TIMOTHY
731
TIMOTHY
vancod critics (Ency. Bib.) have now abandoned
the theory (maintained with great confidence in the
nineteenth century) that the Epistles were written
against Marcion and other Gnostics about the mid-
dle of the second century. It is now conceded that
they were known to Sts. Ignatius and Polycarp, and
therefore written not later than the end of the first
century or early part of the second. It requires a
keen critical sense to detect at that time the existence
of errors at the time of Ignatius, the seeds of which
did not exist thu-tj' or forty years earlier, or of
which St. Paul could not have foreseen the develop-
ment. "The environment is marked by incipient
phases of what afterwards blossomed out into the
Gnosticism of the second century " (Ency. Bib.) : — but
the incipient phases of Gnosticism are now placed by
competent scholars at a much earlier date than that
indicated by this writer. No known system of
Gnosticism corresponds with the errors mentioned
in the Pastorals; in repW to this, however, it is said
that the "errors are not given in detail to avoid un-
due anachronisms" (ibid.). Sometimes opponents of
the authenticity unfairly attack the actual contents,
but here the Epistles are condemned for "contents"
which they do not contain. An amusing instance of
the ijrecariousness of the subjective method is seen in
this same article (Ency. Bib.). The writer arguing
against the Epistles on the subject of greetings says
that "Philemon is the one jjrivate note of Paul ex-
tant". We are suddenly brought up, however, by a
note (editorial?) within square brackets: "compare,
however, Philemon." On turning to Philemon we
find van Manen asserting, with equal confidence, that
the Apostle had nothing whatsoever to do with that
Epistle, and he supports his statement by the same
kind of subjective arguments and assertions that
we find running through the article on Timothy
and Titus. He even throws out the absurd sug-
gestion that Philemon was based on the letter of Pliny,
which is given in full by Lightfoot in his edition of
Philemon.
Hort in his "Judaistic Christianity" (London, 1,S9S), 130-48, does not believe that the errors of the Pastorals had any connexion with Gnosticism, and he gives a very full reply to the objection with which we arc dealing. With Weiss he clears the ground by making some important distinctions: (1) We must distinguish prophecies about future false teachers, which imply that germs, to say the least, of the future evils are already perceptible (I Tim., iv, 1-3; II Tim., iii, 1-5, iv, 3) from warnings about the pres- ent; (2) The perversities of individuals like Alex- ander, Hymenajus, and Philetus must not be taken a.s direct evidence of a general stream of false teaching; (3) Non-Christian teachers, the corrupters of Chris- tian belief, must not be confounded with misguided Christians. The errors which St. Paul easily foresaw would arise amongst false Christians and pagans can- not be urged against the Epistles as if they had already arisen. Hort makes out a good case that there is not the smallest trace of Gnosticism in the existing errors amongst the Ephesian and Cretan Christians, which are treated more as trivialities than serious errors. "The duty laid on Timothy and Titus is not that of refuting deadly errors, but of keep- ing themselves clear, and warning others to keep clear of mischievous trivialities usurping the office of religion. " He shows that all these errors have evi- dent marks of .Judaistic origin. The fact that St. Iren.-eus, Hegesippus, and others used the words of the Pastorals against the Gnostics of the second cen- tury is no proof that Gnosticism w.m in the mind of their author. Words of Scripture have been eni- ]>loyed to confute heretics in every age. This, he says, is tnie of the expressions ^fuJiin/uot 7i'iSiti5, itpffapToi, aluiv, {ifiipivfia, which have to he taken in their ordinary sense. "There is not the faintest sign
that such words have any reference to what we call
Gnostic terms. "
Hort takes yevtaXoylai. in much the same sense in which it was employed by Polybius, IX, ii, 1, and Diodorus Siculus, IV, i, to mean stories, legends, myths of the founders of states. "Several of these early historians, or 'logographers' are known to have written books of this kind entitled T(vea\oyiai, TiveaXoyLKi (e. g. Hecatffius, Acusilanus, Simonides the Younger, who bore the title 6 VtmaKbyo^, as did also Pherecydes)" (p. 136). Philo included under t4 7e>'£oXo7i)t(iv all primitive human history in the Pen- tateuch. A fortiori this term could be applied by St. Paul to the rank growth of legend respecting the Patriarchs, etc., such as we find in the "Book of Jubilees" and in the "Haggada". This was con- demned by him jis tra.shy and unwholesome. The other contemporary errors are of a like Jewish char- acter. Hort takes avriffeint t^s tpeiiSoim/iov yvua-tois to refer to the casuistry of the scribes such a.s we find in the "Halacha", just as the M^Sot and vti-eoXovioi des- ignate frivoUties such as are contained in the Hag- gada.
But is it not possible that these (imBiffat rijs fevSoivi/iov yvtiaem) refer to the system of interpreta- tion developed later in the Kabbala, of which a con- venient description is given in Gigot's " General Intro- duction to the Study of the Holy Scriptures", p. 411? (see also "Kabbala" in "Jewish Encyclopedia" and Vigoroux, " Diet, de la Bible"). He who followed only the literal meaning of the text of the Hebrew Bible had no real knowledge, or tj-uo-is, of the deep mysteries contained in the letters and words of Scripture. By nolarikon words were constructed from the initials of several, or sentences formed by using the letters of a word as initials of words. By ghematria the nu- merical values of letters were used, and words of equal numerical value were substituted for each other and new combinations formed. By themura the alphabet was divided into two equal parts, and the letters of one half on being substituted for the corresponding letters of the other half, in the text, brought out the hidden sense of the Scripture. These systems date back to time immemorial. They were borrowed from the Jews by the Gnostics of the second century, and were known to some of the early Fathers, and were probably in use before Apostolic times. Now di/rWecrij may mean not only opposition or contrast, but also the change or transposition of letters. In thia way diTiffecru t^s tf'evSuvifwv yvuxreus would mean the falsely-called knowledge which consists in the in- terchange of letters just referred to.
Again, we read: "The mischievous feature about them was their presence within the churches and their combination of plausible errors with apparent, even ostentatious, fidelity to principles of the faith — a trouble elsewhere reflected Acts XX. 29f, in con- nexion with the Ephesian church towards the end of the first century" (Ency. Bib.). We do not ad- mit that Acts, XX, was WTitten tow.ards the end of the first centurj'. The best scholars hold it was WTit- ten by St. Luke long before; and so the critics of the Epistles, having without proof dated the compo- sition of a genuine early New-Testament book at the end of the first century, on the strength of that performance endeavour to discredit three whole books of Scripture.
I. Miscellaneous objections. — We bring together under this heading a number of objections that are found scattered in the text, foot-notes, sub-foot-notes, of the article in the "Ency. Bib." — (1) "The con- cern to keei> the widow chiss under the bishop's con- trol is thoroughly sub-apostolic (cp. Ign. ad Poly- carp. iv. .5)". — That would not ])rove that it was not Apostolic !us well. On reading the onl\- |)as.-iagi' re- ferring to widows (I Tim., v) we get a totally dilTcrent impression from the one convoyed here. The great
