Homologoumena to Origen and Eusebius; pertinently observing in regard to earlier allusions in Papias or Polycarp that illustrative citations are a very different thing from citations of an authority.1

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The Genuine Pauline Letters.

Passing over the "Antilegomena," whose instructive historical relation to the second century is comparatively less open to dispute, we come to the Pauline Epistles. Among these, out of thirteen commonly received by antiquity as genuine, four only are admitted as unquestionably authentic by Baur. Here too the same fictitious image of the Apostle, which so perversely obtrudes itself in "Acts," usurps his name in the superscription of several Epistles; but the four genuine ones are by far the most important memorials of early Christianity, supplying a definite standard of literary authenticity and of historical truth; they are in fact the basis of the whole subsequent enquiry. They possess, says Baur, "a marked character of individuality, of particular adaptation to persons and occasions; and the more we study them, the more thoroughly we enter into the circumstances and feelings under which they were written, the more we feel convinced of their authenticity as living pictures of the time." Were it true, as asserted by Prof. Jowett in his work on Thessalonians (p. 37), that St. Paul's Epistles "have no set purpose,' it were of course vain to seek among rambling fortuitous discourses for clear historical indications. "We must not," says Mr. Jowett, "look too precisely for an object; most of the Epistles have hardly any set purpose. They are not treatises written with a particular design or confined to a particular subject;

1 It should be observed that the expression, "expηtai μapтupiais," in Eusebius H.E. 3, 39 is no critical attestation of genuineness; it often, in fact, indicates only a certain supposed reference to a book implied by a more or less striking resemblance of expression.

but the natural outpouring of the apostle's soul," etc., etc. Such a confession of hopeless obscurity,-abdicating in fact the possibility of obtaining any certain knowledge from the documents in question,-arises from an inadequate view of the historical situation, and especially from confounding the false epistles with the genuine. It is inconsistent with the character of the apostolic age to suppose that amid the busy progress of events men sat down deliberately to compose theories or epistolary sermons, instead of speaking as they were impelled by the feelings and convictions of the hour, and writing as circumstances prompted. And hence there can scarcely be any surer proof that a writing is post-apostolic than the general, indefinite, or "catholic" character of its contents. For in whatever sense we take the word "catholic" in its application to a class of writings, whether as promoting the tendency to catholic union by the adopted mode of teaching, or in the sense of general encyclic letters of official admonition to communities personally unconnected with the supposed writers, the term must in every case indicate a later age than that which witnessed the first struggles of Christianity for existence; and it were entirely misleading to suppose that the formal exposition of doctrinal truisms, which to us may possibly appear the most valuable element in an apostolic writing, was the original motive for inditing it.

The four great Epistles-Galatians, Corinthians, and Romans have each of them a specific character, and exhibit a special phase in Christian development. In Galatians we have the first uncompromising assertion of a free and independent Christianity against the prejudices of those who, though of Gentile extraction, would have retained as Christians the observances of Judaism. "Corinthians" rebukes party contentions and other fanatical disorders, incidentally defending Paul, as teacher of an all-embracing spiritual religion, in opposition to those who assailed his

It

authority on carnal grounds. The dispute which occasioned the Epistle to the Romans originated in deeper causes. was no longer minute observances, party predilection, or personal authority which was at issue; it was not the relations of Jew and Gentile, or of Christians generally in regard to Jews, but those of Jew and Gentile Christians. To the advocacy of freedom and of spirituality there was now added a distinct assertion of what was in a certain degree implied in the former arguments, namely, the axiom of Christian universalism. The pretension combated by the apostle may be assumed to be the converse of his own argument, namely, that of a special prerogative in the Jewish Christian, which was infringed by the admission of Gentiles. It was this feeling of the spiritual privileges of Judaism which it was most necessary for St. Paul to eradicate, as directly confronting and most obstinately resisting the principle which he advocated. A favourable opportunity for doing so was offered by the circumstances of the Roman church. So long as the number of Gentile converts was comparatively small, the Jew might overlook the intrusion, and even be lenient as to the conditions of its allowance; but when in the general average of conversions throughout the Roman world, and especially on the conspicuous theatre of the metropolitan city, the Gentile threatened to become the more numerous and important element, Jewish pride naturally took alarm, and felt aggrieved at seeing its supposed birthright invaded and appropriated by strangers. Hence the apostle, who it seems as yet had not been able to make a personal visit, found it necessary during his second stay at Corinth not to delay a distinct expression of opinion in regard to complications so menacing; and it is a mere confusion between ancient and modern views to take the Epistle as a gratuitous expression of theoretical opinion. It is partly didactic, partly polemical; and it had been usual among later commentators, beginning with

Tholuck and De Wette, to treat the allusions of the latter class, contained in chapters ix.-xi., as merely accessory and subordinate to the former. Baur contends that although the theory of Christianity is the apostle's main object, still, in relation to this particular epistle, the controversial purpose stated in the cited chapters is to be considered as the originating source and chief consideration, to which the general theory in the eight first chapters must be held to be subsidiary. The difficulty was no longer as to the right to admit Gentiles, or as to the terms of that admission, but how to reconcile an already accomplished fact with the fundamental postulates of Judaism. St. Paul deals with the problem in his usual manner. His custom is first to place the subject in the most general and absolute point of view, then to carry home the practical application and inferences flowing from the principle so established. This he does in Corinthians, where to the “ σοφια θεου” is assigned the same place and importance as the basis of the whole argument, as to the "Sixaloovvn Ocov" here. From the argument establishing the absolute character of the latter it follows that the rival pretensions of Jew and Gentile can only be subordinate and relative; the general doctrine solves the special case, shewing that the two parties are no longer balanced against each other, but alike absorbed in a more comprehensive system.

66

The Deutero-Pauline Letters.

66

Of the deutero-Pauline letters it may be said generally that they often exhibit a monotony and seeming vagueness widely differing from the originality and vigour of the genuine; instead of advocating a comprehensive principle, they deal with general recommendations of practical duty; they share the irenic tendency distinguishing the writings of the second century, giving to "faith" and "Christ' Christ" an altered meaning; reducing the former

to external belief or adhesion, and changing the latter from the regenerating power within the soul, as conceived by St. Paul, into a transcendental object of metaphysical contemplation. Moreover it should be observed that most of them distinctly allude to the circumstances characterising the latest Christian literature; namely, a constituted hierarchy, and the antithesis of orthodoxy and heresy. Gnosticism, the earliest heresy, appears for the first time under clearly marked forms in these epistles; and its systematic denunciation suggests the time of Hadrian as the earliest probable date of their composition. For according to a memorable passage quoted from Hegesippus in Eusebius (H. E. 3, 32), the church continued pure and undefiled by heresies until Trajan's time; it was only when the apostles had all left the scene, that the false doctrines of gnosticism ventured to shew themselves openly. The original seeds of gnosticism, understood in the general sense of speculative Christianity, may have been doubtless present from earlier times. They may be recognised in many Judaical preconceptions, and also in St. Paul's tendency to look exclusively to the "Lord from heaven" or spiritual Christ, and to expand Christianity to the dimensions of a cosmical theory. And hence the Clementine Homilies in their controversy with Marcion, pointedly conjoin St. Paul with him under the common symbol of Simon Magus. The elements of gnosticism at first mingled in speculative and original minds with orthodox belief; it was only through the growing incompatibility of active thought with the torpid opinion of the majority that it was finally separated and extruded. Hence we are obliged to look somewhat later for the era of conflict, namely the reign of Hadrian, which is indeed expressly given as its date by Clement of Alexandria; and when we consider the strength and extent to which, in the view of several of these letters, gnosticism had already grown, we

1 Rom. viii. 20-22.

2 Strom. 7, 17; ed. Potter, p. 898..