Lecture X

But what do glib expounders of the Bible say about these things? At one place in St. Matthew's Gospel they find a passage concerning the feeding of four thousand people with seven loaves, and at another a reference to the feeding of five thousand with five loaves, and they regard the second account as mere repetition. They say: The transcriber of the original text copied carelessly, as often happens. So on one occasion it is said that four thousand people were fed with seven loaves and on another that five thousand were fed with five loaves. After all, that sort of thing may well happen when a copyist is negligent!—I have no doubt that similar things may occur when books are being written in the modern age, but the Gospels did not by any means come into existence in that way! When a narrative occurs a second time there is deep meaning in it. But because accounts in the Gospel of St. Matthew harmonise with the indications given a century before the appearance of the Christ by Jeschu ben Pandira, the great Essene teacher, in order that when He came He might be understood—because this is so we must go deeply into the indications given in this Gospel if we are to grasp the truths it contains.—But let us continue.—