as soon as the eye opens on one still more wonderful-the last acts and conversations of our Lord with his own (c. xiii.-xvi.). In these sections of the Gospel we learn Christ's conduct towards men, how he maintained his truth against them and for them.

(b) The language and manner of representation altogether changes when the apostle, in c. xvii., makes known the language of Christ to God himself. Here there burns forth a glow of discourse than which nothing can be more ardent; and here, too, is given the most perfect pattern of prayer in its sublime inward strength and certainty of victory.

(c) On a line with this, and equally claiming our wonder, is the section c. i. 1-18, which, at the beginning of the Gospel, in setting forth the eternal existence of the Word and his advent in the flesh, passes involuntarily as it were into a hymn; just as the history of the creation at the beginning of the Old Testament. This section has been incorrectly called a preface, as though it could be omitted, or formed a less substantive part of the work than other sections. It is indispensable to the Gospel, in respect to the main and secondary aims which its author had in view. Ewald concludes his careful examination of the literary structure and composition of this Gospel with the statement, that the variety, warmth, and energy of its description give to it an ever-fresh grace; and that the work, from the sublimity of its contents, the harmony and connectedness of its parts, the constant, clear, and gentle light shed over all, possesses an indescribable attraction which is found to an equal degree in no other writing of the Old or New Testament.

The Gospel is not only important in itself as a literary work, and from its place in the history of Christianity, but important also as being the work of St. John the beloved disciple, who, although not educated for literature, and accustomed, in spite of the fiery zeal of his spirit, to live a life of retreat and meditation, yet in his old age undertook and accomplished the great task of writing the Gospel. That the apostle John is the author, and that no one else could have composed it but he who has always been considered its author, admits, Ewald boldly affirms, of no reasonable doubt or denial; rather, whichever way we examine the question, every reason and evidence concur in decidedly rejecting such doubt.

It is possible that the many among us who are most nervous at the results of our author's criticisms upon the Old Testament, and by whom, in consequence, he is more than "suspect," will yet not refuse the aid which his studies afford them in regard to the authorship of this Gospel. Indeed, the importance of the question is great. The work stands sufficiently sure to

the Christian believer on its own evidence, and proves itself true to him; for it speaks to him, in the midst of the toil and weariness, the joys and sorrows of his life, of the unseen Friend and Brother whom he knows and feels to be present. No criticism which should remove this great Gospel of the love of God from the apostolic age, or divest it of the authority of an eyewitness to the facts recorded in it, would destroy the faith which is part of himself. But it were idle to forget that the multitude of earnest inquirers ask anxiously for an historical basis of evidence, and are not satisfied that the work is true because devout believers affirm that they know it to be true. The Gospel literature belongs to the domain of ancient literature; all are interested that its right place should be, on the surest grounds, assigned to it; many of us are more than interested that the place for ages assigned to it in the Christian church should not be taken away.

If we did not know the name of the author of the Gospel, we could not doubt that he was one of the twelve. He clearly designates himself as such; and throughout the work the historical spirit (taken in its best and simplest meaning) is so manifest, every assertion is made with the confidence and certainty which history alone can give, that it is impossible not to believe the author when he intimates that he is one of the twelve. This confidence runs through the work. The author can relate all that he thinks necessary, because he knows that he will be believed. Hence it is that no one who has been accustomed to distinguish between books of simple true narrative and books of a different character, can hesitate in regarding the author of this Gospel as a man who tells the whole truth, because he had been himself an eye-witness, and because, from a perfect knowledge of the facts, he was in a position to tell the truth. Now, in the late period when the book was written, no other of the twelve survived who could have written it but John.

Again, in the artistic arrangement and execution of the work, the author proves himself a genuine Hebrew historian. His Greek wears all the marks of a Hebrew who had been born and brought up among Jews in the Holy Land, who had been unaccustomed to speak Greek, and who in the Greek dress, which late in life he learnt to put on, never laid aside the spirit of his mother-tongue, or ceased to be guided by it. His Greek, indeed, is less strongly coloured with Hebrew than that of the older Gospels; rather it has adopted much of the genuine Greek manner. But in its life and breath no language can be more really Hebraic than that of this author. And only the age, character, the personality of the disciple John can account for such a language. It cannot be explained as a composition from

the

different materials, or as an imitation of Old-Testament and Hebrew phraseology, still less as having been formed within the Christian congregation after the death of the long-lived and most aged apostle. Indeed, the language is as thoroughly original and single in its kind as the apostle himself in his life and work. He knows that he is writing for Greek, i.e. educated Roman citizens, whether Jewish or Christian, but he does not care artistically to imitate pure Greek; and although he was completely separated from the Jews of that time, he does not hide his own intimate acquaintance with their language. He gives eg. the genuine Hebrew names which were unused in Greek (the name Μεσσίας, i. 42, iv. 25; Κηφᾶς, i. 45; Βηθεσδά, v. 2), or the Greek interpretation of such Hebrew proper names as were used in Greek books (as i. 38, 42, ix. 7, xix. 13, 17, 20: cf. xxi. 2). It is not unimportant that all these Hebrew interpretations are correct; whereas soon after the apostle's death all knowledge of the kind was lost among Christians. It is remarkable also that St. Luke, who, as Ewald thinks, wrote nearly at the same time as the apostle, avoided all such Hebraisms.

Again, if we compare ancient books which were written under foreign names with this Gospel, we find that there is no similarity between them. Ordinarily, such books were written under the name of some celebrated deceased writer or saint. This Gospel, on the hypothesis of its not being the work of St. John, would be written under the name of an apostle who still lived, who had never before composed a work, and who, as far as his activity in the world went, was not to be compared with Peter or Paul, or even with James. Moreover, such books had a particular object in view, for the sake of which some great name was used, so that it is not difficult to discover why that name was chosen under the shadow of which they sought to attain their object; whereas this Gospel would be ascribed to the name of an apostle, to whom (if he be not the author of the four works) there would be no reason why they should be ascribed, since in the earlier Gospels, in the Epistles of St. Paul, in the Acts of the Apostles, John nowhere appears so prominent as Peter. Again, such books bear on their titlepage the names of those to whom they are imputed, and artistically conform to that character, in order to gain credence as being what they wish to be thought; now this Gospel bears no such marks upon it, does not once name its author, so that no reader would suppose it to be the apostle's if he did not on other grounds know it to be his. Again, such books imitate the language and standing of the men whose they are said

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to be, and are forced to submit to this severe artistic rule; now in this Gospel there is no imitation of any work, not even of the Apocalypse; it is, on the contrary, as natural and as original as possible. All the later fame of St. John (apart from the Apocalypse, which was afterwards ascribed to him) refers back to, and agrees with the spirit of, the Gospel and the first Epistle; indeed, if any genuine writings have ever been published to the world free from the least suspicion of spuriousness, they are the Gospel and the first Epistle of St. John. This is Ewald's conclusion as to the authorship of this portion of the Johannine writings. He states and satisfactorily answers the question, whether the apostle wrote the Gospel in its present form quite alone or with the aid of friends. The fact that St. John and the rest of the twelve (the single exception of Matthew does not come into consideration) were not during Christ's earthly life literati provokes the question. Many remarkable phenomena in the book itself invite us to consider it.

Some readers in our time are inclined to think that if the apostle had been an eye-witness, and had taken part in the history, he would have declared himself plainly and openly as the author of it. It is partly from this supposition that doubts as to the authorship have arisen. But the very omission complained of is just what we ought to expect, and could not be otherwise that it appears surprising, is owing to ignorance and mistake. For the Apostle, in this like the other evangel ists, adheres to the old Hebrew custom of publishing historical works purely for themselves, and without mention of authorship. This custom had been interrupted by the influences of Persian and Hellenistic culture; at no time could it be more fittingly revived than in the literature of the Gospels. If ever, indeed, a writer should be silent, and that willingly, in presence of his subject, surely it would be here in presence of the most sublime and unparalleled subject which had entered the domain of history, which lived still fresh in the memories of the faithful, and called out their reverence all the more deeply in proportion as the world was insensible to it. Of these faithful, even of the twelve, not one would gaze upon him with deeper reverence than John his beloved disciple; not one would feel more deeply his own nothingness in his sight than he who had long served him in retirement and meditation, rather than in conflict with the world, and in the circle of a few trusted friends rather than in public life. Had there been no other causes which exercised their own decided influence upon the outward form and execution of the work, the reasons just given would suffice to explain why John did not name himself as author of it. According to

an ancient tradition,* it was late at Ephesus, and only on the advice and at the request of near friends, that the apostle composed the Gospel. The tradition agrees so plainly with all other traits, that we undoubtedly read in it the fragment of an historical truth. If we compare it with what we know of the apostle, and learn about him in the Gospel, we may well believe, in the darkness in which we are, that it was to the wishes of his friends that the apostle yielded, and that he made use of their help.† Those who learned Greek late in life availed themselves of the aid of the learned in that language. St. John had made Greek his own since his youth, and we cannot doubt had already formed his peculiar Greek style; yet in his old age he would be less able to dispense with the aid of literary friends, as he had been less practised in literary composition in his early life. There was no lack of younger friends in the large congregation at Ephesus who could assist him. Again, the style of his sentences bears all the marks of having been dictated to one or more writers. They are briefly expressed, and not unfrequently correct, repeat, and complete one another (iii. 22-24, iv. 1-3, or iv. 43-45, are instances). This is just the style of one who dictates to another his words, thoughts, and assertions, and very different from that of St. Paul, who sketched his thoughts in writing, and left them to be clearly written out by a good penman. And if this be so, it is easy to suppose that the friends, maybe presbyters of the church in Ephesus, whose help the apostle used, might in one or two passages come forth, and from their own point of view assert what they had to say better than the apostle. And if this according to unmistakable signs actually happened, it furnishes a proof of the correctness of this view of the literary composition of the Gospel. I

We are thus enabled to understand the relation of the apostle to his work. He did not wish to name himself as its author, either in the beginning or the end or the course of his Gospel. He used no opportunity of speaking of himself and of his relation to Christ and the rest of the twelve; and this is just what we should expect from the tenderness and elevation of his mind. His own name does not pass his lips; the more easily can he designate the Baptist (differing in this from the other evangelists) plainly as John. And yet there were passages in which it was unavoidable that he should speak of himself; to

Euseb. Hist. Eccles. vi. 14. 'Iwávvny

πνεύματι θεοφορηθέντα, πνευματικὸν ποιῆσαι εὐαγγέλιον.

προτραπέντα ὑπὸ τῶν γνωρίμων

† Compare the case of Josephus κατὰ Ἀπίωνος, i. 9 : χρησάμενός τισι πρὸς τὴν Ἑλληνίδα φωνὴν συνεργοῖς.

Ewald thinks that in the work itself there is only one such passage, c. xix. 35, which cannot be otherwise understood. At the close of the appendix, xxi. 24 f., is another; so that these two passages explain one another.