Page:Lives of the apostles of Jesus Christ (1836).djvu/393

 to any other important circumstances of his life, and it is only in the noble record which he has left of the life of Christ, in the gospel which bears his name, that any monument of his actions and character can now be found. Yet this solitary remaining effort of his genius is of such importance in the history of revealed religion, that hardly the most eminent of the apostles is so often brought to mind, as the evangelist, whose clear, simple, but impressive testimony to the words and deeds of his Lord, now stands at the head of the sacred canon.

On the history of this portion of the Christian scriptures, the testimony of the Fathers, from very early times, is very decided in maintaining the fact, that it was written in the vernacular language of Palestine. The very earliest testimony on this point, dating within seventy-five years of the time of Matthew himself, expressly declares that Matthew wrote his gospel in the Hebrew language; and that each one interpreted it for himself as he could. It is also said on somewhat early authority, that he wrote his gospel when about to depart from Palestine, that those whom he left behind him might have an authentic record of the facts in the life of Christ. So that by these and a great number of other testimonies, uniformly to the same effect, the point seems well established that Matthew wrote in Hebrew; and that what is now extant as his gospel, is only a translation into Greek, made in some later age, by some person unknown.

I.

In mentioning the Hebrew as the original language of the gospel of Matthew, it should be noticed, that the dialect spoken by the Jews of the time of Christ and his apostles, was by no means the language in which the Old Testament was written, and which is commonly meant by this name at present. The true ancient Hebrew had long before become a dead language, as truly so as it is now, and as much unknown to the mass of the people, as the Latin is in Italy, or the Anglo-Saxon in England. Yet the language was still called "the Hebrew," as appears from several passages in the New Testament, where the Hebrew is spoken of as the vernacular language of the Jews of Palestine. It seems proper therefore, to designate the later Hebrew by the same name which is applied to it by those who spoke it, and this is still among modern writers the term used for it; but of late, some, especially Hug and his commentator, Wait, have introduced the name "Aramaic," as a distinctive title of this dialect, deriving this term from Aram, the original name of Syria, and the regions around, in all which was spoken in the time of Christ, this or a similar dialect. This term however, is quite unnecessary; and I therefore prefer to use here the common name, as above limited, because it is the one used in the New Testament, and is the one in familiar use, not only with common readers, but, as far as I know, with the majority of Biblical critics.

Though the evidence that Matthew wrote his gospel in Hebrew, is apparently of the most uniform, weighty and decisive character, there have been many among the learned, within the three last centuries, who have denied it, and have brought the best of their learning and ability to prove that the Greek gospel of Matthew, which is now in the New Testament, is the original production of his pen; and so skilfully has this modern view been maintained, that this has already been made one of the most doubtful questions in the history of the canon. In Germany more particularly, (but not