An attempt to make Mk 1)3 confonn to Mt 1355 i; seen i.i some old MSS (including the good cursives 33-69) as well as in Eth. and Arm. versions, where we find ' carpenter's son ' in place of ' oai-penter* This reading must represent a very old text, for Origen (c. Cels. vi. 36) says, ' Nowhere in the Gospels current in the Churches is Jesus Himself called a carjienter,' alluding apparently to other Gospels in which this trade was ascribed to .Christ. It is also clear that the TR reading must be as old, for Celsus founded on it. One may gather that the change in MSS and versions was Tiot merelj accidental or harmonistio but deliberate, and due to thnsL- who considered that Jesus was dishonoured 1)>' hfinu' descrilit'd us a carpenter. Justin Martyr
when he says'lli i; -If. -n-, • ■■ ' ri Liniongst men. worked as a car- penter, niakin- \'\ ii_h^ Litil \uk._s. thus teaching the marks of righteousness. ;ui. I > oiniif ihIihl:' an active life.' Such making of ploughs and .\ uUls is pill iauly the kind of work expected of a country carpenter like one at Nazareth, tliough possibly Justin's words are a rhetorical expansion of .Mk »'. A curious anecdote is recorded by Farrar, to the effect tliat Libanius. a pagan sophist and devoted admirer of Julian the Apostate, :_.j _. . i-,u„:_.:„., ., ,-!,„* jg jjj^. carpcutcr dolug ■ — '*'
Very soon afterwards rangely enough, in relating ! in Li/e of Christ 'car-
nquired of a Christian, The answer was, ' He is maki came the news of Julian's dea this anecdote, Farrar himself quotes penter's son,' but in Life of Lives he has ' carpenter'].
Whichever of the above readings be adopted, however (and in Mk 6^ the TR is supported by all the chief MSS), the probability is that Joseph by this time was dead, and that Jesus as his reputed .son had carried on the business. Nor are we to reckon this as anything derogatory to the Lord. On the contrary, it is another proof of His con- descension, when, though He was rich, yet for our sakes He became poor (2 Co 8"). By His toil at the bench He has dignified and consecrated manual labour. AVe may derive the practical lesson ex- pressed in Faber's hymn, 'Labour is sweet, for
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Tliou hast toiled.' Even more to us than St. Paul the tent-maker is Jesus the carpenter. He was not an Essene, holding Himself aloof from tem- poral affairs, hut a true Son of Blan, taking His part in the business of life. IJefore He preached the good tidings of the kingdom. He preached the gospel of work. The work that His Father had given Him to do was not the exceptional duty of the teacher, but the ordinary industry of the artisan. His first pulpit was the carpenter's bench, and His first sermons were the implements and utensils He made for the country folk of Galilee.
Attempts have been made to find in Christ's parables and other utterances some reference to the trade in which for so many years He was actively engaged. The metaphor of the green wood and the dry {Lk 23^'), and the similitude of the splinter and the beam (Mt 7''°), are the nearest approaches to such reminiscences (cf. also one of the recently discovered ' Sayings of Jesus ' : ' Cleave the wood, and there you will find me '), but are too slight to found on them any inference. Yet may He not have often sighed in the workshop of Nazareth as He handled the nails and the hammer, and thought of the day when the Son of Man must be lifted up? As in Holman Hunt's famous sym- holical picture, the figure of the young carpenter with outstretched arms released from toil as the sun went down, would make tlie awful shadow of the Cross.
may be compared Millais' The Carpenter's Shop (otherwise known as Christ in the House of His Parents). See The Gospels in Art, pp. 110 and 112; Favrar, Christ in Art, p.
27* ff. Arthur Pollok Syji.
CA'?E {tt^!:^, in, (TTDiXatoi/).— Caves, both natural and artificial, abound in Palestine ; the soft chalky soil of Syria readily lends itself to both. Caves were used in Palestine for a variety of purposes ; originally as dwelling places * (cf. the ' Horites' or 'cave-dwellers,' Gn 14" 36=""'-, Dt 2--, see also Gn 19^"). In the flauriln there must have been m.any of these ; sometimes regular underground towns, such as the ancient Edrei, existed : t even at the present day there may be seen in Gilead (Wadi/ Ezrak), a village, named Anab, of Troglodyte dwellers ; in this village there are about a hundred families.^ Caves were used, further, as places of refuge (Jg 6=, 1 S 13'^ 14", 1 K 18^ He IV, Rev 6'=), as hiding-places for robbers (Jer 7", cf. Mt 21'^, Mk 11", Lk ig-""), as stables,§ as cisterns,|| as folds for flocks,1I and, above all, as burying-places (Gn 23iM9-'8Jn IP"); the accounts of the burial caves discovered in the lower strata of the site of ancient Gezer are of the highest interest.**
It is, however, in reference to the place of birth and the place of burial of Christ that the chief interest in caves centres here. Justin Martyr (Dial. c. Try ph. Ixxviii.), in recounting the story of the birth of Christ, says that it took place in a cave (iv a-rrfKaiif tii/i) near the village of Bethlehem. tt That cave - stables, both ancient and modern, are to be found in Palestine, admits of no doubt. Conder tX says that there are ' in- numerable instances of stables cut in rock, resem-