apostolicfathers0201clem - Carmel Apologetics

424 EPISTLES OF S. IGNATIUS.
Polycarpiatia, as following Ussher and Pearson we may conveniently
style it
All the Seven Vossian Epistles, is the reply of Pearson and of most
critics who hold these to represent the genuine Ignatius. Six Epistles
only, is Ussher's answer to this question, the Epistle to Polycarp being
regarded by him as spurious. This condemnation of the Epistle to
Polycarp has been considered already (pp. 243, 314) and need not
trouble us again. Six Epistles only
is also Zahn's answer (/.
v. A.
p. no sq); but with him the letter excepted is the Epistle to the
Romans, which he receives indeed as genuine but supposes to have
been circulated apart from the rest. He even goes so far as to say
that a collection of all the Seven Epistles in one volume was probably
never in circulation among Greeks (' auf griechischem Boden'). With
this view I am unable to agree.
It seems highly probable indeed that the Epistle to the Romans
would be circulated separately as well; for being, as I have said elsewhere
(see above, p. 38), a sort of vade 7neaim for martyrs
and confessors,
it would have attractions for persons who would take little
or no interest in the other letters : but that it had its
place also in the
Sylloge Polycarpiana I cannot doubt.
In the first place the a priori probability is strongly in favour of
this view. It was written during the martyr's stay at Smyrna, when
he was in some sense Polycarp's guest. It would probably have a
higher attraction for Polycarp than the others, for his letter to the
Philippians shows the interest with which he watched all the incidents
bearing on the martyrdom. Of all the letters of Ignatius therefore,
except those addressed to the Smyrnseans and to Polycarp himself,
it was the most likely to have been preserved by him. And this
inference drawn from a priori probabilities is borne out by his own
letter. One of the closest coincidences which it
presents to the
Ignatian Epistles is a parallel to the Epistle to the Romans (see above,
p. 136, and the note on Polyc. Phil. 10).
Moreover, when we follow the stream of testimony lower down,
the inference is the same. The letter of the Smyrnaean Church, giving
an account of Polycarp's death, presents a marked coincidence with
this Roman letter (see above, p. 137). So also when we step beyond
the borders of Polycarp's own church. Who after the Smyrnseans was
so likely to have possessed the Sylloge Polycarpiana as Irengeus the
disciple of Polycarp But Irengeus, while showing a knowledge of
the other letters, directly quotes the Epistle to the Romans alone
(see pp. 143, 337 sq).
The phenomena also in the extant Letter from