The Hebrew Gospel was closely related to the Gospel of St. Matthew; that we know from the testimony of St. Jerome, who saw, copied and translated it. That it was not identical with the Canonical first Gospel is also certain. Sufficient fragments have been preserved to show that in many points it was fuller, in some less complete, than the Greek Gospel of St. Matthew. The two Gospels were twin sisters speaking different tongues. Was the Greek of the first Gospel acquired, or was it original? This is a point deserving of investigation before we fix the origin and determine the construction of the Hebrew Gospel.
According to a fragment of a lost work by Papias, written about the middle of the second century, under the title of “Commentary on the Sayings of the Lord,”[247] the apostle Matthew was the author of a collection of the “sayings,” λόγια, of our blessed Lord. The passage has been already given, but it is necessary to quote it again here: “Matthew wrote in the Hebrew dialect the sayings, and every one interpreted them as best he was able.”[248] These “logia” could only be, according to the signification of the word (Rom. iii. 2; Heb. v. 12; Pet. iv. 11; Acts vii. 38), a collection of the sayings of the Saviour that were regarded as oracular, as “the words of God.” That they were the words of Jesus, follows from the title given by Papias to his commentary, Λόγια κυριακὰ.
This brief notice is sufficient to show that Matthew's collection was not the Gospel as it now stands. It was no collection of the acts, no biography, of the Saviour; it was solely a collection of his discourses.
This is made clearer by what Papias says in the same work on St. Mark. He relates that the latter wrote not only what Jesus had said, but also what he did;[249] whereas St. Matthew wrote only what had been said.[250]
The work of Matthew, therefore, contained no doings, πραχθέντα, but only sayings, λεχθέντα, which were, according to Papias, written in Hebrew, i.e. the vernacular Aramaic, and which were translated into Greek by every one as best he was able.
This notice of Papias is very ancient. The Bishop of Hierapolis is called by Irenaeus “a very old man.”[251] and by the same writer is said to have been “a friend of Polycarp,” and “one who had heard John.”[252] That this John was the apostle is not certain. It was questioned by Eusebius in his mention of the Prooemium of Papias. John the priest and John the apostle were both at Ephesus, and both lived there at the close of the first century. Some have thought the Apocalypse to have been the work of the priest John, and not of the apostle. Others have supposed that there was only one John. However this may be, it is certain that Papias lived at a time when it was possible to obtain correct information relating to the origin of the sacred books in use among the Christians.
According to the Prooemium of Papias, which Eusebius has preserved, the Bishop of Hierapolis had obtained his knowledge, not directly from the apostles, nor from [pg 163] the apostle John, but from the mouths of men who had companied with old priests and disciples of the apostles, and who had related to him what Andrew, Peter, Philip, Thomas, James, John and other disciples of the Lord had said (εἶπεν). Besides the testimony of these priests, Papias appealed further to the evidence of Aristion and the priest John, disciples of the Lord,[253] still alive and bearing testimony when he wrote. “And,” says Papias, “I do not think that I derived so much benefit from books as from the living voice of those that are still surviving.”[254]
Papias, therefore, had his information about the apostles second-hand, from those “who followed them about.” Nevertheless, his evidence is quite trustworthy. He takes pains to inform us that he used great precaution to obtain the truth about every particular he stated, and the means of obtaining the truth were at his disposal. That Papias was a man “of a limited comprehension”[255] does not affect the trustworthiness of his statement. Eusebius thus designates him because he believed in the Millennium; but so did most of the Christians of the first age, as well as in the immediate second coming of Christ, till undeceived by events.
The statement of Papias does not justify us in supposing that Matthew wrote the Gospel in Hebrew, but only a collection of the logia, the sayings of Jesus. Eusebius did not mistake the Sayings for the Gospel, for he speaks separately of the Hebrew Gospel,[256] without connecting it in any way with the testimony of Papias.
According to Eusebius, Papias wrote his Commentary in five books.[257] It is not improbable, therefore, that the [pg 164] “Logia” were broken into five parts or grouped in five discourses, and that he wrote an explanation of each discourse in a separate book or chapter.