be imagined that this will bear any but the common interpretation, that the Gospel began with the substance of our third chapter. The introduction of the miraculous conception, after John's mission, would be an incredible disturbance of arrangement.* (3.) He says, That Cerinthus and Carpocrates, using this same Gospel of theirs, would prove from the beginning of that Gospel according to Matthew, viz. by its genealogy, that Christ proceeded from the seed of Joseph and Mary." But to what purpose would this heretic have put this construction upon the genealogy, and argued from it the mere humanity of Christ's origin, if it was immediately followed by a section, flatly contradicting what they had been labouring to prove? It is impossible then to get rid of Epiphanius's testimony to the absence of these chapters. Secondly, let us turn to Jerome. Dr. Tattershall conceives that because this author speaks of certain men without the spirit and grace of God, as having had some concern in the composition of this gospel, we may conclude that the introductory chapters were wanting from the copy which he used. The inference is not very obvious; and is at once destroyed by the fact, that Jerome's quotations from the Nazarene Gospel, contain passages of Matthew's introductory chapters. In a passage, e. g., which I have adduced above, occur two instances; “Out of Egypt I have called my son ;" and, “ He shall be called a Nazarene." This discrepancy between these two Fathers would have furnished Dr. Tattershall with a more powerful argument against the Editor's note, than any which he has adduced; and have enabled him to show that Jerome, being cited for one purpose, establishes precisely the reverse. III. Dr. Tattershall adduces in evidence against the worth of the Nazarene Gospel, the absurd chronological mistake in its first sentence, which assigns the Baptist's appearance to the days of Herod, king of Judæa. On this I have only to observe, that it might have been well to state, that the blunder is commonly attributed to Epiphanius himself, rather than to the Gospel which he cites. Whatever that work may have been, it was produced near the spot where the Herods lived, in times when the remembrance of them was fresh, for the people whom they reigned; so that a mistake of that magnitude, in its first verse, must be regarded as of improbable occurrence. over On the other See Eichhorn's Einleitung in das N. T. I., § 8; Leipzig, 1820. hand, Epiphanius, it is admitted, had never seen this Gospel, and therefore cited it from hearsay; he wrote in the latter part of the fourth century, and is remarkable for inaccuracy of every kind, and especially with regard to time. There is then no improbability in the supposition that Epiphanius confounded Herod the king, with Herod the tetrarch, and with the purpose of explanation, inserted a mistake, by adding the words, "King of Judæa." Eichhorn says, Two different Herods are confounded together, the King Herod under whom John was born, and Herod Antipas, under whom the Baptist publicly appeared;-an evident mark of a later annotating or correcting hand, unguided by a knowledge of the true chronology, as contained in Luke, and so substituting one Herod for another." For the foregoing reasons, it appears to me that Dr. Tattershall has not, by making his strictures sound, earned the right to render them " severe. The evidence bearing upon the introduction of Luke's gospel, is much simpler and less confused; and to Dr. Tattershall's estimate of it, no valid objection, I think, can be urged. C. On the Chronological Inconsistency between the introductory chapters of Matthew, and those of Luke. In his note on this subject, Dr.Tattershall points out, as an example of carelessness in the Editors of the Improved Version, the following discrepancy between two of their statements. In their note on Matthew i. 16, they say, "If it be true, as Luke relates, that 'Jesus was entering upon his thirtieth year, in the fifteenth year of the reign of Tiberius' ;" and in their note on Luke i. 4, they say, "The Evangelist (Luke) expressly affirms that Jesus had completed his thirtieth year," &c. It would have been only just to add, that in the more recent editions of the Improved Version, this inconsistency does not exist. The fourth edition (1817) lies before me; and in it the later note stands thus; 'The Evangelist expressly affirms that Jesus had entered upon, or as Grotius understands it, had completed his thirtieth year," &c. To all the other strictures contained in Dr. Tattershall's note, Einleitung in das N. T., I, § 8, 31; Leipzig, 1820. See also Evidences of the Genuineness of the Gospels, by Andrews Norton, Note A, sec. V. i. Boston, U. S., 1837. E "the Unitarian Editors" appear to me to be justly liable. * The inaccuracy of their chronology, was long ago perceived, by more friendly critics than their present assailants; and sounder calculations of the dates of our Lord's birth, and ministry, were instituted and published by Dr. Carpenter, in the admirable dissertation prefixed to his "Apostolical Harmony of the Gospels." Not being aware of any method, at all satisfactory, by which the notes in the "Improved Version," referring to this point, can be defended, I do not profess to understand why they appear again and again without remark or correction, in the successive editions of that work. Dr. Tattershall, I perceive, adopts the usual mode of reconciling the chronology of Matthew and Luke; and supposes that the reign of Tiberius must be reckoned, not from his succession to the dignity of Emperor, on the death of Augustus, but from his previous association with Augustus, in the tribunitial authority. Widely as this explanation has been adopted, it cannot be denied that it has been invented to suit the case; that such a mode of reckoning would never have been thought of, had it not been for this discrepancy between the two Evangelists; and that it has nothing to support it but the evidence which belongs to all hypotheses, viz., that if true, it removes the difficulty which it was designed to explain. Even the industry of Lardner has failed to present us with any instance in which a Roman historian has reckoned the reign of Tiberius, from this association with his predecessor; or with any distinct trace that such a mode of computation was ever employed. And it is notorious that all the Christian Fathers calculated the fifteenth year of Tiberius from the death of Augustus. Should Dr. Tattershall be in possession of any evidence in support of this mode of reckoning, more satisfactory, than that which has hitherto been adduced, he would render an important service to biblical literature by producing it. D. It is so universally understood that we are indebted to Mr. Thirlwall for the admirable translation of Schleiermacher's Essay, that I conceive there can be no impropriety in speaking of the work, as his; The sentence at the end of the There is a misprint in Dr. T.'s note, p. 104. third paragraph should close thus; "nine months after that event, on one calculation, or three months before it, on the other." NOTES. though his name does not appear in the title-page ;-a circumstance of which I was not aware, till making this extract for the press. The whole note from which are taken the words in the Lecture, is as follows:-"The arguments by which Hug attempted to reconcile the two Evangelists on the residence of Joseph, are extremely slight and unsatisfactory. He admits that St. Matthew supposes Bethlehem to have been Joseph's usual dwelling-place. But, he asks, was St. Matthew wrong? This however is not the question, but only whether he is consistent with St. Luke. Now, nothing can be more evident than that, according to the account of the latter, Joseph was a total stranger at Bethlehem. Bethlehem was indeed, as Hug remarks, in one sense his own city, but clearly not in the sense that Matthew's account supposes. Here too, therefore, Schleiermacher's position seems to remain unshaken."-(See note on p. 44, of Translation of Schleiermacher's Critical Essay on St. Luke's gospel.) |