The four Gospels examined and vindicated on Catholic principles

Preface

God speaks to man in a twofold manner, by natural reason and by supernatural revelation. Since both of these proceed from the same God, they cannot be contradictory, but the one must rather strengthen than weaken the other. From this we conclude that since it is contradictory to natural reason to hold anything to be true without sufficient evidence that it is so, all that revelation proposes to us, must be shown to possess sufficient natural evidence. This principle has, however, been frequently misunderstood or misconstrued. Some deny that matters of faith are to be examined by natural evidence, because, they say, in this manner divine faith would cease to be a virtue and a supernatural gift of God. Others, admitting the principle, misconstrue it in such a way that they draw from it the most erroneous conclusions; they say that since nothing which does not fall under the immediate human experience, or cannot be derived from the first principles of the human intellect, can be made evident to natural reason, no doctrine or fact which is incomprehensible to her, can be admitted as true by her tribunal. This is, we know, the starting point of all the different systems of rationalism and infidelity. The truth lies between the two opposite errors. To avoid them both, we must make a twofold distinction, first, between the natural conviction of the human mind and divine faith, and secondly, between direct and indirect evidence. What do we mean precisely, when we say that any thing is evident

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^9^ to natural reason ? We mean that it cannot be denied without denying at the same time the first principles of reasoning, and consequently, without overthrowing all. certitude. Hence if we are convinced by natural reason of the truth of any fact or doctrine, we rely on the first principles of the intellect, we trust to them, in a word, we believe in our own intellectual nature. But what do we mean, if we hold anything to be true by divine faith ? We believe it because God speaks directly to man and enlightens at the same time the human reason by the supernatural light of grace. The conviction, produced in this manner in the human mind, is the effect of divine operation, man only co-operating ; it is, therefore, necessarily much stronger than the mere natural conviction ; for natural reason, though infallible in its first principles, as it is the limited faculty of a finite being, is subject to the possibility of error in its operations, in the application of its first principles or the conclusions drawn from them. But in divine faith it is God Himself Who speaks to man and guides the human reason in its action by the supernatural light of grace. Hence the conviction, produced by divine faith, is a participant of the divine infallibility. Man in believing with divine faith, does not rely merely on conclusions, drawn from the first principles of reasoning, he does not seek truth by the natural power of his intellect only, but relying on the infallible word of God, he believes in Him and embraces the object of his conviction with a supernatural energy, added to the natural light of reasbn through the influence of divine grace. Natural conviction and divine faith, therefore, belong to a difi"erent order ; the one does neither exclude, nor supersede the other ; no, they go together, and the more perfect each is in its own sphere, the more perfect will be the knowledge of truth, possessed by the human mind.

Not less palpable is the error of the rationalists, in maintaining that nothing incomprehensible can become evident to human reason. In this regard we have to distinguish between

■direct and indirect evidence. Indirect evidence we call the conviction of the mind derived from the reliable testimony of others. To admit such an evidence as sufficient, is not contrary to reason, since we are compelled by the limited nature of the human mind to admit it to a great extent even in our natural knowledge. History, geography, and similar sciences would be impossible without it. All that reason requires by her internal principles in such instances is, first, that nothing is proposed to her as being true, which contradicts her own principles, and secondly, that the truthfulness of the witness or authority must be shown to her by a direct evidence, derived from her own principles. Both of these requisites are per-, fectly complied with by the divine revelation in regard to the mysteries of the christian faith. Though beyond the immediate reach of reason, they do not contradict her principles, and the authority by which these mysteries are proposed to reason, is the most reliable, it is the testimony of God, Who vouchsafed to speak by His revelation to man in such a manner, that he can know by the evidence of natural reason, that it is God Himself Who speaks to him. For this end He established a living, perpetual authority on earth, approachable by every individual, and surrounded by such naturally perceptible evidences, that each one who does not shut his eyes, may know by the mere light of natural reason its divine character. This authority is the Church of God, a city seated on the mountain, the pillar and ground of truth ; she proves her divine authority directly to reason, partly by the so-called motives of faith, partly by her divine organization and divine marks ; and this authority being once established, we have a natural and most convincing, though indirect evidence, for all her doctrines.

There is one point more, not to be overlooked in this question. Not all doctrines, or facts, proposed by divine revelation are mysteries ; many of them are not absolutely beyond the reach of reason. Man perhaps would not perceive them, at least not so distinctly without revelation, but being once proposed to him, he perceives their evidence also directly by the natural light of reason. Concerning them, it is not always necessary to establish first the divine authority of the church, and thence to derive the certainty of them ; in such questions we can arrive directly, or at least without the divine authority of the church, at an evidence perfectly satisfactory to human reason. •

Now these are the principles according to which we proceeded in this treatise on the four gospels. This, of course, is not the place to develop them perfectly in all their consequences and to establish the application of them against all possible objections; for our present purpose it will suffice to have them stated, and this the more so, as we presume that the most of our readers will admit them without any difficulty to be philosophically sound and theologically correct.

The modern literature on Scripture, and especially on the New Testament, is very extensive. The protestant theologians of Germany have published, since the second half of the past century up to the present day almost numberless productions on the holy books. We admire their learning and indefatigable labors, but alas, we must confess that the gain for true knowledge from all this learning seems to be of a very doubtful character ; for instead of having corroborated, as we might expect, by their learning the divine revelation, as far as it is contained in the sacred books, they have, on the contrary, more and more undermined all certitude about it. And why so ? They started from principles which necessarily must lead to such fatal consequences. The head-principle of protestantism, that Scripture alone is the infallible authority for man on earth, is one of them; for in order that Scripture can be considered as such an authority, it must be divinely inspired; but to prove the divine inspiration of the Scripture without another infallible authority, is impossible ; and consequently,, the doctrine of inspiration, and by this all infallible authority, has been given up by these theologians since the time of J. S. Semler. Moreover, they were all more or less imbued with the principles of modern philosophical systems of Kantianism, Fichteism, Schellingianism or Hegelianism, in consequence of which they founded quite a new science of criticism and interpretation of the Scripture, calling it the higher criticism and higher interpretation.

The foundation of this new science is very plain ; it consists in the assertion that no miracles, prophecies and mysteries in the proper sense can be admitted by the human reason. From this then they derive very strange rules of criticism and interpretation. Scripture, they assert very distinctly, is not to be considered as the collection of divinely inspired books, but the Old Testament is nothing more than a collection of the Jewish literature, and the New Testament is merely the primitive literature of the first christians. Concerning the authenticity of the several books, the interior qualities of them are decisive ; the testimonies of historical tradition are only of a subordinate weight in this question. The prophecies which refer to a determinate event in a distant time must be considered as a certain sign that the book in which they are contained, has not been written at such an early time as it claims, but later, either immediately before the stated event took place, or even after it. Therefore such books, they say, are necessarily spurious. The miracles are natural events, either misconstrued by the writer or not exactly stated ; sometimes they are invented at a later period, and therefore a sure sign that the book which relates them, is not authentic. All these points, they continue, must be kept well in sight, not only by the critic, but also by the interpreter of the holy books. Moreover, the scientific interpreter must know, that the passages quoted in the N. T., by Christ and the apostles, from the Old Testament, are not used in their true and proper sense, but as they were understood by the Jews at that time, following an erroneous system of interpretation. The doctrines of faith must be subjected to philosophy, therefore only those can be admitted as sound, which are in accordance with the progress of the modern philosophy. All the rest must be rejected as a part of the erroneous opinions of the age in which the book has been written. These are the leading points of this new science. Whosoever feels any desire to know more about them, will be amply satisfied in reading J. G. Eichhorn's Introduction into the Old Testament, vol. I, 62, or his Allgemeine Bibliothek der biblischen Literatur, vol. 4, p. 251-353, vol. 5, p. 207.

Applying these rules to the gospels in particular, there are, according to this new science, four different methods of interpretation and explanation to be distinguished; the first of them is named the historical method, and was adopted by J. S. Semler and Eichhorn. They say that Christ and the apostles accommodated themselves in their doctrine to the prevailing opinions of their age. Hence all that the gospels in any way have in common with Philo of Alexandria, Josephus Fl. or the Talmud, is by no means to be considered as their real doctrine, and must, therefore, be thrown oif as rubbish, to find under it the pure and genuine christian doctrine. As far as they pretended to explain the gospels by means of historical researches, they called their method the historical ; but certainly, its proper name would be the method of a weak-minded accommodation. Immanuel Kant thought to have found another straight path to arrive at the true sense of the holy books. According to his philosophy, man is not enabled to know any thing of God but by his sense of morality. The moral doctrines, therefore, form, according to Kant, exclusively the doctrine of the true religion. Hence all doctrines Avhich do not contain a moral instruction, are of no avail and must be rejected as empty speculations of the age. This became for a while the most popular manner of explaining the Scripture. It is no doubt the easiest ; for there is no great learning required, but only a sound moral sense to arrive at the true meaning of the sacred books ; and who will be so low-minded as to doubt that he possesses this qualification ? — Nevertheless this method became soon rather tedious and disgusting to the common sense of the human mind.

Is it not absurd to speak of a building without foundation, or of a tree without roots ? The same are moral instructions without dogmatical foundation. Hence a new method was invented by Professor Paulus of Heidelburg, who rode, as a writer says, the gray horse of rationalism for more than half a century, without moving from the spot. He improved the first method by the supposition that the miracles mentioned in the Scripture are nothing else but natural events, transformed into miracles by psychological illusions. The man languishing thirty-eight years labored under a fixed, false apprehension ; he believed himself to be sick without being so; Christ perceiving this cured him by charging him severely to get up, take his bed and go home. When we read that Peter found a stater in the mouth of the fish, this means nothing more but that he sold the fish for a stater. No doubt this method is the most amusing on account of its overflowing absurdity; but probably for this very reason it had also for a while its admirers. We may learn from this, that learning without sound principles, makes man a fool. The most subtile and captivating of these modern methods for interpreting the Scriptures is finally the so-called mythical method. It was first introduced by De Wette, and afterwards more developed and applied with some eclat to the gospels and the acts of the apostles by David Strauss in his life of Jesus, published in Tuebingen 1835. They declare the history of the old and new Testaments, as far as the sacred books pretend to relate divine revelations, mysteries and miracles, to be a composition of myths and national tales, not intentionally invented, but, as it were, spontaneously growing out of the mythical spirit of the past ages, as among other nations and communities, thus also among the Jews and the first christians, to surround by them their eminent men, especially Moses and Christ, with a supernatural nimbus, and at the same time to symbolize their religious ideas.

The scientific expounder, therefore, must labor to penetrate these symbols and myths, and to enucleate out of them the historical reality, or the hidden religious ideas. This method necessarily presupposes that the sacred books have been written long after the events had taken place to which they refer, and are, therefore, not authentic ; for it would be absurd to assume, that already the cotemporaries of Moses or of Christ would have described their deeds in a mythical manner. To prove their supposition, they make a liberal use of the rules of criticism, stated above ; especially they hunt for apparent contradictions, or for chronological or historical difficulties, exaggerate them, admit no reconciliation, and conclude then, that such books cannot be written by such an author, or at such a time. The testimonies of historical tradition are either entirely disregarded as being of no weight, or disturbed by all possible objections. Thus they obtain the desired end, the supposed spuriousness of the sacred books, to build on it their system. D. Strauss, writing in this manner the life of Jesus, caused great alarm in the protestant parts of Germany. When called to Zurich, to occupy a chair of theology, the protestant people resisted with the arms in their hands. Also in the literary world some reaction, took place on account of this work ; even those who otherwise avowed the same principles, declared that Strauss went too far ; the historical character of the gospels was again defended, at least, thus far, that they have been written in the first century, about the time of the destruction of Jerusalem, though not by those authors to whom they are ascribed by tradition.

Dr. H. J. Holzmann, professor at the University of Heidelberg, maintains in his works, " Die Synoptischen Evangelien, ihr Ursprung und Geschichtlicher Character," published in Leipzig, 1863, that the first gospel has been written immediately before the destruction of Jerusalem, the third not long after, the second, at least as we have it now, probably also after the said catastrophe. Yet there is scarcely one of these modern writers who agrees with the other. The fanatic Ewald in Goettingen hates and abhors the protestant theologians of Tuebingen not less than the Pope of Rome, which animosity however, is amply repaid again by the adherents of the late Professor Baiir of Tuebingen. In the mean time, this distructive criticism, which for a long while was confined to the protestant universities of Germany, spread also into other countries. The controversy, raised in England in our days by Colenso, manifests the same principles, and E. Renan reproduces in France the results of the German critics, in boldness even surpassing them. " The miracles of the gospel, he says, are in general conceived after natural analogies and violate not too much the laws of nature, like the wonders of the Indo-European mythology."*) In another place the same author says : " To understand Jesus, we must be hardened against the miracles ; we must elevate ourselves above our age of reflection and slow-working analysis, in order to contemplate the faculties of the soul in that state of prolific and naive liberty, in which, disdaining our painful combinations, they attain their object without reflecting on themselves. "f) He thinks even, that the ideality of the moral character of Jesus might be acknowledged, without any necessity of believing in His historical reality, j) These short strictures on this modern school of criticism will suffice to show to the reader; why we could scarcely make any use of their productions, nor take in consideration their bewildering theories. But, you may ask, should they not be refuted? Certainly ; yet we think, the plainest

X) La peinture d'une sublime caractere ne gagne rien a sa conformite avec un heros reel, 1. c. p 214. Whilst writing these lines, we read in the Allg. Zeitung, June 27, 1863, that the same author is about publishing " La vie de Jesus," based on the researches of the German critics. It is said to be looked for with great anxiety by both the friends and opponents of R. But even the Allg. Z. disapproves of histendencies. Dr. Holzmann calls R. a pantheist. We are told that L. Veuillot prepares arefutation of R.'s "La vie de Jesus."

way to do this, will be to lay open the principles of this hypercriticism, to oppose to them the simple statements of historical tradition, and to meet the difficulties, which they derive from apparent errors or mistakes in the holy books. In this manner we endeavored by this treatise to oppose this baneful criticism, without troubling the reader with all the details of its evaporations. By divers reasons we were compelled to be short, and hence it may happen, that, at least at the first view, the reader will not be satisfied in all instances ; yet we entertain the hope, that the whole being carefully considered in its connection, our aim also in regard to this criticism will not be entirely frustrated. We are, however, not so much selfconceited as not to perceive the many imperfections of this treatise. We labored under many difficulties and disadvantages of which the author's deficiency in the English language was not the least. . In this regard, therefore, we ask the kind indulgence of the reader. — It will be easily perceived that we have no predilection for novel opinions and theories ; hence as far as it Avas consistent with facts and principles, we maintained always the common doctrine of the theologians. Only once we were tempted to adopt such a modern theory ; to explain the near affinity between the synoptical gospels, in our times the hypothesis has been ofi"ered that they depend on one common source, the so-called primitive gospel, which has heen lost. We considered at first this supposition to be harmless, and, at the same time, well adapted to solve the riddle. Yet considering that such a primitive gospel is never mentioned by any of the fathers, and is rather opposed to their view on the origin of these three gospels, we gave it up. It is our settled theological conviction, that the common doctrine of the theologians within the church, at least in any question connected with faith, is always essentially correct. What is sometimes wanting consists only in its being not yet perfectly developed, or in its not being established on a sufficiently solid basis against the difficulties which in the course of time may arise against it from various sources.

The annotations under the text should not be left unread ; they form frequently the basis of our argumentation. We took great care for the correctness of the quotations, in order that the reader may be enabled in every instance to examine our conclusions. Some slight typographical errors, we tliink, will be easily noticed and corrected by the reader.

We intended at first to comprise in this treatise all the books of the N. T ; but perceiving the difficulties to which a publication of a larger work is subjected, we confined our labors to the four gospels, leaving the rest to some future period, or what we would wish much more, to some other author among the venerable clergy of this country. Certainly the sacred books are an inexhaustible source, always yielding a joyful recompense to the skillful laborer. May God grant, that also by means of this our humble labor some benefit will be drawn from this sacred fountain. M. H.

PKELIMINARY RPJMARKS.

1) The Catholic believes by the authority of the church, that all the books contained in the Latin Vulgate, are the inspired word of God*) The centre, we may say, of all of them, both of the old and new Testament lies in the four gospels, so that though all are sacred, these books are of a pre-eminent importance according to the doctrine of the fathers ; they contain the falfilment of all that has been foreshadowed and foretold in the Old Testament, and not less at the same time, also all the elements or germs of which the other apostolical writings and the whole history of the church until the end of time, are a continuous development. The eternal Son of God, made man, appears in them in full reality among men, and manifests His glory to man, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth, of Whose fullness we all have received, and grace for grace. No wonder, therefore, that all the instructions of the faithful are based principally on these sacred books, and moreover that the liturgy of the church contains not only many parts of the gospels, but that it represents in the cycle of its festivals, continuously in a symbolical manner all the main events recorded in them. Indeed to understand them well, is the true wisdom for man, is to know all, at least implicitly, and therefore, we think, that to confer something towards their better understanding, little as it may be, is a labor that brings its own reward.

2.) The principal aim of this treatise is, first, to remove the difficulties which we encounter partly from human frailty, partly from human perversity concerning these sacred books, and secondly, to bring at the same time the principal events of the sacred history in their full truth and connection somewhat

*) In many editions of the Vulgate there are also added the "Prayer of Manasses" and the third and fourth book of Esdras. but they are expressly declared not to be canonical.

16 PRELIMINARY REMARKS.

nearer to the mind. For this end we shall endeavor to show, 1.) thatthebooks, even considered merely in the light of natural reason, are most trustworthy liutorical documents ; 2) that the text of them as preserved to the present day, is not only correct^ at least without any essential corruption, but divinely inspired. The inspiration of the sacred books is a definite article of faith for the catholic ; the other two points, the historical reliability, of them and the correctness of their text, are necessarily presupposed by the fact of the inspiration, and consequently though not expressly defined by the church, pertain, as the theologians say, to the faith. The inspiration imports a supernatural fact, not subject to merely human experience, and hence cannot be directly demonstrated by merely natural arguments, but must be derived from faith in the divine authority of the church. The other two points, though the catholic has also for them the assurance of the infallible church, as they do not imply anything that is beyond the reach of arguments, afforded by human reason and research, admit the possibility of a direct proof, not superseding faith concerning them, but corroborating it.

3.) We divide the whole treatise into two parts, of which, however, the first will be far more extensive than the second ; for in order to show, that the four gospels are trustworthy historical documents, we must, according to the rules of historical criticism,enter into the following two questions: 1) whether the gospels are authentic ; that is, really written by those holy and trustworthy men, to whom they are ascribed ; 2) whether the four evangelists, writing on the same subject, are pci-fectly free from all errors and real contradictions among themselves. To answer this question, we shall compare them first in general, and then also more in detail, by which we find occasion to enter on all principal events in the life of Christ, and thus to render the treatise of some practical service.

In the second part we shall give a synopsis of the political history of the Jews- at the time of Christ, to see from this whether the facts, related in the gospels, are in accordance with all that we know by profane history, and therefore, in every way historically certain. To this we add the two important questions, on the correctness of the sacred text and its inspired character. But as we think, that these points can be made sufiiciently clear without entering into minute detail, we considered it better to be short, and not to try too much the patience of the reader.