05. ON THE ALLEGED DISCREPANCY

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THE late Dean Alford, on St. Mark xvi. 9-20, referred to the "inconsistency" of the narrative "with the accounts in the other Gospels," which had been pointed out in early times by some of the Fathers, including Gregory of Nyssa and Jerome. (Cf. p. 23.)

Dean Bargon, however ("The Last Twelve Verses of St. Mark," p. 189), says: "What would be gained by demonstrating (as I am, of course, prepared to do) that there is really no inconsistency whatever between anything which St. Mark here says and what the other Evangelists deliver? . . . . It is only one of many places where a primâ facie discrepancy, though it does not fail to strike, yet (happily) altogether fails to distress faithful readers.

. . . . If sufficient critical skill were brought to bear on the highly elliptical portion of narrative contained in these twelve verses, . . . . any apparent inconsistency . . . . would be found to be imaginary."

The following quotations may be added, as having a more or less direct bearing on the subject :—

Zeller ("The Acts of the Apostles Critically Investigated," vol. ii. p. 199): "Little as the Ascension, in our book (the Acts), can be reconciled with that in Luke's Gospel, we must not infer from this circumstance a diversity of authorship." Compare Alford, "Greek Testament," vol. i., on St. Luke xxiv. 50, and "Prolegomena," chap. iv. sect. 4, par. 2; and Bishop Wordsworth, "Greek Testament," on St. Luke xxiv. 50.

Zeller (vol. ii. p. 197): "It is true that, in the accounts (in the Acts) of St. Paul's conversion and the period immediately subsequent to that event, variations exist which we found of sufficient importance in estimating its historical value. Yet how little these variations justify us in attributing a different origin to the narratives concerned, is incontrovertibly proved by the circumstance, that between the three accounts of St. Paul's conversion, especially between those in the 9th and 22d chapters, there is an accordance, in a great measure verbal, which renders it impossible to attribute them to different authors."

Subjoined are the observations of the late Dean Howson, in his "Bohlen Lectures," p. 94 ff., as to these varying accounts of St. Paul's conversion :—

"There are three accounts of St. Paul's conversion—one given directly by St. Luke in the 9th chapter, the others by St. Paul himself, as related in the 22d and 26th chapters, under apologetic conditions, but conditions extremely different from one another. . . . If they were true to the circumstances under which they are alleged to have been uttered, and true likewise to the character of the speaker as a man of good judgment and fine tact, they must exhibit corresponding variations."

"Speaking to the angry mob in the Temple court, it was essential that St. Paul should be conciliatory, by presenting his subject as much as possible on the Jewish side. . . . This he does with remarkable skill. . . . He speaks in Hebrew."

"Our part as critics, in the scrutiny of this speech (Acts xxii.), is to observe how all the omissions, the additions, the variations of emphasis, on comparison with the direct narrative, fit the occasion, and also harmonise with what we know from other sources of St. Paul's versatility, tact, and presence of mind."

"If next we turn to the speech before Festus and Agrippa, we find the story of his conversion told with what might be termed a strong Gentile colouring; and this was in harmony with the occasion, and quite according to the tone and habit of St. Paul's mind and character."

It may be added that there is an apparent discrepancy between Acts xv. and Galatians ii., and yet both chapters are more or less due to St. Paul. St. Paul himself states that he made himself "all things to all men" (1 Cor. ix. 22); and, as I have pointed out in "St. Paul the Author of the Acts" (Second Part, p. 189, note), a striking illustration of this is afforded by "St. Paul calling out, 'I am a Pharisee, the son of a Pharisee,' before the Sanhedrin (some members of which he perceived to be Pharisees, Acts xxiii. 6). To the mob at Jerusalem he proclaims in the Hebrew tongue that he is a Jew (Acts xxii. 3). To the chief captain (who is a Roman) he states that he also is a Roman (Acts xxii. 25, 27)."

It is obvious that, in such a rapid retrospect, such a brief condensed summary, as these last twelve verses of St. Mark, the main object of the writer (who had not specially in view the Nineteenth Century with its searching negative criticism) would be, not so much to insist on critical accuracy of detail, as to give, at a glance, a comprehensive and impressive picture. It must not be forgotten that the same artist can paint two different pictures of the same scene, and that the same events present a different appearance when viewed in a different light. A narrator may, in two accounts of the same events, emphasize or pass over different facts according to the didactic purpose of his narrative.

That there must be some didactic purpose in this terse and graphic, thorough and complete epitome is obvious. Let us examine a little more closely. In verse 15 we find a very emphatic declaration that the Gospel was graciously intended for all mankind, and was to be freely offered, without distinction, to Jew and Gentile alike throughout the whole world—a confirmation of St. Paul's statement that "the God of the Jews was the God of the Gentiles also" (Rom. iii. 29). Again, in verse 16 we find another emphatic assertion that salvation is not of Works, but of Faith, that there is no need for the believer "to be circumcised after the manner of Moses, and to keep the Law" (Acts xv. 1, 24)—a confirmation of St. Paul's statement that "a man is justified by Faith without the deeds of the Law . . . seeing that it is one God who shall justify the Circumcision by Faith, and the Uncircumcision through Faith" (Rom. iii. 28, 30). "For there is no difference between the Jew and the Gentile" (Rom. x. 12).

Now, as I have observed before, St. Paul's form of the Gospel was not precisely the same as that preached by the other Apostles; St. Paul's Gospel (Rom. xvi. 25; Gal. ii. 2) differed from this, not as to historical facts, but with regard to doctrine and practice. Writing to the Ephesians (ch. iii. 3, 6), he says, "By revelation God made known unto me the mystery . . . that the Gentiles should be fellow-heirs, and of the same body, and partakers of His promise in Christ by the Gospel."

These words are the keynote of the doctrinal Gospel preached by St. Paul. And here in these concluding verses of St. Mark, few and short as they are, we find the two marked features of St. Paul's own peculiar form of the doctrinal Gospel prominently displayed; namely, the doctrine of God's Free Grace, and the doctrine of man's Justification by Faith. St. Paul mentions these two great doctrines together in his Epistle to the Ephesians (ch. ii. 8), when he says, "By Grace are ye saved through Faith, and that not of yourselves; it—i.e., your salvation (Alford)—is the gift of God." We find precisely the same doctrinal teaching in the Third Gospel, which, as we have seen, reflects the mind of St. Paul as it is everywhere exhibited to us in his Epistles. Alford ("Greek Test," vol. i. Proleg., p. 43) points out "Luke's carefulness (in the Third Gospel) to record the sayings of our Lord which were assertive of His unrestricted love for Jew and Gentile alike. We may observe, too, in Luke those parables and sayings are principally found, which most directly regard the great doctrine of man's free justification by grace through faith: e.g., ch. xv. 11 ff.; xvii. 10; xviii. 14, in which latter place the use of δεδικαιωμένος is remarkable."

It is, moreover, an important fact, which must never be lost sight of, that St. Paul "suffered persecution," at the hands of the Judaisers, "for the Cross of Christ," because he would not "preach circumcision" (Gal. v. 11; vi. 12). These persecuting Judaisers proclaimed his inferiority to the original Apostles (2 Cor. xi. 5), and indeed went so far as to deny that he was an Apostle at all (1 Cor. ix. 1-3), doubtless making the most and the worst of his past career as persecutor, to disparage his Apostolic claims (Acts ix. 26). It was, indeed, too true that St. Paul had once "persecuted the Church of God"—he himself, humbled by this recollection, was the first to confess that "he was not meet to be called an Apostle" (1 Cor. xv. 9)—but he had "obtained mercy" and had "received grace and apostleship," inasmuch as he had done this "ignorantly in unbelief" (Rom. i. 5; 1 Tim. i. 13).

Now, in these last verses of St. Mark, there certainly appears to be special emphasis laid on the unbelief of the eleven Apostles. Thus, in verse 11, the reader is told that "they believed not," and again, in verse 13, "neither believed they them," and, once more, in verse 14, the very next verse, "He upbraided them with their unbelief and hardness of heart, because they believed not them who had seen Him after He was risen." We must not forget that in St. Paul's view no faith in Christ, which fell short of faith in the Resurrection of Christ, could possibly be of the slightest efficacy or value. Thus, he writes to the Romans, "If thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised Him from the dead, thou shalt be saved" (Rom. x. 9). Compare also the impressive statement of St. Paul to his Corinthian converts, "If Christ be not risen, then is our preaching vain, and your faith is also vain . . . ye are yet in your sins" (1 Cor. xv. 14, 17). The Resurrection of Christ was the foundation-stone of the Pauline Gospel—faith in the Resurrection of Christ its one essential article. We gather, therefore, from the above emphatic statement of their unbelief, that the chosen eleven Apostles, to whom the Gospel was first intrusted, were originally just as incredulous as St. Paul himself of the testimony of others; and that as St. Paul was in no respect "behind the very chiefest Apostles, in all the signs of apostleship" (2 Cor. xii. 11, 2), so these very chiefest Apostles were not one whit better than St. Paul in this matter of want of faith.

Taking all these circumstances into consideration, it seems not impossible that the didactic purpose—and this may throw some light on the alleged discrepancy—of these last twelve verses of St. Mark may have been to impress on the Gentile reader that these chosen

Apostles, “who had known Christ after the flesh” (2 Cor. v. 16), were, notwithstanding all their advantages, in no way superior to St.

Paul himself, and that although they might claim, as the circumcised children of Abraham, all the privileges of the favoured Jews, yet at first they were just as destitute of that Faith in Christ, which St. Paul preached as the one thing needful, as the most untaught and outcast Gentile could possibly be—so destitute of faith, indeed, as to have been “upbraided with their unbelief and hardness of heart, because they believed not.” Hence the lesson seems to be that the Apostles no less than St. Paul, the Jews no less than the Gentiles everywhere, for there was "no difference" (Rom. x. 12), were all, by nature, unbelieving—they were all alike suffering from "hardness of heart"—all alike "concluded under unbelief" (Rom. xi. 32)—that all alike might be suitable subjects for the mercy of God. All alike were "concluded under sin, that the promise by faith of Jesus Christ might be given to them that believe" (Gal. iii. 22). All alike needed to be justified by faith, and to receive salvation as the free gift of God—to accept by faith that free and universal Gospel of which St. Paul was the appointed preacher (2 Tim. i. 11).

Thus the didactic purpose of these verses may have been to vindicate St. Paul's Apostleship, and, by contrast with the dark background of original unbelief, to bring out all the more prominently, and to illuminate all the more brightly, those great cardinal doctrines of the Gospel of the grace of God (Acts xx. 24), everywhere preached by St. Paul the Apostle of the Gentiles.

It may be added that these narratives in St. Mark and St. Luke may have passed through the hands of,—may have been copied, modified, touched and retouched by,—more than one amanuensis before assuming the final forms in which they now perplex critics. At all events, the difficulty, on account of the alleged discrepancy, in accepting the authorship (or, perhaps it should be, the editorship) of St. Paul (who was not an eye-witness), will not be appreciably greater than in accepting the authorship of St. Mark, which Dean Burgon (p. 254) claims to have so thoroughly demonstrated as to leave remaining "not a particle of doubt, not an atom of suspicion." And the quotations given above prove incontestably that an apparent discrepancy between two documents does not by any means necessarily involve a diversity of authorship—especially when the author concerned is St. Paul.

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