expression in Acts vii. 38, where Stephen is represented as saying to the Jews of their fathers on Mount Sinai, “who received living oracles ([Greek:  logia zonta]) to give unto us.”  Of this nature were the “oracles of God” which were entrusted to the Jews.  Further, the phrase:  “the first principles of the oracles of God” (Heb. v. 12), is no application of the term to narrative, as Dr. Lightfoot affirms, however much the author may illustrate his own teaching by Old Testament history; but the writer of the Epistle clearly explains his meaning in the first and second verses of his letter, when he says:  “God having spoken to the fathers in time past in the prophets, at the end of these days spake unto us in His Son.”  Dr. Lightfoot also urges that Philo applies the term “oracle” ([Greek:  logion]) to the narrative in Gen. iv. 15, &c.  The fact is, however, that Philo considered almost every part of the Old Testament as allegorical, and held that narrative or descriptive phrases veiled Divine oracles.  When he applies the term “oracle” to any of these it is not to the narrative, but to the Divine utterance which he believes to be mystically contained in it, and which he extracts and expounds in the usual extravagant manner of Alexandrian typologists.  Dr. Lightfoot does not refer to the expression of 1 Pet. iv. 11, “Let him speak as the oracles of God” ([Greek:  hos logia Theou]), which shows the use of the word in the New Testament.  He does point out the passage in the “Epistle of Clement of Rome,” than which, in my opinion, nothing could more directly tell against him.  “Ye know well the sacred Scriptures and have studied the oracles of God.”  The “oracles of God” are pointedly distinguished from the sacred Scriptures, of which they form a part.  These oracles are contained in the “sacred Scriptures,” but are not synonymous with the whole of them.  Dr. Lightfoot admits that we cannot say how much “Polycarp” included in the expression:  “pervert the oracles of the Lord,” but I maintain that it must be referred to the teaching of Jesus regarding “a resurrection and a judgment,” and not to historical books.

In replying to Dr. Lightfoot’s chapter on the Silence of Eusebius, I have said all that is necessary regarding the other Gospels in connection with Papias.  Papias is the most interesting witness we have concerning the composition of the Gospels.  He has not told us much, but he has told us more than any previous writer.  Dr. Lightfoot has not scrupled to discredit his own witness, however, and he is quite right in suggesting that no great reliance can be placed upon his testimony.  It comes to this:  We cannot rely upon the correctness of the meagre account of the Gospels supposed to have been written by Mark and Matthew, and we have no other upon which to fall back.  Regarding the other two Gospels, we have no information whatever from Papias, whether correct or incorrect, and altogether this Father does little or nothing towards establishing the credibility of miracles and the reality of Divine Revelation.