in which he
represents himself to be. When I say, "whoever he was," I do not mean to
cast a doubt upon the name to which antiquity hath ascribed the Acts of
the Apostles (for there is no cause, that I am acquainted with, for
questioning it), but to observe that, in such a case as this, the time
and situation of the author are of more importance than his name; and
that these appear from the work itself, and in the most unsuspicious
form.
II. That this account is a very incomplete account of the preaching and
propagation of Christianity; I mean, that if what we read in the history
be true, much more than what the history contains must be true also.
For, although the narrative from which our information is derived has
been entitled the Acts of the Apostles, it is, in fact, a history of the
twelve apostles only during a short time of their continuing together at
Jerusalem; and even of this period the account is very concise. The work
afterwards consists of a few important passages of Peter's ministry, of
the speech and death of Stephen, of the preaching of Philip the deacon;
and the sequel of the volume, that is, two thirds of the whole, is taken
up with the conversion, the travels, the discourses, and history of the
new apostle, Paul; in which history, also, large portions of time are
often passed over with very scanty notice.
III. That the account, so far as it goes, is for this very reason more
credible. Had it been the author's design to have displayed the early
progress of Christianity, he would undoubtedly have collected, or at
least have set forth, accounts of the preaching of the rest of the
apostles, who cannot without extreme improbability be supposed to have
remained silent and inactive, or not to have met with a share of that
success which attended their colleagues.
To which may be added, as an observation of the same kind,
IV. That the intimations of the number of converts, and of the success
of the preaching of the apostles, come out for the most part
incidentally: are drawn from the historian by the occasion, such as the
murmuring of the Grecian converts; the rest from persecution; Herod's
death; the sending of Barnabas to Antioch, and Barnabas calling Paul to
his assistance; Paul coming to a place and finding there disciples; the
clamour of the Jews; the complaint of artificers interested in the
support of the popular religion; the reason assigned to induce Paul to
give satisfaction to the Christians of Jerusalem. Had it not been for
these occasions it is probable that no notice whatever would have been
taken of the number of converts in several of the passages in which that
notice now appears. All this tends to remove the suspicion of a design
to exaggerate or deceive.
PARALLEL TESTIMONIES with the history are the letters of Saint Paul, and
of the other apostles, which have come down to us. Those of Saint Paul
are addressed to the churches of Corinth, Philippi, Thessalonica, the
church of Galatia, and, if the inscription be right, of Ephesus; his
ministry at all which places is recorded in the history: to the church
of Colosse, or rather to the churches of Colosse and Laodicea jointly,
which he had not then visited. They recognise by reference the churches
of Judea, the churches of Asia, and "all the churches of the Gentiles."
(Thess ii. 14.) In the Epistle to the Romans (Rom. xv. 18, 19.) the
author is led to deliver a remarkable declaration concerning the extent
of his preaching, its efficacy, and the cause to which he ascribes
it,--"to make the Gentiles obedient by word and deed, through mighty
signs and wonders, by the power of the Spirit of God; so that from
Jerusalem, and round about unto Illyricum, I have fully preached the
Gospel of Christ." In the epistle to the Colossians, (Col. i. 23.) we
find an oblique but very strong signification of the then general state
of the Christian mission, at least as it appeared to Saint Paul:--"If ye
continue in the faith, grounded and settled, and be not moved away from
the hope of the Gospel, which ye have heard, and which was preached to
every creature which is under heaven;" which Gospel, he had reminded
them near the beginning of his letter (Col. i. 6.), "was present with
them, as it was in all the world." The expressions are hyperbolical; but
they are hyperboles which could only be used by a writer who entertained
a strong sense of the subject. The first epistle of Peter accosts the
Christians dispersed throughout Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, Asia, and
Bithynia.
It comes next to be considered how far these accounts are confirmed or
followed up by other evidence.
Tacitus, in delivering a relation, which has already been laid before
the reader, of the fire which happened at Rome in the tenth year of Nero
(which coincides with the thirtieth year after Christ's ascension),
asserts that the emperor, in order to suppress the rumours of having
been himself the author of the mischief, procured the Christians to be
accused. Of which Christians, thus brought into his narrative, the
following is so much of the historian's account as belongs to our
present purpose: "They had their denomination from Christus, who, in the
reign of Tiberius, was put to death as a criminal by the procurator
Pontius Pilate. This pernicious superstition, though checked for a
while, broke out again, and spread not only over Judea, but reached the
city also. At first they only were apprehended who confessed themselves
of that sect; afterwards vast multitude were discovered by them." This
testimony to the early propagation of Christianity is extremely
material. It is from an historian of great reputation, living near the
time; from a stranger and an enemy to the religion; and it joins
immediately with the period through which the Scripture accounts extend.
It establishes these points: that the religion began at Jerusalem; that
it spread throughout Judea; that it had reached Rome, and not only so,
but that it had there obtained a great number of converts. This was
about six years after the time that Saint Paul wrote his Epistle to the
Romans, and something more than two years after he arrived there
himself. The converts to the religion were then so numerous at Rome,
that of those who were betrayed by the information of the persons first
persecuted, a great multitude (multitudo ingens) were discovered and
seized.
It seems probable, that the temporary check which Tacitus represents
Christianity to have received (repressa in praesens) referred to the
persecution of Jerusalem which followed the death of Stephen (Acts
viii.); and which, by dispersing the converts, caused the institution,
in some measure, to disappear. Its second eruption at the same place,
and within a short time, has much in it of the character of truth. It
was the firmness and perseverance of men who knew what they relied
upon.
Next in order of time, and perhaps superior in importance is the
testimony of Pliny the Younger. Pliny was the Roman governor of Pontus
and Bithynia, two considerable districts in the northern part of Asia
Minor. The situation in which he found his province led him to apply to
the emperor (Trajan) for his direction as to the conduct he was to hold
towards the Christians. The letter in which this application is
contained was written not quite eighty years after Christ's ascension.
The president, in this letter, states the measures he had already
pursued, and then adds, as his reason for resorting to the emperor's
counsel and authority, the following words:--"Suspending all judicial
proceedings, I have recourse to you for advice; for it has appeared to
me a matter highly deserving consideration, especially on account of the
great number of persons who are in danger of suffering: for many of all
ages, and of every rank, of both sexes likewise, are accused, and will
be accused. Nor has the contagion of this superstition seized cities
only, but the lesser towns also, and the open country. Nevertheless it
seemed to me that it may be restrained and corrected. It is certain that
the temples, which were almost forsaken, begin to be more frequented;
and the sacred solemnities, after a long intermission, are revived.
Victims, likewise, are everywhere (passim) bought up; whereas, for some
time, there were few to purchase them. Whence it is easy to imagine that
numbers of men might be reclaimed if pardon were granted to those that
shall repent." (C. Plin. Trajano Imp. lib. x. ep. xcvii.)
It is obvious to observe, that the passage of Pliny's letter here
quoted, proves, not only that the Christians in Pontus and Bithynia were
now numerous, but that they had subsisted there for some considerable
time. "It is certain," he says, "that the temples, which were almost
forsaken (plainly ascribing this desertion of the popular worship to the
prevalency of Christianity), begin to be more frequented; and the sacred
solemnities, after a long intermission, are revived." There are also two
clauses in the former part of the letter which indicate the same thing;
one, in which he declares that he had "never been present at any trials
of Christians, and therefore knew not what was the usual subject of
inquiry and punishment, or how far either was wont to be urged." The
second clause is the following: "Others were named by an informer, who,
at first, confessed themselves Christians, and afterwards denied it; the
rest said they had been Christians some three years ago, some longer,
and some about twenty years." It is also apparent, that Pliny speaks of
the Christians as a description of men well known to the person to whom
he writes. His first sentence concerning them is, "I have never been
present at the trials of Christians." This mention of the name of
Christians, without any preparatory explanation, shows that it was a
term familiar both to the writer of the letter and the person to whom it
was addressed. Had it not been so, Pliny would naturally have begun his
letter by informing the emperor that he had met with a certain set of
men in the province called Christians.
Here then is a very singular evidence of the progress of the Christian
religion in a short space. It was not fourscore years after the
crucifixion of Jesus when Pliny wrote this letter; nor seventy years
since the apostles of Jesus began to mention his name to the Gentile
world. Bithynia and Pontus were at a great distance from Judea, the
centre from which the religion spread; yet in these provinces
Christianity had long subsisted, and Christians were now in such numbers
as to lead the Roman governor to report to the emperor that they were
found not only in cities, but in villages and in open countries; of all
ages, of every rank and condition; that they abounded so much as to have
produced a visible desertion of the temples; that beasts brought to
market for victims had few purchasers; that the sacred solemnities were
much neglected:--circumstances noted by Pliny for the express purpose of
showing to the emperor the effect and prevalency of the new institution.
No evidence remains by which it can be proved that the Christians were
more numerous in Pontus and Bithynia than in other parts of the Roman
empire; nor has any reason been offered to show why they should be so.
Christianity did not begin in these countries, nor near them. I do not
know, therefore, that we ought to confine the description in Pliny's
letter to the state of Christianity in these provinces, even if no other
account of the same subject had come down to us; but, certainly, this
letter may fairly be applied in aid and confirmation of the
representations given of the general state of Christianity in the world,
by Christian writers of that and the next succeeding age.
Justin Martyr, who wrote about thirty years after Pliny, and one hundred
and six after the ascension, has these remarkable words: "There is not a
nation, either of Greek or barbarian, or of any other name, even of
those who wander in tribes, and live in tents, amongst whom prayers and
thanksgivings are not offered to the Father and Creator of the universe
by the name of the crucified Jesus." (Dial cum Tryph.) Tertullian, who
comes about fifty years after Justin, appeals to the governors of the
Roman empire in these terms: "We were but of yesterday, and we have
filled your cities, islands, towns, and boroughs, the camp, the senate,
and the forum. They (the heathen adversaries of Christianity) lament
that every sex, age, and condition, and persons of every rank also, are
converts to that name." (Tertull. Apol. c. 37.) I do allow that these
expressions are loose, and may be called declamatory. But even
declamation hath its bounds; this public boasting upon a subject which
must be known to every reader was not only useless but unnatural, unless
the truth of the case, in a considerable degree, corresponded with the
description; at least, unless it had been both true and notorious, that
great multitudes of Christians, of all ranks and orders, were to be
found in most parts of the Roman empire. The same Tertullian, in another
passage, by way of setting forth the extensive diffusion of
Christianity, enumerates as belonging to Christ, beside many other
countries, the "Moors and Gaetulians of Africa, the borders of Spain,
several nations of France, and parts of Britain inaccessible to the
Romans, the Sarmatians, Daci, Germans, and Scythians;" (Ad Jud. c. 7.)
and, which is more material than the extent of the institution, the
number of Christians in the several countries in which it prevailed is
thus expressed by him: "Although so great a multitude, that in almost
every city we form the greater part, we pass our time modestly and in
silence." (Ad Scap. c. iii.) A Clemens Alexandrinus, who preceded
Tertullian by a few years, introduced a comparison between the success
of Christianity and that of the most celebrated philosophical
institutions: "The philosophers were confined to Greece, and to their
particular retainers; but the doctrine of the Master of Christianity not
remain in Judea, as philosophy did in Greece, but is throughout the
whole world, in every nation, and village, and city, both of Greeks and
barbarians, converting both whole houses and separate individuals,
having already brought over to the truth not a few of the philosophers
themselves. If the Greek philosophy he prohibited, it immediately
vanishes; whereas, from the first preaching of our doctrine, kings and
tyrants, governors and presidents, with their whole train, and with the
populace on their side, have endeavoured with their whole might to
exterminate it, yet doth it flourish more and more." (Clem. AI. Strora.
lib. vi. ad fin.) Origen, who follows Tertullian at the distance of only
thirty years, delivers nearly the same account: "In every part of the
world," says he, "throughout all Greece, and in all other nations, there
are innumerable and immense multitudes, who, having left the laws of
their country, and those whom they esteemed gods, have given themselves
up to the law of Moses, and the religion of Christ: and this
not without the bitterest resentment from the idolaters, by whom they
were frequently put to torture, and sometimes to death: and it is
wonderful to observe how, in so short a time, the religion has
increased, amidst punishment and death, and every kind of torture."
(Orig. in Cels. lib. i.) In another passage, Origen draws the following
candid comparison between the state of Christianity in his time and the
condition of its more primitive ages: "By the good providence of God,
the Christian religion has so flourished and increased continually that
it is now preached freely without molestation, although there were a
thousand obstacles to the spreading of the doctrine of Jesus in the
world. But as it was the will of God that the Gentiles should have the
benefit of it, all the counsels of men against the Christians were
defeated: and by how much the more emperors and governors of provinces,
and the people everywhere strove to depress them, so much the more have
they increased and prevailed exceedingly." (Orig. cont. Cels. lib vii.)
It is well known that, within less than eighty years after this, the
Roman empire became Christian under Constantine: and it is probable that
Constantine declared himself on the side of the Christians because they
were the powerful party: for Arnobius, who wrote immediately before
Constantine's accession, speaks of "the whole world as filled with
Christ's doctrine, of its diffusion throughout all countries, of an
innumerable body of Christians in distant provinces, of the strange
revolution of opinion of men of the greatest genius,--orators,
grammarians, rhetoricians, lawyers, physicians having come over to the
institution, and that also in the face of threats, executions and
tortures." (Arnob. in Genres, 1. i. pp. 27, 9, 24, 42, 41. edit. Lug.
Bat. 1650.)
And not more than twenty years after Constantine's entire possession of
the empire, Julius Firmiens Maternus calls upon the emperors Constantius
and Constans to extirpate the relics of the ancient religion; the
reduced and fallen condition of which is described by our author in the
following words: "Licet adhue in quibusdam regionibus idololatriae
morientia palpitont membra; tamen in eo res est, ut a Christianis
omnibus terris pestiferum hoc malum funditus amputetur:" and in another
place, "Modicum tautum superest, ut legibus vestris--extincta
idololatriae pereat funesta contagio." (De Error. Profan. Relig. c. xxi.
p. 172, quoted by Lardner, vol. viii. p. 262.) It will not be thought
that we quote this writer in order to recommend his temper or his
judgment, but to show the comparative state of Christianity and of
Heathenism at this period. Fifty years afterwards, Jerome represents the
decline of Paganism, in language which conveys the same idea of its
approaching extinction: "Solitudinem patitur et in urbe gentilitas. Dii
quondam nationum, cum bubonibus et noctuis, in solis culminibus
remanserunt." (Jer. ad Lect. ep. 5, 7.) Jerome here indulges a triumph,
natural and allowable in a zealous friend of the cause, but which could
only be suggested to his mind by the consent and universality with which
he saw; the religion received. "But now," says he, "the passion and
resurrection of Christ are celebrated in the discourses and writings of
all nations. I need not mention Jews, Greeks, and Latins. The Indians,
Persians, Goths, and Egyptians philosophise, and firmly believe the
immortality of the soul, and future recompenses, which, before, the
greatest philosophers had denied, or doubted of, or perplexed with their
disputes. The fierceness of Thracians and Scythians is now softened by
the gentle sound of the Gospel; and everywhere Christ is all in all."
(Jer. ad Lect. ep. 8, ad Heliod.) Were, therefore, the motives of
Constantine's conversion ever so problematical, the easy establishment
of Christianity, and the ruin of Heathenism, under him and his immediate
successors, is of itself a proof of the progress which had made in the
preceding period. It may be added also, "that Maxentius, the rival of
Constantine, had shown himself friendly to the Christians. Therefore of
those who were contending for worldly power and empire, one actually
favoured and flattered them, and another may be suspected to have joined himself to them partly from consideration of interest: so considerable
were they become, under external disadvantages of all sorts." (Lardner,
vol. vii. p. 380.) This at least is certain, that, throughout the whole
transaction hitherto, the great seemed to follow, not to lead, the public
opinion.
It may help to convey to us some notion of the extent and progress of
Christianity, or rather of the character and quality of many early
Christians, of their learning and their labours, to notice the number of
Christian writers who flourished in these ages. Saint Jerome's catalogue
contains sixty-six writers within the first three centuries, and the
first six years of the fourth; and fifty-four between that time and his
own, viz. A. D. 392. Jerome introduces his catalogue with the following
just remonstrance:--"Let those who say the church has had no
philosophers, nor eloquent and learned men, observe who and what they
were who founded, established, and adorned it; let them cease to accuse
our faith of rusticity, and confess their mistake." (Jer. Prol. in Lib.
de Ser. Eccl.) Of these writers, several, as Justin, Irenaeus, Clement
of Alexandria, Tertullian, Origen, Bardesanes, Hippolitus, Eusebius,
were voluminous writers. Christian writers abounded particularly about
the year 178. Alexander, bishop of Jerusalem, founded a library in that
city, A.D. 212. Pamphilus, the friend of Origen, founded a library at
Cesarea, A.D. 294. Public defences were also set forth, by various
advocates of the religion, in the course of its first three centuries.
Within one hundred years after Christ's ascension, Quadratus and
Aristides, whose works, except some few fragments of the first, are
lost; and, about twenty years afterwards, Justin Martyr, whose works
remain, presented apologies for the Christian religion to the Roman
emperors; Quadratus and Aristides to Adrian, Justin to Antoninus Pins,
and a second to Marcus Antoninus. Melito, bishop of Sardis, and
Apollinaris, bishop of Hierapolis, and Miltiades, men of great
reputation, did the same to Marcus Antoninus, twenty years
afterwards; (Euseb. Hist. lib. iv. c. 26. See also Lardner, vol. ii. p.
666.) and ten years after this, Apollonius, who suffered martyrdom under
the emperor Commodus, composed an apology for his faith which he read in
the senate, and which was afterwards published. (Lardner, vol. ii. p.
687.) Fourteen years after the apology of Apollonius, Tertullian
addressed the work which now remains under that name to the governors of
provinces in the Roman empire; and, about the same time, Minucius Felix
composed a defence of the Christian religion, which is still extant;
and, shortly after the conclusion of this century, copious defences of
Christianity were published by Arnobius and Lactantius.
SECTION II.
REFLECTIONS UPON THE PRECEDING ACCOUNT.
In viewing the progress of Christianity, our first attention is due to
the number of converts at Jerusalem, immediately after its Founder's
death; because this success was a success at the time, and upon the
spot, when and where the chief part of the history had been transacted.
We are, in the next place, called upon to attend to the early
establishment of numerous Christian societies in Judea and Galilee;
which countries had been the scene of Christ's miracles and ministry,
and where the memory of what had passed, and the knowledge of what was
alleged, must have yet been fresh and certain.
We are, thirdly, invited to recollect the success of the apostles and of
their companions, at the several places to which they came, both within
and without Judea; because it was the credit given to original
witnesses, appealing for the truth of their accounts to what themselves
had seen and heard. The effect also of their preaching strongly confirms
the truth of what our history positively and circumstantially relates,
that they were able to exhibit to their hearers supernatural
attestations of their mission.
We are, lastly, to consider the subsequent growth and spread of the
religion, of which we receive successive intimations, and satisfactory,
though general and occasional, accounts, until its full and final
establishment.
In all these several stages, the history is without a parallel for it
must be observed, that we have not now been tracing the progress, and
describing the prevalency, of an opinion founded upon philosophical or
critical arguments, upon mere of reason, or the construction of ancient
writing; (of which are the several theories which have, at different
times, possession of the public mind in various departments of science and
literature; and of one or other of which kind are the tenets also which
divide the various sects of Christianity;) but that we speak of a
system, the very basis and postulatum of which was a supernatural
character ascribed to a particular person; of a doctrine, the truth
whereof depends entirely upon the truth of a matter of fact then recent.
"To establish a new religion, even amongst a few people, or in one
single nation, is a thing in itself exceedingly difficult. To reform
some corruptions which may have spread in a religion, or to make new
regulations in it, is not perhaps so hard, when the main and principal
part of that religion is preserved entire and unshaken; and yet this
very often cannot be accomplished without an extraordinary concurrence
of circumstances, and may be attempted a thousand times without success.
But to introduce a new faith, a new way of thinking and acting, and to
persuade many nations to quit the religion in which their ancestors have
lived and died, which had been delivered down to them from time
immemorial; to make them forsake and despise the deities which they had
been accustomed to reverence and worship; this is a work of still
greater difficulty." (Jortin's Dis. on the Christ. Rel. p. 107, 4th
edit.) The resistance of education, worldly policy, and superstition, is
almost invincible.
If men, in these days, be Christians in consequence of their education,
in submission to authority, or in compliance with fashion, let us
recollect that the very contrary of this, at the beginning, was the
case. The first race of Christians, as wall as millions who succeeded
them, became such in formal opposition to all these motives, to the
whole power and strength of this influence. Every argument, therefore,
and every instance, which sets forth the prejudice of education, and the
almost irresistible effects of that prejudice (and no persons are more
fond of expatiating upon this subject than deistical writers), in fact
confirms the evidence of Christianity.
But, in order to judge of the argument which is drawn from the early
propagation of Christianity, I know no fairer way of proceeding than to
compare what we have seen on the subject with the success of Christian
missions in modern ages. In the East India mission, supported by the
Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, we hear sometimes of thirty,
sometimes of forty, being baptized in the course of a year, and these
principally children. Of converts properly so called, that is, of adults
voluntarily embracing Christianity, the number is extremely small.
"Notwithstanding the labour of missionaries for upwards of two hundred
years, and the establishments of different Christian nations who support
them, there are not twelve thousand Indian Christians, and those almost
entirely outcasts." (Sketches relating to the history, learning, and
manners of the Hindoos, p. 48; quoted by Dr. Robertson, Hist. Dis.
concerning Ancient India, p. 236.)
I lament as much as any man the little progress which Christianity has
made in these countries, and the inconsiderable effect that has followed
the labours of its missionaries; but I see in it a strong proof of the
Divine origin of the religion. What had the apostles to assist them in
propagating Christianity which the missionaries have not? If piety and
zeal had been sufficient, I doubt not but that our missionaries possess
these qualities in a high degree: for nothing except piety and zeal
could engage them in the undertaking. If sanctity of life and manners
was the allurement, the conduct of these men is unblameable. If the
advantage of education and learning be looked to, there is not one of
the modern missionaries who is not, in this respect, superior to all the
apostles; and that not only absolutely, but, what is of more importance,
relatively, in comparison, that is, with those amongst whom they
exercise their office. If the intrinsic excellency of the religion, the
perfection of its morality, the purity of its precepts, the eloquence,
or tenderness, or sublimity, of various parts of its writings, were the
recommendations by which it made its way, these remain the same. If the
character and circumstances under which the preachers were introduced to
the countries in which they taught be accounted of importance, this
advantage is all on the side of the modern missionaries. They come from
a country and a people to which the Indian world look up with sentiments
of deference. The apostles came forth amongst the Gentiles under no
other name than that of Jews, which was precisely the character they
despised and derided. If it be disgraceful in India to become a
Christian, it could not be much less so to be enrolled amongst those
"quos, per flagitia invisos, vulgus Christianos appellabat." If the
religion which they had to encounter be considered, the difference, I
apprehend, will not be great. The theology of both was nearly the same:
"what is supposed to be performed by the power of Jupiter, Neptune, of
Aeolus, of Mars, of Venus, according to the mythology of the West, is
ascribed, in the East, to the agency Agrio the god of fire, Varoon the
god of oceans, Vayoo god of wind, Cama the god of love." (Baghvat Gets,
p. 94, quoted by Dr. Robertson, Ind. Dis. p. 306.) The sacred rites of
the Western Polytheism were gay, festive, and licentious; the rites of
the public religion in the East partake of the same character, with a
more avowed indecency. "In every function performed in the pagodas, as
well as in every public procession, it is the office of these women
(i. e. of women prepared by the Brahmins for the purpose) to dance before
the idol, and to sing hymns in his praise; and it is difficult to say
whether they trespass most against decency by the gestures they exhibit,
or by the verses which they recite. The walls of the pagodas were
covered with paintings in a style no less indelicate." (Others of the
deities of the East are of an austere and gloomy character, to be
propitiated by victims, sometimes by human sacrifices, and by voluntary
torments of the most excruciating kind. Voyage de Gentil. vol. i. p.
244--260. Preface to the Code of Gentoo Laws, p. 57; quoted by Dr.
Robertson, p. 320.)
On both sides of the comparison, the popular religion had a strong
establishment. In ancient Greece and Rome it was strictly incorporated
with the state. The magistrate was the priest. The highest officers of
government bore the most distinguished part in the celebration of the
public rites. In India, a powerful and numerous caste possesses
exclusively the administration of the established worship; and are, of
consequence, devoted to its service, and attached to its interest. In
both, the prevailing mythology was destitute of any proper evidence: or
rather, in both, the origin of the tradition is run up into ages long
anterior to the existence of credible history, or of written language.
The Indian chronology computes eras by millions of years, and the life
of man by thousands "The Suffec Jogue, or age of purity, is said to
have lasted three million two hundred thousand years; and they hold that
the life of man was extended in that age to one hundred thousand years;
but there is a difference amongst the Indian writers of six millions of
years in the computation of this era." (Voyage de Gentil. vol. i. p.
244--260. Preface to the Code of Gentoo Laws, p. 57; quoted by Dr.
Robertson, p. 320.) and in these, or prior to these, is placed the
history of their divinities. In both, the established superstition held
the same place in the public opinion; that is to say, in both it was
credited by the bulk of the people, but by the learned and philosophical
part of the community either derided, or regarded by them as only fit to
be upholden for the sake of its political uses.*
_________
* "How absurd soever the articles of faith may be which superstition has
adopted, or how unhallowed the rites which it prescribes, the former are
received, in every age and country with unhesitating assent, by the
great body of the people, and the latter observed with scrupulous
exactness. In our reasonings concerning opinions and practices which
differ widely from our own, we are extremely apt to err. Having been
instructed ourselves in the principles of a religion worthy in every
respect of that Divine wisdom by which they were dictated, we frequently
express wonder at the credulity of nations, in embracing systems of
belief which appear to us so directly repugnant to right reason; and
sometimes suspect that tenets so wild and extravagant do not really gain
credit with them. But experience may satisfy us, that neither our wonder
nor suspicions are well founded. No article of the public religion was
called in question by those people of ancient Europe with whose history
we are best acquainted; and no practice which it enjoined appeared
improper to them. On the other hand, every opinion that tended to
diminish the reverence of men for the gods of their country, or to
alienate them from their worship, excited, among the Greeks and Romans,
that indignant zeal which is natural to every people attached to their
religion by a firm persuasion of its truth." Ind. Dis. p. 321. That the
learned Brahmins of the East are rational Theists, and secretly reject
the established theory, and contemn the rites that were founded upon
them, or rather consider them as contrivances to be supported for their
political uses, see Dr. Robertson's Ind. Dis. p. 324-334.
_________
Or if it should be allowed, that the ancient heathens believed in their
religion less generally than the present Indians do, I am far from
thinking that this circumstance would afford any facility to the work
of the apostles, above that of the modern missionaries. To me it
appears, and I think it material to be remarked, that a disbelief of the
established religion of their country has no tendency to dispose men for
the reception of another; but that, on the contrary, it generates a
settled contempt of all religious pretensions whatever. General
infidelity is the hardest soil which the propagators of a new religion
can have to work upon. Could a Methodist or Moravian promise himself a
better chance of success with a French esprit fort, who had been
accustomed to laugh at the popery of his country, than with a believing
Mahometan or Hindoo? Or are our modern unbelievers in Christianity, for
that reason, in danger of becoming Mahometans or Hindoos? It does not
appear that the Jews, who had a body of historical evidence to offer for
their religion, and who at that time undoubtedly entertained and held
forth the expectation of a future state, derived any great advantage, as
to the extension of their system, from the discredit into which the
popular religion had fallen with many of their heathen neighbours.
We have particularly directed our observations to the state and progress
of Christianity amongst the inhabitants of India: but the history of the
Christian mission in other countries, where the efficacy of the mission
is left solely to the conviction wrought by the preaching of strangers,
presents the same idea as the Indian mission does of the feebleness and
inadequacy of human means. About twenty-five years ago was published, in
England, a translation from the Dutch of a History of Greenland and a
relation of the mission for above thirty years carried on in that
country by the Unitas Fratrum, or Moravians. Every part of that relation
confirms the opinion we have stated. Nothing could surpass, or hardly
equal, the zeal and patience of the missionaries. Yet their historian,
in the conclusion of his narrative, could find place for no reflections
more encouraging than the following:--"A person that had known the
heathen, that had seen the little benefit from the great pains hitherto
taken with them, and considered that one after another had abandoned all
hopes of the conversion of these infidels (and some thought they would
never be converted, till they saw miracles wrought as in the apostles'
days, and this the Greenlanders expected and demanded of their
instructors); one that considered this, I say, would not so much wonder
at the past unfruitfulness of these young beginners, as at their
steadfast perseverance in the midst of nothing but distress,
difficulties, and impediments, internally and externally: and that they
never desponded of the conversion of those poor creatures amidst all
seeming impossibilities." (History of Greenland, vol. ii. p. 376.)
From the widely disproportionate effects which attend the preaching of
modern missionaries of Christianity, compared with what followed the
ministry of Christ and his apostles under circumstances either alike, or
not so unlike as to account for the difference, a conclusion is fairly
drawn in support of what our histories deliver concerning them, viz.
that they possessed means of conviction which we have not; that they had
proofs to appeal to which we want.
SECTION III.
OF THE RELIGION OF MAHOMET.
The only event in the history of the human species which admits of
comparison with the propagation of Christianity is the success of
Mahometanism. The Mahometan institution was rapid in its progress, was
recent in its history, and was founded upon a supernatural or prophetic
character assumed by its author. In these articles, the resemblance with
Christianity is confessed. But there are points of difference which
separate, we apprehend, the two cases entirely.
I. Mahomet did not found his pretensions upon miracles, properly so
called; that is, upon proofs of supernatural agency capable of being
known and attested by others. Christians are warranted in this.
assertion by the evidence of the Koran, in which Mahomet not only does
not affect the power of working miracles, but expressly disclaims it.
The following passages of that book furnish direct proofs of the truth
of what we allege:--"The infidels say, Unless a sign be sent down unto
him from his lord, we will not believe; thou art a preacher only."
(Sale's Koran, c. xiii. p. 201, ed. quarto.) Again; "Nothing hindered us
from sending thee with miracles, except that the former nations have
charged them with imposture." (C. xvii. p. 232.) And lastly; "They say,
Unless a sign be sent down unto him from his lord, we will not believe:
Answer; Signs are in the power of God alone, and I am no more than a
public preacher. Is it not sufficient for them, that we have sent down
unto them the book of the Koran to be read unto them?" (C. xxix. p.
328.) Beside these acknowledgments, I have observed thirteen distinct
places in which Mahomet puts the objection (unless a sign, &c.) into the
mouth of the unbeliever, in not one of which does he allege a miracle in
reply. His answer is, "that God giveth the power of working miracles
when and to whom he pleaseth;" (C. v. x. xiii. twice.) "that if he
should work miracles, they would not believe;" (C. vi.) "that they had
before rejected Moses, and Jesus and the Prophets, who wrought
miracles;" (C. iii. xxi. xxviii.) "that the Koran itself was a miracle."
(C. xvi.)
The only place in the Koran in which it can be pretended that a sensible
miracle is referred to (for I do not allow the secret visitations of
Gabriel, the night-journey of Mahomet to heaven, or the presence in
battle of invisible hosts of angels, to deserve the name of sensible
miracles) is the beginning of the fifty-fourth chapter. The words are
these:--"The hour of judgment approacheth, and the moon hath been split
in sunder: but if the unbelievers see a sign, they turn aside, saying,
This is a powerful charm." The Mahometan expositors disagree in their
interpretation of this passage; some explaining it to be mention of the
splitting of the moon as one of the future signs of the approach of the
day of judgment: others referring it to a miraculous appearance which
had then taken place. (Vide Sale, in loc.) It seems to me not improbable,
that Mahomet might have taken advantage of some extraordinary halo, or
other unusual appearance of the moon, which had happened about this
time; and which supplied a foundation both for this passage, and for the
story which in after times had been raised out of it.
After this more than silence, after these authentic confessions of the
Koran, we are not to be moved with miraculous stories related of Mahomet
by Abulfeda, who wrote his life about six hundred years after his death;
or which are found in the legend of Al-Jannabi, who came two hundred
years later.* On the contrary, from comparing what Mahomet himself wrote
and said with what was afterwards reported of him by his followers, the
plain and fair conclusion is, that when the religion was established by
conquest, then, and not till then, came out the stories of his miracles.
_________
* It does not, I think, appear, that these historians had any written
accounts to appeal to more ancient than the Sonnah; which was a
collection of traditions made by order of the Caliphs two hundred years
after Mahomet's death. Mahomet died A.D. 632; Al-Bochari, one of the six
doctors who compiled the Sonnah, was born A.D. 809; died 869. Prideaux's
Life of Mahomet, p. 192, ed. 7th.
_________
Now this difference alone constitutes, in my opinion, a bar to all
reasoning from one case to the other. The success of a religion founded
upon a miraculous history shows the credit which was given to the
history; and this credit, under the circumstances in which it was given,
i. e. by persons capable of knowing the truth, and interested to inquire
after it, is evidence of the reality of the history, and, by
consequence, of the truth of the religion. Where a miraculous history is
not alleged, no part of this argument can be applied. We admit that
multitudes acknowledged the pretensions of Mahomet: but, these
pretensions being destitute of miraculous evidence, we know that the
grounds upon which they were acknowledged could not be secure grounds of
persuasion to his followers, nor their example any authority to us.
Admit the whole of Mahomet's authentic history, so far as it was of a
nature capable of being known or witnessed by others, to be true (which
is certainly to admit all that the reception of the religion can be
brought to prove), and Mahomet might still be an impostor, or
enthusiast, or a union of both. Admit to be true almost any part of
Christ's history, of that, I mean, which was public, and within the
cognizance of his followers, and he must have come from God. Where
matter of fact is not in question, where miracles are not alleged, I do
not see that the progress of a religion is a better argument of its
truth than the prevalency of any system of opinions in natural religion,
morality, or physics, is a proof of the truth of those opinions. And we
know that this sort of argument is inadmissible in any branch of
philosophy what ever.
But it will be said, if one religion could make its way without
miracles, why might not another? To which I reply, first, that this is
not the question; the proper question is not, whether a religious
institution could be set up without miracles, but whether a religion, or
a change of religion, founding itself in miracles, could succeed without
any reality to rest upon? I apprehend these two cases to be very
different: and I apprehend Mahomet's not taking this course, to be one
proof, amongst others, that the thing is difficult, if not impossible, to
be accomplished: certainly it was not from an unconsciousness of the
value and importance of miraculous evidence; for it is very observable,
that in the same volume, and sometimes in the same chapters, in which
Mahomet so repeatedly disclaims the power of working miracles himself,
he is incessantly referring to the miracles of preceding prophets. One
would imagine, to hear some men talk, or to read some books, that the
setting up of a religion by dint of miraculous pretences was a thing of
every day's experience: whereas, I believe that, except the Jewish and
Christian religion, there is no tolerably well authenticated account of
any such thing having been accomplished.
II. The establishment of Mahomet's religion was affected by causes which
in no degree appertained to the origin of Christianity.
During the first twelve years of his mission, Mahomet had recourse only
to persuasion. This is allowed. And there is sufficient reason from the
effect to believe that, if he had confined himself to this mode of
propagating his religion, we of the present day should never have heard
either of him or it. "Three years were silently employed in the
conversion of fourteen proselytes. For ten years, the religion advanced
with a slow and painful progress, within the walls of Mecca. The number
of proselytes in the seventh year of his mission may be estimated by the
absence of eighty-three men and eighteen women, who retired to
Aethiopia." (Gibbon's Hist. vol. ix. p. 244, et seq. ed. Dub.) Yet this
progress, such as it was, appears to have been aided by some very
important advantages which Mahomet found in his situation, in his mode
of conducting his design, and in his doctrine.
1. Mahomet was the grandson of the most powerful and honourable family
in Mecca; and although the early death of his father had not left him a
patrimony suitable to his birth, he had, long before the commencement of
his mission, repaired this deficiency by an opulent marriage. A person
considerable by his wealth, of high descent, and nearly allied to the
chiefs of his country, taking upon himself the character of a religious
teacher, would not fail of attracting attention and followers.
2. Mahomet conducted his design, in the outset especially, with great
art and prudence. He conducted it as a politician would conduct a plot.
His first application was to his own family. This gained him his wife's
uncle, a considerable person in Mecca, together with his cousin Ali,
afterwards the celebrated Caliph, then a youth of great expectation, and
even already distinguished by his attachment, impetuosity, and courage.*
He next expressed himself to Abu Beer, a man amongst the first of the
Koreish in wealth and influence. The interest and example of Abu Beer
drew in five other principal persons in Mecca, whose solicitations
prevailed upon five more of the same rank. This was the work of three
years; during which time everything was transacted in secret. Upon the
strength of these allies, and under the powerful protection of his
family, who, however some of them might disapprove his enterprise, or
deride his pretensions, would not suffer the orphan of their house, the
relict of their favourite brother, to be insulted, Mahomet now commenced
his public preaching. And the advance which he made during the nine or
ten remaining years of his peaceable ministry was by no means greater
than what, with these advantages, and with the additional and singular
circumstance of there being no established religion at Mecca at that
time to contend with, might reasonably have been expected. How soon his
primitive adherents were let into the secret of his views of empire, or
in what stage of his undertaking these views first opened themselves to
his own mind, it is not now easy to determine. The event however was,
that these, his first proselytes, all ultimately attained to riches and
honours, to the command of armies, and the government of kingdoms.
(Gibbon, vol. ix. p 244.)
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* Of which Mr. Gibbon has preserved the following specimen: "When
Mahomet called out in an assembly of his family, Who among you will be
my companion, and my vizir? Ali, then only in the fourteenth year of his
age, suddenly replied, O prophet I am the man;--whosoever rises against
thee, I will dash out his teeth, tear out his eyes, break his legs, rip
up his belly. O prophet! I will be thy vizir over them." Vol. ix. p.
215.
_________
3. The Arabs deduced their descent from Abraham through the line of
Ishmael. The inhabitants of Mecca, in common probably with the other
Arabian tribes, acknowledged, as I think may clearly be collected from
the Koran, one supreme Deity, but had associated with him many objects
of idolatrous worship. The great doctrine with which Mahomet set out was
the strict and exclusive unity of God. Abraham, he told them, their
illustrous ancestor; Ishmael, the father of their nation; Moses, the
lawgiver of the Jews; and Jesus, the author of Christianity--had all
asserted the same thing; that their followers had universally corrupted
the truth, and that he was now commissioned to restore it to the world.
Was it to be wondered at, that a doctrine so specious, and authorized by
names, some or other of which were holden in the highest veneration by
every description of his hearers, should, in the hands of a popular
missionary, prevail to the extent in which Mahomet succeeded by his
pacific ministry?
4. Of the institution which Mahomet joined with this fundamental
doctrine, and of the Koran in which that institution is delivered, we
discover, I think, two purposes that pervade the whole, viz., to make
converts, and to make his converts soldiers. The following particulars,
amongst others, may be considered as pretty evident indications of these
designs:
1. When Mahomet began to preach, his address to the Jews, to the
Christians, and to the Pagan Arabs, was, that the religion which he
taught was no other than what had been originally their own.--"We
believe in God, and that which hath been sent down unto us, and that
which hath been sent down unto Abraham, and Ishmael, and Isaac, and
Jacob, and the Tribes, and that which was delivered unto Moses and
Jesus, and that which was delivered unto the prophets from their Lord:
we make no distinction between any of them." (Sale's Koran, c. ii. p.
17.) "He hath ordained you the religion which he commanded Noah, and
which we have revealed unto thee, O Mohammed, and which we commanded
Abraham, and Moses, and Jesus, saying, Observe this religion, and be not
divided therein." (Sale's Koran, c. xlii. p. 393.) "He hath chosen you,
and hath not imposed on you any difficulty in the religion which he hath
given you, the religion of your father Abraham." (Sale's Koran, c. xxii.
p. 281.)
2. The author of the Koran never ceases from describing the future
anguish of unbelievers, their despair, regret, penitence, and torment.
It is the point which he labours above all others. And these
descriptions are conceived in terms which will appear in no small
degree impressive, even to the modern reader of an English translation.
Doubtless they would operate with much greater force upon the minds of
those to whom they were immediately directed. The terror which they seem
well calculated to inspire would be to many tempers a powerful
application.
3. On the other hand: his voluptuous paradise; his robes of silk, his
palaces of marble, his riven, and shades, his groves and couches, his
wines, his dainties; and, above all, his seventy-two virgins assigned to
each of the faithful, of resplendent beauty and eternal
youth--intoxicated the imaginations, and seized the passions of his
Eastern followers.
4. But Mahomet's highest heaven was reserved for those who fought his
battles or expended their fortunes in his cause: "Those believers who
sit still at home, not having any hurt, and those who employ their
fortunes and their persons for the religion of God, shall not be held
equal. God hath preferred those who employ their fortunes and their
persons in that cause to a degree above those who sit at home. God had
indeed promised every one Paradise; but God had preferred those who
fight for the faith before those who sit still, by adding unto them a
great reward; by degrees of honour conferred upon them from him, and by
granting them forgiveness and mercy." (Sale's Koran, c. iv. p. 73.)
Again; "Do ye reckon the giving drink to the pilgrims, and the visiting
of the holy temple, to be actions as meritorious as those performed by
him who believeth in God and the last day, and fighteth for the religion
of God? They shall not be held equal with God.--They who have believed
and fled their country, and employed their substance and their persons
in the defence of God's true religion, shall be in the highest degree of
honour with God; and these are they who shall be happy. The Lord sendeth
them good tidings of mercy from him, and good will, and of gardens
wherein they shall enjoy lasting pleasures. They shall continue therein
for ever; for with God is a great reward." (Sale's Koran, c. ix. p.
151.) And, once more; "Verily God hath purchased of the true believers
their souls and their substance, promising them the enjoyment of
Paradise on condition that they fight for the cause of God: whether they
slay or be slain, the promise for the same is assuredly due by the Law
and the Gospel and the Koran." (Sale's Koran, c. ix. p. 164.)*
_________
* "The sword," saith Mahomet, "is the key of heaven and of hell; a drop
of blood shed in the cause of God, a night spent in arms, is of more
avail than two months' fasting or prayer. Whosoever falls in battle, his
sins are forgiven at the day of judgment; his wounds shall be
resplendent as vermilion, and odoriferous as musk; and the loss of his
limbs shall be supplied by the wings of angels and cherubim." Gibbon,
vol. ix. p. 256.
_________
5. His doctrine of predestination was applicable, and was applied by
him, to the same purpose of fortifying and of exalting the courage of
his adherents.--"If anything of the matter had happened unto us, we had
not been slain here. Answer; If ye had been in your houses, verily they
would have gone forth to fight, whose slaughter was decreed, to the
places where they died." (Sale's Koran, c. iii. p. 54.)
6. In warm regions, the appetite of the sexes is ardent, the passion for
inebriating liquors moderate. In compliance with this distinction,
although Mahomet laid a restraint upon the drinking of wine, in the use
of women he allowed an almost unbounded indulgence. Four wives, with the
liberty of changing them at pleasure, (Sale's Koran, c. iv. p. 63.)
together with the persons of all his captives, (Gibbon, vol. ix. p. 225.)
was an irresistible bribe to an Arabian warrior. "God is minded," says
he, speaking of this very subject, "to make his religion light unto
you; for man was created weak." How different this from the
unaccommodating purity of the Gospel! How would Mahomet have succeeded
with the Christian lesson in his mouth.--"Whosoever looketh upon a woman
to lust after her, hath committed adultery with her already in his
heart"? It must be added, that Mahomet did not venture upon the
prohibition of wine till the fourth year of the Hegira, or the
seventeenth of his mission, when his military successes had completely
established his authority. The same observation holds of the fast of the
Ramadan, (Mod. Univ. Hist. Vol. i. pp. 126 & 112.) and of the most
laborious part of his institution, the pilgrimage to Mecca. (This
latter, however, already prevailed amongst the Arabs, and had grown out
of their excessive veneration for the Caaba. Mahomot's law, in this
respect, was rather a compliance than an innovation. Sale's Prelim.
Disc. p. 122.)
What has hitherto been collected from the records of the Musselman
history relates to the twelve or thirteen years of Mahomet's peaceable
preaching, which part alone of his life and enterprise admits of the
smallest comparison with the origin of Christianity. A new scene is now
unfolded. The city of Medina, distant about ten days' journey from
Mecca, was at that time distracted by the hereditary contentions of two
hostile tribes. These feuds were exasperated by the mutual persecutions
of the Jews and Christians, and of the different Christian sects by
which the city was inhabited. (Mod. Univ. Hist. Vol. i. p. 100.) The
religion of Mahomet presented, in some measure, a point of union or
compromise to these divided opinions. It embraced the principles which
were common to them all. Each party saw in it an honourable
acknowledgment of the fundamental truth of their own system. To the
Pagan Arab, somewhat imbued with the sentiments and knowledge of his
Jewish or Christian fellow-citizen, it offered no defensive or very
improbable theology. This recommendation procured to Mahometanism a more
favourable reception at Medina than its author had been able, by twelve
years' painful endeavours, to obtain for it at Mecca. Yet, after all,
the progress of the religion was inconsiderable. His missionary could
only collect a congregation of forty persons. It was not a religious,
but a political association, which ultimately introduced Mahomet into
Medina. Harassed, as it should seem, and disgusted by the long
continuance of factions and disputes, the inhabitants of that city saw
in the admission of the prophet's authority a rest from the miseries
which they had suffered, and a suppression of the violence and fury
which they had learned to condemn. After an embassy, therefore, composed
of believers and unbelievers, (Mod. Univ. Hist. Vol. i. p. 85.) and of
persons of both tribes, with whom a treaty was concluded of strict
alliance and support, Mahomet made his public entry, and was received as
the sovereign of Medina.
From this time, or soon after this time, the impostor changed his
language and his conduct. Having now a town at his command, where to arm
his party, and to head them with security, he enters upon new counsels.
He now pretends that a divine commission is given him to attack the
infidels, to destroy idolatry, and to set up the true faith by the
sword. (Mod. Univ. Hist. Vol. i. p. 88.) An early victory over a very
superior force, achieved by conduct and bravery, established the renown
of his arms, and of his personal character. (Victory of Bedr, Mod. Univ.
Hist. Vol. i. p. 106.) Every year after this was marked by battles or
assassinations. The nature and activity of Mahomet's future exertions
may be estimated from the computation, that in the nine following years
of his life he commanded his army in person in eight general
engagements, (Mod. Univ. Hist. vol. i. p. 255.) and undertook, by himself
or his lieutenants, fifty military enterprises.
From this time we have nothing left to account for, but that Mahomet
should collect an army, that his army should conquer, and that his
religion should proceed together with his conquests. The ordinary
experience of human affairs leaves us little to wonder at in any of
these effects: and they were likewise each assisted by peculiar
facilities. From all sides, the roving Arabs crowded round the standard
of religion and plunder, of freedom and victory, of arms and rapine.
Beside the highly painted joys of a carnal paradise, Mahomet rewarded
his followers in this world with a liberal division of the spoils, and
with the persons of their female captives. (Gibbon, vol. ix. p. 255.) The
condition of Arabia, occupied by small independent tribes, exposed it to
the impression, and yielded to the progress of a firm and resolute army.
After the reduction of his native peninsula, the weakness also of the
Roman provinces on the north and the west, as well as the distracted
state of the Persian empire on the east, facilitated the successful
invasion of neighbouring countries. That Mahomet's conquests should
carry his religion along with them will excite little surprise, when we
know the conditions which he proposed to the vanquished. Death or
conversion was the only choice offered to idolaters. "Strike off their
heads! strike off all the ends of their fingers!(Sale's Koran, c. viii.
p. 140.) kill the idolaters, wheresoever ye shall find them!" (Sale's
Koran, c. ix. p. 149.) To the Jews and Christians was left the somewhat
milder alternative of subjection and tribute, if they persisted in their
own religion, or of an equal participation in the rights and liberties,
the honours and privileges, of the faithful, if they embraced the
religion of their conquerors. "Ye Christian dogs, you know your option;
the Koran, the tribute, or the sword." (Gibbon, vol. ix. p. 337.) The
corrupted state of Christianity in the seventh century, and the
contentions of its sects, unhappily so fell in with men's care of their
safety or their fortunes, as to induce many to forsake its profession.
Add to all which, that Mahomet's victories not only operated by the
natural effect of conquest, but that they were constantly represented,
both to his friends and enemies, as divine declarations in his favour.
Success was evidence. Prosperity carried with it, not only influence,
but proof. "Ye have already," says he, after the battle of Bedr, "had a
miracle shown you, in two armies which attacked each other; one army
fought for God's true religion, but the other were infidels." (Sale's
Koran, c. iii. p. 36.) Again; "Ye slew not those who were slain at Bedr,
but God slew them.--If ye desire a decision of the matter between us,
now hath a decision come unto you." (Sale's Koran, c. viii. p. 141.)
Many more passages might be collected out of the Koran to the same
effect; but they are unnecessary. The success of Mahometanism during
this, and indeed every future period of its history, bears so little
resemblance to the early propagation of Christianity, that no inference
whatever can justly be drawn from it to the prejudice of the Christian
argument. For what are we comparing? A Galilean peasant accompanied by a
few fishermen with a conqueror at the head of his army. We compare
Jesus, without force, without power, without support, without One
external circumstance of attraction or influence, prevailing against the
prejudices, the learning, the hierarchy, of his country; against the
ancient religious opinions, the pompous religious rites, the philosophy,
the wisdom, the authority, of the Roman empire, in the most polished and
enlightened period of its existence,--with Mahomet making his way
amongst Arabs; collecting followers in the midst of conquests and
triumphs, in the darkest ages and countries of the world, and when
success in arms not only operated by that command of men's wills and
persons which attend prosperous undertakings, but was considered as a
sure testimony of Divine approbation. That multitudes, persuaded by this
argument, should join the train of a victorious chief; that still
greater multitudes should, without any argument, bow down before
irresistible power--is a conduct in which we cannot see much to surprise
us; in which we can see nothing that resembles the causes by which the
establishment of Christianity was effected.
The success, therefore, of Mahometanism stands not in the way of this
important conclusion; that the propagation of Christianity, in the
manner and under the circumstances in which it was propagated, is an
unique in the history of the species. A Jewish peasant overthrew the
religion of the world.
I have, nevertheless, placed the prevalency of the religion amongst the
auxiliary arguments of its truth; because, whether it had prevailed or
not, or whether its prevalency can or cannot be accounted for, the
direct argument remains still. It is still true that a great number of
men upon the spot, personally connected with the history and with the
Author of the religion, were induced by what they heard and saw, and
knew, not only to change their former opinions, but to give up their
time, and sacrifice their ease, to traverse seas and kingdoms without
rest and without weariness, to commit themselves to extreme dangers, to
undertake incessant toils, to undergo grievous sufferings, and all this
solely in consequence, and in support, of their belief of facts, which,
if true, establish the truth of the religion, which, if false, they must
have known to be so.
PART III.
A BRIEF CONSIDERATION OF SOME POPULAR OBJECTIONS.
CHAPTER I.
THE DISCREPANCIES BETWEEN THE SEVERAL GOSPELS.