THE WITNESSES EXAMINED,

t has been proved by a remarkable succession of f writers, reaching back to the very days of the Apostles, and by the admission of ancient infidels, that Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John wrote the books which bear their names. It has also been proved by the voice of the entire Church, and by the admission of the most critical and skeptical of modern infidels, that Paul wrote the four epistles which constantly allude to the resurrection of Jesus. It only remains to inquire into the credibility of the witnesses, and then to examine their evidence.

In the first place, they make no mistakes and fall into no errors concerning any other thing of which they testify. Clement, the companion of Paul, and several of the early fathers, do not hesitate to illustrate the resurrection by relating as a fact the fable of the phoenix, living for six hundred years, and then dying in the flames of its own kindling, so that out of its ashes another phoenix springs, thus perpetuating its race. Similar absurdities or glaring proofs of ignorance are often found in the writings of the first Christians who immediately followed the apostles, and in the apocryphal gospels. But why are they not found in Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John or in Paul's epistles? What strange power protected them from the prevailing beliefs and blunders of the age in which they lived?

Their simple memoirs and paternal letters, touch upon almost every conceivable subject that affects the interests of man here or hereafter, and they have been exposed for centuries to the fierce light of the most hostile criticism; but science can not lay its finger upon a single false statement, nor even point to one anachronism. Occasionally infidelity has raised a loud hurrah upon the fancied discovery of some misdate, as when it asserted that Luke had fixed a wrong time for the governorship of Cyrenius; but by and by Zumpt showed that Luke was correct, and infidelity had to slink back into its hole. Thus it has been in every instance when the testimony of the evangelists has been questioned concerning any person or event. They have been invariably proved to be perfectly intelligent and perfectly truthful.

It must not be forgotten that they lived in a country and day, when they were surrounded by anarchy, strife, misrule, perpetual alteration which, as Rawlinson says, "render the civil history of Judaea during the period one very difficult to master and remember; the frequent changes, supervening upon the original complication, are a futile source of confusion, and seem to have bewildered even the sagacious and painstaking Tacitus. The New Testament narrative, however, falls into no error in treating of the period; it marks, incidentally and without effort or pretension, the various changes in the civil government — the sole kingdom of Herod the Great — the partition of his dominions among his sons — the reduction of Judaea to the condition of a Roman province, while Galilee, Ituraea, and Trachonitis continued under native princes — the restoration of the old kingdom of Palestine in the person of Agrippa the First, and the final reduction of the whole under Roman rule, and re-establishment of Procurators as the civil heads, while a species of ecclesiastical superintendence was exercised by Agrippa the Second." He cites proofs of all this from the New Testament, and then confirmatory evidence from contemporaneous history.

"Again, the New Testament narrative exhibits in the most remarkable way the mixture in the government — the occasional power of the president of Syria, as shown in Cyrenins's taxing; the ordinary division of authority between the High Priest and the Procurator; the existence of two separate taxations — the civil and the ecclesiastical, the 'census' and the ' didrachm;' of two tribunals, two modes of capital punishment, two military forces, two methods of marking time; at every turn it shows, even in such little matters as verbal expressions, the co-existence of Jewish and Roman ideas and practices in the country — a co-existence, which (it must be remembered) came to an end within forty years of our Lord's crucifixion. The conjunction in the same writings of such Latinisms as [and here follows a list of words in Greek derived from the Latin] and the like, with such Hebraisms as [and here follows a list of words in Greek derived from the Hebrew] was only natural in Palestine during the period between Herod the Great and the destruction of Jerusalem, and marks the writers for Jews of that time and country."

While, therefore, there is overwhelming external evidence that the gospels were written during the first century, the internal evidence is equally conclusive. They could not have been written at any other time. Nor could they have been seriously corrupted without immediate detection. One might as well speak of corrupting Washington's Farewell Address, or the American Declaration of Independence, or the Magna Charta of English rights. Copies of them were instantly made, and transmitted everywhere, and multiplied with amazing rapidity. It is certain that in the year 30 of the present era, there was no such thing as Christianity; it is also certain, and proved by enemies, that twenty-five or thirty years later, Christians constituted "a vast multitude" according to the accurate Tacitus, and were found in immense numbers scattered throughout distant provinces according to Pliny. There was not sufficient time for the growth of myths, nor was it possible to involve so many in the propagation of a forgery.

Hence, in the second place, if the story of the resurrection is false, it is inconceivable that not one of all these many thousands could be induced by the hope of reward, or by the threat of punishment, to turn State's evidence, and to expose the fraud. If false, "you must suppose," as another has well said, " that twelve men of mean birth, of no education, living in that humble station which placed ambitious views out of their reach and far from their thoughts, without any aid from the State, formed the noblest scheme that ever entered into the mind of man, adopted the most daring means of executing that scheme, and conducted it with such address as to conceal the imposture under the semblance of simplicity and virtue. You must suppose that men guilty of blasphemy and falsehood united in an attempt the best contrived, and which has in fact proved the most successful for making the world virtuous; that they formed this singular enterprise without seeking any advantage to themselves, with an avowed contempt of honor and profit, and with the certain expectation of scorn and persecution; that although conscious of one another's villainy, none of them ever thought of providing for his own security by disclosing the fraud; but that amidst sufferings the most grievous to flesh and blood, they persevered in their conspiracy to cheat the world into piety, honesty, and benevolence."

De Rossi, perhaps the highest authority on the Catacombs, " Calculates from carefully-gathered data that the total length of all the galleries known to exist near Rome is 957,800 yards, equal to about 590 miles," and it is estimated that they contain 7,000,000 of graves. As the Romans burned their dead, it is probable that the most of those buried beneath the imperial city were Christians; and every tomb is a witness to the faith of the early church in the resurrection. There has been a recent discovery of a work entitled " The Doctrine of the Twelve Apostles," concerning which we have the testimony of so competent an authority as Right Rev. J. B. Lightfoot, D. D., D. C. I., Lord Bishop of Durham. He with most English critics places the date of this work "between A. D. 80-110." He gives satisfactory reasons for his conclusion, and then says, "Of the genuineness of this document there can be no shadow of doubt." Moreover, brief as it is, "the writer quotes large portions of St. Matthew," thus again proving that the gospels belong to the first century, and that the resurrection was then firmly believed by Christians. So the Peshito Version, or translation of the New Testament into Syriac, made before A. D. 150, tells the same story of the early origin of the gospels, and the universal belief of Christians that Jesus rose from the dead. Indeed it is obviously impossible that the church could have taken a single step forward, or existed for a single day, without a fixed and unfaltering conviction that He in whom she trusted had come forth from the grave.

Turning then to the testimony of the original witnesses, we find them affirming in the most solemn manner that Jesus was seen after His resurrection, not once nor twice only, but again and again, appearing to Mary Magdalene; to Joanna and other women; to Simon Peter; to the two disciples on the way to Emmaus; to the ten disciples, Thomas being absent, who were together on the evening of the day He rose; to the eleven disciples, Thomas being present; to seven disciples on the sea of Galilee; to the whole multitude of disciples on a mountain where He had appointed to meet them; to James; to the eleven as they sat at meat; to all of them again when He ascended to heaven from the mount of Olives. They say that He was not only seen on many occasions, but He ate with them, they handled Him, and they detail His conversations and record His words at considerable length. They declare that "He showed himself alive after his passion, by many infallible proofs, being seen of them forty days, and speaking of the things pertaining to the kingdom of God. And being assembled together with them, [margin, or eating together with them], commanded them that they should not depart from Jerusalem, but wait for the promise of the Father, which, ye have heard of me: for John truly baptized with water; but ye shall be baptized with the Holy Ghost not many days hence. When they therefore were come together, they asked of him, saying, Lord, wilt thou at this time restore the kingdom to Israel? And he said unto them. It is not for you to know the times or the seasons, which the Father hath appointed by his own authority. But ye shall receive power, after that the Holy Ghost has come upon you: and ye shall be witnesses unto me, both in Jerusalem, and in all Judaea, and in Samaria, and unto the uttermost part of the earth. And when he had spoken these things, while they beheld, he was taken up; and a cloud received him out of their sight. And while they looked stedfastly toward heaven, as he went up, behold, two men stood by them in white apparel; which also said, Ye men of Galilee, why stand ye gazing up into heaven? This same Jesus, which is taken up from you into heaven, shall so come in like manner as ye have seen him go into heaven."

Discarding the theory of fraud, what are we to do with the testimony of these four unimpeached witnesses? Strauss replies that we are to trace their belief in the resurrection of Jesus to the power of imagination and nervous excitement. But this is a more foolish explanation, than the fraud theory or the swoon theory, though not so mean. If it had been recorded that He appeared to one or two at night, and then vanished out of sight without a word, there might have been reason to discover the foundation of the Christian faith and the Christian Church in the power of imagination and nervous excitement. But it is wholly impossible that so many of them, not one or two, but ten and eleven, and even five hundred at one time, labored under the singular hallucination that they not only saw Him repeatedly, but saw Him in the broad light of day, and heard Him speak, and placed their hands on Him, and ate with Him, and received His commands and instructions in distinct and articulate and extended language, and witnessed His ascension after forty days from the mount of Olives. Not only so, but the very next record after His ascension informs us that about one hundred and twenty of the disciples were assembled in Jerusalem, that they determined to elect a successor of the traitor Judas who had basely betrayed Him, a part of the narrative, by the way, which a fictitious writer would have been careful not to invent, and that Peter said, " Wherefore of these men which have companied with us all the time that the Lord Jesus went in and out among us, beginning from the baptism of John, unto that same day that he was taken up from us, must one be ordained to be a witness with us of his resurrection."

The theory of hallucination, therefore, breaks down at every point, and if the story of the resurrection as recorded in the four gospels cannot be accepted as true, the only conclusion which any intelligent and candid reader is able to reach is that the writers told a deliberate lie. They were in no state of mind to become the victims of hallucination. So far from being predisposed to believe in the resurrection, not one of them expected it, and hence at the crucifixion of Jesus they were utterly disheartened. But it is a fact which all admit that at the end of the forty days, their timidity suddenly and forever ended, and the discouraged, frightened, and illiterate*fishermen started forth upon the conquest of a world, that would have been achieved long ago but for the failure and unfaithfulness of the church in the day of its prosperity and power. The marvellous success that attended their preaching had no other source, and could have had no other than this — "Jesus and the resurrection," the whole of Christianity, with all that it imports, being constructed, as Keim truly says, "upon an empty grave."

It is not strange that Reuss says, "Recourse to a visionary illusion is impossible, in view of the universality and firmness of the convictions within the church," or that Keim has utterly exploded the conjectures of Strauss and Renan, although he has substituted for them a no less absurd conjecture of his own, when he claims that the spirit of Jesus actually appeared to the disciples while His body remained in the grave. But it is the testimony of witnesses, whose honesty is admitted, and whose credibility is confirmed by the most abundant external and internal evidence, that it was the body that rose, the body they saw and touched and heard in divers continuous and connected remarks on various occasions; and then Paul comes forward in an epistle admitted to be his, to certify to the same fact during the life time of the other apostles, and during the life time of at least two hundred and fifty other witnesses.

Afar more important witness, however, is found in Jesus Himself. According to Strauss He "speaks in the Gospels not only of his resurrection on the third day, but also of the coming of the Son of man, i. e., of his own second coming at a later period, when he will appear in the clouds of heaven, in divine glory, and accompanied by angels to awake the dead, to judge the quick and dead, and to open his kingdom, the kingdom of God or heaven. Here we stand face to face with a decisive point." Yes, it is decisive, for it involves the veracity of Jesus Himself. From the time it became evident He would not be acknowledged by the Jews as the Messiah, "began Jesus to show unto his disciples, how that he must go unto Jerusalem, and suffer many things of the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and be raised again the third day," (Matt. xvi. 21). "And while they abode in Galilee, Jesus said unto them, The Son of man shall be betrayed into the hands of men; and they shall kill him, and the third day he shall be raised again," (Matt. xvii.22, 23). "And Jesus going up to Jerusalem, took the twelve disciples apart in the way, and said unto them, Behold, we go up to Jerusalem; and the Son of man shall be betrayed unto the chief priests and unto the scribes, and they shall condemn him to death, and shall deliver him to the Gentiles, to mock, and to scourge, and to crucify: and the third day he shall rise again," (Matt. xx. 17-19).

These and many other allusions to His death and resurrection, as they fell from His own lips, are recorded in the trustworthy gospel of Matthew; and if He did not rise, the infidel is compelled to go much further, and to do far worse, than fasten upon the apostles the charge of wilful imposture or wild hallucination, for he is forced to assail the character of Jesus also. But if he is prepared to do this, the argument is at an end. Nothing remains to be said to a man who denies the sincerity, or assails the veracity of the meek and lowly Nazarene. Cultured infidelity has vied with Christianity in admiration of His peerless excellences, in praise of His manifold virtues, in acknowledgment of His beneficent influence upon the world, the family, and the individual; and.yet it can not be questioned that He again and again foretold His resurrection. Even coarse, vulgar, blasphemous infidelity, of the Ingersoll order, adopted by Socialists, Nihilists, and pot-house politicians, usually speaks respectfully of Jesus Christ, and claims that He is on their side against the rich and tyrants. But what will it do with His repeated declarations, that He would rise from the grave?

Moreover, it is plainly predicted in the Old Testament that He was to rise from the dead, for the Holy One was not to see corruption, (Ps. xvi. 10); and although He was to make His grave with the wicked, yet He was to prolong His days, to see of the travail of His soul and be satisfied, to divide the spoil with the strong, because He poured out His soul unto death, (Isa. liii.). Indeed the entire tenor of the ancient prophecies concerning Him, from the time of the first promise that He should bruise the serpent's head, although that serpent should bruise His heel, (Gen. iii.), proceeds upon the truth of His death, His resurrection, and His second coming in glory. Hence the entire Old Testament becomes another witness that He arose from the dead; for if this is denied, it is only a dry and useless record of Jewish perversity, but if studied in the light thrown upon its pages by a risen Jesus, it becomes luminous with beauty and glory.

So in the New Testament every leading doctrine of Christianity is essentially linked with the reality of His resurrection. Hence the apostle writes to Timothy, to whom He is giving his farewell instructions, " Remember that Jesus Christ, of the seed of David, was raised from the dead according to my gospel," (2 Tim. ii. 8). It is essential to salvation, for "if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved," (Rom. x. 9). It is required for justification, for he "was delivered for our offences, and was raised again for our justification," (Rom. iv. 25). It is necessary for our sanctification, for " as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life. . . . Knowing that Christ, being raised from the dead, dieth no more; death hath no more dominion over him. For in that he died, he died unto sin once: but in that he liveth, he liveth unto God. Likewise reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord," (Rom. vi. 4^11). It is the high motive of personal consecration, "for the love of Christ constraineth us; because we thus judge, that if one died for all, then were all dead: and that he died for all, that they which live should not henceforth live unto themselves, but unto him which died for them, and rose again," (2 Cor. v. 14, 15). It guarantees our preservation amid many dangers and difficulties, for "it is Christ that died, yea rather, that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also maketh intercession for us," (Rom. viii. 34). It gives us all our hope for the future, for " blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, which according to his abundant mercy hath begotten us again unto a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead," (1 Pet. i. 3). Hence the New Testament becomes another witness that He rose.

Many other uses of this great event are made by the writers of the Scriptures, but probably enough has been said to prove that if you tear it away from revelation, you tear out every leaf of the Bible; if you remove it from the field of history, you remove the very foundation of Christianity. The book of God and "the god of books," as it has been well called, stands or falls with the truth or the untruth that Jesus rose from the dead. If He rose, the seal of divine sanction is set upon the venerable records that have come to us across the ages, as given by inspiration of God. If He did not rise, we are left to grope our way by the feeble and flickering light of human reason, amid the distractions of time, down to dust that cannot be distinguished from the dust of a dead dog, to moulder in a tomb upon which no word of cheer can be written. But it is blessed to notice at the very close of the old book, in a writing which Strauss and Renan acknowledge to be the genuine production of the apostle John, we can still hear the voice of the risen Jesus saying, "Fear not; I am the first and the last: I am he that liveth, and was dead; and, behold, I am alive for evermore. Amen; and have the keys of death and of Hades." "These things saith the first and the last, which was dead, and is alive," (Rev. i. 17, 18; ii. 8), dead for our sins, but alive for our salvation.