[186] Luke 8:3 Matt. 27:55; Mark 15:41; John 13:29. Among the pious women who ministered to Jesus was also Joanna, the wife of Chuzas, King Herod's steward. To her may be traced the vivid circumstantial description of the dancing scene at Herod's feast and the execution of John the Baptist, Mark 6:14-29.
[187] Acts 18:3; 20:33-35; 1 Thess. 2:9; 2 Thess. 3:8; 2 Cor. 11:7-9.
[188] John 18:20. Comp. Matt. 4:23; 9:35; 21:23; 26:55; Mark 1:21, 39; 14:49; Luke 2:46; 4:14-16, 31, 44; 13:10; 21:37.
[189] Acts 13:14-16; 16:13; 17:2, 3.
[190] Luke 2:46; 5:17; Matt. 5:1; 26:55; John 8:2; Acts 22:3 ("at the feet of Gamaliel").
[191] Josephus often speaks of this. C. Ap. I. 12: "More than all we are concerned for the education of our youth (paidotrophia), and we consider the keeping of the laws (to phulattein tous nomous) and the corresponding piety (ten kata toutous paradedomenen eusebeian) to be the most necessary work of life."Comp. II. 18; Ant. IV. 8, 12. To the same effect is the testimony of Philo, Legat. ad Cajum. § 16. 31, quoted by Schürer, p. 467.
[192] 2 Tim, 1:5; 3:15; comp. Eph. 6:4.
[193] Vita, § 2.
[194] Schürer, p. 468; and Ginsburg, art. Education, in Kitto's "Cyc. of Bibl. Liter.," 3d ed.
[195] Acts 6:9 for the freedmen and the Hellenists and proselytes from different countries. Rabbinical writers estimate the number of synagogues in Jerusalem as high as 480 (i.e. 4 x 10 x 12), which seems incredible.
[196] Luke 4:16-22.
[197] Acts 2:8-12.
[198] Comp. the description of King Josiah's Passover, 2 Chr. 35:1-19.
[199] The Rabbinical scholasticism reminds one of the admirable description of logic in Goethe's Faust: "Wer will was Lebendig's erkennen und beschreiben, Sucht erst den Geist hinauszutreiben; Dann hat er die Theile in seiner Hand, Fehlt leider! nur das geistige Band."
[200] Matt. 15:2, 3, 6; Mark 7:3, 5, 8, 9, 13. It is significant that Christ uses the word paradosisalways in a bad sense of such human doctrines and usages as obscure and virtually set aside the sacred Scriptures. Precisely the same charge was applied by the Reformers to the doctrines of the monks and schoolmen of their day.
[201] Matt. 16:21-23; Mark 8:31-33; Luke 9:22, 44, 45; 18:34; 24:21 John 12:34.
[202] See, of older works, Schöttgen, Horae Hebraicae et Talmudicae tom. II. (De Messia), of modern works, Schürer, l.c. pp. 563-599, with the literature there quoted; also James Drummond, The Jewish Messiah,Lond. 1877.
[203] Matt. 18:1-6; comp. Mark 10:13-16; Luke 18:15-17.
[204] Matt. 11:25-30. This passage, which is found only in Matthew and (in part) in Luke 10:21, 22, is equal to any passage in John. It is a genuine echo of this word when Schiller sings: "Was kein Verstand der Verständigen sieht, Das übet in Einfalt ein kindlich Gemüth."
[205] John 1:32-34; comp. 3:34.
[206] Matt. 26:64; John l8:37; Luke23:43.
[207] Luke 9:58; 19:10; Matt. 18:11; 20:17, 28; Mark 2:10, 28; John 1:51; 6:53, and many other passages. The term ho huios tou anthropou occurs about 80 times in the Gospels. On its meaning comp. my book on the Person of Christ, pp. 83 sqq. (ed. of 1880).
[208] Matt 16:20-23; Mark 8:30-33; Luke 9:21-27.
§ 18. Apocryphal Traditions.
We add some notes of minor interest connected with the history of Christ outside of the only authentic record in the Gospel.
I. The Apocryphal Sayings of our Lord.--The canonical Gospels contain all that is necessary for us to know about the words and deeds of our Lord, although many more might have been recorded (John 20:30; 21:25). Their early composition and reception in the church precluded the possibility of a successful rivalry of oral tradition. The extra-biblical sayings of our Lord are mere fragments, few in number, and with one exception rather unimportant, or simply variations of genuine words.
They have been collected by Fabricius, in Codex Apocr. N. T., I pp. 321-335; Grabe: Spicilegium SS. Patrum, ed. alt. I. 12 sqq., 326 sq.; Koerner: De sermonibus Christi agraphois (Lips. 1776); Routh, in Reliq. Sacrae, vol. I. 9-12, etc.; Rud. Hofmann, in Das Leben Jesu nach den Apokryphen (Leipz. 1851, § 75, pp. 317-334); Bunsen, in Anal. ante-Nic. I. 29 sqq.; Anger, in Synops. Evang. (1852); Westcott: Introd. to the Study of the Gospels, Append. C. (pp. 446 sqq. of the Boston ed. by Hackett); Plumptre, in Ellicott's Com. for English Readers, I. p. xxxiii.; J. T. Dodd: Sayings ascribed to our Lord by the Fathers (1874); E. B. Nicholson:The Gospel according to the Hebrews (Lond. 1879, pp. 143-162). Comp. an essay of Ewald in his "Jahrbücher der Bibl. Wissenschaft," VI. 40 and 54 sqq., and Geschichte Christus', p. 288. We avail ourselves chiefly of the collections of Hofmann, Westcott, Plumptre, and Nicholson.
(1) "It is more blessed to give than to receive." Quoted by Paul, Acts 20:35. Comp. Luke 6:30, 31; also Clement of Rome, Ad Cor. c. 2, edion didontes e lambanontes, "more gladly giving than receiving." This is unquestionably authentic, pregnant with rich meaning, and shining out like a lone star all the more brilliantly. It is true in the highest sense of the love of God and Christ. The somewhat similar sentences of Aristotle, Seneca, and Epicurus, as quoted by Plutarch (see the passages in Wetstein on Acts 20:35), savor of aristocratic pride, and are neutralized by the opposite heathen maxim of mean selfishness: "Foolish is the giver, happy the receiver." Shakespeare may have had the sentence in his mind when he put into the mouth of Portia the golden words:
"The quality of mercy is not strained,
It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven
Upon the place beneath: it is twice blessed;
It blesseth him that gives and him that takes;
'Tis mightiest in the mightiest; it becomes
The throned monarch better than his crown."
(2) "And on the same day Jesus saw a man working at his craft on the Sabbath-day, and He said unto him, 'O man, if thou knowest what thou doest, then art thou blessed; but if thou knowest not, then art thou accursed, and art a transgressor of the Law.' " An addition to Luke 6:4, in Codex D. or Bezae (in the University library at Cambridge), which contains several remarkable additions. See Tischendorf's apparatus in ed. VIII. Luc. 6:4, and Scrivener, lntrod. to Criticism of the N. T. p. 8. epikataratosis used John 7:49 (text. rec.) by the Pharisees of the people who know not the law (also Gal. 3:10, 13 in quotations from the O. T.); parabates tou nomouby Paul (Rom. 2:25, 27; Gal. 2:18) and James (2:9, 11). Plumptre regards the narrative as authentic, and remarks that "it brings out with a marvellous force the distinction between the conscious transgression of a law recognized as still binding, and the assertion of a higher law as superseding the lower. Comp. also the remarks of Hofmann, l.c. p. 318.
(3) "But ye seek (or, in the imperative, seek ye, zeteite) to increase from little, and (not) from greater to be less." An addition in Codex D. to Matt 20:28. See Tischendorf. Comp. Luke 14:11; John 5:44. Westcott regards this as a genuine fragment. Nicholson inserts "not," with the Curetonian Syriac, D; all other authorities omit it. Juvencus has incorporated the passage in his poetic Hist. Evang. III. 613 sqq., quoted by Hofmann, p. 319.
(4) "Be ye trustworthy money-changers, or, proved bankers (trapezitai dokimoi); i.e. expert in distinguishing the genuine coin from the counterfeit. Quoted by Clement of Alexandria (several times), Origen (in Joann, xix.), Eusebius, Epiphanius, Cyril of Alexandria, and many others. Comp. 1 Thess. 5:21: "Prove all things, hold fast the good," and the parable of the talents, Matt. 25:27. Delitzsch, who with many others regards this maxim as genuine, gives it the meaning: Exchange the less valuable for the more valuable, esteem sacred coin higher than common coin, and highest of all the one precious pearl of the gospel.(Ein Tag in Capernaum, p. 136.) Renan likewise adopts it as historical, but explains it in an Ebionite and monastic sense as an advice of voluntary poverty. "Be ye good bankers (soyez de bons banquiers), that is to say: Make good investments for the kingdom of God, by giving your goods to the poor, according to the ancient proverb (Prov. 19:17): 'He that hath pity upon the poor, lendeth to the Lord' " (Vie de Jésus, ch. XI. p. 180, 5th Par. ed.).
[(5) "The Son of God says,(?) 'Let us resist all iniquity, and hold it in abhorrence.' " From the Epistle of Barnabas, c. 4. This Epistle, though incorporated in the Codex Sinaiticus, is probably not a work of the apostolic Barnabas. Westcott and Plumptre quote the passage from the Latin version, which introduces the sentence with the words: sicut dicit Filius Dei. But this seems to be a mistake for sicut decet filios Dei, "as becometh the sons of God." This is evident from the Greek original (brought to light by the discovery of the Codex Sinaiticus), which reads, hos prepei huiois theou and connects the words with the preceding sentence. See the edition of Barnabae Epistula by Gebhardt and Harnack in Patr. Apost. Op. I. 14. For the sense comp. 2 Tim. 2:19: apostato apo adikiasJames 4:7: anistete to diabolo, Ps. 119:163: adikian emisesa.]
(6) "They who wish to see me, and to lay hold on my kingdom, must receive me with affliction and suffering." From the Epistle of Barnabas, c. 7, where the words are introduced by "Thus he [Jesus] saith," phesin But it is doubtful whether they are meant as a quotation or rather as a conclusion of the former remarks and a general reminiscence of several passages. Comp. Matt. 16:24; 20:3; Acts 14:22: "We must through much tribulation enter into the kingdom of God."
(7) "He that wonders [ho thaumasaswith the wonder of reverential faith] shall reign, and he that reigns shall be made to rest." From the "Gospel of the Hebrews," quoted by Clement of Alexandria (Strom. II. 9, § 45). The Alexandrian divine quotes this and the following sentence to show, as Plumptre finely says, "that in the teaching of Christ, as in that of Plato, wonder is at once the beginning and the end of knowledge."
(8) "Look with wonder at the things that are before thee (thaumason ta paronta)." From Clement of Alexandria (Strom. II. 9, § 45.).
(9) "I came to abolish sacrifices, and unless ye cease from sacrificing, the wrath [of God] will not cease from you." From the Gospel of the Ebionites (or rather Essaean Judaizers), quoted by Epiphanius (Haer. xxx. 16). Comp. Matt. 9:13, "I will have mercy and not sacrifice."
(10) "Ask great things, and the small shall be added to you: ask heavenly and there shall be added unto you earthly things." Quoted by Clement of Alexandria (Strom. I. 24, § 154; comp. IV. 6, § 34) and Origen (de Oratione, c. 2), with slight differences. Comp. Matt. 6:33, of which it is probably a free quotation from memory. Ambrose also quotes the sentence (Ep. xxxvi. 3): "Denique scriptum est: 'Petite magna, et parva adjicientur vobis. Petite coelestia, et terrena adjicientur.'"
(11) "In the things wherein I find you, in them will I judge you." Quoted by Justin Martyr (Dial. c. Tryph. c. 47), and Clement of Alexandria (Quis dives, § 40). Somewhat different Nilus: "Such as I find thee, I will judge thee, saith the Lord." The parallel passages in Ezekiel 7:3, 8; 18:30; 24:14; 33:20 are not sufficient to account for this sentence. It is probably taken from an apocryphal Gospel. See Hofmann, p. 323.
(12) "He who is nigh unto me is nigh unto the fire: he who is far from me is far from the kingdom. From Origen (Comm. in Jer. III. p. 778), and Didymus of Alexandria (in Ps. 88:8). Comp, Luke 12:49. Ignatius (Ad Smyrn. c. 4) has a similar saying, but not as a quotation, "To be near the sword is to be near God" (engus machairas engus theou).