CHAPTER III.

ON THE DATE AND CREDIBILITY OF THE GOSPEL OF ST. MATTHEW.

THE four Gospels contain many things agreeing with the usual order of nature, and necessary to account for the growth of Christianity, such as the existence, public preaching, and death of Christ; but they also contain many things unusual in the order of nature, and, as the preceding sketch has shown, not necessary to account for the growth of Christianity, such as Christ's miracles and resurrection. Admitting that a miracle may be proved by sufficient testimony, we are forced also to admit that testimony, in order to be sufficient in this case, must be considerably stronger than that upon which we should believe ordinary facts. Paley agrees that Hume states the case of miracles fairly, when he says that it is the question whether it be more improbable that the miracle should be true, or the testimony false. Evid. vol. i. p. 11.

Paley, however, labours to prove that we ought to admit an antecedent probability in favour of a miraculous revelation, from our knowledge of the existence, disposition, and constant agency of the Deity. Others, with Rousseau, have argued that it is antecedently improbable that the Deity should choose to reveal himself by signs of such doubtful and difficult verification as miracles. Most of those who approach the evangelical histories are probably influenced by considerations of one or the other sort; and on the antecedent bias it will depend whether the degree of credibility which can be established for the evangelists appear sufficient to attest even their

miraculous narratives. Hence the different conclusions ar

rived at by those who apply to the study of the Christian evidences. In either case there seems to be a departure from the strict inductive method, which should lead us to inquire, not what the Deity would or ought to have done, but what he actually has done. It seems beyond the power of the human intellect to decide, à priori, whether a miraculous revelation, or instruction through nature alone, be more suitable to the character of God; but mere common sense, accompanied by industry, patience, and candour, is able to form an opinion as to the weight due to the historical evidence alleged in favour of the supposed miraculous revelation. Critical and historical research, therefore, appears to be the only means of arriving at a sound conclusion.

Let us, then, collect the best evidence we can as to the evangelists' veracity and knowledge of the things which they relate, in order to judge if it be so strong as to warrant a reasonable man in believing them when they relate miracles; or, in other words, if, considering the circumstances in which they were placed, and what we can perceive of their views, motives, and characters, it be more improbable that the miracles should be true, or their testimony false.

The first Gospel bears no author's name in itself, but has come down to us from the earliest ages of the church under the title of " the Gospel according to St. Matthew." Neither does it bear in itself any date. We are obliged, then, to supply these omissions by inferences from the contents of the book itself, and by external evidence.

I. The contents of the book show that it was published during or immediately after the Jewish war, A. D. 66 to 70; for the 24th chapter, written in the prophetic style, mentions things which agree with real events up to that time, but disagree with them afterwards. This is shown by the following

examination of the chapter as compared with the histories of Josephus and others; besides which there are some internal indications that it was not a prediction really delivered by Jesus, but the writer's own description of his times.

Matt. xxiv. 1. And Jesus went out, and departed from the temple; and the disciples came to show him the buildings of the temple. 2. And Jesus said unto them, See ye not all these things? Verily I say unto you, there shall not be left one stone upon another that shall not be thrown down.

This prediction is not referred to in the speeches of the Apostles in the Acts,* nor in any of the epistles, although those of Paul dwell frequently upon the state and prospects of the Jewish nation.

3. And as he sat upon the Mount of Olives, the disciples came unto him privately, saying, Tell us when shall these things be? and what shall be the sign of thy coming, and of the end of the world?

Since the writer says the prediction was delivered privately, the general testimony of the church must have been wanting to support it. He does not say from which of the disciples he himself obtained his information. Mark says, the disciples to whom it was delivered were Peter, James, John, and Andrew; but we cannot find that any of these mentioned it themselves, although epistles are remaining from three of them, of which one was written shortly before the events referred to. The coming of Jesus, and the end of the world, were generally expected by the Christians about the time of the siege of Jerusalem; but in the lifetime of Jesus the first phrase would have little meaning, for Jesus was already

Stephen was accused of having said that "Jesus of Nazareth shall destroy this place, and change the customs which Moses delivered." Acts vi. 14. But it does not appear that he referred to any prediction of Jesus himself.

+ 1 Peter, about A. D. 64.

H

with them; and the disciples then expected, not the end of the world, but the restoration of the throne of Israel.*

The disciples probably expected that the redemption of Israel by the Messiah would be accompanied by the destruction of those who refused to repent, and to receive him (Matt. iii. 7, 12; vii. 13). They might partake of the common Jewish notion that the Messiah's kingdom was the beginning of a new world or order of things (Matt. xii. 32); perhaps also, that it was to be attained through much peril and distress of Israel (Dan. xii. 1). But they had not had sufficient ground given them to consider that the Messiah's kingdom was to be introduced by a second coming of Jesus, coincident with the fall of Jerusalem and the end of the world. Their intuitive connexion of all these things together in this scene betokens not only a very ready apprehension of what Jesus is reported to have already said, but some perception of what he was about to say. Matt. xiii. 39, 40, if historical, could at most only lead the hearers to expect an end of the world, in which the Son of Man would reward the righteous and punish the wicked, without connecting this end with a second coming of Jesus, and the fall of Jerusalem. The reader of Matthew, on coming to this verse, is taken by surprise at finding the simultaneousness or connexion of these three things treated as a matter of course by the disciples. The subsequent conduct and language of some of them betoken that there still remained among them the expectation that the Jesus who was already with them, would, during his actual stay on the earth, redeem Israel.

But the matter becomes clear by referring to the ideas of a later period. After the death of Jesus, the Christians believed that he would come again from heaven, which second coming might be called emphatically the coming of the Son of Man, of the Lord, or of Jesus. James v. 7; 1 Peter i. 7, 13; iv. 13; v. 1; 2 Peter iii. 12. Josephus shows that the destruction of the city was anticipated some time before it occurred, and that prognostics of it were found in the prophets. Passages in these apparently connected the punishment of Jerusalem with the end of all things. (See page 80.) Therefore by the time the first gospel was written, the Christians had become familiar with the idea of connexion between the coming of the Son of Man, the fall of Jerusalem, and the end of the world; although they could not foresee the precise order of date of the three events. The writer therefore puts into the mouth of the disciples the question most interesting to the Christians in his own time-" When shall these things be, and what shall be the sign of thy coming?" &c.

These observations apply also in great part to Matt. x. 22, 23; xvi. 28. It seems improbable that the coming of the Son of Man, which appears to have been very commonly used by Jesus to signify his actual appearance, could have been mentioned at the periods referred to as a familiar idea in the sense of a second supernatural coming at a distant period, and apparently without exciting any demand for explanation. Matt. xxvi. 64, occurring shortly before the execution of Jesus, is possibly in substance a real saying,

4. And Jesus answered and said unto them, Take heed that no man deceive you. 5. For many shall come in my name, saying, I am Christ, and shall deceive many.

Jos., War, book ii. ch. 13, "There was also another body of wicked men gotten together, who laid waste the happy state of the city no less than did these murderers. These were such men as deceived and deluded the people under pretence of divine inspiration, but were for procuring innovations and changes of the government; and these prevailed with the multitude to act like madmen, and went before them into the wilderness, as pretending that God would there show them the signals of liberty." This was in the procuratorship of Felix, A. D. 55. Ibid. "Now when these (the Egyptian false prophet and his company) were quieted, it happened, as it does in a diseased body, that another part was subject to an inflammation; for a company of deceivers and robbers got together, and persuaded the Jews to revolt, and exhorted them to assert their liberty, inflicting death on those that continued in obedience to the Roman government, and saying, that such as willingly chose slavery ought to be forced from such their desired inclinations; for they parted themselves into different bodies, and lay in wait up and down the country, and plundered the houses of the great men, and slew the men themselves, and set the villages on fire; and this till all Judea was filled with the effects of their madAnd thus the flame was every day more and more up, till it came to a direct war."

ness. blown

being the application of Dan. vii. 13, in a literal sense, when it had not been accomplished in any other; which saying may have contributed to the subsequent expectation of the church, and to its condensation into the phrase, the "coming of the Son of Man." This might easily be reflected into the account of the previous discourses. A few isolated passages of this kind appear therefore rather to partake of the character which internal evidence and the context affix to ch. xxiv. 3, than to afford a sufficient basis on which to establish the authenticity of the latter.