An Examination of the Testimony of the Four Evangelists Part 1

An Examination of the Testimony of the Four Evangelists.

by Simon Greenleaf, LL.D.

ADVERTIs.e.m.e.nT.

In introducing to the notice of the British Public, Mr. Professor GREENLEAF'S Harmony of the Four Gospels, the publishers have much satisfaction in announcing, that it has become a Standard Work in the United States of America: and its intrinsic value has induced them to make it known, in the hope of promoting its circulation, in this country.

The spirit of infidelity is far more restless and active on the other side of the Atlantic, than, happily, it has been in our highly-favoured land: and, in consequence, it has called forth some of the most able and powerful minds to correct and subdue it. Among these advocates of Divine Revelation, the profound lawyer, Professor Greenleaf, holds a most honourable and distinguished place; and his work may justly be regarded as combining sound and practical knowledge with well-directed zeal and piety.

Its character has been very fairly appreciated in two leading North American journals, from which the following extracts are made, as indicative of its contents, and also of the high estimation in which its learned author is deservedly held in his own country.

EXTRACT OF A NOTICE OF PROFESSOR GREENLEAF ON THE FOUR GOSPELS, OCTOBER 24, 1846, IN "THE NEW YORK OBSERVER."

The Author is a lawyer, very learned in his profession, acute, critical and used to raising and meeting practical doubts. Author of a treatise on the law of evidence, which has already become a cla.s.sic in the hands of the profession which he adorns, and teaches in one of the Law Seminaries which do honour to our country in the eyes of Europe, he brings rare qualifications for the task he a.s.sumes. That he should, with the understanding and from the heart, accept the Gospel as the truth, avow it as his Hope, and seek to discharge a duty to his fellow-men by laying before them the grounds on which he founds this acceptance and this hope, are cheering circ.u.mstances to the Christian, and present strong appeals to the indifferent.

To his profession, to the lawyers of the country, however, this work makes a strong appeal. They are a very secular profession.

Their business is almost wholly conversant with material interests. Their time is absorbed in controversies, of pa.s.sion, or of interest. Acute, critical, and disputatious, they apparently present a field unpropitious for the acceptance of a religion, spiritual, disinterested, and insisting on perfect holiness.

Still, they necessarily need to know and must enforce the rules of finding truth and justice; the principles for ascertaining truth and dispensing justice are the great subjects of all their discussions, so far as they are discussions of any general principle. From this cause it is, that this profession has numbered among its members, in every age, Christians of great eminence, and in our own day and country, we cannot turn to the eminent men of this profession in any large community, without the satisfaction of finding our Faith embraced by those whose habits of practical as well as speculative investigation render them evidently the best able to appreciate its claims and to detect any imperfections in its proof.

So we trust it always may be; and we are a.s.sured that the best models of the mode of investigating matters of legal controversy as the proof of facts, are writings on the evidences. Paley's treatise and that of Chalmers, on the oral testimony in favour of Christ's mission, Paley's examination of the writings of the apostle Paul, are, we are a.s.sured, the best models extant for forming the habit of examining oral and doc.u.mentary evidence.

These are subjects on which it is of vital importance, in a secular view, that a lawyer's habits should be right: in a spiritual view the importance is unspeakable. Mr. Greenleaf has doubtless felt this truth, and has also felt that his position would give to his labours some authority with his brethren and with the public. He has given himself honourably to the labour, and spread its results before the world.

It is long since Infidelity has found its advocates among the truly learned. Among the guesses and speculations of a small portion of unsanctified medical men, she still finds now and then a champion. Historians and philosophers have long since discussed her pretensions. And now from the Jurists and Lawyers, the practical masters of this kind of investigation, works are appearing, whereby not only an earnest reception of the Gospel is manifested, but the mode and means of action and of credit by which all human affairs are governed.

We lose in respect to our own investigations on this subject by its very sacredness. We have an idle dread, that it is not open to free investigation: to severe practical tests. We need to be invited, to be pressed to examine this subject freely. Dr.

Chalmers in one department of this inquiry has led the way. Mr.

Greenleaf in another has also presented an example. And it will not be competent, after these men have thus investigated and taught the rules and laws of investigation, for any man who is not willing to arrogate superior claims to learning and ability, to turn aside superciliously from an examination of the Gospels.

Such are our views of this work, which we commend to all: to the legal profession, from the character of its topics and the rank of its author: to men desirous of knowledge, in every rank in life, because of its presenting this subject under such a treatment as every-day practical questions are treated with. It does not touch the intrinsic evidences of the Gospel: those which to the believer are, after all, the highest proofs. But it is to be remembered, that these are proofs which are not satisfactory until an examination of the outward evidences has led men to the conviction, that the Gospels cannot be false.

FROM THE "NORTH AMERICAN REVIEW."

_Professor Greenleaf on the Gospels, and Strauss' __"__Life of Jesus.__"_-Of course we place the t.i.tles of these two books together only by way of contrast. They relate, it is true, to the same general subject; but it is hard to conceive of two works more unlike in their scope, character, and purpose. The object of the one is to prove, and of the other to disprove, the Christian religion. The one is the production of an able and profound lawyer, a man who has grown grey in the halls of justice and the schools of jurisprudence,-a writer of the highest authority on legal subjects, whose life has been spent in weighing testimony and sifting evidence, and whose published opinions on the rules of evidence are received as authoritative in all the English and American tribunals,-for fourteen years the highly respected colleague of the late Mr. Justice Story, and now the honoured head of the most distinguished and prosperous school of English law in the world. The other is the work of a German professor and speculatist, also profoundly learned in his way,-an ingenious and erring framer of theories of the most striking character, almost unheard of till his brain either conceived them or gave them currency, though relating to topics with which men have been familiar for eighteen centuries,-a subtle controversialist, whose work, as he himself avows, is deeply tinged with the most strongly marked peculiarities of the philosophy and theology of his countrymen. We presume the most ardent admirer of Dr. Strauss will not object to our characterising the two works as excellent specimens, the one of clear and shrewd English common sense, the other of German erudition, laborious diligence, and fertility in original speculation. And if the subject of inquiry were one that involved his own temporal and immediate interests, and it were necessary to determine which of these two writers would give the wiser and safer counsel, or the more trustworthy opinion, we suppose the same person would agree with us in making the choice.

On the publishers announcing to Professor Greenleaf their wish to introduce his Harmony to the notice of the British Public, he with equal prompt.i.tude and kindness communicated to them some important additions to his Introduction, and also numerous valuable notes, more particularly adapted to the use of Theological Students. These are now printed for the first time: and at the suggestion of a very eminent and learned clergyman of the Established Church, the publishers have added in an Appendix an accurate and elegant translation of the late learned French Advocate, A.

M. J. J. Dupin's Refutation of the eminent Jewish writer, Joseph Salvador's "Trial and Condemnation of Jesus," executed by the late distinguished American Lawyer and Statesman, JOHN PICKERING, LL.D., Counsellor at Law, and President of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (sometime Secretary to the American Emba.s.sy in this country); who has most truly characterised M. Dupin's examination of Salvador, as being "conducted with an ability, learning, animation, and interest, that leave nothing to be desired."

TO THE MEMBERS OF THE LEGAL PROFESSION.

GENTLEMEN,

The subject of the following work I hope will not be deemed so foreign to our professional pursuits, as to render it improper for me to dedicate it, as I now respectfully do, to you. If a close examination of the evidences of Christianity may be expected of one cla.s.s of men more than another, it would seem inc.u.mbent on us, who make the law of evidence one of our peculiar studies. Our profession leads us to explore the mazes of falsehood, to detect its artifices, to pierce its thickest veils, to follow and expose its sophistries, to compare the statements of different witnesses with severity, to discover truth and separate it from error. Our fellow-men are well aware of this; and probably they act upon this knowledge more generally, and with a more profound repose, than we are in the habit of considering. The influence, too, of the legal profession upon the community is unquestionably great; conversant, as it daily is, with all cla.s.ses and grades of men, in their domestic and social relations, and in all the affairs of life, from the cradle to the grave. This influence we are constantly exerting for good or ill; and hence, to refuse to acquaint ourselves with the evidences of the Christian religion, or to act as though, having fully examined, we lightly esteemed them, is to a.s.sume an appalling amount of responsibility.

The things related by the Evangelists are certainly of the most momentous character, affecting the principles of our conduct here, and our happiness for ever. The religion of Jesus Christ aims at nothing less than the utter overthrow of all other systems of religion in the world; denouncing them as inadequate to the wants of man, false in their foundations, and dangerous in their tendency. It not only solicits the grave attention of all, to whom its doctrines are presented, but it demands their cordial belief, as a matter of vital concernment. These are no ordinary claims; and it seems hardly possible for a rational being to regard them with even a subdued interest; much less to treat them with mere indifference and contempt. If not true, they are little else than the pretensions of a bold imposture, which, not satisfied with having already enslaved millions of the human race, seeks to continue its encroachments upon human liberty, until all nations shall be subjugated under its iron rule. But if they are well founded and just, they can be no less than the high requirements of Heaven, addressed by the voice of G.o.d to the reason and understanding of man, concerning things deeply affecting his relations to his sovereign, and essential to the formation of his character and of course to his destiny, both for this life and for the life to come. Such was the estimate taken of religion, even the religion of pagan Rome, by one of the greatest lawyers of antiquity, when he argued that it was either nothing at all, or was everything. _Aut undique religionem tolle, aut usquequaque conserva._(1)

With this view of the importance of the subject, and in the hope that the present work may in some degree aid or at least incite others to a more successful pursuit of this interesting study, it is submitted to your kind regard, by

Your obedient servant, SIMON GREENLEAF.

HARVARD UNIVERSITY, DANE HALL, _May 1, 1846_.

ADVERTIs.e.m.e.nT TO THIS EDITION.

The arrangement of the Gospels by Dr. Robinson was adopted in this work, it being the latest published in the United States, and by a scholar of the highest reputation. But by comparing his order with that of Archbishop Newcome, as shown in contiguous columns in the Table of Contents and Synopsis of the Harmony, it will be found that they differ only in a very few unimportant particulars, not at all affecting the general scheme or structure of the Harmony, or the purposes of this examination. I have, however, in several places omitted their transposition of the verses of the text, occurring within the limits of a section; it being more convenient to insert them in the order in which they were written by the Evangelists.

The preliminary Dissertation has been revised and enlarged, and some further notes added to the text, which is printed conformably to the common octavo edition of the American Bible Society, except in a few places, where the article a was accidentally printed instead of _an_, in the words _an house_, &c.

Cambridge, Ma.s.sachusetts, _March_ 1, 1847.

AN EXAMINATION, ETC.

-- 1. In examining the evidences of the Christian religion, it is essential to the discovery of truth that we bring to the investigation a mind freed, as far as possible, from existing prejudice and open to conviction. There should be a readiness, on our part, to investigate with candour, to follow the truth wherever it may lead us, and to submit, without reserve or objection, to all the teachings of this religion, if it be found to be of divine origin. "There is no other entrance," says Lord Bacon, "to the kingdom of man, which is founded in the sciences, than to the kingdom of heaven, into which no one can enter but in the character of a little child."(2) The docility which true philosophy requires of her disciples is not a spirit of servility, or the surrender of the reason and judgment to whatsoever the teacher may inculcate; but it is a mind free from all pride of opinion, not hostile to the truth sought for, willing to pursue the inquiry and impartially to weigh the arguments and evidence, and to acquiesce in the judgment of right reason. The investigation, moreover, should be pursued with the serious earnestness which becomes the greatness of the subject-a subject fraught with such momentous consequences to man.

It should be pursued as in the presence of G.o.d, and under the solemn sanctions created by a lively sense of his omniscience, and of our accountability to him for the right use of the faculties which he has bestowed.

-- 2. In requiring this candour and simplicity of mind in those who would investigate the truth of our religion, Christianity demands nothing more than is readily conceded to every branch of human science. All these have their data, and their axioms; and Christianity, too, has her first principles, the admission of which is essential to any real progress in knowledge. "Christianity," says Bishop Wilson, "inscribes on the portal of her dominions, 'Whosoever shall not receive the kingdom of G.o.d as a little child, shall in nowise enter therein.' Christianity does not profess to convince the perverse and headstrong, to bring irresistible evidence to the daring and profane, to vanquish the proud scorner, and afford evidences from which the careless and perverse cannot possibly escape.

This might go to destroy man's responsibility. All that Christianity professes, is to propose such evidences as may satisfy the meek, the tractable, the candid, the serious inquirer."(3)

-- 3. The present design, however, is not to enter upon any general examination of the evidences of Christianity, but to confine the inquiry to the testimony of the Four Evangelists, bringing their narratives to the tests to which other evidence is subjected in human tribunals. The foundation of our religion is a basis of fact-the fact of the birth, ministry, miracles, death, resurrection, and ascension of Jesus Christ.

These are related by the Evangelists as having actually occurred, within their own personal knowledge. Our religion, then, rests on the credit due to these witnesses. Are they worthy of implicit belief, in the matters which they relate? This is the question, in all human tribunals, in regard to persons testifying before them; and we propose to test the veracity of these witnesses, by the same rules and means which are there employed. The importance of the facts testified, and their relations to the affairs of the soul, and the life to come, can make no difference in the principles or the mode of weighing the evidence. It is still the evidence of matters of fact, capable of being seen and known and related, as well by one man as by another. And if the testimony of the Evangelist, supposing it to be relevant and material to the issue in a question of property or of personal right, between man and man, in a court of justice, ought to be believed and have weight; then, upon the like principles, it ought to receive our entire credit here. But if, on the other hand, we should be justified in rejecting it, if there testified on oath, then, supposing our rules of evidence to be sound, we may be excused if we hesitate elsewhere to give it credence.

-- 4. The proof that G.o.d has revealed himself to man by special and express communications, and that Christianity const.i.tutes that revelation, is no part of these inquiries. This has already been shown, in the most satisfactory manner, by others, who have written expressly upon this subject.(4) Referring therefore to their writings for the arguments and proofs, the fact will here be a.s.sumed as true. That man is a religious being, is universally conceded, for it has been seen to be universally true. He is everywhere a wors.h.i.+pper. In every age and country, and in every stage, from the highest intellectual culture to the darkest stupidity, he bows with homage to a superior Being. Be it the rude-carved idol of his own fabrication, or the unseen divinity that stirs within him, it is still the object of his adoration. This trait in the character of man is so uniform, that it may safely be a.s.sumed, either as one of the original attributes of his nature, or as necessarily resulting from the action of one or more of those attributes.

-- 5. The object of man's wors.h.i.+p, whatever it be, will naturally be his standard of perfection. He clothes it with every attribute, belonging, in his view, to a perfect character; and this character he himself endeavours to attain. He may not, directly and consciously, aim to acquire every virtue of his deity, and to avoid the opposite vices; but still this will be the inevitable consequence of sincere and constant wors.h.i.+p. As in human society men become a.s.similated, both in manners and in moral principles, to their chosen a.s.sociates, so in the wors.h.i.+p of whatever deity men adore, they "form to his the relish of their souls." To suppose, then, that G.o.d made man capable of religion, and requiring it in order to the development of the highest part of his nature, without communicating with him, as a father, in those revelations which alone could perfect that nature, would be a reproach upon G.o.d, and a contradiction.(5)

-- 6. How it came to pa.s.s that man, originally taught, as we doubt not he was, to know and to wors.h.i.+p the true Jehovah, is found, at so early a period of his history, a wors.h.i.+pper of baser objects, it is foreign to our present purpose to inquire. But the fact is lamentably true, that he soon became an idolater, a wors.h.i.+pper of moral abominations. The Scythians and Northmen adored the impersonations of heroic valour and of bloodthirsty and cruel revenge. The mythology of Greece and of Rome, though it exhibited a few examples of virtue and goodness, abounded in others of gross licentiousness and vice. The G.o.ds of Egypt were reptiles, and beasts and birds. The religion of Central and Eastern Asia was polluted with l.u.s.t and cruelty, and smeared with blood, rioting, in deadly triumph, over all the tender affections of the human heart and all the convictions of the human understanding. Western and Southern Africa and Polynesia are, to this day, the abodes of frightful idolatry, cannibalism, and cruelty; and the aborigines of both the Americas are examples of the depths of superst.i.tion to which the human mind may be debased. In every quarter of the world, however, there is a striking uniformity seen, in all the features of paganism. The ruling principle of her religion is terror, and her deity is lewd and cruel. Whatever of purity the earlier forms of paganism may have possessed, it is evident from history that it was of brief duration. Every form, which history has preserved, grew rapidly and steadily worse and more corrupt, until the entire heathen world, before the coming of Christ, was infected with that loathsome leprosy of pollution, described with revolting vividness by St. Paul, in the beginning of his Epistle to the Romans.

-- 7. So general and decided was this proclivity to the wors.h.i.+p of strange G.o.ds, that, at the time of the deluge, only one family remained faithful to Jehovah; and this was a family which had been favoured with his special revelation. Indeed it is evident that nothing but a revelation from G.o.d could raise men from the degradation of pagan idolatry, because nothing else has ever had that effect. If man could achieve his own freedom from this bondage, he would long since have been free. But instead of this, the increase of light and civilization and refinement in the pagan world has but multiplied the objects of his wors.h.i.+p, added voluptuous refinements to its ritual, and thus increased the number and weight of his chains. In this respect there is no difference in their moral condition, between the barbarous Scythian and the learned Egyptian or Roman of ancient times, nor between the ignorant African and the polished Hindu of our own day. The only method, which has been successfully employed to deliver man from idolatry, is that of presenting to the eye of his soul an object of wors.h.i.+p perfectly holy and pure, directly opposite, in moral character, to the G.o.ds he had formerly adored. He could not transfer to his deities a better character than he himself possessed. He must for ever remain enslaved to his idols, unless a new and pure object of wors.h.i.+p were revealed to him, with a display of superior power sufficient to overcome his former faith and his present fears, to detach his affections from grosser objects, and to fix them upon that which alone is worthy.(6) This is precisely what G.o.d, as stated in the Holy Scriptures, has done. He rescued one family from idolatry in the Old World, by the revelation of himself to Noah; he called a distinct branch of this family to the knowledge of himself, in the person of Abraham and his sons; He extended this favour to a whole nation, through the ministry of Moses; but it was through that of Jesus Christ alone that it was communicated to the whole world. In Egypt, by the destruction of all the objects of the popular wors.h.i.+p, G.o.d taught the Israelites that he alone was the self-existent Almighty. At the Red Sea, he emphatically showed them that He was the Protector and Saviour of his people. At Sinai, he revealed himself as the righteous Governor who required implicit obedience for men, and taught them, by the strongly marked distinctions of the ceremonial law, that he was a holy Being, of purer eyes than to behold evil, and that could not look upon iniquity. The demerit of sin was inculcated by the solemn infliction of death upon every animal, offered as a propitiatory sacrifice. And when, by this system of instruction, he had prepared a people to receive the perfect revelation of the character of G.o.d, of the nature of his wors.h.i.+p, and of the way of restoration to his image and favour, this also was expressly revealed by the mission of his Son.(7)

-- 8. That the books of the Old Testament, as we now have them, are genuine; that they existed in the time of our Saviour, and were commonly received and referred to among the Jews, as the sacred books of their religion;(8) and that the text of the Four Evangelists has been handed down to us in the state in which it was originally written, that is, without having been materially corrupted or falsified, either by heretics or Christians; are facts which we are ent.i.tled to a.s.sume as true, until the contrary is shown.