SYNOPSIS OF LITERATURE Part I--PRIMITIVE CHRISTIANITY Chapter I--The Beginnings § 1. Documentary Clues A good introduction to the rational discussion of the whole problem of origins is furnished in Radical Views about the New Testament, by Dr. G. A. van den Bergh van Eysinga, trans. from the Dutch by S. B. Slack (R. P. A., 1912). The Unitarian view is freshly put by Wilhelm Soltau in The Birth of Jesus Christ (Eng. tr., Black, 1903). Of the countless works discussing early Christian literature and the formation of the New Testament "Canon," the following may be consulted with profit: All relevant articles in the Encyclopædia Biblica (A. & C. Black); Supernatural Religion: An Inquiry into the Reality of Divine Revelation, 6th ed. revised, 1875, two vols.; 3rd vol. 1877; R. P. A. rep. in one vol., 1902; A Reply to Dr. Lightfoot's Essays, by the same author, 1889; An Introduction to the Study of the New Testament, by Dr. Samuel Davidson, 2nd ed. revised, 1882, two vols.; The Apostolical Fathers, by Dr. James Donaldson, 1874 and later; Renan's preface to his Saint Paul, the Appendice to his L'Antéchrist, and his Les Évangiles; E. B. Nicholson's compilation, The Gospel According to the Hebrews, 1879; History of the Canon in the Christian Church, by Professor Reuss, Eng. tr. 1890; Apostolical Records of Early Christianity, by the Rev. Dr. Giles, 1886; Strauss's second Leben Jesu, tr. in Eng. (not always accurately) as A New Life of Jesus, 2nd ed. 1879, two vols.; and the old research of Lardner on The Credibility of the Gospels (Part II, ch. i to xxix in vol. ii of Works, ed. 1835) which covers the ground pretty fully, indeed diffusely. As to the Pauline epistles see Van Manen's article in the Encyclopædia Biblica, and T. Whittaker's Origins of Christianity (R. P. A., 1909). The most comprehensive account of the early sources is Harnack's Geschichte der altchristlichen Literatur bis Eusebius (1893) in two great volumes; and the still bulkier Chronologie which follows thereon. More compendious surveys are Professor Gustav Krüger's Geschichte der altchristlichen Literatur in den ersten drei Jahrhunderten, 1895; and Dr. James Donaldson's History of Christian Literature and Doctrine, three vols., 1864-66. Of real value is the survey of Professor Arnold Meyer, Die moderne Forschung über die Geschichte des Urchristentums, 1898. [The writings ascribed to the Apostolic Fathers are translated in the first volume of the "Ante-Nicene Library"; those ascribed to Justin Martyr in the second volume.] § 2. The Earliest Christian Sects