A Few Words About the Devil, and Other Biographical Sketches and EssaysBradlaugh, Charles
Religion
A Few Words About the Devil, and Other Biographical Sketches and Essays
Bradlaugh, Charles
Free thought
"Lebbaeus, whose surname was Thaddaeus." We are told, on this point, by
able biblicists, that the early MSS. have not the words "whose surname
was Thaddaeus," and that these words have probably been inserted to
reconcile the gospel according to Matthew with that attributed to Mark.
How good must have been the old fathers who sought to improve upon the
Holy Ghost by making clear that which inspiration had left doubtful! In
the English version of the Rheims Testament used in this country by our
Roman Catholic brethren, the reconciliation between Matthew and Mark is
completed by omitting the words "Lebbaeus whose surname was," leaving
only the name "Thaddaeus" in Matthew's text. This omission must be
correct, being by the authority of an infallible church. If Matthew x,
3, and Mark iii, 18, be passed as reconciled, although the first
calls the twelfth disciple Lebbaeus, and the second gives him the name
Thaddaeus, there is yet the difficulty that in Luke vi, 16, corroborated
by John xiv, 22, there is a disciple spoken of as "Judas, not Iscariot."
"Judas, the brother of James." Commentators have endeavored to clear
away this last difficulty by declaring that Thaddaeus is a Syriac word,
having much the same meaning as Judas. This has been answered by the
objection that if Matthew's Gospel uses Thaddæus in lieu of Judas, then
he ought to speak of Thaddaeus Iscariot, which he does not; and it is
further objected also that while there are some grounds for suggesting
a Hebrew original for the gospel attributed to Matthew, there is not the
slightest pretense for alleging that Matthew wrote in Syriac. It is to
be hoped that the unbelieving reader will not stumble on the threshold
of his study because of a little uncertainty as to a name. What is in a
name? The Jewish name which we read as Jesus is really Joshua, but the
name to which we are most accustomed seems the one we should adhere to.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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