The Criticism of the Fourth Gospel THE MORSE LECTURES PUBLISHED BY CHARLES SCRIBNER’S SONS THE CRITICISM OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL. By WILLIAM SANDAY, D.D., LL.D. 8vo $1.75 _net_ THE PLACE OF CHRIST IN MODERN THEOLOGY. By A. M. FAIRBAIRN, D.D., LL.D. 8vo $2.50 THE RELIGIONS OF JAPAN. By WILLIAM ELLIOT GRIFFIS. 12mo $2.00 THE WHENCE AND THE WHITHER OF MAN. By Professor JOHN M. TYLER. 12mo $1.75 THE CRITICISM OF THE FOURTH GOSPEL EIGHT LECTURES ON THE MORSE FOUNDATION, DELIVERED IN THE UNION SEMINARY, NEW YORK IN OCTOBER AND NOVEMBER, 1904 BY WILLIAM SANDAY, D.D., LL.D., LITT.D. LADY MARGARET PROFESSOR, AND CANON OF CHRIST CHURCH, OXFORD HON. FELLOW OF EXETER COLLEGE; FELLOW OF THE BRITISH ACADEMY CHAPLAIN IN ORDINARY TO THE KING NEW YORK CHARLES SCRIBNER’S SONS 1905 TO MY AMERICAN FRIENDS PREFACE These lectures were delivered in accordance with the terms of the Morse foundation in the Union Theological Seminary, New York, between October 12 and November 4, 1904; and they were afterwards repeated, with some changes, in Oxford. I have tried to improve their form both while they were being delivered and since. But I have been content to state the case for the most part broadly and constructively, and have not (as I had at one time intended) burdened the pages with notes and detailed discussions. I am conscious of inadequate treatment throughout, but especially perhaps in Lecture VII. There has been a movement of thought going on ever since the lectures were begun; and, if I am not mistaken, the burning point of the whole controversy has come to rest more and more upon the question discussed in this lecture. But on neither side has the real issue been pressed home with any thoroughness. Critical writers are in the habit of assuming with very little proof that the theology of St. John is simply a development of that of St. Paul, and that the theology of St. Paul was from one end to the other the Apostle’s own creation. I cannot think that this is a true representation of the facts; it seems to me to ignore far too much the Mother Church and that which gave its life to the Mother Church. At the same time I am quite aware that what I have given is rather a sketch for a possible answer to this question, than a really satisfactory discussion of it. There are not wanting signs that a fuller examination of the relations between the teaching of Christ on the one hand and St. Paul and St. John on the other is the next great debate that lies before us. In this debate the question of the genuineness and authenticity of the Fourth Gospel will be but an episode.