not continue, and is followed by the explanation: "that is, who are seeking the truth and not finding it."(1) It is evident, that so short and fragmentary a phrase cannot prove anything.(2)
The next passage occurs in Hom. xviii. 15: "For Isaiah said: I will open my mouth in parables, and I will utter things that have been kept secret from the foundation of the world."(3) Now this passage, with a slightly different order of words, is found in Matt. xiii. 35. After giving a series of parables, the author of the Gospel says (v. 34), "All these things spake Jesus unto the multitudes in parables; and without a parable spake he not unto them; (v. 35) That it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophet (Isaiah), saying: I will open my mouth in parables, &c." There are two peculiarities which must be pointed out in this passage. It is not found in Isaiah, but in Psalm lxxviii. 2,(4) and it presents a variation from the version of the lxx. Both the variation and the erroneous reference to Isaiah, therefore, occur also in the Homily. The first part of the sentence agrees with, but the latter part is quite different from, the Greek of the lxx., which reads: "I will utter problems from the beginning," [———].(5)
The Psalm from which the quotation is really taken is, by its superscription, ascribed to Asaph, who, in the Septuagint version of II. Chronicles xxix. 30, is called a
prophet.(1) It was, therefore, early asserted that the original reading of Matthew was "Asaph," instead of "Isaiah." Porphyry, in the third century, twitted Christians with this erroneous ascription by their inspired evangelist to Isaiah of a passage from a Psalm, and reduced the Fathers to great straits. Eusebius, in his commentary on this verse of the Psalm, attributes the insertion of the words, "by the prophet Isaiah," to unintelligent copyists, and asserts that in accurate MSS. the name is not added to the word prophet. Jerome likewise ascribes the insertion of the name Isaiah for that of Asaph, which was originally written, to an ignorant scribe,(2) and in the commentary on the Psalms, generally, though probably falsely, ascribed to him, the remark is made that many copies of the Gospel to that day had the name "Isaiah," for which Porphyry had reproached Christians,(3) and the writer of the same commentary actually allows himself to make the assertion that Asaph was found in all the old codices, but ignorant men had removed it.(4) The fact is, that the reading "Asaph" for "Isaiah" is not found in any extant MS., and, although "Isaiah" has disappeared from all but a few obscure codices, it cannot be denied that the name anciently stood in the text.(5) In the Sinaitic Codex, which is probably the earliest MS. extant, and which is assigned to the fourth century, "the prophet Isaiah" stands in the text by the first hand, but is erased by the second (b).
The quotation in the Homily, however, is clearly not from our Gospel. It is introduced by the words "For Isaiah says:" and the context is so different from that in Matthew, that it seems most improbable that the author of the Homily could have had the passage suggested to him by the Gospel. It occurs in a discussion between Simon the Magician and Peter. The former undertakes to prove that the Maker of the world is not the highest God, and amongst other arguments he advances the passage: "No man knew the Father, &c.," to show that the Father had remained concealed from the Patriarchs, &c., until revealed by the Son, and in reply to Peter he retorts, that if the supposition that the Patriarchs were not deemed worthy to know the Father was unjust, the Christian teacher was himself to blame, who said: "I thank thee, Lord of heaven and earth, that what was concealed from the wise thou hast revealed to suckling babes." Peter argues that in the statement of Jesus: "No man knew the Father, &c.," he cannot be considered to indicate another God and Father from him who made the world, and he continues: "For the concealed things of which he spoke may be those of the Creator himself; for Isaiah says: 'I will open my mouth, &c.' Do you admit, therefore, that the prophet was not ignorant of the things concealed,"(1) and so on. There is absolutely nothing in this argument to indicate that the passage was suggested by the Gospel, but, on the contrary, it is used in a totally different way, and is quoted not as an evangelical text, but as a saying from the Old Testament, and treated in connection with the prophet himself, and not with its supposed fulfilment in Jesus. It may be remarked, that in the corresponding part of
the Recognitions, whether that work be of older or more recent date, the passage does not occur at all. Now, although it is impossible to say how and where this erroneous reference to a passage of the Old Testament first occurred, there is no reason for affirming that it originated in our first Synoptic, and as little for asserting that its occurrence in the Clementine Homilies, with so different a context and object, involves the conclusion that their author derived it from the Gospel, and not from the Old Testament or some other source. On the contrary, the peculiar argument based upon it in the Homilies suggests a different origin, and it is very probable that the passage, with its erroneous reference, was derived by both from another and common source.