their Chronology inconsistent with Truth and with itself. Introduction renders it necessary to place our Lord's birth before the mid relate, not mine own, nor as my own, but the opinion of the most learned chronologers; the sum and conclusion whereof is, that the birth of our Saviour was in September, at the time of the feast of Tabernacles, and not in December, as the memory thereof is now celebrated. And then he gives at some length, and better and more strongly stated than I recollect to have seen it elsewhere, the reason upon which these chronologers ground their conclusion. Calvisius (Chronol. p. 424, col. 2, edit. Francof. 1685, fol.) places the birth "circa initium mensis Octobris, finito Festo Tabernaculorum;" Mr. Arthur Bedford, at the feast of Tabernacles, Sunday, October 7th, and Whiston on the 25th of the same month. The latter has a curious note to shew that if the ancient Christians intended to point out the 25th of December as the exact day of the nativity, they were certainly mistaken therein: but he rather relies upon "an uncommon observation which he had from a very great man," [qu. if Dr. Clarke or Sir Isaac Newton?] that the Christian holidays were not meant to declare that the particular event occurred on that particular day; but that whenever any day was polluted by the licentious and idolatrous rites of the Heathens, the Christians endeavoured to sanctify that day by affixing some solemnity of their own to it. Thus they fixed on the 25th of December for the birth of Jesus, with out knowing on what day it happened, merely because the Heathens celebrated their Saturnalia at that time. (See his Harmony, pp. 161-163.) Probably the reader will think this remark more ingenious than just, at least, such a practice, if it ever prevailed, would be as likely to corrupt Christianity as to purify Pagan ism. Archbishop Newcome, taking the mean between the two extremes of the middle of August and the middle of November laid down by Lardner, (Vol. I. p 353 of his Works, edit. 1788, 8vo. or p. 799, Vol. II. Part I. edit. 1741, 8vo,) places the birth of Jesus on the 1st of October; and supposes that he was baptized in the same month. (See his Harmony, p. 2, top, and p. 5 bottom, Notes, 1778, fol.) He also says, "Probably John began to preach when he was 30 years of age. See Numb. iv. 3, 47, that is, about six months before Jesus's baptism." (Ibid. p. 5, middle.) Le Clerc seems to think the month of our Lord's birth quite uncertain. "No 261 dle of 751." Necessary! For what? No reason is assigned, no authority quoted, no probability mentioned for so placing it, or for supposing it to have happened so early in the year. The necessity for placing it thus early seems to be no other than this, that, unless it be so placed, the chronological difficulty cannot be got rid of, so as to reconcile the fictitious Luke with the true. But if this be a sufficient necessity, it will authorize us to get rid of the chronological difficulty in the Introduction to Matthew's Gospel, in the same way. We have only to suppose that Jesus at his baptism in 782 was not yet 35 years of age, and (in which year, Dec. 25, Bp. Pearce we must then place his birth in 747 places it); and if we say that Matthew's Introduction renders it necescessary to place it before the last six days of that year, we shall reconcile at once the pseudo-Matthew (ii. 16) with the genuine Luke (iii. 1 and 23); the chronological difficulty will vanish, and all will go smoothly on without disturbing the day established for the nativity. The wise men might arrive at Jerusalem in 749, in proper time for Herod to be "troubled and all Jerusalem with him," he might call a council of "all the chief priests and scribes of the people;" "might privily inquire of the star-gazers diligently," or exactly, "what time the star appeared;" they might follow their leader, the eastern luminary, to Bethlehem, "till it came and stood over where the young child was," and saved them the necessity of "searching for it diligently;" might offer their precious treasures and their still more precious worship; might be "warned in a dream" (the star it seems, a mere outward-bound convoy, had nothing more to do with them) "not to return to Herod," who, when he saw that he was "mocked, might be exceeding wroth," and might issue the mandate for his "belluina crudelitas" in time lim negare," says he," aut affirmare na tum esse Christum hoc aut illo mense anui Juliani 41: quia res minime constat. Hoc unum constare posse mihi videtur, natum eum esse hoc anno, quanquam ignotus est mensis." Dissert. the first, annexed to his Harmony of the Gospels, p. 508, col. 1, edit. Ainstel. 1699, fol. to have it executed on the 25th of December, 749, when the dreaded infant would be just ripe and ready (barring dreams) to be murdered when he was exactly "two years old," with "all the children that were in Bethlehem, and in all the coasts thereof, under" that age. And thus Herod might shew the Jews how silly a thing it was for them to suppose that the "Scripture cannot be broken" (John x. 35); might reply to his father, (John viii. 44,) that though the Son, of God could never "dash his foot against a stone, (Matt. iv. 6, Luke iv. 11,) that was no proof that a man could not cut his throat, and might congratulate himself on having done more than all the gates of Hell can do (Matt xvi. 18)-conquered the kingdom of heaven, frustrated all its plans some thirty years before the time appointed for their maturity, and secured his seat upon the throne for as many years more as he had sat on it already (no small time); though he was now so worn out with age and disease, and the anxious, corroding cares, disappointments and vexations of a wicked and a miserable reign, that he died about three months afterwards, in March, 750. The dreams would not stand at all in the way of this, for neither the Jews, nor Herod, nor, as I think, his father, though he passes for "a deep one," would know any thing about them, or their suc cess. But the chronological difficulty that occurs in the introductory chapters to Luke, independently of those prefixed to Matthew, has not yet been considered in its full extent. Hitherto it has only been extended to the conception of John the Baptist; but it appears to me to reach even the birth of Jesus himself: for the same note of time first taken up by the pseudoLuke, as a date in order to point out in what king's days the angel appeared to Zacharias, seems to be studiously continued and carrried on by him till he arrives at the birth of Jesus. Elizabeth is stated to have conceived "in the days" wherein the Lord look ed on her, (i. 25,) that is, immediately after the appearance of the angel. After "those days," that is, those days of Herod which followed immediately after, she conceived, and hid herself five months (ver. 24). It is not barely said, "afterwards." The Greek is not μTE TEITA, META TAUTA, or so, but the very words used before are used again: TavTas Tas ÝμEPAS is coupled with pera, as if for the express purpose of informing the reader, that the days of her concealment were the same days identified before, the days of Herod, who is thus pointed out to be still living at the expiration of the five months. The very same mark of time is carefully repeated for the purpose of carrying on the reign of Herod, in the 39th verse. 66 "In those days," in Herod's days, Mary arose and went on a visit to her cousin. And lastly, in ch. ii. 1, it is said, that "in those days," i. e., in the days of Herod, were accomplished the days that Mary should be delivered, and she brought forth her first-born son (ii. 6, 7). In this last place, the pronoun in the Greek is different from that used in verses 24 and 39; being the one usually employed when reference is made to a more remote antecedent, and seems here intended to carry the reader back to the days first mentioned in ch. i. 5, "the days of Herod the king of Judea." Dr. Paley also understands the phrase "those days," as intended to fix the birth of Jesus to the reign of Herod; for he says, that "St Matthew, and St. Luke also himself, relates that Jesus was born in the time of Herod.". (Evidences, Vol. II. p. 187, 2nd ed. 1794, 8vo.) It is probable too, that the spurious chapters which have usurped the name of Matthew, and those which have usurped that of Luke, were written by the same author. And if so, this furnishes an additional reason for supposing that the one account, as well as the other, was meant to place the birth of Jesus in the days of Herod. The chronology, therefore, of the parasitical fungus which passes for the first two chapters, cannot be reconciled with that of the third chapter of Luke, if the commonly-received month and day of the nativity be adopted, unless Herod were living on the 25th of Dec., 752. But, according to Dr. Carpenter, he died in March, 750. Such is the difficulty that results from the date which the first chapter of the spurious Introduction to Luke requires us to assign to the birth of Jesus, when compared with that which their Chronology inconsistent with Truth and with itself. is assigned to it by Luke himself. But this is not all. In the second verse of the second chapter of this foul excrescence, we have a much greater chronological difficulty. Here the pretended Luke errs on the opposite side. He had before placed the birth of Jesus nearly three years too soon. He now places it more than ten years too late. If Jesus was born in the days of Herod, he must have been about 33 at least, at the time of his baptism. But if he was not born till the days of the taxing, when Cyrenius was governor of Syria, he could not have been more than about 20 when he was baptized. This last is a much more formidable difficulty in chronology than any that occurs in the spurious chapters prefixed to Matthew's Gospel. Lardner accordingly discusses the taxing of Cyrenius at greater length than he does the fifteenth of Tiberius. Dr. Carpenter "after repeatedly considering his arguments with a perfect willingness to receive his opinion," is dissatisfied with what he has said on the latter difficulty. But his "double toil and trouble" bestowed on the former seems scarcely to have satisfied Lardner himself, for he concludes it in these words: "If I have not been so happy as to remove every difficulty attending this text, yet I hope the reader will allow at least, that I have not concealed or dissembled any." Like Dr. C., I too have repeatedly considered Lardner's arguments, long ago, with the same disposition, and with no better success. I have more recently attended to those of Mr. Benson. The result has been to increase my convictions that none of those silly stories about the infancy of Jesus which are ascribed to Matthew and to Luke, were ever seen or heard of by those evangelists. The pretended Luke, like the pretended Matthew, not only contradicts the genuine Luke, but he contradicts himself also. Whoever this counterfeit was, he was no evangelist. Whatever he was, he was no chronologer. When viewed in reference to chronology, the childish tales of wonder pre 263 fixed to the rational and moral treatise of the beloved physician, present nothing to the eye but a mass of confusion. In every other point of view they are more like the fictitious legends of Popery than like the genuine Gospel of Luke. CHRONOS. P.S. A good review of Mr. Benson's book could not fail to be acceptable and interesting to the readers of the Repository. It is the work of an ingenious and sensible young man, with a mind possessed of native and acquired abilities, and stored with a very creditable share of learning. Unfortunately, he straps a millstone about his neck before he plunges into the deep. That which is puerile, perplexed and contradictory, that whose genuineness has always been disputed by Christians ever since it was known, (the rubbish that constitutes the spurious chapters,) he takes for granted as the undoubted Gospel of the evangelists, and then labours by compression and extension, and all sorts of distortion and screwing, to bring what is simple in itself (viz. Luke iii. 1—23), whose genuineness no Christian ever disputed, into consistency with a chaos which is inconsistent with itself. He struggles hard; but the load with which he has encumbered himself, drags him to the bottom in spite of all his "anxious" (p. 213) efforts. It always has been so; and always will be so. A man may as well try to serve God and Mammon, as to reconcile the legitimate with the illegitimate evangelists. He who would give a true and consistent account, must hold to the one and despise the other. There is no other way under heaven, given among_men, whereby he can succeed. Mr. Benson concludes, from his inquiries, that Jesus was born in April or May, 4709 of the Julian period, (749 of Rome,) about two years before Herod's death (pp. 116, 117); that John the Baptist entered on his ministry in May, 4739, Jul. per. [779 Rom.] (p. 220); that Jesus was This is said upon the supposition that Tiberius reigned two or three years during the life of Augustus, and that "The Chronology of our Saviour's Luke reckoned those to be years of Ti. Life," Cambridge, 1819, 8vo. berius, and not of Augustus, of whom he baptized in the following November; and that after preaching about two years and a half, he was crucified at the third Passover in his ministry, in the consulship of the Gemini, in the year 4742, J. P. [782, R.] (pp. 293 and 336). This date for the crucifixion, which places it in the 15th year of Tiberius, reckoned from the death of Augustus, Mr. Benson tells us, "has the peculiar advantage of corresponding with the most ancient and uniform tradition which exists upon the subject in the church" (p. 293). In page 214 he does not speak quite so confidently. There he only says, that "the Christian fathers from the earliest times, and almost with one consent declare" for it. Samuel Basnage, in his Annales Politico-Ecclesiastici, Rotterod. 1706, fol., holds the balance more evenly. In Vol I. p. 245, he states that bene multi" and "complures" were for this date: but in p. 247 he adds, that "alii bene multi de non minorum gentium grege" were against it; and among the latter he ranks Irenæus, a more ancient name than any that Mr. Benson has produced in favour of the date. But even takes no notice (iii. 1): "which hypothesis, for I can call it no better," (says Mr. Bowyer, Conject. N. T. note in p. xxiv. of Pref., ed. 1782, 4to.,) "Sir Isaac Newton did not intend to follow, as appears p. 165" of his Observat. on Daniel, One would think no person, who allowed himself a moment's reflection, could be so absurd as to follow it. While Augustus was living, no man would have dared to date in this way. No share of power that he could have conferred on Tiberius, nothing less than his own complete abdication, could have made it safe to use such a mode of reckoning. And after Augustus was dead, to date in this way, without expressly stating that the person who used it began the reign of Tiberius before the death of his predecessor, would have caused such confusion as would have rendered all dating useless, unless this mode of it had been so constantly practised and established as to prevent all ambiguity; which was so far from being the case, that not a single instance of it can be produced. * At which time he would have been a year and a half older than the Evangelist Luke says he was at his baptism. (Ch. iii. 23.) Basnage, who himself argues at length and with ability against this date, overstates the evidence in favour of it. In fact, the opinion was neither ancient nor uniform, nor were there many who asserted it. Mr. Benson enumerates eight writers who are supposed to have declared for it. Basnage has added a ninth. And where do we find a tenth? Nay, even of the nine, some, as Basnage observes, have been erroneously reckoned among the maintainers of this date. Then the antiquity of the works in which it is found has been much over-rated. They abound with interpolations. The particular passages are very suspicious; some of them scarcely intelligible, others quite vague and inexplicit, and others again so ambiguous, that it is not easy to say in what spirit they are written, whether in jest or in earnest. But, setting aside these drawbacks, what right has the voice of nine individuals to be considered as the uniform tradition of the church? Were it uncontradicted, it would be of no great weight in the scale. But in the present case it is not only contradicted by the writers mentioned by Basnage, but by the united voice of the Christian Church in all ages, the voice which has always con33 of the vulgar æra, and with the nected the crucifixion with the year pascal limit of the 1st of April; than which no voice was ever more steady, more uniform, or more invariable. That Jesus was crucified in this year is not a mere traditionary rumour that has floated loose and unconnected down the stream of time: it is a thread closely interwoven with, and running through the whole web of the Christian history: it is a position that has not only always been believed, but that has been uniformly acted upon, from the crucifixion to the present hour, by all associated bodies and communities of Christians in all parts of the world. All Christian Churches, whether Jewish or Gentile, Greek or Roman, Eastern or Western, Catholic or Protestant, Established or Non-established, have always maintained that the day of the crucifixion was to be regulated by the dominical letter that stands opposite to the year 33, in their tables, and the paschal full moon for that year by the their Chronology inconsistent with Truth and with itself. limit of the 1st of April. They have all agreed in carrying on and in registering, in one uninterrupted series, from year to year, the same succession of numbers for their solar and their lunar cycles, and for the corresponding years of the Christian æra. No disputes which have occasionally occurred about the proper time of celebrating their Easter; no supposed defect in the original Jewish and Christian lunar cycle, which Epiphanius and others after him have called a vicious cycle; no anticipation of the full moons, or of the æquinox, arising from a computation of the length of the month, or the year, not perfectly accurate; no correction of these inaccuracies by any alteration in the table of paschal limits, or by what is called the alteration of the stile; none of these things, nor any thing else, has ever disturbed the regularity of the succession, has ever broken a link in the chain, or ever prevailed upon any body of Christians (whatever a few individuals may have done) to deviate into any other year, or any other limit, either before or after in the succession, for the year of the crucifixion, than those I have mentioned. I do not say that this year has always been called the year 33, or that the 1st of April has always been considered as the precise day of the limit: but I say, that however different the denominations of the year may have been, they have all referred to the same year of real, absolute, physical time; and that however the limit may have varied a day or two, the reference has always been to the same spot or place in the cycle, the ground or site, if I may so call it, on which the 1st of April stands in the original table of paschal limits, and to no other of the whole nineteen. The early Christians might explain, and did explain, differently what Luke has said about the age of Jesus at his baptism. Some understood him as saying that Jesus had only begun, others that he had completed his thirtieth year, and others again contended that a greater latitude was included in the word "about." These, though they agreed in the year of the crucifixion, would all call it a different year of Christ. But the difference of time, as to the crucifixion, would be nomi $265 nal only, not real. As to the birth, it would be real. Indeed, it was the year of the birth that was always disputed; the year of the crucifixion never. They disputed about the former because they could never reconcile the spurious chronology, which makes Jesus to be born in the reign of Herod, with the gospel chronology, which makes him only begin to be thirty years of age some time after John had begun to baptize, in the fifteenth year of Tiberius Cæsar. And for this reason many of the early Christians, that they might avoid all ambiguity, all dispute and controversy, and give offence to nobody, chose to date their years of Christ, not from his birth, but from his crucifixion; about which there was no contest nor uncertainty. Since the time of the Emperor Justinian and of Dionysius Exiguus, all Christian churches have invariably considered the year 33 as the year, and the 3d of April as the day of the crucifixion; because the table of Dominical letters, or solar cycle, points out that day, and not the 1st of April, for a Friday. Before this, the Roman Christians connected the crucifixion with a particular year of their æra taken from the building of their city, and whatever it was, invariably adhered to it the Greek Christians, as invariably adhered to some particular year of their Olympiads; and the Jewish Christians to some year of their Jewish æra. And all these years, however differently denominated, pointed to the same real, absolute time. And that year was, in the sixth century, when the vulgar Christian æra was introduced, called the year 33, and has been so called by all Christian churches ever since. This year of the crucifixion was the hinge and pivot upon which the whole æra turned. For, as to the birth of Jesus, it was never pretended that the first year of this æra precisely and exactly corresponded with that: on the contrary, it was maintained that he was really born four years before the commencement of the vulgar æra; the first year of which was only the nominal, not the real year of his birth. This was the last bungling result of many vain attempts to distort the chronology of the gospel, so as to make Jesus contemporary with Herod. |