i; ii. 22 ; 1V. 2, 3 ; v. 6; 2 Ep. Vet'. 7. It cannot be proved, however, that the prologue to the Gos pel has any polemical reference. It is true that its statements stand opposed to many of the Gnostic doctrines ; but they stand opposed no less to many doctrines which are not Gnostic, such as Arian and Humanitarian representations of our Saviour's person ; and it might, therefore, be as reasonably argued, that St. John had the followers of Arius and our modern Unitarians in view when he wrote his prologue, as that he had the Gnostics. The obvious truth is, that all parts of Sciipture which set forth divine verities must stand opposed to the doctrines of those by whom these are denied. In Holy- Scripture, consequently, lies the confutation of all heresy ; but it was not for this that it was for the most part written. Its primary design is to set forth the truth for the salvation of men and the edification of the church ; and if, in aiming at this end, its writers utter what is found to condemn opinions held by men, that may be the result merely of the essential oppugnancy of truth to error, and cannot of itself be held to prove that the writer had these opinions specially in his view when he wrote. In the case of St. John's Gospel, the number of errors its statements confute is such that there is hardly a heretical sect known to the ancients against which it has not been supposed to be directed.
Much stress has been laid, by those who attribute to St. John an anti-gnostic polemic, on his use of the term Alryor as applied to our Lord. The ar gument here is that John took this word from the Gnostic teachers and applied it to Jesus Christ, whom he sets forth as the true Logos. But is it certain that the word could come to John from no other source than the Gnostics ? We know that it occurs constantly, though not in a personal sense, in the writings of Philo ; and what is of still more importance, we know that the Jews did, in a personal sense, speak of the 4,-1 Nnvo (.111entra de Yeya), or Word of Jehovah (Berthoklt, Christologia .itireorunt, p. 94-96). Is it not more probable that the term found its way among the Christians, amidst whom John wrote, from this source, than from heathen speculation ? Besides, is it credible that had St. Johtt borrowed this term from the Gnostics for the purpose of applying it in a very different sense (for the concept of the Logos by the apostle is entirely different from the Gnostic con cept of the Logos), he would have omitted dis tinctly to intimate the existence of such difference ? Was not this more likely to mislead than to in struct ?—just as we find in our own day the con verse course followed by many who employ N. T. phraseology to convey opinions which the N. T. does not teach (Luthardt, Das 7ohann. Evang:, etc., 221, ft'. ; Schott, Isagose, p. 140.
Turning to the writings of St. Paul we are met by several passages in those epistles which he wrote towards the end of his life, especially those to the Ephesians and the Colossians, and the Pastoral Epistles, which are supposed to contain direct allusions to Gnostic speculation. That the writer ot these epistles had in view certain errorists by whom the Christians were in danger of being led astray, and that many of his statements were directed against these, cannot be called in question.
But it is by no means clearly made out that their errors belonged to parties holding what may be called Gnostic views in the sense of that term as commonly used. Still less is there any ground for the assumption on which some have sought to wield an argumeat against the genuineness of these epistles, that they contain sentiments borrowed from the Gnostic schools of the 2C1 century. The utter futility of this, it needs only a glance at the passages adduced in support of it to show. In Eph. i. 21 and Col. i. 16, we have a series of ex istences intermediate between God and the world that bears some resemblance to the Gnostic repre sentation of aupciiiets or aite'pes. When more closely looked at, however, this enumeration will be found to have more of a Judistic than of a Gnostic character ; if, indeed, it be not a mere rhetorical amplification for the sake of emphasis (comp. Rom. viii. 38, 39). That there is an angelic hierarchy is a Biblical doctrine older than the N. T., and one, therefore, which may be referred to by the N. T. writers without supposing them to allude to extra Christian sects or speculations. In Eph. 7, iii. 21, the apostle uses the expression alarms., but in a sense which has no connection whatever with the Gnostic doctrine of intermediate beings. In Eph. 2 the czar is personified, and this is said to be a Gnostic representation ; but is it more so there than in Rom. xii. 2, where we have exactly the same expression ? or than in Luke xvi. S, where alav is also spoken of as a person ? or than in Cor. ii. 6 and other passages ? The use of 7rMpuy.ta (Eph. i. 23 ; Col. i. 19 ; 9) has also been adduced as indicating allusion to Gnostic ideas ; but althp