the superscription "to the Laodiceans"),(1) Colossians, Philippians, and Philemon.(2) None of the other books which now form part of the canonical New Testament were either mentioned or recognized by Marcion.(3) This is the oldest collection of Apostolic writings of which there is any trace,(4) but there was at that time no other "Holy Scripture" than the Old Testament, and no New Testament Canon had yet been imagined. Marcion neither claimed canonical authority for these writings,(5) nor did he associate with them any idea of divine inspiration.(6) We have already seen the animosity expressed by contemporaries of Marcion against the Apostle Paul.
The principal interest in connection with the collection of Marcion, however, centres in his single Gospel, the nature, origin, and identity of which have long been actively and minutely discussed by learned men of all shades of opinion with very varying results. The work itself is unfortunately no longer extant, and our only knowledge of it is derived from the bitter and very inaccurate opponents of Marcion. It seems to have borne much the same analogy to our third Canonical Gospel which existed between the Gospel according to
the Hebrews and our first Synoptic.(1) The Fathers, whose uncritical and, in such matters, prejudiced character led them to denounce every variation from their actual texts as a mere falsification, and without argument to assume the exclusive authenticity and originality of our Gospels, which towards the beginning of the third century had acquired wide circulation in the Church, vehemently stigmatized Marcion as an audacious adulterator of the Gospel, and affirmed his evangelical work to be merely a mutilated and falsified version of the "Gospel according to Luke."(2)
This view continued to prevail, almost without question or examination, till towards the end of the eighteenth century, when Biblical criticism began to exhibit the earnestness and activity which have ever since more or less characterized it. Semler first abandoned the prevalent tradition, and, after analyzing the evidence, he concluded that Marcion's Gospel and Luke's were different versions of an earlier work,(3) and that the so-called heretical Gospel was one of the numerous Gospels from amongst which the Canonical had been selected by the Church.(4) Griesbach about the same time also rejected the ruling opinion, and denied the close relationship usually asserted to exist between the two Gospels.(5) Loffler(6) and Corrodi(7) strongly supported Sender's
conclusion, that Marcion was no mere falsifier of Luke's Gospel, and J. E. C. Schmidt(1) went still further, and asserted that Marcion's Gospel was the genuine Luke, and our actual Gospel a later version of it with alterations and additions. Eichhorn,(2) after a fuller and more exhaustive examination, adopted similar views; he repudiated the statements of Tertullian regarding Marcion's Gospel as utterly untrustworthy, asserting that he had not that work itself before him at all, and he maintained that Marcion's Gospel was the more original text and one of the sources of Luke. Bolten,(3) Bertholdt,(4) Schleiermacher,(5) and D. Schulz(6) likewise maintained that Marcion's Gospel was by no means a mutilated version of Luke, but, on the contrary, an independent original Gospel A similar conclusion was arrived at by Gieseler,(7) but later, after Hahn's criticism, he abandoned it, and adopted the opinion that Marcion's Gospel was constructed out of Luke.(8)
On the other hand, the traditional view was maintained by Storr,(9) Arneth,(10) Hug,(11) Neander,(12) and Gratz,(13) although with little originality of investigation or argument; and
