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[Footnote 2:
“Wer einmal vergottert worden ist, der hat seine Mensetheit unwiederbringlich eingebusst.”–Strauss, Der alte und der neue Glaube, p. 76.]

[Footnote 3:
“Roger was the attendant of Thomas [Becket] during his sojourn at Pontigny. We might have expected him to be very full on that part of his history; but, writing doubtless mainly for the monks of Pontigny, he says that HE WILL NOT ENLARGE UPON WHAT EVERY ONE KNOWS, and cuts that part very short.”–Freeman, Historical Essays, 1st series, p. 90.]

Not only was history subordinated to dogma by the writers of the gospel-narratives, but in the minds of the Fathers of the Church who assisted in determining what writings should be considered canonical, dogmatic prepossession went very much further than critical acumen. Nor is this strange when we reflect that critical discrimination in questions of literary authenticity is one of the latest acquisitions of the cultivated human mind. In the early ages of the Church the evidence of the genuineness of any literary production was never weighed critically; writings containing doctrines acceptable to the majority of Christians were quoted as authoritative while writings which supplied no dogmatic want were overlooked, or perhaps condemned as apocryphal. A striking instance of this is furnished by the fortunes of the Apocalypse. Although perhaps the best authenticated work in the New Testament collection, its millenarian doctrines caused it to become unpopular as the Church gradually ceased to look for the speedy return of the Messiah, and, accordingly, as the canon assumed a definite shape, it was placed among the “Antilegomena,” or doubtful books, and continued to hold a precarious position until after the time of the Protestant Reformation. On the other hand, the fourth gospel, which was quite unknown and probably did not exist at the time of the Quartodeciman controversy (A. D. 168), was accepted with little hesitation, and at the beginning of the third century is mentioned by Irenaeus, Clement, and Tertullian, as the work of the Apostle John. To this uncritical spirit, leading to the neglect of such books as failed to answer the dogmatic requirements of the Church, may probably be attributed the loss of so many of the earlier gospels. It is doubtless for this reason that we do not possess the Aramaean original of the “Logia” of Matthew, or the “Memorabilia” of Mark, the companion of Peter,–two works to which Papias (A. D. 120) alludes as containing authentic reports of the utterances of Jesus.

These considerations will, we believe, sufficiently explain the curious circumstance that, while we know the Christ of dogma so intimately, we know the Jesus of history so slightly. The literature of early Christianity enables us to trace with tolerable completeness the progress of opinion concerning the nature of Jesus, from the time of Paul’s early missions to the time of the Nicene Council; but upon the actual words and deeds of Jesus it throws a very unsteady light. The dogmatic purpose everywhere obscures the historic basis.

This same dogmatic prepossession which has rendered the data for a biography of Jesus so scanty and untrustworthy, has also until comparatively recent times prevented any unbiassed critical examination of such data as we actually possess. Previous to the eighteenth century any attempt to deal with the life of Jesus upon purely historical methods would have been not only contemned as irrational, but stigmatized as impious. And even in the eighteenth century, those writers who had become wholly emancipated from ecclesiastic tradition were so destitute of all historic sympathy and so unskilled in scientific methods of criticism, that they utterly failed to comprehend the requirements of the problem. Their aims were in the main polemic, not historical. They thought more of overthrowing current dogmas than of impartially examining the earliest Christian literature with a view of eliciting its historic contents; and, accordingly, they accomplished but little. Two brilliant exceptions must, however, be noticed. Spinoza, in the seventeenth century, and Lessing, in the eighteenth, were men far in advance of their age. They are the fathers of modern historical criticism; and to Lessing in particular, with his enormous erudition and incomparable sagacity, belongs the honour of initiating that method of inquiry which, in the hands of the so-called Tubingen School, has led to such striking and valuable conclusions concerning, the age and character of all the New Testament literature. But it was long before any one could be found fit to bend the bow which Lessing and Spinoza had wielded. A succession of able scholars–Semler, Eichhorn, Paulus, Schleiermacher Bretschneider, and De Wette–were required to examine, with German patience and accuracy, the details of the subject, and to propound various untenable hypotheses, before such a work could be performed as that of Strauss. The “Life of Jesus,” published by Strauss when only twenty-six years of age, is one of the monumental works of the nineteenth century, worthy to rank, as a historical effort, along with such books as Niebuhr’s “History of Rome,” Wolf’s “Prolegomena,” or Bentley’s “Dissertations on Phalaris.” It instantly superseded and rendered antiquated everything which had preceded it; nor has any work on early Christianity been written in Germany for the past thirty years which has not been dominated by the recollection of that marvellous book. Nevertheless, the labours of another generation of scholars have carried our knowledge of the New Testament literature far beyond the point which it had reached when Strauss first wrote. At that time the dates of but few of the New Testament writings had been fixed with any approach to certainty; the age and character of the fourth gospel, the genuineness of the Pauline epistles, even the mutual relations of the three synoptics, were still undetermined; and, as a natural result of this uncertainty, the progress of dogma during the first century was ill understood. At the present day it is impossible to read the early work of Strauss without being impressed with the necessity of obtaining positive data as to the origin and dogmatic character of the New Testament writings, before attempting to reach any conclusions as to the probable career of Jesus. These positive data we owe to the genius and diligence of the Tubingen School, and, above all, to its founder, Ferdinand Christian Baur. Beginning with the epistles of Paul, of which he distinguished four as genuine, Baur gradually worked his way through the entire New Testament collection, detecting–with that inspired insight which only unflinching diligence can impart to original genius–the age at which each book was written, and the circumstances which called it forth. To give any account of Baur’s detailed conclusions, or of the method by which he reached them, would require a volume. They are very scantily presented in Mr. Mackay’s work on the “Tubingen School and its Antecedents,” to which we may refer the reader desirous of further information. We can here merely say that twenty years of energetic controversy have only served to establish most of Baur’s leading conclusions more firmly than ever. The priority of the so-called gospel of Matthew, the Pauline purpose of “Luke,” the second in date of our gospels, the derivative and second-hand character of “Mark,” and the unapostolic origin of the fourth gospel, are points which may for the future be regarded as wellnigh established by circumstantial evidence. So with respect to the pseudo-Pauline epistles, Baur’s work was done so thoroughly that the only question still left open for much discussion is that concerning the date and authorship of the first and second “Thessalonians,”–a point of quite inferior importance, so far as our present subject is concerned. Seldom have such vast results been achieved by the labour of a single scholar. Seldom has any historical critic possessed such a combination of analytic and of co-ordinating powers as Baur. His keen criticism and his wonderful flashes of insight exercise upon the reader a truly poetic effect like that which is felt in contemplating the marvels of physical discovery.