The matter in hand will be conveniently illustrated by inviting the reader's attention to another famous place. There is a singular consent among the Critics for eliminating from St. Luke ix. 54-6, twenty-four words which embody two memorable sayings of the Son of Man. The entire context is as follows:—'Lord, wilt thou that we command fire to come down from heaven and consume them, (as Elias did)? But he turned, and rebuked them, (and said, Ye know not what manner of spirit ye are of.) (For the Son of Man is not come to destroy men's lives, but to save them.) And they went to another village.' The three bracketed clauses contain the twenty-four words in dispute.
The first of these clauses ('ως και 'ηλιας εποιησε), which claims to be part of the inquiry of St. John and St. James, Mill rejected as an obvious interpolation. 'Res ipsa clamat. Quis enim sanus tam insignia deleverit[563]?' Griesbach retained it as probably genuine.—The second clause (και ειπεν, Ουκ οιδατε 'οιου πνευματος εστε 'υμεις) he obelized as probably not genuine:—the third ('ο γαρ 'υιος του ανθρωπου ουκ ηλθε ψυχας ανθρωπων απολεσαι, αλλα σωσαι) he rejected entirely. Lachmann also retains the first clause, but rejects the other two. Alford, not without misgiving, does the same. Westcott and Hort, without any misgiving about the third clause, are 'morally certain' that the first and second clauses are a Western interpolation. Tischendorf and Tregelles are thorough. They agree, and the Revisers of 1881, in rejecting unceremoniously all the three clauses and exhibiting the place curtly, thus.—Κυριε, θελεις ειπωμεν πυρ καταβηναι απο του ουρανου, και αναλωσαι αυτους; στραφεις δε επετιμησεν αυτοις. και επορευθησαν δησαν εις 'ετεραν κωμην.
Now it may as well be declared at once that Codd. [Symbol: Aleph]BLΞ l g1 Cyrluc[564], two MSS. of the Bohairic (d 3, d 2), the Lewis, and two cursives (71, 157) are literally the only authority, ancient or modern, for so exhibiting the text [in all its bare crudeness]. Against them are arrayed the whole body of MSS. uncial and cursive, including ACD; every known lectionary; all the Latin, the Syriac (Cur. om. Clause 1), and indeed every other known version: besides seven good Greek Fathers beginning with Clemens Alex. (A.D. 190), and five Latin Fathers beginning with Tertullian (A.D. 190): Cyprian's testimony being in fact the voice of the Fourth Council of Carthage, A.D. 253. If on a survey of this body of evidence any one will gravely tell me that the preponderance of authority still seems to him to be in favour of the shorter reason, I can but suggest that the sooner he communicates to the world the grounds for his opinion, the better.
(1) In the meantime it becomes necessary to consider the disputed clauses separately, because ancient authorities, rivalling modern critics, are unable to agree as to which they will reject, which they will retain. I begin with the second. What persuades so many critics to omit the precious words και ειπεν, Ουκ οιδατε 'οιου πνευματος εστε 'υμεις, is the discovery that these words are absent from many uncial MSS.,—[Symbol: Aleph]ABC and nine others; besides, as might have been confidently anticipated from that fact, also from a fair proportion of the cursive copies. It is impossible to deny that prima facie such an amount of evidence against any words of Scripture is exceedingly weighty. Pseudo-Basil (ii. 271) is found to have read the passage in the same curt way. Cyril, on the other hand, seems to have read it differently.
And yet, the entire aspect of the case becomes changed the instant it is perceived that this disputed clause is recognized by Clemens[565] (A.D. 190); as well as by the Old Latin, by the Peshitto, and by the Curetonian Syriac: for the fact is thus established that as well in Eastern as in Western Christendom the words under discussion were actually recognized as genuine full a hundred and fifty years before the oldest of the extant uncials came into existence. When it is further found that (besides Ambrose, Jerome, Augustine,) the Vulgate, the Old Egyptian, the Harkleian Syriac and the Gothic versions also contain the words in question; and especially that Chrysostom in four places, Didymus, Epiphanius, Cyril and Theodoret, besides Antiochus, familiarly quote them, it is evident that the testimony of antiquity in their favour is even overwhelming. Add that in eight uncial MSS. (beginning with D) the words in dispute form part of the text of St. Luke, and that they are recognized by the great mass of the cursive copies,—(only six out of the twenty which Scrivener has collated being without them,)—and it is plain that at least five tests of genuineness have been fully satisfied.
(2) The third clause ('ο γαρ 'υιος του ανθρωπου ουκ ηλθε ψυχας ανθρωπων απολεσαι, αλλα σωσαι) rests on precisely the same solid evidence as the second; except that the testimony of Clemens is no longer available,—but only because his quotation does not extend so far. Cod. D also omits this third clause; which on the other hand is upheld by Tertullian, Cyprian and Ambrose. Tischendorf suggests that it has surreptitiously found its way into the text from St. Luke xix. 10, or St. Matt, xviii. 11. But this is impossible; simply because what is found in those two places is essentially different: namely,—ηλθε γαρ 'ο 'υιος του ανθρωπου ζητησαι και[566] σωσαι το απολωλος.
(3) We are at liberty in the meantime to note how apt an illustration is here afforded of the amount of consensus which subsists between documents of the oldest class. This divergence becomes most conspicuous when we direct our attention to the grounds for omitting the foremost clause of the three, 'ως και Ηλιας εποιησεν: for here we make the notable discovery that the evidence is not only less weighty, but also different. Codexes B and [Symbol: Aleph] are now forsaken by all their former allies except LΞ and a single cursive copy. True, they are supported by the Curetonian Syriac, the Vulgate and two copies of the Old Latin. But this time they find themselves confronted by Codexes ACD with thirteen other uncials and the whole body of the cursives; the Peshitto, Coptic, Gothic, and Harkleian versions; by Clemens, Jerome, Chrysostom, Cyril and pseudo-Basil. In respect of antiquity, variety, respectability, numbers, they are therefore hopelessly outvoted.
Do any inquire, How then has all this contradiction and depravation of Codexes [Symbol: Aleph]ABC(D) come about? I answer as follows:—
It was a favourite tenet with the Gnostic heretics that the Law and the Gospel are at variance. In order to establish this, Marcion (in a work called Antitheses) set passages of the New Testament against passages of the Old; from the seeming disagreement between which his followers were taught to infer that the Law and the Gospel cannot have proceeded from one and the same author[567]. Now here was a place exactly suited to his purpose. The God of the Old Testament had twice sent down fire from heaven to consume fifty men. But 'the Son of Man,' said our Saviour, when invited to do the like, 'came not to destroy men's lives but to save them.' Accordingly, Tertullian in his fourth book against Marcion, refuting this teaching, acquaints us that one of Marcion's 'Contrasts' was Elijah's severity in calling down fire from Heaven,—and the gentleness of Christ. 'I acknowledge the seventy of the judge,' Tertullian replies; 'but I recognize the same severity on the part of Christ towards His Disciples when they proposed to bring down a similar calamity on a Samaritan village[568].' From all of which it is plain that within seventy years of the time when the Gospel was published, the text of St. Luke ix. 54-6 stood very much as at present.
But then it is further discovered that at the same remote period (about A.D. 130) this place of Scripture was much fastened on by the enemies of the Gospel. The Manichaean heretics pressed believers with it[569]. The disciples' appeal to the example of Elijah, and the reproof they incurred, became inconvenient facts. The consequence might be foreseen. With commendable solicitude for God's honour, but through mistaken piety, certain of the orthodox (without suspicion of the evil they were committing) were so ill-advised as to erase from their copies the twenty-four words which had been turned to mischievous account as well as to cause copies to be made of the books so mutilated: and behold, at the end of 1,700 years, the calamitous result!