CHAPTER VI.

THE DIFFERENCES IN DETAIL OF THE SYNOPTIC EVANGELISTS.

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HITHERTO it has been our object to show that the four Evangelists were naturally fitted to record the Life of Christ, under the different forms in which it met the wants of the early Church and is still apprehended by ourselves. It has been seen that the Apostolic age was marked by the existence of representative types of religious belief; that the Gospel narrative was shaped in the first instance by the pressure of immediate needs, and afterwards reduced to writing under circumstances which tended to perpetuate the characteristics which had been preserved by various classes of the first teachers and hearers; that the fourth is distinguished from the other three, by a difference which is likened to the relation of the spirit to the body, of the universal to the special, or again, of the testimony of the loved disciple to the common testimony of the Church. In the present Chapter we shall examine more minutely the mutual bearings of the synoptic Gospels. With this object we shall review in detail the accounts which they contain of the great crises of the Life of our Lord, in order at once to test more rigorously, and define more clearly, the general view which has been proposed. If it be said that the variations to be alleged can be explained by nat

ural causes, we at once admit the statement; for it has been shown that one of the elements of Inspiration is the selection of a messenger by God, who shall express truth in its human form with the fulness and force of his proper character. The differences in the Gospels may, and in some sense must, have arisen naturally; but in the same sense the whole working of Providence is natural, and the results of individual feeling in past time have been consecrated for our instruction by the office of the Christian Church.

The mode in which the different Evangelists deal with the history of the Incarnation and Birth of our Lord offers a perfect illustration of their independence and special characteristics. St. Mark, who records the active ministry of Christ, gives no details of His Infancy; and both from internal and external grounds there is reason to believe that in this respect he observed the limits of the first oral Gospel. The narrative of the mysteries of the Nativity belonged to the period of the written testimony, and not of the first proclamation; and St. Matthew and St. Luke combine to reveal as much of the great facts as helps us to apprehend, not the event itself, but the mode in which it was welcomed by those with whom God was pleased to work in its accomplishment. The genealogy with which St. Matthew opens his Gospel introduces at once its peculiar subject. The first words are an echo of Old Testa

1 The questions involved in the two genealogies of our Lord are so numerous and intricate that it is impossible to enter upon them here. The omission of the discussion is of little consequence, as it has been most ably conducted by Dr. Mill (The Evangelical Accounts of the Descent and Parentage of the Saviour vindicated, Cambr. 1842) and by Lord A. Hervey (The Genealogies of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, Cambr. 1853). A summary of the results which these critics have obtained is given in a little tract, The

Genealogies in St. Matthew and St. Luke, London, 1856. Without affirming every detail in the explanations proposed, we may be satisfied that every discrepancy can be explained; and more than this is not to be expected in a case where necessarily much of the history is most obscure. Both genealogies without doubt give the descent of Joseph, the universal belief till the sixteenth century, -St. Matthew his legal descent, showing that our Lord was Solomon's heir (2 Sam. vii. 13-17; 1 Chron. xvii. 14), though

ment language,' and the symmetrical arrangement of the generations is equally significant in relation to Jewish. history and to Jewish thought. But apart from the form, St. Matthew dates the Messianic hope from David and from Abraham, and binds Christianity with the promises of the ancient covenant. St. Luke, on the contrary, places the corresponding descent not before the Birth but after the Baptism, and represents Christ as the second Adam, "the Son of God."s In the one we see a royal Infant born by a legal title to a glorious inheritance; and in the other a ministering Saviour who bears the natural sum of human sorrow. Even in the lines of descent which extend through the period common to the two genealogies there is a characteristic difference: St. Matthew follows the course of the royal inheritance of Solomon, whose natural lineage was closed by the childless Jehoiachim: St. Luke traces through Nathan the natural parentage of "the son of David." In St. Matthew the Birth of Christ is connected with national glories; in St. Luke with pious hopes. Instead of recalling the crises of Jewish history' and the majesty of the typical kingdom, the Pauline Evangelist begins his narrative with a full recital of the personal acts. of God's mercy to the just and prayerful, and of His allpowerful grace to the holy and believing. In St. Matthew

the line of Solomon failed in Jehoiachim (Jer. xxii. 29, 30), and St. Luke his natural descent, showing that he was lineally descended from David (2 Sam. vii. 12; Ps. lxxxix. 35, 36) through Nathan. For the details of the subject I must refer to the works above quoted.

1 Matt. i. 1, βίβλος γενέσεως. Cf. Gen. v. 1.

2 Matt. i. 1.

3" Cum [Lucas] Adamum Dei filium vocat, significat Christum ex virgine ortum, secundum esse Adamum, ejusque ortum per Spiritum Sanctum non minus esse opus potentiæ divinæ singulare quam Adami fuerat" (Wetst. ad

Luc. iii. f.) For a comparison of St. Paul's and Philo's teaching on the second Adam, compare Babington, Journ. of Philology, i. pp. 47 ff.

4 Matt. i. 2, 6, 11.

5 The words χάρις, χαρίζομαι, are not found in St. Matthew or St. Mark. The former occurs in the Introduction of St. John, and in all the groups of the Epistles.

6 Luke i. 6, 13, 28, 45. On the last passage Ambrose says (In Luc. ii. § 26), "Quæcunque crediderit anima et concipit et generat Dei Verbum, et opera ejus agnoscit. . . . Si secundum carnem una mater est Christi; secundum fidem tamen omnium fructus est Christus."

we read of the Incarnation as it was revealed in a dream to Joseph, in whom may be seen an emblem of the ancient people; but in St. Luke the mystery is announced by "the mighty one of God" to the Blessed Virgin, the type of the Christian Church. In St. Matthew the Nativity is ushered in by prophecy; in St. Luke it is heralded by those songs of triumphant faith which have been rehearsed in our public services for thirteen centuries; and even these, from hymn to hymn, seem to gather fulness and love: the "help of Israel" and the "horn of David” is welcomed as one who shall bring "joy to all the chosen nation," and give "light to the Gentiles." In St. Luke the shepherds, the humble watchers of nature, — the despised successors of the patriarchs, 3-cheered by the voice of angels, recognize and proclaim the praises of the Saviour of the meek in heart; and the devotion first offered in the stable of the village inn is completed by the thanksgivings of the aged Simeon and Anna in the Temple in St. Matthew the Magi, the wise inquirers

The same writer points out in a word the difference between Zachariah and the Blessed Virgin (In Luc. ii. § 15): "Hæc jam de negotio tractat: ille adhuc de nuntio dubitat."

1 Gabriel: Luke i. 10. Cf. Dan. viii. 16: ix. 21.

2 Ambr. In Luc. ii. § 7. It has been argued (even by Neander, L. J. § 14, n.) that the different modes in which God is recorded to have communicated with man, in St. Matthew by dreams, and in St. Luke by angels, show the extent of the subjective influence of the writer's mind upon the narrative. But surely those are right who see in this difference the use of various means adapted to the peculiar state of the recipient. Moreover, as St. Matthew recognizes the ministry of Angels (xxviii. 2), so St. Luke relates Visions (Acts x. 9-16; xvi. 9; xviii. 9, 10). Cf. Gen. xx. 3; xxviii. 12; xxxi. 24 (Dreams) - xviii. 2; xix. 1 (Angels). With regard to the names of the angels

it may be observed that the adoption of foreign terms does not imply the introduction of a foreign belief. Cf. p. 78.

It is to be noticed that the contents of the divine messages (Matt. i. 20, 21; Luke i. 30-33) are related conversely to the general character of the Gos pels, as a consequence of the difference of character in those to whom they were addressed. The promise of Redemption is made to Joseph; of a glo. rious kingdom to the Virgin.

3" Abba Garien dixit... ne doceat pastorem... quisquam filium suum ....... eo quod opificium ipserum est opificium latronum" (Wetst. in Luc. ii. 8).

4 The words wrhp (Cic. In Verr. iì. 63), σwrnpía, σwτhpios, are not found in St. Matthew and St. Mark. They occur John iv. 42, 22; 1 John iv. 14. The progression in Luke ii. 18-20 is very beautiful: wonder-meditation - praise.

led by a strange portent

into the mysteries of the world, in the sky, offer adoration1 and symbolic tribute to the new-born king of the Jews. In the one we read of the fulfilment of the Jewish idea of a royal Messiah: in the other, the realization of the cravings, clear or indistinct, of the human heart. In the one we see typified the universal reign of Christ, and in the other His universal mercy. Once more, St. Matthew alone records the murder of the Innocents, the flight into Egypt, the cause of the final settlement at Nazareth; St. Luke, on the other hand, has preserved the details of the Purification, and adds the one incident which links together the Infancy and the Ministry of Christ in the trait of a perfect obedience and a divine consciousness.2 In the former the hostility of earthly powers to the kingdom of Christ is seen to work out the designs of God; in the latter the law is fulfilled in the redemption of the Saviour from the service of the Jewish Temple.

This contrast in detail the sign of a contrast in general character.

The consideration of these various details will show the reality of the difference in spirit and form between the two narratives; but the artificiality of the contrast lessens the sense of their complementary character throughout. It is impossible to read them in succession without feeling that we pass from one aspect of the great central fact to

1 The word "рoσкuveîv is not applied by St. Luke to our Lord till after the Resurrection: xxiv. 52, where also it is probably an interpolation. Cf. p. 330, n. 2.

2 A comparison of Matt. ii. 11 with Luke ii. 24 (Levit. xii. 8) leads us to place the Purification before the Visit of the Magi. Luke ii. 39 does not exclude the flight into Egypt, and certainly shows the independence of the Evangelists. Nor does there appear to be any discrepancy between Matt. ii. 22, 23 and Luke ii. 4. The divine command (Matt. ii. 20) would suggest a return to Bethlehem, in which such

marvellous things had been wrought; and how can we account for Joseph's selection of Nazareth as a place of abode so readily as by supposing that he was previously connected with it? Cf. Just. M. Dial. § 78, p. 303 D.

As for the aroypaph, it is enough to say with Wetstein: "Epocha tam celebris non potuit Lucam latere." Cf. Acts v. 87 (1851). I leave this note as it was written eight years since. Νο one now after Zumpt's Essay (Berlin, 1854) can doubt that Quirinus was governor of Syria at the time of our Lord's birth as well as ten years afterwards.