it is difficult to resist the conclusion, that the writers of the gospel history wrote as they were moved by the Holy Ghost.

CHAPTER XI.

JESUS BEFORE THE SANHEDRIM.

THE next verse in order (the 66th) reads thus: "And as soon as it was day, the elders of the people, and the chief priests, and the scribes, came together, and led him into their council, saying-"

This verse has given the critics no little trouble. They cannot reconcile it with the three preceding verses; and so they settle the difficulty by a very summary process. Dr. Robinson, in his Harmony of the Gospels, places this verse and the five that follow it, before the 63d, 64th, and 65th verses. So does Dr. Doddridge; and so probably do all the harmonists. But these violent transpositions of the text are exceedingly dangerous. Once admit that a verse is out of place, and where is the process of transposing to stop? What limit is to be put upon the re-arrangement of the canon of Scripture? Who is to decide what verses are in, and what are out of place? All tampering with the word of God is calculated to weaken our reverence for it, and to shake our faith in the integrity of the text. We are far from supposing that all the events recorded by the Evangelists,

took place in the very order in which they are related. But we do believe that we have the record itself, just as it was written, and that the writers had their reasons for their peculiar methods of narration. John, for instance, being an eye-witness to the transactions in the house of Caiaphas, mentions, with great precision, the time of Peter's first denial, and places it before the arraignment of our Lord. Matthew and Mark do not withdraw their eyes from the great central figure, Jesus, before the high-priest, to notice the side-scene between Peter and the servants. They first see what will be the fate of their Master, before they turn their eyes to his denying disciple. The three Evangelists have followed their own tastes and inclinations, in their account of a matter where the point of veracity was in regard to a fact, not in regard to the time of its occurrence.

Select any two witnesses of an event, in which great and small incidents were mixed up, and you will most likely observe the same difference in their accounts. The one may group the great incidents together, and speak of them first; the other may relate every thing, without regard to its relative importance, just in the order in which it happened. Luke differs from John and the other two Evangelists, in his location of the denial of Peter. Whereas John places the first denial before the arraignment of Christ, Matthew and Mark, all the denials subsequent to this maltreatment, Luke places the three denials just before the outrageous proceeding in the house of Caiaphas.

We have no doubt that John and Luke are both right in what they intend to convey. We believe that the first denial of Peter was before the arraignment of our Lord, and that the last two, which (as we have seen) occurred close together, were after his informal condemnation, but before the soldiers and servants began their rude and wicked sport. Peter was with the group around the fire in the court, watching, with the most intense interest, the progress of the trial. As soon as the men about the fire perceived that informal judgment had been pronounced against the prisoner, they turned upon Peter, and urged that if the Master were guilty, so must be the disciple. Peter, in rapid succession, denied twice, even with oaths and cursing, all knowledge of Him from whom he had received so many distinguished marks of kindness and love. The glorious prisoner, so soon as the council judged him to be "guilty of death," was placed in the hands of the Roman guard for safe-keeping. These soldiers, according to their national custom, began a course of wanton and brutal treatment. The servants around the fire soon joined in, and Peter seems to have been entirely overlooked and forgotten. This seems to us a natural account of the whole matter, drawn from the narratives themselves. The internal probability is strongly in favour of Luke's location of the last two denials. We cannot think that after the soldiers and servants had once begun their abuse of the leader, they would any longer trouble themselves about the follower. But

while we believe that Luke is strictly accurate in regard to the time of the last two denials, we can see nothing improper in his mentioning the first denial in the wrong place. He thought it most suitable to notice all three denials in the same connection. We cannot blame him for this, any more than we can blame the historian for grouping together in a single chapter the events of different periods. Matthew and Mark dispose of the trial and maltreatment of our Lord before they mention the several denials of Peter. Neither can we blame them for this, any more than we can blame the historian who treats of military transactions in one chapter, and of trade, agriculture, and mechanic arts in another. We all recognize his right, when treating of facts, to make such an arrangement of them as suits him best.

We have returned once more to the case of Peter, because we had promised an explanation of the discrepancy between the Evangelists, and because it illustrates our objection to the system of transposing verses of Scripture. We object to transposition, because we believe it to be latitudinarian and dangerous, and because we believe that the Evangelists have had a design in the order of their narratives, which is frustrated, or least liable to be frustrated, by interchanging their verses. Matthew is remarkably inattentive to time and place. He may, for example, appear to speak of a thing as happening in Judea, which really took place in Galilee. place two things together to make

But he

But he may thus a contrast, or to

show a connection between them, or to deduce a moral. The motive of the writer, whatever it may be, is interfered with by this transposing process. In the case under consideration, there is a still more serious objection to the transposition. It violates the truth of history.

We have no doubt whatever, that Luke, in the 66th verse, describes the removal of the Jewish court from the house of Caiaphas to the council-chamber within the temple. Conybeare and Howson call this chamber gazith, but Calmet calls it hanoth, and says that the room gazith had long ceased to be used. It matters not by what name we call it, provided we mean by it a room in the temple. The word employed by Luke in the 66th verse, does not settle the question. They led Jesus "into their council," not into their council-room. The equivalent expression with us would be, they led him into court, whether that body was sitting in the court-house, or in any other building appropriated to its use. We cannot decide, then, by the phraseology, that the Sanhedrim removed from the house of Caiaphas to the temple. But we can decide with absolute certainty that there was a removal, after daylight, to some place. "And as soon as it was day, the elders of the people, and the chief priests and the scribes came together, and led him into their council, saying," &c.

Now, remember that Luke had most explicitly stated that the chief priests, and captains of the temple, and the elders, were present at the arrest in