|
THE GOSPELS “ACCORDING TO” GREEK PRIESTS
According to the names “supplied” to the Four Gospels, as to the other New Testament books, the “Apostolic” authors were all of them Jews; the same is supposedly true of most of the now confessed apocrypha. All these were forgeries in the names of Jewish pseudo-apostles. But all of the Gospels, the other New Testament Books, and the forged apocrypha, were written in Greek. Self-evidently, these “ignorant and unlearned” peasant Apostles, speaking a vulgar Aramaic-Jewish dialect, could neither speak nor write Greek,—if they could write at all. The Old Testament books were written mostly in Hebrew, which was a “dead language,” which only the priests could read; thus in the synagogues of Palestine the rolls were read in Hebrew, and then “expounded” to the hearers in their Aramaic dialect. But these Hebrew “Scriptures” had been translated into Greek, in the famous Septuagint version which we have admired. Here is another significant admission by CE.: it speaks of “the supposed wholesale adoption and approval, by the Apostles, of the Greek, and therefore larger Old Testament,” that is, the Greek version containing the Jewish apocrypha; and then admits the fact: “The New Testament undoubtedly shows a preference for the Septuagint; out of about 350 texts from the Old Testament [in the New], 300 favor the Greek version rather than the Hebrew.” (CE. iii, 271.) It was also the Greek Septuagint and Greek forged Oracles, that were exclusively used by the Greek Fathers and priests in all the Gospel-propaganda work of the first three centuries. Obviously, the Gospels and other New Testament booklets, written in Greek and quoting 300 times the Greek Septuagint, and several Greek Pagan authors, as Aratus, and Cleanthes, were written, not by illiterate Jewish peasants, but by Greek-speaking ex-Pagan Fathers and priests far from the Holy Land of the Jews.
There is another proof that the Gospels were not written by Jews. Traditionally, Jesus and all the “Apostles” were Jews; all their associates and the people of their country with whom they came into contact, were Jews. But throughout the Gospels, scores of times, “the Jews” are spoken of, always as a distinct and alien people from the writers, and mostly with a sense of racial hatred and contempt. A few instances only need be given; they all betray that the writers were not Jews speaking of their fellow Jews. The Greek writer of “Matthew” says: “this saying is commonly reported among the Jews until this day” (Mt. xxviii, 15),—showing, too, that it was written long afterwards; a Jew must have said “among our people,” or some such. It is recorded by “Mark”: “For the Pharisees, and all the Jews, except they wash their hands of it, eat not, holding to the tradition of the elders” (Mk. vii, 3); no Jew writing for his fellow-Jews would explain or need to explain this Jewish custom, known to and practiced by “all the Jews.” Luke names a Jew and locates geographically his place of residence: “Joseph, of Arimathea, a city of the Jews”; an American writer, speaking of Hoboken, could not say “a city of the Americans” nor did Jews need to be told by a Jew that Arimathea was a “city of the Jews.” The Greek priest who wrote “John” is the most prolific in telling his Pagan readers about Jewish customs and personalities; absurd in a Jew writing for Jews: “After the manner of the purifying of the Jews” (ii, 6); “And the Jews' passover was at hand” (ii, 13) “Then answered the Jews, and said unto Jesus” (iii, 157 1); “Then there arose a question between some of John's disciples—[all Jews]—and the Jews about purifying” (iii, 25); “And therefore did the Jews persecute Jesus” (v, 16); “Therefore the Jews sought the more to kill him” (v, 18). More: “And the passover, a feast of the Jews, was nigh” vi, 4); no American would say “the Fourth of July, a holiday of the Americans,” though a French writer might properly so explain. “After these things Jesus would not walk in Jewry, because the Jews sought to kill him” (vii, 1); “for they feared the Jews: for the Jews had agreed already” (ix, 22); “His disciples said unto him, Master, the Jews of late sought to stone thee with stones” (xi, 8); “As the manner of the Jews is to bury” (xix, 40), which need be explained to no Jew. These and many like passages prove that no Jews wrote the Gospels; that they were written by foreigners for foreigners; these foreigners were Greek-speaking aliens unfamiliar with Jewish customs; the writers were therefore ex-Pagan Greek priests who were zealously “selling” the “glad tidings of great joy” to the ignorant and superstitious Pagan populace.
THE FOUR GOSPELS—“CHOSEN”
The Four Gospels are thus demonstrated as: not written by Jews; not written by any of the “Twelve Apostles”; not written nor in existence for over a century after the supposed Apostles. When finally the Gospel “according to” Luke came to be written, already, as “Luke” affirms, there were “many” other like pseudo-Apostolic Gospel-biographies of the Christ afloat (Luke, i, 1); he added just another. In his Commentary on Luke, Father Origen confirms this fact as well known: “And not four Gospels, but very many, out of which these we have chosen and delivered to the churches, we may perceive.” (Origen, In Proem. Luc., Hom. 1, vol. 2, p. 210.) How, and why, out of half a hundred of other lying forgeries of Gospels, were these sacred Four finally “chosen” as truly “Apostolic,” inspired, and canonical? Nobody knows, as CE. confesses.
It is a very strange and fatal confession, in view of the insistent false pretense of the Church for centuries of the patent Divinity of the Four Gospels, and of its own infallible inspiration and Divine guidance against all doubt and error; but it confesses:
“It is indeed impossible, at the present day, to describe the precise manner in which out of the numerous works ascribed to some Apostle, or simply bearing the name of gospel, only four, two of which are not ascribed to Apostles, came to be considered as sacred and canonical. It remains true, however, that all the early testimony which has a distinct bearing on the number of the canonical Gospels recognizes four such Gospels and none besides. Thus, Eusebius (d. 340) ... Clement of Alexandria (d. about 220), ... and Tertullian (d. 220), were familiar with our four Gospels, frequently quoting and commenting on them.” (CE. vi, 657.)The statement as to “all the early testimony” in favor of these Four only, is not only untrue, but it is contradicted by a true statement on the same page as the last above; it is, too, a further humiliating confession of blind and groping uncertainty with respect to the very foundation stones on which the Infallible 158 Church is built, and makes a bit less confident the forged assurance that the Gates of Hell—to say nothing of human Reason—shall not yet prevail against the ill-founded structure. Here is the destructive admission:
“In the writings of the Apostolic Fathers one does not, indeed, meet with unquestionable evidence in favor of only four canonical gospels. ... The canonical Gospels were regarded as of Apostolic authority, two of them being ascribed to the Apostles St. Matthew and St. John, respectively, and two to St. Mark and St. Luke, the respective companions of St. Peter and St. Paul. Many other gospels indeed claimed Apostolic authority, but to none of them was this claim universally allowed in the early Church. The only apocryphal work which was at all generally received, and relied upon, in addition to our four canonical Gospels, is the ‘Gospel according to the Hebrews.' It is a well-known fact that St. Jerome regards it as the Hebrew original of our Greek Canonical Gospel according to St. Matthew.” (CE. vi, 657.)Thus, admittedly, “numerous works” of pretended and false “gospels,” some fifty, were forged and falsely “ascribed to some apostle” by devout Christians; after a century and a half only four “came to be considered” and were finally “chosen”—selected—as of divine utterance and sanction. Why? one may well wonder.
WHY FOUR GOSPELS?
Why Four Gospels, then,—when only one would have been aplenty and much safer, as fewer contradictions—out of the fifty ascribed by pious forging hands to the Holy Twelve? The pious Fathers are ready here, as ever, with fantastic reasons to explain things whereof they are ignorant or are not willing to give honest reasons for. “The saintly Bishop of Lyons,” says CE. with characteristic clerical solemnity when anyone else would laugh, “Irenaeus (died about 202), who had known Polycarp in Asia Minor, not only admits and quotes our four Gospels, [he is the very first to mention them!]—but argues that there must be just four, no more and no less. He says: ‘It is not possible that the Gospels be either more or fewer than they are. For since there are four zones of the world in which we live, and four principal winds, while the Church is scattered throughout the world. ... and the pillar and ground of the Church is the Gospel. ... it is fitting that we should have four pillars, breathing out immortality on every side and vivifying our flesh. ... The living creatures are quadriform, and the Gospel is quadriform, as is also the course followed by our Lord”! (CE. vi, 659.) Thus far CE. quoting the good Bishop; but we may follow the Bishop a few lines further in his very innocent ratiocinations from ancient Hebrew mythology, in proof of the divine Four:
“For this reason were four principal covenants given to the human race: One prior to the deluge, under Adam; the second, that after the deluge, under Noah; the third, the giving of the law, under Moses; the fourth, that which renovates man, and sums up all things by means of the Gospel, raising and bearing men upon its wings into the heavenly 159 Kingdom. ... But that these Gospels alone are true and reliable, and admit neither an increase nor diminution of the aforesaid number, I have proved by so many and such arguments. For, since God made all things in due proportion and adaptation, it was fit also that the outward aspect of the Gospel should be well arranged and harmonized. The opinion of those men, therefore, who handed the Gospel down to us, having been investigated, from their very fountainheads, let us proceed also [to the remaining apostles), and inquire into their doctrine with regard to God.” (Iren. Adv. Haer. III, xi, 8, 9; ANF. i, 428-29.)The true reason, however, for four finally “chosen” and accepted Gospels, is that stated by Reinach, after quoting Irenaeus and other authorities: “The real reason was to satisfy each of the four principal Churches each of which possessed its Gospel: Matthew at Jerusalem, Mark at Rome, or Alexandria, Luke at Antioch, and John at Ephesus.” (Reinach, Orpheus, p. 217.) This reason for the use of a different Gospel by each of the principal and independent Churches,—for the special uses of each of which the respective Gospels were no doubt worked up by forging Fathers in each Fold,—is confirmed by Bishop Irenaeus himself in this same argument. Each of the four principal sects of heretics, he says, makes use in their Churches of one or the other of these Four for its own uses, for instance: Matthew by the Ebionites; Mark by “those who separate Jesus from Christ”; Luke by the Marcionites; and John by the Valentinians; and this heretical use of the Four, argues the Bishop, confirms their like acceptance and use by the True Churches: “So firm is the ground upon which these Gospels rest, that the very heretics bear witness to them, and starting from these documents, each of them endeavors to establish his own peculiar doctrine [citing the use by each sect of a different Gospel as above named]. Since, then, our opponents do bear testimony to us, and make use of these documents, our proof derived from them is firm and true.” (Iren., op. cit. sec. 7.) The “canonical Four,” verily, as CE. confesses, were manufactured precisely for the purpose of meeting and confuting the heretics, as were the gradually developed and defined sacred dogmas of the Orthodox Church, even that of the Trinity. The fabrication of the Four can be seen working out under our very eyes, in the light of the foregoing statement of Irenaeus, and of that of CE. to be quoted.
In the next section we shall see proven, that no written, Gospels existed until shortly before 185 A.D., when Irenmus wrote; they are first mentioned in chapter xxii of his Book II; the above quotation is from Book III, when use of them became constant. Evident we see it to be, from what Irenaeus has just said, that the sects of heretics named were making use, each of them of one of the just-published Four as well as of other “spurious gospels”; the Orthodox claimed the Four as their own, and finally established the claim. The “gospel” up to about this time, a century and a half after Jesus Christ, was entirely oral and “traditional”; the Gnostics and other heretics evidently were first to reduce some “gospels” to writing; the Orthodox quickly followed suit, in order to combat the heretics by “apostolic” writings. This is clear from the following, that “the spurious gospels of the Gnostics prepared 160 the way for the canon of Scripture,”—meaning, for the now “canonical Scripture”; for, as the “canon” was not dogmatically established until 1546, the Four were not “canonized” when Irenaeus wrote in 185,—when the “way was prepared” for them by the earlier heretical “spurious gospels.” Thus CE. writes:
“The endless controversies with heretics have been indirectly the cause of most important doctrinal developments and definitions formulated by councils to the edification of the body of Christ. Thus the spurious gospels of the Gnostics prepared the way for the canon of Scripture: the Patri-passian, Sabellian, Arian, and Macedonian heresies drew out a clearer concept of the Trinity; the Nestorian and Eutychian errors led to definite dogmas on the nature and Person of Christ. And so on down to Modernism, which has called forth a solemn assertion of the claims of the supernatural in history.” (CE. vii, 261.)Heresy means “Choice”; heretics are those who choose what they will believe, or whether they will believe at all. It was to foreclose all choice on the part of believers, that the divinely-inspired, apostolic fictions of the Four Gospels were drawn up for the first time to combat the “spurious gospels” of the free choosers. Heresy could not exist in the time of Jesus Christ, for he laid down nothing for belief, except “He that believeth on me shall be saved” against his immediate “second coming” and end of the world. The gospels are thus anti-heretical documents of the second century, after Gnosticism first appeared.
In this connection it may be mentioned, as complained by Augustine, that there were some 93 sects of heretics during the first three centuries of the Christian Faith; all these were Christian sects, believing in the tales of Jesus Christ and him crucified, but each of them as rivals struggling for the profits and power of religion and warring to suppress all others, and make itself master in pelf and power. Hence the Fathers thundered against the heretics. The inspired Four Gospels, contradictory at every point, were impossible to believe in all points; they left every one free to disbelieve all, or to believe such as he could.
So incredible, even on their face, were one and all of these canonical Four Gospels, that the fanatic Father Tertullian thus stated the grounds of his holy faith in them: “Credo quia incredibilis est—I believe because it is unbelievable”; and St. Augustine, greatest of the Fathers, declared himself in these terms: “Ego vero Evangelio non crederem, nisi me Catholicae Ecclesiae conmoveret Auctoritas. ... Ego me ad eos teneam, quibus praecipientibus Evangelio credidi—I would not believe the Gospel true, unless the authority of the Catholic Church constrained me. ... I hold myself bound to those, through whose teachings I have believed the Gospel.” (Augustine, On the Foundation, sec. 5, Ed. Vives, vol. xxv, p. 435; Orpheus, p. 223.)
In the work often cited, Bishop Irenaeus either falsely quotes the Gospel of Mark, or the sacred text has been seriously altered in our present copies; he says: “Mark commences with a reference to the prophetical spirit, saying, ‘The beginning of the Gospel of 161 Jesus Christ, as it is written in Esaias the prophet”' (sec. 8, p. 428), as if Isaiah testified to the Gospel. The Bishop also quotes two long passages, one a written letter of the Apostles “unto those brethren from among the Gentiles who are in Antioch, and Syria, and Silicia, greeting,”—which are not in the Acts of the Apostles or any other New Testament book as we now have them. (Iren., Adv. Maer. III, xi, 14; p. 436.) The good Bishop seems either to have fabricated this alleged Epistle and passage, or other pious hands falsified the sacred Scriptures by forging them out of its pages. So it is evident that these inspired booklets, as we now know them, at least differ in very many material respects from the “traditional Gospel” and from the form in which the Four Gospels were first reduced to writing. Many other instances exist, of which some of the most notorious will be shown in the course of the chapter.
Can't find what you're looking for? Have an idea or a question? Let us know in the Discussion Forum
|
|
|
|
| Need to ask me a question? Something missing, broken, or incorrect? I make every attempt to reply to all email. Click here to send me an email. |
