  In considering the relation in which the First and Third Gospels stand to each other and to the Virgin Birth three questions are of the greatest interest and importance. (1) To what extent do the two Gospels imply a common tradition and belief? (2) How far back can we trace this tradition? (3) In what relation does the public tradition stand to the theory of an earlier tradition of a private and restricted character? (1) In answer to the first question, our view is that each Gospel, in a different way, is a witness to the same tradition. Too much has frequently been made of the theory that in Mt. and Lk. we have two independent accounts of the Virgin Birth tradition. It may seriously be questioned if this theory is true. Mt. i. 18-25 is misunderstood if it is explained as a Virgin Birth tradition. Like the rest of cc. i, ii, its character is Midrashic, and it is written from an apologetic standpoint. It would therefore be much truer to say that it implies the existence of a Virgin Birth tradition as known to the readers of the Gospel. What form that tradition took we are of course unable to say. It is possible that it was similar to the tradition as it appears in Lk. On the other hand, it may be that even in Lk. the form in which the tradition is presented owes something to the Evangelist's craftsmanship. If this is so, it would seem that the narratives of both writers point back to a simpler tradition or belief, from which, in different ways, they came to assume their present form. What is of chief importance is the view that in both Gospels we have, not so much two independent narratives of the Virgin Birth, as rather two independent witnesses to what originally was one and the same tradition. It cannot escape our notice that, in spite of their obvious differences, Lk. i. 34 f. and Mt. i. 18-25 contain what is substantially [pg 117] If then we are unable to accept the view that in Mt. and Lk. we have two independent accounts of the Virgin Birth, we may well ask if the loss is a real one. It is probably nothing of the kind. There was indeed a certain advantage in feeling able to point to two diverse traditions which converged upon one fact. Nevertheless, the argument always had a certain weakness. We had to account for the two different traditions, and the explanation was a theory we could never prove. It may be that St. Luke's story goes back for its authority to Mary; it is very doubtful if St. “Matthew's” has any historical connexion with Joseph; but in either case neither assumption is justifiable in an historical inquiry. It must be allowed, we think, that our view has sounder advantages. Instead of claiming validity for two diverse traditions, we can point to two very different narratives, which arise out of the same belief and are independent witnesses to its existence in the primitive Christian community. (2) To what point, then, can we trace this tradition? We have argued that the Virgin Birth tradition first began to gain currency in the circles in which St. Luke moved at the time when the Third Gospel was being written. We have also seen that the tradition was already known to the readers of the First Gospel. If these conclusions are valid, it is evident that the relative order in which the two Gospels were written will determine the farthest point to which we can trace the Virgin Birth tradition as publicly known. What, then, is the order of composition in the case of Mt. and Lk.? We may frankly admit that if priority must be assigned to Mt., it becomes difficult to understand how St. Luke could have no knowledge of the Virgin Birth at the time when he first took up his pen. For, on this view, we ask, Must not the tradition have already reached the circles in which he was moving at the [pg 118] But the priority of the two Gospels is not a question to be decided simply by the attitude which the Evangelists display towards the Virgin Birth. Mt. and Lk. must be compared throughout. When this is done there do not appear to be sufficient grounds for giving a vote in either direction (cf. Stanton, GHD., ii, p. 368). All that we can say is that the two Gospels are independent works, and must have been written about the same time. If there was an interval, it cannot have been great, for there are no sufficient signs that either writer was acquainted with the work of the other. It is especially difficult to think that St. Luke would have neglected the First Gospel, if it had been accessible to him (cf. Lk. i. 1-4). If, however, we accept, as a working hypothesis, the view that the two Gospels were written independently of each other, and more or less simultaneously,104 it will still follow that the Virgin Birth tradition was already known in at least one influential primitive Christian community (that to which the First Gospel was addressed) while it was unknown to St. Luke.105 Is this a fatal objection, or does such a position represent what may well have been the actual situation? We do not think that the difficulty is too great. The tides by which traditions flow in different places are not simultaneous; they differ in time, in height, and in volume. No practice could be more mischievous than the habit of dating the relative spread of early beliefs simply by the dates of contemporary documents. Regard must be paid to local conditions. [pg 119]In life as in nature there are variations of current and of coast formation. There are limits, of course, within which this caveat holds good; but, provided the interval of time is not too great, the view that St. Luke could begin to write in ignorance of a tradition already known elsewhere is not self-condemned. After all, St. Luke himself had access to much tradition which presumably was unknown to the First Evangelist (witness St. Luke's special matter). Concerning the length of time we can allow the Virgin Birth tradition to have been already known elsewhere, when St. Luke began to write, there is room for difference of opinion. If, as we have contended, he became acquainted with it in the process of writing or immediately afterwards, the period can scarcely have been considerable. Perhaps it ought to be estimated in months rather than in years, but to say more would be idle speculation. The farthest point therefore to which we can trace the existence of the Virgin Birth as a public tradition is some little time previous to the composition of the Third Gospel. (3) It is a perfectly fair assumption to make that the public tradition must have had a private vogue before, and perhaps for some time before, it became public property. This view becomes especially probable in the light of what we have just seen, viz. that the spread of the public tradition among the primitive Christian communities covered an appreciable period of time. The question of the historical truth of the Virgin Birth is precisely the question of how far back the private tradition can be traced; whether it can go back to Mary the mother of Jesus, and whether satisfactory reasons can be given for a silence which extends beyond the period covered by the Pauline Epistles and the Second Gospel, and is broken only at last in the interval which shortly preceded the composition of the Gospels of Mt. and Lk. In this lies the real historical problem. Can the theory of a private authoritative tradition be vindicated? There are several questions which bear upon this problem. They are: (1) The question of the date of the First and of the Third Gospels; (2) The extent to which the credibility of the Gospels permits of the possibility of error; (3) The Alternative Theories of the origin of belief in the Virgin Birth; (4) The theological aspect of the tradition. |
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