1 and fentiments in Paul's Epiftles to the Churches; and that in Paul's fourth, where he fays, that Nero was both an admirer and favourer of Christianity This, I fay, is notoriously false, and contrary to the unanimous relations of Heathen and Christian writers, concerning Nero, and his regard to the Chriftians. Who knows not, who almost has not read the dreadful cruelties, and the barbarous inhumanities, he exercifed against them? Who has not heard the accounts of Tacitus and Suetonius among the Romans; and Tertullian, Eufebius, Lactantius, Auftin, and many others, among the Christian writers, concerning his horrid perfecutions of the Roman Chriftians? Who therefore can credit thefe Epiftles, in which both Paul and Seneca reprefent that Emperor as a favourer of the Chriftians? I conclude them therefore to be spurious by Prop. VIII. Befides, 8. The preceding account of Nero's favour to the Christians, in Paul and Seneca's fourth Epiftles, feems but very indifférently to agree with what Paul afterwards adds in that Epiftle, viz. that he intreats Seneca to venture no more to say any thing of him or the Chriftian religion to Nero, left he should offend him. If the Emperor did, as Seneca fays, admire Paul's Epiftles; and if, as Paul fays, he was both an admirer and favourer of the Chriftians, what need this caution? What hazard could it be for Seneca to communicate more of his knowledge in Chriftianity to him? Add to this; 9. That it is very improbable that St. Paul would obftruct Seneca in his intentions of recommending Christianity to the Emperor. Is not this directly contrary to his known and con ftant zeal and endeavours for its propagation? Would he not rather have rejoiced in fo probable an opportunity of fpreading the knowledge of Chrift, and by the means of one fo near to, and so much in favour with, the Emperor, have procured the liberty for himself and the other Christian converts of exercifing their religion freely? To imagine the contrary is to fuppofe the Apoftle at once defective in his regards to himself and the whole body of Chriftians, and acting in direct contradiction to the whole of his conduct, and zealous endeavours to advance the intereft of Christianity. But befides, it has happened here, as commonly in fuch cafes; want of memory betrays the forgery: although the author, so unlike Paul, in this place is for not discovering the Christian religion to the Emperor, yet in another Epistle, viz. the fixth of Paul, he is made to advise Seneca to take convenient opportunities of infinuating the Chriftian religion, and things in favour of it, to Nero and his family; than which nothing can be a more manifeft contradiction. They are therefore Apocryphal by Prop. VII. CHAP. XII. A Conjecture concerning the Occafion of the Forgery of thefe Epiftles under the Names of Paul to Seneca, and Seneca to Paul, taken from Phil. i. 13. and iv. 22. Authors who have rejected them. IT T would not be difficult to collect many other evidences of the spuriousness of these Epiftles from internal evidences, or fuch as themselves afford: but to omit these, I fhall offer to the reader what I conjecture, and think most probable, concerning the original of them, or the occafion and time of the forgery, in the following particulars. 1. St. Paul, when he was at Rome, had feveral converts to Christianity in the Emperor's house or family. This I gather from from two paffages in his Epistle to the Philippians; the first is that (ch. i. ver. 13.) My bonds in Chrift are manifest in all the palace, in on Tŷ wearTapiw, i. e. in all the court of Cæfar (as. our tranflators rightly paraphrase it in the margin *); the word 'garagio properly denoting the palace or place of the Emperor's refidence: the other is (chap. iv. ver. 22.) All the faints falute you, chiefly they, that are of Cæfar's houthold, i. e. the converts to Christianity, who were of Cæfar's court or family. 2. Seneca was of the court or family of this Emperor, viz. Nero. He was his tutor, and had the direction of his youth, together with Afranius Burrus. (Vid. Sueton. in Neron. cap. 7. et 35.) 3. Several of the antient writers of Christianity did efteem Seneca as almost, if not altogether a Chriftian. Andreas Schottus, or whoever was the author of Seneca's Life, after having given very large encomiums to his works, adds; Quorum admiratione ducti fanéti Patres, Tertullianus, Lactantius, Hieronymus, Auguftinus, cum propter rerum quæ in his tractantur pondus, fententiarumque quibus explicantur gravitatem, tum etiam propter convenientiam conjunctionemque do&trinæ cum fua, pars Chriftianum esse, alii a religione Chriftiana non abhorrere cenfuerunt:" which the holy Fathers Tertullian, Lactantius, Jerome, and Austin, fo much admired, partly by reafon of "the importance of his subjects, and the ferioufness of his «ftile, and partly by reason of the agreement of his principles "with theirs, that fome of them efteemed him actually as a "Chriftian, and others thought him not much lefs." I know not what places in thefe Fathers' works this author refers to; but in Tertullian I obferve, that he applauds Seneca for his treatife of Superftition, which he wrote against the folly of idolatry; and elfewhere ftiles him, Seneca, who is often ours, viz. as Pamelius fays, because he often agrees in his notions with the Chriftians. Lactantius in very many places cites him, as having folidly confuted the ridiculous fuperftitions of d с Paganifm. Auftin for the fame reafons highly commends him, and in one place adds, that Seneca did not blame or fay any thing against the Chriftians, because perhaps he could not do it without violence to his own confcience; on which Ludovicus Vives notes, that when Nero had burnt Rome, and bar baroufly punished the Chriftians as guilty of that crime, Seneca defired leave of the Emperor to retire into the country for a while; which he did, fays he, in my opinion, because he could not bear to fee the daily and cruel massacre of the innocent Chriftians. 4. On these accounts I conjecture the occafion of forging these Epiftles was firft taken, viz. When fome one obferved that there were fome of Nero's court made Chriftians, and that Seneca was of this court, and generally reputed a Christian, it is not unlikely he should thence be influenced to forge a conference between Paul and Seneca, and publifh these spurious letters under their names. This cannot feem strange to those who are acquainted with the nature of the antient forgeries, and will remember that there are few perfons mentioned in the New Testament, as companions of the Apostles, who have not had fome fpurious piece or other fathered upon them. To confirm this conjecture, befides what is already faid, I fhall only obferve; 1.) That in the fpurious Acts under the name of Linus, where thefe Epiftles are mentioned, the text Phil. iv. 22. is also referred to; and it is there urged to prove the genuineness of the Epiftles, that Paul fays, he had converts in Cæfar's family. See the place above, Obf. II. 2.) That feveral later writers have imagined, that Paul particularly bad reference to Seneca, when he speaks of the faints of Cafar's houshold: fo Salmero the jefuit, and several other interpreters mentioned by Calvin; alfo Beza and Heinfius. Now though indeed the Acts of Linus be spurious, and there be no foundation for this latter opinion, yet • Lib. 2, 3, et 4. b De Civit. Dei, lib. 6. c. 10. In Philipp. iv. 22. apud Coc. Cenfur. p. 10. d Annot. in eund. loc. f Exercit. facr. in lcc. e inafmuch inafmuch as both antient and modern writers thus explained this text of the Apostle, my conjecture appears for that reason more probable, that fome one did, from the occafion of that fame interpretation, take the handle of forging these Epiftles of Paul and Seneca. As to the time of their being forged, I suppose it to have been in the middle of the fourth century, because they are not mentioned by Eufebius, or any more antient writer than Jerome; and as to the author of them, I think I may by no improbable conjecture affirm him to have been a Latin, who was not only ignorant of the Greek language, but did not fo much as know that Paul wrote his genuine EpiAles to the Churches in the Greek language. What can be more evident than this is from Seneca's eighth Epistle to Paul? In which, after he had been speaking of the sublime fubjects, which are treated of in the Apostle's Epiftles, he advifes him Latinitati morem gerere, i. e. to have refpect to true Latin; or as we fay commonly, to write good and proper Latin. Now this he could never have faid, if he had known the Apostle wrote all his Epiftles in Greek: this fhews he had only read them in fome Latin translation, and supposed them written originally in that language, and confequently that he was a Latin. This cannot seem strange to those who confider, how many, even now, are ignorant among the common people in what language the Scriptures were written; and that the monks and priests in former ages thought the old Vulgate Latin was the very language in which the facred writers first The learned and witty Erafmus, in his Encomiums of Folly, his Annotations on the New Testament, and elfewhere, has furnished us with abundant proof of this. I remember one place in his Annotations (viz. on Act, xxii. 9.) fo much to this purpose, that I cannot forbear tranfcribing it: "I am confident," fays he, " there are now many thousands of "divines, who do not fo much as know in what language the "Apoftles wrote. If by chance they hear that Mark, Luke, "Paul, Peter, and John wrote in Greek, they are perfectly "astonished at it, as fome incredible thing, which they never "heard of. Some of them imagine, because they were Jews, "that they wrote in Hebrew: others, that they published wrote. |