I have given these particular extracts because they seem to me to present, very clearly and in Prof. Lakes own words, the fundamentals of his case, viz.: 1. That the women probably made a mistake. 2. That they did not immediately report their discovery, because the disciples were no longer in Jerusalem. 3. That the latter only heard the story when they returned from Galilee after an interval of some weeks. I do not propose to attempt here an examination of those subtler points in the original narratives which can only be studied effectively in the light of the far closer and more detailed investigation which we shall make in a later chapter. But there are three broad considerations which stand out and call for emphasis. In the first place, the evidence for the supposed absence or inaccessibility of the disciples on Easter Sunday (so vital to Prof. Lakes interpretation of the case) seems to me to be of a very doubtful and precarious character. It rest solely upon a broken or partly completed sentence in St. Mark. Against this there is positive evidence of a most direct and demonstrative kind. Not only does St. Mark himself expressly imply the presence of the disciples but the whole Synoptic tradition asserts and implies it too. If there is one thing in the Gospel story which does not seem to admit of doubt it is that, although the earliest account says that the disciple forsook Jesus and fled, they did not all flee. One man among them at least braved the terrors of the city that night and even obtained access to the scene of the midnight trial. That man was Peter. I do not know how the reader feels about this matter, but personally I am surer of the essential historicity of the pathetic little story of Peters fal and repentance than of almost anything else in the Gospels. It is one of those stories which is intelligible enough as a transcript from real life, but which would be quite inexplicable regarded as fiction. What possible explanation can we offer of a story so damning and derogatory to the repute of one of the leading apostles getting into the first Christian account of the Passion save that it was an ineffaceable memory of an actual event. If, therefore, Peter was manifestly present in Jerusalem on Friday morning, who can say with any confidence that he and his companions had fled the city by the following Sunday? Secondly, the behaviour of the women themselves, according to this hypothesis, is so curiously unnatural and strange. Remember who these women are. We are not dealing with mere acquaintances of the apostolicband, but with their own kith and kin. Salome was the mother of two of the disciples; Mary of Cleophas, her sister, of two others. Moreover, they were not normally resident in the city; they had come up specially for the Feast. If the disciples as a body were in any pressing kind of danger, their women-folk were in like peril. They could not leave them indifferently to the machinations of the Priests or the fury of a section of the multitide. Some attempt to secure their safety and their speedy withdrawal from the city would assuredly be made. Peace!
Posted on: Thu, 05 Jun 2014 03:57:41 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015