The Books of the New Testament | Page 8

Oracles of the Lord. It may be regarded
as almost certain that the word "Oracles" signifies written Gospels, just
as in the New Testament the word signifies the written documents of
the Old Testament. He mentions Gospels written by St. Matthew and St.
Mark, and we know from Eusebius that he made use of 1 John. It is
deeply to be regretted that we only have {14} a few remaining
fragments of the writings of this early bishop, who was acquainted with
men who knew our Lord's disciples. In the letters of St. Ignatius, the
martyred Bishop of Antioch, A.D. 110, we find signs of acquaintance
with Matt. and John. The Epistle written by St. Polycarp to the
Philippians soon after the death of St. Ignatius contains quotations from
Matt. and Luke, and the quotations in it from 1 John almost certainly
imply the authenticity of St. John's Gospel, as it is impossible to
attribute the Epistles to any writer except the writer of the Gospel. The
Didaché, about A.D. 100, shows acquaintance with Matt. and Luke,
and contains early Eucharistic prayers of which the language closely
resembles the language of St. John. The Epistle of Barnabas, probably
about A.D. 98, contains what is probably the oldest remaining
quotation from a book of the New Testament. It says, "It is written,
Many called, but few chosen," which appears to be a quotation from
Matt. xxii. 14. The Epistle of St. Clement of Rome, written to the
Christians of Corinth about A.D. 95, is full of the phraseology of St.
Paul's Epistles, but contains nothing that can be called a direct
quotation from our Gospels. But it does contain what are possibly
traces of the first three Gospels, though these passages are perhaps
quoted from an oral Gospel employed in the instruction of
catechumens.
We must conclude that, considering what a large amount of early
Christian literature has perished, the external evidence for the
authenticity of our Gospels is remarkably strong. They are genuine
writings of the apostolic age, and were received by men whose lifetime
overlapped the lifetime of some of the apostles. In the early Christian
literature which remains, there is much which lends support to the

authenticity of the Gospels, and nothing which injures a belief in that
authenticity. And there are strong reasons for thinking that in the early
Christian literature which has perished, there was much which would
have made a belief in their authenticity quite inevitable.
It would be an aid to modern study if we could be certain {15} when
and where the four Gospels were put together in one canon. In the 4th
and 5th centuries it was believed by some Christians that the collection
had been made at Ephesus by St. John himself, and that he had prefixed
the names of the writers to the Gospels when he published his own
Gospel. It is at present impossible to discover how far this supposed
fact is legendary or not, but modern criticism has done something to
corroborate the idea that the Gospels were really collected first in Asia
Minor, and if St. John did not make the collection himself, it was
probably made by his disciples soon after his death.
[Sidenote: Their Diversity.]
If we compare the four Gospels together, it is as plain as daylight that
there is a marked difference between the first three Gospels on the one
hand and the fourth Gospel on the other hand. The first three Gospels
are usually called the Synoptic Gospels, because they give us one
synopsis or common view of our Lord's work. To a great extent they
record the same events and the same discourses, and in many passages
they express themselves in almost identical words. The account which
they give of our Lord's work is mostly confined to His ministry in
Galilee, the birthplace of our religion, and it includes only one visit to
Jerusalem. But St. John's Gospel differs widely in language from the
other Gospels, and also gives an account of no less than five visits to
Jerusalem, and chiefly describes the scenes connected with our Lord's
ministry in Judaea. Whereas our first three Gospels can be
appropriately printed in three parallel columns, the greater part of St.
John's Gospel cannot be appropriately placed by the side of the other
three. Another most important difference is that St. John's Gospel is
marked by a tone and teaching which are seldom to be found in the
Synoptic Gospels. The difference was well expressed by Clement of
Alexandria, who calls the Synoptic Gospels bodily and St. John's

Gospel spiritual; and by Theodore of Mopsuestia, who says that St.
John declared that "doubtless it was not right to omit {16} the facts told
with regard to the sojourn of Christ in the flesh, but neither