The Making of the New Testament Part 5

Moreover his witness does not stand alone, but has the support of still more ancient reference (_e. g._ 1st Tim. vi. 3, Acts i. 1) and the internal evidence of the Synoptic Gospels themselves. The motive for his statement is apologetic. Differences between the two Gospels had been pointed out on the score both of words and events. Papias shows that Gospel tradition is not to be held responsible for verbal agreement between the two parallel reports of the Lord's words. The differences are attributable to translation. So, too, regarding events. Exact correspondence of Mark with Matthew (or other gospels) is not to be looked for, especially as regards the order; because Mark had not himself been a disciple, and could not get the true order from Peter, whose anecdotes he reproduced; for when Mark wrote Peter was no longer living. Mark has reproduced faithfully and accurately his recollection of "things either said or done," as related by Peter. But Peter had had no such intention as Matthew of making a systematic compilation (_syntagma_) of the sayings of the Lord, and had only related his anecdotes "as occasion required." If the tradition regarding Matthew, as well as that regarding Mark, was derived from the Elder, he, too, as well as Papias, knew the Greek Matthew; regarding it as a "translation"

of the apostolic _Logia_, he naturally makes Matthew the standard and accounts as above for the wide divergence of Mark as to order.

The Jerusalem elder who thus differentiates the two great branches of gospel tradition into Matthaean Precepts and Petrine Sayings and Doings, is probably "the Elder John"; for this elder's "traditions" were so copiously cited by Papias as to lead Irenaeus, and after him Eusebius, to the unwarranted inference of personal contact. Irenaeus even identified the Elder John with the Apostle, thus transporting not only him, but the entire body of "Elders and disciples" from Jerusalem to Asia, a pregnant misapprehension to which we must return later. In the meantime we must note that this fundamental distinction between _syntagmas_ of the Precepts, and narratives of the Sayings and Doings, carries us back as far as it is possible to penetrate into the history of gospel composition. The primitive work of the Apostle Matthew, was probably done in and for Jerusalem and vicinity--certainly so if written in Aramaic. The date, if early tradition may be believed, was "when Peter and Paul were preaching and founding the church at Rome." Oral tradition must have begun the process even earlier.[16] Mark's work was done at Rome, according to internal evidence no less than by the unanimous voice of early tradition. It dates from "after the death of Peter" (64-5) according to ancient tradition. According to the internal evidence it was written certainly not long before, and probably some few years after, the overthrow of Jerusalem and the temple (70). At the time of Papias' writing, then (_c._ 145), all four gospels were probably known, though only Matthew and Mark were taken as authoritative because (indirectly) apostolic. At the time of prosecution of his inquiries the voice of (Palestinian) tradition was still "living and abiding." If, as tenses and phraseology seem to imply, this means Aristion and the Elder John (_ob._ 117?) it is reasonable to regard it as extending back over a full generation. The original Matthew was even then (_c._ 100), and in Palestine itself, a superseded book. It had three successors, if not more, two Greek and one Aramaic, all still retaining their claim to the name and authority of Matthew[17]; but all had been re-cast in a narrative frame, which at least in the case of our canonical first Gospel was borrowed from the Roman work of Mark. So far as the remaining fragments of its rivals enable us to judge, the same is true in their case also, though to a less extent. It is quite unmistakably true of Luke, the gospel of Antioch, that its narrative represents the same "memorabilia of Peter"; for so Mark's gospel came to be called. Thus the Petrine story appears almost from the start to have gained undisputed supremacy. But side by side with this remarkable fact as to gospel _narrative_ is the equally notable confirmation of the other statements of 'the Elders' regarding the Precepts. For all modern criticism admits, that besides the material of Mark, which both Matthew and Luke freely incorporate, omitting very little, our first and third evangelists have embodied, in (usually) the same Greek translation but in greatly varied order, large sections from one or more early compilations of the Sayings of Jesus.

Footnote 16: Some authorities of the first rank think there is evidence of literary dependence in 1st Cor. i. 18-21 on the Saying (Matt. xi. 25-27 = Lk. x. 21 f.).

Footnote 17: The orthodox Aramaic _Gospel of the Nazarenes_ borrows from Luke as well as Matthew, but speaks in the name of "Matthew."

This apostle was also regarded as author of the _Gospel according to the Hebrews_, a heretical product of _c._ 120, current in Greek among the Jewish Christians of Palestine (Ebionites).

It is indispensable to a historical appreciation of the environment out of which any gospel has arisen that we realize that no community ever produced and permanently adopted as its "gospel" a _partial_ presentation of the message of salvation. To its mind the writing must have embodied, for the time at least, the message, the whole message, and nothing but the message. Change of mind as to the essential contents of the message would involve supplementation or alteration of the written gospel employed. No writing of the kind would be produced with tacit reference to some other for another aspect of the truth.

It was not, then, the mere limitation of its language which caused the ancient Matthaean Sayings (the so-called _Logia_) to be superseded and disappear; nor is mere "translation" the word to describe that which took its place. The growth of Christianity in the Greek-speaking world not only called upon Jerusalem to pour out its treasure of evangelic tradition in the language of the empire, but stimulated a sense of its own increasing need. That which could once be supplied by eye-witnesses, the testimony of Jesus' mighty works, his death and resurrection, was now fast disappearing. And simultaneously the appreciation of its importance was growing. It was impossible to be blind to the conquests made by the gospel _about_ Jesus. Enclosed in it, as part of its substance the gospel _of_ Jesus found its final resting-place, much as the mother church itself was later taken up and incorporated in a catholic Christendom. So it is that in the Elder's time the church of the 'apostles, elders and witnesses' have done more than merely supersede their Aramaic(?) _Syntagma_ of the Precepts by "translations." They had adopted alongside of it from Rome Mark's "Memorabilia of Peter" as to "things either said or done by the Lord."

We can see indeed from the apologetic way in which 'the Elder' speaks of Mark's limitations (Peter is not to be held responsible for the lack of order) that Mark's authority is still held quite secondary to Matthew's; but the very fact that his work is given authoritative standing at all, still more the fact that it has become the framework into which the old-time _syntagma_ has been set, marks a great and fundamental change of view as to what const.i.tutes "the gospel."

No mere _syntagma_ of the Precepts of Jesus has ever come down to us, though the papyrus leaves of "Sayings of Jesus" discovered in 1897 at Behneseh in Egypt by Grenfell and Hunt had something of this character.[1] It was impossible that any community outside the most primitive one, where personal "witnesses of the Lord" still survived "until the times of Trajan," could be satisfied with a "gospel" which gave only the precepts of Jesus without so much as an account of his crucifixion and resurrection. And, strange as it may seem, the evidence of Q (_i. e._ the coincident material in Matthew and Luke not derived from Mark), as judged by nearly all critics, is that no narrative of the kind was given in the early compilation of discourses from which this element was mainly derived. After the "witnesses," apostolic and other, had begun to disappear, a mere _syntagma_ of Jesus' sayings could not suffice. It became inevitable that the precepts should be embodied in the story. And yet we have at least two significant facts to corroborate the intimations of ancient tradition that this combination was long postponed. (18) When it is at last effected, and certainly in the regions of southern Syria,[19] there is even there practically nothing left of authentic _narrative_ material but the Petrine tradition as compiled by Mark at Rome. Our Matthew, a Palestinian Jew, the only writer of the New Testament who consistently uses the Hebrew Bible, makes a theoretical reconstruction of the order of events in the Galilean ministry, but otherwise he just incorporates Mark substantially as it was. What he adds in the way of narrative is so meagre in amount, and so manifestly inferior and apocryphal in character, as to prove the extreme poverty of his resources of oral tradition of this type. Luke has somewhat larger, and (as _literary_ products) better, narrative additions than Matthew's; but the amount is still extremely meagre, and often _historically_ of slight value. Some of it reappears in the surviving fragments of the _Preaching of Peter_. To sum up, there is outside of Mark _no_ considerable amount of historical material, canonical or uncanonical, for the story of Jesus. This fact would be hard to account for if in the regions where witnesses survived, the first generation really took an interest in perpetuating narrative tradition. (2) The _order_ of even such events as secured perpetuation was already hopelessly lost at a time more remote than the writing of our earliest gospel. This is true not only for Mark, as 'the Elder'

frankly confesses, but for Matthew, Luke and every one else.

Unchronological as Mark's order often is (and the tradition as to the 'casual anecdotes' agrees with the critical phenomena of the text), it is vastly more historical than Matthew's reconstruction. On the other hand Luke, while expressly undertaking to improve in this special respect upon his predecessors, almost never ventures to depart from the order of Mark, and when he does has never the support of Matthew, and usually not that of real probability. In short, incorrect as they knew the order of Mark to be, it was the best that could be had in the days when evangelists began to go beyond the mere _syntagmas_, and to write "gospels" as we understand them, or, in their own language, "the things which Jesus began _both_ to do _and_ to teach" (Acts i. 1). From these two great outstanding phenomena of gospel criticism alone it would be apparent that the distinction dimly perceived in the tradition of the Jerusalem elders reported by Papias, and indeed by many later writers, is no illusion, but an important and vital fact.

Footnote 18: It was superscribed "These are the ... words (_logoi_ as in the Pastoral Epistles, not _logia_ as in Papias and Polycarp) which Jesus the living Lord spoke to the disciples and Thomas."

Footnote 19: The possibility should be left open that the Greek Matthew was written in Egypt (cf. Matt. ii. 15), as some critics hold. From the point of view of the church historian, however, Egypt must really be cla.s.sed as in "the regions of southern Syria." Its relations with Jerusalem were close and constant.

A third big, unexpected fact looms up as we round the capes of critical a.n.a.lysis, subtracting from Matthew and Luke first the elements peculiar to each, then that derived by each from Mark. It is a fact susceptible, however, of various interpretation. To some it only proves either the futility of criticism, or the worthlessness of ancient tradition. To us it proves simply that the process of transition in Palestine, the home of evangelic tradition, from the primitive _syntagma_ of Precepts, framed on the plan of the Talmudic treatise known as _Pirke Aboth_, or "Sayings of the Fathers," to the Greek type of narrative gospel, was a longer and more complex one than has commonly been imagined. A cursory statement of the results of critical efforts to reproduce the so-called "second source" of Matthew and Luke (Mark being considered the first), will serve to bring out the fact to which we refer, and at the same time, we hope, to throw light upon the history of gospel development.

The mere process of subtraction above described to obtain the element Q offers no serious difficulties, and for those who attach value to the tradition of 'the Elders' it is natural to antic.i.p.ate that the remainder will show traits corresponding to the description of an apostolic _syntagma_ of sayings of the Lord translated from the Aramaic, in short the much-desired _Logia_ of Matthew. The actual result is disappointing to such an expectation. The widely, though perhaps somewhat thoughtlessly accepted equivalence Q = the _Logia_ is simply false. Q is _not_ the _Logia_. It is not a _syntagma_, nor even a consistent whole, and as it lay before our first and third evangelists it was not (for a considerable part at least) in Aramaic. True, Q does consist _almost_ exclusively of discourse material, a large part of which has only topical order, and is wholly, or mainly, dest.i.tute of narrative connection. Also we find traces here and there of translation at some period from the Aramaic, though not more in the Q element than in Mark.

But to those who looked for immediate confirmation of the tradition the result has been on the whole disappointing. Some, more particularly among English critics, have considered it to justify a falling back upon the vaguer generalities of the once prevalent theory of oral tradition.

In reality we are simply called upon to renew the process of discrimination. Most of the Q material has the saying-character and is strung together with that lack of all save topical order which we look for in a _syntagma_. But parts of it, such as the Healing of the Centurion's servant (Matt. viii. 5-10, 13 = Luke vii. 1-10), or the Preaching of the Baptist and Temptation Story (Matt. iii. 7-10, 12; iv.

2-11 = Luke iii. 7-9, 17; iv. 2-13), obstinately refuse to be brought under this category. Moreover, the latter section has the unmistakable motive of presenting Jesus _in his character and ministry_ as "the Son of G.o.d," precisely as in Mark. It begins by introducing Jesus on the stage at the baptism of John, after the ancient narrative outline (Acts i. 22; x. 37 f.), and cannot be imagined as forming part of anything else but a _narrative_ having the conclusion characteristic of our own type of gospel. Other considerable sections of Q, such as the Question of John's Disciples and Discourse of Jesus on those that were 'Stumbled'

in him (Matt. xi. 2-11, 16-27; Luke vii. 18-35; x. 13-22), share with the Baptism and Temptation section not only the doctrinal motive of commending Jesus in his person and ministry as the longed-for Son of G.o.d, but in a number of characteristics which set them quite apart from the general ma.s.s of precepts and parables in Q. We can here mention only the following: (1) the coincidence in language between Matthew and Luke is much greater in these sections of Q, often even greater than in the sections borrowed from Mark, showing clearly the existence of a common doc.u.ment written not in Aramaic, but in the Greek language. (2) This material, unlike most of Q, has served as a source and model in many portions of Mark. (3) It is for the most part not included in the five great blocks into which Matthew has divided the Precepts by means of a special concluding formula (vii. 28; xi. 1; xiii. 53; xix. 1, and xxvi.

1) but appears outside, in the form of supplements to the Markan narrative (iii. 7--iv. 11; viii. 5-13, 18-22, xi. 2-27; xii. 38-45, etc.). Finally (4) the Q material of this type seems to be given more copiously by Luke than by Matthew, and with something more than mere conjecture of his own as to its historical occasion. In fact, since it appears that at least this element of Q was known to Mark, there is nothing to justify exclusion from it of such material as the Transfiguration story, though in this case it would be needful to prove that Mark was not the source. Similarly it would be reasonable to think of Luke's wide divergence from Mark in his story of the Pa.s.sion as occasioned by his preference for material derived from this source.

Only, since Matthew has preferred to follow Mark, we have no means of determining whence Luke did derive his new and here often valuable material.

The existence, then, of an element of Q which quite fails to correspond to what we take the Matthaean _syntagma_ to have been by no means proves either the futility of criticism or the worthlessness of the ancient tradition. It only shows that our synoptic evangelists were not the first to attempt the combination of discourse with narrative, but that Luke at least had a predecessor in the field, to whom all are more or less indebted. Criticism and tradition together show that there are two great streams from which all historically trustworthy material has been derived. The one is Evangelic Story, and is mainly derived from Mark's outline of the ministry based on the anecdotes of Peter, though some elements come from another source, princ.i.p.ally preserved by Luke, which we must discuss in a later chapter devoted to the growth of Petrine story at Rome and Antioch. The other stream, "Words of the Lord," comes from Jerusalem, and is always a.s.sociated in all its forms with the name of Matthew. We have every reason for accepting the statement that as early as the founding of the church in Rome (45-50) the Apostle Matthew had begun the work of compiling the Precepts of Jesus, in a form serviceable to the object of "teaching men to observe all things whatsoever he had commanded." Our present Gospel of Matthew, however, is neither this work nor a translation of it; for the only three things told us about the apostle's work are all irreconcilable with the characteristics of our Matthew. The compilation of "Words of the Lord"

was (1) a _syntagma_ and not, like Mark, an outline of the ministry. It was (2) written in Aramaic; whereas our Matthew is an original Greek composition. It was (3) by an apostle who had personal acquaintance with Jesus; whereas our first evangelist is to the last degree dependent upon the confessedly defective story of Mark. Still if we take our Matthew as the last link in the long chain of development, covering perhaps half a century, and including such by-products as the _Gospel according to the Hebrews_ and the _Gospel of the Nazarenes_, we may obtain a welcome light upon the environment out of which has come down the work which an able scholar justly declared, "the most important book ever written, the Gospel according to Matthew."

The language in which it was written was alone sufficient to place the Greek Matthew beyond all possible compet.i.tion in the larger world from Aramaic rivals. But its comprehensiveness and catholicity still further helped it to the position which it soon attained as the most widely used of all the gospels. Matthew is not only in its whole structure a composite gospel, but shows in high degree the catholicizing tendency of the times. Just as it frankly adopts the Roman-Petrine narrative of Mark with slightest possible modification, so also it places in Peter's hand with equal frankness the primacy in apostolic succession. Almost the only additions it makes to Mark's account of the public ministry are the story of Peter's walking on the sea (xiv. 28-33), and his payment of the temple tribute for Christ and himself with the coin from the fish's mouth (xvii. 24-27). The latter story introduces the chapter on the exercise of rulers.h.i.+p in "the church" (ch. xviii.), beginning with the disciples' question: "Who _then_ is greatest in the kingdom?" Peter is again in it the one salient figure (xviii. 21). An equally important addition, connected with xviii. 17 f. is the famous committal to Peter of the power of the keys, with the declaration making him for his confession the 'Rock' foundation of "the church." This addition to Mark's story of the rebuke of Peter at Caesarea Philippi, is one which decidedly alters its bearing, and seems even to borrow the very language of Gal. i. 16 f. in order to exalt the apostles.h.i.+p of Peter. In fact, the Roman gospel and the Palestinian almost reverse the roles we should expect Peter to play in each. Matthew alone makes Peter "the first" (x.

2), while Mark seems to take special pains to record rebukes of the twelve and the brethren of the Lord, and especially the rebukes called down upon themselves by Peter, or Peter and John.

In respect to the primacy of Peter we can observe a certain difference even among the Palestinian gospels which succeeded to the primitive _syntagma_ of Matthew. Little, indeed, is known of the orthodox _Gospel of the Nazarenes_, beyond its relatively late and composite character; for it borrowed from Matthew, Mark and Luke in turn. Its list of apostles, however, begins with "John and James the sons of Zebedee,"

_then_ "Simon and Andrew," and winds up: "Thee also, Matthew, did I call, as thou wert sitting at the seat of custom, and thou followedst me." The anti-Pauline _Gospel according to the Hebrews_ shows its conception of the seat of apostolic authority by giving to "James the Just" the place of Peter as recipient of that first manifestation of the risen Lord, which laid the foundation of the faith. Why then does the Greek Palestinian gospel, in contrast with its rivals, lay such special stress on the primacy of Peter?

From the cautious and (as it were) deprecatory tone of the appendix to John (John xxi.) in seeking to commend the "other disciple whom Jesus loved" as worthy to be accepted as a "true witness" without detriment to the acknowledged authority of Peter as chief under-shepherd of the flock, we may infer that not at Rome alone, but wherever there was question of 'apostolic' tradition, the authority of Peter was coming rapidly to the fore. The tendency at Antioch is even more marked than at Rome, as is manifest from Acts. If, then, it seems stronger still in a region where we should expect the authority of James to be put forward, this need not be taken as a specifically Roman trait. We must realize the sharp antagonism which existed in Palestine from the time of the Apostolic council down, between (1) the consistent legalists, who maintained down to the period of Justin (153) and the _Clementine Homilies and Recognitions_ (180-200), their bitter hostility to Paul and his gospel of Gentile freedom from the Law; and (2) the 'catholic,' or liberal, Jewish-Christians, who took the standpoint of the Pillars. It is but one of many indications of its 'catholic' tendency that our Matthew increases the emphasis on the apostolic authority of Peter to the point of an actual primacy. The phenomenon must be judged in the light of the disappearance or suppression of all evangelic story save what came under the name of Peter, and the tendency in Acts to bring under his name even the entire apostles.h.i.+p to the Gentiles. Peter is not yet in these early writings the representative of Rome, but of _catholicity_. The issue in Matthew is not as between Rome and some other dominant see, but (as the reflection of the language of Gal. i.

17 f. in Matt. xvi. 17 shows) as between 'catholic' apostolic authority and the unsafe tendencies of Pauline independence.

Nevertheless, for all his leanings to catholicity the Greek Matthew has not wholly succeeded in excluding materials which still reflect Jewish-Christian hostility to Paul, or at least to the tendencies of Pauline Christianity. Over and over again special additions are made in Matthew to emphasize a warning against the workers of "lawlessness." The exhortation of Jesus in Luke vi. 42-45 to effect (self-)reformation not on the surface, nor in word, but by change of the inward root of disposition fructifying in deeds, is altered in Matt. vii. 15-22 into a warning against the "false prophets" who work "lawlessness," and who must be judged by their fruits. They make the confession of Lords.h.i.+p (_cf._ Rom. x. 9) but are not obedient to Jesus' commandment, and lack good works. In particular the test of Mark ix. 38-40 is directly reversed. The principle "Whosoever is not against us is for us" is not to be trusted. A teacher may exercise the 'spiritual gifts' of prophecy, exorcism, and miracles wrought in the name of Jesus, and still be a reprobate. A similar (and most incongruous) addition is made to Mark's parable of the Patient Husbandman (Mark iv. 26-29), in Matt. xiii.

24-30, and reiterated in a specially appended "interpretation" (xiii.

36-43). This addition likens the "workers of lawlessness" to tares sown alongside the good seed of the word by "an enemy." A similar incongruous attachment is made to the parable of the Marriage feast (Matt. xxii.

1-14; _cf._ Luke xiv. 15-24) to warn against the lack of the 'garment of good works.' Finally, Matthew closes his whole series of the discourses of Jesus with a group of three parables developed with great elaboration and rhetorical effect, out of relatively slight suggestions as found elsewhere. The sole theme of the series is the indispensableness of good works in the judgment (Matt. 25; _cf._ Luke xii. 35-38; xix. 11-28, and Mark ix. 37, 41). A similar interest appears in Matthew's insistence on the permanent obligation of the Law (v. (16) 17-20; xix. 16-22--in contrast with Mark x. 17-22), on respect for the temple (xvii. 24-27) and on the Davidic descent of Jesus, with fulfilment of messianic promise in him (chh. i.-ii.; ix. 27). He limits the activity of Jesus to the Holy Land (xv. 22; contrast Mark vii. 24 f.), makes him in sending forth the Twelve (x. 5 f.) specifically forbid mission work among Samaritans or Gentiles, and while the prohibition is finally removed in xxviii. 18-20, the apostolic seat cannot be removed, but remains as in x. 23, among "the cities of Israel" to the end of the world.

There is probably no more of intentional opposition to Paul or to his gospel in all this than in James or Luke. We cannot for example regard it as more than accidental coincidence that in the phrase "an enemy hath done this," in the parable of the tares, we have the same epithet which the Ebionite literature applies to Paul. But enough remains to indicate how strongly Jewish-Christian prejudices and limitations still affected our evangelist. With respect to date, the atmosphere is in all respects such as characterizes the period of the nineties.

It does not belong to our present purpose to a.n.a.lyze this gospel into its const.i.tuent elements. The process can be followed in many treatises on gospel criticism, and the results will be found summarized in _Introductions_ to the New Testament such as the recent scholarly work of Moffatt. We have here but to note the general character and structure of the book as revealing the main outlines of its history and the conditions which gave it birth.

Matthew and Luke are alike in that both represent comparatively late attempts to combine the ancient Matthaean _syntagma_ with the 'Memorabilia of Peter' compiled by Mark. But there is a great difference. Luke contemplates his work with some of the motives of the historian. He adopts the method of narrative, and therefore subordinates his discourse material to a conception (often confused enough) of sequence in s.p.a.ce and time. Matthew, as the structure of his gospel, no less than his own avowal shows, had an aim more nearly corresponding to the ancient Palestinian type. The demand for the narrative form had become irresistible. It controlled even his later Greek and Aramaic rivals. But Matthew has subordinated the historical to the ethical motive. He aims at, and has rendered, just the service which his age demanded and for which it could look to no other region than Jerusalem, a full compilation of the commandments and precepts of Jesus.

The narrative framework is adopted from Mark without serious alteration, because this work had already proved its effectiveness in convincing men everywhere that Jesus was "the Christ, the Son of G.o.d." Like Luke, Matthew prefixes an account of Jesus' miraculous birth and childhood, because in his time (_c._ 90) the ancient "beginning of the gospel" with the baptism by John had given opportunity to the heresy of the Adoptionists, represented by Cerinthus, who maintained that Jesus _became_ the Son of G.o.d at his baptism, a merely temporary "receptacle"

of the Spirit. The prefixed chapters have no incarnation doctrine, and no doctrine of pre-existence. They do not intend in their story of the miraculous birth to relate the incoming of a superhuman or non-human being into the world, else they could not take up the pedigree of Joseph as exhibiting Jesus' t.i.tle to the throne of David. Miracle attends and signalizes the birth of that "Son of David" who is destined to become the Son of G.o.d. Apart from the mere question of attendant prodigy the aim of Matthew's story of the Infancy is such as should command the respect and sympathy of every rational thinker. Against all Doketic dualism it maintains that the Son of G.o.d is such from birth to death.

The presence of G.o.d's Spirit with him is not a mere counterpart to demonic "possession," but is part of his nature as true man from the beginning.

But the doctrinal interest of Matthew scarcely goes beyond the point of proving that Jesus is the Christ foretold by the prophets. Doctrine as well as history is subordinate to the one great aim of teaching men to "observe all things whatsoever Jesus commanded."

CHAPTER VII

THE PETRINE TRADITION. EVANGELIC STORY

Of the extent to which the early church could do without narrative of Jesus' earthly ministry we have extraordinary evidences in the literature of Pauline Christianity on the one side and of Jewish Christianity on the other. For Paul himself, as we know, the real story of Jesus was a transcendental drama of the Incarnation, Redemption, and Exaltation. It is probable that when at last "three years" after his conversion he went up to Jerusalem "to get acquainted with Peter," the story he was interested to hear had even then more to do with that common apostolic witness of the resurrection appearances reproduced in 1st Cor. xv. 3-11, than with the sayings and doings of the ministry. As to this Paul preserves, as we have seen, an almost unbroken silence. And that which did not interest Paul, naturally did not interest his churches.

On the other hand those who could have perpetuated a full and authentic account of the ministry were almost incredibly slow to undertake the task; partly, no doubt, because of their vivid expectation of the immediate end of the world, but largely also because to their mind the data most in need of preservation were the 'life-giving words.' The impression of Jesus' character, his person and authority was not, as they regarded it, a thing to be gained from the historical outline of his career. It was established by the fact of the Resurrection, by the predictions of the prophets, which found fulfilment in the circ.u.mstances of Jesus' birth, particular incidents here and there in his career and fate, but most of all in his resurrection and the gifts of the Spirit which argued his present session at the right hand of G.o.d. Once this authority of Jesus was established the believer had only to observe his commandments as handed down by the apostles, elders and witnesses.

On all sides there was an indifference to such historical inquiry as the modern man would think natural and inevitable, an indifference that must remain altogether inexplicable to us unless we realize that until at least the time of the fourth evangelist the main proofs of messiahs.h.i.+p were not looked for in Jesus' earthly career. His Christhood was thought of as something in the future, not yet realized. Even his resurrection and manifestation in glory "at the right hand of G.o.d," which is to both Paul (Rom. i. 4) and his predecessors (Acts ii. 32-36) the a.s.surance that "G.o.d hath made him both Lord and Christ," is not yet the beginning of his specific messianic programme. Potentially this has begun, because Jesus has already been seated on the 'throne of glory,' "from henceforth expecting until his enemies be made the footstool of his feet."

Practically it is not yet. The Christ is still a Christ that is to be.

His messianic rule is delayed until the subjugation of the "enemies"; and this subjugation in turn is delayed by "the long suffering of G.o.d, who willeth not that any should perish, but that all men should come to repentance." Meantime a special "outpouring of the Spirit" is given in 'tongues,' 'prophecies,' 'miracle working,' and the like, in fulfilment of scriptural promise, as a kind of coronation largess to all loyal subjects. This outpouring of the Spirit, then, is the great proof and a.s.surance that the Heir has really ascended the 'throne of glory' in spite of the continuance of "all things as they were from the foundation of the world." These 'gifts' are "firstfruits of the Spirit," pledges of the ultimate inheritance, proofs both to believers and unbelievers of the complete Inheritance soon to be received. But the gifts have also a practical aspect. They are all endowments for _service_. The Great Repentance in Israel and among the Gentiles is not to be brought about without the co-operation of believers. The question which at once arises when the manifestation of the risen Christ is granted, "Lord, dost thou at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?" is therefore answered by the a.s.surance that the time is in G.o.d's hand alone, but that the 'gifts of the Spirit,' soon to be imparted, are intended to enable believers to do their part, at home and abroad, toward effecting the Great Repentance (Acts i. 6-8).[20]

Footnote 20: The parallel in Mark xvi. 14-18 is very instructive, but needs the recently discovered connection between verses 14 and 15 to complete the sense: "And they excused themselves (for their unbelief) saying, This age of lawlessness and unbelief is under the dominion of Satan, who by means of the unclean spirits prevents the truth and power of G.o.d from being apprehended. On this account reveal thy righteousness (_i. e._ justice, in the sense of Isa. lvi, 1 _b_) even now. And Christ replied to them, The limit of years of Satan's power is (already) fulfilled, but other terrible things are at hand; moreover I was delivered up to death on behalf of sinners in order that they might return unto the truth and sin no more, that they might inherit the spiritual and incorruptible glory which is in heaven." Then follows the mission into all the world and endowment with the gifts.

For a church which felt itself endowed with living and present evidences of the messianic power of Jesus it was naturally only a second thought (and not a very early one at that) to look back for proof to occurrences in Jesus' life in Galilee, however notable his career as "a prophet mighty in deed and word before G.o.d and all the people." The _present_ gifts of his power would be (at least in demonstrative effect) "greater works than these." With those who had the resurrection testimony of 1st Cor. xv. 3-11, and even the recurrent experience of "visions and revelations of the Lord," antic.i.p.atory revelations of his messiahs.h.i.+p, utterances, like that to Peter at Caesarea Philippi, wherein Jesus only predicted the great work to be divinely accomplished through him, whether by life or death, in going up to Jerusalem, intimations which had been disregarded or disbelieved at the time, could not rank with present knowledge, experience and insight. They would be recalled merely as confirmatory foregleams of "the true light that now s.h.i.+neth," as the two who had received the manifestation at Emmaus exclaim, "Did not our heart burn within us while he talked to us in the way?"

We could not indeed psychologically account for the development of the resurrection faith after the crucifixion, if before it Jesus' life and utterances had not been such as to make his manifestation in glory seem to the disciples just what they _ought_ to have expected. But, conversely, nothing is more certain than the fact that they _did not_ expect it; and that when the belief had become established by other means, the att.i.tude toward the "sayings and doings" maintained by those who had them to relate--as we know, the most successful missionary of all felt it no handicap to be entirely without them--was one of looking back into an obscure past for things whose pregnant significance became appreciable only in the light of present knowledge. "These things understood not his disciples at the first, but when Jesus was glorified, then remembered they that these things had been written of him, and that they had done these things unto him."

We are fortunate in having even one example of the "consecutive narratives" (_diegeses_) referred to in Luke i. 1. Our Mark is a gospel written purely and simply from this point of view, aiming only to show how the earthly career of Jesus gave evidence that this was the Son of G.o.d, predestined to exaltation to the right hand of power, with little attempt, if any, to bring in the precepts of the New Law. We should realize, however, that this is already a beginning in the process soon to become controlling, a process of carrying back into the earthly life of Jesus in Galilee of first this trait, then that, then all the attributes of the glorified Lord.

Ancient and reliable tradition informs us that this first endeavour to tell the story of "Jesus Christ the Son of G.o.d" was composed at Rome by John Mark, a former companion of both Peter and Paul, from data drawn from the anecdotes casually employed by Peter in his preaching. There is much to confirm this in the structure, the style, and the doctrinal object and standpoint of the Gospel.

To begin with, the date of composition cannot be far from 75. Mark is not only presupposed by both Matthew and Luke, but in their time had already acquired an extraordinary predominance. To judge by what remains to us of similar products, Mark in its own field might almost be said to reign supreme and reign alone. Such almost exclusive supremacy could not have been attained, even by a writing commonly understood to represent the preaching of Peter, short of a decade or more of years. On the other hand we have the reluctant testimony of antiquity, anxious to claim as much as possible of apostolic authority for the record, but unwilling to commit Peter to apparent contradictions of Matthew, that it was written after Peter's death (64-5).[21] Internal evidence would in fact bring down the date of the work in its present form a full decade thereafter. It is true that there are many structural evidences of more than one form of the narrative, and that the apocalyptic chapter (ch.

xiii.), which furnishes most of the evidence of date, may well belong among the later supplements. But in the judgment of most critics this 'eschatological discourse' (almost the only connected discourse of the Gospel) is clearly framed in real retrospect upon the overthrow of Jerusalem and the temple, and the attendant tribulation on "those that are in Judaea." The writer applies a general saying of Jesus known to us from other sources about destroying and rebuilding the temple specifically to the demolition effected by t.i.tus (70). He warns his readers in the same connection that "the end" is not to follow immediately upon the great Judaean war, but only when the powers of evil in the heavenly places, powers inhabiting sun, moon and stars, are shaken (xiii. 21-27). The Pauline doctrine of 2nd Thess. ii. 1-12 is adopted, but with careful avoidance of the prediction that the "man of sin" is to appear "in the temple of G.o.d." Paul's "man of sin" is now identified with Daniel's "abomination that maketh desolate" (Dan. xii.

11), which therefore is spoken of as "he" (masculine). "His" appearance will prelude the great Judaean tribulation; but his standing place is ill-defined. It is only "where he ought not." Matthew (following his usual practice) returns more nearly to the language of Daniel. With him the "Abomination" is again an object standing "in _a_ holy place." But Matthew is already applying the prophecy to another tribulation still to come. He does not see that Mark refers to the sack of Jerusalem on which he himself looks back in his addition to the parable of the Supper (Matt. xxii. 6 f.; _cf._ Luke xiv. 15-24), but takes Mark xiii. 14-23 as Jesus' prediction of a great final tribulation _still to come_.

Footnote 21: So Irenaeus (186) and (by implication) Papias. Clement of Alexandria (210) meets the difficulty by alleging that Peter was still alive, but gave no aid to the writer.

Mark's crudities of language and style, his frequent latinisms, his explanation to his readers (almost contemptuously exaggerated) of Jewish purifications and distinctions of meats (vii. 3 f.), presupposition of the Roman form of divorce (x. 12), explanation in Roman money of the value of the (Greek and Oriental) "mite" (_lepton_), are well-known confirmations of the tradition of the writing's place of origin. But these are superficial characteristics. More important for us to note is the fundamental conception of what const.i.tutes "the gospel," and the writer's att.i.tude on questions of the relation of Jew and Gentile and the authority of the apostles and kindred of the Lord.

The most striking characteristic of Mark is that it aims to present the gospel _about_ Jesus, and is relatively indifferent to the gospel _of_ Jesus. Had the writer conceived his task after the manner of a Matthew there is little doubt that he could have compiled catechetic discourses of Jesus like the Sermon on the Mount or the discourse on prayer of Luke xi. 1-13. The fact that he disregards such records of Jesus' ethical and religious instruction does not mean that he (tacitly) refers his readers to the Matthaean Precepts, or similar compilations, to supplement his own deficiencies. It means a different, more Pauline, conception of what "the gospel" is. Mark conceives its primary element to be attachment to the _person_ of Jesus, and has already gone far toward obliterating the primitive distinction between a Jesus whose earthly career had been "in great humility," and the glorified Son of G.o.d. The earthly Jesus is still, it is true, only a man endowed with the Spirit of Adoption. But he is so completely "in" the Spirit, and so fully endowed with it, as almost to a.s.sume the Greek figure of a demi-G.o.d treading the earth incognito. No wonder this Gospel became the favourite of the Adoptionists and Doketists.

Mark does not leave his reader in the dark as to what a man must do to inherit eternal life. The requirement does not appear until after Jesus has taken up with the twelve the road to Calvary, because it is distinctly _not_ a keeping of commandments, new or old. It is an adoption of "the mind that was in Christ, who humbled himself and became obedient unto death." In Matthew's 'improved' version of Jesus' answer to the rich applicant for eternal life, the suppliant is told he may obtain it by obeying the commandments, with supererogatory merit ("if thou wouldest be perfect"), if he follows Jesus' example of self-abnegating service. In the form and context from which Matthew borrows (Mark x. 13-45) there is no trace of this legalism, and the whole idea of supererogatory merit, or higher reward, is strenuously, almost indignantly, repudiated. No man can receive the kingdom at all who does not receive it "as a little child." Every man must be prepared to make every sacrifice, even if he has kept all the commandments from his youth up. Peter and the disciples who have "left all and followed"

are in respect to reward on the same level as others. Peter's plea for the twelve is answered, "There is no man that hath left" earthly possessions for Christ's sake that is not amply compensated even here.