"Yet, see," our opponents will exclaim in answer, "what a mighty river has come from a little spring. We heard first of two men going into an empty tomb, finding two bundles of grave clothes, and departing. Then there comes a certain person, concerning whom we are elsewhere told a fact which leaves us with a very uncomfortable impression, and SHE sees, not two bundles of grave clothes, but two white angels, who ask a dreamy pointless question, and receive an appropriate answer. Then we find the time of this apparition shifted; it is placed in the front, not in the background, and is seen by many, instead of being vouchsafed to no one but to a weeping woman looking into the bottom of a tomb. The speech of the angels, also, becomes effective, and the linen clothes drop out of sight entirely, unless some faint trace of them is to be found in the "long white garment" which Mark tells us was worn by the young man who was in the tomb when the women reached it. Finally, we have a guard set upon the tomb, and the stone which was rolled in front of it is sealed; the angel IS SEEN TO DESCEND FROM HEAVEN, to roll away the stone, and sit upon it, and there is a great earthquake. Oh! how things grow, how things grow! And, oh! how people believe!
"See by what easy stages the story has grown up from the smallest seed, as the mustard tree in the parable, and how the account given by Matthew changes the whole complexion of the events. And see how this account has been dwelt upon to the exclusion of the others by the great painters and sculptors from whom, consciously or unconsciously, our ideas of the Christian era are chiefly drawn.
Yes. These men have been the most potent of theologians, for their theology has reached and touched most widely. We have mistaken their echo of the sound for the sound itself, and what was to them an aspiration, has, alas! been to us in the place of science and reality.
"Truly the ease with which the plainest inferences from the Gospel narratives have been overlooked is the best apology for those who have attributed unnatural blindness to the Apostles. If we are so blind, why not they also? A pertinent question, but one which raises more difficulties than it solves. The seeing of truth is as the finding of gold in far countries, where the shepherd has drunk of the stream and used it daily to cleanse the sweat of his brow, and recked little of the treasure which lay abundantly concealed therein, until one luckier than his fellows espies it, and the world comes flocking thither. So with truth; a little care, a little patience, a little sympathy, and the wonder is that it should have lain hidden even from the merest child, not that it should now be manifest.
"How early must it have been objected that there was no evidence that the tomb had not been tampered with (not by the Apostles, for they were scattered, and of him who laid the body in the tomb--Joseph of Arimathaea--we hear no more) and that the body had been delivered not to enemies, but friends; how natural that so desirable an addition to the completeness of the evidences in favour of a miraculous Resurrection should have been early and eagerly accepted. Would not twenty years of oral communication and Spanish or Italian excitability suffice for the rooting of such a story? Yet, as far as we can gather, the Gospel according to St. Matthew was even then unwritten. And who was Matthew? And what was his original Gospel?
"There is one part of his story, and one only, which will stand the test of criticism, and that is this:- That the saying that the disciples came by night and stole the body of Jesus away was current among the Jews, at the time when the Gospel which we now have appeared. Not that they did so--no one will believe this; but the allegation of the rumour (which would hardly have been ventured unless it would command a.s.sent as true) points in the direction of search having been made for the body of Jesus--and made in vain.
"We have now seen that there is no evidence worth the name, for any miracle in connection with the tomb of Christ. He probably reappeared alive, but not with any circ.u.mstances which we are justified in regarding as supernatural. We are therefore at length led to a consideration of the Crucifixion itself. Is there evidence for more than this--that Christ was crucified, was afterwards seen alive, and that this was regarded by his first followers as a sufficient proof of his having risen from the dead? This would account for the rise of Christianity, and for all the other miracles.
Take the following pa.s.sage from Gibbon:- "The grave and learned Augustine, whose understanding scarcely admits the excuse of credulity, has attested the innumerable prodigies which were worked in Africa by the relics of St. Stephen, and this marvellous narrative is inserted in the elaborate work of "The City of G.o.d," which the Bishop designed as a solid and immortal proof of the truth of Christianity. Augustine solemnly declares that he had selected those miracles only which had been publicly certified by persons who were either the objects or the spectators of the powers of the martyr.
Many prodigies were omitted or forgotten, and Hippo had been less favourably treated than the other cities of the province, yet the Bishop enumerates above seventy miracles, of which three were resurrections from the dead, within the limits of his own diocese.
If we enlarge our view to all the dioceses and all the saints of the Christian world, it will not be easy to calculate the fables and errors which issued from this inexhaustible source. But we may surely be allowed to observe that a miracle in that age of superst.i.tion and credulity lost its name and its merits, since it could hardly be considered as a deviation from the established laws of Nature."--(Gibbon"s Decline and Fall, chap. xxviii., sec. 2).
"Who believes in the miracles, or who would dare to quote them? Yet on what better foundation do those of the New Testament rest? For the death of Christ there is no evidence at all. There is evidence that he was believed to have been dead (under circ.u.mstances where a misapprehension was singularly likely to arise), by men whose minds were altogether in a different clef to ours as regards the miraculous, and whom we cannot therefore fairly judge by any modern standard. We cannot judge THEM, but we are bound to weigh the facts which they relate, not in their balance, but in our own. It is not what might have seemed reasonably believable to them, but what is reasonably believable in our own more enlightened age which can be alone accepted sinlessly by ourselves. Men"s modes of thought concerning facts change from age to age; but the facts change not at all, and it is of them that we are called to judge.
"We turn to the fourth Gospel, as that from which we shall derive the most accurate knowledge of the facts connected with the Crucifixion.
Here we find that it was about twelve o"clock when Pilate brought out Christ for the last time; the dialogue that followed, the preparations for the Crucifixion, and the leading Christ outside the city to the place where the Crucifixion was to take place, could hardly have occupied less than an hour. By six o"clock (by consent of all writers) the body was entombed, so that the actual time during which Christ hung upon the cross was little more than four hours.
Let us be thankful to hope that the time of suffering may have been so short--but say five hours, say six, say whatever the reader chooses, the Crucifixion was avowedly too hurried for death in an ordinary case to have ensued. The thieves had to be killed, as yet alive. Immediately before being taken down from the cross the body was delivered to friends. Within thirty-six hours afterwards the tomb in which it had been laid was discovered to have been opened; for how long it had been open we do not know, but a few hours later Christ was seen alive.
"Let it be remembered also that the fact of the body having been delivered to Joseph BEFORE the taking down from the cross, greatly enhanced the chance of an escape from death, inasmuch as the duties of the soldiers would have ended with the presentation of the order from Pilate. If any faint symptom of returning animation shewed itself in consequence of the mere change of position and the inevitable shock attendant upon being moved, the soldiers would not know it; their task was ended, and they would not be likely either to wish, or to be allowed, to have anything to do with the matter.
Joseph appears to have been a rich man, and would be followed by attendants. Moreover, although we are told by Mark that Pilate sent for the centurion to inquire whether Christ was dead, yet the same writer also tells us that this centurion had already come to the conclusion that Christ was the Son of G.o.d, a statement which is supported by the accounts of Matthew and Luke; Mark is the only Evangelist who tells us that the centurion WAS sent for, but even granting that this was so, would not one who had already recognised Christ as the Son of G.o.d be inclined to give him every a.s.sistance in his power? He would be frightened, and anxious to get the body down from the cross as fast as possible. So long as Christ appeared to be dead, there would be no unnecessary obstacle thrown in the way of the delivery of the body to Joseph, by a centurion who believed that he had been helping to crucify the Son of G.o.d. Besides Joseph was rich, and rich people have many ways of getting their wishes attended to.
"We know of no one as a.s.sisting at the taking down or the removal of the body, except Joseph of Arimathaea, for the presence of Nicodemus, and indeed his existence, rests upon the slenderest evidence. None of the Apostles appear to have had anything to do with the deposition, nor yet the women who had come from Galilee, who are represented as seeing where the body was laid (and by Luke as seeing HOW it was laid), but do not seem to have come into close contact with the body.
"Would any modern jury of intelligent men believe under similar circ.u.mstances that the death had been actual and complete? Would they not regard--and ought they not to regard--reappearance as const.i.tuting ample proof that there had been no death? Most a.s.suredly, unless Christ had had his head cut off, or had been seen to be burnt to ashes. Again, if unexceptionable medical testimony as to the completeness of the death had reached us, there would be no help for it; we should have to admit that something had happened which was at variance with all our experience of the course of nature; or again if his legs had been broken, or his feet pierced, we could say nothing; but what irreparable mischief is done to any vital function of the body by the mere act of crucifixion? The feet were not always, "nor perhaps generally," pierced (so Dean Alford tells us, quoting from Justin Martyr), nor is there a particle of evidence to shew that any exception was made in the present instance. A man who is crucified dies from sheer exhaustion, so that it cannot be deemed improbable that he might swoon away, and that every outward appearance of death might precede death by several hours.
"Are we to suppose that a handful of ignorant soldiers should be above error, when we remember that men have been left for dead, been laid out for burial and buried by their best friends--nay, that they have over and over again been p.r.o.nounced dead by skilled physicians, when the facilities for knowing the truth were far greater, and when a mistake was much less likely to occur, than at the hurried Crucifixion of Jesus Christ? The soldiers would apply no polished mirror to the lips, nor make use of any of those tests which, under the circ.u.mstances, would be absolutely necessary before life could be p.r.o.nounced to be extinct; they would see that the body was lifeless, inanimate, to all outward appearance like the few other dead bodies which they had probably observed closely; with this they would rest contented.
"It is true, they probably believed Christ to be dead at the time they handed over the body to his friends, and if we had heard nothing more of the matter we might a.s.sume that they were right; but the reappearance of Christ alive changes the whole complexion of the story. It is not very likely that the Roman soldiers would have been mistaken in believing him to be dead, unless the hurry of the whole affair, and the order from Pilate, had disposed them to carelessness, and to getting the matter done as fast as possible; but it is much less likely that a dead man should come to life again than that a mistake should have been made about his having being dead. The latter is an event which probably happens every week in one part of the world or another; the former has never yet been known.
"It is not probable that a man officially executed should escape death; but that a DEAD MAN should escape from it is more improbable still; in addition to the enormous preponderance of probability on the side of Christ"s never having died which arises from this consideration alone, we are told many facts which greatly lessen the improbability of his having escaped death, inasmuch as the Crucifixion was hurried, and the body was immediately delivered to friends without the known destruction of any organic function, and while still hanging upon the cross.
"Joseph and Nicodemus (supposing that Nicodemus was indeed a party to the entombment) may be believed to have thought that Christ was dead when they received the body, but they could not refuse him their a.s.sistance when they found out their mistake, nor, again, could they forfeit their high position by allowing it to be known that they had restored the life of one who was so obnoxious to the authorities.
They would be in a very difficult position, and would take the prudent course of backing out of the matter at the first moment that humanity would allow, of leaving the rest to chance, and of keeping their own counsel. It is noticeable that we never hear of them again; for there were no two people in the world better able to know whether the Resurrection was miraculous or not, and none who would be more deeply interested in favour of the miracle. They had been faithful when the Apostles themselves had failed, and if their faith had been so strong while everything pointed in the direction of the utter collapse of Christianity, what would it be, according to every natural impulse of self-approbation, when so transcendent a miracle as a resurrection had been worked almost upon their own premises, and upon one whose remains they had generously taken under their protection at a time when no others had ventured to shew them respect?
"We should have fancied that Mary would have run to Joseph and Nicodemus, not to the Apostles; that Joseph and Nicodemus would then have sent for the Apostles, or that, to say the least of it, we should have heard of these two persons as having been prominent members of the Church at Jerusalem; but here again the experience of the ordinary course of nature fails us, and we do not find another word or hint concerning them. This may be the result of accident, but if so, it is a very unfortunate accident, and we have already had a great deal too much of unfortunate accidents, and of truths which MAY be truths, but which are uncommonly like exaggeration. Stories are like people, whom we judge of in no small degree by the dress they wear, the company they keep, and that subtle indefinable something which we call their expression.
"Nevertheless, there arise the questions how far the spear wound recorded by the writer of the fourth Gospel must be regarded, firstly, as an actual occurrence, and, secondly, as having been necessarily fatal, for unless these things are shewn to be indisputable we have seen that the balance of probability lies greatly in favour of Christ"s having escaped with life. If, however, it can be proved that it is a matter of certainty both that the wound was actually inflicted, and that death must have inevitably followed, then the death of Christ is proved. The Resurrection becomes supernatural; the Ascension forthwith ceases to be marvellous; the Miraculous Conception, the Temptation in the Wilderness, all the other miracles of Christ and his Apostles, become believable at once upon so signal a failure of human experience; human experience ceases to be a guide at all, inasmuch as it is found to fail on the very point where it has been always considered to be most firmly established--the remorselessness of the grip of death. But before we can consent to part with the firm ground on which we tread, in the confidence of which we live, move, and have our being--the trust in the established experience of countless ages--we must prove the infliction of the wound and its necessarily fatal character beyond all possibility of mistake. We cannot be expected to reject a natural solution of an event however mysterious, and to adopt a supernatural in its place, so long as there is any element of doubt upon the supernatural side.
"The natural solution of the origin of belief in the Resurrection lies very ready to our hands; once admit that Christ was crucified hurriedly, that there is no proof of the destruction of any organic function of the body, that the body itself was immediately delivered to friends, and that thirty-six hours afterwards Christ was seen alive, and it is impossible to understand how any human being can doubt what he ought to think. We must own also that once let Joseph have kept his own counsel (and he had a great stake to lose if he did NOT keep it), once let the Apostles believe that Christ"s restoration to life was miraculous (and under the circ.u.mstances they would be sure to think so), and their reason would be so unsettled that in a very short time all the recognised and all the apocryphal miracles of Christ would pa.s.s current with them without a shadow of difficulty."
It will be observed that throughout both this and the preceding chapter I have been dealing with those of our opponents who, while admitting the reappearances of our Lord, ascribe them to natural causes only. I consider this position to be only second in importance to the one taken by Strauss, and as perhaps in some respects capable of being supported with an even greater outward appearance of probability. I therefore resolved to combat it, and as a preliminary to this, have taken care that it shall be stated in the clearest and most definite manner possible. But it is plain that those who accept the fact that our Lord reappeared after the Crucifixion differ hardly less widely from Strauss than they do from ourselves; it will therefore be expedient to shew how they maintain their ground against so formidable an antagonist. Let it be remembered that Strauss and his followers admit that THE DEATH of our Lord is proved, while those of our opponents who would deny this, nevertheless admit that we can establish THE REAPPEARANCES; it follows therefore that each of our most important propositions is admitted by one section or other of the enemy, and each section would probably be heartily glad to be able to deny what it admits. Can there be any doubt about the significance of this fact? Would not a little reflection be likely to suggest to the distracted host of our adversaries that each of its two halves is right, as FAR AS IT GOES, but that agreement will only be possible between them when each party has learnt that it is in possession of only half the truth, and has come to admit both the DEATH OF OUR LORD AND HIS RESURRECTION?
Returning, however, to the manner in which the section of our opponents with whom I am now dealing meet Strauss, they may be supposed to speak as follows:-
"Strauss believes that Christ died, and says (New Life of Jesus, Vol.
I., p. 411) that "the account of the Evangelists of the death of Jesus is clear, unanimous, and connected." If this means that the Evangelists would certainly know whether Christ died or not, we demur to it at once. Strauss would himself admit that not one of the writers who have recorded the facts connected with the Crucifixion was an eyewitness of that event, and he must also be aware that the very utmost which any of these writers can have KNOWN, was THAT CHRIST WAS BELIEVED TO HAVE BEEN. DEAD. It is strange to see Strauss so suddenly struck with the clearness, unanimity, and connectedness of the Evangelists. In the very next sentence he goes on to say, "Equally fragmentary, full of contradiction and obscurity, is all that they tell us of the opportunities of observing him which his adherents are supposed to have had after his resurrection." Now, this seems very unfair, for, after all, the gospel writers are quite as unanimous in a.s.serting the main fact that Christ reappeared, as they are in a.s.serting that he died; they would seem to be just as "clear, unanimous, and connected," about the former event as the latter (for the accounts of the Crucifixion vary not a little), and they must have had infinitely better means of knowing whether Christ reappeared than whether he had actually died. There is not the same scope for variation in the bare a.s.sertion that a man died, as there is in the narration of his sayings and doings upon the several occasions of his reappearance. Besides, in support of the reappearances, we have the evidence of Paul, who, though not an eye- witness, was well acquainted with those who were; whereas no man can make more out of the facts recorded concerning the death of Jesus, than that he was believed to be dead under circ.u.mstances in which mistake might easily arise, that there is no reason to think that any organic function of the body had been destroyed at the time that it was delivered over to friends, and that none of those who testified to Christ"s death appear to have verified their statement by personal inspection of the body. On these points the Evangelists do indeed appear to be "clear, unanimous, and connected."
"Later on Strauss is even more unsatisfactory, for on the page which follows the one above quoted from, he writes: "Besides which, it is quite evident that this (the natural) view of the resurrection of Jesus, apart from the difficulties in which it is involved, does not even solve the problem which is here under consideration: the origin, that is, of the Christian Church by faith in the miraculous resurrection of the Messiah. It is impossible that a being who had stolen half-dead out of a sepulchre, who crept about weak and ill, wanting medical treatment, who required bandaging, strengthening, and indulgence, and who still, at last, yielded to his sufferings, could have given to the disciples the impression that he was a conqueror over death and the grave, the Prince of Life, an impression which lay at the bottom of their future ministry. Such a resuscitation could only have weakened the impression which he had made upon them in life and in death; at the most could only have given it an elegiac voice, but could by no possibility have changed their sorrow into enthusiasm, have elevated their reverence into worship."
"Now, the fallacy in the above is obvious; it a.s.sumes that CHRIST was in such a state as to be compelled to creep about, weak and ill, &c., and ultimately to die from the effects of his sufferings; whereas there is not a word of evidence in support of all this. He may have been weak and ill when he forbade Mary to touch him, on the first occasion of his being seen alive; but it would be hard to prove even this, and on no subsequent occasion does he shew any sign of weakness. The supposition that he died of the effects of his sufferings is quite gratuitous; one would like to know where Strauss got it from. He MAY have done so, or he may have been a.s.sa.s.sinated by some one commissioned by the Jewish Sanhedrim, or he may have felt that his work was done, and that any further interference upon his part would only mar it, and therefore resolved upon withdrawing himself from Palestine for ever, or Joseph of Arimathaea may have feared the revolution which he saw approaching--or twenty things besides might account for Christ"s final disappearance. The only thing, however, which we can say with any certainty is that he disappeared, and that there is no reason to believe that he died of his wounds. All over and above this is guesswork.
"Again, if Christ on reappearing had continued in daily intercourse with his disciples, it might have been impossible that they should not find out that he was in all respects like themselves. But he seems to have been careful to avoid seeing them much. Paul only mentions five reappearances, only one of which was to any considerable number of people. According also to the gospel writers, the reappearances were few; they were without preparation, and nothing seems to have been known of where he resided between each visit; this rarity and mysteriousness of the reappearances of Christ (whether dictated by fear of his enemies or by policy) would heighten their effect, and prevent the Apostles from knowing much more about their master than the simple fact that he was indisputably alive.
They saw enough to a.s.sure them of this, but they did not see enough to prevent their being able to regard their master as a conqueror over death and the grave, even though it could be shewn (which certainly cannot be done) that he continued in infirm health, and ultimately died of his wounds.
"If the Apostles had been highly educated English or German Professors, it might be hard to believe them capable of making any mistake; but they were nothing of the kind; they were ignorant Eastern peasants, living in the very thick of every conceivable kind of delusive influence. Strauss himself supposes their minds to have been so weak and unhinged that they became easy victims to hallucination. But if this was the case, they would be liable to other kinds of credulity, and it seems strange that one who would bring them down so low, should be here so suddenly jealous for their intelligence. There is no reason to suppose that Christ WAS weak and ill after the first day or two, any more than there is for believing that he died of his wounds. This being so, is it not more simple and natural to believe that the Apostles were really misled by a solid substratum of strange events--a substratum which seems to be supported by all the evidence which we can get--than that the whole story of the appearances of Christ after the Crucifixion should be due to baseless dreams and fancies? At any rate, if the Apostles could be misled by hallucination, much more might they be misled by a natural reappearance, which looked not unlike a supernatural one.
"The belief in the miraculous character of the Resurrection is the central point of the whole Christian system. Let this be once believed, and considering the times, which, it must always be remembered, were in respect of credulity widely different from our own, considering the previous hopes and expectations of the Apostles, considering their education, Oriental modes of thought and speech, familiarity with the ideas of miracle and demonology, and unfamiliarity with the ideas of accuracy and science, and considering also the unquestionable beauty and wisdom of much which is recorded as having been taught by Christ, and the really remarkable circ.u.mstances of the case--we say, once let the Resurrection be believed to be miraculous, and the rest is clear; there is no further mystery about the origin of the Christian religion.
"So the matter has now come to this pa.s.s, that we are to jeopardise our faith in all human experience, if we are unable to see our way clearly out of a few words about a spear wound, recorded as having been inflicted in a distant country nearly two thousand years ago, by a writer concerning whom we are entirely ignorant, and whose connection with any eye-witness of the events which he records is a matter of pure conjecture. We will see about this hereafter; all that is necessary now is to make sure that we do not jeopardise it, if we DO see a way of escape, and this a.s.suredly exists."
I will not pain either the reader or myself by a recapitulation of the arguments which have led our opponents as well as the Dean of Canterbury, and I may add, with due apology, myself, to conclude that nothing is known as to the severity or purpose of the spear wound.
The case, therefore, of our adversaries will rest thus:- that there is not only no sufficient reason for believing that Christ died upon the cross, but that there are the strongest conceivable reasons for believing that He did not die; that the shortness of time during which He remained upon the cross, the immediate delivery of the body to friends, and, above all, the subsequent reappearance alive, are ample grounds for arriving at such a conclusion. They add further that it would seem a monstrous supposition to believe that a good and merciful G.o.d should have designed to redeem the world by the infliction of such awful misery upon His own Son, and yet determined to condemn every one who did not believe in this design, in spite of such a deficiency of evidence that disbelief would appear to be a moral obligation. No good G.o.d, they say, would have left a matter of such unutterable importance in a state of such miserable uncertainty, when the addition of a very small amount of testimony would have been sufficient to establish it.
In the two following chapters I shall show the futility and irrelevancy of the above reasoning--if, indeed, that can be called reasoning which is from first to last essentially unreasonable.
Plausible as, in parts, it may have appeared, I have little doubt that the reader will have already detected the greater number of the fallacies which underlie it. But before I can allow myself to enter upon the welcome task of refutation, a few more words from our opponents will yet be necessary. However strongly I disapprove of their views, I trust they will admit that I have throughout expressed them as one who thoroughly understands them. I am convinced that the course I have taken is the only one which can lead to their being brought into the way of truth, and I mean to persevere in it until I have explained the views which they take concerning our Lord"s Ascension, with no less clearness than I shewed forth their opinions concerning the Resurrection.
"In St. Matthew"s Gospel," they will say, "we find no trace whatever of any story concerning the Ascension. The writer had either never heard anything about the matter at all, or did not consider it of sufficient importance to deserve notice.
"Dean Alford, indeed, maintains otherwise. In his notes on the words, "And lo! I am with you always unto the end of the world," he says, "These words imply and set forth the Ascension"; it is true that he adds, "the manner of which is not related by the Evangelist": but how do the words quoted, "imply and set forth" the Ascension?
They imply a belief that Christ"s spirit would be present with his disciples to the end of time; but how do they set forth the fact that his body was seen by a number of people to rise into the air and actually to mount up far into the region of the clouds?
"The fact is simply this--and n.o.body can know it better than Dean Alford--that Matthew tells us nothing about the Ascension.
"The last verses of Mark"s Gospel are admitted by Dean Alford himself to be not genuine, but even in these the subject is dismissed in a single verse, and although it is stated that Christ was received into Heaven, there is not a single word to imply that any one was supposed to have seen him actually on his way thither.
"The author of the fourth Gospel is also silent concerning the Ascension. There is not a word, nor hint, nor faintest trace of any knowledge of the fact, unless an allusion be detected in the words, "What and if ye shall see the Son of Man ascending where he was before?" (John vi., 62) in reference to which pa.s.sage Dean Alford, in his note on Luke xxiv., 52, writes as follows:- "And might not we have concluded from the wording of John vi., 62, that our Lord must have intended an ascension INSIGHT OF SOME OF THOSE TO WHOM HE SPOKE, and that the Evangelist GIVES THAT HINT, BY RECORDING THOSE WORDS WITHOUT COMMENT, THAT HE HAD SEEN IT?" That is to say, we are to conclude that the writer of the fourth Gospel actually SAW the Ascension, because he tells us that Christ uttered the words, "What and if ye shall see the Son of Man ascending where he was before?"
"But who WAS the author of the fourth Gospel? And what reason is there for thinking that that work is genuine? Let us make another extract from Dean Alford. In his prolegomena, chapter v., section 6, on the genuineness of the fourth Gospel, he writes:- "Neither Papias, who carefully sought out all that Apostles and Apostolic men had related regarding the life of Christ; nor Polycarp, who was himself a disciple of the Apostle John; nor Barnabas, nor Clement of Rome, in their epistles; nor, lastly, Ignatius (in his genuine writings), makes any mention of, or allusion to, this gospel. SO THAT IN THE MOST ANCIENT CIRCLE OF ECCLESIASTICAL TESTIMONY, IT APPEARS TO BE UNKNOWN. OR NOT RECOGNISED." We may add that there is no trace of its existence before the latter half of the second century, and that the internal evidence against its genuineness appears to be more and more conclusive the more it is examined.
"St. Paul, when enumerating the last appearances of his master, in a pa.s.sage where the absence of any allusion to the Ascension is almost conclusive as to his never having heard a word about it, is also silent. In no part of his genuine writings does he give any sign of his having been aware that any story was in existence as to the manner in which Christ was received into Heaven.
"Where, then, does the story come from, if neither Matthew, Mark, John, nor Paul appear to have heard of it?
"It comes from a single verse in St. Luke"s Gospel--written more than half a century after the supposed event, when few, or more probably none, of those who were supposed to have seen it were either living or within reach to contradict it. Luke writes (xxiv., 51), "And it came to pa.s.s that while he blessed them, he was parted from them, and carried up into Heaven." This is the only account of the Ascension given in any part of the Gospels which can be considered genuine. It gives Bethany as the place of the miracle, whereas, if Dean Alford is right in saying that the words of Matthew "set forth" the Ascension, they set it forth as having taken place on a mountain in Galilee.
But here, as elsewhere, all is haze and contradiction. Perhaps some Christian writers will maintain that it happened both at Bethany and in Galilee.
"In his subsequent work, written some sixty or seventy years after the Ascension, St. Luke gives us that more detailed account which is commonly present to the imagination of all men (thanks to the Italian painters), when the Ascension is alluded to. The details, it would seem, came to his knowledge after he had written his Gospel, and many a long year after Matthew and Mark and Paul had written. How he came by the additional details we do not know. n.o.body seems to care to know. He must have had them revealed to him, or been told them by some one, and that some one, whoever he was, doubtless knew what he was saying, and all Europe at one time believed the story, and this is sufficient proof that mistake was impossible.
"It is indisputable that from the very earliest ages of the Church there existed a belief that Christ was at the right hand of G.o.d; but no one who professes to have seen him on his way thither has left a single word of record. It is easy to believe that the facts may have been revealed in a night vision, or communicated in one or other of the many ways in which extraordinary circ.u.mstances ARE communicated, during the years of oral communication and enthusiasm which elapsed between the supposed Ascension of Christ and the writing of Luke"s second work. It is not surprising that a firm belief in Christ"s having survived death should have arisen in consequence of the actual circ.u.mstances connected with the Crucifixion and entombment. Was it then strange that this should develop itself into the belief that he was now in Heaven, sitting at the right hand of G.o.d the Father? And finally was it strange that a circ.u.mstantial account of the manner in which he left this earth should be eagerly accepted?"
[In an appendix at the end of the book I have given the extracts from the Gospels which are necessary for a full comprehension of the preceding chapters.--W. B. O.]
CHAPTER IX--THE CHRIST-IDEAL