October 16

"And there are also many other things which Jesus did, the which, if they should be written every one, I suppose that even the world itself could not contain the books that should be written. Amen." Joux 21:25.

This is the language of the writer of this gospel in concluding his narrative. After all that he had brought forward, much more remained behind. He had composed a memoir, rather than a history, and only furnished a few specimens of a subject boundless in itself.

Yet the expression he employs in asserting this may seem to many surprising, if not confounding. There are two ways of solving the difficulty.

First, the language is a figure, a strong hyperbole. This is very common in the East. Indeed, it is frequent with writers and speakers in all countries. Even in our familiar discourse we often, without being aware of it, express ourselves as remotely from truth, if absolutely considered. "I am tired to death." "I have no strength left." "Every body knows it." Such a thing is "provided at the shortest notice," which would be a moment. But no deception is intended, and no danger of mistake follows.

Yet, secondly, though this meets the difficulty, some have also a little altered the rendering, and read, not the world would not contain, but would not receive the books that would be written. So Doddridge and others. This is allowable in criticism; but let us observe the justness of the inference. If all the particulars of his birth and infancy, and youth and manhood; if all the occurrences of his private and public life; if all his actions, his miracles, his speeches, his prayers, with all their relative circumstances—if all these had been recorded, instead of a book, we must have had books, and books so large and many that the design must have been counteracted. For then there were no books but were in manuscript. And who would have had leisure to transcribe them? Who would have taken the trouble? If they were purchased from transcribers, who would have endured the expense? They could only have been the property of the very rich. And when they had become their own, who could have had time to read them? Who could have remembered them all? How multiplied would have been the difficulties requiring explanation! All these would have been with men reasons or excuses for not procuring, or not perusing, or not understanding them.

Therefore each of the inspired lives of our Saviour himself is not so long as many a sermon. The four put together are far shorter than the published account of many a modern insignificant character. But let us not complain or lament that the whole is so compendious and brief. It is not a defect, but an excellency. The wisdom and goodness of God appear in it. It meets the better our situations, engagements, and capacities. More would only have perplexed us or multiplied our diversions.

And let us remember, also, that we do not want the aid of traditional supplement or human additions to the Scriptures of truth. Though short, they are sufficient. They leave nothing obscure as to our duty or welfare. They are able to make us wise unto salvation, through faith that is in Christ Jesus.

And may we not suppose that it will be a part of our engagement and blessedness in heaven to derive from those acquainted with them, or from the Saviour himself, the knowledge of a thousand things concerning his eventful history of which we are now ignorant?

Above all, let us rejoice in what has been furnished. Let us rejoice that it is so divinely proved, and that it has been preserved uncorrupted down to our own time, and that we have it in our language, and are allowed and able to read it. And let us keep the end of the whole in view, and never be satisfied till it be accomplished in our experience. "Many other signs truly did Jesus in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book: but these are written, that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of God; and that, believing, ye might have life through his name."