Certain books have been written and circulated in the early ages of Christianity which professed to recite events not mentioned in the Four Gospels or New Testament. Though all are spurious and of uncertain authorship, there is, nevertheless, great interest in some of the incidents; and as they were so extensively read by early Christians some account of these is acceptable to all readers of sacred subjects. Though in all ages treated with contempt by the authoritative teachers in the Church, it is easy to comprehend how they came to attract so much notice, for there is an air of simplicity and verisimilitude in some of the incidents, and of course no human being is in a position to affirm or deny the substance of the things thus recorded. Milman says these legends can still be traced in some of our Christmas carols. One of these apocryphal gospels is called the “Protevangelion, or Gospel of James,” who was one of the sons of Joseph the carpenter, and it records incidents of the childhood of Jesus. The existence of this gospel is traced to the fourth century. Another is the “Gospel of Pseudo-Matthew, or of the Infancy of Mary and of Jesus,” supposed to be written in the fifth century. Another is the “Gospel of the Nativity of Mary.” This was fathered upon Jerome, and supposed to be written in the fifth century, and it was much read in the Middle Ages. Another is the “History of Joseph the Carpenter,” supposed to belong to the fourth century. Another is the “Gospel of Thomas, or Gospel of the Infancy of Jesus,” said to be written about the middle of the second century. Another is the “Arabic Gospel of the Infancy,” ascribed to the fifth or sixth century. There is also a professed correspondence between Jesus and King Agbarus, part of which is said to belong to the sixth century and part to the third century. There is also the “Gospel of Nicodemus, or Acts of Pilate,” supposed to be written in the second century. There are also Letters and Reports of Pilate and Herod about Christ, professing to narrate facts and incidents of that time. All these gospels or legends abound in miracles and prodigies, some of them very puerile. A translation was published of the above-mentioned legends by B. Harris Cowper in 1867.
FALSE CHRISTS IN DIFFERENT AGES.
False Christs began to appear early, as is mentioned in St. Luke and by Josephus: Jortin mentions other successors. In the reign of Adrian one Barcohab pretended to be Messias. In 434 one Moses Cretensis promised, like Moses, to divide the sea at Crete and deliver the Jews there; and some people, when commanded by him, actually cast themselves into the waves and perished. Again, about 420, the time of Socrates the historian, another impostor appeared. Again, in 520, one Dunaan; one Julian in 529; one Mohammed in 571; another, a Syrian, in 721. In 1138 another in France; in 1157 another in Spain; in 1167 another in Fez. In Arabia, in 1167, another appeared, and was brought before the king, who asked the pretender what sign or miracle he could show in attestation of his power. The man replied, “Cut off my head, and I will return to life again.” The king took him at his word, and the head was cut off, but it never was put on again nor life restored. Again, another appeared in Persia in 1174; another in Moravia in 1176; another, who was also an enchanter, in Persia in 1199; another in Spain in 1497; another in Austria in 1500; another in Cologne in 1509; another in Spain, burnt by the Emperor Charles V., in 1534; another in the East Indies in 1615; another in Holland in 1624; another in Smyrna in 1666, named Sabbatar Sevi, who raised great expectations; another in 1682, named Rabbi Mordecai, a German Jew.
THE SEPTUAGINT BIBLE AND NEW TESTAMENT.
Vast difficulties surround the settlement of the orthodox list of books of the New Testament. The Old Testament was not used as a name in the time of Christ; but the sacred books, or the Law and the Prophets, were the modes of reference, these being read regularly in the synagogues as part of the ceremonial of public worship. In the third century before the Christian era, the Old Testament was translated into Greek, or at least was begun to be so, in order to meet the wants of the Greek-speaking Jews. Ptolemy II. is said to have asked the high priest at Jerusalem to select skilful elders to make the translation, and a copy was to be deposited in the library at Alexandria. Some think the word “Septuagint” implied that there were seventy translators; others that it only meant that the work was approved by the Alexandrine Sanhedrim. The translation is said to be defective in several passages. The Septuagint came soon to be the standard version, as Hebrew had become almost an unknown language even to the Jews of Palestine. The dates and order of the Gospels have also given rise to interminable controversies. The Apostles all gave oral recollections of the facts of Christ’s life and sayings. The expression “New Testament” did not come into use until the latter part of the second century. A canon was at length settled, though the date is uncertain, expressing the authentic collection of Christian Scriptures. And yet the earliest known list of books of the New Testament was not discovered till the seventeenth century in the Ambrosian Library at Milan, and the original of it was said to be of the date of 150 A.D.
ENGLISH VERSIONS OF THE BIBLE.
Mr. Dore says that there is no English Bible known to be in existence earlier than the fourteenth century. But the Psalter and other portions of the Old and New Testament were translated from the Latin into English at various times between the seventh and fourteenth centuries. Three versions in English of the Psalter bear a date soon after 1300. The first entire Bible in English was the work of Nicholas de Hereford and John Wycliffe, about 1380. Tyndale’s New Testament was printed in English about 1525, and he died in 1537. Coverdale’s Bible in the English language was published in 1535. The Genevan Version, published in English at Geneva in 1560, by its singular rendering of Gen. iii. 7, is commonly known as the Breeches Bible. A Roman Catholic translation into English of the New Testament was published at Rheims in 1582, and later at Douai, on the removal of the Roman Catholic College to the latter place. King James I.’s new translation of the Bible, called the Authorised Version, was first published in 1611.