brought it from India, and the ’Greek Gospel according to St. Matthew,’ are separate and independent works” ("Christian Records.”  Rev. Dr. Giles, pp. 93, 94).  It must not be forgotten that there was in existence in the early Church a Hebrew Gospel which was widely spread, and much used.  It was regarded by the Ebionites, or Jewish Christians, later known as Nazarenes, as the only authentic Gospel, and Epiphanius, writing in the fourth century, says:  “They have the Gospel of Matthew very complete; for it is well known that this is preserved among them as it was first written in Hebrew” ("Opp.,” i. 124, as quoted by Norton).  But this Gospel, known as the “Gospel according to the Hebrews,” was not the same as the Greek “Gospel according to St. Matthew.”  If it had been the same, Jerome would not have thought it worth while to translate it; the quotations that he makes from it are enough to prove to demonstration that the present Gospel of Matthew is not that spoken of in the earliest days.  “The following positions are deducible from St. Jerome’s writings:  1.  The authentic Gospel of Matthew was written in Hebrew. 2.  The Gospel according to the Hebrews was used by the Nazarenes and Ebionites. 3.  This Gospel was identical with the Aramaean original of Matthew” (Davidson’s “Introduction to the New Testament,” p. 12).  To these arguments may be added the significant fact that the quotations in Matthew from the Old Testament are taken from the Septuagint, and not from the Hebrew version.  The original Hebrew Gospel of Matthew would surely not have contained quotations from the Greek translation, rather than from the Hebrew original, of the Jewish Scriptures.  If our present Gospel is an accurate translation of the original Matthew, we must believe that the Jewish Matthew, writing for Jews, did not use the Hebrew Scriptures, with which his readers would be familiar, but went out of his way to find the hated Septuagint, and re-translated it into Hebrew.  Thus we find that the boasted testimony said to be recorded by Papias to the effect that Matthew and Mark wrote our two first synoptical Gospels breaks down completely under examination, and that instead of proving the authenticity of the present Gospels, it proves directly the reverse, since the description there given of the writings ascribed to Matthew and Mark is not applicable to the writings that now bear their names, so that we find that in Papias there is evidence that two of the Gospels were not the same.

H. That there is evidence that the earlier records were not the Gospels now esteemed Canonical. This position is based on the undisputed fact that the “Evangelical quotations” in early Christian writings differ very widely from sentences of somewhat similar character in the Canonical Gospels, and also from the circumstance that quotations not to be found in the Canonical Gospels are found in the writings referred to.  Various theories are put forward, as we have already seen, to account for the differences