* EG (see below) was also a Greek composition, but, unlike HG and like NG, it was allied to Matthew, though not so closeli' as NG.
t Bede, in the beginning of the 8th cent., made the fact of Jerome having quoted and translated the Hebrew Go.spel the reason for holding that the latter was to be ranked ' not among apocrj^jhal but among ecclesiastical histories' {in Luc. i. 1).
J The loose usage of koB' 'EPpaCov? as a Gospel title was seen by several earlier writers besides those already mentioned (p. 490). Hollzmann, e.g. (Einleitung in dasSeue Testament^, 1892, p. 487 f.), suggested that it was applied to a whole series of more or less cognate Greek and Aramaic compositions. Lipsius preferred to regard HG as assuming different shapes in different circles and at different times. This is almost inevit- able, when HG and TG are identified.
492 GOSPELS (UI^CANOI^ICAL)
GOSPELS (UNGANONICAL)
to be the true * Hebrews,' and who saw in Christi- anity the completed form of Hebrew religion, could well, as Waitz observes, call their Gospel a • Gospel according to the Hebrews,' even although it was written in Greek. There were varieties of such Jewish Christians, from the orthodox ' Naza- rsei' to the extreme wing of the Ebionite Chris- tians, and there is no reason to doubt that more than one Gospel was composed and circulated by them. If one of these was an Aramaic version of Matthew, it would be particularly easy for later writers to use Ka^"E/3/)aioi;s loosely as a linguistic title, and thus to imagine that HG meant either a Hebrew Gospel or the supposed original of Matthew. One of the obstacles in dealing with the entire pro- blem of the Jewish Christian Gospels is due to the fact that some early Christian writers and fathers often mention books which they seem never to have seen, and that their references to the Gospel books of the Jewish Christians are too loose and vague to be taken at their face-value. This applies particularly to Epiphanius and Jerome. When the latter, for example (de Vir. illustr. 2), introduces the quotation about the Lord's post- Resurrection appearance to His brother James, by declaring that it occurred in 'the Gospel called "according to the Hebrews," which I recently translated into Greek and Latin, and which Origen often uses,' he is surely confusing HG and NG. He is anxious to prove the importance of NG ; that is why he says it was often cited by Origen.* But what Origen cited was HG. There is an error of memory here, at any rate. So with Epiphanius. He explains [Hcer. xxix. 7, 9) that the Nazoraeans — Jewish Christians who practised Jewish habits of life, and who had their headquarters at Syrian Beroea — possessed and used the Gospel of Matthew in Hebrew ; he declares that their edition was unniutilated {ir\ir]pi(TTa.Tov), but does not know if it contained the genealogy itrom Abraham to Christ. This is to distinguish the Nazoraeans from sectarian Christians like the Cerinthians, who {Hcer. xxviii. 5, XXX. 14) used a mutilated Matthew, leaving out passages like P'^^ 10-^ and 26^^. Obviously, his remarks are contradictoiy. If he knew that the Gospel used by these Nazoreeans was unmutilated, he must have known whether it contained Mt P'" or not. He is speaking about this NG either from hearsay or from a hasty perusal of Irenaius, and, with a carelessness which is characteristic of him, at several points confuses it with EG.
The rival theories thus are : (i. ) HG and NG either identical or ditt'erent editions of the same work; (ii.) HG and NG different works entirely. The latter seems preferable, but in any case it is essential to have the extant data before us.
(a) In the first place (cf. Schmidtke, pp. 1-31, 63 f.), we possess a number of marginal scholia on Matthew from a group of minuscule MSS which, partly on the basis of von Soden's researches and discoveries, Schmidtke regards as witnessing to a special type of text or a special edition of the Gospels dating not later than A.D. 500. These scholia are held to be exegetical notes, probably drawn from the Commentary on Matthew which Apollinaris of Laodicea wrote, prior to Jerome. They profess to quote the reatlings of ri> 'lov5al'K6;> (sc. evayyiXiov Kara Mardalov). Perhaps the discredit into which the supposed Aramaic (original) Matthew was falling, on account of its use by heretical sects, led to the pious preservation of these brief extracts on the margin of Church copies. There is a good deal of speculation in the eye of this hypothesis. The scholia, however, are unmis- takable.
* According to Schmidtke (p. 134 f.), Jerome betrays here the fact that he copied thia etory from Origen ; but tiiis is not a necessary inference (cf. p. 490 n.).
In Mt 46 the ' Je\yish ' Gospel read ev 'lepovo-oA^fi for eU ■nji' ayiav noKiv, in 6^2 it omitted etK-rj and in O'-* the doxology to the Lord's prayer ; at 76 it read : * ' If you are in my bosom and do not the will of mj- Father who is in heaven, I will cast you out of my bosom'; in IQiSit read imkp octets for is oi o<^eis, in 1112 SiapTraferai for ^laferai, in 1126 eiiyaptcrTu) for ef o/ioAoyoOftat ; in 12'W it omitted the second ' three days and three nights ' ; in 156 it read Kop^av 8 ii^^ecs ux^eArjS^o-eo-Se ef riixiav ; it omitted 162b-3 and read ' son of John ' for Bar-Jonah in 161' ; in 18'-2 after ' seventy times seven ' it read : xai yap crToij Trpoi^^rais tiera rh XpL(r6rivai avToiis iv irveujiiaTi ayioi evpicrKero (v avToli Adyos a/mapria; ; in 2&'^ it read : koI r^pvricraTO (cal w/xocrev (cai KarippacraTO ; and in 27^ it had : xal irapt&aKev avrois ai/6pas ivdirkov^ iva KoSeZiiVTOu, Kar ivavrCov toO <Tmi)Ka.iOV xal rqpixTiv auTOv ^fxepat