Christianity: Its Evidences, Its Origin, Its Morality, Its HistoryBesant, Annie
Religion
Christianity: Its Evidences, Its Origin, Its Morality, Its History
Besant, Annie
Christianity -- Controversial literature
The English, as here given, represents as closely as possible both the
resemblances and the differences of the Greek text. What reader, in
reading this, can believe that Clement picked out a bit here and a bit
there from the Canonical Gospels, and then wove them into one connected
whole, which he forthwith represented as said thus by Christ? To the
unprejudiced student the hypothesis will, at once, suggest itself--there
must have been some other document current in Clement's time, which
contained the sayings of Christ, from which this quotation was made.
Only the exigencies of Christian apologetic work forbid the general
adoption of so simple and so natural a solution of the question. Mr.
Sanday says: "Doubtless light would be thrown upon the question if we
only knew what was the common original of the two Synoptic texts ... The
differences in these extra-Canonical quotations do not exceed the
differences between the Synoptic Gospels themselves; yet by far the
larger proportion of critics regard the resemblances in the Synoptics as
due to a common written source used either by all three or by two of
them" ("Gospels in the Second Century," p. 65). It is clear that Jesus
could not have said these passages in the words given by Matthew,
Clement, and Luke, repeating himself in three different forms, now
connectedly, now in fragments; two, at least, out of the three must give
an imperfect report. Mr. Sanday, by speaking of "the common original of
the two Synoptic texts," clearly shows that he does not regard the
Synoptic version as original, and thereby helps to buttress our
contention, that the Gospels we have now are not the only ones that were
current in the early Church, and that they had no exclusive
authority--in fact, that they were not "Canonical." Further on, Mr.
Sanday, referring to Polycarp, says: "I cannot but think that there has
been somewhere a written version different from our Gospels to which he
and Clement have had access ... It will be observed that all the
quotations refer either to the double or treble Synoptics, where we have
already proof of the existence of the saying in question in more than a
single form, and not to those portions that are peculiar to the
individual Evangelists. The author of 'Supernatural Religion' is,
therefore, not without reason when he says that they may be derived from
other collections than our actual Gospels. The possibility cannot be
excluded" ("Gospels in the Second Century," pp. 86, 87). The other
passage from Clement is yet more unlike anything in the Canonical
Gospels: in chap. xlvi. we read:--
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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