15. Luke xxii. 17-20. This passage has been made the subject of a most instructive discussion by Dean Blakesley[376] (d. 1885), whose notion respecting it deserves more consideration than it would seem to have received, though it must no doubt be ultimately set aside through the overpowering weight of hostile authority. He is perplexed by two difficulties lying on the surface, the fact that the Lord twice took a cup, before and after the breaking of the bread; and the close resemblance borne by vv. 19 and 20 to the parallel passage of St. Paul, 1 Cor. xi. 24, 25. The common mode of accounting for the latter phenomenon seems very reasonable, namely, that the Evangelist, Paul's almost constant companion in travel, copied into his Gospel the very language of the Apostle, so far as it suited his design. In speaking of the two cups St. Luke stands alone, and much trouble has been taken to illustrate the use of the Paschal cup from Maimonides [d. 1206] and other Jewish doctors, all too modern to be implicitly depended on. Dean Alford indeed (N. T. ad loc.) hails “this most important addition to our narrative,” which “amounts, I believe, to a solemn declaration of the fulfilment of the Passover rite, in both its usual divisions—the eating of the lamb, and drinking the cup of thanksgiving.” Thus regarded, the old rite would be concluded and abrogated in vv. 17, 18; the new rite instituted in vv. 19, 20. To Dean Blakesley all this appears wholly unsatisfactory, and he resorts for help to our critical authorities. He first gets rid of the words of ver. 19 after σῶμά μου, and of all ver. 20, and so far his course is sanctioned by Westcott and Hort, who place the whole passage within their double brackets, and pronounce it a perverse interpolation from 1 Cor. xi. 24, 25. This much accomplished, the cup is now mentioned but once, but with this awkward peculiarity, that it precedes the bread in the order of taking and blessing, which is a downright contradiction of St. Matthew (xxvi. 26-29) and of St. Mark (xiv. 22-25), as well as of St. Paul. Here Westcott and Hort refuse to be carried further, and thus leave the remedy worse than the disease[377], if indeed [pg 352] there be any disease to remedy. Dean Blakesley boldly places Luke xxii. 19 (ending at σῶμά μου) before ver. 17, and his work is done: the paragraph thus remodelled is self-consistent, but it is robbed of everything which has hitherto made it a distinctive narrative, supplementing as well as confirming those of the other two Evangelists.
Now for the last step in Dean Blakesley's process of emendation, the transposition of ver. 19 before ver. 17, there is no other authority save b e of the Old Latin and Cureton's Syriac, the last with this grave objection in his eyes, that it exhibits the whole of ver. 19, including that τοῦτο ποιεῖτε εἰς τὴν ἐμὴν ἀνάμνησιν which he would regard as specially belonging of right, and as most suitable for, St. Paul's narrative (Praelectio, p. 16), although Justin Martyr cites the expression with the prelude οἱ γὰρ ἀπόστολοι ἐν τοῖς γενομένοις ὑπ᾽ αὐτῶν ἀπομνημονεύμασιν, ἂ καλεῖται, εὐαγγέλια. The later portion of ver. 19 and the whole of ver. 20, as included in the double brackets of Westcott and Hort, are absent from Cod. D, and of the Latins from a b e ff i l, as is ver. 20 from the Curetonian Syriac also: authorities for the most part the same as we had to deal with in our Chap. X. p. [299], note. Another, and yet more violent remedy, to provide against the double mention of the cup, is found in the utter omission of vers. 17, 18 in Evst. 32 and the editio princeps of the Peshitto Syriac, countenanced by many manuscripts of the same[378]. Thus both the chief Syriac translations found a difficulty here, though they remedied it in different ways[379].
The scheme of Dean Blakesley is put forth with rare ingenuity[380], and maintained with a boldness which is best engendered [pg 353] and nourished by closing the eyes to the strength of the adverse case. We have carefully enumerated the authorities of every kind which make for him, a slender roll indeed. When it is stated that the Received text (with only slight and ordinary variations) is upheld by Codd. אABCEFGHKLM (hiant PR) SUXVΓΔΛΠ, by all cursives and versions, except those already accounted for, it will be seen that his view of the passage can never pass beyond the region of speculation, until the whole system of Biblical Criticism is revolutionized by means of new discoveries which it seems at present vain to look for.
16. Luke xxii. 43, 44. ὤφθη δὲ αὐτῷ ἄγγελος ἀπ᾽ οὐρανοῦ ἐνισχύων αὐτόν. καὶ γενόμενος ἐν ἀγωνίᾳ, ἐκτενέστερον προσηύχετο; ἐγένετο δὲ ὁ ἱδρὼς αὐτοῦ ὡσεὶ θρόμβοι αἵματος καταβαίνοντες ἐπι τὴν γῆν. It is a positive relief to know that any lingering doubt which may have hung over the authenticity of these verses, whose sacred words the devout reader of Scripture could so ill spare, is completely dissipated by their being contained in Cod. א[381]. The two verses are omitted in ABRT, 124, 561 (in 13 only ὤφθη δὲ is primâ manu), in f of the Old Latin, in at least ten manuscripts of the Bohairic[382], with some Sahidic and Armenian codices. A, however, whose inconsistency we had to note when considering ch. ii. 14, affixes to the latter part of ver. 42 (πλήν), “to [pg 354] which they cannot belong” (Tregelles), the proper Ammonian and Eusebian numerals for vv. 43-4 (ι)σπγ, and thus shows that its scribe was acquainted with the passage[383]: some Armenian codices leave out only ver. 44, as apparently does Evan. 559. In Codd. Γ, 123, 344, 512, 569, (440 secundâ manu in ver. 43) the verses are obelized, and are marked by asterisks in ESVΔΠ, 24, 36, 161, 166, 274, 408: these, however, may very well be, and in some copies doubtless are, lesson-marks for the guidance of such as read the divine service (cf. sequent.). A scholion in Cod. 34 [xi] speaks of its absence from some copies[384]. In all known Evangelistaria and in their cognate Cod. 69* and its three fellows, the two verses, omitted in this place, follow Matt. xxvi. 39, as a regular part of the lesson for the Thursday in Holy Week: in the same place the margin of C (tertiâ manu) contains the passage, C being defective in Luke xxii from ver. 19. In Cod. 547 the two verses stand (in redder ink, with a scholion) not only after Matt. xxvi. 39, but also in their proper place in St. Luke[385]. Thus too Cod. 346, and the margin of Cod. 13. Codd. LQ place the Ammonian sections and the number of the Eusebian canons differently from the rest (but this kind of irregularity very often occurs in manuscripts), and the Philoxenian margin in one of Adler's manuscripts (Assem. 2) states that it is not found “in Evangeliis apud Alexandrinos, proptereaque [non?] posuit eam S. Cyrillus in homilia ...:” the fact being that the verses are not found in Cyril's “Homilies on Luke,” published in Syriac at Oxford by Dean Payne Smith, [pg 355] nor does Athanasius ever allude to them. They are read, however, in Codd. אDFGHKLMQUXΛ, 1, and all other known cursives, without any marks of suspicion, in the Peshitto, Curetonian (omitting ἀπ᾽ οὐρανοῦ), Harkleian and Jerusalem Syriac (this last obelized in the margin), the Ethiopic, in some Sahidic, Bohairic, and Armenian manuscripts and editions, in the Old Latin a b c e ff2 g1.2 i l q, and the Vulgate. The effect of this great preponderance is enhanced by the early and express testimony of Fathers. Justin Martyr (Trypho, 103) cites ἱδρὼς ὡσεὶ θόμβοι as contained ἐν τοῖς ἀπομνημονεύμασιν ἅ φημι ὑπὸ τῶν ἀποστόλων αὐτοῦ καὶ τῶν ἐκείνοις παρακολουθησάντων (see Luke i. 3, Alford) συντετάχθαι. Irenaeus (iii. 222) declares that the Lord ἵδρωσε θρόμβους αἵματος in the second century. In the third, Hippolytus twice, Dionysius of Alexandria, and Pseudo-Tatian; in the fourth, Arius, Eusebius, Athanasius, Ephraem Syrus, Didymus, Gregory of Nazianzen, Epiphanius, Chrysostom, Pseudo-Dionysius Areopagita; in the fifth, Julian the heretic, Theodore of Mopsuestia, Nestorius, Cyril of Alexandria, Paulus of Emesa, Gennadius, Theodoret, Bishops at Ephesus in 431; and later writers such as Pseudo-Caesarius, Theodosius of Alexandria, John Damascene, Maximus, Theodore the heretic, Leontius of Byzantium, Anastasius Sinaita, Photius, as well as Hilary, Jerome, Augustine, Cassian, Paulinus, Facundus[386]. Hilary, on the other hand, declares that the passage is not found “in Graecis et in Latinis codicibus compluribus” (p. 1062 a, Benedictine edition, 1693), a statement which Jerome, who leans much on others in such matters, repeats to the echo. Epiphanius, however, in a passage we have before alluded to (p. 270, note), charges “the orthodox” with removing ἔκλαυσε in ch. xix. 41, though Irenaeus had used it against the Docetae, φοβήθέντες καὶ μὴ νοήσαντες αὐτοῦ τὸ τέλος καὶ τὸ ἰσχυρότατον, καὶ γενόμενος ἐν ἀγωνίᾳ ἵδρωσε, καὶ ἐγένετο ὁ ἱδρὼς αὐτοῦ ὡς θρόμβοι αἵματος, καὶ ὤφθη ἄγγελος ἐνισχύων αὐτόν: Epiphan. Ancor. xxxi[387]. Davidson states [pg 356] that “the Syrians are censured by Photius, the Armenians by Nicon [x], Isaac the Catholic, and others, for expunging the passage” (Bibl. Critic. ii. p. 438).
Of all recent editors, before Westcott and Hort set them within their double brackets, Lachmann alone had doubted the authenticity of the verses, and enclosed them within brackets: but for the accidental presence of the fragment Cod. Q his hard rule—“mathematica recensendi ratio” as Tischendorf terms it—would have forced him to expunge them, unless indeed he judged (which is probably true) that Cod. A makes as much in their favour as against them. So far as the language of Epiphanius is concerned, it does not appear that this passage was rejected by the orthodox as repugnant to their notions of the Lord's Divine character, and such may not have been at all the origin of the variation. We have far more just cause for tracing the removal of the paragraph from its proper place in St. Luke to the practice of the Lectionaries, whose principal lessons (such as those of the Holy Week would be) were certainly settled in the Greek Church as early as the fourth century (see above, Vol. I. pp. 74-7, and notes). I remark with lively thankfulness that my friend Professor Milligan does not disturb these precious verses in his “Words of the New Testament:” and Mr. Hammond concludes that “on the whole there is no reasonable doubt upon the passage.” Thus Canon Cook is surely justified in his strong asseveration that “supporting the whole passage we have an array of authorities which, whether we regard their antiquity or their character for sound judgement, veracity, and accuracy, are scarcely paralleled on any occasion” (Revised Version, p. 103).
17. Luke xxiii. 34. We soon light upon another passage wherein the Procrustean laws of certain eminent editors are irreconcileably at variance with their own Christian feeling and critical instinct. No holy passage has been brought into disrepute on much slighter grounds than this speech of the Lord upon the cross: the words from Ὁ δὲ Ἰησοῦς down to ποιοῦσιν are set within brackets by Lachmann, within double brackets by Westcott and Hort. They are omitted by only BD*, 38, 435, [pg 357] among the manuscripts: by E they are marked with an asterisk (comp. Matt. xvi. 2, 3; ch. xxii. 43,44); of א Tischendorf speaks more cautiously than in the case of ch. xxii. 43, 44, “A [388], and a passage in Arethas of the sixth century. Eusebius assigned the section to his tenth table or canon, as it has no parallel in the other three Gospels. The passage is contained without a vestige of suspicion in אACFGHK (even L) M (hiat P) QSUVΓΔΛΠ, all other cursives (including 1, 33, 69), c e f ff2 l, the Vulgate, all four Syriac versions, all Bohairic codices except the aforenamed two, the Armenian and Ethiopic. The Patristic authorities for it are (as might be anticipated) express, varied, and numerous:—such as Irenaeus and Origen in their Latin versions, the dying words of St. James the Just as cited in Eusebius, Eccl. Hist., lib. ii. cap. 23, after Hegesippus, ἐπὶ τῆς πρώτης τῶν ἀποστόλων γενόμενος διαδοχῆς (Eus.), Hippolytus, the Apostolic Constitutions twice, the Clementine Homilies, Ps.-Tatian, Archelaus with Manes, Eusebius, Athanasius, Gregory of Nyssa, Theodorus of Heraclea, Basil, Ephraem Syrus, Ps.-Ephraem, Ps.-Dionysius Areopagita, Acta Pilati, Syriac Acts of the Apostles, Ps.-Ignatius, Ps.-Justin, Cyril of Alexandria, Eutherius, Anastasius Sinaita, Hesychius, Antiochus Monachus, Andreas of Crete, Ps.-Chrysostom, Ps.-Amphilochius, Opus Imperfectum, Chrysostom often (sometimes loosely enough more suo), Hilary, Ambrose eleven times, Jerome twelve times, Augustine more than sixty times, Theodoret, and John Damascene. Tischendorf adds—valeant quantum—(but only a fraction of this evidence was known to Tischendorf), the apocryphal Acta Pilati[389]. It is almost incredible [pg 358] that acute and learned men should be able to set aside such a silva of witness of every kind, chiefly because D is considered especially weighty in its omissions, and B has to be held up, in practice if not in profession, as virtually almost impeccable. Vain indeed is the apology, “Few verses of the Gospels bear in themselves a surer witness to the truth of what they record than this first of the Words from the Cross; but it need not therefore have belonged originally to the book in which it is now included. We cannot doubt that it comes from an extraneous source” (Hort, Notes, p. 68). Nor can we on our part doubt that the system which entails such consequences is hopelessly self-condemned.
18. John i. 18. ὁ μονογενὴς υἱός, ὁ ὢν εἰς τὸν κόλπον τοῦ πατρός... This passage exhibits in a few ancient documents of high consideration the remarkable variation θεός for υἱός, which however, according to the form of writing universal in the oldest codices (see Vol. I. pp. 15, 50), would require but the change of a single letter, ΥΣ or ΘΣ. In behalf of ΘΣ stand Codd. אBC primâ manu, and L (all wanting the article before μονογενής, and א omitting the ὁ ὤν that follows), 33 alone among cursive manuscripts (but prefixing ὁ to μονογενής, as does a later hand of א), of the versions the Peshitto (not often found in such company), and the margin of the Harkleian (whose affinity with Cod. L is very decided), the Ethiopic, and a host of Fathers, some expressly (e.g. Clement of Alexandria, Didymus “de Trinitate,” Epiphanius, Cyril of Alexandria, &c.), others by apparent reference (e.g. Gregory of Nyssa). The Egyptian versions may have read either θεός or θεοῦ, more probably the latter, as Prebendary Malan translates for the Bohairic[390], the [pg 359] Sahidic being here lost. Their testimonies are elaborately set forth by Tregelles, who strenuously maintains θεός as the true reading, and thinks it much that Arius, though “opposed to the dogma taught,” upholds μονογενὴς θεός. It may be that the term suits that heretic's system better than it does the Catholic doctrine: it certainly does not confute it. For the received reading υἱός we can allege AC (tertiâ manu) EFGHKMSUVXΔΛΠ (D and the other uncials being defective), every cursive manuscript except 33 (including Tregelles' allies 1, 69), all the Latin versions, the Curetonian, Harkleian, and Jerusalem Syriac, the Georgian and Slavonic, the Armenian and Platt's Ethiopic, the Anglo-Saxon and Arabic. The array of Fathers is less imposing, but includes Athanasius (often), Chrysostom, and the Latin writers down from Tertullian. Origen, Eusebius, and some others have both readings. Cyril of Jerusalem quotes without υἱός or θεός,—ὃν ἀνθρώπων μὲν οὐδεὶς ἑώρακεν; ὁ μονογενὴς δὲ μόνος ἐξηγήσατο. C. 7, l. 27, p. 107, ed. Oxon., Pereira.
Tregelles, who seldom notices internal probabilities in his critical notes, here pleads that an ἅπαξ λεγόμενον like μονογενὴς θεός[391] might easily be changed by copyists into the more familiar ὁ μονογενὴς υἱός from John iii. 16; 18; i John iv. 9, and he would therefore apply Bengel's Canon (I. see p. 247). Alford's remark, however, is very sound: “We should be introducing great harshness into the sentence, and a new and [to us moderns] strange term into Scripture, by adopting θεός: a consequence which ought to have no weight whatever where authority is overpowering, but may fairly be weighed where this is not so. The ‘praestat procliviori ardua’ finds in this case a legitimate limit” (N. T., note on John i. 18). Every one indeed must feel θεός to be untrue, even though for the sake of consistency he may be forced to uphold it. Westcott and Hort set μονογενὴς θεός in the text, but concede to ὁ μονογενὴς υἱός a place in their margin.
Those who will resort to “ancient evidence exclusively” for the recension of the text may well be perplexed in dealing with this passage. The oldest manuscripts, versions, and writers are hopelessly divided, so that we can well understand how some critics (not very unreasonably, perhaps, yet without a shadow of authority worth notice) have come to suspect both θεός and [pg 360] υἱός to be accretions or spurious additions to μονογενής. If the principles advocated in Vol. II. Ch. X be true, the present is just such a case as calls for the interposition of the more recent uncial and cursive codices; and when we find that they all, with the single exception of Cod. 33, defend the reading ὁ μονογενὴς υἱός, we feel safe in concluding that for once Codd. אBC and the Peshitto do not approach the autograph of St. John so nearly as Cod. A, the Harkleian Syriac, and Old Latin versions[392].
19. John iii. 13. Westcott and Hort remove from the text to the margin the weighty and doubtless difficult, but on that account only the more certainly genuine, words ὁ ὢν ἐν τῷ οὐρανῷ. Tischendorf rejected them (as indeed does Professor Milligan) in his “Synopsis Evangelica,” 1864, but afterwards repented of his decision. The authorities for omission are אBL (which read μονογενὴς θεός in ch. i. 18) Tb [vi], 33 alone among manuscripts. CDF are defective here: but the clause is contained in AEGHKMSUVΓΔΛΠ, and in all cursives save one, A* and one Evangelistarium (44) omitting ὤν. No versions can be cited against the clause except one manuscript of the Bohairic: it appears in every one else, including the Latin, the four Syriac, the Ethiopic, the Georgian, and the Armenian. There is really no Patristic evidence to set up against it, for it amounts to nothing that the words are not found in the Armenian versions of Ephraem's Exposition of Tatian's Harmony (see Vol. I. p. 59, note 2); that Eusebius might have cited them twice and did not; that Cyril of Alexandria, who alleges them once, passed over them once; that Origen also (in the Latin translation) neglected them once, inasmuch as he quotes them twice, once very expressly. Hippolytus [220] is the prime witness in their behalf, for he draws the theological inference from the passage (ἀποσταλεὶς ἵνα δείξῃ αὐτὸν ἐπὶ γῆς ὄντα εἶναι καὶ ἐν οὐρανῷ), wherein he is followed in two places by Hilary and by Epiphanius. To these add Dionysius of Alexandria [iii], Novatian [iii], Aphraates the Persian, Didymus, Lucifer, Athanasius, Basil, [pg 361] besides Ambrose, Jerome, Augustine, and by John Damascene (thrice), by Cyril of Alexandria, Chrysostom, and Theodoret each four times,—indeed, as Dean Burgon has shown[393], more than fifty passages from thirty-eight ecclesiastical writers; and we then have a consensus of versions and ecclesiastical writers from every part of the Christian world, joining Cod. A and the later manuscripts in convicting אBL, &c., or the common sources from which they were derived, of the deliberate suppression of one of the most mysterious, yet one of the most glorious, glimpses afforded to us in Scripture of the nature of the Saviour, on the side of His Proper Divinity.