VIII.

JOHN, CHAPTER XXI. VERSES 24, 25.

It may seem that the words with which John's Gospel now concludes could hardly have been written by the apostle. He, I conceive, ended his Gospel, thus :

"This is the disciple who testifies concerning these things, and has written them."

The addition follows:

["And we know that his testimony is true. And there are many other things that Jesus did, which, if they were severally written, I do not think that the world itself would contain the books written."]

It is hardly to be supposed, that the apostle would say of himself; "We know that his testimony is true," subjoining immediately after, "I do not think." This is not the style of any writer speaking of himself. The extravagant hyperbole in the second sentence is equally foreign from the style of St. John. The passage appears to be an editorial note, which, written, probably, at first a little separate from the text, became incorporated with it at a very early period.

According to ancient accounts, St. John wrote his Gospel at Ephesus, over the church in which city he presided during the latter part of his long life. It is not improbable that, before his death, its circulation had been 'confined to the members of that church. Thence copies of it would be afterwards obtained; and the copy provided for transcription was, we may suppose, accompanied by the strong attestation which we now find, given by the church, or the elders of the church, to their full faith in the account which it contained; and by the concluding remark made by the writer of this attestation in his own person

There is no external authority, properly speaking, for rejecting this passage. In one manuscript, the last verse is omitted; and in several others, it is said to have been thought by some to be an addition. The character of the language, however, is different from that of John.*

I HAVE thus gone through with all the passages of length or importance, in the Received Text of the Gospels, the genuineness of which appears to me improbable. It is obvious, that, should we regard them all as interpolations, the Gospels would lose nothing of their value. On the contrary, with the exception, perhaps, of the story of the adulteress, they all present some peculiar difficulty, some intrinsic improbability, some inconsistency with what is elsewhere related, or something at variance with the general character of the writing in which they are found, or with the opinion we entertain of its author. But such dissimi

* The use of %ra (whatever), as equivalent simply to the relative à (which, that), is not common, and does not occur elsewhere in John. It was accordingly changed to a by Origen, Chrysostom, and Cyril; and is substituted for it in the Vatican and other manuscripts. It is such a use of ros, as a native Greek might fall into from meeting with its frequent occurrence in the New Testament, without appreciating its exact force. Ka9', is nowhere else found in the writings of the apostle. It is here used illogically, its proper meaning being one by one, severally; whereas the meaning intended is all. This being the case, the proper word, rávra, would at once have been adopted by so simple a writer as John. Oipas occurs nowhere else in the New Testament or Septuagint. It is, apparently, not a word which belonged to the common vocabulary of those Jews who used the Greek language.

L

larity of one part with another would not have been confined to a few spurious or suspicious passages, it would have pervaded the whole of the Gospels, had they been, as is supposed in the theory examined in the First Part of this work, an aggregation of stories collected by different hands.

NOTE B.

(See p. 69.)

VARIOUS READINGS OF COPIES OF THE GOSPELS EXTANT IN THE TIME OF ORIGEN, WHICH ARE PARTICULARLY NOTICED BY HIM.

THE following is a collection of all the instances, so far as I have been able to ascertain them, in which Origen, in his extant works, has remarked upon different readings in the copies of the Gospels that he consulted.* If it be not complete, which I have endeavoured to make it, it at least gives a fair view of the state of the case.

I. Matth. viii. 28. Instead of reqαonvov, which seems to have been the more common reading in his time, Origen says that a few manuscripts read Tadagnvar, and he himself prefers Γεργεσαίων oι Γεργεσηνῶν (it is uncertain which), without expressly saying that he had found it in any copy. Opp. IV. 140, 179. Much diversity of reading exists in our present copies.

II. Matth. xvi. 20. Origen observes, that Mark and Luke, in giving the same account with Matthew, use the words ἐπετίμησεν and ἐπιτιμήσας, but that Matthew, according to some copies, wrote disotsihato. In other copies, he observes, that the word лstiunoer is found. Opp. III. 532. The same diversity exists in our present MSS.

* I have used, as my principal guides, the synopsis of Origen's readings, at the end of the second volume of Griesbach's "Symbolæ Criticæ," and Wetstein's New Testament.

III. Matth. xviii. 1. Some copies, he says, have Rgg, and some quiog. Opp. III. 588. The same diversity still exists.

IV. Matth. xxi. 5. Instead of лolor vior vлоvyiov, he appears to have found, in some copies, wiоv vлožvуiov. Opp. III. 738.* This reading is extant in two MSS.

V. Matth. xxi. 9, 15. In one or the other verse, it appears, that Origen, in the copy or copies before him, found oixo instead of vig. He himself quotes both verses with the reading vig. Opp. II. 583. No other trace of the reading oxe now remains.

VI. Matth. xxvii. 17. It appears that 'Inoous was given as another name of Barabbas, in some ancient copies, 'Insour Bagaßßav. Origen, according to his Latin translator, says; "In many copies the name of Jesus is not found as that of Barabbas; and, perhaps, this is right; so that the name of Jesus may not be given to any wicked person." Opp. III. 918. vid. et. p. 853. The name 'Inoour, before Bagassar, both in the 16th and 17th verses, is now found in four MSS. and two versions, and mentioned in the scholia of about twenty MSS. as a reading of ancient copies.

VII. Mark. Origen says; "Let it be supposed that Aßns, the publican, was a follower of Christ; yet he was not of the number of the apostles, except according to some copies of Mark's Gospel." Opp. I. 376. It is uncertain to what place in Mark's Gospel these words refer; possibly, as Griesbach and others suppose, to ch. ii. v. 14; more probably, I think, to ch. iii. v. 18. This passage of Origen, which presents various difficulties, is not illustrated by the

* On this passage of Origen, where the text is manifestly corrupt, see Griesbach's "Dissertatio de Codicibus Quat. Evang. Origenianis," § xv.