The disciples still asleep.
Enter Jesus.
Jes. Sleep on now and take your rest. [Exit.
Enter Jesus. (Disciples still asleep.)
Jes. It is enough: the hour is come, etc.
The transcriber, missing an exit and an enter, has simply run two speeches together; and the gospel copyists have faithfully followed their copy, putting “they wist not what to answer him” in the wrong place. In an original narrative the combination could not happen. In the transcription of the copy of a play it could easily happen. We find instances in the printing of the plays of Shakespeare and other early dramatists.
[One antagonist of the mystery-play theory, making no attempt to rebut the above solution, denies that it can be applied to the midnight trial before the priests, elders, and scribes. Of this trial M. Loisy recognizes the impossibility: pronouncing that, sans doute, the asserted search for witnesses by night never took place. But, says the objector[61]:—
(1) It may be incredible history; but it is impossible drama. I defy Mr. Robertson to say how it could have been represented on the stage, or why it should have been given a place in a drama at all. And he is searching for evidence of drama.
(2) The incident exists only in Mr. Robertson’s imagination. The Greek phrase in [Mk. xiv, 55], is the regular phrase for sifting evidence, and does not imply or suggest any hunting up of witnesses throughout Jerusalem.