Clement’s Epistle to the Corinthians: perhaps a little more on those in the Ignatian Epistles, although many of these are merely analogies of expression which may have been acci- dental, or echoes of current religious phraseology. An unmistakable reminiscence appears in Polycarp’s Epistle to the Philippians (Philip. iv; 1 Tim. vi. 7, 10). There are no echoes in Hermas or in the Didache, and none of import- ance in Barnabas. Justin Martyr has a few characteristic expressions of the Pastorals, which may be only accidental coincidences. The Muratorian Canon enrols the three as canonical, and expressly justifies their reception because, being private letters, their canonicity might be called in question. They are found in the Peshitto and Old Latin Versions, and are accepted and cited as Pauline by Clement of Alexandria, Irenaeus, and Tertullian. At the end of the second century they have a recognised place among the Pauline Epistles. It is, however, significant, that they were excluded from Marcion’s Canon. It cannot be positively affirmed that Marcion knew them, although his acquaintance with them would seem to be implied by Tertullian (Adv. Mare. v. 21), who says that it was strange how Marcion could have accepted a letter written to one man (Philemon), and have rejected the two to Timothy and the one to Titus.
On the assumption that they were known to Marcion, it is said that he cut and carved the New Testament Scriptures to suit his own views, and that there was therefore nothing strange in his rejecting the Pastorals. But besides rejecting the whole of the New Testament with the exception of ten Epistles of Paul and the Gospel of Luke which he mutilated, Marcion applied the knife to the Pauline Epistles. In view of his reverence for Paul as the only true apostle and rep- resentative of Jesus Christ, and for Paul’s Epistles as con- taining the only true gospel,—it is strange that, knowing the Pastorals as Pauline, he should have rejected them en masse, instead of merely altering or abridging them to suit himself. Tatian also rejected the two letters to Timothy, but accepted Titus, because it contained nothing adverse to ascetic practices. :