The Irish standard., 1900-08-11

may be that he takes all the rest for
granted, though he does not say so.
OF the two stories of Judas death, he
says that after all the fantastic efforts at
harmonizing them had failed. writer's
might have let the subject alone and
waited
But" he writes, "a continuous
stream OF fallacious exegesis has flowed
on, nor does there seem to be any pros
pect Of its intermission."
Professor Harris thinks Matthew may
have heard the story of Judas bursting
upon the ground and written it
hanged" in order to avoid the repul-
siveness of the picture.
Then, assuming that the account ii.
the Acts is correct, he traces the story of
Naban, nephew of the Grand Vizie,
Ahikar of the court Of King Sennacher-
ib in Assyria. Sennacherib, it appears,
was worried at the growing age of Ahi-
kar, and the fact that he had no son
upon whom to impress his wisdom and
statecraft. Accordingly the King told
Ahikar to adopt Naban, son of Ahikar's
sister, and rear him for future Vizier.
Naban grew in wisdom and in vicious
ness in proportionate degree. One day
he wrote reasonable papers, stamped
them with the seal OF the Grand Vizier,
ND c,,,cod 1,;e ,,,c1o +o l,o daooeoJ -,
prisoned, and finally sentenced to be be-
headed. 1t chanced that Ahikar had
befriended the executioner on one occa-
sion, and the man secreted Ahikar until
occasion rose when~the repcntant King
had need of Ahikar's counsel. The ex-
ecutioner confessed that the vizier was
living; he was brought out of his retreat
and saved the kingdom. Then, just
when vengeance was to have been
wreaked upon Naban, the. seditious one
"swelled up and burst asunder."
Professor Harris marks this unusual
mode of death ascribed to the two men
as pointing to the Righteousness of both
deaths. He makes no suggestions as to
hQWJudas did die, but throws out every
effort of later writer's to show that Ju-
das may have hanged himself and burst,
too:
i;Among these "rationalizing" efforts
toS, make harmony of the two stories,
Professor Harris points out the theor-
les, in general that the rope broke, let
ting the body fall, and that the rope was
cut, letting it fall
Especially Professor Harris sing'es
out the theories of Theophylact and
Papias for contravention.
Theophylact has assumed that Judas,
in betraying Christ, had sublime con-
fidencc in Christ's power and willing
ness to save himself from his enemies,
and that when he saw preparations for
putting Christ to death, disappointment
was more the cause Of suicide than re-
morse could have been.
Professor Harris goes further and
brings in Josephus, not to bulwark
scripture, but his own reasoning. Jo-
sephus' story Of the death OF Herod the
Great was that the man "swelled and
burst" All these kindred stories of
death by bursting the professor shows
to have been of conventional form, and
he refers to Cosquin's finding, which is
that the story of the suicide was Can
Onica1 h1,t rot hictorico1n
Writing Of M. Cosquin's l,armonizing
of the story, Professor Harris says:
"If he wishes to say that this story is
romance with a moral intention he
may obtain our assent at the expense OF
our faith in the documents, but to ap.
ply an apologetic method of this kind
to the New Testament is to introduce
critical factor that is disturbing to some
thing more than the DEGREES OF the
councils. Clearly, we shall have to re-
interpret the New Testament, with al
lowance OF possible folklore through
out. Nor is it even certain that all the
cases that may turn UP will show NOR
al intention as the kernel of the nom
historical incident"
Between the lines at least Professor
Harris has said that Judas did not COM
NIT suicide. He attempts no analysis
of the traitors character to disprove the
story. He expresses no opinion Of The
ophylact's argument that Judas himself
was disappointed in the submissiveness
of Christ to his murderers. He argues
only that because Swelling and burst
ing" was common means of death as
cribed to semi-mythical characters in
history, the death of Judas by that inn
probable form is of folklore origin.
Yenial Sins.
Have you ever dreamed of being
bound by thousand little threads, so
that though you want to escape and go