pensatores multiplicis gratie Dei’ (2 P 17,1 P 4%); m Exod. xii. 4 (ix. p. 149), ‘Scio enim scriptum esse, quia unusquisque a quo uincitur huic et sernus addicitur’ (2 P 2); in Levit. iv. 4 (ix. Ῥ. 221), ‘Et iterum Petrus dicit Consortes, inquit, facti estis divine nature’ (2 P 1‘); in Num. xiii. 8 (x. p. 157), ‘Et ut ait quodam in loco Scriptura Mutum animal humana voce respondens arguit prophete dementiam’ (2 P 216); in Lid. Jesu Naue Vii. 1 (xi. p. 63), ‘ Petrus etiam duabus epistolarum suarum personat tubis.’ Compare the allusions in the two following passages—in Num. xviii. 4 (x. p. 228), ‘Consuetudinem propheticam ... de qua dicitur Omnis prophetia non potest propria absolutione constare’ (2 P 1”); in Ezech. v. 3 (xiv. p. 74), ‘Multo nobis utilius fuerat diuino non credidisse sermoni, quam post credulitatem adhue rursum peccata conuerti, que ante com- misimus’ (2 P 2), The question remains— Are these references to, and quotations from, 2 P part of the original text of Origen, or insertions by Rufinus? (1) It is a fact worth noticing, that while it would have been consonant with Eusebius’ plan (HE Ul. iii. τίνες τῶν κατὰ χρόνους ἐκκλησιαστικῶν συγγραφέων ὁποίαις κέχρηνται τῶν ἀντιλεγομένων) ἴο record the use which Origen made of the Epistle, had he found in the Greek text of Origen the assages given above from the Latin translation, he oes not notice their existence. (2) It would not have been against the probabilities of the case if no reference to 2P had occurred in the extant Greek works of Origen, and yet a single allusion or so had been made to that Epistle in a work which chanced to survive only in a Latin trans- lation. But it is certainly strange that not one reference is to be found in the works of Origen extant in Greek, but that half a dozen present themselves in those works of Origen which exist only in Rufinus’ Latin. The idea of θεοποίησις, for example, is a characteristic thought with Origen (as indeed it is with Clement). We are surprised that twice in the works which are preserved to us in Rufinus’ translation Origen illustrates the idea from 2 P, while in his other works he never does so. Thus the number of references to 2 P in Rufinus’ translation creates a suspicion as to their genuineness. (3) Each of these references to, or quotations from, 2 P can, it is believed, be cut out without injury to the context.* But whatever be the truth as to the references to 2 P found in those works of Origen which have reached us only through the medium of Rufinus’ translation, the deliberate statement of Origen as to 2 P remains. The phrase ἀμφιβάλλεται γάρ clearly conveys, not an opinion of Origen’s, but information as to the division of opinion in his time; it may further be thought to suggest that 2 P had already secured a position, which was assailed. The words of the revious clause—forw δὲ καὶ Sevrépay—leave us in ittle doubt that Origen’s judgment was unfavour- able to the Epistle. d : (ii.) Egypt.—The two great Egyptian versions, the Sahidic and the Bohairic, contain all the seven Catholic Epistles. The date of these versions,
however, has not been put beyond doubt. Light- foot placed ‘the completion or codification of the Memphitic [i.e. Bohairic) version’ at the middle of
the 3rd cent. (Scrivener, Plain Introduction * Ρ. 343). Headlam, in his completion of Lightfoot’s article
*In one ὁ referred to above—‘ Petrus in epistola sus dicit Gratia uobis et pax multiplicetur in recognitione Del: et iterum alibi Ut boni dispensatores multiplicis gratia Dei’ (Lomm. vii. p. 234)—there seems to be some positive evidence for the theory of interpx , It would be most unnatural for Origen to refer to 2 P with the words in epistela aua ; to quote the salutation of 2 P, which only differs from that of 1 P by an immaterial addition (in recognitions Dei); and then to add ὁ quotation from 1 P, introducing it with the phrase σέ erum
alili.
PETER, SECOND EPISTLE
804
(in the fourth edition of Scrivener, ii. p. 104f.), holds that ‘it has been sufficiently proved that translations into Coptic existed in the 3rd cent., very probably in the 2nd.’ F. Robinson (art. on EGYPTIAN VERSIONS in vol. i. p. 670ff) urges that such conclusions are in danger of outrunning the evidence, and that ‘historical evidence, on the whole, points to the 3rd cent. as the period when the first Coptic translation was made.’ The investigation desiderated by Westcott (Canon p. 370), ie. ‘how far an older work underlies the printed text, and whether that can be attributed to one author,’ has not yet been accomplished. We must therefore acquiesce in his verdict as to the Bohairic version, a verdict which is even more applicable to the Sahidic—‘ till this has been deter- mined, no stress can be laid upon the evidence which the version affords for the disputed Cath. Epp.’
(iii.) Carthage.—There is no evidence that Ter- tullian or Cyprian was acquainted with2P.
(iv.) Asia Minor.—(a) In a letter to Cyprian (Cyprian, Zp. lxxv. 6), Firmilian, bp. of Csarea in Cappadocia, writes: ‘Stephanus ... adhue etiam infamans Petrum et Paulum beatos apostolos . . . qui in epistolis suis hereticos execrati sunt et ut eos euitemus monuerunt.’ The reference, it would seem, must be to 2 P, since 1 P contains no indictment of heretics. (δ) Methodius, bp. of Olympus and afterwards of Patara, who appears to have suffered in the Diocletian persecution. Zahn (Gesch. Kan. 1. i. p. 313) points out some