J. Gresham Machen Bibliography

THE IRENAEUS TESTIMONY TO THE FOURTH GOSPEL. Its Extent, Mean- ing, and Value. By FRANK GRANT LEWIS. Chicago: The Univer- sity of Chicago Press. 1908. Pp. 64. 54 cents, postpaid. (His- torical and Linguistic Studies issued under the direction of the Department of Biblical and Patristic Greek of the University of Chicago. Second Series. Vol. I, Part vii.)

In Chapter i, Dr. Lewis presents and interprets two tables, showing Irenaeus’ use of the Fourth Gospel, (1) from the point of view of the Gospel and (2) from the point of view of the progress of Irenaeus’ work. In Chapter ii, he removes all doubt that “the son of Zebedee was, for Irenaeus, the author of the fourth gospel”. In Chapter iii he discusses “the value of the Irenaeus testimony for us”. Here it is demonstrated that the testimony of Irenaeus from Polycarp really affords information from the end of the first century and establishes the Ephesian residence of the Apostle John (Papias is interpreted as referring to only one John). The testimony which Irenaeus derived from the “presbyters”, the oral character of which Dr. Lewis defends at some length, confirms the testimony from Polycarp in showing “how near Irenaeus felt himself to be to the apostles of the first century”. The first result of Dr. Lewis’s investigation, therefore, is a vindica- tion of the Irenaeus testimony. But if this testimony is so trustworthy, does it not place beyond question the Johannine authorship of the Fourth Gospel? This Dr. Lewis is unwilling to admit. All that we really learn through Polycarp is that John either wrote himself, or more probably permitted one of his disciples to write, certain short sermons or “booklets” which were founded on the life of Jesus. These were the “writings” with which Irenaeus says the oral discourses of Polycarp were in agreement. About the middle of the second century, these booklets were combined into our Fourth Gospel. Such an hypo- thesis, Dr. Lewis thinks, “is not necessarily out of harmony with what Irenaeus himself wrote of the authorship of the gospel”. For when Irenaeus says that John gave out the Gospel ( ἐξέδωκε τὸ εὐαγγέλιον ) that need not necessarily mean that he published a single completed work. This booklet theory (cf. Burton, A Short Introduction to the Gos- pels, pp. 117ff.) is thought to account for a number of puzzling facts. In the first place, the first definite attestation of the Gospel occurs about 170 A. D. That there is no earlier attestation is easily explained if the Gospel was not in evidence before the middle of the century. In the second place, the literary relation between Justin and the Fourth Gospel is best explained by Justin’s use of material from which our Gospel has been compiled, for if he had had the Gospel itself and recognized it as Johannine, he would have made more abundant use of it. In the third place, the immediate acceptance of the Gospel after 150 A. D. is explained by the truly Johannine character of the material embodied in the Gospel. But for that, a “Johannine” gospel could not have been accepted at so late a time. In the fourth place, the “displacements” in the Gospel receive a satisfactory explanation, if the Gospel is a compilation. Against such a theory, several specific objections may be made. In the first place, Dr. Lewis has not really done justice to the meaning of Irenaeus. There can be no doubt that Irenaeus regarded the Fourth Gospel as written by John himself and completed at the end of the first century. Therefore, his testimony, which is so convincingly defended by Dr. Lewis, casts its weight against Dr. Lewis’s booklet theory. Again, if the booklets were widely enough known and highly enough valued to insure the immediate acceptance of the Gospel when it finally appeared, why should their scanty use in Justin and in the extant writings of the early part of the second century be any easier to explain than the scanty use of the Gospel, supposing the latter to have been already in existence? Finally, the theory shatters upon the character of the Gospel itself. Despite the efforts of certain recent scholars, the unity not only of style (that would be explicable on the booklet theory) but also of plan throughout the book is too plain to be successfully denied. Hence, the literary connections existing (for example) between Justin and the Gospel and between Polycarp and the closely related First Epistle indicate the early existence of the Gospel itself and not merely of material from which it was later compiled. Dr. Lewis’s late dating of the completed Gospel becomes, therefore, impossible. The usefulness of the monograph, however, is quite independent of the incorrectness of the ultimate conclusion. For that conclusion depends, chiefly at any rate, upon considerations extraneous to the Irenaeus testimony. The Irenaeus testimony itself is perfectly com- patible with the first-century origin of the completed Gospel, and Dr. Lewis has himself made this clear. The important result of Dr. Lewis’s study is an emphatic vindication of the Irenaeus testimony to the Fourth Gospel, and that result has been reached by independent and thorough investigation. A number of criticisms might be made with regard to details, but in general the dissertation is admirable both in conception and in method. The somewhat condescending criticisms of Lightfoot and of Zahn are, however, quite gratuitous and out of accord with the objectivity that is characteristic of the rest of our author’s discussion. What Dr. Lewis says at the end about the Apocalypse (p. 62) is, as the author himself recognizes, out of direct connection with the preceding investigation. At any rate, it produces somewhat the impression of a shot at a venture. Princeton. J. GRESHAM MACHEN.