are not, a corresponding presumption is established in behal of their forged character. Antioch was the metropolis of Syria. It had been the residence of the Syrian kings. It was, under the early emperors, the capital city of the East. Art and architecture had made it a Syrian Athens. Wealth had been so profusely lavished in its adornment that it was known as "the golden." In its cypress groves the Daphnean pleasures were celebrated with more than oriental luxuriance and exquisiteness. This city of architectural magnificence, profuse wealth, and pagan wickedness, was for the first centuries the center of Gentile Christianity. Here the disciples were first called Christians. Here Paul labored, and from the city's gates he set forth on his first missionary journey. Its bishops, headed, tradition relates, by Peter, ranked in ordine dignitatis after those of Rome and Alexandria. Its Christians numbered, in Chrysostom's day, 100,000, and its Church ministered to the needs of 3,000 of its poor. Antioch was, therefore, the Syrian Jerusalem. What, then, were the qualities needed in a bishop of such a Church of such a city in the last years of the first and the first years of the second century? Courage, that persecution may be endured without disruption of membership. Spirituality, love to Christ, that doctrine may be kept pure, that the allurements of pleasure may not beguile. Pride, that the consciousness of divine duties may repel the Christian from the degradations of heathenism. A loyalty to the Church, that neither imperial edict may cause dismay nor internal jealousies create disunion. And courtesy, that the charity of which the apostles who abode in the city wrote may blossom in all its life. The qualities which are demanded in the Antiochan bishop, and which were disciplined by the episcopal office, are precisely the qualities which are impressed upon the Ignatian epistles. The agreement is obvious. Ignatius was bishop of the Church at Antioch, and the characteristics of his reputed letters are the characteristics which were needed in and disciplined by that office. The second consideration in the solution of the problem relates to the consistency of these characteristics. Do they contradict each other? Are they natural, or, to use Dr. Whateley's word, are they plausible? If they are, the inference is strongly in favor of the genuineness of the letters from whose contents they are deduced. The courage manifested in the Ignatian literature is of a most impulsive type. It bursts into hyperbole. It riots in extravagance of simile. It should not, however, for this reason be condemned as unreal. It is no more peculiar than the bravery of the Scottish Wishart, who, as he is bound to the stake, exclaims, " You shall not see me change my countenance. I fear not the fire." The courage of the martyr described in the letters is of that intense type befitting a follower of Stephen. Of the same strong cast, too, are his love to Christ and his enthusiasm. His spiritual pride, moreover, is the natural result of his courage, combined with a consciousness of the responsibilities with which he is clothed. His loyalty to the Church flows from his loyalty to his God, whose visible body is in peril of being torn asunder by schismatics. And his tenderness toward others is the obedience to his Master's command of loving his neighbor as himself. These characteristics are natural, plausible, consistent. They are colored with the intensest reality. The inference is, therefore, allowable that the writings whence they are drawn are neither forgeries nor the patch-work of fabricators, but that they are the genuine productions of the pen of him whose name they bear. The conclusion, therefore, which this protracted examination necessitates favors the genuineness of the shorter Greek recension. This is the conclusion now generally adopted by the best scholars, and one that has recently been fortified by the work of Zahn. Until, therefore, more light is shed upon the question in consequence of new comparisons of the text or by the discovery of new MSS., critical opinion must incline toward the position that the Greek version more accurately represents the original Ignatius than the Syriac. The teaching of these epistles, whose genuineness we have endeavored to prove, should be exhibited more fully than the previous drift of our discussion has permitted. Two points deserve consideration. 1. Christology. The representations of the letters respecting the divinity and humanity of Christ are remarkably full and positive. God was manifested by Jesus Christ his Son, who is the Word, not spoken, but essential.* Of himself he can do nothing. He was begotten by the Father before the beginning * Mag., viii. Ibid., vii; John v, 30. of time; the only-begotten Son, he remains the same forever, and of his kingdom there shall be no end.* The prophets foresaw him by the Spirit, and waited for him as their teacher, and expected him as their Lord and Saviour, saying, "He will come and save us." But he was truly man. as well as truly God. He possessed all the faculties of a human being. He ate, and drank, and slept. He was born of a virgin, baptized by John, and crucified by Pilate. He lived a Holy life, and healed every kind of sickness and disease among the people, and wrought signs and wonders for the benefit of men; and to those who had fallen into the error of polytheism he made known the one and only true God, his Father, and underwent the passion, and endured the cross at the hands of the Christ-killing Jews, under Pontius Pilate the governor and Herod the king. He also died, and rose again, and ascended into the heavens to him that sent him, and is sat down at his right hand, and shall come at the end of the world, with his Father's glory, to judge the living and the dead, and to render to every one according to bis works.§ 2. The Church. The teaching of the letters regarding the Church, the bishop, and the sacraments, is exhibited in the following extract: See that ye all follow the bishop, even as Christ does the Father, and the presbytery as ye would the apostles. Do ye also reverence the deacons, as those that carry out [through their office] the appointment of God. Let no man do any thing connected with the Church without the bishop. Let that be deemed a proper Eucharist which is [administered] either by the bishop or by one to whom he has intrusted it. Wherever the bishop shall appear there let the multitude [of the people] also be; even as where Christ is, there does all the heavenly host stand by, waiting upon him as the chief captain of the Lord's might, and the governor of every intelligent nature. It is not lawful without the bishop either to baptize or to offer, or to present sacrifice, or to celebrate a love-feast. But that which seems good to him is also well-pleasing to God, that every thing ye do may be secure and valid. ¶ In conclusion, it only remains to present a brief review of the Ignatian controversy. Since the publication of the longer Greek recension by Pacæus in 1557 and by Gessner in 1559, and of the shorter Greek by Archbishop Usher in 1644, down + Mag., ix; Isa. XXXV, 4. § Mag., xi. * Mag., vi; Dan. ii, 44; vii, 14, 27. Some refer this to the Lord's Supper. ¶ Smyr., viii. to the discovery of the Syriac version, criticism vacillated in its adherence to these two texts. The longer Greek was defended by Whiston (1710-11) and by C. Meier, (1836.) Daillé (Dallæus) (1666) refused to acknowledge the authenticity of either version; but the Vindicia of Bishop Pearson, (1672,) in reply to Daillé, inclined critical opinion toward the acceptance of the shorter Greek. In 1743 Lardner, ("Credibility of Gospel History,") though favoring the views of Pearson, acknowledged that, "whatever positiveness some may have shown on either side," he had "found it a very difficult question." Similar expressions of doubt were made by Justin, (1751,) Mosheim, (1765,) Griesbach, (1768,) Rosenmüller, (1795,) Neander, (1826,) and by other scholars. The discovery of the Syriac MSS. reopened the discussion. In 1846 Dr. Cureton published his Vindicia Ignatiana, and three years later his Corpus Ignatianum, defending the Syriac version. His view was accepted by Lee, (1846,) Chev. Bunsen, (1847,) Ritschl, (1851, and later in 1857,) Weiss, (1852,) and by Lipsius, (1856 ;) and rejected by Jacobson, by Hefele in his third edition of the "Apostolic Fathers," by Dewzinger, (1849,) Petermann, (1849,) Uhlhorn, (1851 and 1856,) Rothe, (1837,) Huther, (1841,) and by Düsterdieck, (1843.) Dorner, (1845,) before the publication of the Syriac MSS., accepted the shorter Greek recension. ART. III.-ISAIAH'S VISION OF THE CROSS. PRE-EMINENT among all Messianic prophecies, unsurpassed in the grandeur and solemnity of its poetic diction, profound in its divine teachings beyond most other Scriptures, and full of, inimitable pathos, stands the inexhaustible Fifty-third of Isaiah. It is the ancient Ecce Homo of an inspired man of God, an Old Testament Psalm of the Cross, setting forth in rhythmic form a prophetic picture of Vicarious Atonement. To be appreciated by the English reader it should be presented to his eye in poetic form, and our language affords no better measure than that of the heroic blank verse in which to set this matchless jewel of Hebrew poetry. RHYTHMIC VERSION OF ISAIAH LII, 13—LIII, 12. 13 Behold, with wisdom shall my servant act; Exceeding high. (14) As wonderstruck on thee O'er him shut kings their mouths; for what was not 4 Surely, our sicknesses he lifted up; Our sorrows, he bore them; and we supposed Smitten of God, and pained! (5) And he was pierced And by his stripes came healing unto us! 6 All we like sheep have gone astray; each man 7 Harassed was he, and he was sunken low 8 From suffering and from judgment he was seized, That he was cut off from the land of life Because of the transgression of my people, A curse for them? (9) And he shall give the unjust |