apostolicfathers0201clem - Carmel Apologetics

SPURIOUS AND INTERPOLATED EPISTLES. 279
(iii) It is further urged by Zahn, that the Ignatian interpolator, though in his
forged letters he plagiarizes from the passage of the Epistle to the Romans quoted by
Eusebius, yet betrays no knowledge of this epistle outside the historian's quotation
(see I.v.A. pp. 128, 161); and naturally he lays great stress on this supposed fact {Ign.
Ep. p. vii). But can this statement be sustained Is not the opening of the Tarsian
Epistle iKKXrjalg. d^iewaivu) Kal a^LOfj-v-qfioveiiTi^ Kal d^i.ayaTrrjT(i) palpably suggested by
the opening of the Roman Epistle, where, and where alone, there is a similar accumulation
of words compounded of d^ios, and in which also occurs the solitary instance of
the rare word d^iiTraiuos in the genuine Ignatius Again, the opening of /gn. Mar.
Tjj rj\€7]iJ.ivT[i X'^P'-''''-
©EoO irarpbs v^iarov Kal KvfAov'I. X....d^to^^y...Mapi'y nXelcxTa iu
Oeoj xo-ipeiv more closely resembles other parts of this same passage than anything else
in the genuine Ignatius. Again in /gn. Mar. 1 the expression ovai/j-rju tCiv deivwv rwv
ifiol 7]T0i/j.a(T/j.ivuif is adapted, as Zahn points out, from a passage in J^om. 5, which is
quoted by Eusebius. But there is one strong reason for believing nevertheless that it
was not taken from the historian. In Eusebius the reading is ruv i^ol irol/Muv without
any variation ;
while in the independent texts of the Roman Epistle it is twi> ifiol
ijToifJiaafi^vuv, as quoted in Ign. Mar. 2, likewise without any variation. Again Tars.
10 Trpoaeijxeffde iva 'Irjffov eTrtrtv^w has its closest resemblance in jRom. 8 alrriaaade wepl
ifjLoO IVa iviT^x'^ (the phrase iva 'Itjo-ov Xptcrrov iwiTiJXt^ occurring twice in § 5 of this
same epistle), though parallels may likewise be found in Magii. 14, Siiiyrn. 11, and
elsewhere.
(iv) Lastly; Zahn {Ign. Ep. p. vii) sees a confirmation of his view in the
phenomena of the MSS '
;
Soli epistulae ad Ephesios, quippe quae ultimo loco ab ipso
interpolatore posita sit, dix.-r]v subscriptum est tamquam clausula totius collectionis (p.
288, 17).' This seems to be a mistake. The cni.-i]v is not the concluding word but is
part of the letter itself, djoiT/j' t) xdpis (see below, 111. p. 266), and was quoted as such by
Anastasius of Antioch (see above, p. 204). It occurs moreover in exactly the same
position in the Epistle to Polycarp (see iii. p. 232) and there is even some
; ground
for surmising that it may have stood originally in the genuine Ignatius in both these
places (ill. p. 266). But Zahn continues; 'Atque in codice Vaticano 859 [g.^] qui
reliquis epistulis omnibus subscripsit to\} ayiov lepoixaprvpos 'lyvariov eTrto-xoXr Trpbs
'AvTioxfts, irpbs "Upwa, k.t.X., sive addito sive omisso epistulae numero, epistulae
ad Romanos prorsus singularis subjuncta est epigraphe, toO dy. iepofj.. Iyi/. irarpidpxov
QeoO TriXews cwTioxdas iiruTToXTj Trpbs pu/xaiovs t^'.'
This is true likewise of our other
chief MSS (gi g4). But Zahn has omitted to observe that a corresponding elaborate
title (inserting however in this case not Ko.rpidpxov QeovirdXews but apxt-ewiffKbirov
QeovwoXeus) is also placed at the head of the Letter to Mary, the first in the collection
of epistles ascribed to Ignatius, as the Letter to the Romans is the last, in these MSS
gi gg (comp. also g4). Thus the more elaborate superscription and subscription bind
the whole collection together and the
; phenomena, so far from showing that the last
letter was originally separate, establish its close connexion with the rest. The
only inference that we can draw from these facts is, that the parent MS from which our
existing MSS (at least gj gog4) were derived was not written before the age of Justinian
(a.d. 538), when Antioch acquired the name of Theopolis.