THE HISTORICAL CHARACTER OF ST. JOHN'S GOSPEL.
The Historical Character of St. John's Gospel. By J. Armitage Robinson, D.D. (Longmans and Co. 6d. and 1s. net.)—The details of Dr. Robinson's arguments make up a very considerable body of proof. The Mary and Martha of St. Luke's narrative, for instance, are obviously the same people as the two sisters of whom St. John tells us ; Martha is active in both, Mary is rapt in her sorrow as she is in her devotion. The difference between what the Synoptists and what St. John put into the mouth of Jesus remains unexplained. Did He talk in this way or in that ? Or have we His exoteric teaching in one set of biographies, His esoteric in the other ? These are questions to which we cannot expect an answer. One thing is certain,—if He was what Christendom believes, He must have been many-sided, and we cannot hope to measure Him by any human standard. It must be allowed, however, that the problem is made more difficult by the Johannine Epistles. The greater part of them might have been worked up into the Gospel without any one detecting the difference of origin.
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