The Ignatian Epistles Entirely Spurious | Page 9

quite as well supported by the
authority of versions and manuscripts. It may be thus rendered: "Ye
wrote to me, both ye yourselves and Ignatius, suggesting that if any one
is going to Syria, he might carry thither my letters to you." [23:1] The
sentence, as interpreted by the advocates of the Ignatian Epistles, wears
a strange and suspicious aspect. If Ignatius and the Philippians wished
their letters to be carried to Antioch, why did they not say so? Syria was
an extensive province,--much larger than all Ireland,--and many a
traveller might have been going there who would have found it quite
impracticable to deliver letters in its metropolis. When there was no
penny postage, and when letters of friendship were often carried by
private hands, if an individual residing in the north or south of the
Emerald Isle had requested a correspondent in Bristol to send his letters
by "any one" going over to Ireland, it would not have been
extraordinary if the Englishman had received the message with
amazement. Could "any one" passing over to Ireland be expected to
deliver letters in Cork or Londonderry? There were many places of note
in Syria far distant from Antioch; and it was preposterous to propose
that "any one" travelling to that province should carry letters to its
capital city. No one can pretend to say that the whole, or even any
considerable part of Syria, was under the ecclesiastical supervision of
Ignatius; for, long after this period, the jurisdiction of a bishop did not
extend beyond the walls of the town in which he dwelt. If Ignatius
meant to have his letters taken to Antioch, why vaguely say that they
were to be carried to Syria? [24:1] Why not distinctly name the place of
their destination? It had long been the scene of his pastoral labours; and
it might have been expected that its very designation would have been
repeated by him with peculiar interest. No good reason can be given
why he should speak of Syria, and not of Antioch, as the place to which
his letters were to be transmitted. Nor is this the only perplexing
circumstance associated with the request mentioned in the postscript to

this letter. If the Philippians, or Ignatius, had sent letters to Polycarp
addressed to the Church of Antioch, was it necessary for them to say to
him that they should be forwarded? Would not his own common sense
have directed him what to do? He was not surely such a dotard that he
required to be told how to dispose of these Epistles.
If we are to be guided by the statements in the Ignatian Epistles, we
must infer that the letters to be sent to Antioch were to be forwarded
with the utmost expedition. A council was to be called forthwith, and
by it a messenger "fit to bear the name of God's courier" [25:1] was to
be chosen to carry them to the Syrian metropolis. There are no such
signs of haste or urgency indicated in the postscript to Polycarp's
Epistle. The letters of which he speaks could afford to wait until some
one happened to be travelling to Syria; and then, it is suggested, he
might take them along with him. If we adopt the reading to be found in
the Latin version, and which, from internal evidence, we may judge to
be a true rendering of the original, we are, according to the
interpretation which must be given to it by the advocates of the Ignatian
Epistles, involved in hopeless bewilderment. If by Syria we understand
the eastern province, what possibly can be the meaning of the words
addressed by Polycarp to the Philippians, "If any one is going to Syria,
he might _carry thither my letters to you_"? [26:1] Any one passing
from Smyrna to Philippi turns his face to the north-west, but a traveller
from Smyrna to Syria proceeds south-east, or in the exactly opposite
direction. How could Polycarp hope to keep up a correspondence with
his brethren of Philippi, if he sent his letters to the distant East by any
one who might be going there?
It is pretty evident that the Latin version has preserved the true original
of this postscript, and that the current reading, adopted by Dr. Lightfoot
and others, must be traced to the misapprehensions of transcribers.
Puzzled by the statement that letters from Polycarp to the Philippians
were to be sent to Syria, they have tried to correct the text by changing
[Greek: par haemon] into [Greek: par humon]-- implying that the letters
were to be transmitted, not from Polycarp to the Philippians, but from
the Philippians to Antioch. A very simple explanation may, however,
remove this whole difficulty. If by Syria we understand, not the great

eastern province so called, but