than the other Gospels, although it differs in very important points from that also—still, taken in connection with the third Synoptic, and Acts xiii. 25, this indicates the great probability of the existence of other writings combining the particulars as they occur in Justin. Luke iii. 15, reads: "And as the people were in expectation, and all mused in their hearts concerning John whether he were the Christ, 16. John answered, saying to them all: I indeed baptize you with water, but he that is stronger than I cometh, the latchet of whose shoes I am not worthy to unloose: he shall baptize you with the Holy Spirit and with fire," &c.
Whilst, however, with the sole exception of the simple statement of the Baptist that he was not the Christ, which in all the accounts is clearly involved in the rest of the reply, there is no analogy whatever between the parallel in the fourth Gospel and the passage in Justin, many important circumstances render it certain that Justin did not derive his narrative from that source. We have already(1) fully discussed the peculiarities of Justin's account of the Baptist, and in the context to the very passage before us there are details quite foreign to our Gospels which show that Justin made use of another and different work. When Jesus stepped into the water to be baptized a fire was kindled in the Jordan, and the voice from heaven makes use of words not found in our Gospels; but both the incident and the words are known to have been contained in the Gospel according to the Hebrews and other works. Justin likewise states, in immediate continuation of the passage before us, that Jesus was considered the son of
Joseph the carpenter, and himself was a carpenter and accustomed to make ploughs and yokes.(1) The Evangelical work of which Justin made use was obviously different from our Gospels, therefore, and the evident conclusion to which any impartial mind must arrive is, that there is not only not the slightest ground for affirming that Justin quoted the passage before us from the fourth Gospel, from which he so fundamentally differs, but every reason on the contrary to believe that he derived it from a Gospel different from ours.(2)
The next point advanced by Tischendorf is, that on two occasions he speaks of the restoration of sight to persons born blind,3 the only instance of which in our Gospels is that recorded, John ix. 1. The references in Justin are very vague and general. In the first place he is speaking of the analogies in the life of Jesus with events believed in connection with mythological deities, and he says that he would appear to relate acts very similar to those attributed to Æsculapius when he says that Jesus "healed the lame and paralytic, and the maimed from birth [———], and raised the dead."(4) In the Dialogue, again referring to Æsculapius, he says that Christ "healed those who were from birth and according to the flesh blind [———], and deaf, and lame."(5) In the fourth Gospel
the born-blind is described as [———]. There is a variation it will be observed in the term employed by Justin, and that such a remark should be seized upon as an argument for the use of the fourth Gospel serves to show the poverty of the evidence for the existence of that work. Without seeking any further, we might at once reply that such general references as those of Justin might well be referred to the common tradition of the Church, which certainly ascribed all kinds of marvellous cures and miracles to Jesus. It is moreover unreasonable to suppose that the only Gospel in which the cure of one born blind was narrated was that which is the fourth in our Canon. Such a miracle may have formed part of a dozen similar collections extant at the time of Justin, and in no case could such an allusion be recognized as evidence of the use of the fourth Gospel. But in the Dialogue, along with this remark, Justin couples the statement that although the people saw such cures: "They asserted them to be magical illusion; for they also ventured to call him a magician and deceiver of the people."(1) This is not found in our Gospels, but traces of the same tradition are met with elsewhere, as we have already mentioned;(2) and it is probable that Justin either found all these particulars in the Gospel of which he made use, or that he refers to traditions familiar amongst the early Christians.
Tischendorfs next point is that Justin quotes the words of Zechariah xii. 10, with the same variation from the text of the Septuagint as John xix. 37—"They shall look on him whom they pierced" [———]
[———] instead of [———], arising out of an emendation of the translation of the Hebrew original. Tischendorf says: "Nothing can be more opposed to probability, than the supposition that John and Justin have here, independently of each other, followed a translation of the Hebrew text which elsewhere has remained unknown to us."(2) The fact is, however, that the translation which has been followed is not elsewhere unknown. We meet with the same variation, much earlier, in the only book of the New Testament which Justin mentions, and with which, therefore, he was beyond any doubt well acquainted, Rev. i. 7: "Behold he cometh with clouds, and every eye shall see him [———], and they which pierced [———] him, and all the tribes of the earth shall bewail him. Yea, Amen." This is a direct reference to the passage in Zech. xii. 10. It will be remembered that the quotation in the Gospel: "They shall look upon him whom they pierced," is made solely in reference to the thrust of the lance in the side of Jesus, while that of the Apocalypse is a connection of the prophecy with the second coming of Christ, which, except in a spiritual sense, is opposed to the fourth Gospel. Now, Justin upon each occasion quotes the whole passage also in reference to the second coming of Christ as the Apocalypse does, and this alone settles the point so far as these two sources are concerned. If Justin derived his variation from either of the Canonical works,