ilUillll ifornij Dnal ity mihmm^mm Ex Libris C. K. OGDEN THE LIBRARY OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LOS ANGELES ^. p A/ / f^ APOLOGIA BY THE SAME AUTHOR CLUE : A Guide through Greek to Hebrew Scripture (Diatessarica — Part I). Demy Svo, Cloth, Price is. 6d. net. THE CORRECTIONS OF MARK (Diatessarica— Part II). Demy Svo, Cloth, Price i^s. net. FROM LETTER TO SPIRIT (Diatessarica— Part III). Demy Svo, Cloth, Price zos. net. PARADOSIS (Diatessarica— Part IV). Demy Svo, Cloth, Price ys. 6d. net. JOHANNINE VOCABULARY (Diatessarica— Part V). Demy Svo, Cloth, Price ly. 6d. net. JOHANNINE GRAMMAR (Diatessarica— Part VI). Demy Svo, Cloth, Price i6s. 6d. net. SILANUS THE CHRISTIANr Demy Svo, Cloth, Price "js. 6d. net. NOTES ON NEW TESTAMENT CRITICISM (Diatessarica — Part VII). In the Press. THE FOURFOLD GOSPEL (Diatessarica-Part VIII). In Preparation. See pp. I02 foil, of this volume AGENTS America . The Macmillan Company 64 & 66 Fifth Avenue, New York Canada . The Macmillan Company of Canada, Ltd. 27 Richmond Street West, Toronto India . . Macmillan & Company, Ltd. Macmillan Building, Bombay 309 Bow Bazaar Street, Calcutta APOLOGIA AN EXPLANATION AND DEFENCE BY Edwin A. Abbott AUTHOR OF "SILANUS THE CHRISTIAN Paul. Wherefore, O king Agrippa, I was not disobedient unto the heavenly vision... testifying... how that he first by the resurrection of the dead should proclaim light both to the people and to the Gentiles. Festus (in a loud voice). Paul, thou art mad. Thy much learning doth turn thee to madness. Paul. I am not mad, most excellent Festus, but speak forth words of truth and soberness King Agrippa, believest thou the prophets ? Acts of the Apostles xxvi. 19 — 27. LONDON Adam and Charles Black 1907 Cambriiige : PRINTED BY JOHN CLAY, M.A. AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS. 3S A TO ISAIAH AND PAUL "FORMED FROM THE WOMB" AND "APPOINTED" TO SEE "THE KING" AND "THE RIGHTEOUS ONE" IN VISIONS THE MORE REAL BECAUSE SUPERNATURAL BEING ABOVE THE PERCEPTIONS OF FLESHLY NATURE AND THE MORE DIVINE BECAUSE NATURAL BEING IN ACCORDANCE WITH SPIRITUAL NATURE WHEREIN MAN IS MOST LIKE GOD r^TM^sJiCi^e-j r' SUPPLEMENT TO DEDICATION. "More than forty years had elapsed since Fox had begun to see visions^ and to cast out devils. He was then a youth of pure morals and grave deportment, with a perverse temper, with the education of a labouring man, and with an intellect in the most unhappy of all states, that is to say, too much disordered for liberty, and not sufficiently disordered for Bedlam." Macaulay's History of England, vol. II. p. 251. "The Lord shewed me, that the natures of those things which were hurtful without, were wathin in the hearts and minds of wicked men. The natures of dogs, swine, vipers, of Sodom and Egypt, Pharaoh, Cain, Ishmael, Esau, etc. The natures of these I saw within, though people had been looking without. I cried to the Lord, saying, * Why should I be thus, seeing I was never addicted to commit those evils ?' And the Lord answered, ' It was needful I should have a sense of all conditions, how else should I speak to all conditions?' In this I saw the infinite love of God. I saw also, that there was an ocean of darkness and death ; but an infinite ocean of light and love, which flowed over the ocean of darkness. In that also I saw the infinite love of God, and I had great openings. " As I was walking by the steeple-house side in the town of Mansfield, the Lord said unto me, 'That which people trample upon mugt be thy food.' And as the Lord spake he opened to me, that people and professors trampled upon the life, even the life of Christ was trampled upon ; they fed upon words, and fed one another with words ; but trampled under foot the blood of the Son of God, which blood was my life : and they lived in their airy notions, talking of him.... " I saw into that which was without end, things which cannot be uttered, and of the greatness and infiniteness of the love of God, which cannot be expressed by words. For I had been brought through the very ocean of darkness and death, and through and over the power of Satan, by the eternal glorious power of Christ ; even through that darkness was I brought which covered over all the world, which chained down all, and shut up all in the death.... "And I saw the harvest white, and the seed of God lying thick in the ground, as ever did wheat that was sown outwardly, and none to gather it ; for this I mourned with tears.... " I saw that there was a great crack to go throughout the earth, and a great smoke to go as the crack went, and that after the crack there should be a great shaking. This was the earth in people's hearts, which was to be shaken before the seed of God was raised out of the earth." George Yoyd Journal, ed. 1765, pp.12 — 13. ^ Macaulay adds in a footnote, "For a specimen of his visions, see h\5 Journal p. 13" (fol. ed. 1765). This includes only the last three above-quoted paragraphs. I add two earlier ones from p. 12, for better comprehension of the vision of " the very ocean of darkness and death" on p. 13. For remarks on this Supplement and on its relation to the Dedication, see below pp. 80 foil. PREFACE THE present work came to be written in the fulfilment of a promise to publish some Notes on the text of Silamis the Christian. There were three objects in view. The first was easy and brief — to give, and explain, the contexts of any quotations (especially from Epictetus) that required explanation. The second was less easy, less brief, and more technical — to prove the truth of statements about the New Testament by appeal to the most ancient authorities. The third was to set forth the motives and assumptions underlying Silanus, and to shew their reasonableness. This was difficult to combine with the other two. For it involved argument, explanation, and illustration, in a style different from that of technical and critical Notes. Further, it had been my intention to make the Notes a link between preceding and forthcoming parts of Diatessa- rica, and, for that purpose, to append a reprint of the Indices of Parts III — VI of Diatessarica, adding newly-made Indices of Parts I and II. When, however, the reprint and the additions were completed, it appeared that these (amplified by the Index of Part VII) would run to a good deal more than a hundred pages. Those who might care for such a work seemed likely to prefer to have it separately. So I decided to publish that by itself under the title Indices to Diatessarica. Then, reviewing (as they passed through the press) the vii PREFACE earlier parts of the proposed composite work, I discovered that, in the attempt to illustrate the gospels in which the young Silanus found so many difficulties, the Notes on Silanus had expanded to such an extent that not a twentieth part could now be properly so entitled. They had become now, in effect, notes on points of interest to students of the New Testament — some of them (as for example, the note on the Date of the Apocalypse, and the Dissertation on " The Son of Man ") amounting almost to separate treatises. The promised " Notes on Silanus" properly so called, were still there ; but to have called them by that name would have been quite misleading. Their right title now was undoubtedly Notes on New Testament Criticism. Lastly, going back to the introductory portion of the proposed composite volume, I found that this, too, required reconsideration. My attempts to remove what appeared to me misunderstandings had caused it to grow far beyond its intended dimensions. It had also become, to a greater degree than I had anticipated, descriptive of the author's individual and personal convictions and developments — interesting possibly to some, but not to the same class of readers that would desire, for example, to study consecutive extracts setting forth the views of Justin Martyr, Irenseus, Tertullian, and Origen, on the meaning of " The Son of Man." So I resorted once more to disintegration, deciding to publish the Introduction as a separate volume, before the other two. Being of the nature of an explanation and defence, it seemed aptly and briefly describable as Apologia. As to the Notes on New Testament Criticism, and the Indices to Diatessarica — both of which I hope to publish in the course of this year (1907) — I will reserve further comment for their several prefaces, merely remarking that the Notes will constitute Part VII of Diatessarica (2800—2999). viii PREFACE As to the present work, and its attitude towards ordinary views of Christianity, I would refer the reader to chapters X — XII addressed to "A friend" and to "Friendly reviewers," and would gladly avoid further prefatory remark, but for the fact that one very serious misunderstanding, unmentioned in those chapters, has just come into my mind, occurring in a particularly kindly review, and indicating that the writer thought me to be more in agreement than I really am with ordinary views about miracles. On this point I thought I had been already clear. At all events I will try to be clear now. " Dr Abbott " — says the Westminster Gazette — " rather unfairly to himself, throws in our faces, in the very first sentence of his preface, his early disbelief in the miraculous element in the Bible ; but he knows as well as anyone that, whatever may be the precise truth about the details, an honest and an admiring belief in the reality of miracles, mostly of a simple kind, was an effective element in religion in the period of which he treats." The precise way in which two educated Roman gentle- men, such as Scaurus and Silanus, would have regarded some of the miracles of the New Testament — for example, the withering of the fig-tree and the drowning of the swine — I will not now discuss. On that point I will merely venture to express my opinion that some educated critics of those days — though not quite up to the Thucydidean level, illustrated by the great historian's comment on the popular readiness to read a prophetic limos as loimos — may not have been so inferior as is commonly supposed, to some modern educated critics, in keenness of insight, good sense, allowance for exaggerations, and love of truth. But on this point I may be wrong. On my next point I am certainly not wrong, for it concerns my own convictions. In saying that I have acted " unfairly " to myself, because ix PREFACE I have given prominence to my " early disbelief in the miraculous element of the Bible," the reviewer seems to think that I have given up this " early disbelief," and that I have been " unfair " to myself in mentioning it. That is not the case. So far from giving up that early disbelief, I feel it more strongly than ever, only with a correspondingly increased strength of belief that Christ is still divine, still the incarnate Son of God, still the just object of Christian worship along with the Father and the Holy Spirit. PJiilochristus (1878) and Onesimiis (1882) were both written under the influence of the conviction that a belief in miracles ought not to be regarded as necessary for the worship of Christ. Silamis (1906) was written after much longer and closer study of the facts, under a much stronger conviction that a time is at hand when well-educated students of the New Testament will find it easier to worship Christ without miracles than with them. This particular critic, then, accuses me, so to speak, of believing more than I profess to believe. Others have taken an opposite view. Finding that I have given up faith in Biblical miracles, they seem to me to have inferred that I am deficient in faith generally, and that I believe much less than they do in the divine government of the world. So far as I can judge, the contrary is the fact. And indeed why should not the contrary be the fact? Because a man gives up faith in the Ptolemaic astronomy and takes up faith in the Newtonian astronomy, does he necessarily cease to believe that a great God and a wise God ordained and sustains the motions of the heavenly hosts? When he casts aside the crystal spheres and other clumsy materialistic machinery by which the primitive astronomers sought to explain the ways of God to men, does he con- sequently dispense with God Himself? PREFACE At all events in my own case the interpretation of the Scriptures on what may be called the Newtonian as distinct from the Ptolemaic principle has led me on to feel about them — with a feeling infinitely deeper than in my youth and early manhood — what the Psalmist expressed about the Book of the World, " Marvellous are thy works, and that my soul knoweth right well." Each year strengthens my conviction that the universe, human and non-human, is much more wonderfully made than any human mind has as yet conceived ; that materialistic science has not made, and never will make, a hair's breadth of progress towards the knowledge of the Primaeval Cause or Ultimate Goal — except so far as it has helped to suggest netv analogies^ and to rise from 7iew material discoveries to new spiritual thoughts. Now, as before, only more clearly than before, I realise that our one clue to the truth, and our one hope of the highest good, must be found in the Word that " was in the beginning and was with God and was God." But this kind of faith — which some may call excessive or fanatical — finding its scope in a spiritual world, is quite compatible with a strict and stern scepticism as to such material facts as are determinable by experiment and evidence in accordance with scientific methods. In these days, with our increased means of ascertaining historical and scientific truth, the highest faith appears to me to demand, from all serious and honest students of the Bible, a sober and resolute in- credulity as to all alleged occurrences that cannot stand historical and scientific tests. Those who are not true to the lower truth in the visible and transient world of fact and flesh will find it increasingly difficult — dragged down by the weight of honest doubts not quite honestly suppressed — to rise to the higher truth in the invisible and eternal world of thought and spirit. xi PREFACE It is a desire to be, at all hazards, clear, thB.t has in part dictated the Dedication of this work. Some may be offended at it, and put the book down. If so, it will have served, at least, one of its purposes. For it was intended, not indeed to offend anyone but to deter some from reading further — to deter all, in fact, who feel that they can never accept the author's fundamental axiom ; which is, that although the visible heaven and earth will ultimately pass away, there are certain " words," thoughts, and (so to speak) invisible visions, spiritual visions, that " will never pass away." The things that are materially seen are temporal, but the things that are not materially seen are eternal. On this assumption — for, logically speaking, it is an assumption, capable indeed of being imparted, but not of being demonstrated by verbal logic or scientific experiment — all the writer's work is based. Take this basis away and he has no hope for himself and no hope that he could honestly try to impart to others. Is this clear ? " Yes," I think, will be the answer of those who will take the trouble to distinguish between a " vision " and "that which is visionary." They may indeed ask for a criterion to distinguish true visions from false (a question that I cannot touch on here^) ; they may also deny (as I too ^ See Essays for the Times , No. 15, Revelation by Visions and Voices, price 6d, London, Francis Griffiths, pp. 25 — 33, where I have reminded the reader that it is not Shakespeare but Theseus, who classes together the visions of the poet, the maniac, and the lover. So, of course, it may be said on the other side that it is not Shakespeare but Hippolyta, who replies : — "All the story of the night told over, And all their minds transfigured so together, More witnesseth than fancy's images. And grows to something of great constancy ; But, howsoever, strange and admirable." It seems to me that Shakespeare is on the side of the poets. Like Horace, he "laughs and speaks the truth" through a woman's lips. xii PREFACE should deny) that visions alone could supply the basis for a permanent religion ; they may assert (what I should dispute) that Christendom will cease to be Christian if it ever gives up its belief in Christ's tangible resurrection ; but they will not say — after the explanation given above — that the author, in putting such a dedication on the first page of his book, " acts rather unfairly to himself" Much rather they will recognise that in thus emphasizing the importance he attaches to visions he is dealing fairly with all concerned, guarding the reader from misunderstanding and the writer from being misunderstood. My thanks are due to several friends for corrections and suggestions. The Rev. J. Hunter Smith, formerly a colleague of mine at King Edward's School Birmingham, has sent me most useful extracts from the works of modern critics, from whose remarks, even where I could not agree with them, I have often derived help as they pointed to sources that I had left untouched. Mr H. Candler, formerly Assistant Master at Uppingham — the " H. C." to whom Flat/and was dedicated many years ago — subjected my proofs to a searching exami- So, in a serious mood, he makes Horatio — perhaps the calmest and most philosophic of all Shakespearian characters, not really surpassed by Brutus — predict, in a subsequently verified prediction, that the spirit of Hamlet's father, dumb to others, "will speak to him." I should not hesitate to say that one test of a true vision is the "transfiguring" of the "minds" of those who see it and of those to whom they impart it, and that, judged by this test, Paul's vision of the risen Saviour was " true." But, further, believing in the objective existence of the Spirit of Christ after death, and in the existence of spiritual laws in accordance with which He manifested Himself, I should venture to assert that the Spirit of the Saviour would necessarily be "dumb" to Caiaphas and Pilate while making Himself audible to Paul, had he been standing between the two. Caiaphas and Pilate would not have been prepared to see such a vision or hear its voice. Paul had been thus prepared by the aspirations, the efforts, and the errors, of his past life. xiii PREFACE nation as the result of which I have made many alterations. Other obligations are acknowledged where they occur. But I should like to add here that the letter commented on in Chapter X was written to me, after an inspection of the proofs of Silamis, by my old and valued friend the Rev. J. Llewelyn Davies, D.D., Rector of Kirkby Lonsdale. His letter was all the more useful to me because it frankly expressed dissent from my views ; and I owe him all the more thanks because he kindly allowed me to use it, and to mention his name in connexion with it, though it had not been written with any thought of publication. Edwin A. Abbott. Wellside Hampstead 9 March, 1907 XIV CONTENTS References PAGE xvi APOLOGIA CHAPTER I. Prepossession, or, the Gospels as Records of A Life II. Ought Prepossession to include Miracles? III. The Gospels as Records of Circumstances IV. The Gospels as Gr^eco- Jewish Traditions V. The relj\tion of the Gospel to the Law . VI. The Gospel of "kindness" .... VII. How the Fourth Gospel expresses " kindness " VIII. The Gospel of "truth" . IX. Obstacles to the Gospel of Truth X. To A Friend XI. To A Friendly Reviewer XII. To Another Friendly Reviewer . XIII. To the Reader: A Summary. 3 9 i6 20 25 28 32 38 42 49 57 68 84 XV REFERENCES REFERENCES Black Arabic numbers refer to paragraphs in the several volumes of Diatessarica : — 1— 111= Clue. 273 — 551 = Correc/ions. 553— 114:9= From Letter to Spirit. 1150—1435 = Paradosis. 1436 — 1885 =Johannine Vocabulary. 1886 — 2799 =Johannine Grammar. 2800 — 29^9 = Notes on New Testament Criticism (see Pref p. viii). XV] APOLOGIA A. A. CHAPTER I PREPOSSESSION, OR, THE GOSPELS AS RECORDS OF A LIFE In one aspect of the gospels, they may be regarded as attempts to describe the Hfe of one whom almost all Christians regard as divine, and whom most Christians (including the author) regard as divine in the highest sense. How are the records of such a life to be approached so that it may be, I will not say comprehended, but apprehended ? Some may say, " Impartially, on the evidence, and without prepossession, as we should study the biography of Mohammed. Put aside your belief that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God. Weigh the narratives, their agreements, their disagreements. Eliminate what is erroneous or improbable. Arrange and explain all that is certain or probable so far as it can be made to fall into one consistent account of a human being. But let there be no prepossession. Dismiss, for the time, your belief in Christ's divinity, and argue about him as dispassionately as if it would make no difference to you whether investigation proved him to be the incarnate Son of God or a Jewish fanatic." On the other hand, Wordsworth declares that there is a " kind of prepossession " without which " the soul receives PREPOSSESSION no knowledge that can bring forth good^" That sounds unscientific. But is it ? Is it not a scientific certainty that no child can grow into a man unless he starts in life with a " kind of prepossession " that he must trust to experience, and learn from experience? The action that pained a child once will, he infers, pain him again, if he repeats the action. Some may call the child's first avoidance of the repetition of a painful action physical or instinctive. But in time, at all events, it becomes inferential. Whence springs the ^rst m/erence? I know no better answer than that which Wordsworth seems to suggest — " from a kind of prepossession." A voice says to the child, " What happened before will happen again," and he is "prepossessed" with a feeling that he must trust the voice. And is it for nothing that, as a general rule, the baby's first "experience," derived from a very limited induction, is that humanity, represented by its mother, is kind — an illusion, no doubt, but an illusion that may guide to truth ? Silanus approaches the gospels with a " prepossession " as to Christ's " constraining love," derived in the first place from the epistles of Paul, who had felt that love, and in the next place from Clemens the Athenian, to whom that love had been imparted. Scaurus approaches the gospels without that pre- possession. The contrast between the results of the two methods of approach is intended to shew (among other things) that the gospels do not supply a good Christian initiation except in the hands of those teachers who have felt the love of Christ. ' T/ie Prelude, Book viii. Elsewhere (Book xiv) he describes the soul as rising "up to the height oi feeling intellect^'' and says : — "This spiritual Love acts not nor can exist Without Imagination, which, in truth. Is but another name for absolute power And clearest insight, amplitude of mind, And Reason in her most exalted mood." PREPOSSESSION But this " prepossession " of Silanus is really an inference drawn from facts. When an astronomer sees a planet deviating from its ordinary course or rate of motion, he infers a force that causes the deviation. Then he forms a working hypo- thesis about this force. On the basis of his hypothesis he makes further observations and calculations with the view of finding the exact cause — an unknown planet perhaps — that may explain all the phenomena. Somewhat similar is the course taken by Silanus, when he attempts to explain the success of what a Roman would call " the Christian superstition." He sees Saul the persecutor become Paul the missionary, ranging Asia and Europe as a spiritual conqueror, and subjecting the souls of men to the same Christ that had made his soul subject. Paul, he finds, speaks of Christ's " constraining love." This " prepossesses " him to believe that Jesus must have had a marvellous if not unique personality. The vague stories about the first of the C^sars, appearing after death to his assassins and turning their swords against themselves, sink into nothing (so Silanus argues) in comparison with this subjugation of Paul, and (through Paul) of so many mul- titudes of Gentiles, by Jesus the Jew. This feeling "possesses" him " before " he reads the gospels. Etymologically regarded, it may be called "prepossession." But, regarded logically, is it not inference ? Another " prepossession " felt by Silanus is a general belief in the power of goodness, and — even when that belief is temporarily shaken — a belief or feeling that one must side with the good against the evil, even though the evil may conquer: (p. 365) " Rather than submit to the Beast, it is better to be on the conquered side." But this, too, is in part an inference. " There are those," he exclaims, " who will not be the slaves of the Beast — Epictetus, Scaurus, my father, others known to me, multitudes unknown." So far as these rebels against the Beast are merged in the " multitudes 5 PREPOSSESSION unknown," the speaker is moved by prepossession ; but so far as he is influenced by those "known" to him, he is acting from inference, or from inferential feeling, though the feeling may in part go back to so early a period in childhood that it can hardly be distinguished from prepossession. Apply these considerations to the study of the gospels. The earliest of them, that of Mark, gives us fair warning at the very outset that the writer is not going to tell us a new story. He is going to continue an old one. " As it is written in the prophet Isaiah," he says. Turning to Isaiah, we find that Mark is referring to a " gospel " of Isaiah that promised a forgiveness of sins\ The same prophet — or perhaps, in view of the plurality of authorship, it would be safer to say the same " book of Isaiah " as it was known to Mark — drew a vivid picture of a Suffering Servant of God who "bore the sins" of his people and "made intercession" for them. When, therefore, the evangelist tells us, a few lines afterwards — without giving us any preparatory information about the nature of the gospel or good news— that almost the first words of Jesus of Nazareth were, " Believe in the gospel," we may be naturally and logically "possessed" with the anticipation — before going further in the biography— that we shall find Jesus connecting His gospel with the forgiveness of sins-. 1 See Notes^ 2839 a foil. The importance of the connexion between Mark and Isaiah is perhaps not sufficiently recognised. A friend, criticizing Silanus and expressing a very friendly appreciation of the Epictetian chapters at the beginning of the book, and of the Clementine chapters at the end, writes that he " would like to cut out the chapters about Isaiah." Probably he is right from the artistic point of view. I dare say they are dull. But they are an integral part of Silanus, and an important part for anyone desiring to ascertain what the work has to suggest about the origin and scope of the earliest synoptic gospel, — where, by "scope," I mean not only what the earliest evangelist includes, but also (and still more) what he omits because he assumes it to be known, and what he excludes as being out of his province. 2 See Silaiius^ pp. 184-5. PREPOSSESSION But what is forgiveness of sins ? Many confuse it with mere remission of penalty. Others, while feeling that it is something more, cannot say ^vJlat more. It is, indeed, a very mysterious though (in various degrees) a very common human faculty. In attempts to describe it\ I have tried to avoid circumscribing it so as to define or limit too precisely the extent to which one human being may have the power of imparting to another an actual lightening or remission of the burden of sin. But this power of forgiving, however indefinable and inexplicable, remains a fact. Those who know nothing about it, know nothing about the chief object of Christ's life. How then can they understand His words or works, if they are totally ignorant of what He is talking about and of the object towards which He is directing His actions? Again, Mark tells us, and the other evangelists agree with him, that John the Baptist (whom all. Christians and non- Christians alike, recognise as a Jewish prophet and reformer, of great force of character, who largely influenced great multitudes of his countrymen) accepted Christ as his chief. All the evangelists say that this acceptance was before Christ had performed a single " mighty work," and they connect it in various ways with a vision. This leads us back to the visions of ancient Israel — visions of many kinds, but almost all (if they were visions that manifested God) abounding in splendour and glory and for the most part inspiring temporary fear. The new vision revealed the Holy Spirit itself descending on Jesus. It may mean that the Spirit came to make its home in Jesus as a dove in its nest. Or it may mean that John actually saw a visionary dove-. In any case the vision appears 1 lb. pp. 187 foil., 235 foil. 2 On the meaning of " actually," applied to the seeing of something visionary, see '•'■Revelation by Visions and Voices^'' price dd., Griffiths, London. It was originally intended to be a part of Through Nature to Christy which is now out of print. On the Dove, see I)iaiessa}ica Part III (662-724). 7 PREPOSSESSION to have inspired no fear. Even a non-Christian biographer of Christ ought to regard this story as important evidence. It bears on the relation between Jesus and one whom most would agree to call the last of the prophets. If we accept it, and if we have any adequate appreciation of John the Baptist himself, it ought to "prepossess" us to find in Jesus one greater than the greatest of the prophets, one who felt His whole life to be inspired continuously by those heavenly influences which His predecessors claimed to receive only in discontinuous revelations. CHAPTER II OUGHT PREPOSSESSION TO INCLUDE MIRACLES? This inferential " prepossession," be it noted, relates to spiritual not to material power. The mind looks back to the prophets of Israel promising a future forgiveness, which they could not themselves impart. Then it regards John the Baptist as proclaiming its advent in Jesus. Lastly it is prepossessed with a readiness to believe that Jesus may have felt this power within Himself — this strange faculty of forgiving and of enabling others to forgive. It is divine and may be called supernatural, above our powers. Or it may be called preternatural, beyond our present natural powers and yet not above them. In any case, the power of forgiving sins is not what is commonly called miraculous. Quibble and quarrel as we may about the definitions of " miracle," we all recognise the distinction between the supernatural act of instantaneously withering up sin, and the miraculous act of instantaneously withering up a tree. It is very easy to be misty about miracles, with a mistiness of speech resulting (it is always to be hoped) from nothing worse than mistiness in thought. I will do my very best to be clear, at all events in speech. Friends, or critics, have asked me why I am so perverse, and obstinate, and " given up to a fixed idea," in rejecting miracles. Do I reject them, they ask, merely as " violations " of the laws of nature or also as " counteractions " of the laws of nature ? It is not in either aspect that I reject them. Nor do I profess myself able to " reject miracles as a zvhole " in any aspect. PREPOSSESSION AND THE MIRACLES The use of abstract terms and general propositions, in connexion with miracles, leads, as it seems to me, sometimes to misunderstanding, sometimes to endless and fruitless controversy, and sometimes to a sort of " wriggling," or evasion, that borders on intellectual dishonesty. For example, when evidence is brought to shew that this or that miracle is a legend — honest, but still a legend, to be explained as a legend and in accordance with our experiences of legendary growth — it is no answer to say that the bringer of this evidence " has a rooted antipathy to miracles " ; or that " miracles are not a priori impossible" ; or — which I have seen in print — "the possibility of Four Dimensions has pulverised the argument against miracles." The question is not one of this kind. It is not of a general nature. Still less is it of a personal nature. The question is as to the nature of the evidence for and against a particular miracle. To divert attention from this definite issue, by such arguments as these, or by solemnly enunciating the platitude that " After all, you cannot prove miracles to be necessarily false," is to be guilty of a very serious offence. You cannot prove a// " mirac/es," but you can prove t/iis or tJiat miracle, to be "false." The unwary hearer is sometimes led to believe that, because you cannot prove all miracles to be false, there- fore you cannot prove all the miracles in Jonah to be false, or at least to be no miracles. But you can do this. And you may be able to do the same thing about all the miracles in Genesis, and in Exodus, and in Mark, and in Matthew, and so on. If you deliberately deceive your hearer into supposing that what is impossible for all miracles is also impossible for all the miracles in any particular book or books, you are — a deceiver. If you deceive him ignorantly, then you are guilty of an offence, very small in comparison, but still very gross in a teacher — ignoratio elenchi. But the advocate of miracles may turn round on us and say, " I did not say ' false,' I said ' necessarily false.' " True. But lO PREPOSSESSION AND THE MIRACLES what would a j ury say to him, in a British law-court, if he, being counsel for an accused man, said, " Gentlemen, the prosecutor cannot prove my client's explanation to be necessarily false"? Would not they reply, " What ' necessarily false ' may mean we do not quite see and do not very much care. It is enough for us that it is proved to be 'false' " " Necessarily false " is sometimes used, like " necessarily impossible," to mean necessity brought about by the nature of things, or a priori necessity. And the platitude, " Miracles cannot be proved to be necessarily false'' is sometimes intended to express the assertion, " God could work miracles if He liked. You cannot prove that He necessarily cannot or will not." Who dreams of " proving " it .? Who but an absolute fool would mention such a proposition in the same breath with " proof" ? This use of " necessarily " — how can we describe it except as another instance of ignoratio carried to its utmost — ignoratio elenchi absolnta et perfecta, not to be excused except in a born Philom}'thus } In view of the frequency of this ignoratio, it seems safer to say that, after having examined all the "signs," "wonders," "miracles," or "mighty works" mentioned in the Bible, I have been led to the conclusion that some are literally true, but in accordance with what are called laws of nature ; others are not literally true, but are metaphorical or poetical traditions erroneously taken as literal; others are visions that have been erroneously taken as non-visionary facts. Some of these visions appear to me to have been ordained by God — in accordance with laws of the spiritual world of which we have very little knowledge although it both surrounds us and is in us — to give us glimpses of truth beyond the truths of what we call " matter," and to be more real than any of what we call " material " occurrences. As Solidland may be called more " real " than Flatland, so Thoughtland may be found more real than Factland. We really know nothing whatever about what is " real." We 1 1 PREPOSSESSION AND THE MIRACLES have only faith and feeling about it — that kind of faith which bursts out in the words " The things that are seen are temporal, but the things that are not seen are eternal." These last considerations may suggest the answer to the question sometimes put to me, " Why do you persist in calling Christ ' supernatural ' when you really mean that he is ' natural,' the son of Joseph and Mary born in a natural way?' My answer is, "I call Him supernatural because many people have such poor, stupid, mean, contemptible, and degraded views of human nature, that, if I called Christ ' natural,' I should be deceiving them. I believe all the higher human nature to be in some sense 'divine,' having been 'begotten,' as the Fourth Gospel says, ' from God,' as well as by man, but Christ to be in a special sense divine, being ' begotten ' not only as the eternal Son ' in the beginning,' but also by a unique congenital act on earth, so that whereas in us there is a portion, in Him there was ' the fulness,' of the Holy Spirit." No doubt, in human nature, the flesh and the spirit are so mysteriously connected that action on the latter acts also on the former. And we may be fairly and scientifically pre- possessed with the belief that such a one as Christ may have had a marvellous power of healing the human frame. Even though such acts of healing may have been exaggerated in reporting, so that we have to reject much, we may be reasonably prepared to believe a great deal that would be incredible in the records of an ordinary man. But still this prepossession concerning the healing of the body ought to be quite subordinate to the prepossession concerning the healing of the soul. And neither of these prepossessions ought to extend to the " mighty works " on which, for many centuries, we have been accustomed to lay stress — such a one for example as the destruction of the swine. Paley's Evidences of Christianity affords an extreme 12 PREPOSSESSION AND THE MIRACLES instance of this " prepossession " in favour of miracles. He goes so far as to argue that " the story " for which the Christian apostles contended was " a miraculous story " on the ground that " they had nothing else to stand upon." As regards the claim to be Messiah, not so much as " a doubt," he says, could have been suggested to the Jews by " a young man calling himself the Son of God, gathering a crowd about him, and delivering to them lectures of morality^" Surely this is a narrow view of an immense subject. No doubt, Christ's wonderful acts of healing helped to call the attention of the Jews to Christ's words and spiritual works. But in this passage, and throughout the whole of his treatise, Paley appears to ignore the marvellous powers possessed by a few men, makers of nations or founders of religions, creators (in some form) of new communities, who have appealed, not to miracles nor to the sense of profit, but to what they deemed to be the truth. Even in our modern experience we are often forced to exclaim, " O, the difference between man and man !" And if these differences exist " between man and man," how much greater a difference might be expected (quite apart from miracles) in the Man in whom dwelt the Divine Fulness ! In Silanus, even an unbeliever like Scaurus is represented as recognising a marked distinction between Christ and the Greek "lecturers" or "philosophers." Scaurus perceives how efficacious (quite apart from miracles) was that personal and spiritual power by which Christ converted Saul ; and Saul, now Paul, converted an appreciable part of the civilised world. To ^ Evidences of Christianity^ Part i, chap. vi. He adds, " I mean, no such doubt could exist when they had the whole case put before them, when they saw hmi put to death for his officiousness, and when by his death the evidence concerning him was closed.'''' I do not understand the final words, which I have italicised. I should have thought " the evidence " was not "closed" — nor regarded by Saul, the unbeliever, as "closed" — by Christ's death. So far as regards Saul at all events, we might almost say that " the evidence " began after Christ's death. ^3 PREPOSSESSION AND THE MIRACLES thrust upon Christian believers the dilemma, "Worship Christ as miraculous, or else treat him as a mere * lecturer of morality,' " appears to me an error of Paley's, in part resulting from his environment. With "lecturers" he was familiar. His studies perhaps had not drawn him towards great prophets and spiritual movers of mankind. Hence he may have underrated the power of the spirit. Just so a child might disbelieve in Robinson Crusoe's description of a wave " as high as a great hill," because his own experiences of water had been limited to the area of a washing-basin or a tub. We cannot study Christ scientifically unless we approach the subject with a prepossession as to the greatness of " the Son of man," that is to say, potential humanity. But spiritual greatness and material greatness, spiritual power and material power, Thoughtland and Factland, must be kept entirely distinct'. To say that Christ towered above His apostles, and gave the Bread of Life to Thomas, is true. But assertions such as those in the Acfs of John, that the disciples saw " His feet whiter than any snow, so that the ground there was lighted up by His feet, and His head reaching unto the heaven," and again, " Oftentimes He appeared to me a small man and uncomely and then again as one reaching to heaven," and again, " If at any time He were bidden by one of the Pharisees and went to the bidding, we went with Him : and there was set before each one [of the ^ Comp. Flatland (now out of print) 2nd. ed. p. xiv, where the author expresses the hope "that, taken as a whole, his work may prove suggestive, as well as amusing, to those Spacelanders of moderate and modest minds who — speaking of that which is of the highest importance but lies beyond experience — decline to say on the one hand ' This can never be,' and on the other hand, ' It must needs be precisely thus, and we know all about it.' " I italicise " lies beyond experience." For these words were never intended to suggest that alleged historical facts belong to the province that " lies beyond experience." The phrase referred to the ultimate cause of things. 14 PREPOSSESSION AND THE MIRACLES guests] a loaf of bread by the host, and He also with us received a loaf. And He would bless His own and divide it amongst us ; and from that little each of us was filled and our own loaves were saved whole, so that they who bade Him were amazed^" — these must be rejected as false. Why? On a priori grounds? No, but for three reasons. First, there is no sufficient evidence to prove the alleged fact. Secondly, if the alleged fact had been fact, Christ's biographers would almost certainly have mentioned it. Thirdly, we can shew how the writer came to believe in his stories and to allege non-fact as fact. ^ See Acts of John^ ch. 2-8. Of course some may reject these tales as deliberate fictions. I do not. Having regard to their nature, and to their very early date, I think they arose in a natural way from metaphor misunderstood. ^s CHAPTER III THE GOSPELS AS RECORDS OF CIRCUMSTANCES It is not always easy to distinguish the personal aspect of the gospels from the impersonal; the records of the Man from the records of His circumstances. Under the former we may consider such words as those to the paralytic, " Thy sins are forgiven thee," and the act of healing that followed the command, " Arise and walk." Under the latter we may consider the statement that, after Christ's death, the stone was rolled away from His sepulchre. But the two aspects run into one another. Whether the stone was rolled away " by an angel," or by Christ Himself, does not seem to make much difference, when we are con- fronted with an appeal to that " kind of prepossession " which Wordsworth justifies. " Surely in this case, if ever," so it may be argued, " God might be expected, as St Peter says, to have ' loosed the pangs of death,' and to have ' raised up ' Jesus, because ' it was not possible that He should be holden by it\' Is not this something more than a mere question of fact .-' Do not ' motive ' and ' character ' — the ' motive,' so to speak, and the 'character' of God Himself — intervene in a question of this kind ? " I think they do. The " prepossession " implied by St Peter in the words, " It was not possible that He should ^ Acts ii. 24. 16 THE GOSPELS AS RECORDS OF CIRCUMSTANCES be holden by it," seems to me, in Wordsworth's sense, and in the highest sense, most " reasonable." But that does not imply acceptance of it as a materialistic statement. Those who are forced to reject the legends of the ascension of Enoch and Elijah, will find in the Old Testament no justification at all, not even from an induction of two instances, for ante- cedently supposing that the Father, for the sake of His incarnate Son, would roll away a material stone from a material grave. On the other hand, they may see reason for supposing that His Son would be spiritually raised up and would begin, after His death, to reign with a new power in the hearts of His disciples. That this spiritual resurrection should be attested by visions and voices, may seem to them reasonable and natural. They may regard it as a scientific deduction from the history of visions and voices, which even an atheist must admit to have been very powerful instruments in moulding mankind. The difference between the scientific atheist and the scientific Christian is, that the former probably thinks all the visions recorded in literature, including Isaiah's vision and the manifestations of the risen Saviour — however much they have influenced mankind — mere rubbish. The latter does not. So far as concerns Christians, then, and their discussions among themselves, it appears that the prepossession in favour of what may be called a tangible resurrection is met by another prepossession in favour of a spiritual resurrection. If it be urged that God would not have allowed Christian believers to entertain for so many centuries the former belief unless it had been true, the reply is obvious, that He has allowed mankind to remain for a much larger number of centuries under illusions as to the nature and motions of some of His noblest works, the glorious hosts of heaven, and that His almost invariable method of teaching seems to be of the same kind. As He leads His children through much tribula- tion into the Kingdom of Righteousness, so does He lead A. A. 17 2 THE GOSPELS them through the labyrinth of much illusion into His Temple of Truth. For Christian students, the result is that, in deciding between a tangible and an intangible resurrection, we are thrown back upon the verbal and historical evidence. That there was some real resurrection we all agree. Of what kind it was, we may not feel certain. But we must decide from the records, not forgetting those that come from the one witness who, writing before all the rest afid speaking in his own person^ is able to say " Have I not seen Jesus our Lord"^ ? " The same witness says, " He appeared to Cephas " and " last of all, as unto one born out of due time, he appeared to me alsoV as though there were no difference, in kind, between the "appear- ances " — only a difference of time. We must also closely examine the very numerous and remarkable variations in the later accounts, contained in our gospels, and endeavour to explain their origin. In Silanus, it is maintained that these variations can all be explained as the honest but erroneous results of a tendency to interpret spiritual language and metaphor in a literal and materialistic manner — a tendency that has affected large portions of the gospels. Let me here call attention to a special instance of such apparent misunderstanding, which seems to deserve more notice than it has hitherto received from modern commentators. Matthew — alone among the evangelists — alleges that Christ said to the Twelve, " Raise the dead^." Chrysostom and Jerome, with other Fathers and some MSS., omit this precept. Well they may. For Matthew describes the Saviour Himself as " raising the dead " in only one instance, that of Jairus's daughter. Yet here we find our Lord represented as commanding all the apostles to perform this stupendous act ! ' I Cor. ix. I. 2 J Cor. xv. 5-8. ^ Mt. X. 8. In the Acts of the Apostles (ix. 41, xx. 10) only one such act is attributed to Peter and one to Paul. 18 AS RECORDS OF CIRCUMSTANCES Perhaps the two Fathers above-mentioned omitted the precept, against the evidence of the MSS., simply because they were prepossessed against it as incredible. If so, they were wrong : for its apparent incredibility makes it all the more probable that it was uttered. But were they more wrong than Alford, who prints the text and notes its omission by many good authorities, without a word of comment .-* It is contended, in Silanns, that the precept was uttered by Christ (like many of His other sayings) in a spiritual sense but interpreted by Christians at an early period in a literal sensed But if that contention should prove to be true the consequences of its truth would be far-reaching. 1 See Silanus, pp. 337-8, and Noies on New Testament Criticism^ 2995. 19 2 — 2 CHAPTER IV THE GOSPELS AS GRAECO-JEWISH TRADITIONS Under the foregoing title the gospels may be discussed in two ways, first, in their relations with one another, secondly, as parts of a continuous stream of Jewish thought expressed in Greek and influenced by Greek, as regards both thought and language. On the first point Diatessarica has attempted to shew that Matthew and Luke borrow largely from a corrected edition of Mark^; that in many cases where Luke omits or alters what is in Mark, John intervenes to interpret Mark^ ; and, generally, that the later evangelists often write with reference, or allusion, to the earlier ones. It has also been incidentally pointed out that Mark is influenced by Isaiahs But no systematic attempt has been made in Diatessarica, so far, to shew how each of our evangelists has been influenced by the ancient traditions of the Hebrews, and by their Greek or Jewish interpreters. Take, for example, an English Concordance to the Bible, and look down the columns that illustrate the words, "Repent" or " Repentance." In the Old Testament " repent" occurs but seldom. When it does occur, it is more often applied to God than to man. Sometimes God is said to " repent him of the evil*." On other occasions, it is said that God " will not spare 1 See Corrections of Mark, 318 (i) foil, and 323. 2 Ste Johannine Gratnmar, Index, "John the Evangelist, intervention of" ; comp. Silanus, p. 306. 3 See Corrections 0/ Mark, 459(iv)n. i. * Jer. xviii. 8. 20 THE GOSPELS or repent\" or that He is " not a man that he should lie ; neither the son of man that he should repent-." When we come to the New Testament instances, we find them much more abundant, but always referring to man, not to God. The usage, however, varies greatly in different books of the New Testament. " Repent " and " repentance " occur about 40 times in the Synoptic gospels and the Acts. The verb occurs a dozen times in Revelation. But neither noun nor verb occurs once in the Johannine gospel or epistles. First, why is there this difference between the Old Testament and the New? Are we to suppose that human "repentance" was a new doctrine, Christian, not Jewish or Hebrew? In the next place, why do some Christian writers so often use the word while others altogether avoid it ? To the first question the answer is, that no doctrine is more vehemently inculcated by the Hebrew prophets. Only, instead of calling it " repentance," that is to say " recalling with pain " — the word used in the saying " God will not repent" — they use a much nobler phrase, "turning to Jehovah." In describing man's righteous repentance as a kind of " turn- ing,'" ancient Hebrew almost always inserts "to Jehovah," "from sins," or some modifying clause, for the sake of clearness. Otherwise, "turning" might mean "turning away," "apostasy." But in later Hebrew or Aramaic one of the noun-forms meaning " turning " came to be specially applied to this good kind of turning-' ; and so, both noun and verb could be used absolutely in a good sense. Hence, if the Baptist, or our ^ Ezek. xxiv. 14. 2 Numb, xxiii. 19, comp. i S. xv. 29. 3 Levy Ch. ii. 535 (^, and comp. Deut. xxx. 1-3 "return to the Lord,'' where Etheridge's translation of the Targum of Palestine thrice uses the noun " repentance " {i.e. turning) absolutely. Is. vi. 10 "turn [again]" — without "to the Lord" — is exceptional and is made clear by "and be healed," which follows. The only certain instance in LXX (Is. xlvi. 8 being a doubtful conflate) in which ^eTavoelv is represented by Heb. "turn" is in Sir. xlviii. 15 "for all this the people turned not, and ceased not from their sins." 21 THE GOSPELS Lord, cried to people, " Turn ! " all their hearers would know that the meaning was " Turn to the Lord ! " But the question would arise, after our Lord's death, how this ''turning'^ should be expressed in Greek. Should it be rendered still by the same word as in the phrase " Uirn to the Lord," though the omission of the words " to the Lord " made the verb now ambiguous ? Luke does this once in the words, " But thou when once thou hast turned (i.e. repented) strengthen the brethren ^" For the most part, however, he uses the Greek verb and noun signifying " change of mind {metanoia)." There are objections to metanoia. In the first place even this is ambiguous, since it may mean change of mind for the worse. Hence it is perhaps that the Pauline epistles, on two of the very few occasions when they use it, insert modifying clauses, " change of mind with a view to salvation" " change of mind with a view to recognition of trnth'^r More- over Epictetus, Plutarch, and Marcus Antoninus, sometimes use the word in a bad sense, of men worrying themselves and constantly changing their minds. Even at its best and clearest, it is far indeed below the level of the old warning of the Hebrew prophets, " Turn ye unto the Lord ! " It has been pointed out (p. 6), that in Mark — almost in the first words assigned to our Lord, " Repent and believe in the gospel " — the word " gospel " presupposes a knowledge of Isaiah's "gospel," or "good tidings," announcing the forgiveness of sins. It might also have been added that the word " repent " represents the prophetic "Turn ye to Jehovah!" This "turning" is expressed by the evangelists in various ways. Mark and Luke speak of " receiving the kingdom of God as a little child^" Matthew does not, either in his parallel to Mark or elsewhere. But he has a tradition, ^ Lk. xxii. 32. 2 2 Cor. vii. 10, 2 Tim. ii. 25. 3 Mk X. 15, Lk. xviii. 17. 22 AS GRAECO-JEWISH TRADITIONS peculiar to himself, including the old prophetic word " turn," only with an explanation, " Except ye turn, and become as the little children^" The fourth gospel — besides describing this process as " being born from above " — mentions " coming to the light" and "coming to the Father V In the same gospel, "If any man is athirst let him come unto me'" may be compared with the tradition peculiar to Matthew, " Come unto me all ye that are wearied*." This is but one of many subjects as to which the differences between the four evangelists may be in part explained by a comparison of all of them with the language of the Old Testament. Why, for example, does the fourth gospel never mention " mercy " while it abounds in mentions of " truth " — a word (in the abstract sense) never used by the Synoptists^ ? Again, why (in the gospels) is " righteousness " almost confined, and the word " perfect " entirely confined, to Matthew.!* The answers to all these and to many similar questions cannot be obtained without reference to several literary sources. First must be considered the fountain-head so often mentioned by our Lord as "the Law and the Prophets." Secondly will come Jewish interpretation of the Scriptures, so far as it can be considered as likely to represent Jewish thought of the first century, influencing our Lord Himself and the evangelists after Him. Thirdly we must consider Greek interpretation of Jewish thought as deducible from the LXX, from the second century Greek translators of the Old Testament, and from Christian writers of the first two centuries. Lastly we must consider Greek thought, and Greek idiom — as current among the earliest Greek converts — and 1 Mt. xviii. 3. ^ ]n iii. 3. iii- 21, xiv. 6. 3 Jn vii. 37. * Mt. xi. 28. * St&Jokannine Vocabulary, VJ21 m-r. 23 THE GOSPELS the extent to which they would influence evangehsts writing for Greek readers. Something has been done in previous parts of Diatessarica to provide materials for studying the gospels in this way, so far as grammar and vocabulary are concerned. But I hope to do more in Tlie Fourfold Gospel. 24 CHAPTER V THE RELATION OF THE GOSPEL TO THE LAW The method above described will (I believe) lead students to the conclusion that the purity, and the amplitude, of Christ's spiritual conceptions, have been inadequately re- cognised from the first, and that the Church is intended to grow into a fuller recognition of them. In the first place, Christians have not sufficiently recognised the grandeur of the Law on which Christ took His stand. The date of the Law and of its developments, the personality or personalities of the lawgiver or lawgivers, matter little to us as Christians. Enough for us to know that Christ accepted what " Moses " ordained — even w^hen He regarded it as im- perfect and as a temporary adaptation for an imperfect people — as coming from God, and as being based on love — love of God and love of man. " The Law of Moses " inculcated care for the poor, the fatherless, and the widow. It extended beyond overt acts. " Coveting " was prohibited. Even the "stranger" was to be "loved." Debts were to be periodically remitted by Israelites to each other, and they were not to be deterred from lending by the " base thought" of imminent remission^ Some of this may have been unpractical, but it was at all events most kind. The kindness included animals. No beast was to be put to labour ^ See Si'/anus, p. 82. 25 THE RELATION OF THE GOSPEL on the sabbath. The mother bird in its nest was to be spared ^ The ox was not to be muzzled when treading out the corn. This last enactment is quoted in the first epistle to the Corinthians with the question " Is it for the oxen that God taketh care*?" The apostle must have meant (I think) that when God enjoined kindness to animals, He had it mainly in His mind (if one may so speak) to make men kind to one another. Nevertheless one may reasonably regret that the meaning was thus expressed. The Pauline comment tends to encourage a view — which I think I have seen described as Christian and orthodox — that " animals have no rights " ! Of course, in one sense, men, too, have no permanent " rights." For " rights " may mean such claims as are based on statute law ; and the rights that a law of this year confers a law of next year may take away or suspend in emergencies. But the Jewish law at all events, being regarded by Jews as immutable, may be said to confer "rights" on irrational creatures. In the book of Jonah one claim of the city of Nineveh to God's mercy is said to be that it contains " much cattle'." Our Lord speaks of the birds of the air as being objects of God's providence, and suggests that the flowers also are included in His care. If indeed canonical law in any Christian Church assumes that "animals" are distinguished from men by having " no rights," may not that Christian canonical law be said to fall below the Law of Moses in respect of kindness ? In the second place, Christians have not recognised the greatness of humanity, as conceived by Christ, in accordance with one of the noblest of the Hebrew Psalms, which, taking for its main subject Man or the Son of Man, declares that " out of the mouth of babes and sucklings " God has " estab- lished strength"; that He has made Man "little lower than 1 Deut. xxii. 6. ^ i Cor. ix. 9 quoting Deut. xxv. 4. 3 Jonah iv. 11. 26 TO THE LAW God " ; that He has " crowned him with glory and honour " and made the Son of Man to " have dominion " over all His works ^ In Silamis- it is suggested, and an attempt will be made hereafter to confirm the suggestion, that our Lord, when He spoke of having " all authority in heaven and on earth," and of giving power to His disciples to " tread upon serpents and scorpionsV had in view a spiritual domination, which the Psalmist described literally as a power over " the beasts of the field" — which might perhaps be more clearly expressed for modern readers by "wild beasts" — and the whole of the animal world*. According to this view, the Law and the Prophets and the Psalms contained, in some sense, all Christ's teaching. He introduced nothing new when He inculcated the old funda- mental enactments, " Love God," " Love your neighbour." Only He brought into the world a new ideal of God, a new ideal of Man or the Son of Man, a new view of "neighbourhood," and a new power of drawing men nearer to God and to one another through Himself and through His disciples. The Psalms speak over and over again of God's " mercy and truth." What the Psalms reiterate in word, that (according to our belief) the gospel of Christ revealed in deed, that is to say, in the life of Christ. ^ Ps. viii. " Babes and sucklings " must be interpreted in the light of I Cor. xiv. 20 " In malice be ye babes — but in mind be full-grown men." The different possibilities of rendering the Heb. of R.V. "established strength " do not affect the conclusion that Jesus had this Psalm in view when He spoke of " the Son of Man." See Notes on N. T. Criticism, 2998. 2 See Silanus, pp. 186-7. ^ Mt. xxviii. 18, Lk. x. 19. * Ps. viii. 7-8. Buhl 93 a and Gesen. 961 . the apostles] remove a moun- tain ? ' I reply, ' They did much greater works, by raising up tm thousand of the dead (nvpiovi veKpovs),' " — on which " ten thousand " it may be remarked that Luke (Acts ix. 41, xx. 10) mentions only two. Chrysostom proceeds (2) " But z't is said (Keyovrai) that after their time certain saints, much their inferiors, actually removed mountains, at the dictation of necessity " — mentioning no names or dates, and throwing the burden of responsibility on "// is said." (3) Then he passes from an irresponsible "it is said" to a "clear" inference, thus, " Hence // is clear that these loo 43 OBSTACLES TO THE GOSPEL OF TRUTH He said. Yes, but what did He mean by " all things"? He meant the things that are real, eternal, invisible, the things of the spirit and the mind and the soul, the things needed by the rich man "going sorrowfully away" with an uncured spiritual disease within him — never the things of the body except so far as they depend on the things of the soul. Therefore, when we say to ourselves, " Did not Christ Himself believe that He could perform real miracles?" we ought to remind ourselves that He moved in a higher world of thought than ours and had purer views of what was a " real miracle.' To overthrow a tangible mountain was, in the view of Jewish thought, quite possible for an Elijah or Elisha. But might not even a necromancer perform such an act as this, as the magicians of Pharaoh had power to turn their rods into serpents and back again into rods .-* No doubt Jesus felt that would have removed [fnountains] (/cal olroi fieredeaav av) at the dictation of necessity {koKovo-t^s xpf'«s')-" (4) Then he suggests that no such necessity occurred, " But if at that time (rore) no such necessity occurred, do not find fault [with them on that account] (/xi) iyKokei)." (5) Then he finds a loophole for the apostles by contradicting a part of the text he has himself quoted ("7-sostom, and very much less pardonable. 44 OBSTACLES TO THE GOSPEL OF TRUTH He could do this, if occasion called for it, or rather if the Father bade Hivi do it. But He felt that the Father did not bid Him do it. On the other hand, to overthrow a spiritual mountain, a mountain of sin, that indeed would be a real miracle and an act worthy of God, an act not for time but for eternity. For " the things that are seen are temporal, but the things that are not seen are eternal." It was in this sense that He said "All things are possible." But, when it came to the question whether He should be delivered from physical suffering and humiliation and saved by God's act from the enemies approaching in Gethsemane to seize His body, then, after saying "All things are possible," He added " If it be possible." According to a tradition peculiar to Matthew, He declared, even in the moment of arrest, that He could still ask the Father, who would send twelve legions of angels to help Him. A different tradition is related by John. If His kingdom had been derived "from this world," His servants would have " fought " for Him : so He said to Pilate. But His kingdom was "not from this world." There are points of similarity between the two traditions. From one point of view, He could have asked the Father for help and the Father would have denied Him nothing. From another point of view, the Son — with His eyes fixed on Heaven, discerning the Father's will, and seeing the Father's hand pointing to the Cross as the Son's prescribed goal — could not ask for what was not " possible." " But, in order to establish such a conclusion as this, you have to sweep away a great part of Christ's teaching." Not of Christ's real teaching, and much less than might be sup- posed of Christ's alleged teaching, as I hope to shew in The Fourfold Gospel. Some things in the evangelistic narrative — as for example the story of the withered fig-tree, told by Mark and Matthew alone, and the story of Peter's walking on the water, told by Matthew alone — many will be glad to recognise as allegorical. Christ's comments on the former will have to be 45 OBSTACLES TO THE GOSPEL OF TRUTH taken as spiritual, and as not quite accurately recorded. This will also apply to the story of the Feeding of the Five Thousand told by all the evangelists^ Perhaps it will appear that the Johannine discourses on the Feeding, though widely different from any Synoptic account, are closer than the latter to the essence of Christ's teaching. Yet, of course — obvious though these negative conclusions are beginning to appear to a small and growing group of believers, as well as to a great and growing multitude of un- believers — a long interval must elapse before worshippers of Christ, in any large numbers, will lay aside their belief in His miracles and miraculous nature. And it is good that the interval should be long. A positive change should precede the negative, and we should learn to recognise Christ's in- visible miracles before dispensing with the visible ones. Scaurus, speaking hypothetical ly as an unbeliever, likened the Spirit of Christ to a magnetic power whereby after death He drew His disciples to Himself and towards one another. Christians also assert this. But they add that this " magnetic power" is really a divine love, is indeed the Spirit of God, and that Jesus was God incarnate. Why should a Christian ^ Christ's own references to the Feeding of the Five Thousand and to that of the Four Thousand (if only we had the earliest text of His com- ment and the exact historical account of the acts on which He comments) might indicate that He spoke ot the " loaves " — as He certainly spoke of the "leaven" and as He habitually spoke of "bread," "wine," "water," *' meat " etc. — in a metaphorical sense. It was the disciples that literalised His saying about " leaven." So much is certain. Then (so the context suggests) He may have remonstrated with them by appealing to their own experience as to the "bread," saying, in effect, "When I gave you the Word of God, the Bread from Heaven, that you might distribute it to the multitudes and receive in return the Bread for your own needs — whether it was twelve baskets or seven — do you not know that the question was not of perishable, but of the imperishable and spiritual food ? And yet you now misconstrue my words as though I meant literal leaven ! " For a discussion of this view, and of the general question, see The Fourfold Gospel (Index, "Bread"). 46 OBSTACLES TO THE GOSPEL OF TRUTH accepting this truth, and this addition too, be isolated from those who beHeve what he does, only basing their belief on conditions about miracles that he is unable to accept? The great point is that worshippers of Christ, whether they accept or reject the miraculous, should be " perfect," in the sense of being whole-hearted and sincere. In the Old Testament — as has been said above — a " perfect " victim did not mean one that was perfect in beauty of form, colour, strength. It meant " unblemished by defect," " com- plete so far as to have no part wanting." So in Christians a haunting doubt — not only in those who appear to the world to have no doubt, but even in others, so far as doubt hangs a weight upon their Christian thought and action, making their vision dull and their acts faltering and undecided — is a distinct " blemish." And a " blemished " victim is unfit for sacrifice. What the Apostle says on another subject, bears on this subject, " He that doubts is condemned." Of course there are " doubts " that a man must " fight " — as when we doubt the existence of goodness anywhere because we doubt it in ourselves, echoing the muttering of Satan, " Doth Job serve God for naught .'' " and then, " Is there a God worth serving ? " Against these we must sometimes contend, and strengthen our faith by conquering them. But we have no right to expect to conquer if we admit into our faith, as part of it, beliefs as to which we already know enough to be unable to deny that they may be at any moment proved to be false by irresistible historical evidence. These beliefs may be doubts in disguise. Or they may contain germs of doubt — germs that may be quickened into life as parasites that cannot be destroyed without destroying the body on which they prey. In an intellectually dishonest mind, such beliefs are not so deadly ; for if a professing believer in Christ really believes in nothing except " authority," it does not matter much whether he believes a few inveracities more 47 OBSTACLES TO THE GOSPEL OF TRUTH or less. But in a mind of moderate honesty, such beliefs tend to what is called by Isaiah " weak hands and feeble knees." A Christian ought not to doubt on any matter affecting his allegiance to Christ, any more than he ought to be unkind. His heart and mind should go out in confidence to the kindness and grace and truth of the higher nature of things, making him kind too. Instead of always fearing and fight- ing fears, he ought to be for the most part growing and exulting in what we may call, with the poets of Israel — but perhaps in a wider sense — " the beauty of our God " and " the beauty of holiness." Unkindness distorts, and caricatures, and destroys all beauty and grace: but doubt, too, blurs, and enfeebles, and ends by destroying everything. " Kindness and this-may-be-true " never made and never will make a convert. " Kindness and this-is-true " will in the end go everywhere and conquer everything. Real " kindness " has in itself something of " grace " and something of " truth." It is in harmony with, and faithful to, the Cosmos, that is to say, the beautiful and loveable order of the universe. There is a modern saying, that we are to live in " the good, the beautiful, and the true." Rightly regarded, this is but an impersonal expression of the doctrine that we are to find our true being in the good Son of God in whom is summed up "grace and truth," as being the "glory of the Only begotten," the supreme revelation of the Fatherhood of God. 48 CHAPTER X TO A FRIEND Shortly after writing the foregoing chapters I received a letter from a friend to whom I am indebted for a revision of the proofs of Silauus, and for whose sincere and dis- passionate judgment I have had from my youth upwards a profound respect. Some extracts from it put the case against my views so clearly, briefly, and forcibly, that they will be of use to those who wish to consider fairly and fully the question of " prepossession " in favour of miracles. I. After paying a kindly tribute to my "appreciation of Christ's nature and influence," the letter says, " The books which tell of him you leave in a very shattered condition. I am reminded of one of M. Arnold's phrases — that Jesus Christ was 'a head and shoulders above his reporters.' The Gospels become collections of untrustworthy reports, put together by superstitious men wanting in historical sense and spiritual judgment." I should be sorry to think — and indeed my friend does not say — that I have described Jesus Christ as merely "a head and shoulders above his reporters"; He seems to me to have been mountains high above His "reporters," though placing Himself on their level. Moreover the evangelists (I believe) were not the "reporters" — in the modern sense of the term — ^but editors or compilers of " reports," compiling long after the date of the things " reported." Hence I should not myself blame A. A. 49 4 TO A FRIEND the evangelists — as Scaurus occasionally blames them — for deficiency in historical sense. Neither should I call them "superstitious." In "spiritual judgment," I must admit that Mark does seem to me gravely " wanting," unless he regarded himself as a mere amanuensis. Matthew and Luke (consider- ing the circumstances) I should not call "wanting^" But John seems to me inspired with a spiritual judgment that one might almost call (in the spiritual world) miraculous. 2. " We are accustomed," says my friend, " to this view of the evangelists in those who think of Christ as a ' mere man ' — whom Coleridge calls ' psilanthropists.' But when he is recognised as a unique person, the sinless Son of God, and God is assumed to be dispensing ' visions,' and moving in the spiritual history of each man, it seems reasonable to believe in more of Divine Providence working in the beginnings of the Kingdom of Christ." On this subject he adds, " I find it impossible not to think of the New Testament as having come into existence under some special Divine super- intendence and being entitled to special reverence and confidence." In one sense I agree with a large part of this, I accord to the New Testament a " special reverence " (such as I should accord to no other book) as being the mine from which we must draw forth, with the helps given to us by God, our knowledge of His Son. But when I find — to speak of no other defects — the earliest of the gospels, that of Mark, beginning by quoting " Isaiah " for something that Isaiah has not said, and ending with the words "for they were afraid-," 1 To reply more fully it would be necessary to point out that the books commonly called " Matthew " and " Luke " are, probably, of a composite character. Large parts of these gospels I should regard as on the highest level of inspiration. ^ Of course it may be said that Mark's gospel did not originally " end " thus. Possibly not. But what then 1 We are talking about the hypo- thesis of " special Divine superintendence " over Mark, as part of the New Testament. If the last words — in some respects the most important 50 TO A FRIEND without one word to describe Christ's manifestations after death — then my very conviction itself of " some special Divine superintendence" makes it clear to me that God's " superintendence " was of a very different kind from that which has " superintended " the Koran. In the Koran are none of our difficulties. And how easy it would have been for Divine Providence to have " superintended " the New Testament, if not in the way in which it " superintended " the Koran, namely by destroying divergent copies, then in other ways, for example by giving to the world at an early date an authentic account of Christ's words and works, under the sanction of the Council of Jerusalem ! That God has not done this I take as proof that He did not intend to do it, and that His not doing it will turn out to be for our good in the end. In connexion with this hypothesis of a " special Divine superintendence," my friend admits that he is "aware — painfully aware — of the difficulty of defining how much of error such a view allows us to admit in the sacred writings." It is my contention that the time has come when Christians must be no longer harassed and worried and distracted from higher things by being thus " painfully aware " of a " difficulty" that must indeed stare every honest and educated Christian in the face. There are other things that more fitly claim from us a sacrifice of " pain." We have no right to be " pained " — not much at least nor often — about " error " in our gospel or good tidings. We may fairly ask whether God intends us now to be put to the pain of attempting what many of us must feel to be an impossibility. For impossible words — of the earliest of the Christian gospels were allowed by Providence to be lost, does not the " special superintendence," at least in this par- ticular case, altogether vanish — unless indeed (as I should deem to be a priori not improbable) those last words tended to support a spiritual view of the Resurrection, for which the Church was not at that time prepared ? On the end of Mark's gospel, see Notes on New Testament Criticism, 2924. 51 4—2 TO A FRIEND it surely is to "define" exactly those limits of "error" which will just allow our faith to find a footing, safe for the present, on the edge of a cliff, below which there is perpetually at work a corroding and encroaching criticism. How great would be the relief of many educated readers of the Bible if they could attain the conviction that "error," as in the Old Testament, so in the New, was subordinated by God, as also He subordinated our errors in the knowledge of His stars, that He might keep us from a false appearance of a complete knowledge — complete knowledge, in this world, being always dead — and that He might lead us through illusion to the truth ! 3. In connexion with special Providence my friend says, " As I have often protested to you, I cannot see how a normal son of Joseph and Mary could become, on your non-miraculous hypothesis, the unique sinless Son of God and King of the Kingdom of Heaven." But I do not think I have ever said this. Certainly I never intended to say "'it, for I do not believe it. My belief is, not that the normal son of Joseph and yidivy '' became," that is (I suppose) was promoted to be, the unique sinless Son of God, but that the eternal Son of God descended from heaven (one speaks of " descending," of course, in metaphor) to " become " Jlesh as the Son of Joseph and Mary, and then returned to heaven, having been mani- fested to men as King of its Kingdom. There is a difference (to my mind) between man " becoming " God, and God " becoming " man. The latter represents my belief. 4. The letter continues, " I often wish that our sacred volume had received for its title, ' The Kingdom of Heaven.' The Kingdom is understood and entered into by knowing Christ the King : but then he is to be known as the King — not as the most touching and constraining of Teachers, not as the best man that ever lived, but as Lord and Saviour." All this I heartily accept, except that I should prefer " Lord," as a term higher than " King," endeared and ennobled 52 TO A FRIEND by Pauline and Johannine usage, and (in suitable contexts) less likely than " King " to be understood as implying a reign enforced by fear or physical compulsion. I certainly meant to make it clear, by the contrast between Christ and Epictetus, that the former was different /// kind from the latter, and was superior to " the most touching and constraining of Teachers." In describing Christ as entering into the heart of Saul to reign there, I attempted to suggest that He forced that entrance, not as being merely " the best man that ever lived," but as being the irresistible Lord of human hearts, whom humanity should regard as its only spiritual King. 5. As regards the future my friend says, " I am pretty well convinced that those who worship Christ will continue to accept the Gospels as they have come down to us, and that those for whom the Gospels have no authority " I leave this sentence unfinished because, before commenting on what will befall (in my friend's opinion) the second of his two classes, I should like to suggest, about the classes them- selves, that he should have recognised more than two. Is there not already a very large class of which it can hardly be said that they " accept the Gospels " exactly " as they have come down to us," while yet it would be unfair to say that the gospels "have no authority for them"? I certainly do not acknowledge myself as one "for whom the Gospels have no authority." They have great authority for me. So, too, have the Psalms and the Prophets. I accept the Old Testament and the New not indeed exactly " as they have come down to us," not without exceptions and reservations, but still so as to admit that they possess a great deal of " authority." In the case of one or two books of the Bible the reservations may be very large indeed. In reading the gospels I make no such serious reservations. 6. And now to come to the conclusion of m}' friend's last sentence, " Those," he says, " for whom the Gospels have no authority will find themselves unable to worship Christ." These words, as they stand, do not apply to those of my 53 TO A FRIEND way of thinking, for whom the Gospels cannot be said to " have no authority." But I will venture to make them apply, by wording his sentence thus, " Those for whom the Gospels have so little authority that they hack out of them, as you yourself do, every particle of miraculous narrative, will find themselves unable to worship Christ." This is my rhetoric, but (I think) his meaning. Well, in the first place, I must repeat that the force of my friend's conviction about the future ought to be weakened when he reflects on the insufficient breadth of his classifica- tion of believers and non-believers. He seems to me to ignore those who cannot accept the gospels " as they have come down to us " and yet are prepared to accept them as having some authority, and indeed — on spiritual matters — very great authority. These form a small class, perhaps, but a class worth thinking about. I remember, very many years ago, hearing the Headmaster of an important public school, traditionally connected with the army, deplore the fact that, when the old boys came back on a visit, while those who were in the army stayed to communion, those who went to the university did not. The biography of the late Professor Henry Sidgwick made it painfully apparent that a man of singular candour, disinterestedness, and thoughtfulness, a dispassionate student, trained as a Christian and desiring to remain one, might feel himself cast out from the joy of following Christ by the demands of truth compelling him to reject what appeared to him essential portions of Christ's recognised biographies. It could hardly be said that for Henry Sidgwick the gospels " had no authority." Yet he seems to have doubted whether he had the right to call himself a Christian. Silanus was written with such instances in view. But the most important consideration of all appears to me to be this, that in "hacking out the miraculous element" — which is a rhetorical way of describing the process whereby historical and verbal criticism elicits the real facts that lie 54 TO A FRIEND beneath such legends as that of the stopping of the sun and the withering of the fig-tree — the painstaking and reverential student may be in reality " hacking out " a great mass of misunderstanding that has obscured the revelation of the true and spiritual grandeur of Christ, obscuring also the true and spiritual grandeur of humanity, made in the divine image and destined to be conformed to God. In this revelation lies (as it seems to me) the great hope for the future. Thomas of Aquinum is reported to have said, in effect, that the material miracles of the Bible were as nothing compared with the moral miracles wrought by the Spirit of Christ. How true ! Nay, when one comes to think seriously and soberly about it, how obvious ! Yet how far are we at present from regarding it as obviously, or really, or even conceivably true ! When at last we learn this truth, not by heart but in the heart, all things in the Bible and all things in the world, will, as St Paul says, " become new." And then all things ought to become to us all the more divinely wonderful for being per- ceived to be, not (materially) miraculous, but natural. Surely this change of view is at least conceivable — even to those who crave material miracles. A miraculous Moses, for example, with a wonder-working rod in hand, able to drive back the sea and to draw water from the rock, to bring down bread from the sky and to open a chasm for the swallowing up of rebels in the earth — is he not in truth far less divinely wonderful than the same Moses without all these adjuncts, but with eyes fixed on the one invisible God, moulding a stiff- necked nation into some degree of conformity with what was revealed to him as the will of Jehovah ? If this is already felt to be so by some, as regards the great Lawgiver of Israel after the flesh — even when very large historical deductions are made from the detailed legis- lature attributed to him — why should not men ultimately come to feel the same thing about the Messiah of Israel after the spirit .'' 55 TO A FRIEND Not that all the historical and literary problems in the gospels seem at present soluble or ever likely to be entirely solved. But we shall be taught, by patient attempts at their solution, to seek, and learn, more and more of the real evan- gelic mysteries, the mystery of the needs and weaknesses of human nature, the mystery also of its divine greatness and strength, the mystery of the infinite possibility of its confor- mation to the divine image — if only we will revolt against the Prince of this world, who is always urging us to worship nothing but what is portentous, nothing but what is altogether outside our experience or beyond any prospective faculty or capacity of man. God the Son, incarnate as Jesus of Nazareth, is unique. But He influences us most through the instrument most familiar to us in our ordinary experience — the family. The Father cannot be manifested except through the Son. The Son cannot manifest the Father except by imparting to us that Spirit through which He Himself is in eternal unity with the Father, the Spirit of Love. It is one of the many merits of the Fourth Gospel that, more than the Three, it teaches us to lay stress not on visible " mighty works," but on "signs" of invisible might; not on one definite place, technically called " heaven," but on a home, wheresoever it may be — perhaps homes, " many mansions " or " abiding- places'' — constituted by friendly presences, according to the saying of the Divine Persons (Jn xiv. 23) " We will come unto him and make our abiding-place with him\" 1 Comp. Paradosis 1393, where it is shewn that \i.ovr] occurs nowhere else in N. T. except Jn xiv. 2 " In my Father's house are many abiding- places^'' and xiv. 23 "We \i.e. the Father and the Son] will make our abiding-place with him," i.e. with the man that " loves the Son and keeps his word." The former passage might suggest that the abiding-places are in heaven above ; the latter shews that the abiding-place may be in man's heart below. Comp. xiv. 20 "you in me and I in you," and many other passages where the evangelist reiterates phrases indicating that the supreme blessedness cannot be described in terms oi place. 56 CHAPTER XI TO A FRIENDLY REVIEWER One of the reviews of Silanus'^ — evidently written with every desire to be fair, and even (as far as possible) to be sympathetic, and giving among its extracts the two passages that I myself should have selected as likely to convey the most favourable impression of my book — puts me several questions, to which — as similar questions might occur to some of my readers — I will endeavour to reply. I. The reviewer begins by saying, "What the author preaches is really salvation through emotion. Feeling is the ultimate leader; reason fails as a guide. In illustration, we may at once quote the touching passage from the closing chapter in which Silanus narrates his definite conversion to faith in Christ." He proceeds to quote (p. 366) and I will repeat that part of his extract on which he probably based his condemnation, " It was no act of reason. Nor was it vision. It was more like feeling. The arm of the Lord seemed to lift me up. And thus... at last... I was carried as a little child into the joy of the family of God...." He pro- ceeds, " It seems to us impossible not to feel that " — I italicise — " Dr A bbott's thesis might be made, as the saying is, to prove ^ The Layman, 23 Nov. 1906. This journal has not been long in circulation ; but its literary reviews, so far as I have seen them, have appeared to me of much more than ordinary merit ; and as the writer frankly, and with almost diametrical opposition, dissents from my con- clusions, his remarks supply me with a convenient basis for explanations that may at once make my reasons clearer and my conclusions stronger. 57 TO A FRIENDLY REVIEWER too inj4ch...." Now comes the first question. "If a Roman Catholic did use some such language to Dr Abbott, would the latter accept the attempted justification as adequate ? " In reply, I ask my questioner two questions, First, Where and what is my " thesis " ? Secondly, Is there not some difference between a false "thesis," and a "thesis" that " might be made " — by some people — " to prove too much " ? My thesis is (p. 75) " Follow the logos," but "the logos, in its fullest sense." Silanus is resolved to try whether the " logos " may not indicate that ''feeling" as well as " reason " — not apart from " reason " — may help us towards the knowledge of God. The logos must include pathos. If a convert to Roman Catholicism told me that he had been led to the worship of the Virgin by some such force as led Silanus to the worship of Christ — not exactly " feeling," but " more like feeling " than like vision — and asked me whether he was not similarly justified, I should reply, " Yes, if you made similar efforts to reach the right goal, but not otherwise. If you resolutely followed the Logos in its fullest sense, as he did ; if you loved truth as passionately as he did ; if you studied the prophets, as he did ; if you were absolutely resolved not to be led away by fears about your own soul and by a base and superstitious terror lest God should punish an honest man for inability to believe in assertions about histori- cal facts ; if, above all things, you carefully, critically, and reverently, gave the same attention, or even a tenth part of the attention, to the study of Christ and Christ's words as you gave to what others (the Fathers, the commentators, and what you call ' the Church ') have taught about Christ ; if you have done all this, and yet feel (in consequence of your vision of the Virgin) that you cannot be satisfied with the worship of the Father, through the Son, in the Spirit, but must needs worship or adore the Mother too — then by all means go and worship in your own way. It may be a dangerous way. You may be taught to distinguish ' adore ' and ' worship ' 58 TO A FRIENDLY REVIEWER with your lips but find it hard to do so in your heart. Still, it will be an honest way, and I wish you good speed. It is better heartily to worship, against all history, an ideal Mother, than to pretend to worship a divine Son, who is no divine Son to you, a Son whom you do not love, a Son whom }'ou do not know, a Son who is to you a Machine, a Scheme of Salvation." If on the other hand the convert were to confess to me that he had not taken the trouble that Silanus took, I should ask him how he could reasonably hope to be similarly justi- fied. " Such ' visions,' " I should say, " or such ' feelings,' or ' quasi-feelings,' are not to be trusted by those who have not proved themselves resolute and fearless seekers after truth." If, further, he confided to me that he was largely influenced by an intense fear for his own soul, and by a haunting suspicion that there was truth in the maxim " Securns jiidicai orbis terrarum" and that his whole nature craved the support of an infallible Church — then, I confess, I should feel for him that kind of pity which it is not good to feel, and I should desire to close the conversation. One last remark to the convert might perhaps suggest itself to me, " What would you do if your infallible Church were to decide that the Virgin was not to be worshipped or adored, and that a return was to be made to the practice of the Churches in the first three centuries?" But I should not utter it, for I should feel that we had too little ground in common for any profitable discussion. To me the craving for an infallible Church is "a dread desire," and I always have in mind Virgil's warning against converting desire into a God — Sua cuique Deus fit diva cupido. To return to my reviewer. I think he has misunderstood my " thesis." I do not " preach salvation through emotion." If I seem to do so in some passages of Silanus, it is because I have not expressed myself clearly. At all events I did not intend to do so. Nor do I think I have been proved 59 TO A FRIENDLY REVIEWER to have done so in the passage quoted by the reviewer — if a fair regard is paid to the antecedents of Silanus, and to his resolute determination not to " yield to self-deceiving, and call it believing." My intention was to preach salvation through right action, based on right reason, and influenced by right emotion. My thesis, or rather my precept, is, " Follow the Logos." But my Logos is the Word of God, and that Word includes reason as well as emotion. A right vision, or right " feeling," such as Silanus felt, is rarely or never vouchsafed — this at least is my conviction — except through right reason and right emotion, even in the hearts of the most sinful, in the processes leading to their conversion. There are moments, critical moments in a man's life, when Emotion steps in front, and may seem to act alone ; but if she is guiding us rightly, her brother. Reason, has always been quietly preparing the way for his sister, and is close behind ready to second and support her teaching. 2. On the compatibility of spiritual uniqueness with ordi- nary parentage I may have failed sometimes to make myself clear because I find it difficult to understand the arguments against it. For example my reviewer says that Silanus " pre- sents us with a Christ who is no more than an individual among individuals." Now I do not understand, ist, what the writer means by " individuar' as distinct from "man," 2nd, what he means by " among!' By the latter, he can hardly mean " in the midst of" (as John the Baptist says, " there standeth one among you whom ye know not"). I think he means " no more than a man somewhat above the level of ordinary men, but still to be reckoned among tJie^n!' If so, the writer has failed to understand my position. Even the sceptical Scaurus is represented as ad- mitting that Christ may be as different from other men as steam is from water. The converted Silanus would frankly accept Christ as unique in humanity, the incarnation of the Eternal Son of God. 60 TO A FRIENDLY REVIEWER 3. The writer adds, " Apart from the question whether such parentage is consistent with beHef in His sinlessness, it is clearly not consistent with belief in His mission as ' Consummator.' " \Here I may remark that I believe in Christ both as sinless and as " Consionmator" but the iticonsistency, so far from being " clearly " majiifested to vie, seems to me non- existent.^ 4. Then he appeals to me with the following questions, " And except He be Consummator, how can He be a full and perfect Redeemer ? To the fullness and perfection of Redemption there is necessary the power to infuse fresh moral and spiritual grace. And how can there be such infusion, except there first be a ' Consummator ' ? " {^Accepting Christ as '■' Co7isnmniator" I accept all the ivriter's deductions. But I camiot itnderstand zvhy he should suppose that I do not accept them.'] " We would ask Dr Abbott whether he denies that the conception of men as feeding upon the Manhood of Christ is an essential part of the Gospel." \^I do not deny it. I believe it with all my heart.] "In that case we venture to put it to him that there is no answer to the question ' How can this man give us His flesh to eat ? ' except it first be conceded that human life was gathered up into Him." [/ entirely believe — " concede " would not express my feeling — that ''human life was gathered up into " CJirist, the incarnation of tlie Eternal So7i?^ 5. The writer proceeds to say, ''And with such ati in- gathering ordinary parentage would be irreconcilable!' This sentence — which I have italicised — I absolutely fail to under- stand. Or, if I understand it, I am amazed at it, because it seems to spring from a fundamental disbelief that one born of human parents so as to become a sharer in actual human flesh and blood can be, in the foreordained Providence of God, the Redeemer of mankind, and gather mankind into Himself But what says the Epistle to the Hebrews (ii. 14)? " Since the children are sharers in flesh and blood, he [the 61 TO A FRIENDLY REVIEWER Eternal Son] also himself in like manner partook of the same!' I should have thought that these words, especially with the phrase " in like manner " — combined with the general tenor of the Pauline epistles, none of which ever mentions the Virgin birth — decidedly favoured my view. But at all events they seem to me to shew that antecedently it is quite as probable, to say the very least, that in carrying out His divine purpose of sending His Son to redeem mankind, God should use the instrumentality of two human parents, as that he should use the instrumentality of one. 6. I do not think I am doing an injustice to those who insist on the Virgin birth in assuming that most of them would agree with the following advocacy of it by Tertullian {Marc. iv. lo, transl. Clark) : " He [i.e. Christ] cannot be constituted the Son of man unless He be born of a human parent (qui non sit natus ex homine) either father or mother. And then the discussion will turn on the point, of which human parent (cujus hominis) He ought to be accounted the son — of the father or the mother .^ Since (si) He is [begotten'] of (ex) God the Father, He IS NOT, OF COURSE, [THE SON] OF A HUMAN FATHER (utique non ex homine). If He is not of a human father (si non et (.-•) ex homine), it follows that He must be [the son] of a human mother (super est ut ex homine sit matre). If of a human mother, it is evident that she must be a virgin (jam apparet quia ex virgine)\" How then does Tertullian meet the flat contradiction of his views contained in Jn i. 13 " Who were begotten, not of blood nor of the will of the flesh. ..but of God'' ? He meets it {De Came Chris ti 19) by declaring that the text is corrupt. He asserts that it ought to be read " Who was begotten." Nay, he accuses heretics of having " tampered with it " by altering "■was'' into "■ tvere!' It is impossible, he thinks, that "were ^ Clark's transl., in "si non et ex homine," does not render "emy %'vo. cloth. Price 155. net. "There is something very attractive in the way in which Dr Abbott forces the documents to tell their secret history, not by brilliant guess- work but by the use of rigid scientific method." — Manchester Guardian. " There is a great deal of valuable information in this second instal- ment of Dr Abbott's great work, whether one agrees with the main thesis or not." — Guardian. " Full of acute and learned criticism." — Pilot. "The industry and ingenuity displayed through the work are marvel- lous. In this attempt to solve the Synoptic variations Dr Abbott is as ploddingly persevering as he is dazzlingly original." — Expository Times.. " One excellent feature in it is the effort to bring the whole evidence within reach of an intelligent English reader." — Dundee Advertiser. "As an exposition of the documentary theory of the origin of the Gospels, Dr Abbott's work promises to hold a high place." — Glasgow Herald. " Deserves to be read with the utmost care." — Outlook. "A monument of patient, scholarly labour." — Christian World. ?Part I» FROM LETTER TO SPIRIT AN ATTEMPT TO REACH THROUGH VARYING VOICES THE ABIDING WORD T)er/iy %vo. cloth. Price 10s. net. " The candid and reverent spirit in which the book is written wins the reader's sympathy... .The criticism exhibited is often acute and it is set forth with an accumulation of detail which is evidence of persevering research ;...For the writer's ability, labour, and candour we have great respect ... " — Guardian. " The book is noteworthy as a defence on new ojounds of the historical tradition present in the Fourth Gospel, and the author's diligence in collecting details from every quarter must be universally admired." — AthencEUJii. "A monument of painstaking comparison and analysis The appendices and indices teem with suggestive material He has steeped himself in the spirit, and he has logically explained much which to other critics is mere opportunity for wriggling." — Outlook. "The notion that St John wrote not to supplement the Synoptics but to substitute a spiritual for a materialistic conception of Jesus. ..is exceedingly suggestive and worked out with much ingenuity." — Daily News. "A fresh illustration of the author's sound learning and keen exegetical insight." — Daily Chronicle. "Very original and suggestive." — Cambridge Review. "To the proving of his case Dr Abbott brings all the wealth of curious learning and the singular fertility of linguistic conjecture for which he is so justly distinguished among Biblical critics of the day." — Scotsman. "There is in the book. ..a large amount of careful work which will be found helpful to all who are seeking their way through the letter to the spirit of the Gospels." — Bookman. " Has the true scientific temper The discussion does not fail to be stimulating and suggestive." — Literary World. "The result at once of great learning, indomitable industry, and remarkable ingenuity, this is a work that stimulates and rewards." — Aberdeen Free Press. "Often throughout the book the incidental matters which crop up are of the greatest interest. For instance, what Dr Abbott says on the probability of Christ's teaching about 'taking on oneself the yoke' becoming misunderstood and perverted to 'taking up the cross' is luminously suggestive It is a storehouse of learning, and, quite apart from the conclusions which Dr Abbott seeks to establish, it will be valued for the recondite material both from Jewish and Christian early writings which it brings together and makes easily accessible." — Christian World. " He spares no pains to bring a very ingenious discussion up to date and well within the reach of those who have no knowledge of Greek or H ebre w." — Dundee A dvertiser. "The accumulation of such facts is a task of great labour, but is valuable to all workers in the field of Biblical criticism, whether they agree with Dr Abbott's view of the Synoptic problem or not The curious facts which he has gathered about the Rabbinical beliefs con- cerning 'voices irom heaven' contain much that is new to us." — Filol. " A valuable contribution to the Synoptic problem." — Leeds Mercury. "The strength of his position lies in the accumulation of particulars. He must be examined page by page and point by point." — Expository Times. "Warm thanks are due to the author for the immense labour he has undertaken." — Primitive Methodist Quarterly Review. " With thorough and penetrating scholarship, and a degree of toil beyond all praise, Dr Abbott has sought out parallels to facts and expressions in the Gospels for the purpose of elucidating their meaning, and tracing them to their original sources Such a work as this, which certainly puts to shame the sluggishness and the spiritual indifference, and the miserable formality ordinarily displayed in the study of tht Gospels, will require prolonged and serious investigation, such as cannot be given to it in a notice like the present. It materially advances our comprehension of the intellectual conditions and methods of instruction of Christ's age...." — Baptist Magazine. " They are full of minute and curious learning, and help to advance Dr Abbott's plea that the study of the Aramaic versions is of essential importance for the interpretation of the Gospels." — Manchester Guardian. "The book is not more remarkable for its striking hypotheses than it is for its careful and systematic collection of evidence.... Dr Abbott's recent series of volumes (soon happily to be followed by another) really constitute a new and enlightening commentary on some of the most important passages in the New Testament. And the commentary is equally illuminative of the Rabbinical passages quoted It is full of learning, of originality, but above all of suggestiveness Page after page scintillates with brilliant points Dr Abbott has clearly relied a good deal on secondary sources, but he has so carefully verified and examined his materials, he has applied to them so penetrating and sound a criticism, that his book is distinguished by its accuracy in details. Dr Abbott stands forth as a conspicuous example of the salvation which lies in precision of thought and exactness of method."— /d?7Wjr// Quarterly Reviev. The Classical Revie^v, stating in detail " what results the writer has attained which seem tolerably certain to be correct," adds " Incidentally Dr Abbott gives us a most valuable dissertation of 43 pages on Bath Kol, i.e. Voices from Heaven in Jewish Tradition, leprinting in an Appendix Pinner's collection of examples from the Talmuds and Targums ; he gives us a useful restatement in another Appendix of the reasons for believing that the so-called Second Epistle of St Peter is a forgery, and in yet another a convincing review of Eusebius' promise to record the evidence accessible to him that bore on the canonicity or authenticity of Christian writings. He demonstrates anew the correctness of Bishop Lightfoot's interpretation of that promise The temper of Dr Abbott's writing is worthy 01 his subject. ..he has shown us the true significance of unregarded words." PARADOSIS OR "IN THE NIGHT IN WHICH HE WAS (?) BETRAYED" Demy ^vo. cloth. Pfice js. 6t^. net. " We are inclined to think that the present instalment, although the thinnest in bulk, is the most valuable of the four Dr Abbott exhibits his customary industry, acuteness, and learning One finds oneself, much more often than usual, able to follow not only with interest, but with willing assent." — Guardian. The Dundee Advertiser, while calling attention to the " conjectures in the chain of argument," says "There is, however, a strong temptation to think Dr Abbott's hypothesis established when it is seen to be the key that fits into one difficulty after another," and adds " For ingenious and scholarly work there is nothing being done at present in the English language like the series of volumes by Dr Edwin A. Abbott. It is research work, painstaking and slow and elaborate.'' *' In great detail and with learned elaboration the various passages are examined; but the main topic of this book is often the occasion for interesting digressions into paths in which Dr Abbott is always an instructive, if not always a convincing, companion." — London Quarterly Review. "A marvel of minute scholarship and of patient industry." — I Vcstminstcr Magazine. " He has, in a rare degree, the true scientific temper, which knows that far-reaching implications may be hidden in apparently trivial facts. Indeed it may safely be said that, had he never established a single conclusion, his investigations would, for their patient and unobtrusive thoroughness, alone suffice to earn him an honourable name. This latest book, the fourth part of the ' Diatessarica,' is a case in point The real value of the book, however, is not in the conclusion but in the way in which the conclusion is supported Dr Abbott works out his argument with great elaborateness and detail, and to follow it conscientiously is to be amply repaid, whether one end in agreement or dissent. One of Dr Abbott's incidental remarks is too valuable to pass without reference: 'We need,' he says, *to become more, not less, anthropomorphic in our thoughts about God, after the pattern of the best anthropomorphism of t'le prophets of Israel and the Son of God.' Not many more useful reminders could come to those who have the forming of modern theology." — Christian World. " Unwearied industry and remarkable ingenuity, a word which we use honoris causa, distinguish this as they distinguish all Dr Abbott's work." — Spectator. "The criticism is marked by that singular nicety that marks Dr Abbott's work, particularly in an explanation of the intrusion of 'Galilee' into the Resurrection narratives." — Pall Mall Gazette. " We are struck once more by the ingenuity with which Dr Abbott follows his theory of an Aramaic original, and finds in subsequent misunderstandings of its text a reason for many of the divergences in the canonical Gospels The conjectural character of a great deal of his work is inevitable in such an unexplored field, but he is providing us with a mass of new material for the literary study of the Gospels, especially in the direction of accounting for discrepancies in parallel narratives." — Manchester Guardian. " In fearless scientific criticism of the Gospels as documents, Dr Abbott occupies a front place among modern scholars, but his criticism is instinct with deep reverence, and always in his own happy phrase 'an attempt to reach through varying voices the abiding word.' " — Literary World. " We gladly confess that we have learned a great deal from the work before us." — Record. " It is characterized by the same extreme care and minuteness of detail and thoroughness of scholarship which are found in preceding volumes." — Leeds Mercury. "A scholarly work, worthy of Dr Abbott's great reputation as a Biblical critic." — Outlook. "This is the fourth part of Dr Abbott's great work, ' Diatessarica,' and, like its predecessors, ' Clue ' and ' From Letter to Spirit,' is full of acute criticism and painstaking inquiry. It is indeed monumental in its breadth and thoroughness Novel as this interpretation is, no one has a right to set it aside who does not study the contents of this learned, reverent, and carelul work." — Baptist Magazine. iiatt V JOHANNINE VOCABULARY A COMPARISON OF THE WORDS OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL WITH THOSE OF THE THREE Demy Svo. doth. P-rke 135. 6d. net. "This is likely to prove the most useful of the five volumes that have now appeared in the series which Dr Abbott has called ' Diates- sarica.'...It exhibits the marvellous industry which is so characteristic of Dr Abbott's work quite as much as any of the earlier volumes... the accumulation of facts which it contains is likely to be of permanent value to students of the language of the Gospels, and especially of the Fourth Gospel." — Gttardia/i. "The whole inquiry is a wonderful exhibition of patient and delicate scholarship. Both beginners and experienced students may profit greatly from Dr Abbott's masterly treatment of verbal and grammatical mi7intiae. The handling of tenses is especially instructive.. ..And as a storehouse of facts laboriously collected from many sources and carefully marshalled the work will be invaluable to students of the Fourth Gospel." — Chrisiian World. "The Synoptic variations, similarities, and peculiarities are admirably set out above condensed and lucid notes. It is a book full of good things on a question already full." — Pall Mall Gazette. "The reader, learned or unlearned in the technical sense, will find in the book abundant matter to engross his attention and to stimulate reflection. It is of the same high quality as Dr Abbott's other works, a minutely accurate, scholarly, and stimulating production — another volume of a remarkable series." — Aberdeen Free Press. "No other work on Greek Testament synonymous words, especially those in St John, so completely brings to light their precise difference and applies them to the clearer elucidation of the Gospel narrative, as this volume, which throws much original light on obscure passages, and often reconciles seeming difficulties in text and context and shows that in some cases what appears to be mere tautology or redundance is in reality a most important statement of either incident or doctrine." — Acauemy. "The present sympathetic and laborious study promises to be an extremely valuable addition to the literature of the subject.... The book is an extremely suggestive study, and the temptation to see more in the original than can fairly be taken out of it is, on the whole, wisely restrained." — Glas^-oiu Herald. •'' " The plan, it will be seen, is thorouc;h, and so is the execution ; yet there is nothing abstruse, nothing beyond the comprehension of the ordinary student of the New Testament. Almost every page of this volume offers some fresh fact, suggestion, or discussion bearing on the actual meaning of the evangelist, and there is none of that pedantic philology which would confuse the real issues." — Dundee Advertiser. "Dr Abbott has rendered ver^' real services to students of the Fourth Gospel by this scholarly and laborious work.... Sometimes he seems to us to incline to draw large inferences from his own hypotheses, yet when we turn again to these hypotheses they commend themselves to us, and we feel that they have been reached by a very original and acute mind. Dr Abbott has given us an invaluable guide to the interpretation of the Fourth Gospel, a guide which some of us will very often consult." — Examiner. "With confidence we recommend this book to all serious students of the gospels.... For English readers of the gospels it is, we believe, the best piece of work that Dr Abbott has wrought." — Literary World. "It is a good deal — but not too much — to say that no one can thoroughly understand the Fourth Gospel who has not studied the material brought together by Dr E. A. Abbott in his 'Johannine Vocabulary.' It is a masterpiece of minute, patient, and ingenious scholarship.. ..Teachers and preachers especially will find it rich in raw material for their work." — Great Thoughts. "A substantial contribution to the knowledge of the greatest of Christian \ix\imgs." —British Weekly. "A marvel of industry and scholarship, into which it is impossible to enter in any adequate way within the limits of an ordinary review." — Record. "An exceedingly useful theological text-book." — Globe. " It is all that the title indicates.. ..But it is far more than that. ..The consequence of such an investigation is that new, or at any rate clearer, light is thrown on passage after passage.... We hope we have said enough to show our readers the value of this volume as a student's book." — Church of England Pulpit and Ecclesiastical Review. "The results which he brings out are very striking. ...The upshot of the whole is in accord with the general tendency of recent criticism — to put the Fourth Gospel on a higher plane of authority." — Westminster Gazette. "The author brings out the exact meanings and subtle inflections of the original in a very striking manner. The different shades of meaning and the manner in which such important words as believing, authority &c. are exemplified, makes the work one of great value to the Bible student." — Rock. "The notes are packed with painstaking scholarship.. ..And the whole evidence is surveyed in a masterly manner at the end." — Expository Times. " His discussion of Johannine synonyms, e.g. the words for * seeing,' 'hearing,' 'knowing,' 'coming,' and other simple but fruitful ideas, is most illuminating. Microscopic, it may no doubt be styled : but if examination under a lens of high power reveals new beauties in the structure of an organism, microscopic investigation proves both in- structive and fruitful. We are inclined to say that this volume was well worth publishing were it only for the complete account it contains of the Johannine key-word 'believing.'. ..These minute linguistic inquiries may at first sight appear to be meticulous and useless. But it is only by slow patient underground work of this kind that such subtle points as the relation between the several lines of tradition concerning Christ can be determined. And where the subject is so sacred and vital and the end so important, time and trouble should not be begrudged. Dr Abbott spares neither. He deserves the thanks of all careful and earnest New Testament students for the work he is carrying through with such patience and perseverance. Those who cannot accept all his conclusions must admire his learning and his zeal, and they cannot help receiving profit from his company and guidance," — London Quarterly Review. "The vocabularies, with their exhaustive apparatus of notes, represent a large amount of patient linguistic research.. ..But it is only when we approach the question of the right method of interpreting the Gospel as a whole, particularly in its literary relations to the other three, that the real value of all this critical spadework can be made apparent. We hope that Dr Abbott's scrupulous scholarship will allow him before long to attack this work of constructive interpretation." — Manchester Guardian. "The present volume is full of valuable material.. ..We do not know of any investigation into the vocabulary of the Fourth Gospel so minute and thorough as this. The labour expended in producing it deserves the warmest recognition, and we shall look forward with great interest to the publication on the Johannine Grammar." — Primitive Methodist Quarterly Review. "Whether we agree with Dr Abbott's conclusions or not, we may always feel sure that his work will be up to the highest standard of modem scholarship — that it will be painstaking, erudite, reverent, full of food for thought..., Can be read quite profitably by English readers, and is studded with illuminating passages as to the real meaning of the Gospel narratives." — Liberal C/iurchman. " Having said so much, we feel that for the student anything more is needless ; he will at once say. That's the sort of book for me ! and will get it, study it, and be well rewarded for so doing... .We end by thanking Dr Abbott for much very valuable help." — Interpreter. " It is positively amazing to me the amount of detail that Dr Abbott has so accurately put together in this volume. He has done original thinking at every turn.... The chapter on Johannine Synonyms is especially suggestive and helpful.. ..Will be useful to all students of John's Gospel. Dr Abbott's Diatessarica will make a thesaurus for technical students of the Gospels." — Baptist Theological Quarterly (Louisville, Kentucky). " Dr Abbott may not win assent for all his conclusions, but he is at least sure of abiding gratitude for the materials on which they are based. In this respect he has made the way easier for all who follow him.... Most illuminative and suggestive.... He makes good his point that the Fourth Evangelist is an allusive writer.. ..One lays down the volume with immense admiration for the work which it represents and the faithfulness with which the work has been done.. ..It is work which time cannot make ■old, and to which each new generation of scholars will find it profitable, if not essential, to return." — Review of Theology and Philosophy. " In this Johannine Vocabulary we have a work that every clergyman and everyone interested in the Greek Testament should at once procure and set to work to study.. ..Dr Abbott shews — and once the reader has his eyes thus opened, he is astounded that he was so long blind — that there is an infinite deal still to be observed and interpreted in the very language of the New Testament writers." — Classical Review. "Full of acute and suggestive criticism.. ..The evidence is carefully stated and the results are interesting and helpful. ...The whole work is an important contribution to the study and understanding of the Gospel." — Hibbert Journal. JOHANNINE GRAMMAR De7izy ^vo. cloth. Price i6i-. 6d. net. " Together, the two volumes [Vocabulary and Grammar] really con- stitute a great part of a complete commentary upon the Fourth Gospel.... The vast mass of details... serves really to advance our knowledge and understanding of the Gospel.... The use that he has made of all this varied material is strictly scientific. He has first carefully classified his phenomena, and then generalized from them. And this he has done in no pedantic manner, but with constant reference to the realities of thought and language.... The effect of Dr Abbott's books is to define clearly, and to place upon a reasoned basis, a multitude of impressions that have hitherto been vague and uncertain. The amount of suggestive- ness and of vividness imparted to the text in the two books is quite extraordinary.... We believe that, since Bishop Westcott's commentary, no such solid contribution has been made to the real understanding of the Gospel in any language.... For the professed scholar and student they are indispensable." — Times. "The term 'Johannine Grammar' scarcely does justice to the prominent merits and distinctive aim of Dr Abbott's valuable and scholarly work, which brings out more adequately than any existing commentary on St John's Gospel the meaning of St John as derived from a correct interpretation of the peculiar language and grammatical form used by the evangelist, so remarkable for creating ambiguities very difficult of explanation." — Academy. "The work is one of great erudition, and indicates a deeply sympathetic study of the original.... The book is intended, of course, in the first instance for Greek scholars, but a large number of the quotations are translated literally and supplied with an English index so that the EngUsh reader can make good use of the author's learning.... The indices are on an elaborate scale, and make the work extremely handy for reference to particular passages in the Gospel." — Glasgow Herald. " Ambiguities are pointed out, and other uncertainties in the fourth Gospel which no ordinary text-book of New Testament Greek has been able to explain.. ..On particular points the reader may prefer to hold his own opinion, but he cannot help rejoicing in the methodically accumu- lated material on which an opinion worth having may be formed.. ..It is a book which increases our indebtedness to the author." — Dtmdee Advertiser. A. A. 8 "An astonishing example of minute and penetrating research.... Of the keen analysis and wealth of illustration to be found in this part of the work it is quite impossible in the brief space at our command to give even an approximate idea.. ..Preachers will find this Grammar invaluable, as the admirable indexes make it easy to find what is said about any given text.. ..A magnificent contribution to the study of the spiritual Gospel."— CV/rw/M/i! Wotid. "In 'Johannine Vocabulary' we had... elements of usefulness which are likely to be permanent, and are not likely to be superseded.... 'Johannine Grammar' is a worthy companion volume to 'Johannine Vocabulary.'. ..In the indices in this volume we have a very helpful commentary on the Fourth Gospel ; and the number of points which are elucidated by this careful analysis of vocabulary and grammar is very large." — Gum-dian. "A work of enormous labour as well as erudition.... The work closes with magnificent indices." — Expository Times. "The scholarship and erudition shown on every page oi /o/ia?i?iine Gra??ifnar are beyond praise. From the point of view of pure scholarship the book is altogether admirable, and as an example of painstaking devotion — industry is all too cold a word — it is nothing short of marvellous. We cannot call to mind anything of its kind at all equal to it, and it must take rank for many a year to come as the thesaurus of Johannine scholarship. One of the really remarlcable features is that the work, which throughout is concerned with the niceties of the Greek, has been so largely made intelligible to the English reader.... The volume is particularly easy for reference. Each paragraph is numbered, and the indexes are specially full.... No student of the Fourth Gospel can hence- forth afford to neglect Johannine Grammar. It will help him at every turn." — Literary World. " It is difficult for any one who cares for the grammar of the New Testament and the interesting questions of interpretation which are opened up by it, to lay down the book when once it has been taken up. It is hardly possible to open upon a single page without finding some problem dealt with in a fashion which reveals a practised hand.... He is often convincingly right even when high authorities are against him, and to read fifty pages in this book is to obtain many fresh glimpses into the real meaning of long famiUar words." — London Quarterly Review. " Remarkable from many points of view, literary, theological, and philosophical.... Will be found invaluable not only in the translation of textual readings... but useful in the recension of the textual readings, themselves supported by the author in appropriate quotations from the Fathers, and by sound grammatical corrections." — Morning Post. "One is all thanks for the extraordinary labour which has piled up such a mass of invaluable material for the student. Dr Abbott never writes as a mere grammarian, but always as one who cares alone for the mind of the author.. ..No one will agree with all of it, least of all will a Catholic, but all will learn much." — Dublin Review. "A monument of minute, scholarly, critical labour." — Outlook. " The grammar of the text of the fourth Gospel has never been more thoroughly and instructively analysed and explained than in this scholarly volume.... It has much in it to interest and stimulate students of the Bible who know only English.... A valuable addition to the hterature of Biblical criticism." — Scotsman. " Informed throughout with a critical spirit, a spirit itself controlled by a most judicial temper of mind....Dr Abbott has brought to bear on the problems of Gospel exegesis a force that is new in its completeness. The grammatical method of interpretation is familiar, but it has never been so applied." — Spectator. (( •A contribution to the study of the Fourth Gospel, for which all interested in the great question of its origin and authorship will be deeply indebted to him.... He has helped by a patience and industry deserving of all gratitude to what may be some day allowed to be the final solution of this great religious problem." — Yorkshire Post. " The ' Diatessarica,' of which the sixth volume is now in our hands, must long remain a visible monument to its author's originality and varied learning.... And in the present 'Johannine Grammar' we have a unique specimen of the good service which may be done by a thorough- going and scientific examination of the words of a Gospel." — British Weekly. "Of the wide reading and scholarship manifest on every page it is needless to speak. ...Students will by this inspiring example be enabled to recognise what a grammatical examination of a document means.... Cannot but act as a stimulus.... He has gone to the right sources for his examples, analogies, and illustrations.... A book in which no student of the New Testament can fail to find abundant profit." — Bookman. " Dr Abbott has a rare and enviable extent of reading and a genius for aptly applying its results, and he has been careful not to fall behind the times.. ..Excellent in detail,. ..certain to enrich the pages of future commentators.... We must thank him for enlivening what are necessarily pages of heavy reading with many original and instructive observations from an acute and well-stored mind." — Saturday Review. " The sixth volume of the monumental series to which is appropriately given the title of ' Diatessarica,' for together they contain the materials for an exhaustive study of the four Gospels on the comparative method.... Whereas a superficial glance at it might give the impression that words and phrases are pressed to an extent that not the most careful of writings would bear, on a closer acquaintance with the work we become convinced that the assumption is fully confirmed by the facts.. ..Should go far to remove the fault sometimes attributed to English scholarship of being deficient in the spade-work of the Germans.... In the 'Johannine Grammar ' the future commentator has a perfectly ordered storehouse of material for his deductions and interpretations." — Layman. "The most valuable of the six parts of Diatessarica. It is in fact a grammatical commentary of a very high order, and far more helpful than many of the perfunctory commentaries.... No student of Gospel problems can neglect Diatessarica." — Baptist Theological Quarterly (Louisville, Kentucky). "A most valuable, and in fact almost indispensable, work for every student of New Testament Greek, marked by all the acumen, erudition, and painstaking industry, so characteristic of Dr Abbott's writings. The methodical arrangement, the illustrative quotations, and the copious indexes with which it is supplied, leave nothing to be desired in the way of completeness, and make the volume of much value even to those who know little or nothing of Greek. It should certainly find a place in every reference library." — Library World. "The examination of the language and conceptions [is] conducted with a subtlety of insight and thoroughness of investigation which are beyond all praise." — Expositor. "The Indices which he furnishes (which cover both 'Vocabulary' and 'Grammar') are bound to be extremely valuable. Very valuable also are the 'Notes on Preceding Paragraphs' (2664-2799), which are, to our mind, the most stimulating part of the book....Danesi's photograph has enabled Dr Abbott to correct not a few errors of Tischendorf's collation." — Oxford Magazine. " The present volume is the necessary complement to Dr Abbott's earlier work, Johannine Vocadulary... and the two together make up a marvellously exhaustive handling of the Greek of the Fourth Gospel.... Special mention should be made of the indices.. ..No other word than ' exhaustive ' can be applied to them ; they are, like the book itself, monumental... .The results will furnish materials for study for a long time to come." — Record. " Contains much of interest for students of Jewish Hellenistic writings.''— _/?w?jA Quarterly Review. " Dr Abbott's books. ..are to be welcomed for their most careful scholarship, and also because they may suggest to others to continue his labours.. ..Dr Abbott's method will commend itself to scholars, and his results will be duly appreciated..,. Apart from his deviations from the field of grammar Dr Abbott has done most minute and careful work in that field, as the table of contents and the book itself will show.... Everyone who pursues a critical study of the Fourth Gospel ought to use his book." — AthencBum. "Whatever view may be taken of his theories, the amount of material that he has collected at the cost of stupendous labour is of the utmost value.. ..The volume with its predecessor bearing the title 'Johannine Vocabulary,' constitutes one of the most important contributions recently made to the study of the Gospel and Epistles of John. It constantly raises new problems of interpretation, and anyone who worked patiently through it would have practically a commentary on the Fourth Gospel." — British Friend. " No student of the Greek Testament can well afford to do without this book and the 'Vocabulary' even if he have not the previous Diatessarica of four parts.. ..Remarkable. ..in bringing out the spiritual meaning of the passages." — Church of England Pulpit and Ecclesiastical Review. " This deep mine of learning, fabulously rich in precious lore for the true student of the Gospels.... Its value has been enhanced by several copious indices.... Prodigiously learned as it is, the work is not beyond the ordinary capacity of serious readers, and it simply teems with fresh suggestive lines of thought. To students it is indispensable." — Great Thoughts. "We have here a book every page of which is illuminating and informing... the sixth volume of the series called Diatessarica, which is an invaluable help for the ultimate solution of the synoptic problem... indispensable to purchasers of Johannine Vocabulary, as it contains the indexes to that work also.... Valuable material for many sermons will be found in it. It can also be used as a grammar for the whole New Testament.'' — Examiner. " A gigantic task to have accomplished, and one which would reflect honour on the labours of a lifetime.... Those who under Dr Abbott's guidance grasp his method and follow him minutely will reap an ample reward. No study— for ministers at any rate— could be more fruitful. It demands industry, pains, and patience, but all who display those qualities will be thankful for so valuable a help." — Baptist Times. "Reveals an amazing amount of labour.. ..The author has done a good deal to bring out important points in such a way as to be intelligible to English readers, and to render these accessible has made the English 8-3 index very full.... Brings out much that even a fairly close student of the Fourth Gospel might easily miss. Any student who worked through the index of passages in the Fourth Gospel, making an abstract of the dis- cussions in the book, would find at the close of his work that he had practically a complete commentary on the Gospel." — Primitive Methodist Quarterly Review. "A great book.... We do not hesitate to term it the most important contribution made by its author to Biblical scholarship.... It is probable that from this time forward no one will deem himself competent to enter upon a thorough study of the Fourth Gospel without this Johan7iine Gramynar by his side. It is certain that some of Dr Abbott's opinions will be traversed by other scholars, but not one of them will deny that a great boon has been conferred upon all students of the Word, and that new and trustworthy aid is here furnished for the elucidation of many a difficult passage." — Methodist Times. "For real insight into the spiritual meaning,. ..is not surpassed by any. Do not let the student be misled by the title to think this is only a book of reference. Though it extends to 600 pages, it is nevertheless a book to be read : and as he reads it, the student will gain a growing comprehension not merely of the meaning of the Greek text but also of the deep spiritual lessons the writer designs to teach. In other words, it is not only a continuous commentary, a help for verse after verse, but a spiritual commentary — spiritual in the true sense of that much misused term." — Interpreter. " It is impossible to convey in a few lines any adequate notion of the copious learning, illuminated by interesting suggestions and careful judgments, which adorns this ample volume.. ..We cordially recommend this valuable work to the attention of our readers, and would advise every student who wishes really to understand the Fourth Gospel to keep it beside him for consultation in his dM(ic\x\i\ts'''—Hibbert Journal. "The present part is indispensable to possessors of Johannine Vocabulary., and the two volumes together constitute the most valuable help to the study of the Fourth Gospel that exists.... We are here in the hands of a master who by his reverent, patient, and exact investigations, makes the Greek of this Gospel yield up its secret.. ..Our author makes it clear that the grammatical questions which the Gospel raises are not the end but the means to the end, the full understanding of the marvellous book, and the truth about Jesus' life. Those who know the Fourth Gospel best will best value this work, and the reader who has been accustomed to pass over its difificulties lightly or unknowingly, will here find new light.... The splendid indexes and table of contents make the book easy to refer lo."— Review of Theology and Philosophy. "The sixth part of the Diatessarica, an elaborate series of works in which the author has laid all students of the New Testament under obligation by his marvellous erudition and industry, even though they may find themselves unable to agree with many of his conclusions.... Complete indices form a fitting conclusion to a most suggestive and profitable whole.... The discussions are always interesting, characterized by moderation and served by a rich but never obtrusive learning.... Always suggestive, even where his conclusions will not command universal assent.... The author has given forth the ripe fruit of many years' labour, and the result is a corpus of illustrative and expository material with which no serious student of the Fourth Gospel, or indeed of the New Testament as a whole, will be able to dispense."' — Church Quarterly Review. "There are some works before which criticism must stand hopeless. Where magnitude of bulk and scale are united with multiplicity of detail and microscopic learning, a review that would satisfy its writer would be nearly as large as its subject. Such a work is Liddell and Scott's Lexicon, and Dr Abbott's Johamiine Grammar arouses the same feeling in the mind. Its scope, its diligence, its multifarious learning, can but excite admiration and envy, while its accurate scholarship must make any who would challenge its statements distrustful of their own disagreement." — Classical Review. SILANUS THE CHRISTIAN Demy Svo. cloth. Price ys. 6d. net. "A book of absorbing interest and deep religious significance.... A study in spiritual conversion which recalls Philochristus both in the chaste beauty of its language and a restrained dramatic power... .The expression of genuine difficulties— difficulties both critical and religious, which are presenting themselves again in a very similar form to the modern mind. It is one of the chief merits of Dr Abbott's able and stimulating book that, while it does not ignore these difficulties or treat them as foolish or unreal, it exhibits them in their true religious perspective, as belonging to the fringe rather than the essential revelation of the Gospels." — Manchester Guardian. " Interesting on account of the literary skill with which he presents innumerable points of exposition and criticism, and on account, too, of the beauty and strength of many of its passages." — Athencsu7n. "A deeply interesting theological book in the form of a story.... Dr Abbott contrives, with real dramatic ability, to make it appear natural that all his characters should be for the time being completely obsessed by their subject.... The gist of its teaching.. .is summed up in the words of Clemens ' It has been said that the religion of the Christians is a person — and nothing more. I should prefer to say the same thing differently. Our religion is a person — and nothing less '." — Spectator. " The book is an able and delightful one. We know nothing so vivid and so good on Epictetus....The strength and the weakness of the character and system of that wonderful teacher are set forth with unrivalled power and with graphic simplicity. So also is the teaching of the New Testament in some of its aspects.... We appreciate the scholar- ship, the literary art, the high character, and the reverence of the book." — Aberdeen Free Press. "The form of fiction which Dr Abbott employs undoubtedly adds a lively force of persuasion and reality to the highly critical and even technical arguments with which his study abounds.... Valuable... as a contribution to the criticism of the doctrines and ethics of Stoic and Christian." — Outlook. " He does, in our opinion, present to the readers he contemplates a conception of Christ... such as may help many to whom 'miracles' are a hindrance ab initio. Viewed as an easy and interesting introduction to the Higher Criticism of the New Testament, Silanus the Christian is very welcome." — Literary World. " A religious romance that recalls the Philochristus and Onesimus of his earlier days and is quite worthy to stand alongside of them.... Finely conceived and finely written, and characterised not only by a great deal of insight into certain aspects of New Testament teaching, but by an instinctive power of realising and reproducing the intellectual and social atmosphere of the Roman world in the early decades of the second century.. ..No one with any sympathy for the subject will read this book without feeling its charm and appreciating its strong and fresh presentation not only of the spiritual teaching of Jesus, but of the doctrine of Epictetus." — Glasgow Herald. " Readers of Philochristus and Otiesifniis will know what to expect in Silaftus, alike in its non-miraculous Christianity, in its keen criticism of documents, its lofty and unfaltering ethicahsm, and its exquisite charm of style. The impress of genius is everywhere manifest.... A noble book, and one which we venture to think will afford relief to those who are staggered with the idea of the supernatural." — Baptist Times. "An exceedingly interesting study of psychology illustrating the history of thought in the time of Jesus.... This volume proves that such rejection [of the miraculous element in Christianity] is compatible with that high form of reverence for the written word which seeks always to find the spirit behind the letter, and with the most fervent and loyal devotion to the person of Christ and His teaching." — Birininghani Daily Post. " One of the most charming Christian romances ever written." — Expository Times. " The pen that long ago wrote Philochristus, that delightful study of the central figure in the Gospels, has clearly not lost its cunning.... In the charm with which Dr Abbott contrives to invest the elucidation of religious ideas he is certainly unrivalled.... It will be apparent what an opportunity is here for the rare gifts of historical learning, insight, and characterisation which Dr Abbott has at command, and admirably is it made use of. A lifelike picture is given of the spiritual milieu of the second century, and of the entry of Christian ideas upon the scene, and incidentally a great variety of critical and other questions are descanted upon with the author's well-known daring and ability." — Scotsman. " The author of Philochristus and The Kernel and the Husk occupies a niche by himself in English theology, and we shall not be surprised if this work, written in the ripeness of his powers, proves the most enduring of his writings.. ..There are passages of exegesis and spiritual interpreta- tion in this volume that take us to the very heart of things." — British Congrcgationalist. " Interest of a distinctive kind is always attached to Dr E. A. Abbott's work, his ingenious industry being one of the outstanding features of modern theology. He has an equipment that gives him the right, as well as a courage that gives him the power, to take a line of his own ; and the fruit is seen in a notable series of volumes, as suggestive as they are unconventional.... There are vivid pictures of the personality and teaching of Epictetus ; and the mental experiences of Silanus afford an effective medium for the presentation of Dr Abbott's views on the New Testament.... Theology must always be the gainer from strong work with an individual stamp ; and there lies Dr Abbott's great value to his generation." — Christian World. & "Deserves every student's respect.. ..The author, with a notably fine equipment as a critic — knowledge, patience, impartiality, judgment — has made himself master of the leading movements in pagan thought during that unlit period, and in Silanus he shows us a youth groping his way to faith in Christ." — Scottish Review. "The story is both beautiful and possible. ..may be of great value, on account of the strong sense of spiritual reality which floats serenely over the troubled waves of petty verbal questionings ;...may be cordially recommended to any man who would not care to read the ordinary apologetic Christian books of the day, but who would like to learn from a very competent teacher what are the facts about the earliest Christian literature, and wherein their persuasive spiritual power still lies."— Westminster Gazette. "The author has drunk deeply of the spirit of the philosophy and ethics of the middle and later period of the Roman Empire, and he also evinces no mean knowledge of the textual and historical criticism of the New Testament, especially of the Gospels.. ..Biblical scholars will learn much from his close study of the whole question." — Irish Times. " The originality of the book is abundantly manifested ; and it will appeal to many for whom Dr Abbott's recent works were 'too hard '." — Oxford Magazine. "A fine imaginative study of the conflict of the higher paganism with the growing power of the Gospel. Incidentally the book is full of subtle and acute exposition of the Gospel narratives, but its central interest is in the study of a human soul in its inner conflict.. ..No disagreement with Dr Abbott in details should be allowed to obscure the literary excellence of his work, or the convincing power with which he has brought his readers face to face with the central truth of the Christian Revelation — 'our religion is a person — and nothing less'." — Inquirer. "One of the most interesting of the books of i(^o6... .P/iilochrisius was interesting, so was Onesiimis : Silanus the Christian is far more so.... It will exactly suit a very large class of the laity of the present day.... Written in a deeply reverent and earnest spirit.... For every reason, Silanus the Christian may be recommended to the clergy.. ..It is a noble-minded book : it will enlarge the sympathies of every reader : if it sometimes surprises and perplexes, it never offends ; and it clearly and convincingly shews how a Christianity containing little dogma and even less of the miraculous element is infinitely superior to the very highest ethics of philosophy." — Optimist. " By far the most vivid picture of Epictetus and by far the most instructive account of the Stoic philosophy that I have seen, are to be found in Dr Abbott's remarkable story... finely conceived and admirably written... of absorbing interest... as fascinating as any novel and vastly more instructive.... It not only contains a most instructive and pathetic story of a soul in search of truth and goodness : it is an invaluable repertory of ingenious exposition and interpretation. It simply teems with materials for the Christian preacher and teacher. It is a treasury of Biblical learning." — Great Thoughts. " In its way the work is one by a master." — Westminster Review. " One of the most charming Christian romances ever written." — Commomuealth. " Full of interest as an historical study, though it lacks verisimilitude as a story, and defends what appears to us to be an indefensible thesis. We can none the less heartily recommend all students of the New Testament to read the book, and we cannot but admire the author's industry, ability, and truly religious spirit." — London Quarterly Review. "This will be Dr Abbott's most popular book. ..every page is full of thought and crowded with suggestion... alive with human interest.... Not only fascinating in scholarship and style, but a timely and valuable message for an age of doubt." — Primitive Methodist Leader. " Many who are convinced that the old teaching is still the soundest and happiest approach will rejoice that Dr Abbott can lead others by his own less attractive path to the same high view of the nature and the claims of the Founder of Christianity.. ..A really impressive book., ..This presentation of the paramount interest of the issues of the soul's life and of the power over the affections and the conscience of the appeal of Christ." — Saturday Review. "We desire to express our deep gratitude to Dr Abbott. ...This book must do good. It will shake no one's faith in God revealed perfectly in Christ. It will help all who are not intolerant... to be just and sympathetic with those who take a position with which they do not agree and which they may regret or think unsafe. And it will show them the 'great gulf between what philosophy was even at its best, and Christianity." — Interpreter. "As a study of the teaching of Epictetus, and as indicating some of the points of affinity and contrast between Roman Stoicism and Christianity, the book is full of interest.... Epictetus comes before us... as a living personality."— _/(7«r;/(i:/ of Education. "The volume is distinguished by the same imaginative power, freshness of thought, and chastity of style which were the notes of its predecessors Philochristiis and Onesimus." — Journal of Theological Studies. " Instinct with a spirit from which, we think, virtue will go out to men of good will. ...We think that many who dissent from Dr Abbott's views will receive spiritual stimulus from contact with the personality which speaks through the characters of this book, and feel that he has borne impressive witness to the things which to them are supremely real and precious." — Times. CAMBRIDGE: PRINTED BY JOHN CLAY, M.A. AT THE UNIVERSITY PRESS. SOUTHPpli"ilSfi'>' °' California LOS ANGELES, CAL "fSrnw VoslTall"" ^' ■ '•-iTVuJ U iJOriu jj^ 3 1158 00777 4374 UC SOUTHERN REGIONAL LIBRARY FACILITY AA 000 619 078 9 ^Uet^^itni