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Neither Mark nor Luke, nor even John, in his wild ex- travagance of statement, mentions any earthquake; nor does any writer of history make any mention of an earthquake at that time; and yet Matthew says. "It was a great earthquake." H© probably copied from those Hindu fables. Vol. XI, p. 116, S. B. E., where we are told that at the moment of Buddha's exit a great earthqval-e shook the earth (Fo Sho Sec. 2104). 294 A QUESTION OF MIRACLES fears anil bade them say to his disciples; "Jesus is risen" and gone into Galilee. (5) Trembling and amazed, those women fled from the sepulchre; and when Magdalen (of the seven devils) found the disciples, they were mourning and weeping and refused to believe her story. In other words, they did not believe in the resur- rection, though they had been often told about it. They believed Jesus to be dead beyond any earthly or heavenly help. Those disciples must have heard him repeatedly say that he must suffer death and be raised again the third day. (6) Still they did not believe it. How could they believe such an amazing story? No such thing had ever before happened in all this w^orld; and nothing like it has ever happened since. They seem never to have heard of Bethany and Lazarus and his four days of syncope in the tomb, (7) nor did they believe that he would be raised the third day; otherwise they would not have stood aloof unbelieving, weeping and disconsolate. (8) Section 2. Let us now see what Luke, the Italian, has to say about this matter. He tells the story of those women bringing spices to the sepulcher and find- ing the stone rolled away from the door ; and that they entered; and, behold, tzvo men stood by them in (5) Mark 16, v. 8 to 12. (6) Matt. 16, V. 21; Luke 9, v. 22; Matt. 17, v. 23. (7) John 11, V. 32 to 44. Jolin was not as honest as an Illinois clergyman, who, when pressed for his opinion about Lazarus' resurrection, replied, "I have often thought, brethren, that per- haps Lazarus was not quite dead." (8) Mark 16, v. 10. A QUESTION OF MIRACLES 295 shining garments. The women were frightened and bowed their faces to the earth. Those men said : "Why seek ye the Hving among the dead? He is risen." (9) When Magdalen told these things to the disciples, "they seemed as idle tales and they believed them not." Peter, to test the truth thereof, ran to the sepulcher, where he found only the linen clothes. (10) Those "two men in shining garments" had utterly disap- peared. Whence they came or whither they went, or who they were, or what their mission to the sepulcher, no human being, for now nearly nineteen hundred years, has been able to tell. Perhaps during all these centuries those angels in white garments have existed only in the towering imagination of that woman of the seven devils. (11) John enlarges upon this story of Luke, and instead of two men in shining garments, they became, under his facile pen, "two angels in white," one of them sit- ting at the head and the other at the feet where the body of Jesus had lain. (12) Luke, as we have just observed, knows nothing about any angels whatever at the tomb. But John (9) Luke 24, v. 5. (10) Luke 24, v. 1 to 12. (11) John 20, V. 12. (12) John 20, V. 12, has "two angels in white." Matthew has only one angel (Matt. 28, v. 1), but that angel has "a counte- nance like lightning. ' ' Mark has but one young man in * * a long white garment" (Mark 16, v. 5). Luke 24, v. 5, has no angels at the tomb, but he has two men in shining garments. Which of these four men was inspired? All those four conflicting state- ments cannot be true. 296 A QUESTION OF MIRACLES says he ran with Peter and. in fact, he outran I'oter to the sepulcher. But John did not enter until Peter came up and went into the tomb, then John followed and they found the linen and the napkins ; nothing more. Here now follows this startling line: "As yet his disciples knew not the Scripture, that he must rise again from the dead." Yet Matthew (13) tells us that Jesus had preached that do'^trine to his dis- ciples, and Luke 9, v. 22, and Mark 8, v. 31, say the same. If John was inspired, did he forget his inspira- tion? (14) Jesus had been preaching, so we are told, more than a year about his death and resurrection, John no doubt being present. (15) Sec. 3. Moreover, John himself, if he wrote the fourth gospel (16) mentions the miraculous about (13) Ch. 16, V. 21. (14) John 20, V. 9. (15) Matt. 16, V. 21; Mark 8, v. 31; Luke 9, v. 22. (16) John, the son of Zebedee, was an uneducated, clumsy, phlegmatic fisherman. There is no sure unimpeachable record that he was ever in Ephesus. Paul traveled up and down in Asia Minor, establishing churches for fifteen or sixteen years, and he makes no mention of John, the son of Zebedee. There were two Johns: John the Presbyter, and John the Fisherman. Ireneus, who wrote about 182 to 188 A. D., is the authority for John of Galilee being in Ephesus. He is also the one who insisted that Jesus was M^U years old at the time of the crucifixion (Ireneus vs. Heresies, Book 2, ch. 22, sec. 6). Ireneus was born 120 to 140 A. D. and died about 202 A. D. He believed that the Father, Son and Holy Ghost were all equal in the trinity. Tertulian, the African, later came to the help of Ireneus, but he broke down his own evidence by saying that John of Galilee was banished to Patmos after having been boiled i7i oil. John the Presbyter probably wrote the Second and Third Epistles, where- in he styles himself the Elder. John of Galilee was not a Greek scholar. This whole question being in sharp dispute, I will only A QUESTION OF MIRACLES 297 Jesus. He says that Jesus turned water into wine; that he came down from heaven; and that Jesus was "before Abraham." (17) "He that hath seen me hath seen the Father." (18) Sec. 4. There are some other incomprehensible things about this resurrection matter which now take place. The same day that Peter and John ran to the sepulcher and found it empty, two of the disciples went to Emmaus, a village about seven miles from Jerusalem; and while on their way Jesus joined them, so we are told, and went with them, and talked with them. They told him certain women had seen a vision of angels, which said that Jesus was alive; and when they reached the village they besought him to tarry with them. (19) All this time those men knew not to whom they were talking; but at supper they recognized him, and "he vanished out of sight." (20) Is it not surprising that those men did not notice the nail holes in Jesus' hands and feet? Besides, how could he walk ivithout limping? His feet must have been very sore from the nail holes. Astonished at what had happened, they returned at once to Jerusa- observe that the author of Eevelations was gifted with a glowing imagination. John of the Fourth Gospel wrote theology, but not a gospel of love. (17) John 1, V. 10 and John 2, v. 1 to 10; John 6, v. 38; John 8, V. 58. (18) John 14, V. 9. (19) Luke 24, v. 12 and 13. (20) Luke 24, v. 31. 298 A QUESTION OF MIRACLES leiii, where they found the eleven; and while talking to them "Jesus stood in their midst," and said, "behold my hands and feet; that it is I myself; handle me and see. for a spirit hath not flesh and bones as ye see me have." Still they did not believe. (21) Whereupon Jesus asked for meat, and they gave him a piece of broiled fish and some honeycomb, and he ate before them. (22) That spear thrust, it seems, had not in- jured his stomach. (23) Jesus was, therefore, at that time not a spirit. He was flesh and blood, and had a stomach, and was hungry, and did eat; at least such is the narrative of Luke, and John indirectly corroborates him. (24) At these gatherings, Thomas, one of the disciples, was absent ; and when told of these things, said he would not believe them unless he could see the prints of the nails, and thrust his hand into the wound made by the spear. John now fixes this all up; wherein he says, eight days later, the disciples, including Thomas, w^ere in a room, "the doors being shut" (25) and Jesus passed through those closed doors and stood in the midst of them and said : "Thomas, reach hither thy (21) Luke 24, v. 39 to 43; John 20, v. 27. John says Jesus asked Thomas to thrust his hand into his side. (22) This is to show, no doubt, that if there is to be a resur- rection, it is to be a bodily resurrection.