phets having foretold these and many wonderful things concerning him. And the sect of the Christians, so called from him, subsists to this time." Whether this quotation in its entirety be genuine or not we have without it enough Jewish testimony to the point under our consideration. And now we pass on to the Christian testimony to the same fact, as evidenced by writers of the first two Tradition of centuries of our era. But before doing so, we would call attention to what in our opinion is a stronger proof even than these references-the existence and tradition of the Christian Church itself. For twenty centuries all the world over has the crucifixion been the object of reverence by Christians of all denominations. As Paul says, "But we preach Christ crucified, unto the Jews a stumThe Sign of bling block, and unto the Greeks foolishness the Christian Church the Cross Apostles' (1 Cor. i. 23). The Cross has been the symbol of the Faith, used by the followers of the Crucified as a sign of their profession. The preaching of the crucifixion looms as large in the dawn of Christianity as it does to-day, and there is the unbroken witness of all centuries to the death of Jesus Christ upon Calvary under the procurator Pontius Pilate. We have the Apostles' Creed which in its simplest form was, if not of immediate apostolic origin, at least of origin from those who personally knew the Apostles. And what could have induced the earliest Christians to adopt as their glory so degrading a symbol as the Latin instrument of a slave's death, unless it had been sanctified to them by Him who died upon it? Here is a definite origin for it, and there is no other probable. That it was no adaptation of Mithraism we have already shown, for their form of cross was different, and moreover the Christians held all pagan worship in abhorrence. This very state of mind would have prevented them from choosing as characteristic of them what was already in some sense a badge of heathendom, unless they had been impelled thereto by the history of their Founder's death. Everywhere the sign of the Cross was made as a profession of their faith in the crucified. In public worship, in private devotion, in the Catacombs, in the churches, we find the same testimony. Why should Christians who Why choose had before them so many other means of testifying so degrading their love for Jesus, so many other emblems that they might have chosen, have selected this particular sign and thus, as it were, have made their Master a stumblingblock and a ridicule to the pagan world? world? For be it remembered, here was no pretty myth of an Apocryphal sun-god, but the assertion that their Founder was condemned to the death of a slave. Only reality could have induced such a statement and the adoption of such a sign. a symbol ? Clement Polycarp And now let us see some small portion of the evidence which even the first two centuries can give as to the death of Jesus Christ. Clement writes of the "Passiones Domini ante oculos nostros". Polycarp (156-166 A.D.) was a disciple of St. John the Divine and was appointed by the Apostles Bishop of Smyrna. In his letter ad Phil., c. ix., he says, speaking of the Christian martyrdom, "For they loved not the present world but Him who died and was raised again by God for Irenæus us". Irenæus was the disciple of Polycarp. He says in his book, Adv. Hæres., L. c. iii.: "For after that our Lord was raised from the dead," etc. And Irenæus, a native of Asia Minor and Bishop of Lyons in Gaul, who was born A.D. 140 and died A.D. 202, refers to the death of Christ in his book Adv. Hæres. Aristides (A.D. 138-161), a philosopher of Athens, wrote an apology to the Emperor Antoninus Pius, in which he says: "He was pierced by the Jews, and he died and was buried". Justin Martyr who was born at Shechene (Neapolis) in Samaria, and was beheaded in A.D. 165, writing to Trypho the Jew says: "For after that you had crucified Him," etc." Papias, Bishop of Hierapolis, who suffered martyrdom in Rome A.D. 160, gives testimony to the same as does also Ignatius who suffered martyrdom in A.D. 115, either 1 Ep. i., ad Cor. 2 Dialogue, xviii. Aristides Justin Papias at Antioch or at Rome. In his epistle to the Trallians, which is allowed to be authentic, he says that Jesus was truly persecuted under Pontius Pilate, truly crucified and died. Melito (A.D. 170) Melito says, "Deus passus est a manu Israelitico." These were men living but a very short time after the event; some of them in the companionship of eyewitnesses of it and all easily able to verify what they said. Aristides would hardly have dared to refer to the death of Jesus in his letter to the Roman Emperor, if that event had never taken place. It is useless to multiply further references. Those given are more than sufficient to prove the Christian witness to the crucifixion of Christ. And all these are also witnesses to the existence of Jesus as an historical character. Let us now pass on to the evidence given in the writings of the New Testa- The New Before doing so, however, we wish once writings Testament in this ment. more to call attention to the fact that we are dealing with these works as merely historical documents, and in no sense does the question of inspiration considered enter into the matter. Neither does authorship argument form a necessary feature for us in this present inquiry. We intend only to make use of what is unquestionably allowed by the best of modern critics. It might be claimed for the Gospel according to Matthew that it was certainly written by him whose 1 Apud Gallandum, 179. name it bears, and hence by an eyewitness to the event he records, and the same for John's Gospel, but we do not wish here to press this point. At least the former of these Gospels was written during the lifetime of the Apostle, and the events therein narrated were matter of public knowledge at the time. And in the case of the fourth Gospel it is allowed that, if John himself did not write it, it was composed either at his dictation, or by one of his immediate and personal disciples. The Gospels of Mark and Luke are written by companions of Peter and Paul respectively, and hence have almost the value of first-hand evidence, for Peter was a witness of the sufferings of his Master, and Paul had every opportunity of personal knowledge, being before his conversion an intimate friend and partisan of the Jewish Sanhedrin. We shall have more What they to say upon this matter when we come to speak of the Resurrection itself. Each of the four gives in detail the story of the Cross, and Paul, writing to the Corinthians only twenty-six years after the event speaks of the crucifixion as a well-known fact, and this Epistle is allowed to be genuine by all the best of the higher critics. Here then we have historical testimony to the death of Christ upon the cross carried back to within a very few years of the event. And now we may pass on to consider some of the difficulties which are alleged testify |