This interpretation, however, is refuted by the facts recorded. It is, as J. Weiss calls it, ' a scientilic legend.' The oldest tradition expressly mentions that on the very night of the flight Peter was found in the high priest's palace (Mk 14'* ; cf. Mt 26^5-8) and there thrice denied his Lord. The message .sent to the disciples through the women on Easter Day, according to the earliest Evan- gelist, was this, ' He goeth before you into Galilee,' implying, as Loofs points out (p. 19), that the dis- ciples were still waiting in Jerusalem. And so John, who predicts the 'scattering' (16^^), yet gives detailed accounts of the meetings in Jeru- salem. If Mt 28"''° is accepted as genuine, the fact that the Evangelist records the appearance to the women in Jerusalem, in which the previous direction of the angels to the disciples to go into Galilee is received from Jesus' own lips, shows that the appointed meeting in Galilee was not held to exclude earlier appearances.
Further (see Chase, Gospels, p. 45), to argue that the silence of Matthew (probably following his source Mark) as to any appearance to the apostles in Jerusalem, means ignorance of the fact, and that, therefore, the appearances in or near Jerusalem are to be looked upon as a later addition to the earliest form of the Resurrection-story, which spoke only of Galilee, proves too much. Even as regards Galilee, Matthew mentions only one appearance to the apostles. Are we, therefore, to conclude that he and his ' source ' were unaware of any otlier apjjear- ance? We know from St. Paul that a list of a]ipearances was handed down in the Apostolic Church from the earliest times, and that this formed part of the catechetical instruction given in the churches. The facts about the appearances, therefore, would be familiar to his readers, and just here may be found the sufficient explanation of their silence. The Evangelists felt at liberty to make a selection of the facts, each from his own point of view.
If the theory which would confine all the appear- ances to Galilee is thus unsuccessful in account- ing for the facts, is I,oofs any more successful in transferring all the appearances to Jerusalem, as he does in arguing in favour of the tradition repre- sented by Luke and John ? To carry out his theory, Loofs is obliged to separate Jn 21 from the rest of the Gospel, treating it as having little or
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no connexion with it, and limling in it a combina- tion of two incitlents, one of wliirli (the lishing scene of vv.''") has been niisphiceit (Lk 5''"), while the other (the dialogue of vv."''^) was originally unconnected with (ialilee. On this Sanday says : ' These are strong measures, w hieh, however high our estimate of tlie tradition, Lk-Jn, are obvi- ously not open to one w ho thinks that the identity of style between Jn 21 and the rest of the Gospel is too great to permit of their separation' (HUB ii. 640'').
The attempt to treat the narratives as alter- natives and to conline the apjiearances either to Galilee or to Jerusalem being thus unsatisfactory, we seem compelled to combine the traditions much as they are combined in the Fourth Gospel (with App. ) "and in the App. to Mark, and to recognize appearances both in Jerusalem and in Galilee. If Mt 28""'" is to be treated as a later addition, tlie purpose of the insertion apparently, as llohrbach suggests, was to cancel the impression otherwise produced that Jesus was seen only in Galilee. This is supported by St. Paul's list of appearances in 1 Co 15, which, though it makes no mention of place, ' suggests Galilee for the scene of the ap- pearance to the 500 hardly less clearly than it suggests Jerusalem for the appearance to Peter and the Eleven.'
We cannot, indeed, fit the narratives into each other so as to leave no difficulties or contradictions unsolved. As regards the details of the ilifi'erent traditions it would seem that from the lirst there was a certain amount of confusion which was never wholly cleared up. But these difficulties with regard to details are discoiinted as serious objections when we remember — a fundamental consideration in this connexion — the aim of the Evangelists in the Gospels. ' The narratives con- stitute not primarily a liistory, but a Gospel of the Resurrection' (Westcott). They were written not to create belief in tlie resurrection of Jesus in the minds of men to whom the fact was unfamiliar, but to inform more fully those who had already received the general tradition of the Church, and to show the significance of the fact, both for Him and for them. ' Believing in the resurrection themselves, and writing for those who believed in it, they [the writers] aimed at giving such an account of it as should bring out its permanent significance for the Church ' (Denney, Jesus and the Gospel, p. 153). With this in view each writer selects the facts which he considers most appro- priate to his object. He is so far indiflerent to their connexion with other facts which he is not concerned to relate. He may pass over a great part of the evidence, or he may mass it together in a generalized statement ; and, while he will not consciously depart from historical truthfulness, he will yet so handle his materials that, in order to estimate them aright, we must keep distinctly before us his special aim.