xv. 4_b_. For θανάτῳ τελευτάτω, Syr^{cu} has נתקטל, evidently in accordance with Exod. xxi. 17. In the Arabic Diatessaron (§ 20, 23) the second half of this verse seems to be replaced by Mark vii. 10_b_. After “morte moriatur” in this passage, Ephraem adds “et qui blasphemat Deum _crucifigatur_,” which Zahn (_Forsch._, i. 157) thinks he must have found in his original. This apocryphal addition, which has no other testimony than that of Ephraem, does not seem to Zahn like a passage that had been afterwards removed from the text of the New Testament with complete success (_Forsch._, i. 241). The correct explanation of the words is given by Harris: they are the Peshitto rendering of Deut. xxi. 23. Compare Driver’s _Deuteronomy_ on the passage, and the reference there made to Lightfoot’s _Galatians_ (Extended Note on iii. 13, ninth edition, p. 152 f.). Symmachus also renders the words: “propter blasphemiam Dei suspensus est,” while Onkelos says על דחב קרם יי אצטליב, and Siphre מביגי שקלל את השם. This should be noted in connection with Matt. xxvi. 65, and still more so with John xix. 7. The only passage usually cited there is Levit. xxiv. 16, according to which Jesus should have been _stoned_. Our commentators pass too hastily over the question why the Jews insisted on crucifixion instead of stoning. xvi. 18_b_, 19. So far as the criticism of the text is concerned, there is no occasion for entering on the discussion whether this passage, like the one resembling it in xviii. 15-18, is original or not. There may, however, be cases in which one cannot overlook the fact that where the “lower” criticism ends the “higher” begins. Compare, on the one side, Zahn, _Forsch._, i. 244 ff., and on the other, Resch, _Logia_, p. 55; _Paralleltexte_, ii. 187-196, 441. xvi. 22. The peculiar reading, “compatiens,” which is found in the Arabic Tatian (J. H. Hill, p. 137, § 23. 42: Zahn, _GK._, ii. 546), and which Sellin has also traced in Ephraem, is now explained by the Syr^{sin} of Mark viii. 32: see my note in Lewis, _Some Pages_, p. xiii. The very same play upon the words חוס, “to pity,” and חס, “to be far from,” is found as late as in the _Histoire de Mar-Jabalaha, de trois autres patriarches_, ed. Bedjan, 1895, p. 407, line 14; p. 408, line 4. For a moment I thought of ὀργισθεὶς and σπλαγχνισθείς in Mark i. 41. xviii. 7. The Dictum Agraphum τὰ ἀγαθὰ ἐλθεῖν δεῖ, μακάριος δὲ δι’ οὗ ἔρχεται, which, according to the _Clementine Homilies_ (xii. 29), ὁ τῆς ἀληθείας προφήτης ἔφη, was known also to Ephraem (_cf._ Zahn, _Forsch._, i. 241 f. on § 50. 4). An exact parallel to this “harmless expansion of the canonical text” is seen in the form which Matt. xii. 36 assumed in Codex C of the Palestinian Syriac Evangeliarium: that “for every _good_ word that men do _not_ speak they shall give account” (see Lewis, _In the Shadow of Sinai_ (1898), pp. 256-261; and thereon, _ThLz._, 1899, col. 177).