THE SON OF MAN.

New Zealand Tablet, 20 March 1913, Page 49

THE SON OF MAN.

TO THE EDITOR. Sir, — We have, unfortunately, amongst us callow writers, whose reckless outpourings are menaces to good government, religion, and morality, and whose spicy virus is imbibed with amazing appetite by the credulous and gullible. Oh, the times and thefools! The latest extraordinary journalistic ebullition is a comparative treatise, linking our Saviour with two gory-dyed generals and marauders. Naturally, the Divine Redeemer does not show up to advantage in the illogical essay. Because distorted minds cannot bring Him within the focus of historical perspective, and because Caesar and Napoleon left autobiographies behind them, the Man of men is an incredible character, and two slayers of men and spoilers of homes are elevated among the gods. Christ’s historical existence is proved to any sane student’s satisfaction by Jewish, Pagan, and Christian writers, and so well established that no honest seeker can have room for doubt. It has been said that Josephus’s Antiquities of the Jews are unreliable, and many of his statements spurious. Even Ingersoll would not dare make such a bold assertion. No one has ever questioned the passage in which Josephus refers to the judicial murder of James the Just, ‘ the brother of Jesus called the Christ,’ by Annas the younger. James was an Apostle, and the first bishop of Jerusalem. And here is what Josephus says concerning the life and death of Christ: ‘Now, there was about this time Jesus, a wise man, if it be lawful to call Him a man; for He performed many wonderful works. He was a teacher of such men as received the truth with pleasure. He drew over to Him many of the Jews, and also many tlentiles. This man was the Christ. And when Pilate, at the instigation of tho principal men among us, had condemned Him to the cross, those who had loved Him from the first did not cease to adhere to Him. For He appeared alive to them again on the third day ; the divine prophets having foretold these and ten thousand other wonderful things concerning Him. And the tribe of the Christians, so named from Him, subsists to this time.’ Infidel and unerudite critics treat this explicit passage as an interpolation ; Ingersoll says it is admitted as such. But Father Lambert, who scourged the blatant little infidel so delightfully, completely upsetting all his assumptions, crudities, and mistakes, is well worth listening to on this point. ‘ Admitted by whom?’ Lambert writes. ‘By you (Ingersoll), Paine, and Voltaire, and other —Tooley street tailors. The paragraph is so strong and direct that the infidel fraternity cannot get over its force except by denying its genuineness. And this they do accordingly. After this denial, which in itself is of no weight whatever, you proceed to the next step in infidel tactics, and say, “it is admitted.” Now, sir, it is not admitted that this paragraph is an interpolation. On the contrary it is held to be genuine, and for the best of reasons. It is found in all the copies of Josephus s works now extant, whether printed or manuscript ; in a Hebrew translation preserved in the Vatican Library, and in an Arabic version preserved by the Maronites of Mount Libanus. It is cited by Eusebius, the most ancient of Church historians, by St. Jerome, Rufinus, Isidore of Pelusium, Sozomen, Casaiodorus, Nicephorus, and many others. Eusebius was the first to quote this passage, and it is morally impossible that he could have forged it without being detected. There was no objection made to this passage in the early ages by any of the opponents of the Christian faith. The paragraph is then genuine, according to all rules of evidence and all the canons of sound criticism.’ Some Protestant authorities, I may mention, treat the paragraph as spurious, but furnish their readers with no proof whatever, beyond saying that Origen does not quote it in any of his works. Eusebius, though, quotes it, and it was he that collected Origen's

works, some of which have been lost. The fact of the matter is, the famous paragraph of Josephus is such a reluctant tribute to Christ's humanity, that infidels and sceptics can only get over it, by absolutely denying its authenticity. In the original versions of the Talmud there are many references to Jesus, characterised by intense hatred.' Why these bitter allusions? So much for Jewish tributes to Christ's earthly existence. Now, let us see what other ancient writers had to say concerning Him and His followers. Tacitus, a pagan, in plain language states that the Founder of Christianity ' had been put to death in the reign of Tiberius by the procurator Pontius Pilate, and that His religion, though crushed for a time, burst forth again, not only throughout Judea, in which" it sprung up, but even in Pome, the common reservoir for all streams of wickedness.' He terms Christ's religion ' a deadly superstition.' Christ also figures in other antiChristian writings, notably in those of Suetonius, the younger Pliny, the sneering Lucian, Numenius, Celsus, Porphyry, Arnobius, and Julian, the Emperor and Apostate. The latter writes: 'He (Christ) did not do anything worth speaking of, unless we consider it a great thing to have cured the deaf and blind, and to have expelled the demons from those who were possessed in the villages of Bethsaida and Bethany.' Hierocles, a pagan philosopher, writes: ' Peter, Paul, and some others of that sect, liars, ignorants, and magicians, have boasted of the actions of Jesus, but Maximus Dcgens, the philosopher Darius, Philostratus. wise men and lovers of truth, have told us of the miracles of Apollonius.' So much for pagan, and antiChristian testimonies : they speak - volumes. Many portions of the Gospels are singularly corroborated by heathen writers. Macrobius, a heathen historian, refers in lucid terms to the massacre of the infants by Herod. Chalcidus, a Platonic philosopher, attests to the Star of Bethlehem, and Julian the Apostate writes an account of this phenomenon. Phlegon of Trallium, a pagan, mentions the darkness that obscured everything, which occurred in the 202nd Olympiad, corresponding to the 33rd year of the Christian era. Ingorsoll extols Josephus as the best historian the Hebrews produced (this is not in keeping with the opinions of the street fry of the American's school), but Matthew, Mark, Luke, John, and Josephus were contemporaries. Why extol Josephus and discredit the" four Evangelists ? Thes writers of the Gospels cannot be set aside, and atheists, to get round the difficulty, adopt their old tactics, by boldly proclaiming the great masterpieces of truth and charity as spurious and figments of cheats. The early anti-Christian'writers never characterised them thus, for the calumny would be too patent. Because Christ does not come down from the Cross at the scoffers' bidding and declare Himself, the gullible and credulous are informed with blatant sophistry that He never existed; but the mild-eyed, thorn-crowned Nazarene is still silhouetted against the darkness between earth and heaven, on His gory monument of sacrifice and love, and somehow or other, the übiquitous gibbet is a terrible obstacle and menace to the forces of evil, and a frowning condemnation of the ingratitude of man.

‘ O generous love ! that He Who smote In man for man the foe, ’ The double agony in man For man should undergo; And in the garden secretly. And on the Cross on high, Should teach His brethren and inspire To suffer and to die.’ « —Bream of Gerontius. I am, etc., T.P.C. Auckland.