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THE

CHRISTIAN'S DEFENCE.

GENUINENESS, AUTHENTICITY AND CREDIBILITY OF THE NEW TESTA

MENT SCRIPTURES.

CHAPTER I.

To eight Jews, who wrote in different parts of the world, and at intervals in the extremes of about fifty years apart, we are indebted for twenty-seven tracts, which collectively are called the NEW TESTAMENT, or more strictly, the NEW COVENANT.

This title, it is conceded, was neither given by divine command, nor yet was it applied to these writings by the writers themselyes; but it was adopted by Christians so early as the second century, and it is justified by several passages in the writings: thus, in Matt. xxvi. 28, it is said, “This is my blood of the new testament," or new covenant; and it is particularly warranted by St. Paul, who calls the doctrines, precepts, and promises of the Gospel dispensation, the NEW COVENANT, in opposition to those of the Mosaic dispensation, which he terms the OLD COVENANT, as may be seen by consulting 2 Cor. chap. iii. 6—14. The term NEW COVENANT is not improperly rendered NEW TESTAMENT, because it has been proved that the first Christians used the term in the sense of a testament, and the Latin version, which, as will yet be shown, is of great antiquity, renders the words, Matt. xxvi. 28, as quoted above, "Hic enim est sanguis meus Novi Testamenti."

Christians hold the New Testament to be that in which their inheritance is sealed to them as the sons and heirs of God, and in which the death of Christ, as a testator, is related at large, and applied to their benefit. Many Infidels boldly and shamelessly deny the antiquity claimed by each of the tracts which constitute the New Testament, i. e., they deny that they were written in the first century, or by the persons to whom they are ascribed. If they can establish the truth of their assertion, it follows that the writers were impostors, and

the religion taught by them a base and cruel fraud practised upon mankind.

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Should any man or set of men assert, that Cyrus, Alexander, or Julius Cæsar never existed, and that their histories, as recorded by various ancient writers, are forgeries of later years, their assertions would be treated by all intelligent persons with contempt and derision. That Jesus Christ flourished in Judea during the Augustan age, and that the writers of the New Testament were his contemporaries, are facts much better supported and authenticated than that there lived such men as Cyrus, Alexander, and Julius Cæsar; yet the very boldness and recklessness of the enemies of Christianity startle the enquirer after truth, and produce in the minds of many a disposition to undervalue the evidence by which the genuineness and authenticity of the writings of the New Testament are supported; for although it is of the same kind, and in degree vastly superior to the evidence of the histories of Cyrus, Alexander, and Julius Cæsar, yet the very circumstance of its having been questioned has annexed a suspicion to it. Dr. Chalmers, treating on this subject, says, " At all points of the question there has been a struggle and a controversy. Every ignorant objection, and every rash and petulant observation, has been taken up and commented upon by the defenders of Christianity. There has at last been so much said about it, that a general feeling of insecurity is apt to accompany the whole investigation. There has been so much fighting, that Christianity is now looked upon as debatable ground. Other books, where the evidence is much inferior, but which have had the advantage of never being questioned, are received as of established authority. It is striking to observe the perfect confidence with which an Infidel will quote a passage from an ancient historian. He perhaps does not overrate the credit due to him. But present him with a tabellated and comparative view of all the evidences that can be adduced for the gospel of Matthew, and any profane historian which he chooses to fix upon, and let each distinct evidence be discussed upon no other principle than the ordinary and approved principles of criticism, we assure him that the sacred history would far outweigh the profane in the number and value of its testimonies."

The same author elsewhere says, "Had the subject not been sacred, and had the same testimony been given to the facts connected with it, we are satisfied that the history of Jesus given in the New Testament, would have been looked upon as the best supported by evidence of any history that has come down to us. It would assist us in appreciating the evidence for the truth of the gospel history, if

we could conceive for a moment, that Jesus, instead of being the founder of a new religion, had been merely the founder of a new school of philosophy, and that the different histories which have come down to us had merely represented him as an extraordinary person, who had rendered himself illustrious among his countrymen by the wisdom of his sayings and the beneficence of his actions. We venture to say, that had this been the case, a tenth part of the testimony which has actually been given would have been enough to satisfy us. Had it been a question of mere erudition, where neither a predilection in favor of religion nor an atipathy against it could have impressed a bias in any one direction, the testimony, both in weight and quantity, would have been looked upon as quite unexampled in the whole compass of ancient literature."* Therefore, to form a fair estimate of the strength and decisiveness of the Christian argument, the reader should if possible divest himself of every prejudice for or against Christianity. The first will cause the mind to be suspicious of itself; for the predilection felt will create an apprehension that it has thereby been disposed to cherish a particular conclusion, independently of the evidences by which it is supported. The last will dispose to annex suspicion and distrust to the testimony of the Christian writers; every author who writes in defence of Christianity is supposed to be a Christian, and with those who indulge a prejudice against Christianity this has the effect to weaken the impression of his testimony.

Dr. Chalmers says, "This suspicion affects, in a more remarkable degree, the testimony of the first writers on the side of Christianity. In opposition to it, you have no doubt to allege the circumstances under which the testimony was given; the tone of sincerity which runs through the performance of the author; the concurrence of other testimonies; the persecutions which were sustained in adhering to them, and which can be accounted for on no other principle than the power of conscience and conviction; and the utter impossibility of imposing a false testimony on the world had they been disposed to do it. Still there is a lurking suspicion, which often survives the strength of all argument, and which it is difficult to get rid of, even after it has been demonstrated to be completely unreasonable. He is a Christian? He is one of the party! Am I an Infidel? I persist in distrusting the testimony! Am I a Christian? I rejoice in the strength of it! But this very joy becomes matter of suspicion to a scrupulous enquirer. He feels something more than the concur

* Dr. Chalmers' Principles of Historical Evidence.

rence of his belief in the testimony of the writer. He catches the infection of his piety and his moral sentiments. In addition to the acquiescence of the understanding, there is a con amore feeling both in himself and in his author, which he had rather been without, because he feels it difficult to compute the precise amount of its influence; and the consideration of this restrains him from that clear and decided conclusion which he would infallibly have landed in, had it been purely a secular investigation."*

Having thus paved the way for the investigation of the genuineness, authenticity, and credibility of the New Testament Scriptures, we are prepared to lay before the reader the assumptions of the Infidel. As has been already stated, they assert that the books of the New Testament were not written in the first century. This assertion however is of a modern date. The Infidels of ancient times urged no such objections: they not only acknowledged that such a person as Jesus Christ did exist, and during the Augustan age, but Celsus and Porphyry who flourished, the first in the second, and the last in the third century, mention the writings of the New Testament and quote from them.

Toland is charged with having betrayed, in his life of Milton, a suspicion that the writings of the New Testament are forgeries: but in his defence of the life of Milton, he disavows, by the words on which the charge is grounded, his having meant the writings which we receive as inspired. An anonymous Italian ventured, in a letter to Le Clerc, to throw out the following suspicion: "It is possible that in the fifth century, about the time when the Goths overran Italy, four men of superior understanding might unite in inventing and forging the writings of the Apostles, as well as of the fathers, and falsify some passages of Josephus and Suetonius, in order to introduce into the world, by means of this fraud, a new and more rational religion." This sceptic attributes to these four men, (who by the way must have been very conversant in Jewish theology, and both Jewish and heathen antiquity,) the immense labor of forging all the writings, not only of the New Testament, but of all the fathers, including Eusebius' history of the Christian church, and of inventing that diversity of style and sentiment by which they are distinguished from each other. But less than this he could not have done; for his credulity, which Infidels affect to call by the name of unbelief, would have been shocked by the testimony of all the fathers, had he confined his imputation of

* Dr. Chalmers' Principles of Historical Evidence.

forgery to the writings of the New Testament alone. This suspicion, however, has been openly thrown out, only by those Infidels who are impudently invincible by truth and argument. Mr. Gibbon, one of the most virulent enemies of Christianity, but whose acquaintance with the laws of evidence forbade his subscribing to an assertion so palpably absurd, says, "It has been observed with truth as well as propriety, that the conquests of Rome prepared and facilitated those of Christianity.

The authentic histories of the actions of Christ, were composed in the Greek language, after the Gentile converts were grown extremely numerous. As soon as those histories were translated into the Latin tongue, they were perfectly intelligible to all the subjects of Rome, excepting only to the peasants of Syria and Egypt, for whose benefit particular versions were afterwards made. The public highways, which had been constructed for the use of the legions, opened an easy passage for the Christian missionaries from Damascus to Corinth, and from Italy to the extremity of Spain or Britain.

There is the strongest reason to believe that before the reigns of Diocletian and Constantine, the faith of Christ had been preached in every province and in all the great cities of the empire. The rich provinces that extend from the Euphrates to the Ionian sea, were the principal theatre on which the apostle of the Gentiles displayed his zeal and piety. The seeds of the Gospel, which he had scattered in a fertile soil, were diligently cultivated by his disciples; and it should seem, that during the two first centuries, the most considerable body of Christians was contained within those limits. Among the societies which were instituted in Syria, none were more ancient or more illustrious than those of Damascus, of Berea or Aleppo, and of Antioch. The prophetic introduction of the Apocalypse has described the seven churches of Asia; Ephesus, Pergamos, Thyatira, Sardis, Laodicea, Smyrna, and Philadelphia, and their colonies were soon diffused over that populous country. In a very early period, the islands of Cyprus and Crete, the provinces of Thrace and Macedonia, gave a favorable reception to the new religion; and Christian republics were soon founded in the cities of Corinth, of Sparta, and of Athens. To these domestic testimonies we may add the confessions, the complaints, and the apprehensions of the Gentiles themselves.

From the writings of Lucian, a philosopher who had studied mankind, and who describes their manners in the most lively colors, we may learn that under the reign of Commodus, his native country of Pontus was filled with Epicureans and Christians. Within four-score

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