THE SAYINGS OF JESUS.* Tars valuable and scholarly edition of
the Oxyrhynchus frag- ments, with Introduction, Critical Apparatus, and Commentary, takes literary rather than theological ground :—
" I have regarded the fragments as remains of early Christian literature rather than as a theological document. The distinc- tion, if fine, is real ; and may serve to deliver me from the charge of exercising myself in great matters which are too high for me." It is, perhaps, not easy to exclude theological side-lights ; but • • The Sayings of Jesus from Oxyrhynehus. By Hugh G. Evelyn White• Cambridge : at the University Press. LIU Odd had the function of these side-lights been limited in general to connotation, the study of Christian origins, which has been so much in evidence during the last half-century, would probably have produced more satisfactory results.
The two papyri are fragments from compilations made early in the third century ; and there is a prima facie case for treating them as parts of one and the same collection. This collection,
we may suppose, was made at a time when the primitive Collec- tion, used by Mark and by the compiler of Q., had been absorbed
into the Synoptic Gospels ; and was probably the work of a Christian familiar with the Jewish and Egyptian practice of treasuring up the sayings of famous teachers. It may be regarded as a no more than " unconscious revival " of the earlier Logia ; its true model being Jewish or Egyptian.
While the distinctive character of the sayings is Synoptic, Johannine influence is unmistakable :- " On a general view, we might say that the sayings were formed at a period when Johannism was already in the air, but still nascent and undeveloped ; or, if we hold that Johannine thought is essentially the product of one master mind, that they were shaped in a locality which lay back from the stream, and was only reached by ripples of Johannine thought."
The latter may well have been the case in Egypt ; and with regard to their origin, while admitting that positive proof is not to be had, unless some new discovery should hereafter add to
the evidence, the editor, by a process of exhausting the alternatives, arrives at the conclusion that " circumstantial evidence points to the conclusion that the Oxyrhynchus sayings are excerpts from the Gospel according to the Hebrews." It is difficult to see any connexion between the 13 Logia : the principle of selection, it seems, is practical :-
" If we regard the Sayings as having been selected for their independent worth, and not as units illustrating any developing principle, as a thesaurus designed to give in a small compass ao much of a Gospel as was judged most likely to be of help and comfort in daily life, does not this view agree best with the data on which we have to work ? "
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