Companion to the Bible

by E. P. Barrows

SECOND DIVISION, PARTICULAR INTRODUCTION

CHAPTER XXIX.

THE HISTORICAL BOOKS.

1. The New Testament, like the Old, is not an abstract system of doctrines and duties, but a record of facts involving doctrines and duties of the highest import. This record does not constitute an independent history, complete in itself, and to be explained in its own light. It is rather the necessary sequel to the record of the Old Testament. It interprets the Old Testament, and is itself interpreted by it. The two constitute together an organic whole, and can be truly understood only in their mutual connection. To discard the Old Testament whether formally or in practice, is to throw away the key which unlocks to us the treasures of the New; for the writers of the New Testament continually reason out of the Scriptures of the Old. If we cannot truly comprehend the Old Testament except when we view it as preparatory to the revelation contained in the New, so neither can we have a full understanding of the New except as the completion of the revelation begun in the Old. In a word, we understand revelation aright only in its unity.

2. The New Testament uses all the teachings of the Old, but it does not repeat them all. The unity, personality, and infinite perfections of God; his universal providence, and his supremacy as well over nations as individuals; the duties that men owe to God and each other, as embodied for substance in the ten commandments and expanded in the teachings of Moses and the prophets; the indissoluble connection, on the one hand, between righteousness and true prosperity, and on the other, between sin and ruin—all these great truths are so fully unfolded in the Old Testament that they need no formal repetition in the New. The person and office of the Messiah—as that great prophet, like unto Moses, whom God should raise up for his people in the latter days; as that mighty king of David's line, who should sit on his throne and in his kingdom to order it and to establish it with judgment and with justice forever; as that high priest after the order of Melchisedec whom God should establish forever with a solemn oath—had been prefigured in the institutions of Moses, in the Psalms, and in the writings of the prophets.

Some other important truths not so fully revealed in the Old Testament but deducible in a legitimate way either from its general scope or from some brief hints in its teachings, had become firmly established in the faith of the Jewish people during the long interval that elapsed between Malachi and Christ. Such particularly were the doctrines of the resurrection of the dead and of future rewards and punishments. These truths, also, as well as those more directly and fully taught in the Old Testament, were assumed by the Saviour and his apostles as a platform for the peculiar revelations of the gospel, the sum of which is Jesus Christ crucified for the salvation of the world. The four gospels, then, as containing the history of our Lord's appearance and works, lie at the foundation of the revelation contained in the New Testament. To these, then, our attention must first be given; after which the history of the apostolic labors, as given in the Acts of the Apostles, will naturally follow.

I. THE GOSPELS AS A WHOLE.

3. The word gospel (Anglo-Saxon, god, good, and spell, history or tidings) answers to the Greek word euangelion, good-tidings, whence comes the Latin evangelium, with the derived words in use among us, as evangelist, evangelical, etc. It properly signifies the good message itself, and it is only by a secondary usage that it is applied to the written histories of the Saviour's life, as being the embodiment of this message. The titles prefixed to these gospels from the beginning; "The Gospel according to Matthew", "The Gospel according to Mark," etc., indicate that the written record is not itself the gospel, but rather an account of the gospel according to these different writers. Christ himself is the author of the gospel. It existed and was received by many thousands before a line of it was put upon record on the written page.

4. The genuineness, uncorrupt preservation, and authenticity of the four canonical gospels have already been shown at some length. Chaps. 2, 3, 4. In connection with the argument for their genuineness, their natural division into two parts—the first three, commonly called the synoptical gospels, and the gospel according to John; the remarkable agreements and differences of the three synoptical gospels among themselves; and the remarkable contrast which the fourth gospel presents to all three of the synoptical gospels, have also been considered simply as existing facts. Chap. 2, Nos. 14 and 15. But when we seek an explanation of these remarkable phenomena, we enter upon a very difficult problem, one on which the ingenuity of Biblical scholars has exhausted itself for several successive generations without reaching thus far a result that can be regarded as perfectly satisfactory. Almost all conceivable theories and combinations of theories have been proposed, some of which, however, are now generally abandoned as untenable, and need not be considered at large.

5. Looking at the three synoptical gospels, Matthew, Mark, and Luke, we find a remarkable agreement not only in their general plan, but in many of their details also. With the exception of our Lord's last journey to Jerusalem and the history of his passion there, they are mainly occupied with his ministry in Galilee. The selection of incidents is also to a great extent the same. "The most remarkable differences lie in the presence of a long series of events connected with the Galilean ministry, which are peculiar to St. Matthew and St. Mark (Matt. 14:22-16:12; Mark 6:45-8:26), and a second series of events connected with the journey to Jerusalem (Luke 9:51-18:14), which is peculiar to St. Luke." Westcott, Introduct. to the Study of the Gospels, chap. 3. The coincidences of language, as well as incident, are also remarkable; and here the general law prevails that these coincidences are more common, as has been shown by Norton and others, in the recital of the words of others than in the narrative parts of the gospels, and most common when our Lord's own words are recited.