A Reply to Dr. Lightfoots Essays | Page 8

admitted the historic truth of all the facts contained in the canonical gospels, and used them as Scripture. For, in spite of his peculiar opinions, the testimony of Basilides to our 'acknowledged' books is comprehensive and clear. In the few pages of his writings which remain, there are certain references to the Gospels of St. Matthew, St. Luke, and St. John, &c." And in a note Dr. Westcott adds, "The following examples will be sufficient to show his mode of quotation, &c." [17:1]
Not a word of qualification or doubt is added to these extraordinary statements, for a full criticism of which I must beg the reader to be good enough to refer to Supernatural Religion, ii. pp. 41-54. Setting aside here the important question as to what the "gospel" of Basilides--to which Dr. Westcott gives the fanciful names of a "Life of Christ," or "Philosophy of Christianity," without a shadow of evidence--really was, it could scarcely be divined, for instance, that the statement that Basilides "admitted the historic truth of all the facts contained in the canonical gospels" rests solely upon a sentence in the work attributed to Hippolytus, to the effect that, after his generation, all things regarding the Saviour--according to the followers of Basilides--occurred in the same way as they are written in the Gospels. Again, it could scarcely be supposed by an ordinary reader that the assertion that Basilides used the "canonical gospels"--there certainly were no "canonical" gospels in his day--"as Scripture," that his testimony to our 'acknowledged' books is comprehensive and clear, and that "in the few pages of his writings which remain there are certain references" to those gospels, which show "his method of quotation," is not based upon any direct extracts from his writings, but solely upon passages in an epitome by Hippolytus of the views of the school of Basilides, not ascribed directly to Basilides himself, but introduced by a mere indefinite [Greek: phêsi]. [17:2] Why, I might enquire in the vein of Dr. Lightfoot, is not a syllable said of all this, or of the fact, which completes the separation of these passages from Basilides, that the Gnosticism described by Hippolytus is not that of Basilides, but clearly of a later type; and that writers of that period, and notably Hippolytus himself, were in the habit of putting, as it might seem, by the use of an indefinite "he says," sentiments into the mouth of the founder of a sect which were only expressed by his later followers? As Dr. Lightfoot evidently highly values the testimony of Luthardt, I will quote the words of that staunch apologist to show that, in this, I do not merely represent the views of a heterodox school. In discussing the supposed quotations from the fourth Gospel, which Dr. Westcott represents as "certain references" to it by Basilides himself, Luthardt says: "But to this is opposed the consideration that, as we know from Irenaeus, &c., the original system of Basilides had a dualistic character, whilst that of the 'Philosophumena' is pantheistic. We must recognise that Hippolytus, in the 'Philosophumena,' not unfrequently makes the founder of a sect responsible for that which in the first place concerns his disciples, so that from these quotations only the use of the Johannine Gospel in the school of Basilides is undoubtedly proved, but not on the part of the founder himself." [18:1]
It is difficult to recognise in this fancy portrait the Basilides regarding whom a large body of eminent critics conclude that he did not know our Gospels at all, but made use of an uncanonical work, supplemented by traditions from Glaucias and Matthias; but, as if the heretic had not been sufficiently restored to the odour of sanctity, the additional touch is given in the passage more immediately before us. Dr. Westcott conveys the information contained in the single sentence of Clement of Alexandria, [Greek: kathaper ho Basileidês kan Glaukian epigraphêtai didaskalon, h?s auchousin autoi, ton Petrou hermênea], [19:1] in the following words; and I quote the statement exactly as it has stood in my text from the very first, in order to show the inverted commas upon which Dr. Lightfoot lays so much stress as having been removed. In mentioning this fact Canon Westcott says: "At the same time he appealed to the authority of Glaucias, who, as well as St. Mark, was 'an interpreter of St. Peter.' [19:2] Now we have here, again, an illustration," &c.; and then follows the passage quoted by Dr. Lightfoot. The positive form given to the words of Clement, and the introduction of the words "as well as St. Mark," seem at once to impart a full flavour of orthodoxy to Basilides which I do not find in the original. I confess that I fail to see any special virtue in the inverted