Like ceaseless droppings, which at last are known
To leave their dint upon the solid stone.
I observe that Scholars and Divines of the best type (as the Rev. T. S. Green[243]) at last put up with them. The wisest however reproduce them under protest, and with apology. The names of Tischendorf and Tregelles, Meyer and Davidson, command attention. It seems to be thought incredible that they can all be entirely in the wrong. They impose upon learned and unlearned readers alike. “Even Barnabas [pg 138] has been carried away with their dissimulation.” He has (to my surprise and regret) two suggestions:—
(a) The one,—That this entire section of the second Gospel may possibly have been written long after the rest; and that therefore its verbal peculiarities need not perplex or trouble us. It was, I suppose, (according to this learned and pious writer,) a kind of after-thought, or supplement, or Appendix to S. Mark's Gospel. In this way I have seen the last Chapter of S. John once and again accounted for.—To which, it ought to be a sufficient answer to point out that there is no appearance whatever of any such interval having been interposed between S. Mark xvi. 8 and 9: that it is highly improbable that any such interval occurred: and that until the “verbal peculiarities” have been ascertained to exist, it is, to say the least, a gratuitous exercise of the inventive faculty to discover reasons for their existence. Whether there be not something radically unsound and wrong in all such conjectures about “after-thoughts,” “supplements,” “appendices,” and “second editions” when the everlasting Gospel of Jesus Christ is the thing spoken of,—a confusing of things heavenly with things earthly which must make the Angels weep,—I forbear to press on the present occasion. It had better perhaps be discussed at another opportunity. But φίλοι ἄνδρες[244] will forgive my freedom in having already made my personal sentiment on the subject sufficiently plain.
(b) His other suggestion is,—That this portion may not have been penned by S. Mark himself after all. By which he clearly means no more than this,—that as we are content not to know who wrote the conclusion of the Books of Deuteronomy and Joshua, so, if needful, we may well be content not to know who wrote the end of the Gospel of S. Mark.—In reply to which, I have but to say, that after cause has been shewn why we should indeed believe that not S. Mark but some one else wrote the end of S. Mark's Gospel, we shall be perfectly willing to acquiesce in the new fact:—but not till then.
2. True indeed it is that here and there a voice has been lifted up in the way of protest[245] against the proposed inference from the familiar premisses; (for the self-same statements have now been so often reproduced, that the eye grows weary at last of the ever-recurring string of offending vocables:)—but, with one honorable exception,[246] men do not seem to have ever thought of calling the premisses themselves in question: examining the statements one by one: contesting the ground inch by inch: refusing absolutely to submit to any dictation whatever in this behalf: insisting on bringing the whole matter to the test of severe inquiry, and making every detail the subject of strict judicial investigation. This is what I propose to do in the course of the present Chapter. I altogether deny the validity of the inference which has been drawn from “the style,” “the phraseology,” “the diction” of the present section of the Gospel. But I do more. I entirely deny the accuracy of almost every individual statement from which the unfavourable induction is made, and the hostile inference drawn. Even this will not nearly satisfy [pg 140] me. I insist that one only result can attend the exact analysis of this portion of the Gospel into its elements; namely, a profound conviction that S. Mark is most certainly its Author.
3. Let me however distinctly declare beforehand that remarks on “the style” of an Evangelist are singularly apt to be fallacious, especially when (as here) it is proposed to apply them to a very limited portion of the sacred narrative. Altogether to be mistrusted moreover are they, when (as on the present occasion) it is proposed to make them the ground for possibly rejecting such a portion of Scripture as spurious. It becomes a fatal objection to such reasoning that the style may indeed be exceedingly diverse, and yet the Author be confessedly one and the same. How exceedingly dissimilar in style are the Revelation of S. John and the Gospel of S. John! Moreover, practically, the promised remarks on “style,” when the Authorship of some portion of Scripture is to be discussed, are commonly observed to degenerate at once into what is really quite a different thing. Single words, perhaps some short phrase, is appealed to, which (it is said) does not recur in any part of the same book; and thence it is argued that the Author can no longer be the same. “According to this argument, the recurrence of the same words constitutes identity of style; the want of such recurrence implies difference of style;—difference of style in such a sense as compels us to infer diversity of authorship. Each writer is supposed to have at his disposal a limited number of ‘formulæ’ within the range of which he must work. He must in each chapter employ these formulæ, and these only. He must be content with one small portion of his mother-tongue, and not dare to venture across the limits of that portion,—on pain of losing his identity.”[247]
4. How utterly insecure must be every approximation to [pg 141] such a method of judging about the Authorship of any twelve verses of Scripture which can be named, scarcely requires illustration. The attentive reader of S. Matthew's Gospel is aware that a mode of expression which is six times repeated in his viiith and ixth chapters is perhaps only once met with besides in his Gospel,—viz. in his xxist chapter.[248] The “style” of the 17th verse of his ist chapter may be thought unlike anything else in S. Matthew. S. Luke's five opening verses are unique, both in respect of manner and of matter. S. John also in his five opening verses seems to me to have adopted a method which is not recognisable anywhere else in his writings; “rising strangely by degrees,” (as Bp. Pearson expresses it,[249]) “making the last word of the former sentence the first of that which followeth.”—“He knoweth that he saith true,” is the language of the same Evangelist concerning himself in chap. xix. 35. But, “we know that his testimony is true,” is his phrase in chap. xxi. 24. Twice, and twice only throughout his Gospel, (viz. in chap. xix. 35: xx. 31), is he observed to address his readers, and on both occasions in the same words: (“that ye may believe.”) But what of all this? Is it to be supposed that S. Matthew, S. Luke, S. John are not the authors of those several places? From facts like these no inference whatever is to be drawn as to the genuineness or the spuriousness of a writing. It is quite to mistake the Critic's vocation to imagine that he is qualified, or called upon, to pass any judgment of the sort.
5. I have not said all this, of course, as declining the proposed investigation. I approach it on the contrary right willingly, being confident that it can be attended by only one result. With what is true, endless are the harmonies which evolve themselves: from what is false, the true is equally certain to stand out divergent.[250] And we all desire nothing but the Truth.
I. To begin then with the “Style and manner” of S. Mark in this place.