The Last Twelve Verses of the Gospel According to S. Mark. John William Burgon
it—(and competent judges have declared that there are sufficient reasons for giving it to Hesychius rather than to Severus—while no one is found to suppose that Gregory of Nyssa was its author,)—who will not admit that no further mention must be made of the other two?
(4.) Let it be clearly understood, therefore, that henceforth the name of “Gregory of Nyssa” must be banished from this discussion. So must the name of “Severus of Antioch.” The memorable passage which begins—“In the more accurate copies, the Gospel according to Mark has its end at ‘for they were afraid,’ ”—is found in a Homily which was probably written by Hesychius, presbyter of Jerusalem—a writer of the vith century. I shall have to recur to his work by-and-by. The next name is
Eusebius,
II. With respect to whom the case is altogether different. What that learned Father has delivered concerning the conclusion of S. Mark's Gospel requires to be examined with attention, and must be set forth much more in detail. And yet, I will so far anticipate what is about to be offered, as to say at once that if any one supposes that Eusebius has anywhere plainly “stated that it is wanted in many MSS.,”74—he is mistaken. Eusebius nowhere says so. The reader's attention is invited to a plain tale.
It was not until 1825 that the world was presented by [pg 042] Cardinal Angelo Mai75 with a few fragmentary specimens of a lost work of Eusebius on the (so-called) Inconsistencies in the Gospels, from a MS. in the Vatican.76 These, the learned Cardinal republished more accurately in 1847, in his “Nova Patrum Bibliotheca;”77 and hither we are invariably referred by those who cite Eusebius as a witness against the genuineness of the concluding verses of the second Gospel.
It is much to be regretted that we are still as little as ever in possession of the lost work of Eusebius. It appears to have consisted of three Books or Parts; the former two (addressed “to Stephanus”) being discussions of difficulties at the beginning of the Gospel—the last (“to Marinus”) relating to difficulties in its concluding chapters.78 The Author's plan, (as usual in such works), was, first, to set forth a difficulty in the form of a Question; and straightway, to propose a Solution of it—which commonly assumes the form of a considerable dissertation. But whether we are at present in possession of so much as a single entire specimen of these “Inquiries and Resolutions” exactly as it came from the pen of Eusebius, may reasonably be doubted. That [pg 043] the work which Mai has brought to light is but a highly condensed exhibition of the original, (and scarcely that,) its very title shews; for it is headed—“An abridged selection from the ‘Inquiries and Resolutions [of difficulties] in the Gospels’ by Eusebius.”79 Only some of the original Questions, therefore, are here noticed at all: and even these have been subjected to so severe a process of condensation and abridgment, that in some instances amputation would probably be a more fitting description of what has taken place. Accordingly, what were originally two Books or Parts, are at present represented by XVI. “Inquiries,” &c, addressed “to Stephanus;” while the concluding Book or Part is represented by IV. more, “to Marinus,”—of which, the first relates to our Lord's appearing to Mary Magdalene after His Resurrection. Now, since the work which Eusebius addressed to Marinus is found to have contained “Inquiries, with their Resolutions, concerning our Saviour's Death and Resurrection,”80—while a quotation professing to be derived from “the thirteenth chapter” relates to Simon the Cyrenian bearing our Saviour's Cross;81—it is obvious that the original work must have been very considerable, and that what Mai has recovered gives an utterly inadequate idea of its extent and importance.82 It is absolutely necessary [pg 044] that all this should be clearly apprehended by any one who desires to know exactly what the alleged evidence of Eusebius concerning the last chapter of S. Mark's Gospel is worth—as I will explain more fully by-and-by. Let it, however, be candidly admitted that there seems to be no reason for supposing that whenever the lost work of Eusebius comes to light, (and it has been seen within about 300 years83,) it will exhibit anything essentially different from what is contained in the famous passage which has given rise to so much debate, and which may be exhibited in English as follows. It is put in the form of a reply to one “Marinus,” who is represented as asking, first, the following question:—
“How is it, that, according to Matthew [xxviii. 1], the Saviour appears to have risen ‘in the end of the Sabbath;’ but, according to Mark [xvi. 9], ‘early the first day of the week’?”—Eusebius answers,
“This difficulty admits of a twofold solution. He who is for [pg 045] getting rid of the entire passage,84 will say that it is not met with in all the copies of Mark's Gospel: the accurate copies, at all events, making the end of Mark's narrative come after the words of the young man who appeared to the women and said, ‘Fear not ye! Ye seek Jesus of Nazareth,’ &c.: to which the Evangelist adds—‘And when they heard it, they fled, and said nothing to any man, for they were afraid.’ For at those words, in almost all copies of the Gospel according to Mark, comes the end. What follows, (which is met with seldom, [and only] in some copies, certainly not in all,) might be dispensed with; especially if it should prove to contradict the record of the other Evangelists. This, then, is what a person will say who is for evading and entirely getting rid of a gratuitous problem.
“But another, on no account daring to reject anything whatever which is, under whatever circumstances, met with in the text of the Gospels, will say that here are two readings, (as is so often the case elsewhere;) and that both are to be received—inasmuch as by the faithful and pious, this reading is not held to be genuine rather than that; nor that than this.”
It will be best to exhibit the whole of what Eusebius has written on this subject—as far as we are permitted to know it—continuously. He proceeds:—
“Well then, allowing this piece to be really genuine, our business is to interpret the sense of the passage.85 And certainly, if I divide the meaning into two, we shall find that it is not opposed to what Matthew says of our Saviour's having risen ‘in the end of the Sabbath.’ For Mark's expression, [pg 046] (‘Now when He was risen early the first day of the week,’) we shall read with a pause, putting a comma after ‘Now when He was risen,’—the sense of the words which follow being kept separate. Thereby, we shall refer [Mark's] ‘when He was risen’ to Matthew's ‘in the end of the Sabbath,’ (for it was then that He rose); and all that comes after, expressive as it is of a distinct notion, we shall connect with what follows; (for it was ‘early, the first day of the week,’ that ‘He appeared to Mary Magdalene.’) This is in fact what John also declares; for he too has recorded that ‘early,’ ‘the first day of the week,’ [Jesus] appeared to the Magdalene. Thus then Mark also says that He appeared to her early: not that He rose early, but long before, (according to that of Matthew, ‘in the end of the Sabbath:’ for though He rose then, He did not appear to Mary then, but ‘early.’) In a word, two distinct seasons are set before us by these words: first, the season of the Resurrection—which was ‘in the end of the Sabbath;’ secondly, the season of our Saviour's Appearing—which was ‘early.’ The former,86 Mark writes of when he says, (it requires to be read with a pause,)—‘Now, when He was risen,’ Then, after a comma, what follows is to be spoken—‘Early, the first day of the week, He appeared to Mary Magdalene, out of whom He had cast seven devils.’ ”87—Such is the entire passage. Little did the learned writer anticipate what bitter fruit his words were destined to bear!
1. Let it be freely admitted that what precedes is calculated at first sight to occasion nothing but surprise and perplexity. For, in the first place, there really is no problem to solve. The discrepancy suggested by “Marinus” at the outset, is plainly imaginary, the result (chiefly) of a strange misconception of the meaning of the Evangelist's Greek—as in fact no one was ever better aware than Eusebius himself. “These places of the Gospels would never have occasioned any difficulty,” he writes in the very next page, [pg 047] (but it is the commencement of his reply to the second question of Marinus,)—“if people would but abstain from assuming that Matthew's phrase (ὀψὲ σαββάτων) refers to the evening of the Sabbath-day: whereas, (in conformity with the established idiom of the language,) it obviously refers to an advanced period of the ensuing night.”88