If, therefore, it be argued that the mention of her nationality supposes that the author found the fact in his Gospel, and that as we know no other but Mark(1) which gives that information, that he therefore derived it from our second Gospel, the additional mention of the name of "Justa" on the same grounds necessarily points to the use of a Gospel which likewise contained it, which our Gospel does not. Nothing can be more decided than the variation in language throughout this whole passage from the account in Mark, and the reply of Jesus is quite foreign to our Gospels. In Mark (vii. 25) the daughter has "an unclean spirit" [———]; in Matthew (xv. 22) she is "grievously possessed by a devil" [———], but in the Homily she is "affected by a sore disease" [———]. The second Gospel knows nothing of any intercession on the part of the disciples, but Matthew has: "And the disciples came and besought him [———] saying: 'Send her away, for she crieth after us,'"(2) whilst the Homily has merely "being also asked by us," [———] in the sense of intercession in her favour. The second Gospel gives the reply of Jesus as follows: "Let the children first be filled: for it is not meet to take the bread of the children, and to cast it to the dogs. And she answered and said unto him: 'Yea, Lord, for the dogs also eat under the table of the crumbs of the children. And he said unto her: For this saying go thy way; the devil is gone out of thy daughter."(3) The nature of the reply of the woman is,
in the Gospels, the reason given for granting her request; but in the Homily the woman's conversion to Judaism,(1) that is to say Judeo-Christianity, is prominently advanced as the cause of her successful pleading. It is certain from the whole character of this passage, the variation of the language, and the reply of Jesus which is not in our Gospels at all, that the narrative cannot rightly be assigned to them, but the more reasonable inference is that it was derived from another source.(2)
The last of De Wette's(3) passages is from Hom. iii. 57: "Hear, O Israel; the Lord thy(4) God is one Lord." This is a quotation from Deuteronomy vi. 4, which is likewise quoted in the second Gospel, xii. 29, in reply to the question, "Which is the first Commandment of all? Jesus answered: The first is, Hear, O Israel; the Lord our God is one Lord, and thou shalt love the Lord thy God," &c. &c. In the Homily, however, the quotation is made in a totally different connection, for there is no question of commandments at all, but a clear statement of the circumstances under which the passage was used, which excludes the idea that this quotation was derived from Mark xii. 29. The context in the Homily is as follows: "But to those who were beguiled to imagine many gods as the Scriptures say, he said: Hear, O Israel," &c, &c.(5) There is no hint of the assertion of many gods in the Gospels; but, on the contrary, the question is put by one of the scribes in Mark to whom Jesus says: "Thou art not far from the Kingdom of God."6 The quotation,
therefore, beyond doubt, cannot be legitimately appropriated by the second Synoptic, but may with much greater probability be assigned to a different Gospel.
We may here refer to the passage, the only one pointed out by him in connection with the Synoptics, the discovery of which Canon Westcott affirms, "has removed the doubts which had long been raised about those (allusions) to St. Mark."(1) The discovery referred to is that of the Codex Ottobonianus by Dressel, which contains the concluding part of the Homilies, and which was first published by him in 1853. Canon Westcott says: "Though St Mark has few peculiar phrases, one of these is repeated verbally in the concluding part of the 19th Homily."(2) The passage is as follows: Hom. xix. 20: "Wherefore also he explained to his disciples privately the mysteries of the kingdom of the heavens." This is compared with Mark iv. 34.... "and privately to his own disciples, he explained all things."
[———]
We have only a few words to add to complete the whole of Dr. Westcott's remarks upon the subject. He adds after the quotation: "This is the only place where [———] occurs in the Gospels."(4) We may, however, point out that it occurs also in Acts xix. 39 and 2 Peter i. 20. It is upon the coincidence of this word that