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THE GOSPELS IN THE SECOND CENTURY


_AN EXAMINATION OF THE CRITICAL PART OF A WORK
ENTITLED 'SUPERNATURAL RELIGION'_


BY

W. SANDAY, M.A.


_Rector of Barton-on-the-Heath, Warwickshire;
and late Fellow of Trinity College, Oxford.
Author of a Work on the Fourth Gospel._




LONDON:
1876.





_I had hoped to inscribe in this book the revered and cherished
name of my old head master, DR. PEARS of Repton. His consent had
been very kindly and warmly given, and I was just on the point of
sending the dedication to the printers when I received a telegram
naming the day and hour of his funeral. His health had for some
time since his resignation of Repton been seriously failing, but I
had not anticipated that the end was so near. All who knew him
will deplore his too early loss, and their regret will be shared
by the wider circle of those who can appreciate a life in which
there was nothing ignoble, nothing ungenerous, nothing unreal. I
had long wished that he should receive some tribute of regard from
one whom he had done his best by precept, and still more by
example, to fit and train for his place and duty in the world.
This pleasure and this honour have been denied me. I cannot place
my book, as I had hoped, in his hand, but I may still lay it
reverently upon his tomb._





CONTENTS

CHAP.

I.    INTRODUCTORY

II.   ON QUOTATIONS GENERALLY IN THE EARLY CHRISTIAN WRITERS

III.  THE APOSTOLIC FATHERS

IV.   JUSTIN MARTYR

V.    HEGESIPPUS--PAPIAS

VI.   THE CLEMENTINE HOMILIES

VII.  BASILIDES AND VALENTINUS

VIII. MARCION

IX.   TATIAN--DIONYSIUS OF CORINTH

X.    MELITO--APOLLINARIS--ATHENAGORAS--THE EPISTLE OF VIENNE AND LYONS

XI.   PTOLOMAEUS AND HERACLEON--CELSUS--THE MURATORIAN FRAGMENT

XII.  THE EXTERNAL EVIDENCE FOR THE FOURTH GOSPEL

XIII. ON THE STATE OF THE CANON IN THE LAST QUARTER OF THE SECOND CENTURY

XIV.  CONCLUSION

[ENDNOTES]

APPENDIX. SUPPLEMENTAL NOTE ON THE RECONSTRUCTION OF MARCION'S GOSPEL

INDICES





PREFACE.


It will be well to explain at once that the following work has
been written at the request and is published at the cost of the
Christian Evidence Society, and that it may therefore be classed
under the head of Apologetics. I am aware that this will be a
drawback to it in the eyes of some, and I confess that it is not
altogether a recommendation in my own.

Ideally speaking, Apologetics ought to have no existence distinct
from the general and unanimous search for truth, and in so far as
they tend to put any other consideration, no matter how high or
pure in itself, in the place of truth, they must needs stand aside
from the path of science.

But, on the other hand, the question of true belief itself is
immensely wide. It is impossible to approach what is merely a
branch of a vast subject without some general conclusions already
formed as to the whole. The mind cannot, if it would, become a
sheet of blank paper on which the writing is inscribed by an
external process alone. It must needs have its _praejudicia_--
i.e. judgments formed on grounds extrinsic to the special matter
of enquiry--of one sort or another. Accordingly we find that an
absolutely and strictly impartial temper never has existed and
never will. If it did, its verdict would still be false, because
it would represent an incomplete or half-suppressed humanity.
There is no question that touches, directly or indirectly, on the
moral and spiritual nature of man that can be settled by the bare
reason. A certain amount of sympathy is necessary in order to
estimate the weight of the forces that are to be analysed: yet
that very sympathy itself becomes an extraneous influence, and the
perfect balance and adjustment of the reason is disturbed.

But though impartiality, in the strict sense, is not to be had,
there is another condition that may be rightly demanded--resolute
honesty. This I hope may be attained as well from one point of
view as from another, at least that there is no very great
antecedent reason to the contrary. In past generations indeed
there was such a reason. Strongly negative views could only be
expressed at considerable personal risk and loss. But now, public
opinion is so tolerant, especially among the reading and thinking
classes, that both parties are practically upon much the same
footing. Indeed for bold and strong and less sensitive minds
negative views will have an attraction and will find support that
will go far to neutralise any counterbalancing disadvantage.

On either side the remedy for the effects of bias must be found in
a rigorous and searching criticism. If misleading statements and
unsound arguments are allowed to pass unchallenged the fault will
not lie only with their author.

It will be hardly necessary for me to say that the Christian
Evidence Society is not responsible for the contents of this work,
except in so far as may be involved in the original request that I
should write it. I undertook the task at first with some hesitation,
and I could not have undertaken it at all without stipulating for
entire freedom. The Society very kindly and liberally granted me
this, and I am conscious of having to some extent availed myself
of it. I have not always stayed to consider whether the opinions
expressed were in exact accordance with those of the majority of
Christians. It will