EVENTS IN THE PUBLIC LIFE OF JESUS, EXCLUDING THE MIRACLES.
§ 84.
GENERAL COMPARISON OF THE MANNER OF NARRATION THAT DISTINGUISHES THE SEVERAL EVANGELISTS.
If, before proceeding to the consideration of details, we compare the general character and tone of the historical narration in the various gospels, we find differences, first, between Matthew and the two other synoptists; secondly, between the three first evangelists collectively and the fourth.
Among the reproaches which modern criticism has heaped on the gospel of Matthew, a prominent place has been given to its want of individualized and dramatic life; a want which is thought to prove that the author was not an eye-witness, since an eye-witness is ordinarily distinguished by the precision and minuteness of his narration.[1] Certainly, when we read the indefinite designation of times, places and persons, the perpetually recurring τότε, then, παράγων ἐκεῖθεν, departing from thence, ἄνθρωπος, a man, which characterize this gospel; when we recollect its wholesale statements, such as that Jesus went through all the cities and villages ([ix. 35], [xi. 1], comp. [iv. 23]); that they brought to him all sick people, and that he healed them all ([iv. 24 f.], [xiv. 35 f.], comp. [xv. 29 ff.]); and finally, the bareness and brevity of many isolated narratives: we cannot disapprove the decision of this criticism, that Matthew’s whole narrative resembles a record of events which, before they were committed to writing, had been long current in oral tradition, and had thus lost the impress of particularity and minuteness. But it must be admitted, that this proof, taken alone, is not absolutely convincing; for in most cases we may verify the remark, that even an eye-witness may be unable graphically to narrate what he has seen.[2]
But our modern critics have not only measured Matthew by the standard of what is to be expected from an eye-witness, in the abstract; they have also compared him with his fellow-evangelists. They are of opinion, not only that John decidedly surpasses Matthew in the power of delineation, both in their few parallel passages and in his entire narrative, but also that the two other synoptists, especially Mark, are generally far clearer and fuller in their style of narration.[3] This is the actual fact, and it ought not to be any longer evaded. With respect to the fourth Evangelist, it is true that, as one would [[388]]have anticipated, he is not devoid of general, wholesale statements, such as, that Jesus during the feast did many miracles, that hence many believed on him ([ii. 23]), with others of a similar kind ([iii. 22], [vii. 1]): and he not seldom designates persons indecisively. Sometimes, however, he gives the names of individuals whom Matthew does not specify ([xii. 3], [4], comp. with [Matt. xxvi. 7], [8]; and [xviii. 10] with [Matt. xxvi. 51]; also [vi. 5 ff.] with [Matt. xiv. 16 f.]); and he generally lets us know the district or country in which an event happened. His careful chronology we have already noticed; but the point of chief importance is that his narratives (e.g. that of the man born blind, and that of the resurrection of Lazarus) have a dramatic and life-like character, which we seek in vain in the first gospel. The two intermediate Evangelists are not free from indecisive designations of time (e.g. [Mark viii. 1]; [Luke v. 17], [viii. 22]); of place ([Mark iii. 13]; [Luke vi. 12]); and of persons ([Mark x. 17]; [Luke xiii. 23]); nor from statements that Jesus went through all cities, and healed all the sick ([Mark i. 32 ff.], [38 f.]; [Luke iv. 40 f.]); but they often give us the details of what Matthew has only stated generally. Not only does Luke associate many discourses of Jesus with special occasions concerning which Matthew is silent, but both he and Mark notice the office or names of persons, to whom Matthew gives no precise designation ([Matt. ix. 18]; [Mark v. 22]; [Luke viii. 41]; [Matt. xix. 16]; [Luke xviii. 18]; [Matt. xx. 30]; [Mark x. 46]). But it is chiefly in the lively description of particular incidents, that we perceive the decided superiority of Luke, and still more of Mark, over Matthew. Let the reader only compare the narrative of the execution of John the Baptist in Matthew and Mark ([Matt. xiv. 3]; [Mark vi. 17]), and that of the demoniac or demoniacs of Gadara ([Matt. viii. 28 ff.] parall.).
These facts are, in the opinion of our latest critics, a confirmation of the fourth Evangelist’s claim to the character of an eye-witness, and of the greater proximity of the second and third Evangelists to the scenes they describe, than can be attributed to the first. But, even allowing that one who does not narrate graphically cannot be an eye-witness, this does not involve the proposition that whoever does narrate graphically must be an eye-witness. In all cases in which there are extant two accounts of a single fact, the one full, the other concise, opinions may be divided as to which of them is the original.[4] When these accounts have been liable to the modifications of tradition, it is important to bear in mind that tradition has two tendencies: the one, to sublimate the concrete into the abstract, the individual into the general; the other, not less essential, to substitute arbitrary fictions for the historical reality which is lost.[5] If then we put the want of precision in the narrative of the first Evangelist to the account of the former function of the legend, ought we at once to regard the precision and dramatic effect of the other gospels, as a proof that their authors were eye-witnesses? Must we not rather examine whether these qualities be not derived from the second function of the legend?[6] The decision with which the other inference is drawn, is in fact merely an after-taste of the old orthodox opinion, that all our gospels proceed immediately from eye-witnesses, or at least through a medium incapable of error. Modern criticism has limited this supposition, and admitted the possibility that one or the other of our gospels may have been affected by oral tradition. Accordingly it maintains, not without probability, that a gospel in which the descriptions are throughout destitute of colouring and life, cannot be the production [[389]]of an eye-witness, and must have suffered from the effacing fingers of tradition. But the counter proposition, that the other gospels, in which the style of narration is more detailed and dramatic, rest on the testimony of eye-witnesses, would only follow from the supposed necessity that this must be the case with some of our gospels. For if such a supposition be made with respect to several narratives of both the above kinds, there is no question that the more graphic and vivid ones are with preponderant probability to be referred to eye-witnesses. But this supposition has merely a subjective foundation. It was an easier transition for commentators to make from the old notion that all the gospels were immediately or mediately autoptical narratives, to the limited admission that perhaps one may fall short of this character, than to the general admission that it may be equally wanting to all. But, according to the rigid rules of consequence, with the orthodox view of the scriptural canon, falls the assumption of pure ocular testimony, not only for one or other of the gospels, but for all; the possibility of the contrary must be presupposed in relation to them all, and their pretensions must be estimated according to their internal character, compared with the external testimonies. From this point of view—the only one that criticism can consistently adopt—it is as probable, considering the nature of the external testimonies examined in our Introduction, that the three last Evangelists owe the dramatic effect in which they surpass Matthew, to the embellishments of a more mature tradition, as that this quality is the result of a closer communication with eye-witnesses.
That we may not anticipate, let us, in relation to this question, refer to the results we have already obtained. The greater particularity by which Luke is distinguished from Matthew in his account of the occasions that suggested many discourses of Jesus, has appeared to us often to be the result of subsequent additions; and the names of persons in Mark ([xiii. 3] comp. [v. 37]; [Luke viii. 51]) have seemed to rest on a mere inference of the narrator. Now, however, that we are about to enter on an examination of particular narratives, we will consider, from the point of view above indicated, the constant forms of introduction, conclusion, and transition, already noticed, in the several gospels. Here we find the difference between Matthew and the other synoptists, as to their more or less dramatic style, imprinted in a manner that can best teach us how much this style is worth.
Matthew ([viii. 16 f.]) states in general terms, that on the evening after the cure of Peter’s mother-in-law, many demoniacs were brought to Jesus, all of whom, together with others that were sick, he healed. Mark ([i. 32)] in a highly dramatic manner, as if he himself had witnessed the scene, tells, that on the same occasion, the whole city was gathered together at the door of the house in which Jesus was; at another time, he makes the crowd block up the entrance ([ii. 2]); in two other instances, he describes the concourse as so great, that Jesus and his disciples could not take their food ([iii. 20], [vi. 31]); and Luke on one occasion states, that the people even gathered together in innumerable multitudes so that they trode one upon another ([xii. 1]). All highly vivid touches, certainly: but the want of them can hardly be prejudicial to Matthew, for they look thoroughly like strokes of imagination, such as abound in Mark’s narrative, and often, as Schleiermacher observes,[7] give it almost an apocryphal appearance. In detailed narratives, of which we shall presently notice many examples, while Matthew simply tells what Jesus said on a certain occasion, the two other Evangelists are able to describe the glance with which his words were accompanied ([Mark iii. 5], [x. 21]; [Luke vi. 10]). [[390]]On the mention of a blind beggar of Jericho, Mark is careful to give us his name, and the name of his father ([x. 46]). From these particulars we might already augur, what the examination of single narratives will prove: namely, that the copiousness of Mark and Luke is the product of the second function of the legend, which we may call the function of embellishment. Was this embellishment gradually wrought out by oral tradition, or was it the arbitrary addition of our Evangelists? Concerning this, there may be a difference of opinion, and a degree of probability in relation to particular passages is the nearest approach that can be made to a decision. In any case, not only must it be granted, that a narrative adorned by the writer’s own additions is more remote from primitive truth than one free from such additions; but we may venture to pronounce that the earlier efforts of the legend are rapid sketches, tending to set off only the leading points whether of speech or action, and that at a later period it aims rather to give a symmetrical effect to the whole, including collateral incidents; so that, in either view, the closest approximation to truth remains on the side of the first gospel.