Stress is laid by all writers on the external evidences upon certain alleged quotations from our gospels, which are said to be found in the early Fathers. But the question naturally arises, if they considered them to be of Apostolic authority why did they not mention them by name? They say Moses says, but they never say Matthew, Mark, Luke, or John says. They cite the words of Jesus, but not of his Evangelists. They also say "The Lord said" rather than saith, which indicates they were rather indebted to tradition than to written accounts. Irenæus says he heard Polycarp repeat the oral relations of John and of other hearers of the Lord, and Clement may have received his knowledge in the same manner. We shall see from the testimony of Papias that he at least preferred tradition to the books with which he was acquainted. Moreover, such quotations of the sayings of Jesus as occur are never given in the same words nor in the same order. Attempts are made to account for this by saying that they quoted loosely from memory. But is it likely they would quote loosely words which they believed to be written by the inspiration of the Holy Ghost? This does not say much for their intellectual ability. Clement and Polycarp, for instance, both give, "Be pitiful that ye may be pitied," word for word; while the Gospel shews, "Blessed are the merciful for they shall obtain mercy." Clement says, "Forgive that it may be forgiven you;" Polycarp, "Forgive and it shall be forgiven you." The nearest to which is, "For if ye forgive men their trespasses, your heavenly Father will also forgive you."
Such facts have constrained Mr. Sanday to admit in his work on the Gospels in the Second Century that "The author of Supernatural Religion is not without reason when he says they may be derived from other collections than our actual Gospels" (p. 87, 1876.) Canon Westcott himself in summing up the results says:— "(1) No Evangelic reference in the Apostolic Fathers can be referred certainly to a written record. (2) It appears most probable from the form of the quotations that they were derived from oral tradition" (p. 63, 1881.) We shall see, however, that whether they went to other collections or relied upon oral traditions, their Evangelic references are never exactly the same as in our gospels. They manifestly had other sources of information. Moreover it must be borne in mind that the Christian sayings very frequently crept into the text by way of gloss. An illustration of this kind of interpolation is found in the "Epistle of Barnabas," chap, xix., p. 133, where we read, "Thou shalt not hesitate to give, nor murmur when thou givest." "Give to everyone that asketh thee, and thou shalt know who is the good Recompenser of the reward." But for this supposed quotation being omitted in the oldest MS., the "Codex Seaiticus," it would be considered evidence that the writer of the epistle was quoting from Luke vi., 30. In copying manuscripts there was no such strictness as in a modern printing-office, where "follow your copy" is the compositor's rule. If a transcriber at the time when our Gospels were in vogue (and be it remembered we have no manuscripts either of the Fathers or of the New Testament older than the fourth or fifth century after Jesus) saw a quotation different from the way in which he had been accustomed to see it, he would not hesitate to alter it So that many of the alleged literal quotations from our Gospels may be only emendations of the scribes who found the quotations were wrong and put them right. Dr. Donaldson, in the introduction to his Apostolical Fathers, chap, iii., p. 27, tells us how "Each transcriber, as he copied, inserted the notes of previous readers into the text, and often from his heated imagination added something himself." He also informs us (p. 28) "That we know for certain that even in the second and third centuries the letters of bishops and others were excised and interpolated in their lifetime." So pure is the stream through which our Gospels have descended!
The able and learned author of "Supernatural Religion" well puts the argument: "When, therefore, in early writings, we meet with quotations closely resembling, or we may add, even identical with passages which are found in our Gospels, the source of which, however, is not mentioned, nor is any author's name indicated, the similarity or even identity cannot by any means be admitted as proof that the quotation is necessarily from our Gospels, and not from some other similar work now no longer extant, and more especially not when, in the same writings, there are other quotations from sources different from our Gospels" (vol. i., pp. 213, 214, 1879.) That citations similar to those found in our Gospels are not necessarily taken therefrom may be instanced from Ignatius, or the writer who used his name who in his Epistle to the Smyrnæans, chap, iii., p. 242, says: "When, for instance, He came to those who were with Peter He said to them: 'Lay hold, handle me and see that I am not an incorporeal spirit.'" According to Jerome (Vir. Illust. 16) this quotation is from the Gospel of the Nazarenes. But for this direct statement, it would of course be assigned by orthodox traditionalists to a quotation from memory of Luke xxiv., 39. Origen, however, quoted this self-same passage from another work well known in the early Church, but since lost or destroyed, the "Preaching of Peter."
But whilst similarity would not prove their use, variation from the Gospels is the best proof that they were not used. Such passages abound. Clement, for instance, says: "Our Apostles also knew, through the Lord Jesus Christ, that there would be strife on account of the episcopate" (chap, xliv., p. 38.) He says "it is written cleave to the holy, for those that cleave to them shall themselves be made holy" (chap, xlvi., p. 40.) He also quotes (chap. 1., p. 43) "I will remember a propitious day, and will raise you up out of your tombs," which is probably from the apocryphal fourth book of Ezra. Barnabas declares: "The Lord says 'He has accomplished a second fashioning in these last days. The Lord says I will make the last like the first'" (chap, vi., p. 3, Sinaitic.) He quotes as a saying of Jesus: "Those who wish to behold me, and lay hold of my kingdom, must through tribulation and suffering obtain me" (chap, vii., p. 114.) And again: "For the Scripture saith, 'And it shall come to pass in the last days that the Lord will deliver up the sheep of His pasture and their sheepfold and tower to destruction" (chap, xvi., p. 129.) Other instances might be given. In the second Epistle of Clement there are at least five such passages, but these suffice to show that other documents than the Gospels were referred to, and that even where the sentiment is similar the expression is different It must be borne in mind also that we have it on the authority of Luke in his preface that already in his time many had taken in hand to set forth in order a declaration of those things which were most surely believed among Christians.
Mosheim, in his "Ecclesiastical History" (pt. ii., chap. ii., sec. 17, p. 65, Stubbs' ed., 1863) speaks of "A variety of commentaries, filled with impostures and fables, on our Savior's life and sentiments composed soon after his ascent into heaven, by men who without being bad, perhaps were superstitious, simple, and piously deceitful. To these were afterwards added other writings, falsely ascribed to the most holy apostles by fraudulent individuals." But these fraudulent individuals were Christians, and the purpose of their frauds was to subserve the interests of the Church. We have record of many other Gospels, not to mention Acts of Apostles and Revelations. Some of these were certainly anterior to our own. Such were probably the Gospel of Paul, whence Marcion's Gospel and Luke's were derived, the Gospel of Peter from which possibly Mark was compiled. The Oracles or Sayings of Jesus which probably entered into the construction of Matthew together with the Gospel to the Hebrews. The Gospel of the Egyptians, which we have already seen as quoted by Clement, the original of which C. B. Waite thinks "may have been in use among the Therapeutæ of Egypt a long time before the introduction of Christianity, the passages relating to Christ being afterwards added" ("History of the Christian Religion to the year 200," p. 77, Chicago, 1881.) According to Origen, Theophylact and Jerome, this Gospel was written before the Gospel of Luke, and many learned moderns have deemed it earlier than any of the Canonical Gospels. At least contemporary with these were the Gospel of James or Protevangelion, the Gospel of Thomas or Infancy, and the Gospel of Nicodemus or Acts of Pilate, all of which remain, although the Christian Church has lost the doubtless equally respectable Gospels of Matthias, of Philip, of Bartholomew, of Andrew, and even of Judas Iscariot.
IV.
We have thus far seen that the five earliest Fathers of the Christian Church have no claim to be considered Apostolic, and that, so far from bearing testimony to the authenticity of our canonical Gospels, their own age and authorship are disputed. We have noticed that their works never mention by name any of the writers of the New Testament with the exception of Paul; that the sayings they ascribe to Jesus, while often similar to those found in our Gospels, are never identical with them, and that they contain much that is evidently derived from other sources. We have in addition seen that there were numerous Gospels current in the early days of the Christian Church; thus confirming the account of Luke that many had taken in hand to set forth in order the things believed among them.
The early Christian ages were characterised by anything rather than by investigation, or even by accuracy of representation. Deception in literary productions appears to have been the rule rather than the exception. It was not only practised but defended. The author of "Supernatural Religion" says of these Fathers (pp. 460—1, vol. 1, 1879):—"No fable could be too gross, no invention too transparent, for their unsuspicious acceptance, if it assumed a pious form or tended to edification. No period in the history of the world ever produced so many spurious works as the first two or three centuries of our era. The name of every Apostle, or Christian teacher, not excepting that of the great Master himself, was freely attached to every description of religious forgery. False gospels, epistles, acts, martyrologies, were unscrupulously circulated, and such pious falsification was not even intended or regarded as a crime, but perpetrated for the sake of edification. It was only slowly and after some centuries that many of these works, once, as we have seen, regarded with pious veneration, were excluded from the canon; and that genuine works shared this fate, whilst spurious ones usurped their places, is one of the surest results of criticism."
Yet we are to suppose that while words written for edification were falsely ascribed to other Apostles, it was utterly impossible with regard to our four Evangelists. We shall be better able to judge this question upon examining the testimony of the first person who mentions the writings of the first two.