Diatessaron

[The Lector]

There has been some confusion between the Gospel of the Hebrews and the Gospel of Matthew, which was also written in Hebrew. I refer the reader to the footnoted commentaries in Eusebius' Ecclesiastical History, in The Nicene & Post Nicene Fathers, vol. 1, p. 159 for a full treatment of this question. In summary, what appears to have happened was that the original "Gospel of the Hebrews" was written by Matthew. It was later abridged to become our current Gospel of Matthew, as indicated by the missing story provided later by John's Gospel. What became the Gospel of the Hebrews in later centuries was itself an abridged edition of the original Gospel of the Hebrews retained by the Jerusalem Church. The later editions, as says Epiphanius, were "not complete, but spurious and mutilated" which reflected the increasingly sectarian and heretical views of the Ebionites. It should be added that Epiphanius identifies the "Diatessaron of Tatian" as "the Gospel According to the Hebrews". If that is true, then the Diatessaron precedes the Four Gospels. "Diatessaron" is a harmony of the Gospels. Tatian was a Syrian and a pupil of Justin Martyr, but later became heretical.

Zechariah, what do you think then?
In which case as mentioned above, the Diatessaron would have come before the 4 seperate gospels [of course, obviously not being called the Diatessaron then!] <!-- s --><img src="{SMILIES_PATH}/huh.gif" alt="" title="Huh" /><!-- s -->