14. Comparison of the Statements of the Four Evangelists
Respecting John the Baptist, the Prophecies Regarding Him, His
Addresses to the Multitude and to the Pharisees, Etc.
We deem it necessary to compare with the expression of
the passage we are considering the similar expressions found elsewhere
in the Gospels. This we shall continue to do point by point to
the end of this work, so that terms which appear to disagree may be
shown to be in harmony, and that the peculiar meanings present in each
may be explained. This we shall do in the present passage. The words, “The voice of one crying in the wilderness, Make straight the way of the Lord,” are placed by John, who was a disciple, in the mouth of the Baptist. In Mark, on the other hand, the same words are recorded at the beginning of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, in accordance with the Scripture of Isaiah, as thus: “The beginning of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, as it is written in Isaiah the prophet, Behold, I send My messenger before thy face, who shall prepare thy way before thee. The voice of one crying in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make His paths straight.” Now the words, “Make straight the way of the Lord,” added by John, are not found in the prophet. Perhaps John was seeking to compress the “Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make straight the paths of our God,” and so wrote, “Make straight the way of the Lord;” while Mark combined two prophecies spoken by two different prophets in different places, and made one prophecy out of them, “As it is written in Isaiah the prophet, Behold I send My messenger before thy face, who shall prepare thy way. The voice of one crying in the wilderness, Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make His paths straight.” The words, “The voice of one crying in the wilderness,” are written immediately after the narrative of Hezekiah’s recovery from his sickness, while the words, “Behold I send My messenger before thy face,” are written by Malachi. What John does here, abbreviating the text he quotes, we find done by Mark also at another point. For while the words of the prophet are, “Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make straight the paths of our God,” Mark writes, “Prepare ye the way of the Lord, make His paths straight.” And John practises a similar abbreviation in the text, “Behold I send My messenger before thy face, who shall prepare thy way before thee,” when he does not add the words “before thee,” as in the original. Coming now to the statement, “They were sent from the Pharisees and they asked Him,” we have been led by our examination of the passage to prefix the enquiry of the Pharisees—which Matthew does not mention—to the occurrence recorded in Matthew, when John saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to his baptism, and said to them, “Ye generations of vipers,” etc. For the natural sequence is that they should first enquire and then come. And we have to observe how, when Matthew reports that there went out to John Jerusalem and all Judæa, and all the region round about Jordan, to be baptized by him in Jordan, confessing their sins, it was not these people who heard from the Baptist any word of rebuke or refutation, but only those many Pharisees and Sadducees whom he saw coming. They it was who were greeted with the address, “Ye offspring of vipers,” etc. Mark, again, does not record any words of reproof as having been used by John to those who came to him, being all the country of Judæa and all of them of Jerusalem, who were baptized by him in the Jordan and confessed their sins. This is because Mark does not mention the Pharisees and Sadducees as having come to John. A further circumstance which we must mention is that both Matthew and Mark state that, in the one case, all Jerusalem and all Judæa, and the whole region round about Jordan, in the other, the whole land of Judæa and all they of Jerusalem, were baptized, confessing their sins; but when Matthew introduces the Pharisees and Sadducees as coming to the baptism, he does not say that they confessed their sins, and this might very likely and very naturally be the reason why they were addressed as “offspring of vipers.” Do not suppose, reader, that there is anything improper in our adducing in our discussion of the question of those who were sent from the Pharisees and put questions to John, the parallel passages from the other Gospels too. For if we have indicated the proper connection between the enquiry of the Pharisees, recorded by the disciple John, and their baptism which is found in Matthew, we could scarcely avoid inquiring into the passages in question, nor recording the observations made on them.