thing.” We echo the warning, with this addition, that Christianity _is_
a progressive thing; not a doctrine dead, and embalmed in creeds, but a
spirit living and impersonated in Christ. Two things are necessary to a
revelation: its record, which is permanent; its readers, who perpetually
change. From the collision of the lesson and the mind on which it drops,
starts up the living religion that saves the soul within, and acts on
the theatre of the world without. Each eye sees what it can, and what it
needs; each age develops a new and nobler idea from the immortal page.
We are like children, who, in reading a book above their years, pass
innocently and unconsciously over that which is not suited to their
state. In this divine tale of Christ, every class and every period
seizes, in succession, the views and emotions which most meet its wants.
It is with Scripture as with nature. The everlasting heavens spread
above the gaze of Herschel, as they did over that of Abraham; yet the
latter saw but a spangled dome, the former a forest of innumerable
worlds. To the mind of this profound observer, there was as much a _new
creation_, as if those heavens had been, at the time, called up and
spread before his sight. And thus it is with the Word of God. As its
power and beauty develop themselves continually, it is as if Heaven were
writing it now, and leaf after leaf dropped directly from the skies. Nor
is there any heresy like that, which denies this progressive unfolding
of divine wisdom, shuts up the spirit of heaven in the verbal
metaphysics and scholastic creeds of a half-barbarous period,—treats the
inspiration of God as a dry piece of antiquity, and cannot see that it
communes afresh with the soul of every age; and sheds, from the living
Fount of truth, a guidance ever new.
NOTES.
---------------------
A.
_On the Improved Version._
Great allowance must perhaps be made for the clergymen who persist,
after repeated expostulation, in their assumption that the Improved
Version is an authoritative exposition of Unitarian theology. The
convenience of limiting their studies, for the most part, to a single
work, and the inconvenience of dispensing with the previous labours of
Dr. Nares, and Archbishop Magee, whose hostile criticisms furnish the
orthodox divine with invaluable prolegomena to the book, ought to
diminish our surprise at the tenacious adherence to this ground of
attack. The advantage too of giving fresh currency to the popular
notion, that some dreadful production exists, containing unmentionable
impieties, and constituting the “Unitarian Bible,” is undeniable. It is
evident that the utility of fostering this impression is by no means
overlooked: for after strong assertion and contemptuous comments have
given to a very few passages of the Improved Version the appearance, to
an unlearned audience, of falsification of the word of God, I have heard
it said, that these cases are but a _small sample of a system_, which
might be illustrated to an indefinite extent from every page. As there
are not, on an average, more than two variations in a page from
Archbishop Newcome, the charge must, in an incalculable majority of
instances, fall on him.
I am at a loss, however, to perceive even any controversial advantage to
be gained by the rash statement of Mr. Byrth; that every Unitarian
minister is as much bound to uphold the criticism and interpretation of
the Improved Version, as the Established Clergy to maintain the
Thirty-nine Articles. A clergyman, it is known, signs the articles, and
solemnly contracts to preach in conformity with them; a minister among
Unitarians may never see the Improved Version, or hear its name. During
a five years’ course of study at the college where I received my
education for the ministry, I do not remember any mention of it in the
theological classes, and only two in the Greek classes: both of which
were condemnatory; one, of the introduction of the English indefinite
article to indicate, in certain cases, the absence of the definite
article in the original; the other, of the rendering of the preposition
διά, with the genitive, by the word “for.” The fact that most ministers
of our persuasion subscribe to the British and Foreign Unitarian
Association, which has succeeded to the property in the Improved
Version, and continues to circulate it, no more makes them responsible
for its criticisms than a contribution to the Bible Society makes a
clergyman accountable for the forgery of the “heavenly witnesses.” The
one aids in distributing a possibly defective, the other a certainly
interpolated, copy of the Christian records. Let us apply another test
to this imprudent parallel between the established clergy, and the
Unitarian ministers. In the United States of America, no one, I presume,
could take holy orders in the Episcopal church, without pledging his
assent to the Thirty-nine Articles; and should he cease to approve of
them, his ordination vow would require him to resign his preferment. But
in that country are hundreds of Unitarian ministers, who know nothing of
the Improved Version; and would be as much astonished to be told that
they were bound by it, as would Dr. Tattershall to hear that he must
answer for the Oxford Tracts.
But the mere fact, that within a year after the publication of this
work, a Unitarian divine, a subscriber to the Unitarian society, in a
Unitarian periodical, submitted it to a criticism far more searching and
elaborate than that which an acumen sharpened by theological hostility
is now able to produce, is sufficient to set in its true light the
statement which I have quoted. I beg to call the attention of our
Reverend opponents to the following enumeration of the points, to which
the censures of the Reviewer (Dr. Carpenter) are directed.
(1.) The selection of Newcome’s Revision, instead of the authorized
version, as the basis.
(2.) The departure, and without any intelligible rule, from Griesbach’s
text, which, in the introduction, had been mentioned in a way to excite
the expectation of its invariable adoption. Of these departures, a
complete table is given.
(3.) The neglect of proper acknowledgment and defence of these
departures.
(4.) The professed employment of brackets for one purpose, (to indicate
words which, according to Griesbach, were probably, though not
certainly, to be expunged,) and the actual use of them for another; as,
for example, in the introduction of St. Matthew’s Gospel, which is thus
enclosed.
(5.) The use of italics (intended to indicate doubtful authority)
without adequate evidence of doubtful authority, and in violation of the
apparent intention to repudiate critical conjecture. And in particular,
the use of this type in the introduction to St. Luke’s gospel; which
“the evidence is far too little to justify;” and in the introduction to
St. Matthew’s gospel. Both these examples are considered by the reviewer
as instances of _conjectural criticism_.
(6.) The unwarrantable license allowed in general to conjectural
emendation of the text; of which particular cases are adduced; as the
transposition of verses, John i. 15, 18; and, in a lower sense of the
word _conjecture_, the omission of διὰ τῆς πίστεως, Rom. iii. 25; and
the καὶ in 2 Tim. iii. 16.
(7.) The departures from the received text without notice. Of these
departures, a complete table is given.
(8.) The departures from Newcome’s Revision, without sufficient notice;
of these, a list was given, and a synoptical table has since been
published in the appendix to Dr. Carpenter’s reply to the “unanswered”
Archbishop Magee.
(9.) The use of the English indefinite article, in certain cases, where
there is no Greek definite article. For example, the Centurion’s
exclamation at the crucifixion, Matt. xxvii. 54; in his remarks on
which, Mr. Byrth will perceive that he has been anticipated by the
reviewer.
(10.) The introduction of doctrinal notes, which the reviewer thinks
ought to have been entirely excluded.[112]
The culpable omission of the epithet, “Unitarian,” from the description
of the “Society for promoting Christian Knowledge,” in the title-page of
the first edition, has since received the censure of the same friendly
but just critic.[113]
If then, all that is original and “orthodox,” in the recent assaults on
the Improved Version, be the sarcasm and extravagance; and all that is
“candid” and “scholar-like” was long ago anticipated by a Unitarian
divine, (to whom Dr. Nares awards the praise of being “the very learned
and dispassionate reviewer,”) with what propriety can we be held
responsible, as Unitarian ministers, for the peculiarities of the work,
and called upon to defend it from strictures, produced at second-hand in
Christ Church, and originally published among ourselves. If Dr.
Carpenter had been minister in Liverpool, instead of Bristol, would he
have been bound to come forward and answer _himself_?
I by no means intend to charge the clergymen engaged in this controversy
with plagiarism. Their great authority, Archbishop Magee, so completely
withheld in his postscript, all notice of his obligations to the
Unitarian Reviewer, that a reader may well be excused for not knowing
that there was such a person. Nor do I at all doubt the competency of
our respected opponents to originate whatever they have advanced,
without the aid of any one’s previous researches. I simply affirm that
they have been anticipated, in a quarter, and to an extent, which
disprove their assertions respecting the acceptance and influence of the
Improved Version among Unitarians.
For the very same reason, however, that we are not bound to praise this
work when faults are fairly attributed to it, neither are we bound to be
silent, when merit is unjustly denied it. With the corrections
introduced in the fourth and fifth Editions, it has the exclusive honour
of accomplishing the following important ends:
(1.) It exhibits the text of the New Testament in the most perfect
state, being conformed to Griesbach’s second Edition.
(2.) It enables the English reader to compare this critical with the
Received text, all their variations being noticed.
(3.) It places before its possessors Archbishop Newcome’s Revision,
which otherwise would have passed into unmerited oblivion. Wherever it
departs from its basis, and advances any new translation, the Primate’s
rendering is given also; so that the whole extent of the innovation is
seen, and free choice afforded to the reader.
When the advocates of the common version shall exert themselves to bring
it into accordance with the true text, they will attack the Improved
Version, from a safer position. But so long as they leave with this
heretical work the sole praise, among British translations, of showing
what the Evangelists and Apostles really wrote, and content themselves
with circulating a version containing words and passages, without mark
or warning, which they know to be spurious, and in more than one case,
to be ancient theological allies of their creed, they are too much open
to the charge of availing themselves of detected forgeries, to be
entitled to read lectures to others, about reverence for the text. Dr.
Tattershall enforces well “the duty of preserving the Canon of Scripture
in its _integrity_.” Will he permit me to remind him of the duty of
preserving it in its _simplicity_: or is there, in the _bare proposal of
curtailment of the volume_, a sinfulness which does not exist in _the
practical and persevering maintenance of known interpolation_?
---------------------
B.
_On the Ebionites and their Gospel._
The argument of Mr. Belsham against the authenticity of Matthew’s
account of the miraculous conception appears to me very unsound: but Dr.
Tattershall’s criticism upon it, I must think to be altogether
unsuccessful; if at least, amid its intricate construction, I have
really apprehended the points to which its force is applied. In
rejecting this portion of Scripture, Mr. Belsham relies on the authority
of the Nazarenes and Ebionites, or early Hebrew Christians: who are
affirmed by Epiphanius and Jerome, to have used copies of Matthew’s
Gospel, without the introductory passages in question.
As the value of this argument depends altogether on the character of the
attesting parties and documents, Dr. Tattershall calls in question the
respectability of them all; and disparages, first, the ancient Nazarenes
and Ebionites themselves; secondly, the testimony, in this matter, of
Epiphanius and Jerome; thirdly, the Hebrew gospel or record, which they
describe. The positions advanced under every one of these heads, appear
to me to be erroneous.
I. Nothing, it is said, can be more incorrect than to admit the claim of
the Nazarenes and Ebionites to be regarded as the _original_, or main
body of Hebrew Christians. They were a _sect_, at first united, then
divided into two; successors of the Judaizing Christians; and after
Adrian’s destruction of Jerusalem (A. D. 132), they _separated_ from the
general community of the Christian Church.
I certainly had conceived that this _quæstio vexata_ of ecclesiastical
history, might be considered as set at rest, since the controversy
respecting it between Bishop Horsley and Dr. Priestley; and still more,
since the production of many additional _loca probantia_ from the
Fathers, by Eichhorn, Olshausen, Bertholdt and others, who have engaged
in the inquiry respecting the origin of the three first gospels. If,
however, the subject is still open to agitation, the principle on which
it must be discussed is evident. If, as Dr. Tattershall states, the
Nazarenes and Ebionites did not embrace _in extent_, the main body, and
_in time_, the original societies, of Jewish believers, it is incumbent
on him to find some clear traces of _other_ or _earlier_ Hebrew
Christians, denominated by some different term, or at all events
_excluded from these_. Until such persons are discovered, in the
primitive history of the church, the Nazarenes and Ebionites must remain
in undisturbed possession of their title as “_The_ early Hebrew
Christians.” Meanwhile, in direct proof of their claim to be so
regarded, I submit the following considerations:
(1.) Their name is applied, in a direct definition, to the _whole_ of
the Jewish Christians. Origen says, “_Those from among the Jews who
received Jesus as the Christ_,” were called Ebionites.[114]
(2.) The characteristic sentiments of this “_sect_,” are ascribed to
_the early Hebrew Christians generally_. These were, the persuasion of
the continued obligation of the Mosaic law, on persons of Jewish birth,
and the belief that Christ was a creature, some considering him as
simply human, others as pre-existent.[115] Origen says, “Those from
among the Jews who have faith in Jesus, have not abandoned their ancient
law; for they live in conformity with it, deriving even their name
(according to the true interpretation of the word,) from the poverty of
the law; for _Ebion_, among the Jews, means _poor_.”[116] Origen again
says, “And when you observe the belief respecting the Saviour, held by
_those from among the Jews who have faith in Jesus_, some supposing that
he was of Mary and Joseph, and others that he was of Mary alone and the
Holy Spirit, but still without the notion of his Deity, &c.”[117]
(3.) The characteristic _Gospel_ of the sect (under its frequent title
“Gospel according to the Hebrews”) was used _by the Hebrew Christians
generally_. Eusebius says: “In this number, some have placed the Gospel
according to the Hebrews, which is a favourite especially with the
Hebrews who receive Christ.”[118] The gospel here given to “the Hebrews
who received Christ,” is given in the following to the “Ebionites,” by
the same author. “They (the Ebionites) made use only of that which is
called ‘the Gospel according to the Hebrews;’ the rest they made small
account of.”[119]
If these passages be thought sufficient to identify the Ebionites and
Nazarenes with the “main body of Hebrew Christians,” perhaps the
following may be held to prove their early existence; as it states that
they presented the Apostle John with a motive for composing his Gospel:
Epiphanius says, “When therefore the blessed John comes and finds men
speculating about the human nature of Christ,—the Ebionites going astray
respecting the genealogy of Christ in the flesh, deduced from Abraham,
and by Luke from Adam; and when he finds the Cerinthians and Merinthians
affirming his natural birth as a mere man; the Nazarenes too, and many
other heresies; coming as he did, fourth, or in the rear of the
Evangelists, he began, if I may say so, to recall the wanderers, and
those who speculated about the human nature of Christ, and to say to
them, when from his station in the rear, he beheld some declining into
rugged paths, and quitting, as it were, the straight and true one,
‘whither are you tending, whither are you going, you who are treading a
path rugged and obstructed, conducting, moreover, to a precipice?
Return, it is not so; the God, Logos, who was begotten of the Father
from the beginning, is not from Mary only.’”[120]
That the Nazarenes and Ebionites were truly “_the_ early Hebrew
Christians,” must be considered as a fact established by such evidence
as the foregoing, till some testimony to the contrary can be produced.
That they were the successors of the Judaizing Christians reproved by
St. Paul is an assertion destitute of support; for the opponents who
troubled the _Apostle of the Gentiles_ were distinguished by their
pertinacious attempts, as Hebrews, to _force the Mosaic Law on Gentile
converts_; whereas, respecting the Nazarenes, Lardner observes, “Divers
learned moderns are now convinced of this, and readily allow, that the
Jewish believers, who were called Nazarenes, _did not_ impose the
ordinances of the law upon others, though they observed them as the
descendants of Israel and Abraham.”[121]
The application by Epiphanius of the words “_sect_” and “_heretics_” to
these believers, does not prove that he was speaking of a _different
class_ from the early Hebrew Christians; but only that this same class
began, in his time, to be spoken of in a different and more disparaging
way. He is the first writer, so far as I can discover, who describes
them in such reproachful language. On this point Dr. Wall observes: “He
styles them heretics, for no other reason that I can see, but that they,
together with their Christian faith, continued the use of circumcision
and of the Jewish rites; which things St. Paul never blamed in a Jewish
Christian, though, in the Gentile Christian, he did: and Epiphanius with
the same propriety, as far as I can perceive, might have blamed St.
James, bishop of Jerusalem, and those thousands of Jewish Christians
with him, concerning whom James said to Paul, ‘Thou seest, brother, how
many thousands of Jews there are which believe, and they are all zealous
for the law.’”[122]
And as to the Nazarenes and Ebionites separating from the general
community of the Christian church, after the second destruction of
Jerusalem by Adrian, and thus _bringing upon themselves_ the opprobrium
of heresy, the fact, stated in this form, cannot be proved. From the
first, the Hebrew Christians had formed a separate body from the Gentile
Christians. But their proportion to the whole body of believers seems to
have been for some time too considerable to admit of their being spoken
of in contemptuous language. When the Gentile portion of the Church
became altogether ascendant, and especially when it furnished all the
_ecclesiastical writers_, (one of whose chief functions it has been, in
every age, _to call names_,) the Jewish brethren, destitute of all
pretensions to philosophy, and free from that ambitious speculative
spirit out of which orthodox theology arose, were naturally treated with
less respect, and regarded as exceptions to that general union which had
consolidated itself independently of them, and at last completely left
them out. It does not appear that any further change was wrought by
Adrian’s destruction of Jerusalem, than necessarily followed from his
resolution to exclude, from the new colony which he founded there, all
who practised Jewish rites. This imperial determination compelled the
withdrawal of the Hebrew Christians to the North of Palestine; and they
were replaced by a new church, whose Gentile origin and customs
qualified its members (under the Emperor’s decree) for settlement on the
ancient site.
II. Dr. Tattershall disparages the testimony of the witnesses cited in
this cause,—Epiphanius and Jerome; and not without good reason, if there
should be sufficient proof, _when the whole case is before us_, of his
two allegations, viz.:
First, That Epiphanius contradicts himself; affirming now the
completeness, and then the mutilation, of the Gospel in question.
Secondly, That Epiphanius contradicts Jerome; in asserting, _what
“Jerome does not admit_,” the identity of the Ebionite Gospel with that
of St. Matthew.
Premising that one and the same work is to be understood as described,
by the several titles, “Nazarene Gospel,” “Ebionite Gospel,” “Gospel
according to the Hebrews,” “Gospel according to the Twelve Apostles,” I
would submit that the first of these allegations is more plausible than
true, and that the second is wholly untenable.
The contradictory statements of Epiphanius are the following:
(a.) “They (_i.e._ the Nazarenes) have the Gospel of Matthew _most
entire_ in the Hebrew language among them; for this, truly, is still
preserved among them, as it was at first, in Hebrew characters. But I
know not whether they have taken away the genealogy from Abraham to
Christ.”[123]
(b.) “In that Gospel which they (_i.e._ the Ebionites) have called the
Gospel according to St. Matthew, which is _not entire and perfect, but
corrupted and curtailed_, and which they call the Hebrew Gospel,”
&c.[124]
The verbal contradiction between these two passages, is no doubt
manifest enough; and in a writer of more accuracy than Epiphanius, might
have justified the proposal of Casaubon (approved by Jones) to effect a
violent reconciliation, by the conjectural insertion of the negative
adverb in the former sentence, which would then describe the document as
_not_ wholly perfect. But the looseness of this author’s style appears
to me sufficient to explain the opposition between the statements; which
seem indeed, to look defiance at each other, when brought by force, face
to face; but which at the intervals of separate composition, may be, by
no means, irreconcilable. That in the first, Epiphanius designed the
phrase “most entire,” to be understood with considerable latitude, is
evident from the expression of suspicion which instantly follows, that
the genealogy might probably be absent. And if the work in question
contained a quantity of matter additional to Matthew’s Gospel, whilst it
also _omitted_ some of its integral parts; it seems not unnatural that
the same writer, who with his thoughts running on its redundancies, had
at one time called it a _most full_ copy, should at another, when
dwelling on its deficiencies, style it an incomplete edition of the
first Evangelist. But it is more important to observe, that _on the
points_ for which the _Editors of the Improved Version_ adduce the
testimony of Epiphanius, viz., to identify the Gospel of Matthew with
that of the Nazarenes and Ebionites, and to attest the absence from this
book of the story of the miraculous conception, there is here _no
contradiction whatever_. In _both_ passages he states the work to be
Matthew’s, and in _neither_, according to Dr. Tattershall, does he say
that the first two chapters were wanting. The harmony then, on these,
the only points in dispute, is complete.