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ART. VII.-THE GOSPEL ACCOUNTS OF THE MIRACULOUS BIRTH AND INFANCY OF JESUS.

It is an old adage that "truth is stranger than fiction.” Why should it not be, since fiction is only an attempt to simulate the truth, and gathers its material from that which has been, and can go no farther than the imagery supplied by the past? The truth is new, original, and the past may furnish no exact type or ideal for it. So there is a verisimilitude in a truthful account that cannot be simulated. He who can so present an historic fact before us that it will live again in its environments, and breathe out the spirit of its time, has acquired the finest art of the historian. Upon such a presentation there is always the stamp of truth that clearly distinguishes it from fiction. The individual who estimates history by the minuteness of its details, rather than by the manner in which those details have been employed to give a clear and perfect view of the event, has but very little conception of the purpose of history. Every detail of a landscape need not be brought out by the painter to give an absolutely correct view of such landscape to the student of a work of art. Another painter may give the same landscape from a different point of view, and differ in detail from the first, and yet be equally true to the prospect before him. This may illustrate the fact that histories of certain events may differ in detail and yet present with absolute truthfulness the events described. It would be the height of folly to take any one of these historians as the perfect standard of truthfulness and criticise the presentations of the others by it. It would be far more in harmony with sound reason to make a composite historic picture out of them all, as far as possible, and account for that which we could not blend into perfect harmony in our picture by our inabilty to take in the viewpoint occupied by all. The true historian is not a mere annalist, however much he may have to depend on annalists for the facts out of which he reproduces the history of any nation, people, or events. His processes are eclectic, in order that the portraiture of historic fact may stand out and teach its true lesson

to the reader. These criteria applied to the four gospels will serve to dissipate very much of the criticism of the present time and dispel a very large number of the supposed discrepancies that critics are wont to find in the Gospel story. So important an event as the resurrection of the Lord is not detailed by the four evangelists in the same way. If they were alike it would be a very striking defect, and would, with very good reason, be regarded as proving subsequent compilation by another hand or collusion upon the part of the four original authors. Yet differences of detail of this sort, which so forcibly illustrate the independency of the four writers, are seized upon to-day to prove unreliability in the history they present. Does not independency demand some disagreement in the writers of this gospel history? Let the critic tell us just how much and what, in each case, will meet the requirements and yet not perturb his keen sense of historic propriety. It is assumed by certain critics that Mark's gospel is the original gospel, while the remaining three are more or less copies, with certain mythical additions. By what criteria this conclusion is made out does not appear. We have seen the idea advanced that accounts of the birth and the supernatural manifestations connected with the infancy of Jesus being only found in the gospels of Matthew and Luke, and these two gospels widely differing in details, indicates that they are mythical additions made to the story of the life of Jesus quite late in the first century, or as late as the second century of the Christian era. No doubt the theory that Mark's gospel was the original gospel was inspired by this conception concerning the truthfulness of these accounts.

Two most impressive facts strike the unprejudiced reader of the gospel accounts of the birth of Jesus. These are, (1) the parsimony of the miraculous connected with so great an event, and (2) the majesty and beauty of these supernatural displays. These accounts are either facts or myths. If myths, is it at all conceivable that the myth-making propensity would have invented such a story and stopped with the production of so few manifestations of the supernatural? As we study this story we must keep it clearly before our minds that here is an attempt to present the birth of

him who was to have the sovereignty of the world—the greatest among men of all ages, and the Son of God. The myth-makers have started out to give proper impressiveness to so important an event, and they call for the miraculous to sufficiently attest it and glorify it. From what we know of the disposition of miracle-mongers in all the past, and especially in connection with the birth of Jesus, we are sure that we would never have had this chastened yet appropriate presentation of the supernatural had it sprung from myths. The Arabian gospel of the infancy of Jesus furnishes a case very suggestive as to what the mythical propensity would have produced. Matthew's star of the nativity and visit of the Magi is simple grandeur, and the divine interpositions connected with it are both rational and beautiful. So also his story of the miraculous conception. How chaste! How harmonious with the revelation that the Son of God was born among men! Could we have had less than this in harmony with the infinite import of the mission of the Saviour? Suppose that all the gospel writers had begun as Mark and John did, without any reference to the birth, infancy, childhood of Jesus, and we had been simply left to tradition for any knowledge of his birth and early life; would not that have been regarded by men as a serious defect in the account of the life of the Saviour of men-one who claimed to be the Son of God? The individual, then, who finds fault with the historical accounts of Matthew and Luke must fill up the vacancy he creates with one that is rational and exactly comports with the after history of Christ as the gospels present it. We are inclined to think that the manner in which Mark and John begin their accounts of the mission of Christ is proof that they must have had within their knowledge the accounts of the infancy of Jesus given by Matthew and Luke. It is inconceivable that the writer of the second gospel should introduce Jesus with the baptism of John if the church for whom he was writing knew nothing of his nativity, birth and early life. If, on the other hand, there were extant among the early Christian converts traditions concerning the advent of the Saviour, and there no doubt were such, it is not at all a reasonable supposition that these would be ignored by all the gospel

writers. Again, these facts stand intimately related to certain prophecies found in the Old Testament Scriptures. (1) There is the prophecy of Isaiah (1. 14; 8. 5, and 9. 6, 7), interpreted by Matthew (1. 23). In the presentation of these facts our argument does not require that we take notice of the objections made by certain interpreters of prophecy as to the exact import of Isaiah's prophecy of the birth of a child to be called Immanuel. All we need do is simply to point to the strange language of Isaiah, and the fact that Matthew interpreted it as a prophecy of the virgin birth of Jesus. These facts prove conclusively that the idea of the virgin birth of the Messiah, founded on Isaiah's prophecy, was extant in Matthew's day. Now the singular fact is that the story of the Man of Nazareth fits into these conceptions in every way. They cannot rationally be torn apart and considered separately. They make a harmonious whole. The same may be said of the star of the Magi and the prophecy of Balaam, Num. 24. 17. There are the two facts; explain them in the light of what the Bible actually is in the world to-day and in the light of what Jesus is to the world. The prophet saw a personage ("Him") in the far distant future, that he called a "Star in Jacob" and a "Scepter in Israel." Matthew tells us that a star appeared, at the birth of Jesus, that called Magi from the east to Jerusalem. It is sufficient for our purpose to point to these two facts, that belong to the most marvelous book of the ages, and the most wonderful man of all time, and ask if they are not consistent with both, and if any accounting can be made of these facts, spanning twelve centuries or more of human history, that leaves the divine out of consideration. Shall it be said that these seeming agreements between supposed prophecy and fulfillment are accidental? Then the accidental is more marvelous than the miraculous. Again, the objector may say that these alleged incidents connected with the birth of Jesus may have been constructed by the evangelist to agree with his conceptions of these supposed prophecies. But this admits that these were conceived-by interpreters of the Old Testament Scriptures of the days of the evangelist-to be prophecies that applied to the Messiah, which would need to be explained.

How came the evangelist Matthew, or current myth, to evolve such a conception of the birth of Jesus and fit it into the prophecy in such a manner? The star of the Magi, while pointing to the prophecy of Balaam, does so in such an indirect way that it requires the fulfillment to make the whole conception harmonious. The prophecy has its elucidation in fulfillment. Prophecy is not history pre-written or anticipated. But it is the revelation of the future in terms of the present or past. It makes use of human language and symbol to represent that which will transcend both language and symbol. Hence the "star" and the "scepter" of the prophet and the star of the Magi are only faint symbols of that revealed in "the root and offspring of David, the bright and the morning star."

When we turn to Luke's account we have agreement with Matthew only in two facts: (1) The miraculous conception and virgin birth of Jesus; and (2) Bethlehem, the place of the nativity. Luke says nothing about the visit of the Magi, the flight into Egypt, the one particular guiding star, and Matthew says nothing about how Joseph and the mother of Jesus came to be at Bethlehem at the time of the birth of the Saviour. Luke tells us how this happened. It will be noted also, as a detail harmonious with the fact of the inherent truthfulness of the account, that both Matthew and Luke give genealogical tables. These genealogies differ from King David down to Christ. This very difference furnishes a strong presumption in favor of their truthfulness. The mere fact that we cannot explain them in a manner to satisfy all minds to-day does not in any sense militate against their truthfulness. They are the links in a chain of title which attest an inalienable inheritance under the law of Moses, and a tribal and family descent through all the ages of Israel's history, from the progenitor of the Hebrew race to the days of the Saviour. These differing genealogies could not be fiction. Their very disagreement precludes the idea of fiction. Where is the race of people that furnishes another such set of genealogical tables from the one single progenitor down through two thousand years? Where is there to be found another race of people that can be con

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