6. And from the ideas, and the expressions, and the collocation of the same, it may be very reasonably conjectured that this one is distinct from that. [635] For the Gospel and the Epistle agree with each other, and both commence in the same way. For the one opens thus, "In the beginning was the Word;" while the other opens thus, "That which was from the beginning." The one says: "And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us; and we beheld His glory, the glory as of the Only-begotten of the Father." [636] The other says the same things, with a slight alteration: "That which we have heard, which we have seen with our eyes, which we have looked upon, and our hands have handled, of the Word of life: and the life was manifested." [637] For these things are introduced by way of prelude, and in opposition, as he has shown in the subsequent parts, to those who deny that the Lord is come in the flesh. For which reason he has also been careful to add these words: "And that which we have seen we testify, and show unto you that eternal life which was with the Father, and was manifested unto us: that which we have seen and heard declare we unto you." [638] Thus he keeps to himself, and does not diverge inconsistently from his subjects, but goes through them all under the same heads and in the same phraseologies, some of which we shall briefly mention. Thus the attentive reader will find the phrases, "the life," "the light," occurring often in both; and also such expressions as fleeing from darkness, holding the truth, grace, joy, the flesh and the blood of the Lord, the judgment, the remission of sins, the love of God toward us, the commandment of love on our side toward each other; as also, that we ought to keep all the commandments, the conviction of the world, of the devil, of Antichrist, the promise of the Holy Spirit, the adoption of God, the faith required of us in all things, the Father and the Son, named as such everywhere. And altogether, through their whole course, it will be evident that the Gospel and the Epistle are distinguished by one and the same character of writing. But the Revelation is totally different, and altogether distinct from this; and I might almost say that it does not even come near it, or border upon it. Neither does it contain a syllable in common with these other books. Nay more, the Epistle--for I say nothing of the Gospel--does not make any mention or evince any notion of the Revelation and the Revelation, in like manner, gives no note of the Epistle. Whereas Paul gives some indication of his revelations in his epistles; which revelations, however, he has not recorded in writing by themselves.
7. And furthermore, on the ground of difference in diction, it is possible to prove a distinction between the Gospel and the Epistle on the one hand, and the Revelation on the other. For the former are written not only without actual error as regards the Greek language, but also with the greatest elegance, both in their expressions and in their reasonings, and in the whole structure of their style. They are very far indeed from betraying any barbarism or solecism, or any sort of vulgarism, in their diction. For, as might be presumed, the writer possessed the gift of both kinds of discourse, [639] the Lord having bestowed both these capacities upon him, viz., that of knowledge and that of expression. That the author of the latter, however, saw a revelation, and received knowledge and prophecy, I do not deny. Only I perceive that his dialect and language are not of the exact Greek type, and that he employs barbarous idioms, and in some places also solecisms. These, however, we are under no necessity of seeking out at present. And I would not have any one suppose that I have said these things in the spirit of ridicule; for I have done so only with the purpose of setting right this matter of the dissimilarity subsisting between these writings. [640]
[612] In opposition to Noëtus, a bishop in Egypt. Eusebius, Hist. Eccl., vii. 24 and 25. Eusebius introduces this extract in the following terms: "There are also two books of his on the subject of the promises. The occasion of writing these was furnished by a certain Nepos, a bishop in Egypt, who taught that the promises which were given to holy men in the sacred Scriptures were to be understood according to the Jewish sense of the same; and affirmed that there would be some kind of a millennial period, plenished with corporeal delights, upon this earth. And as he thought that he could establish this opinion of his by the Revelation of John, he had composed a book on this question, entitled Refutation of the Allegorists. This, therefore, is sharply attacked by Dionysius in his books on the Promises. And in the first of these books he states his own opinion on the subject; while in the second he gives us a discussion on the Revelation of John, in the introduction to which he makes mention of Nepos." [Of this Noëtus, see the Philosophumena, vol. v., this series.]
[613] As it is clear from this passage that this work by Dionysius was written against Nepos, it is strange that, in his preface to the eighteenth book of his Commentaries on Isaiah, Jerome should affirm it to have been composed against Irenæus of Lyons. Irenæus was certainly of the number of those who held millennial views, and who had been persuaded to embrace such by Papias, as Jerome himself tells us in the Catalogus and as Eusebius explains towards the close of the third book of his History. But that this book by Dionysus was written not against Irenæus but against Nepos, is evident, not only from this passage in Eusebius, but also from Jerome himself, in his work On Ecclesiastical Writers, where he speaks of Dionysius.--Vales. [Compare (this series, infra) the comments of Victorinus of Petau for a Western view of the millennial subject.]
[614] tes polles psalmodias. Christophorsonus interprets this of psalms and hymns composed by Nepos. It was certainly the practice among the ancient Christians to compose psalms and hymns in honour of Christ. Eusebius bears witness to this in the end of the fifth book of his History. Mention is made of these psalms in the Epistle of the Council of Antioch against Paul of Samosata, and in the penultimate canon of the Council of Laodicea, where there is a clear prohibition of the use of psalmoi idiotikoi in the church, i.e., of psalms composed by private individuals. For this custom had obtained great prevalence, so that many persons composed psalms in honour of Christ, and got them sung in the church. It is psalms of this kind, consequently, that the Fathers of the Council of Laodicea forbid to be sung thereafter in the church, designating them idiotikoi, i.e., composed by unskilled men, and not dictated by the Holy Spirit. Thus is the matter explained by Agobardus in his book De ritu canendi psalmos in Ecclesia.--Vales. [See vol. v., quotation from Pliny.]
[615] taute mallon he proanepausato: it may mean, perhaps, for the way in which he has gone to his rest before us.
[616] katepangellomenon, i.e., diu ante promittunt quam tradunt. The metaphor is taken from the mysteries of the Greeks, who were wont to promise great and marvellous discoveries to the initiated, and then kept them on the rack by daily expectation, in order to confirm their judgment and reverence by such suspense in the conveyance of knowledge, as Tertullian says in his book Against the Valentinians.--Vales. [Vol. iii. p. 503.]
[617] Reading elpizein anapeithonton for elpizomena peithonton, with the Codex Mazarin.
[618] en men oun to 'Arsenoeite. In the three codices here, as well as in Nicephorus and Ptolemy, we find this scription, although it is evident that the word should be written 'Arsinoeite , as the district took its name from Queen Arsinoe.--Vales.
[619] hei kai phainointo. There is another reading, hei kai me phainointo, although they might not appear to be correct. Christophorsonus renders it: ne illis quæ fuerant ante ab ipsis decreta, si quidquam in eis veritati repugnare videretur, mordicus adhærerent præcavebant.
[620] heplomenais tais kardiais. Christophorsonus renders it, puris erga Deum ac simplicibis animis; Musculus gives, cordibus ad Deum expansis; and Rufinus, patefactis cordibus. [The picture here given of a primitive synod searching the Scriptures under such a presidency, and exhibiting such tokens of brotherly love, mutual subordination (1 Pet. v. 5), and a prevailing love of the truth, is to me one of the most fascinating of patristic sketches. One cannot but reflect upon the contrast presented in every respect by the late Council of the Vatican.]
[621] This passage is given substantially by Eusebius also in book iii. c. 28.
[622] The text gives oneiropolein, for which for which oneiropolei or oneiropolei is to be read.
[623] di' hon euphemoteron tauta oethe porieisthai. The old reading was euthumoteron ; but the present reading is given in the mss., Cod. Maz., and Med., as also in Eusebius, iii. 28, and in Nicephorus, iii. 14. So Rufinus renders it: et ut aliquid sacratius dicere videretur, legales aiebat festivitates rursum celebrandas. [These gross views of millennial perfection entailed upon subsequent ages a reactionary neglect of the study of the Second Advent. A Papal aphorism, preserved by Roscoe, embodies all this: "Sub umbilico nulla religio." It was fully exemplified, even under Leo X.]
[624] [The humility which moderates and subdues our author's pride of intellect in this passage is, to me, most instructive as to the limits prescribed to argument in what Coleridge calls "the faith of reason."]
[625] Rev. xxii. 7, 8.
[626] diexagoges legomenes. Musculus renders it tractatum libri; Christophorsonus gives discursum; and Valesius takes it as equivalent to oikonomian, as diexagagein is the same as dioikein.
[627] Rev. i. 1, 2.
[628] 1 John i. 1.
[629] Matt. xvi. 17.
[630] Rev. i. 9.
[631] Rev. xxii. 7, 8.
[632] It is worth while to note this passage of Dionysius on the ancient practice of the Christians, in giving their children the names of Peter and Paul, which they did both in order to express the honour and affection in which they held these saints, and to secure that their children might be dear and acceptable to God, just as those saints were. Hence it is that Chrysostom in his first volume, in his oration on St. Meletius, says that the people of Antioch had such love and esteem for Meletius, that the parents called their children by his name, in order that they might have their homes adorned by his presence. And the same Chrysostom, in his twenty-first homily on Genesis, exhorts his hearers not to call their children carelessly by the names of their grandfathers, or great-grandfathers, or men of fame; but rather by the names of saintly men, who have been shining patterns of virtue, in order that the children might be fired with the desire of virtue by their example.--Vales. [A chapter in the history of civilization might here be given on the origin of Christian names and on the motives which should influence Christians in the bestowal of names. The subject is treated, after Plato, by De Maistre.]
[633] Acts xiii. 5.
[634] Acts xiii. 13.
[635] This is the second argument by which Dionysius reasoned that the Revelation and the Gospel of John are not by one author. For the first argument he used in proof of this is drawn from the character and usage of the two writers; and this argument Dionysius has prosecuted up to this point. Now, however, he adduces a second argument, drawn from the words and ideas of the two writers, and from the collocation of the expressions. For, with Cicero, I thus interpret the word suntaxin. See the very elegant book of Dionysius Hal. entitled Peri suntaxeos onomaton--On the Collocation of Names; although in this passage suntaxis appears to comprehend the disposition of sentences as well as words. Further, from this passage we can see what experience Dionysius had in criticism; for it is the critic's part to examine the writings of the ancients, and distinguish what is genuine and authentic from what is spurious and counterfeit.--Vales.
[636] John i. 14.
[637] 1 John i. 1, 2.
[638] 1 John i. 2, 3.
[639] The old reading was, ton logon, ten gnosin. Valesius expunges the ten gnosin, as disturbing the sense, and as absent in various codices. Instead also of the reading, ton te tes sophias, ton te tes gnoseos, the same editor adopts ton te tes gnoseos, ton te tes phraseos, which is the reading of various manuscripts, and is accepted in the translation. Valesius understands that by the hekateron logon Dionysus means the logos endiathetos and the logos prophorikos, that is, the subjective discourse, or reason in the mind, and the objective discourse, or utterance of the same.
[640] [The jealousy with which, while the canon of New Testament Scripture was forming, every claim was sifted, is well illustrated in this remarkable essay. Observe its critical skill and the fidelity with which he exposes the objections based on the style and classicality of the Evangelist. The Alexandrian school was one of bold and original investigation, always subject in spirit, however, to the great canon of Prescription.]