Gospels (Apocryphal)

Gospels (Apocryphal)

GOSPELS (APOCRYPHAL)

i. Title.In the sense in which the term is popularly understood, apocryphal is synonymous with spurious or false; when, however, it is applied as a title to writings of the early Christian centuries, it bears the significance of extra-canonical. By Apocryphal Gospels are, accordingly, meant all writings claiming to be Gospels which are not included in the Canon of the NT, without any implication that their contents are necessarily false or of questionable origin. (See, further, for the meaning of the term, art. Apocrypha in Hasting’s Dictionary of the Bible i. 112 ff.; also Hennecke, NT Apokr. 3* ff., Handb. vii ff.; and Zahn. Gesch. d. NT Kan. i. 127 ff.).

ii. Origin.For a generation after the death of Jesus, His teaching and the facts about His life were preserved by oral tradition in the circle of believers. With the rise of a second generation, however, the need was felt for reducing the oral reminiscences to written form. The reason for this was twofold. For one thing, the number of those who could give personal testimony of what Jesus did and said was rapidly becoming smaller; and for another, the Christian faith was spreading far beyond the limits of its original home in Palestine. Both these facts made it imperative that, if trustworthy accounts of the teaching and life of Jesus were to be preserved for the guidance of the scattered communities of Christians, the tradition should be committed to something more permanent and less liable to disturbing influences than oral reminiscence. The impulse of this necessity gave rise to our written Gospels, and to many other Evangelic records which have disappeared. Of the many attempts to write the story of Jesus, to which St. Luke in his prologue refers, none (with the exception of Mt. and Mk.) can be said with any certainty to have survived;* [Note: The probability is that most of them disappeared early, being unable to maintain their position alongside of the Gospels which are now in the Canon.] although it is possible that the Gospel Fragment of Faym may be the wreckage of one of them. In any case, some of the earlier non-canonical Gospels, which are extant in more or less fragmentary condition, are probably the products of the general desire, that was everywhere felt, to have a more certain knowledge of Jesus and His teaching than was possible from the oral instruction of wandering evangelists. The Gospel according to the Hebrews, which is but little later than the Synoptics, belongs almost certainly to this class; and the same may be true also of the Gospel according to the Egyptians.

The majority of extra-canonical Gospels are due, however, to other causes. Written at a time when the present Four Gospels were gaining, or had already gained, a place of exceptional authority, [Note: The authoritative position of the canonical Gospels, which was beginning to be recognized before the middle of the 2nd century, was assured by the end of the century.] they came into existence in answer to two desires, urgently felt in certain circles of Christians. (1) The first was the desire, popularly entertained, for fuller information about the life of Christ than that given by the four Gospels. This intelligible and not unnatural curiosity was directed chiefly to the facts antecedent to Christs advent, and to those periods of His life which the older Gospels left in shadowHis parentage, His birth and childhood, and the period after the Resurrection. It is noteworthy that the writers who endeavoured to satisfy this desire for fuller knowledge made no attempt to fill up the silent years between Christs childhood and His entrance on His public ministry, the reason in part probably being that it seemed too daring for them to illumine a darkness, for which there was not the slightest historical suggestion in the New Testament (Hofmann, PRE [Note: RE Real-Encyklopdie fur protest. Theologic und Kirche.] 3 [Note: designates the particular edition of the work referred] i. 655). With greater probability, however, it may be said that the reason was, not so much any self-restraint through loyalty to the data of history, as the absence of any clear dogmatic motive; and dogmatic motives, as will appear, were almost invariably associated with the desire to satisfy curiosity. It may be safely assumed that, had any doctrinal interest called for the history of the silent years, no scruples about historical truthfulness would have prevented writers from enlivening them with the products of their fancy. In the main it is certain that the details furnished by the apocryphal writings regarding matters about which the canonical Gospels are silent, have little or no historical basis. They are in reality Christian haggadoth, popular stories similar to those in Jewish literature which were framed for purposes of pious entertainment and instruction. The Gospels of the Infancy and Childhood, for example, are full of legendary matter drawn from various sources, or freely invented by the fancy of the writers. Where the details are not entirely imaginative, they have their origin in the transformation of utterances of Christ into deeds, or in the literal interpretation of OT prophecies and Jewish expectations about the Messiah, or in the ascription to Jesus of miracles similar to those recorded in the OT (Hofmann, PRE [Note: RE Real-Encyklopdie fur protest. Theologic und Kirche.] 3 [Note: designates the particular edition of the work referred] i. 655).

As an example of the way in which the Christian haggadist worked, it may suffice to mention his treatment of OT texts. Psa 148:7 reads: Praise the Lord from the earth, ye dragons; accordingly, in pseudo-Matthew dragons are represented as coming out of a cave and worshipping the child Christ. The picture of Paradise regained in Isa 11:6 ff. suggested the legend that all kinds of wild beasts accompanied the Holy Family on the way to Egypt (Cowper, Apocr. [Note: Apocrypha, Apocryphal.] Gosp. lix f.).

But although the Apocryphal Gospels abound in legendary accretions of this kind, the mistake should not be made of assuming that there is no authentic material in the additions to the narratives in the four Gospels. Oral tradition maintained itself for a time after our present Gospels were reduced to writing, and it is not improbable that genuine sayings of Christ and authentic details about His life have been preserved in uncanonical books. On this point see further in iii.

(2) A much more powerful motive than the desire to satisfy curiosity, leading to the production of Gospel writings, was the dogmatic interest, the desire to find support for beliefs which were held in various sections of the Church. This was especially marked in Gnostic circles, where numerous Evangelic writings (running into thousands, Epiphanius says [Haer. 26]) were produced, claiming the authority of a secret tradition for their peculiar doctrines.

Even in the earlier Apocryphal Gospels, which are of the Synoptic type, it is clear that theological prepossessions played a considerable part, as indeed they did to some extent in the canonical Gospels. Thus, in the Gospel according to the Hebrews the conception of Christ has an Ebionitic tinge, and in the Gospel of Peter there are expressions which betray Docetic sympathies on the part of the writer. The dogmatic motive is prominent as well in those writings which fill up with fictitious details the empty spaces of the Gospel narrative, and thus have generally been regarded as due to the desire to gratify the irrepressible longing for fuller knowledge. It is doubtful if this latter motive, although it was certainly operative, would have led to the invention of such a mass of fictitious matter, had it not been powerfully stimulated by dogmatic considerations. In the Protevangelium of James the legendary history of Marys antecedents and of the circumstances of Christs birth was due not merely to any horror vacui, but to the imperative dogmatic necessity, as the writer conceived it, of safeguarding in this way alike the true Divinity and the true humanity of Jesus Christ. Similarly, the Childhood Gospel of Thomas, with its repulsive stories of the child Christs miraculous power and knowledge, would never have found acceptance in Christian circles had it not been for the witness which the miracles were supposed to bear to Christs supernatural origin.

iii. Relation to Canonical Gospels.The fragmentary condition and the uncertain text of many of the Apocryphal Gospels render a confident judgment as to their relation to the canonical Gospels exceedingly difficult. Where the question of affinity is raised, the problem to be solved is whether the uncanonical Gospels are dependent on the canonical, or draw from a common oral source. The latter possibility is one not to be dismissed without careful consideration; but, on the whole, the evidence points in almost every case to the use of some or all of the four Gospels by the authors of the apocryphal writings. Only in the case of one Gospel, the Gospel according to the Hebrews, is there a strong consensus of opinion in favour of independence (see, however, vii. A. 1). Where there is an appearance of independence, this is frequently to be accounted for by a free manipulation and embellishment of old material, to bring it into line with the writers peculiar point of view, or to suit it to the character of his surroundings.

While a large degree of dependence on the canonical Gospels must in general be maintained in regard to the Apocryphal Gospels, this must not be pressed so far as to exclude the possibility of their embodying details drawn from reliable oral sources. The fact must steadily be borne in mind that the stream of living oral tradition continued to flow for several generations, though in ever decreasing volume, alongside of the written Gospels;* [Note: Traces of the influence of oral tradition on the canonical Gospels, after they were reduced to writing, are to be found in the well-known additions to John (8:111) and Mark (16:9, 20).] accordingly, where the uncanonical Gospels deviate from the canonical record, either by slight interpolations into common matter or by additions peculiarly their own, the possibility is always open that in these additions we have early and reliable traditions, either unknown to the four Evangelists or passed over by them as unsuitable for their purpose.

Two important considerations must, however, be kept in mind in estimating the trustworthiness of all such additions. In the first place, the authoritative position which the canonical Gospels early reached as authentic sources of the life and teaching of Jesus entitles them to be used as a touchstone of the probable authenticity of the additional matter contained in the Apocryphal Gospels. No saying of Christ or detail about His life has any title to be regarded as genuine if it does not fit into the conception which the four Evangelists have given us of the teaching and personality of Jesus. Secondly, when we keep in view the undoubted fact that fictitious writings were common in which the life and teaching of Christ were freely handled in the interest of heretical sects, it is clear that extreme caution must be observed in receiving as authentic any addition to the canonical record. If it would be less than just to say that all the Apocryphal Gospels stand in the position of suspect witnesses, with a presumption of unreliability against them in respect of their peculiar matter, it is nevertheless true that their exclusion from the Canon, as well as the notoriously tainted origin of some of them, render it imperative that their claim to embody a genuine tradition must be carefully sifted, and allowed only after the clearest proof.

iv. Value.The question of greatest moment which arises in estimating the value of the Apocryphal Gospels naturally has reference to their worth as additional sources for the life and teaching of Jesus. From what has been already said about their origin and their relation to the canonical Gospels, their value in this respect will appear to be extremely slight. A comparison of the Apocryphal Gospels with those in the Canon makes the pre-eminence of the latter incontestably clear, and shows that as sources of Christs life the former, for all practical purposes, may be neglected. The simple beauty and verisimilitude of the picture of Jesus in the four Gospels stand out in strong relief when viewed in the light of the artificial and legendary stories which characterize most of the Apocryphal Gospels. The proverbial simplicity of truth receives a striking commentary when (for example) the miracles of the Canonical Gospels are compared with those of the Apocryphal writings. The former, for the most part, are instinct with ethical purpose and significance, and are felt to be the natural and unforced expression of the sublime personality of Jesus; the latter are largely theatrical exhibitions without ethical content. In them we find no worthy conception of the laws of providential interference; they are wrought to supply personal wants, or to gratify private feelings, and often are positively immoral (Westcott). In a few of the Gospels which show signs of independence, there may be here and there a trace of primitive and trustworthy tradition; but all such details, which have a reasonable claim to be considered authentic, do not sensibly increase the sum of our knowledge about Christ. The conclusion, based on the comparison of the Apocryphal with the Canonical Gospels, is amply warranted, that in rejecting the former and choosing the latter as authoritative Scriptures the Church showed a true feeling for what was original and authentic.

Though the Apocryphal Gospels afford us little additional knowledge about Christ, they are invaluable as enabling us to realize more clearly the conditions under which the four Gospels were received in the Church, until they were finally established as authoritative in the Gospel Canon. The existence of so many Evangelic writings shows that for some time after the Canonical Gospels appeared, they had no position of commanding influence. The high place which oral traditionthe living and abiding voicestill retained in the estimation of the Church (cf. Euseb. Historia Ecclesiastica iii. 39. 4) militated against the acceptance of any written Gospel as authoritative beyond the communities in which it was current. In the early part of the 2nd cent. we have, accordingly, to think of the four Gospels as having merely a local and circumscribed authority, while in different sections of the Church the production of Evangelic literature still proceeded, in which the tradition was handled more or less freely to suit the dominant conceptions and needs. But by the middle of the century there were indications that the four Gospels, already widely known through the constant intercourse that united Christian communities together, were being elevated above their competitors to a place of exceptional authority. This was due, not to mere good fortune or to any arbitrary dealing on the part of the Church, but to the superior claims of the writings themselves, which were recognized when the necessity arose of counteracting, by trustworthy and authentic records, the rapid growth of a pseudo-tradition in Gnostic circles. This rise of our four Gospels to a commanding and unchallengeable position bears witness not only to their inherent value,which the Church, with a fine spiritual sensitiveness, perceived,but to the conviction that, as opposed to fictitious writings which appeared under the names of Apostles, they embodied the testimony of Apostolic writers. By the time of Irenaeus (circa (about) 180) the Gospel canon may be regarded as definitely fixed; and although Apocryphal Gospels continued to circulate, the authoritative position of the four Gospels was finally assured.

Perhaps the chief value of the Apocryphal Gospels is to be found in the light which they cast on the conditions of life and thought in early Christian times. They are of service in the difficult work of reconstructing the complex environment in which Christianity grew up.

When, for example, one reads in the Childhood Gospel of Thomas the account of the miracles wrought by the child Christ, and marks the spirit of diablerie so frequently exhibited, one is conscious of nothing but a painful feeling of wonder, that fables so bizarre and so revolting could ever have been tolerated in a community of Christians. Of any ethical sympathy with the spirit of Christ, of any recognition of the beauty and simplicity of Christs childhood, as He grew in grace and wisdom, in favour with God and man, there is in this Gospel hardly the faintest trace. Though worthless as an account of Christs childhood, the Gospel of Thomas is yet a mirror in which we see reflected the curious condition of the society which accepted it. We see here, in a typical instance, how strong were the external influences which played on the development of Christianity in early times. In the process of permeating the heathen world with its great thought of Redemption and its lofty ethical sentiment, Christianity, as was inevitable, was itself coloured, and in certain circles distorted, by the foreign elements of its environment. Oriental mythology and Greek philosophy had met, and given rise to syncretistic systems which exerted a deep influence on mens conceptions of the Christian faith and life. Traces of this are clearly discernible in the Apocryphal Gospels, most plainly in the Gnostic Gospels. Buddhistic influences are possibly responsible for the childhood stories in the Gospel of Thomas.

The confusion and vagueness of the Christological views in the different Apocryphal Gospels also bear witness to the great variety of influences which were at work in the early Church, and enable us to realize with what trouble the conception of the Divine manhood of Jesus was eventually established. The indecision and one-sidedness which are revealed in doctrinal matters are also traceable in the interpretation of the ethical content of Christs teaching and life. Ascetic and Encratite views are found in several Gospels, and no doubt were characteristic of all the Gnostic Gospels. A close sympathy with the true ethical spirit of Christianity is, however, noticeable in the Gospel according to the Hebrews, in which stress is laid on acts of mercy and brotherly kindness; and in the Traditions of Matthias mentioned by Clement of Alexandria, and possibly identical with the Gnostic Gospel of Matthias, the doctrine of Christian responsibility for others welfare, in its most stringent form, is very forcibly put: If the neighbour of an elect person sins, the elect has sinned; for if he had lived according to the counsels of the Word, his neighbour would have so esteemed his manner of life that he would have kept free from sin.

The apologetic interest which is so characteristic of 2nd cent. writers (witness the Apologies of Aristides, Justin, Tertullian, etc.) is reflected in several of the Apocryphal Gospels.

Traces are to be found in the Gospel according to the Hebrews, in which the servant of the high priest is a witness to the Resurrection. A later stage of the apologetic movement may be observed in the Gospel of Peter, where Pilate is practically exonerated from blame for Christs condemnation, and is made to bear witness to Christs Divinity. In the Acts of Pilate (Gospel of Nicodemus) the movement has reached its climax in the reverence which the Romans pay to Jesus at His trial, in the miraculous homage of the Roman standards, and in the irrefutable evidence given of Christs resurrection, to the conviction of His enemies.

A subsidiary element in estimating the value of the Apocryphal Gospels is their antiquarian interest. A passage in the Protevangelium of James (ch. 18) affords an interesting parallel to the scene in the fairy tale, The Sleeping Beauty, when by a magic spell the whole of nature suddenly stands still, and all living beings are immovably rooted where they are. The Childhood Gospel of Thomas, useless as it is as a source of information about Christs youth, gives a remarkably vivid and convincing picture of Jewish village life. Caution must be observed in trusting the details of Jewish life in the Protevangelium; many of them are entirely unhistorical.

v. Doctrinal characteristics.As stated above in ii., one of the main impulses which led to the production of Apocryphal Gospels was the desire to establish peculiar tenets held in certain Christian circles. Gospels of this type, although professedly narratives of our Lords life and teaching, were in reality Tendenzschriften, doctrinal treatises conceived and written in the interests of a definite system of thought. Such were the numerous Gnostic Gospels, of which the smallest fragments remain. But even those Gospels in the production of which there was no deliberate dogmatic purpose, are doctrinally significant. It is true of them, equally with the canonical Gospels, that they were written in the interests of faith, ; the writers were not mere chroniclers of past events, giving information about One in whose life and personality they had no vital concern; they were believers, for whom Christ was Lord. The religious value which Jesus had for them, and the manner in which they conceived of His person, were reflected in their narrative of His life. However small the value of the writings may be as authentic sources of information regarding Jesus, they are interesting as showing by a side light what men thought about Him. How far the early Church as a whole was from any clear and uniform conception of Christ, is apparent from the Apocryphal Gospels. In them we have not only the reflexion of views representing the main stream of Christian thought, but also the foreshadowings of doctrines which later, in their developed form, were rejected as heretical.

The majority of the Apocryphal Gospels betray a heretical tendency, which varies broadly according as the Divine or the human nature of Christ is denied. On the one hand, there is the Ebionitic conception of Jesus, with its rejection of His heavenly origin; on the other, the Docetic, with its obscuration or denial of His true humanity. Both these opposing views find expression in the Apocryphal Gospels. The former is found in the Gospel according to the Hebrews and in the Gospel of the Twelve Apostles; the latter, somewhat veiled, in the Gospel of Peter, but fully developed in the Gnostic Gospels, in which the Saviourthe heavenly Christfreed from the association with the phantasmal earthly Christ, and made the possessor of His full powers through the death and resurrection, declares the true wisdom to His disciples.

The Childhood Gospels stand in the main current of ecclesiastical doctrine in their view of the person of Christ. The Gospel of Thomas shows that the circles in which it found acceptance held to the doctrine of Christs human and Divine natures. There are traces that point to a Gnostic origin, and to a conception of Christ in which His true humanity was obscured; but in the later form in which it was current in the Church, the humanity and Divinity of our Lord are alike emphasized. The child Jesus is a boy among boys, taking His part in the usual games and occupations of childhood; and yet the belief in His supernatural dignity is evidenced by the extraordinary miracles attributed to Him, and by His astonishing knowledge, which drew the confession from His teacher: This child is not earthborn; assuredly he was born before the creation of the world (ch. 7). The Protevangelium of James, too, it is clear, was written in the interests of orthodoxy, which were imperilled, alike by the belief current in Jewish-Christian circles that Joseph was the father of Jesus, and by the Gnostic doctrine that, in being born of Mary, Jesus did not partake of her human nature, but passed through her like water through a pipe (Epiphan. Hr. 31. 7). In opposition to this double attack on the generally accepted doctrine, the writer of the Protevangelium, while not leaving it in doubt that Jesus was born as a human child (the infant took the breast from His mother), sought to make His Divinity secure by depicting Mary as holy from her birth, as fed only on angels food, as conceiving by the word of the Lord, as bringing forth her child in virginity, and as remaining a virgin to the end. It is noteworthy that, although the primary object of the Protevangelium was to safeguard the orthodox conception of Christs person against hostile attacks, the method adopted had the result of elevating Mary above the ordinary levels of humanity, and of initiating a movement which, deriving strength from other sources, terminated in the worship of Mary, the All-Holy mother of God.

vi. Influence.Although after the 2nd cent. no Gospels were reckoned as authoritative except those now in the Canon, the Apocryphal Gospels continued to be read for purposes of edification, both in public and in private. Those which were distinctly heretical gradually disappeared as the power of the Church grew, while those which were of a type similar to the canonical Gospels were unable for any lengthened period to maintain their position alongside their authoritative rivals. Still we find that the Gospel according to the Hebrews was read in some quarters in Jeromes day (end of 4th cent.), and was highly esteemed by that Father himself; while the vitality of the Gospel of Peter is evidenced by the fact that a large portion of it was placed in the grave of a monk in the early Middle Ages (8th12th cent.). The popularity of the Childhood Gospels was remarkable, especially in the Churches of the East. There the Protevangelium was so highly prized as a book of devotion that it was used for reading in public worship, and furnished material for the homilies of preachers. Translations of it circulated in Syriac, Coptic, and Arabic, and, along with other childhood legends, its stories, often greatly embellished and exaggerated, found a place in a comprehensive Gospel of the Infancy and Childhood, the so-called Arabic Gospel, which had a wide circulation not only in the Churches in the East, but in Mohammedan circles. Passages from the Protevangelium stand in the lectionaries of the orthodox Church, for use at the festivals held in honour of Mary and of her reputed parents, Joachim and Anna.

In the Western Church the Apocryphal Gospels were regarded with more suspicion. Towards the close of the 4th cent. their authority was repudiated in the plainest terms by Jerome and Augustine, the former characterizing certain stories as ex deliramentis apocryphorum petita (Tappehorn, Ausserbiblische Nachrichten, 15). On the other hand, their contemporaries, Zeno of Verona, and Prudentius, the greatest poet of early Christian times, drew from the Protevangelium in their works in praise of Mary. The combined influence of Jerome and Augustine, however, determined the ecclesiastical attitude to the Apocryphal Gospels, and the ban of the Church fell upon them under Damasus (382), Innocent I. (405), and Gelasius (496). In the long run this condemnation by ecclesiastical authority proved unavailing to check the popular appetite for the apocryphal legends; and by various devices the writings, which had incurred the censure of the Church, were brought back again into public circulation.

Harnack truly remarks that the history of apocryphal literature is a proof that the prohibition of books is powerless against a pressing need. In all sections and in all languages of the Church this literature is perhaps the most strongly represented alongside of the canonical writings, in a form, as one would expect, that is always changing to suit the taste of the age. It was really apocryphal, that is to say, it had what may be termed a subterranean existence; but, suppressed and persecuted though it was, it always forced its way back to the surface, and at last the public tradition of the Church was defenceless against it (Gesch. d. altchr. Litt. i. lx. note 5).

Within a century after the Decretum Gelasii, Gregory of Tours in his book de Gloria Martyrum (i. ch. 4) had no scruples in using the extravagant legends contained in the Transitus Mariae; indeed, so little store was apparently set by ecclesiastical condemnation, that about 435, thirty years after the decree of Innocent i., a mosaic of the Annunciation in S. Maria Maggiore in Rome, prepared under the direction of Sixtus iii., embodied apocryphal details. Apocryphal writings are used by pseudo-Chrysostom (circa (about) 600); and in the epic poem of the nun Hroswitha ( 968), entitled Historia nativitatis laudabilisque conversationis intact Dei genitricis, the material is in part drawn from the later Gospels of the Childhood. From the 12th cent. onwards, the Apocryphal Gospels afforded an inexhaustible mine for poets and minstrels in Germany, France, and England; and numerous miracle-plays represented incidents drawn from the same source. A powerful impulse was given to the spread of these legends by the Dominican Vincent de Beanvais, who in his work entitled Speculum Majus, published about the middle of the 13th cent., and translated in the following century into many languages, transcribed large portions of pseudo-Matthew and the Gospel of Nicodemus, etc. The latter half of the 13th cent. also saw the appearance of a collection of legendary Lives of the Saints, the Speculum Sanctorum, better known as the Golden Legend, written by another member of the Dominican order, Jacobus de Voragine, Archbishop of Genoa. This work, in which many of the apocryphal legends find a place, had an immense influence, there being manuscript translations extant in English, German, French, Italian, and Spanish. With the invention of the printing-press this influence was largely extended, the Legenda Aurea and Vincents Speculum being among the earliest books to be set up in type. From that time onwards, the stories of the Apocryphal Gospels have had an influence on popular Christianity in Catholic countries far exceeding that of the Biblical narrative.

Roman Catholic writers have denied their claim to be in any sense authoritative sources of Evangelic history, and have uttered warnings against their incautious use; an unfavourable judgment was passed upon them by the Papal Congregation of Rites as recently as 1884, in connexion with the proposal to celebrate in the following year the nineteen hundredth anniversary of the birth of Mary; but, all this notwithstanding, these apocryphal stories, likened by Harnack to twining plants which, when cut down, spring up again from beneath and choke much that is healthy, have securely rooted themselves in the popular imagination, and have been the fruitful source of many superstitious beliefs. Even Tappehorn, a Roman Catholic writer, who, in his scholarly treatise on The Apocryphal Gospels of the Childhood, etc., speaks with deep regret of the tendency to accept these writings as trustworthy historical sources, cannot resist the temptation to retain as much of their contents as has been taken up into ecclesiastical tradition. He accepts, for instance, as reliable, the names of Marys parents, the circumstances relating to her birth, her dedication to the Temple service, the marvellous story of her death, resurrection, and ascension, and declares that use of these apocryphal data may be made with an easy conscience for the purpose of religious edification (op. cit. 88).

The narratives of the Apocryphal Gospels have had an extraordinary influence on Christian art. Reference has already been made to the attraction which the legends had for poets from the earliest times, and especially since the date of the publication of the Legenda Aurea. (For details of the earlier poetry see von Lehner, Die Marienverchrung, 256 ff.). Sculpture and painting also owed many of their subjects to apocryphal sources, or were influenced in their treatment by apocryphal details. The history of Marys reputed parents, her service in the Temple, her betrothal to Joseph, the Annunciation, the Birth of Jesus in a cave, the Flight into Egypt, the Assumption of Marythese and other incidents described in the Apocryphal Gospels were favourite themes of painters and sculptors, especially during the Renaissance.

A marble tablet of the 4th or 5th cent. in the crypt of St. Maximin in Provence, represents Mary in the attitude of prayer, with the inscription in barbarous Latin, MARIA VIRGO MINESTER DE TEMPUIO GEROSALEThe Virgin Mary, servant of the temple at Jerusalem (von Lehner, op. cit. 327). The events in the life of the Virgin, arranged in a series, were depicted by different painters of the Renaissance, one of the best known series being that by Taddeo Gaddi in the Baroncelli Chapel at Florence (Mrs. Jameson, Legends of the Madonna, Introd. iii). Marys presentation at the Temple, and her marvellous ascent of the Temple steps (narrated in pseudo-Matthew, ch. 4 and the Nativity, ch. 6), supply a subject for one of Titians masterpieces (in the Academy, Venice), while her marriage to Joseph is represented in many fine pictures, notably in Raphaels beautiful early work (in the Pinacoteca, Milan). The Annunciation is a favourite theme in Christian art; in accordance with the narrative in the Protevangelium, Mary is represented either at the well with a pitcher of water or spinning wool for the veil of the temple (as in the mosaic, already referred to, in S. Maria Maggiore in Rome). Pictures of the Nativity betray the influence of the apocryphal stories; they show the mother and child and Joseph in a cave, where, according to the Protevangelium, Jesus was born; a dazzling light radiates from the face of the child; an ox and an ass (first mentioned in pseudo-Matthew) bow in adoration before Hima frequent representation in early reliefs (von Lehner, op. cit. 314 ff.)or in later pictures are introduced as mere picturesque details. An incident in the Flight to Egypt, the bending down of a palm-tree to yield its fruit to Mary, affords a subject for many beautiful works (e.g. by Pinturicchio, William Blake). The Assumption of Mary was frequently represented in paintings from the 10th cent, onward (e.g. Titians in the Academy, Venice; Botticellis in the National Gallery), while the consummation of her life is depicted in her coronation as Queen of Heaven (among others by Raphael, Fra Angelico, and Taddeo Gaddi). The second part of the Gospel of NicodemusThe Descent into Hellgives a subject to Fra Angelico (San Marco, Venice) and to Durer (in his series of woodcuts composing The Little Passion).

The narratives in the Koran about Jesus, who is regarded as a forerunner of Mohammed, are drawn largely from apocryphal sources, either directly from the so-called Arabic Gospel of the Infancy, or indirectly from the popular tales which had an apocryphal origin. An account is given, for instance, of Marys nativity,in the Koran her parents are named Imran and Hanna,of her dedication to the Temple, of the miraculous choice of Joseph to be her protector, etc. Jesus is represented as working miracles in His childhood; His making of birds out of clay (Gospel of Thomas) is mentioned. The Koran represents strongly Docetic views in its denial that Jesus died upon the Cross. In Sura 4. 156 the Jews are reported as saying: We have killed the Messiah, Jesus, the Son of Mary, the Messenger of God; to which the answer is immediately given: Yet they did not kill and crucify Him, but a phantasm appeared to them. In truth they did not kill Him, but God raised Him to Himself; for God is strong and wise. Other legends about Jesus, not mentioned in the Koran, were collected by Moslem commentators, notably by Kessaeus. See art. Christ in Mohammedan Literature in Appendix to vol. ii.

vii. Classification.The classification here adopted follows that given by Harnack (Gesch. d. altchr. Litt. i. 4 f.) and by Tasker (Hasting’s Dictionary of the Bible , Extra Vol. 422 f.).

A.Gospels of the Synoptic type, with some title to be regarded as embodying an early tradition.

1.Gospel according to the Hebrews.

2.Gospel according to the Egyptians

3.Gospel of Peter.

4.Faym Gospel Fragment.

5.Oxyrhyncus Gospel Fragment.

B.Heretical and Gnostic Gospels, written to establish peculiar conceptions of the person and life of Jesus.

1.Gospel of Marcion.

2.Gospel of the Twelve Apostles.

3.Gospel of Thomas.

4.Gospel of Philip.

C.Supplemental Gospels, written to throw light on the dark parts of Christs history.

(a)Gospels of the Childhood, together with those dealing with the parents of Jesus.

1.Protevangelium of James with the recensions

(1)Gospel of pseudo-Matthew.

(2)Gospel of the Nativity of Mary.

2.Childhood Gospel of Thomas.

3.Arabic Gospel of the Childhood.

4.History of Joseph the Carpenter.

5.The Departure of Mary.

(b) Gospels dealing with the Passion and the post-Resurrection life of Jesus.

1. Gospel of Nicodemus.

2. Legend of Abgar.

D. Gospel Harmonies, in which several Gospels are worked together into one.

Gospel of Tatian (Diatessaron).

A. Gospels of the Synoptic Type, with Some Title to Be Regarded as Embodying an Early Tradition

A. 1. Gospel according to the Hebrews.The earliest mention of this Gospel occurs in the of Hegesippus about the year 180 (Euseb. Historia Ecclesiastica iv. 22. 8). The name according to the Hebrews is not original; in the circles in which the Gospel was current, it apparently had no distinctive name, that which it now bears having been given to it by outsiders, to indicate that it was the Gospel in use among Hebrew Christians, the descendants of the original Church in Judaea. There is some probability in the view, which is strongly advocated by Harnack (Chron. i. 637 f.), that the Gospel was in use in the Jewish-Christian community in Alexandria, and that the title was given to it to distinguish it from the Gospel used by the native Christian community, the Gospel according to the Egyptians. The language in which the Gospel was written (as we learn from Jerome, contra Pelag. iii. 2) was West Aramaic, the language of Christ and His Apostles,a circumstance which betrays its influence on the narrative in the fact that the Holy Spirit is represented as female (My Mother the Holy Spirit, the Aramaic ruha being feminine). The Gospel was translated into Latin and Greek by Jerome, who had a very high opinion of it, and was inclined to regard it as the original Matthew; but it is more than probable that it had already circulated in a Greek version in different parts of the Church, and found considerable recognition. It was wrongly identified by Jerome with the Ebionitic Gospelthe Gospel of the Twelve Apostles, also attributed to Matthewwhich was written originally in Greek, and was in use among the Gnostic Ebionites.

As the fragments which have been preserved to us show, the Gospel according to the Hebrews was of the Synoptic type. Whether it contained a story of the Nativity is uncertain, but (considering the Jewish-Christian standpoint of the book) highly improbable. Included, however, were the Baptism, the Temptation, the Lords Prayer, the Healing of the man with the withered hand, the pericope adulterae (or something similar), the injunction to forgive unto seventy times seven, the conversation with the Rich Young Ruler, the entrance into Jerusalem, the parable of the Pounds, the Trial, the denial of Peter, appearances after the Resurrection, and sayings of Jesus not elsewhere recorded. As a rule, the fragments show a somewhat closer resemblance to Mt. than to the other Synoptics, but there are also details which have their nearer parallels in Luke.

The divergences from the Synoptics are in several cases remarkable in character, and point, in the opinion of many scholars, to an earlier and more reliable tradition. In the narrative of the Baptism, Jesus, in answer to the proposal of His mother and brethren that they should go and be baptized by John for the remission of sins, says: In what have I sinned, that I should go and be baptized by him? Unless perhaps this which I have said be ignorance,an utterance which is generally interpreted as meaning that Jesus, though conscious of no sin, was humble enough not to make the claim of sinlessness. (This passage, regarded by some as primitive and authentic, is better understood as the product of reflexion at a time when Christs baptism was felt to be a problem requiring solution. In the earliest days the presence of the problem was not felt. The writer of the Gospel, who holds to the sinlessness of Jesus, solves the difficulty by pointing to His deep humility).

After the Baptism, the descent of the Spirit is described with greater fulness than in the Synoptics; the dove is awanting, but the voice from heaven is put into the form of an utterance by the Spirit: It came to pass, when the Lord was come up out of the water, that the whole fountain of the Holy Spirit came down and rested on Him and said unto Him, My Son, in all the prophets I awaited Thy coming, that I might rest on Thee. For Thou art my rest; Thou art my firstborn Son, who reignest for ever.

A passage, which probably belongs to the narrative of the Temptation, reads: The Lord said, Just now My mother, the Holy Spirit, seized Me by one of My hairs and bore Me away to the high mountain Tabor,a fantastic description on the model of Eze 8:3 and Bel and the Dragon 36.

In the Lords Prayer the fourth petition runs: Give us to-day our bread for to-morrow. In the Aramaic mahar (to-morrow) we may have the word used by Jesus Himself; in which case , translated daily in Mat 6:11, Luk 11:3, would be an adjectival form derived from (the following day). On the other hand, there are scholars who believe that the converse is the case, and that mahar is an attempt to give the meaning of (Meyer in Henn. 18, Handb. 28 f.). The former alternative is the more probable.

The narrative of the healing on the Sabbath of the man with a withered hand represents the man as appealing to Jesus on the ground that he was a mason who earned his bread by working with his hands,a detail which may well he authentic.

In the longest fragment of the Gospel we have a version of Christs interview with the Rich Young Ruler, which shows notable differences from the Synoptic account. Where the Synoptists speak of the rich mans sorrow because of his inability to accept Christs terms, the Gospel according to the Hebrews, in vivid and homely language, represents him as showing astonishment and a touch of resentment: (He) began to scratch his head, and it did not please him. Whereupon Jesus rebuked him for claiming to have fulfilled the law, when he had neglected offices of mercy and brotherly kindness: How sayest thou, I have done the law and the prophets? Since it is written in the law, Thou shalt love thy neighbour as thyself; and behold, many of thy brethren, the sons of Abraham, are covered with filth and are dying with hunger, while thy house is full of many good things, and nothing at all goes out of it to them. If this account is to be taken as genuine, it is clear that our estimate of the Rich Young Rulers character, based on the Synoptic tradition, will have to be considerably revised. It is, however, more probable that in this passage we have a mistaken combination of the story of the Rich Young Ruler with the parable of Dives and Lazarus related by Luke.

After the Resurrection, Jesus is represented as appearing first to James, to release him from a vow which he had taken at the Last Supper: James had sworn that he would not eat bread from that hour, when he had drunk the Lords cup, until He should see Him risen from those that are asleep. This is an obviously later form of the tradition of Christs appearing to James, due most likely to the desire of Jewish Christians to exalt their head above the Apostles of Christ. It should be noted that James is here portrayed as one of Christs followers who partook of the Last Supper,an unhistorical detail. There is probably a confusion between James the Just and James the brother of John, an inference borne out by the reference to drinking the lords cup (cf. Mat 20:22).

Into the difficult question of the relation of the Gospel according to the Hebrews to the Synoptics, it is impossible in this article to enter with any fulness. That it is closely allied to them, especially to Mt., is clear from the character of the fragments. Three different solutions of the problem have been suggested, all of them supported by competent authorities. (1) Hebrews is held to be the original Aramaic Matthew (Hilgenfeld), or an elaboration of it (Zahn), and as such, the groundwork of our canonical Matthew. This view is now almost universally rejected. (2) Hebrews is held to be independent of the Synoptics, the affinity being explained by a common reliance on oral tradition. This view, which is the one at present most widely held, is strongly supported by Harnack, who goes so far as to express the hope (Chron. i. 645) that, after Zahns penetrating discussion of the question, no one will have the hardihood to repeat the statement that the Gospel according to the Hebrews is based on one or more canonical Gospels. That hope has not been realized. For (3) the view has recently been confidently advocated by Wernle (Synop. Frage, 248 ff.) that Hebrews is dependent on all the Synoptics, making use of Matthew, and in some cases combining the accounts of Matthew and Luke. Meyer (in Henn. 18) supports this view, and strongly emphasizes the secondary character of the Gospel. In this judgment the present writer is disposed to concur. It appears to him that all the facts of the case are satisfactorily explained, if we hold that the Gospel according to the Hebrews was written by one who used canonical Matthew (and Luke), and built up his Gospel on the basis of a separate tradition, under the influence of his own doctrinal prepossessions.

But even should the view of the Gospels independence be accepted, this does not necessarily imply that in it we are face to face with an earlier, or an equally early, stage of the primitive tradition. The realistic presentation, the fondness for little details, the quaint and, in some particulars, undignified language, which are characteristic of the Gospel, may possibly be indications that in some narratives we have the tradition in its original form; on the other hand, these features may with as much probability be due to later manipulation by popular evangelists. Details, such as Christs words before His baptism, which are by some regarded as primitive on the ground that they are of such a character that they could not have been added later, are believed by others (in our opinion more justly), to be products of an age of reflexion. Traces of a later age than that of the Synoptics are found in the Resurrection fragment: there is the unhistorical detail in reference to the appearing of Christ to James, and the later apologetic interest is shown in securing witness for the resurrection from the enemies of Christ. (After rising from the dead, Jesus handed the linen cloth to the servant of the high priest). The judgment is warranted that, while the Gospel according to the Hebrews probably retains in some points the freshness of the original tradition, it contains many elements that are secondary, and that, as a whole, it represents not an earlier, but a somewhat later stage of the Gospel tradition than the Synoptics. A date towards the end of the 1st cent. is probable.

On the view here taken of the Gospel according to the Hebrews, the value of its fragments as a source of the life of Jesus is inconsiderable. It cannot justly lay claim to be an authority, as Oscar Holtzmann regards it, on the same level as the Synoptics. Some sayings, however, ascribed to Christ and not elsewhere recorded, have a genuine ring, giving us, if not the ipsissima verba of Jesus, at least true echoes of His voice. Christ is represented as saying to His disciples: Never be glad, except when ye look upon your brother in love,a singularly beautiful precept condemning Schadenfreude, the disposition to rejoice in anothers misfortune. The Gospel also reported a saying in which it was reckoned among the greatest offences that one should sadden the spirit of ones brother. Another striking saying, quoted from this Gospel by Clement of Alexandria (Strom. ii. 9. 45) and accepted by many as substantially a genuine utterance of Jesus, runs as follows: He that wonders shall reach the kingdom, and having reached the kingdom shall rest. In another passage (Strom. v. 14. 96) Clement records the saying in a longer form, which agrees almost verbally with one of the Oxyrhynchus sayings: He who seeks shall not cease until he finds; and when he finds, he shall be astonished, and being astonished he shall reach the kingdom, and having reached the kingdom he shall rest.

The ethical teaching of the Gospel, from all that we can gather, was in sympathy with the mind of Christ, stress being laid on brotherly love and forgiveness. Doctrinally, the Gospel occupies the position of the old Jewish Church. It exhibits Jesus as the Messiah sent from God, not as the Son of God conceived of the Holy Ghost in a special sense, but as the long expected Messiah of Davids race, in whom prophecy finds its fulfilment (Handmann, TU [Note: U Texte und Untersuehungen.] v. 3, p. 125).

Literature.Hilgenfeld, NT extra can. receptum, iv. p. 5 ff.; Nicholson, Gospel according to the Hebrews; Handmann, Das Hebraer-evangelium (TU [Note: U Texte und Untersuehungen.] v. 3); Zahn, Gesch. d. NT Kanons, ii. 642 ff.; Harnack, Gesch. d. altchr. Litt. i. 6 ff., Chronologie, i. 631 ff.; Hennecke, NT Apokr. 11 ff., Handb. 21 ff.; Menzies in Hasting’s Dictionary of the Bible , Ext. Vol. 338 ff.; Adeney in Hibbert Journal, Oct. 1904.

A. 2. Gospel according to the Egyptians.This Gospel, whose ancient date may be inferred from the fact that, like the Gospel according to the Hebrews, it bears no authors name, was current in native Christian circles in Egypt. Our information regarding it is very slight: it is mentioned by Origen in his discussion of the prologue in Lukes Gospel, and characterized by him, apparently on the ground of his own knowledge of it, as a heretical writing (Ecclesia quattuor evangelia habet, haereses plurima, e quibus quoddam scribitur secundum aegyptios translation by Jerome). All that can with certainty be said to remain of the Gospel is a small group of sayings, recorded by Clement of Alexandria in treating of the attitude of different Christian communities to marriage. References to the Gospel are also found in Hippolytus (Philos. v. 7), who states that it was used by the sect of the Naassenes to support their peculiar views about the nature of the soul, and in Epiphanius (Hr. 62. 2), who mentions its use by the Sabellians.

The fragments which remain are part of a conversation between Jesus and Salome, and are all of the same character, dealing with the transient (if not sinful) nature of the sex relations. They read as follows:

1. Salome asked, How long shall death reign? The Lord answered, So long as ye women give birth. When Salome had said, Then should I have done well, if I had not given birth? the Lord answered, Eat every plant, but that which is bitter, cat not (Clem. Alex. [Note: Alexandrian.] Strom. iii. 6. 45).

2. When Salome inquired when those things [the coming of the Kingdom] should be, the Lord said, When ye trample on the garment of shame, and when the two become one, and the male with the female, neither male nor female (Clem. Alex. [Note: Alexandrian.] Strom. iii. 13. 92).

3. The Saviour said, I came to destroy the works of the female (Clem. Alex. [Note: Alexandrian.] Strom. iii. 9. 63).

The Encratite tendency of these sayings is recognized by the majority of scholars, but is energetically denied by Zahn, who, however, rejects No. 3 as not having stood in the Gospel according to the Egyptians. If the third saying be put aside, it is certainly arguable that the first two do not go much farther in an ascetic direction than Mat 22:30 (In the resurrection they neither marry nor are given in marriage, but are as the angels in heaven). This view finds some support in the fragment of a Gospel discovered at Oxyrhyncus in 1903 (Grenfell and Hunt, New Sayings, 44). That Cassian, the Gnostic leader of the Encratites, from whom Clement quoted the sayings, used them to support his ascetic condemnation of marriage, is not decisive. It is noteworthy that Clement rejected Cassians interpretation, and understood the sayings in a mystical sense. If, however, the Encratite sense of the words be maintained, Harnack is certainly justified by Clements attitude in concluding that Encratism cannot have been the aim of the Gospel, in fact cannot have been stamped upon it as its characteristic feature, but that probably only this one passage occurred in it which could be adduced in favour of the extreme ascetic practice (Chron. i. 616). That the Gospel contained much else that was entirely free from suspicion of heresy is probable; and this natural inference becomes a certainty, if we accept the widely received opinion, that the Gospel according to the Egyptians was used as a principal authority by the writer of the so-called Second Epistle of Clement of Rome (c. 170). In this writing, besides a passage closely reminiscent of the Gospel according to the Egyptians,* [Note: The Lord Himself having been asked by some one, When will the kingdom come? said, When the two shall be one, and the outside as the inside, and the male with the female, neither male nor female (2 Clem. xii. 2).] there are several, containing sayings of Jesus, of which some show verbal agreement with the Synoptics, while others, with considerable divergences, are similar in character. On the assumption, which is possible though incapable of proof, that 2nd Clement drew the sayings of Jesus recorded by him from one main source, and this was the Gospel according to the Egyptians, Harnack based the conclusion that the Gospel contained nothing heretical, else the Roman Church about 170 would certainly not have read it; and, further, that it was an independent Gospel, having affinities with Matthew and Luke, and containing in some instances sayings in a form even more original than they (Chron. i. 619 f.). One must confess that so extremely favourable a judgment, reared on a somewhat uncertain basis, does not inspire entire confidence when over against it one places Origens view of the Gospel as heretical and its use by the Naassenes and Sabellians. While it may be allowed that there were probably passages in the Gospel which ranked it with the Synoptics, it seems clear that it showed affinities with the speculative teaching of Gnostic schools. It contained references to manifold changes of the soul which were relied on by the Naassene sect in building up their system of thought; and Epiphanius in refuting the heresy of the Sabellians, who made use of the Gospel according to the Egyptians, declared that there were in it many things put into the mouth of the Saviour, and said as in a corner mystically, such as His declaration to the disciples that the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit were one and the same (Hr. 62. 2).

With so little to rest a confident judgment on, it is extremely difficult to characterize this Gospel, but it may be near the truth to say that it was a Gospel of the Synoptic type with a slight Gnostic colouring.* [Note: Von Dohschtz (Die urchr. Gemeinden, 190) finds in the Gospel a trace of the Gnostic idea of the subversion of all ordinary standards of value, from which it is only a short step to the perversion of all ethical conceptions. This view is justly opposed by Zahn (NT Kan. ii. 640).]

The disposition to refer to this Gospel isolated fragments and utterances of Jesus, such as the Faym Fragment and the Oxyrhyncus Sayings, is extremely hazardous. All that can with certainty be said is that some of the recently discovered sayings belong to the same sphere of thought as the Gospel. Further than that it is impossible to go (see Grenfell and Hunt, New Sayings, 27 ff.).

The date of the Gospel is about the middle of the 2nd cent., probably between 130 and 150.

Literature.Hilgenfeld, NT extra can. iv. 42 ff.; Harnack, Gesch. d. altchr. Litt. i. 12 ff., Chron. i. 612 ff.; Zahn, NT Kan. ii. 628 ff.; Volter, Petrusevangelium oder Aegypterevangelium, 1893; Schneckenburger, Ueber das Evangelium der Aegyptcr, 1834; Hennecke, NT Apokr. 21 ff., Handb. 38 ff.; Tasker, l.c. 423 ff.

A. 3. Gospel of Peter.In his enumeration of Petrine writings, Eusebius mentions (Historia Ecclesiastica iii. 3) a Gospel which, along with the Acts, Preaching and Apocalypse of Peter, he declares to he spurious, and not considered authoritative by any ecclesiastical writer. Until fourteen years ago, our knowledge of the contents of the Gospel was of the scantiest description, being based on a slight reference by Origen, on a letter by Serapion, bishop of Antioch (end of 2nd cent.), and on a passage in Theodoret, now generally discredited, which states that the Nazarenes, who honoured Christ as a just man, used the Gospel according to Peter (Haer. Fabb. ii. 2). Origens reference (Com. in Matt. [Note: Matthews (i.e. prob. Rogers) Bible 1537.] bk. x. 17) tells us nothing more than that those who believed the brethren of Jesus to be the sons of Joseph by a former wife relied on the Gospel of Peter and the Book of James; from which we infer that the Gospel contained the narrative of the Virgin-birth. From Serapions letter (part of it preserved in Euseb. Historia Ecclesiastica vi. 12), which was written to the Church in Rhossus in the diocese of Antioch, we gather the following facts about the Gospel. When on a visit to Rhossus, Serapion had the Gospel brought under his notice, as being the occasion of some ill-feeling in the Church. Not suspecting any heretical leanings on the part of those who were favourable to the Gospel, the bishop, without any careful examination of its contents, sought to establish peace by authorizing it to be read. Having learned afterwards that the Gospel had originated among the Docetae, he procured a copy from some members of that party, and found that, while it contained much true teaching, there were additions of a questionable character, to which he proceeded to call attention. Until recently this was all that was known of the Gospel of Peter; not a single fragment had been handed down; one could only gather that it was a Gospel with a slight Docetic colouring, but for the most part entirely orthodox.

Of this long lost Gospel we have now a fragment of considerable length dealing with the Passion and Resurrection of Christ. The fragment was found in the winter of 18861887 at Akhmm, in Upper Egypt, by the French Archaeological Mission, and was published by M. Bouriant in 1892. The narrative claims to be the personal witness of the Apostle Peter, and reveals the Docetic tendency referred to by Serapion. The fragment begins at the end of the judgment-scene, after Pilate had washed his hands, and ends in the middle of a sentence, which introduces the narrative describing the appearance of Christ to His disciples at the Sea of Galilee. The nature of the contents can here only be indicated.

Herod is regarded as the real judge of Christ; throughout, there is the evident intention to exculpate Pilate, who washed his hands, while Herod refused. It is Herod who gives the order for the crucifixion, and his permission is required for the disposal of the body of Jesus. When Jesus was handed over to the people, it is stated that they clothed Him with purple and set Him on the seat of judgment, saying, Judge righteously, O King of Israel.* [Note: Justin Martyr (Apol. i. 35) has a similar statement. They mocked Him and set Him on the judgment-seat, and said, Judge for us. The corresponding passage in St. Johns Gospel (19:13) reads: When Pilate, therefore, heard these words, he brought Jesus out and sat upon the judgment-seat ( ). It is, however, legitimate to translate in the transitive sense, so that the verse would run: He brought Jesus out and set Him on the judgment-seat. The passage in St. John, understood in this sense, is probably the source from which the statements in Justin and the Gospel of Peter are derived.] On the cross we learn that Jesus held His peace, as in no wise having pain. One of the malefactors reproached the Jews standing round the cross (not his fellow-sufferer, as in Luk 23:40), and they, being angered with him, commanded that his legs should not be broken, that he might die in torment. After referring to the darkness which came over the land, the narrative runs: And the Lord cried out, saying, My power, My power, thou hast forsaken Me. And when He had said this, He was taken up. After the death of Christ the Jews began to feel compunction for what they had done; they began to lament and to say, Woe for our sins; the judgment and the end of Jerusalem are nigh. All the people murmured and beat their breasts, saying, If by His death those most mighty signs have happened, behold, how righteous He is. The Jewish authorities, having received soldiers from Pilate to guard the tomb for three days, themselves took part in the watch. The Resurrection is described with many miraculous details; there is a voice from heaven; two men, encircled by a great light, descend and enter the tomb, from which the stone rolls away of itself. Then the watchers see three men coming out of the tomb, the two supporting the one, and a cross following them; and the heads of the two reached as far as heaven, but that of Him that was led overtopped the heavens. And they heard a voice from heaven saying, Hast thon preached to them that sleep? And a response was heard from the cross, Yea. When Pilate was informed of all that had happened, he said, I am pure from the blood of the Son of God. He was entreated by the Jewish authorities to command the centurion and the soldiers to tell nothing of what they had seen, for it is better (say they) for us to be guilty of the greatest sin before God than to fall into the hands of the people of the Jews and be stoned. The rest of the fragment deals with the visit of Mary Magdalene and other women to the sepulchre, and with the grief of the disciples. The fragment closes as follows: But we, the twelve disciples of the Lord, wept and were grieved; and each one, being grieved for that which was come to pass, departed to his home. But I, Simon Peter, and Andrew my brother, took our nets and went to the sea; and there was with us Levi, the son of Alphaeus, whom the Lord

The writers peculiar point of view is clear from the quotations which have been given. (1) The most noticeable feature of the Gospel is its pronounced apologetic interest, shown in its friendliness to Pilate and its antipathy to the Jews. Pilate is freed from all blame in the death of Christ, Herod being the responsible judge; Joseph, who cared for the body of Jesus, is the friend of Pilate. Pilate, too, is represented as acknowledging the Divine dignity of Jesus. On the other hand, the Jews acknowledge their sin in putting Jesus to death, and confess Him to have been a just man. The writers fierce hatred of the Jews is betrayed in the utterance ascribed to the Jewish authorities, that they would rather be guilty of the greatest sin than fall into the hands of men. (2) The Docetic sympathies of the writer, which are somewhat guarded, are revealed in the statement that Jesus kept silence on the cross, as in no wise feeling pain; in the cry of dereliction, which points to a distinction between the impassible Divine Power residing in Jesus and His passible human nature; in the representation of Christs death as a being taken up. That the Docetism was not of an extreme type is shown by the fact that the dead Christ is referred to as the Lord. Gnostic influences are discernible in the speaking of the cross, and in the supernatural height of Jesus and the angels.

The Gospel is of the Synoptic type. It has close linguistic and material relations with the Synoptics, although there are many deviations in order and detail. There is a considerable probability that the author knew and made use of all our canonical Gospels, which he treated with great freedom, embellishing the narrative in the interest of his own point of view, and making additions of a legendary and highly miraculous character. That he had an independent tradition at his command is possible, and even probable (? ancient Acts of Pilate); but whether that be so or not, his Gospel adds nothing to our knowledge of the life of Christ. It appears to be a fair example of what may be called the second generation of non-canonical narratives, which are based upon the earlier and authentic records, and do not yet depart very widely from them, though they may have special tendencies in various doctrinal directions (Kenyon, Gospels in the Early Church, 34).

The date of the Gospel is about the middle of the 2nd cent., although some critics put it considerably earlier. Its place of origin was almost certainly Syria.

Literature.Bouriant, Mmoires publis par les membres de la mission archologique franaise an Caire, ix. i. 137 ff.; Harnack, TU [Note: U Texte und Untersuehungen.] ix. 2; Zahn, Das Evangelium des Petrus; von Schubert, Die Komposition des pseudopetr. Evangeliumfragment, (translation by Macpherson); Lods, Levangile et lapocalypse de Pierre; Robinson and James, Gospel and Revelation of Peter; Swete, Gospel of St. Peter; also editions by Rendel Harris, the author of Supernatural Religion, Rutherford (extra volume of Ante Nicene Library); Stlcken in Hennecke, NT Apokr. 27 ff. Handb. 72 ff.; and numerous magazine articles.

A. 4. Faym Gospel Fragment.A number of papyri were, in the year 1882, brought from Faym, a province in Central Egypt, to Vienna, by the Archduke Rainer. Among these, Dr. Bickell of Innsbrck discovered a small Gospel fragment, dealing with the incident in which Jesus foretold the denial of Peter. The fragment, which is badly mutilated, was published in 1885 by Bickell, who confidently maintained that it was a part of a very ancient lost Gospel, of the class referred to in Luk 1:1. The contents of the fragment closely resemble the Synoptic narrative (Mar 14:27; Mar 14:29-30, Mat 26:31; Mat 26:33-34), with the omission of the verse containing Christs promise to go before His disciples into Galilee after rising from the dead. Owing to the condition of the papyrus, the text, especially at the beginning of the fragment, is very uncertain; but, according to the reconstruction of Zahn (NT Kan. ii. 785), the translation is as follows:

[When then had sung a hymn, after] supper, according to their custom, He said again. This night ye shall be offended, according to the Scripture, I will smite the shepherd, and the sheep shall be scattered. But when Peter said, Even if all (shall be offended), I will not, He said, To-day before the cock crow twice, thou shalt deny Me thrice.

The nature of the document to which the fragment originally belonged is altogether uncertain. Bickells opinion, that it is a part of a Gospel of high antiquity, has received the support of Harnack, who inclines to regard it as an excerpt from either the Gospel according to the Hebrews or the Gospel according to the Egyptians (TU [Note: U Texte und Untersuehungen.] v. 4. 493 ff., Chron. i. 590). On the other hand, Zahn believes it to be an extract from a Patristic writing, a free quotation from Mark made by a preacher or by the writer of a book for edification. This would satisfactorily account for the omission of Mar 14:28, (Mat 26:32). That the fragment probably belonged to a writing of this kind is further borne out by two striking deviations from the Synoptic phraseology. Instead of (cock) the fragment has the more classical ; instead of the colourless (crow) it has the more descriptive word . The probability is that the canonical expression is the original, which a preacher replaced in the one case by a more elegant word, in the other by one more significant (Zahn, NT Kan. ii. 788). Hennecke (NT Apokr. 9) thinks it possible that the fragment may have been a part of a collection of sayings, but subscribes to Krgers judgment, that the possibility is not excluded that the fragment merely represents an extract from one of our Gospels, or belonged to a Gospel harmony, perhaps even is drawn from a homily, and that one is not justified in drawing far-reaching conclusions from it.

Literature.Bickell in Zeitschrift fr Kathol. Theologie, 1885, iii. 498 ff.; Harnack, Zahn, Hennecke (in opp. cit.).

A. 5. Oxyrhyncus Gospel Fragment.In the year 1903 Messrs. Grenfell and Hunt discovered at Behnesa, the ancient Oxyrhyncus, in Central Egypt, a small portion of a Gospel containing the conclusion of a discourse by Jesus similar to a part of the Sermon on the Mount. This they published, along with a second collection of Sayings, in the following year. The papyrus is in a very broken state, only a small part of that which it originally contained being decipherable. From the handwriting the discoverers adjudge the fragment to have been written not later than a.d. 250, although the original composition was much earlier.

The translation of the fragment, slightly altered from that given by Grenfell and Hunt (New Sayings, 40), is as follows:

[Take no thought] from morning until even, nor from evening until morning, either for your food what ye shall eat or for your raiment what ye shall put on. Ye are far better than the lilies which grow but spin not. Having one garment, what do ye [lack?] Who could add to your stature? He Himself will give you your garment. His disciples say unto Him, When wilt Thou be manifest to us, and when shall we see Thee? He saith, When ye shall be stripped and not be ashamed. He said, The key of knowledge they hid: they entered not in themselves, and to them that were entering in they opened not; but ye, be ye wise as serpents and harmless as doves.

The sayings here given are, for the most part, parallel to passages found in Matthew and Luke, in a form generally somewhat shorter than the canonical version. Christs answer to the question of the disciples as to when He should manifest Himself, When ye shall be stripped and not be ashamed , recalls the saying reported in the Gospel according to the Egyptians: When ye trample upon the garment of shame, etc., and suggests the conclusion that the fragment stood in intimate relation with that Gospel. The simpler form of the saying in the fragment, and the more direct allusion to Gen 3:7, point to an earlier date than that of the version in the Gospel according to the Egyptians. Though it is possible that the fragment represents a tradition independent of the Synoptics, it is more probable that the Gospel to which it belonged worked up the material found in Matthew and Luke into new combinations, and added matter drawn from other sources.

The date of the Gospel was probably somewhat earlier than the middle of the 2nd century.

B. Heretical and Gnostic Gospels.Only a few of the more important Gnostic Gospels are referred to in this article. Many are known to us by name merely, or by some indication of the circles in which they were current. Although the Gnostics repudiated the canonical Apostolic writings, they sought in many instances to secure authority for their Gospels by attributing them to Apostles or to others well known in Apostolic times. Besides those mentioned below, there were Gospels of Matthias, of Bartholomew, of Andrew, of Barnabas; and even the name of Judas Iscariot was associated with the authorship of the Gospel. Gnostic Gospels sometimes bore the name of the founder of the school (Valentinus, Basilides, Cerinthus), but in these cases the writer of the Gospel claimed to have received his information from some Apostle or follower of an Apostle. OT names were also attached to some Gospels; Epiphanius (Hr. 26. 2) refers to a Gospel of Eve. For whatever knowledge we have of these Gospels, readers are referred to Hofmanns article (PRE [Note: RE Real-Encyklopdie fur protest. Theologic und Kirche.] 3 [Note: designates the particular edition of the work referred] , i. 661 ff.) or to Taskers article (l.c. 437 f.).

B. 1. Gospel of Marcion.Shortly before the middle of the 2nd cent., Marcion, a native of Pontus, settled in Rome, where he devoted himself to the work of purifying the Church from all Jewish influences. The underlying principle of his system was the conception of the absolute antagonism between the God of the OT and the God of the NT. Only in Christ was the true God made known. He, accordingly, rejected the OT, and prepared for the Churches which he founded a canon of NT writings, divided into the Gospel and the Apostle. The original Apostles, he maintained, had misunderstood the teaching of Christ; only Paul had grasped the true significance of the gospel. Into his canon he admitted ten Epistles of Paul, largely expurgated, and one Gospel, which he claimed to be the Pauline Gospel ( , Rom 2:16). This Gospel, according to the testimony of early Church writers, was the Gospel of Luke, from which great omissions had been made to free it from all Jewish colouring. All citations from the OT were cut out, and everything else which looked with favour on the Jews. From the quotations given by Tertullian, Epiphanius, and others, it is possible to reconstruct Marcions Gospel. The whole of the Infancy narrative, the Baptism, and the Temptation were omitted, nothing of the first three chapters in Luke being retained but the chronological notice in 3:1. The history of Jesus commences with 4:14, and from that point to the end of the Gospel larger or smaller portions are excised, amounting in all to over 120 verses. Among the passages excluded are the parables of the Prodigal Son and of the wicked Husbandmen. In all, including the omissions of the first three chapters and part of the fourth, we find that Marcions Gospel was shorter than Lukes by fully 300 verses.

Against all Patristic testimony some critics (Semler and Eichhorn in the 18th cent., Baur, Ritschl, and Schwegler in the 19th) maintained the priority of Marcions Gospel to that of Luke. The traditional view was, however, so completely vindicated by Hilgenfeld and Volkmar, that Ritschl retracted. In our own country, somewhat later, the battle was refought, with the same result. The author of Supernatural Religion revived the theory of Marcions originality, and called forth a reply by Dr. Sanday (Gospels in the Second Century, ch. viii.), in which he conclusively proved, to the satisfaction of his opponent, that Lukes Gospel was from one hand, the same characteristics of style being evident in Marcions Gospel and in the sections of Luke not found in it.

Where the text of Marcion differs from Luke, there is evidence in some cases to show that the variance is due, not to any arbitrary change made by Marcion in the interest of his peculiar views, but to the copy of the Third Gospel which lay before him. The readings of Marcion thus deserve consideration in the study of Textual Criticism.

Literature.Zahn, NT Kan. i. 674 ff., ii. 409 ff.; Sanday, Gospels in the Second Century, ch. viii., art. Luke, Gospel of (Hasting’s Dictionary of the Bible iii. 168 f.); Salmon, Introd. to NT, 186 ff.; Westcott, Canon of NT, 314 ff.

B. 2. Gospel of the Twelve Apostles.Among the heretical attempts to write the history of Jesus, Origen in his Homily on Luk 1:1 ff. mentions the Gospel of the Twelve Apostles ( ). That this Gospel is the same as one which Epiphanius (Hr. 30. 3) describes as The Gospel according to Matthew in use among the Gnostic Ebionites, is clear from the fact that in the opening passage quoted by Epiphanius we have the call of the twelve Apostles, of whom Matthew is specially addressed (and thee, Matthew, I called, while thou wast sitting at the seat of custom). Epiphanius further states that the Ebionites called their Gospel The Gospel according to the Hebrews, a reference which may rest on a confusion on the part of Epiphanius (as Harnack thinks), but more probably is quite accurate. Nothing seems more likely than that the Gnostic Jewish-Christian sect, acquainted with the tradition that Matthew wrote his Gospel in Hebrew, should have claimed that their Gospel was the genuine Gospel of Matthew, and, accordingly, the true Hebrew Gospel (Hennecke, NT Apokr. 24). If this be so, we have an explanation of the error into which Jerome fell when he identified the Gospel according to the Hebrews with the Gospel according to the Apostles in use among the Nazarenes (circa (about) Pelag. iii. 2). That these two Gospels were entirely different is apparent from the widely divergent accounts of the Baptism,the one incident, common to both, described in their extant fragments.

All that remains of the Gospel of the Ebionites is found in Epiphanius (Hr. 30, 13, 14, 16, 22). The Gospel opens with the ministry of the Baptist: It came to pass in the days of Herod, the king of Judaea, that John came baptizing with the baptism of repentance in the river Jordan. Then somewhat abruptly, after the manner of the Fourth Gospel, Jesus is introduced in the midst of the narrative dealing with the Baptist. There was a certain man named Jesus (and He was about thirty years old), who chose us. An account of the calling of the Apostles follows, special emphasis being laid on the call of Matthew. Then the broken thread of the narrative is again taken up. And John was baptizing, and Pharisees came out to him and were baptized, and all Jerusalem. His food was wild honey, the taste of which was the taste of manna, like a honey-cake in oil. In the narrative of Christs baptism which follows, three voices come from heaven; the first, Thou art My beloved Son, in Thee I am well pleased, being repeated for the benefit of the Baptist, This is My beloved Son, etc.; the second is addressed to Christ, I have this day begotten Thee. Another fragment describes the incident recorded in Mat 12:47-50 in words which vary only very slightly from the canonical version. Characteristic of the teaching of the Gospel are the two remaining fragments: I am come to destroy sacrifices, and except ye cease from sacrificing, wrath will not cease from you; and Surely I have in no wise desired to eat flesh at this passover with you.

The tendency of the Gospel is characteristically Ebionitic. All that is reported of Jesus is in harmony with the views of the Gnostic Ebionites (Elkesaites), who combined the old Jewish-Christian belief in Jesus as a mere man, anointed to be Messiah through the descent of the Spirit at baptism, with the doctrine of a heavenly Christ, who wanders over the common earth among men, like a strange guest from heaven, in order that He may lead into His eternal kingdom all that is spiritual and pure in this impure material world (Hennecke, 25). The matter-of-fact way in which Jesus is introduced in the Gospel (there was a certain man named Jesus) points to the view that of Himself Jesus was nothing to the members of this sect, but only became significant as the object of faith through the descent of the heavenly Christ. The ascetic (vegetarian) views of the Ebionites and their hatred of sacrifices of blood are manifest in the fragments. In accordance with his vegetarian sympathies, the author removes locusts () from the Baptists diet, and by way of compensation states that the honey which he ate tasted like honey-cake () in oil. The play on the words and shows that our Greek Gospels, and not a Hebrew original, lay before the writer.

The author in the composition of his work made use of the canonical Gospels in a free and clumsy manner. The narrative of the Baptism, in particular, is extremely awkward and badly told. No scruples deterred the writer from changing the words of Christ to the directly opposite sense by the simple insertion of a negative (I have in no wise desired to eat this passover-flesh with you; cf. Luk 22:15).

The date of the Gospel is late in the 2nd cent.; Zahn puts it at 170; Harnack not earlier than 180, and perhaps as late as the beginning of the 3rd cent.

Literature.Credner, Beitrge, i. 332 ff.; Hilgenfeld, NT extra can. iv. 33 ff.; Zahn, NT Kan. ii. 724 ff.; Harnack, Gesch. d. altchr. Litt. i. 205 ff., Chron. i. 625 ff.; Meyer in Hennecke, NT Apokr. 24 ff., Handb. 42 ff.

B. 3. Gospel of Thomas.A single citation from a Gnostic Gospel of Thomas is given by Hippolytus (Philos. v. 7), who states that he found it in a writing in use among the Naassenes: He who seeks me shall find me in children from seven years old; for there concealed in the fourteenth aeon I shall be made manifest. Origen (Hom. in Luc. i. 1) speaks of a Gospel of Thomas; and a Gospel bearing that name is placed by Eusebius (Historia Ecclesiastica iii. 25. 6) among heretical writings. Cyril of Jerusalem (Cat. iv. 36), referring to spurious and noxious Gospels, mentions a Gospel according to Thomas written by the Manichaeans; and in another passage (Cat. vi. 31) he warns all against reading it, as it is written not by an Apostle, but by one of the three evil disciples of Manes. The Decretum Gelasii condemns a Gospel of Thomas which was used by the Manichaeans. In what relation (if any) the Manichaean Gospel stood to the Gnostic Gospel, referred to by Hippolytus, is indiscoverable, as no fragment of the former is known. That the Gnostic Gospel bears some relation to the Childhood Gospel of Thomas is practically certain from what we know of the latter, and from the character of the passage cited by Hippolytus. There are indications in the Childhood Gospel which point to a Gnostic origin; and this being the case, if the two Gospels were entirely independent, it would be nothing less than marvellous that, while the one is composed of narratives of Christs childhood, the only fragment preserved of the other should contain a cryptic utterance of Christ about children. (See below, C. (a) 2, where also literature will be found).

B. 4. Gospel of Philip.A solitary fragment of this Gospel is preserved in Epiphanius (Hr. 26. 13), who states: The Gnostics cite a Gospel, forged in the name of Philip the holy Apostle, as saying:

The Lord revealed to me what the soul must say in ascending to heaven, and how she must answer each of the upper powers: I have known myself and gathered myself from all quarters, and I have borne no children to the Archon [the ruler of this world], but I have rooted up his roots and gathered the scattered members, and I know who thou art. For I am one of those who are from above. And so she is released. But if one be found who has borne a son, she is kept below until she is able to recover her own children and to educate them for herself.

The Coptic Gnostic writing, the Pistis Sophia, bears witness to the existence in the 3rd cent. of the Gospel of Philip in Gnostic circles in Egypt. It is there stated: And when Jesus had made an end of speaking these words, Philip leaped up and stood, and laid down the book which was in his hand, for he it is who writes all things which Jesus said and did (Harnack, Gesch. d. altchr. Litt. i. 14). It is clear from this notice, as well as from the passage quoted by Epiphanius, that the contents of the Gospel of Philip were not of the same character as those of the canonical Gospels, but were of an esoteric nature, revelations of hidden truth purporting to have been communicated by the Risen Lord. The extreme Encratite views of the Gnostic writer are apparent; the assertion of the soul that on earth it has abstained from marriage, is the only passport into heaven.

The Gospel of Philip belongs to the large class of Gnostic writings well described as Gospel-Apocalypses, which owed their origin to the peculiar conception which the Gnostics entertained regarding the person of Christ. The true Saviour was not the earthly Jesus, but the heavenly Christ who sojourned in Him, and who was fully liberated for the work of salvation by the Resurrection. Salvation consisted in freeing the souls of men from the dominion of the God of this world, by the communication of the heavenly knowledge (Gnosis); and this knowledge was revealed by Christ as a mystery to His Apostles, partly in parables whose meaning was hid from the common crowd, partly in a secret tradition given after the Resurrection. The true gnosis was reserved for the small number of , whose spirit was derived from the upper world, and who, when purified from their connexion with the earth, returned into the kingdom of light. These views are clearly reflected in the fragment of the Gospel of Philip.

The date of the Gospel is towards the end of the 2nd century.

LiteratureHarnack, Altchr. Litt. i. 14 f., Chron. i. 592 f.; Zahn, NT Kan. ii. 761 ff.; Hennecke, NT Apokr. 40, Handb. 91.

C. Supplemental Gospels, Written to Throw Light on the Dark Parts of Christs History

(a) Gospels of the Childhood, together with Those Dealing with the Parents of Jesus

C. (a) 1. Protevangelium of James.This writing, dealing with the history of Mary and the Infancy of Jesus, was first published in the West in a Latin translation by the French humanist Postellus about the middle of the 16th century. Some years later the Greek text was issued by Michael Neander. The title Protevangelium (Earliest Gospel) occurs for the first time, so far as we know, in the edition of Postellus; the writing itself claims to be, not a Gospel, but a history. (The History of James concerning the birth of the All-Holy Mother of God, or something similar, is the title in the MSS [Note: SS Manuscripts.] . See Tischendorfs Evang. Apocr. 1). It is not improbable that the name Protevangelium was given by Postellus himself, who had an extremely high opinion of the book. In earlier times it is never referred to as a Gospel, save in the lists of spurious writings condemned by ecclesiastical authority in the 4th and 5th cents.: cetera autem (evangelia), quae vel sub nomine Matthiae sive Jaeobi minoris non solum repudianda, verum etiam noveris esse damnanda (Decree of Innocent i., a.d. 405). The person referred to as the author (I, James, wrote this history) was in early times universally believed to be the Lords brother, the head of the Church at Jerusalem. The true author is unknown.

The earliest certain reference to the Protevangelium occurs in Origen (middle of 3rd cent.), who states that many, on the authority of the Book of James (and the Gospel of Peter), believed the brothers of Jesus to have been the sons of Joseph by a former marriage. Allusions to details mentioned in the Gospel are found (c. 200) in Clement of Alexandria (Strom. vii. 16. 93), and (c. 140) in Justin Martyr (Dial. 78; 100, Apol. 33); these, however, do not necessarily point to dependence on the Protevangelium, but may have been, and in Justins case probably were, drawn from floating tradition. Zahn dates the writing in the early decades of the 2nd cent.; but most scholars place it later, in the second half of the century.

In its present form the Protevangelium narrates the childlessness of Joachim and Anna, the shame and reproach that fell upon them on that account, and the birth of Mary in answer to their prayer (chs. 15). When Mary is three years old, she is taken to the temple, where she lives until her twelfth year, being fed by the hand of an angel (chs. 7, 8). The priests then consult as to what they should do with her, and are instructed by an angel, in answer to prayer, to summon the widowers of the people, each with a rod in his hand, that God may give a sign whose wife she should be (ch. 8). Joseph attends in obedience to the summons, and is marked out for the charge of the virgin of the Lord by a dove coming out of his rod and alighting on his head. Joseph would fain refuse, because he has children and is an old man; but, being solemnly charged by the priest, he takes Mary to his house and immediately leaves home on business (ch. 9). Thereafter, the priests, desirous of having a veil made for the temple, summon the undefiled virgins of the family of David, and among them Mary, who is chosen by lot to spin the true purple and the scarlet. With these she returns home (ch. 10). While drawing water at the well, she hears a voice pronouncing her blessed. When she returns, trembling, to the house, an angel appears to her as she sits spinning, and announces that she will conceive by the power of the Lord (ch. 11). Then follows the narrative of the visit to Elisabeth, at the close of which it is stated that she was sixteen years old when these mysteries happened (ch. 12). Joseph now returns from his work of building, and, on seeing her state, reproaches her (ch. 13). An angel of the Lord appears to him and informs him of the mystery (ch. 14). Joseph is accused of defiling the virgin of the Lord; and when both he and Mary proclaim their innocence, they are compelled to drink the water of ordeal, and are unhurt (chs. 15, 16). When the imperial decree of enrolment is issued, Joseph sets out to Bethlehem with Mary. On the way, near to Bethlehem, her days are fulfilled; Joseph leads her into a cave, and, leaving his two sons with her, goes to seek a woman to attend her (ch. 17). [At this point the narrative changes suddenly from the third person to the first: And I, Joseph, was walking, and was not walking]. Joseph sees the whole of Nature standing still; birds and sheep and men are motionless, a sudden arrest having been put upon their movements (ch. 18). A woman is found, who enters the cave, which is illumined by a dazzling light; the light gradually decreases, and the infant is seen, who takes the breast from his mother. Another woman, Salome, appears, and is incredulous when she is told of the virgin-birth; she seeks a proof, and her hand burns as with fire, but is restored when she touches the infant (chs. 19, 20). [The impersonal narrative is now resumed]. The visit of the Magi is next described in language very similar to that in Matthew (ch. 21). Herod, learning that he has been mocked by the Magi, orders the massacre of children under two years. Mary hides her child in an ox-stall (ch. 22). The rest of the narrative deals with John the Baptist and Zacharias. Zacharias, because he will not reveal where his son is concealed, is murdered in the temple. His body miraculously disappears, but his blood is found turned into stone (chs. 2224). The narrative ends with a thanksgiving of James for having received the gift and wisdom to write the history (ch. 25).

There is a general agreement that the Protevangelium, as it has come down to us, is not in its original shape. The group of incidents dealing with Zacharias and John the Baptist are in no way essential to the authors purpose; they are indeed irrelevant and disturbing. An ancient apocryphal writing, of which Zacharias was the subject, is known to have existed; and it seems highly probable that part of this was awkwardly appended to the original Book of James. This happened, there is ground for believing, in the 5th century. That it did not form a part of the original writing finds some support in the fact that Origen, who refers to the Protevangelium, gives a different account of the death of Zacharias. There is considerable difference of opinion as to whether the rest of the book is the work of one author. The abrupt introduction of Joseph, speaking in the first person (chs. 1820), gives convincing evidence that that section is not from the hand of the writer of the Gospel, although that by no means implies that it was introduced into his history by another. Harnack believes that the original Book of James did not contain this narrative by Joseph; but if so, it was a singularly aimless piece of writing, stopping short of the consummation which gives the whole early history of Mary significance, and to which that history manifestly looks, namely, her giving birth to Jesus in virginity. We conclude that the Apocryphum Josephi (as Harnack calls it) was incorporated in his work by the author himself, and that not unskilfully, reference being found in it to details which had been already related. In the section dealing with Marys connexion with the Temple, there are also signs of different sources. It is noticeable that, when Mary leaves the Temple under the care of Joseph, she is represented as being twelve years old; on the other hand, it is said that at the time of her pregnancy she was sixteen years old, although it is clear, from the main scheme of the narrative, that the conception took place soon after her departure from the Temple, during Josephs absence from home on business. It is more than probable that we have a combination of two accounts telling of Marys association with the Temple, one narrating her residence there until she was twelve years of age, the other representing her as I being brought, when she was sixteen, to spin material for the temple veil, because she was of the family of David. There is no reason, however, for supposing that these different traditions were combined by any one else than the author of the history.

With the exception of the Zacharias group of incidents, the Protevangelium is a well-designed unity, a skilfully constructed romance, in which the author, with the help of material lying ready to his hand, achieved to his own satisfaction the definite purpose which he had in view. What this purpose was it is not difficult to divine. It was to defend the orthodox conception of Christs person against a double attack, and to give an answer to those who taunted Christians with the lowly if not shameful birth of Jesus. Accordingly, Mary was represented as of royal descent, the daughter of a wealthy man, brought up in the pure atmosphere of the Temple; that was a sufficient answer to every calumny about her character, and to every sneer about her humble rank. Against the Gnostic view that Jesus, in being born of Mary, did not partake of her human nature, it was enough to mention that the infant took the breast from His mother. The whole strength of the author was, however, devoted to safeguarding the Divinity of Jesus against Jewish-Christian misconceptions. That end, he conceived, could be best attained by exalting the person of Mary, by revealing her as one who, from birth to womanhood, had retained an absolute purity and virginity. She was born, in answer to prayer, to parents who had long been childless; she was brought up in the Temple, and fed on heavenly food; in virginity she conceived by the power of the Lord; in virginity she gave birth; in virginity she remained to the end. At every stage her virginity is raised above suspicion; the drinking of the water of the ordeal guarded her virginity in conception; the witness of Salome established it in the birth; while the statement, given under the authority of James, that the brethren of Jesus were sons of Joseph by a former wife, was sufficient to remove any doubts of her virginity to the last.

The author of the Protevangelium, it is clear, was no Jewish Christian. His ignorance of Jewish usages is notably betrayed in the representation of Mary as a temple-virgin (an unheard of thing among the Jews), and in the water of the ordeal being administered to Joseph (see Numbers 5). The Hebraistic colouring is due to the sources which the writer used. In certain of the incidents he is influenced by OT narratives (birth and dedication of Samuel, Aarons rod, etc.), which he doubtless read in the Greek version. The canonical accounts of the Annunciation and Nativity have been largely drawn upon. Conradys views, that the Protevangelium was the source of Matthew and Luke (Die Quelle d. kan. Kindheitsgeschichten), and that it was originally written in Hebrew (SK [Note: K Studien und Kritiken.] , 1889, p. 728 ff.), have received no support. The former view Hennecke characterizes as kritische Geschmacklosigkeit.

The Protevangelium was condemned by the Western Church in the decrees of Damasus (382), Innocent 1. (405), and Gelasius (496). Popular Christianity, however, demanded something in the place of that which had been forbidden, and letters were forged, one to Jerome from the bishops Chromatius of Aquileia and Heliodorus of Altinum, the other the answer of Jerome, from which it appeared that the learned Father had acceded to the bishops request to translate into Latin the original Hebrew Matthew. This explains the appearance of The Gospel of pseudo-Matthew, which freely worked over the contents of the Protevangelium, gave an account of the Flight to Egypt and the miracles wrought on the way, and added narratives drawn from the Childhood Gospel of Thomas. A detail, which is frequently represented in Christian art,the ox and the ass at the manger,appears for the first time in this Gospel. The veneration of Mary, which received an impulse in the Protevangelium, has now grown to greater proportions; she is glorified as the Queen of the Virgins, and her holy, nun-like manner of life is dwelt upon at considerable length. The date of ps.-Matt. is 6th century.

The Gospel of the Nativity of Mary, also connected with Jerome by another forged letter, covers the same ground as the Protevangelium (with the exception of the Zacharias legend). The aim of the book is to exalt Mary as the spotless virgin; after her betrothal to Joseph she does not go home with him, but returns to her parents house. There she receives the angels message. The Gospel closes with the bare mention of the birth of Jesus. This new recension of the Protevangelium was doubtless due to an orthodox revulsion of feeling against the somewhat coarse and extravagant nature of pseudo-Matthew. The date is probably late in the 6th century.

Literature.Hilgenfeld, Einleitung, 152; Tischendorf, Evangelia Apocr. xiixxii; Zahn, NT Kan. i. 914 f., ii. 774 ff.; Harnack, Altchr. Litt. i. 19 ff., Chron. i. 598ff.; von Lehner, Die Marienverehrung, 223 ff.; Conrady (works cited above); Mrs. Lewis, Apocrypha: Protevang. Jacobi (Studia Sinaitica, xi); Meyer in Hennecke, NT Apokr. 47ff., Handb. 106ff.; Tasker, l.c.; translation in Ante-Nicene Library, vol. xvi., Cowper, Orr (NT Apocr. [Note: Apocrypha, Apocryphal.] Writings), etc.

C. (a) 2. Childhood Gospel of Thomas.This Gospel, which deals with the marvellous events of Christs childhood, was widely read in early times in all branches of the Christian Church. In its present form it does not claim to be a Gospel; it is generally referred to as Incidents in the Lords Childhood. There is everything, however, in favour of the view that the original form of the writing was a Gospel in use in Gnostic circles, referred to by Origen and Hippolytus (see B. 3). Besides the appropriateness of the citation of Hippolytus to a Childhood Gospel, the relation between the two writings is supported by a statement in Irenaeus (i. 20. 1) that the followers of the Gnostic Marcus had in their apocryphal books a story of Jesus as a boy putting His schoolmaster to confusion. This incident is found described twice over in the Childhood Gospel of Thomas. If the Gospel of Thomas, mentioned by Nicephorus in his Stichometry (date uncertain, 6th8th cent.) as containing 1300 stichoi, had any relation with that known to us, the copy which lay before him was more than twice as long as the longest now extant.

The external evidence, then, converges on the view that our present Gospel was a compilation of stories drawn from a longer Gospel, which originated in Gnostic circles, the parts which were undisguisedly Gnostic in tone being omitted. This conclusion is confirmed by the character of the Gospel itself. A few Gnostic traces still remain, notably in the mysterious symbolism of the letters of the alphabet. The extraordinary miracles attributed to the child Christ, and His astonishing knowledge, were no doubt interpreted by Gnostics in a way to lend support to their own views. For them the worth of these miracles lay in the proof, which could be drawn from them, that Christ did not belong to this world, that even as a child He was raised beyond human development and limitation, to that as a child He could teach every human teacher (Meyer in Henn. 64). The fragment in Hippolytus (quoted in B. 3) may have been a Gnostic utterance of the child Christ.

The figure of Jesus in this Gospel is a melancholy and hateful caricature of the grace, simplicity, and obedience of the Holy Childhood. The miracles which the child Christ is described as working are, for the most part, deeds of malevolence, or marvels without any ethical meaning. To the latter class belong His making birds of clay and causing them to fly; His carrying water from the well in His cloak after breaking the pitcher; to the former, His passionate vengeance on a boy who accidentally ran against Him, and was laid dead on the spot; the cursing of His teacher, who fell down in a swoon. The painful impression made by His petulant and vengeful spirit is not sensibly relieved by an occasional miracle of healing. His bearing and conduct are those of a spoilt and impudent child; in two instances He takes Joseph to task for venturing to correct Him. A single extract will enable the reader to form some idea of the youthful Gnostic at school. A teacher, Zacchaeus by name, approaches Joseph, offering to teach Jesus letters, and how to greet His elders respectfully, and how to love those of His own agemuch needed lessons! This is how Jesus profits by His attendance at school. He looked upon His teacher Zacchaeus, and said to him: Thou, who knowest not the nature of the A, how canst thou teach others the B? Thou hypocrite! first teach the A if thou canst, and then we shall believe thee about the B. Then He began to question the teacher about the first letter, and he was unable to answer Him. In the hearing of many the child says to Zacchaeus: Hear, O teacher, the disposition of the first letter, and observe how it has straight lines and a middle stroke which crosses those which thou seest to belong to one another; (lines) which go together, raise themselves, wind round in a dance, move themselves, and go round again, which are composed of three signs, are of similar nature, of the same weight, of the same size. Thou hast the lines of the A. How vast is the gulf separating this absurd and pretentious display from the simple story of Christ among the doctors in the Temple! Here a forward and unbearably conceited boy, who is ready to teach his elders; there a child with the fresh wonder of lifes greatness in his heart, eager to learn, ready to obey.

Many of the stories here narrated of Christ have their origin in folk-lore and mythology. Similar stories are told of Krishna and Buddha. But in all countries the popular imagination has home unconscious witness to mans greatness by its delight in tales of wonder-children. Legends of this nature were laid hold of by the Gnostics, and used in the interest of their peculiar speculations about Christ. The wonder-child becomes a Gnostic, who looks down on the unspiritual world, and, in particular heartily despises the religion of the Jews (Meyer in Henn. 65) Apart from the speculations with which they were burdened, these stories took hold of the popular imagination in orthodox circles. The craving for the marvellous proved stronger than the sense of what was fitting in Jesus; and the silence of Christs childhood, which had been regarded as an evidence of His true humanity, became thronged with silly and repulsive exhibitions of power and knowledge, which were believed to be signs of His Divine dignity.

In its present form the Childhood Gospel of Thomas cannot be older than the 3rd century. The Gospel exists in several recensions, which vary considerably in length.

Literature.Tischendorf, Evang. Apocr. xxxvi ff.; Zahn, NT Kan. i. 515, 539, 802, ii. 768 ff.; Harnack, Altchr. Litt. i. 15ff., Chron. i. 593ff.; Bost, Les vang. apocr. de lenfance de Jsus Christ; Conrady, Das Thomasevangelium, SK [Note: K Studien und Kritiken.] , 1903, p. 377ff.; Meyer in Hennecke, NT Apokr. 63ff., Handb. 132ff.; Wright, Contributions to the Apocr. [Note: Apocrypha, Apocryphal.] Literature of the NT; Cowper, Orr (opp. citt.).

C. (a) 3. Arabic Gospel of the Childhood.This is a late composition, in which are worked up the materials of the earlier Childhood Gospels. The compiler has also added many legends of a wildly fantastic and highly miraculous nature. One or two examples may suffice to show the character of the greater portion of the book. The Magi receive from the Lady Mary, as a souvenir of their visit to Bethlehem, one of the swaddling bands in which the infant Jesus was wrapped. On their return home they show their trophy to the assembled kings and princes. A feast is held, and a fire is lighted, which the company worships. The swaddling band is thrown into the fire, and, when the fire had burned itself out, it is found unharmed. Whereupon the cloth is laid up with great honour in the treasure house. Again, the water in which the infant Jesus is washed has a marvellous virtue, and children whose bodies are white with leprosy are cleansed by bathing in it. A young man who by witchcraft had been changed into a male, is restored to human form by Marys placing Jesus on the mules back.

This Gospel was the main source of the knowledge of Jesus among the Mohammedans. For their edification, Kessaeus incorporated its stories, with much embellishment, in his history of patriarchs and prophets.

Literature.Tischendorf, Evang. Apocr. [Note: Apocrypha, Apocryphal.] ; Thilo, Codex Apocr. [Note: Apocrypha, Apocryphal.] NT; Walker, (Ante-Nicene Library, vol. xvi.); Tasker (l.c.); Meyer in Hennecke, Handb. 102.

C. (a) 4. History of Joseph the Carpenter.In Egypt, where feast-days were multiplied to celebrate events or to commemorate persons held in high esteem by the Church, the History of Joseph was written for the purpose of being read on 20th July, the alleged day of Josephs death. The narrative is placed in the mouth of Jesus, who discourses to His disciples on the Mount of Olives. After an introductory address, which has passages reminiscent of the Psalms, the Gospels, and St. Pauls Epistles, the life of Joseph is shortly described, in which evident use is made of the Protevangelium or one of its sources (Apocryphum Josephi). The circumstances attending the death of Joseph are described at great length. We are told of his dread of death; we listen to a bitter lament for his sins (among them his venturing to correct Jesus as a child), and to a prayer to be delivered from the demons of darkness who lie in wait for his soul. When Death approaches with his dread retinue, Jesus drives them back. In answer to His prayer, Michael and Gabriel carry off the spirit of Joseph to the dwelling place of the pious. Thereafter Christ comforts the mourners, and Himself bewails the death of Joseph. It is plain, from this survey of the contents of the book, that its purpose was less to give the history of Joseph than to recommend Christianity as the deliverer in the extremity of death, and to teach the true Christian art of dying (Meyer in Henn. Handb. 103).

The history, in all probability, was written in Coptic. Recensions of it in the Bohairic and Sahidic dialects exist, the latter fragmentary (Forbes Robinson, Coptic Apocryphal Gospels, 130 ff.). There is also an Arabic text, first printed in 1722.

Tischendorf puts the date of the history in the 4th century.

Literature.Tischendorf, Meyer, Forhes Robinson (opp. citt.).

C. (a) 5. The Departure of Mary.The growing veneration of Mary in the Church led to the invention of incidents in her life parallel to those in the life of Christ. This was the motive that gave rise to the Departure of Mary (Transitus Mari), otherwise known as the (the Falling Asleep), Dormitio, Assumptio. As Christ had risen from the dead and ascended into heaven, so must Mary have risen and ascended. The story runs as follows:

One day, when Mary, according to her custom, had gone to the holy tomb of our Lord to burn incense and pray, the archangel Gabriel announces her approaching death, and informs her that, in answer to her request, she shall go to the heavenly places to her Son, into the true and everlasting life. On her return home she prays, and all the Apostlesthose who are already dead and those still aliveare gathered to her bedside at Bethlehem. The Apostles narrate how they were engaged when the summons came to them. The heavens are filled with hosts of angels; miracles of healing happen, and the sick crowd to the house. The Jews endeavour to seize Mary; but the Apostles, carrying the couch on which the Lady, the mother of God, lay, are borne on a cloud to Jerusalem. Here Christ appears to her, and in answer to her request declares; Rejoice and be glad, for all grace is given to thee by My Father in heaven, and by Me, and by the Holy Ghost; whoever calls on thy name shall not be put to shame, but shall find comfort and support both in this world and in that which is to come, in the presence of My heavenly Father. Then, while the Apostles sing a hymn, Mary falls asleep. She is laid in a tomb in Gethsemane; for three days an angel-choir is heard glorifying God, and when they are silent all know that her spotless and precious body has been transferred to Paradise.

In this story, which has had a remarkable influence in the Roman Catholic Church, we have the clear signs of an advanced stage of the worship of the Virgin. Prayer to her is here enjoined; and the tendency disclosed, to find parallels between her life and the life of Christ, marks a definite stage of the movement which eventually made her a sharer in the work of redemption. The epithet (mother of God), which was first applied to Mary by Cyril of Jerusalem (beginning of 4th cent.), and played so large a part in the Nestorian controversy (from a.d. 428), occurs in this writing.

The Transitus was written at the close of the 4th cent. In the Gelasian Decree (496) it was included among those apocryphal writings which are non solum repudiata, verum etiam ab omni Romana catholica et apostolica ecclesia eliminata atque cum suis auctoribus auctorumque sequacibus sub anathematis indissolubili vinculo in aeternum damnata. In spite of this the writing maintained its place, and by the 6th cent. it was held in the highest honour. It was in later days ascribed to Melito of Sardis (c. 170), and even to the Apostle John. Versions of it, in longer and shorter forms, are extant in Greek, Latin, Arabic, Coptic, and Syriac.

Literature.Tischendorf, Wright, Forbes Robinson, Orr (opp. Citt.); Mrs. Lewis, Apocrypha (Stud. Sinaitica, xi.).

(b) Gospels Dealing with the Passion and the Post-resurrection Life of Jesus

C. (b) 1. The Gospel of Nicodemus.This Gospel, dealing with the Trial, Death, and Resurrection of Jesus, and with His Descent into Hades, is a combination of two earlier writings(1) Acta Pilati, and (2) Descensus Christi ad inferos. The older Greek MSS [Note: SS Manuscripts.] contain only (1) with an independent conclusion, while there are clear signs that the compiler had not thoroughly mastered all his material. The earliest form is found in a Latin version, probably of the 5th or 6th cent.; but it was not until the 13th cent. that the name of Nicodemus was associated with it. The writing claimed to have been written in Hebrew by Nicodemus, and to have been translated into Greek by Ananias or aeneas Protector.

The contents of the Gospel are as follows:

(1) Jesus is accused by the Jews. Pilate orders Jesus to be brought before him. The messenger, by Pilates instructions, shows Jesus great respect. As Jesus enters the judgment-hall, the tops of the Roman standards bow down before Him (ch. 1). The charge that Jesus was born of fornication is disproved (ch. 2). Pilate privately examines Him,the passage is based on Joh 18:30-38,and declares Him not worthy of death (chs. 3, 4). Various witnesses, among them Nicodemus and some who had been healed by Jesus, come forward and speak on His behalf (chs. 58). The Jews choose Barahbas instead of Jesus, and are reproached for their ingratitude by Pilate. Pilate washes his hands, and suffers Jesus to be led forth to crucifixion (ch. 9). Then follows an account of the crucifixion and burial, based on Luke 23 (chs. 10, 11). Joseph of Arimathaea is put into prison by the Jews for burying Jesus, but is miraculously delivered (ch. 12). The guards at the sepulchre report the resurrection to the Sanhedrin, and are bribed to say that the disciples stole the body (ch. 13). A priest, a scribe, a Levite from Galilee bear witness to Christs ascension; they are charged to keep silent, and are sent back to Galilee (ch. 14). On the proposal of Nicodemus, search is made for Jesus, but conclusive evidence is once more given of His ascension (chs. 15, 16).

(2) This purports to have been written down by Carinus and Leucius, sons of the aged Simeon, who had been raised from the dead by Jesus (ch. 17). A purple royal light appears in Hades; John the Baptist announces the near approach of Christ to visit those sitting in darkness and the shadow of death (ch. 18). Seth tells of his prayer for oil from the tree of mercy to heal his father, and of Michaels promise that he should receive it when the Son of God came to earth (ch. 19). A conversation takes place between Satan and Tartarus, who dread Christs coming (ch. 20). The summons is made (Psa 24:7) in a voice of thunder to grant Jesus admission: Satan and Tartarus are powerless to exclude Him (ch. 21). Satan is delivered into the power of Hades, who reviles him vehemently, and consigns him to everlasting torment (chs. 22, 23). All the saints are gathered to Christ, and with them He comes up from the powers below (ch. 24). The archangel Michael leads all the saints to Paradise, where they converse with Enoch and Elias and the penitent thief (chs. 25, 26). Having finished their writing, Carinus and Leucius are transfigured and vanish. Joseph and Nicodemus report everything to Pilate, who draws up an account of all that had been done and said concerning Jesus by the Jews, and places it in the public records of his praetorium (ch. 27). [In some MSS [Note: SS Manuscripts.] two other chapters are added: ch. 28 incorporates a Jewish chronology from Adam to Christ, which Annas and Caiaphas acknowledge, in Pilates presence, to be a proof that Jesus was the long-promised Saviour; ch. 29 gives a letter from Pilate to Claudius, dealing with the cruel condemnation, crucifixion, and resurrection of Christ].

The first part of the Gospel of Nicodemusthe Acts of Pilateexists in various recensions, the earliest of which cannot be much older than the beginning of the 5th century. The question, however, is raised by references in Justin and Tertullian, whether these Acts are not based on much older documents. In his first Apology (ch. 35) Justin, after describing the crucifixion of Jesus, declares: And that these things happened, one may learn from the Acts drawn up under Pontius Pilate; and again (ch. 48), when speaking of miracles which Jesus wrought, he adds a like testimony. Moreover, Tertullian in two passages (Apol. 5 and 21) speaks of a report sent to Tiberius by Pilate dealing with Christ; and in the latter passage, after giving a brief account of Christs life and a detailed description of His death, resurrection, and ascension, he states: Pilate, who in his heart was already a Christian, reported all these things about Christ to Tiberius, who was emperor at that time. Many scholars believe that the report referred to by Tertullian is preserved in the Letter of Pilate to Claudius (ch. 29 of the Gospel of Nicodemus). On the other hand, Harnack holds the Letter to be later than Tertullian (Chron. i. 607 ff.). On the ground of Justins references, Tischendorf (Evang. Apoer. lxiv), followed by Hofmann (PRE [Note: RE Real-Encyklopdie fur protest. Theologic und Kirche.] 3 [Note: designates the particular edition of the work referred] i. 659), dates our extant Acts of Pilate in the 2nd century. Lipsius (Die Pilatusakten, 14 ff.), however, Harnack (Chron. i. 610 ff.), and others believe that Justin had no knowledge of any Acts of Pilate, and simply assumed their existence; while von Schubert, followed by Stlcken (Henn. Handb. 146 f.), maintains that Justin was acquainted with Acts of Pilate which probably formed the basis of the present Acts. The question is an intricate one, and cannot be fully discussed here. Tischendorfs conclusion may, however, safely be set aside. Harnack bases his judgment mainly on the ground that, if Justin had had any real knowledge of Acts of Pilate dealing with the facts which he narrates, he would have quoted from them, while, as a matter of fact, his quotations are from the Prophets and the Gospels. Against this it must, however, be urged that, if Justin had not had some definite knowledge to go upon, he would never have dared in an address to the Emperor to ground his case on documents which presumably were in the public archives. The present writer inclines to the view that Acts of Pilate, at least believed to be genuine, were in existence in the 2nd cent., and that our present Acts were influenced by them. Whether the 2nd cent. Acts were based on any authentic report by Pilate, it is impossible to say.

It is clear that the Acta Pilati in their present form are largely dependent on the canonical Gospels, and that many of the additions are fabrications put forward for apologetic reasons. The aim of the writer is to furnish convincing proof of the truths of Christianity; what could better serve his purpose than to show Pilate on the side of Christ, and to narrate incidents touching Christs resurrection which not even His enemies could challenge? Heathen aspersions on the birth of Jesus are also disposed of by evidence given at His trial.

The second part of the GospelThe Descent into Hadesrepresents in a developed form the tradition, early and widely accepted, which was based on 1Pe 3:19 (He went and preached unto the spirits in prison). Earlier traces of the same tradition are found in the Gospel of Peter (And they heard a voice from heaven, saying, Hast Thou preached to them that sleep? And a response was heard from the Cross, Yea), and in the Legend of Abgar.

The Gospel of Nicodemus was taken up by Vincent de Beanvais in his Speculum Majus and by Jacobus de Voragine in his Aurea Legenda, and through these works it exerted a far-reaching influence.

Literature.Tischendorf, Evang. Apocr. [Note: Apocrypha, Apocryphal.] liv ff.; Lipsius, Die Pilatusakten, Apokr. Apostelgeschichten; von Schubert, Die Composition des ps.-petr. Evangeliumfragment; Harnack, Altchr. Litt. i. 21 ff., Chron. i. 603 ff.; von Dobschutz, Zeitschr. f. NT Wissenschaft (1902), 89 ff., Hasting’s Dictionary of the Bible iii. 544 ff.; Mommsen, Zeitschr. f. NT Wiss. (1902) 198 ff.; Kruger, Gesch. d. altchr. Litt. 36; Stulcken in Hennecke, NT Apokr. 74 ff., Handb. 143 ff.

C. (b) 2. The Legend of Abgar.In Eusebius (Historia Ecclesiastica i. 13. 6 ff.) we find letters purporting to have passed between Abgar v. king of Edessa, and Jesus. Eusebius states that the letters were preserved in the royal archives, and gives a literal translation of them from the Syriac. Abgar, who was suffering from an incurable disease, having heard of Christs wonderful power of healing, wrote, entreating Christ to come and cure him, and offering Him a residence in Edessa, where He would be safe from the malice of the Jews. Jesus replied that He must accomplish His mission and ascend to Him who had sent Him, but that after His ascension He would send one of His disciples, who would cure the king and bring life to him and all who were with him. Then follows an account, also translated from the Syriac, of the fulfilment of Christs promise in the sending by the Apostle Thomas of Thaddaeus, one of the Seventy, to Edessa.

The legendary character of the correspondence is beyond all doubt, although its genuineness was accepted by Eusebius, and has been defended by several scholars, among them Cureton and Phillips in England (see Phillips, Addai the Apostle, ix ff.). It had its origin some time after the introduction of Christianity into Edessa (c. 170), owing to a desire to have an Apostolic foundation for the Church. The date of it is probably the second half of the 3rd century.

The correspondence and the narrative of Addais mission found a place, with many additions, in the Syriac Teaching of Addai, which dates from about 400. The legend had a wide influence, and found credence in all sections of the Church, notwithstanding the doubts expressed regarding it in the Gelasian Decree; a Greek recension of itthe Acts of Thaddaeuscontains in addition the story of the portrait of Jesus miraculously stamped on a napkin. See also art. Abgar.

The legendary letter of Christ was in widespread favour as a talisman to guard against dangers of all kinds. For this purpose it was placed at the city gate of Edessa and at the doors of private houses. Up to quite recent times copies of the letter were to be found framed in the houses of the peasantry in England (see Donehoo, Apocryphal and Legendary Life of Christ, 223).

Literature.Lipsius, Die edessenische Abgarsage, 1880, Die apokr. Apostelgeschichten, ii. 2. 178 ff.; Zahn, Forschungen, i. 350 ff., NT Kan. i. 369 ff.; Tixront, Les origines de lglise ddesse, 1888; Harnack, Altchr. Litt. i. 533ff.; Kruger, Altchr. Litt. 228 f.; Phillips, Doctrine of Addai the Apostle, 1876; Stlcken in Hennecke, NT Apokr. 76 ff., Handb. 153 ff.

D. Gospel Harmonies, in Which Several Gospels Are Worked Together into One

D. Gospel of Tatian.The Gospel of Tatian, better known as the Diatessaron,* [Note: Diatessaron ( ) is variously interpreted. The expression is generally regarded as signifying a compilation in which only the four Gospels were used; but as the word was in use as a musical terminus technicus to denote a harmony, Tatian might have employed it as a description of his work, no matter how many Gospels he had drawn upon (Hamlyn Hill, Earliest Life, 21; Julicher, Einleitung, 391 f.).] was a Harmony of the four Gospels, in all likelihood written originally in Syriac for the use of the Church at Edessa. The author of the Harmony was a disciple of Justin Martyr in Rome; but, being condemned for heretical views, he returned to his native land in the valley of the Euphrates about the year 172. Between that date and the close of the 2nd cent. his patchwork Gospel was written, in which, using the chronological scheme of the Fourth Gospel, he wove into a connected narrative the four different accounts of our Lords life. It is doubtful whether, before the appearance of the Diatessaron, the four Gospels circulated separately in the Syrian Church; but however that may be, it was clearly Tatians intention to provide a Gospel for popular use which should obviate the disadvantages of having the narrative of Christs life in different forms.* [Note: To distinguish it from the fourfold form of the Gospel (Evangelion da-Mepharreshe, the Gospel of the Separated), the Diatessaron received the name of Evangelion da-Mehallete, the Gospel of the Mixed).] The evidence goes to show that the Diatessaron was in general use in the Syrian Church up to the beginning of the 5th cent. In the Teaching of Addai (e. 400) we read that a large multitude of people assembled day by day and came to the prayer of the service, and to the reading of the Old and New Testament, of the Diatessaron, etc. (Phillips, Addai the Apostle, 34). In the middle of the 4th cent. Ephraem used the Diatessaron as the basis of his famous commentary on the Gospels. But from the 5th cent. onwards Tatians Gospel was displaced from public worship by the new translation of the separate Gospels made under Rabbla,the Peshitta, the Syriac Vulgate,although, largely owing to the commentary of Ephraem, it continued to be read and to exert an influence for many centuries later.

Neither the Diatessaron nor the commentary of Ephraem has been preserved to us in the original Syriac. There are, however, Latin and Arabic versions of the Diatessaron, and two distinct Armenian versions of Ephraems commentary. For the reconstruction of the text of the Diatessaron, Ephraems commentary is of the highest value, and the work has been brilliantly executed by Zahn (Forschungen, i.). Unfortunately, while the Latin and Arabic versions keep Tatians arrangement of the narrative, they are of no value for the restoration of the text. The Latin Harmony (Codex Fuldensis), which belongs to about the beginning of the 6th cent., gives throughout the text of the Vulgate; while the Arabic version, which was originally made in the 11th cent., is evidently a translation from a text of the Diatessaron which had been accommodated to the Peshitta. In the 9th cent. an epic poem entitled Hliand was written, based on a translation of the Codex Fuldensis. It became widely known, and to it our Anglo-Saxon forefathers were largely indebted for their knowledge of the life of Christ (Hamlyn Hill, op. cit. 20, 38).

In accordance with Tatians peculiar views, the Diatessaron reveals a slight Encratite tendency. According to Theodoret (Hr. Fab. i. 20), it omitted the genealogies of Christ and everything dealing with Christs birth (all things that show our Lord to have been born of the seed of David according to the flesh). The Birth-narratives of Luke and Matthew are, however, found in the Arabic and Latin recensions, as well as in Ephraems commentary.

Literature.Zahn, Forschungen, i. ii. iv. vii.; Ciasca, Tatiani Evangeliorum Harmoniae, Arabice; Harnack, Altchr. Litt. i. 485 ff., Chron. i. 284 ff.; TU [Note: U Texte und Untersuehungen.] i. i. 196 ff., art. in Encyc. Brit.9 [Note: designates the particular edition of the work referred] ; Burkitt, S. Ephraims Quotations from the Gospel (cf. also his Evangelion da-Mepharreshe); Rendel Harris, The Diatessaron of Tatian; Hamlyn Hill, Earliest Life of Christ; Hemphill, The Diatessaron, etc.; Stenning in Hasting’s Dictionary of the Bible , Ext. Vol. 451 ff.

A. F. Findlay.

Fuente: A Dictionary Of Christ And The Gospels