I. _The Problem of the Three Recensions._--The Ignatian problem arises from the fact that we possess three different recensions of the Epistles. (a) _The short recension_ (often called the Vossian) contains the letters to the Ephesians, Magnesians, Trallians, Romans, Philadelphians, Smyrnaeans and to Polycarp. This recension was derived in its Greek form from the famous Medicean MS. at Florence and first published by Vossius in 1646 (see _Theol. Literaturzeitung_, 1906, 596 f., for an early papyrus fragment in the Berlin Museum, containing _Ad Smyrn._ iii. fin. xii. init.). In the Medicean MS. the Epistle to the Romans is missing, but a Greek version of this epistle was discovered by Ruinart, embedded in a _martyrium_, in the National Library at Paris and published in 1689. There are also (1) a Latin version made by Robert Grosseteste, bishop of Lincoln, about 1250, and published by Ussher in 1644--two years before the Vossian edition appeared; (2) an Armenian version which was derived from a Syriac not earlier than the 5th century and published at Constantinople in 1783; (3) some fragments of a Syriac version published in Cureton's edition of Ignatius; (4) fragments of a Coptic version first published in Lightfoot's work (ii. 859-882). (b) _The long recension_ contains the seven Epistles mentioned above in an expanded form and several additional letters besides. The Greek form of the recension, which has been preserved in ten MSS., has thirteen letters, the additional ones being to the Tarsians, the Philippians, the Antiochians, to Hero, to Mary of Cassobola and a letter of Mary to Ignatius. The Latin form, of which there are thirteen extant MSS., omits the letter of Mary of Cassobola, but adds to the list the Laus Heronis, two Epistles to the apostle John, one to the Virgin Mary and one from Mary to Ignatius. (c) _The Syriac or Curetonian recension_ contains only three Epistles, viz. to Polycarp, to the Romans, and to the Ephesians, and these when compared with the same letters in the short and long recensions are found to be considerably abbreviated. The Syriac recension was made by William Cureton in 1845 from three Syriac MSS. which had recently been brought from the Nitrian desert and deposited in the British Museum. One of these MSS. belongs to the 6th century, the other two are later. Summed up in a word, therefore, the Ignatian problem is this: which of these three recensions (if any) represents the actual work of Ignatius?