The Secret Vault presents: The Christian and Pagan Creeds Collated. Rev. Robert Taylor, A. B. & M. R. C. S.
to be Considered as Genuine and Authentic.
By the Rev. Robert Taylor, A. B. & M. R. C. S.
Preliminary
There is no greater nor grosser delusion perhaps in the world, than that of the common sophistry of arguing for the genuineness and authenticity of the writings of the New Testament, upon the ridiculous supposition, that the state of things of which we are witnesses, with respect to these writings in our times, is the same, or much like what it was, in the primitive ages; that is, that these writings were generally in the hands of professing Christians, were distinguished as pre-eminently sacred, had their authority universally acknowledged, or were so extensively diffused, that material alterations in them from time to time, could not have been effected without certain discovery, and as certain reprobation of so sacrilegious an attempt.
The very reverse of such an imaginary resemblance of past to present circumstances, is the truth of history, as borne out by the admissions of all who have devoted their time and labours to the investigation of ecclesiastical antiquity.
The learned Dr Lardner is constrained to admit, that "even so late as the middle of the sixth century, the canon of the New Testament had not been settled by any authority that was decisive and universally acknowledged; but Christian people were at liberty to judge for themselves concerning the genuineness of writings proposed to them as apostolical, and to determine according to evidence." - Vol. 3, pp. 54-61.
We have shown also, that the scriptures were not entrusted to the hands of the laity. The mystical sense which we find by the very earliest Fathers to have been attached to them, is the strongest corroboration of those positive testimonies which we have, that the Christian people were kept in the profoundest ignorance of the contents of the sacred volume. The clergy only, were held to be the fit depositaries of those mystical legends, which in the hands of the common people, were so liable to be "wrested to their own destruction." Not to insist on the deplorable ignorance of lay-people all over Christendom for so many ages, during which, scarce any but the clergy were able to read at all. It would be hard to authenticate a single instance of the existence of a translation of the gospels into the vulgar tongue, of any country in which Christianity was established, at any time within the first four centuries. [LN. extracted from the healing gods of all civilisations, 'Egyptian reticence. The priests were extremely reticent respecting their religion, and such explanations as they made in response to inquiries were in enigmatical terms, hints of half-truths, mystical suggestions, and intimations of symbolism which confused their hearers and served further to obscure the meaning of their religious rites, rather than reveal their sentiments. The Egyptians believed that 'words are a great mystery.' The 'Divine Books' and the books of the 'double house of life? were sacred, and none but the initiated were permitted to see them; "it is not to be looked at" (Papyrus Leyden, 348, recto 2, 7) by any except him for whom it was intended. The eye of no man whatsoever must see it; it is a thing of abomination for [every man] to know it. Hide it therefore; the Book of the Lady of the Hidden Temple is its name.' thus we are talking of the veil of Isis.]
The clergy, or those engaged and interested in the business of dealing out spiritual edification, whose testimony alone we have on the subject, mutually criminate and recriminate each other, according as they grasp or lose their hold on the ascendancy, (and so are held to be orthodox or heretical) with corrupting the scriptures.
The epistolary parts of the New Testament, entirely independent and wholly irrelevant of the gospels as they manifestly are, may be considered as the fairest and most liberal specimen of the manner, in which the stewards of the mysteries of God, "brought forth things new and old" [Every Scribe instructed unto the kingdom of heaven, is like unto a man that is a householder, which brings forth out of his treasure, things new and old. - Matt, 13-52. - i.e. he practices the art of deceiving the people.] according to the spiritual necessities of the congregations which they addressed, while they steadily kept the key of the sacred treasure, the right of expounding it, and even of determining what it was, exclusively in their own hands. Hence, though the gospel is spoken of in innumerable passages of these epistles, (written, as we have seen they were, before any gospels which have come down to us, except those which are deemed apocryphal,) there occurs not in them, a single quotation or text seeming to be taken from the gospel so spoken of, or sufficient to show what the contents of that gospel, were.
Hence the authenticity and genuineness of the writings of St. Paul, and of all those parts of the narrative of the Acts of the Apostles, which Paley [Paley, William 1743 to 1805, Christian Apologist, philosopher and Utilitarian.] in his Horae Paulinae, has shown, present such striking coincidences with his writings, is a wholly distinct and irrelevant question, to that of the genuineness and authenticity of the writings on which the Christian faith is founded: for, as all persons must see and admit at once, that if the four gospels of Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John, which have come down to us, could be shown to be the compositions of such persons, as those to whom, under those names, they are ascribed, and so to be fairly and honourably genuine and authentic - this, their high and independent sanction, would lose nothing, nor even so much as to be brought into suspicion, by a detection of the most manifest forgery and imposture of those subordinate, or, at most, only supplementary writings: so the genuineness of these supplementary writings, involves no presumption of the genuineness or authenticity of those; but rather, as being admitted to have been written earlier than our gospels, and referring continually to gospels still earlier than themselves, which had previously been the rule of faith to so many previously existing churches; these epistles supply one of the most formidable arrays of proof that can possibly be imagined against the claims of our gospels; and having served this effect, like expended ammunition that has carried the volley to its aim, they dissipate and break off into the void and in-collectable inane. The gospels once convicted of being merely supposititious and furtive compositions, it is not the genuineness and demonstrable authenticity of any other parts of the New Testament, that its advocates will care to defend, or its enemies to impugn. They fall as a matter of course, like the provincial towns and fortresses of a conquered empire, to the masters of the capital.
conclusion
In this Diegesis, we shall therefore more especially confine our investigation to the claims of the Evangelical histories; and as our arguments must mainly be derived from the admissions which their best learned and ablest advocates have made with respect to them, we shall throughout, speak of them and of their contents, in the tone and language which courtesy and respect to the feelings of those for whose instruction we write, may reasonably claim from us; and which being understood as adopted for the convenience of argument only, can involve no compromise of sincerity.
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Next chapter 14. Canons of Criticism. Data of Criticism. Corollaries. Dr Lardner's Table.