The Virgin Birth of Christ. 15 Egyptian, etc.), but these narratives of the Virgin birth are found in all. We know, indeed, that a section of the early Jewish Christians—the Ebionites, as they are commonly called —possessed a Gospel based on Matthew from which the chap ters on the nativity were absent. But this was not the real Gospel of Matthew: it was at best a mutilated and corrupted form of it. The genuine Gospel, as the manuscripts attest, always had these chapters. Next, as to the Gospels themselves, they were not of late and non-apostolic origin; bu t.were written by apostolic men, and were from the first accepted and circulated in the church as trustworthy embodiments of sound apostolic tradition. Luke’s Gospel was from Luke’s own pen—its genuineness has recently received a powerful vindication from Prof. Hamack, of Berlin—and Matthew’s Gospel, while some dubiety still rests on its original language (Aramaic or Greek), passed without challenge in the early church as the genuine Gospel of the Apostle Matthew. Criticism has more recently raised the question whether it is only the “groundwork” of the dis courses (the “Logia” ) that comes directly from Matthew. However this may be settled, it is certain that the Gospel in its Greek form always passed as Matthew’s. It must, there fore, if not written by him,, have had his immediate authority. The narratives come to us, accordingly, with high apostolic sanction. SOURCES OF THE NARRATIVES. As to the sources of the narratives, not a little can be gleaned from the study of their internal character. Here two facts reveal themselves. The first is that the narrative of Luke is based on some old, archaic, highly original Aramaic writing. Its Aramaic character gleams through its every part. In style, tone, conception, it is highly primitive—emanates, appar ently, from that circle of devout people in Jerusalem to whom its own pages introduce us (Luke 2:25, 36-38). It has, there-
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