That the narrative of the interview with Nicodemus was in the Gospel of the Hebrews, we learned from Justin Martyr quoting it. We will place the parallel passages opposite each other:
| Gospel of the Hebrews. | Gospel of St. John. |
| Justin Martyr, 1 Apol. 61. | c. iii. 3, 5. |
| “Christ said, Except ye be born again, ye cannot enter into the kingdom of heaven.” | “3. Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.” |
| Pseudo-Clement, Hom. xi. 26. | |
| “And Christ said (with an oath),[352] Verily I say unto you, Unless ye are born again of the water of life (in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost), ye cannot enter into the kingdom of Heaven.” | “5. Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.” |
The fragment in the Homilies clearly belongs to the same narrative as the fragment in Justin's Apology. Both are addressed in the second person plural, “Except ye be born again;” in the Gospel of St. John the first is, “Except a man be born again;” the second, “Except a man be born of water and spirit;” both in the third person singular. The form of the first answer in Justin differs from that in St. John: “he cannot enter the kingdom,” “he cannot see the kingdom.”
That these are independent accounts I can hardly doubt. The words, “in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost,” are an obvious interpolation, perhaps a late one, in the text of the Homilies; for Rufinus would hardly have omitted to translate this, though he did allow himself to make short verbal alterations.
There is another apparent quotation from St. John in the fifth book of the Recognitions: “Every one is made the servant of him to whom he yields subjection.”[353] But here again the quotation is very questionable. St. John's version of our Lord's saying is, “Whosoever committeth sin is the servant of sin.” St. Paul is much nearer: [pg 210] “Know ye not, that to whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are to whom ye obey; whether of sin unto death, or of obedience unto righteousness?”[354]
The quotation in the Recognitions is not from St. Paul, for the author expressly declares it is a saying of our Lord. St. Paul could not have had St. John's Gospel under his eye when he wrote, for that Gospel was not composed till long after he wrote the Epistle to the Romans. He gives no hint that he is quoting a saying of our Lord traditionally known to the Roman Christians. He apparently makes appeal to their experience when he says, “Know ye not.” Yet this fragment of an ancient lost Gospel in the Clementine Recognitions gives another colour to his words; they may be paraphrased, “Know ye not that saying of Christ, To whom ye yield yourselves servants to obey, his servants ye are?” It appears, therefore, that this is an earlier recorded reminiscence of our Lord's saying than that of St. John.
There is one, and only one, apparent quotation from St. Paul in the Recognitions: “In God's estimation, he is not a Jew who is a Jew among men, nor is he a Gentile that is called a Gentile, but he who, believing in God, fulfils his law and does his will, though he be not circumcised.”[355] St. Paul's words are: “He is not a Jew which is one outwardly; neither is that circumcision which is outward in the flesh; but he is a Jew which is one inwardly; and circumcision is that of the heart, in the spirit, and not in the letter.”
There is no doubt a resemblance between these passages. But it is probable that the resemblance is due solely to community of thought in the minds of both [pg 211] writers. It would be extraordinary if this were a quotation, for the author of the Recognitions nowhere quotes from any Epistle, not even from those of St. Peter; and that he, an Ebionite, should quote St. Paul, whose Epistles the Ebionites rejected, is scarcely credible.
The Recognitions mention the temptation: “The prince of wickedness ... presumed that he should be worshipped by him by whom he knew that he was to be destroyed. Therefore our Lord, confirming the worship of one God, answered him, It is written, Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and Him only shalt thou serve. And he, terrified by this answer, and fearing lest the true religion of the one and true God should be restored, hastened straightway to send forth into this world false prophets and false apostles and false teachers, who should speak, indeed, in the name of Christ, but should accomplish the will of the demon.”[356] Here we have Christ indicated as the one who was to restore that true worship of God which Moses had instituted, but which the Ebionites, with their Essene ancestors, asserted had been defaced and corrupted by false traditions. And in opposition to this, the devil sends out false apostles, false teachers, to undo this work, calling themselves, however, apostles of Christ. There can be little doubt who is meant. The reference is to St. Paul, Silas, and those who accepted his views, in opposition to those of St. James and St. Peter.
In Homily xii. is a citation which seems to indicate the use of the third Canonical Gospel. At first sight it appears to be a combination of a passage of St. Matthew and a parallel passage of St. Luke. It is preceded in the Homily by a phrase not found in the Canonical Gospels, but which is given, together with what follows, [pg 212] as a declaration of the Saviour. The three passages are placed side by side for comparison: