and in the
main, of course, directly supports it. Then Dr. Lightfoot actually
makes use of the following extraordinary argument:--

"But it may be worth while adding that the error of Malalas is
capable of easy explanation. He has probably misinterpreted some
earlier authority, whose language lent itself to misinterpretation.
The words [Greek: marturein, marturia], which were afterwards used
especially of martyrdom, had in the earlier ages a wider sense,
including other modes of witnessing to the faith: the expression
[Greek: epi Traianou] again is ambiguous and might denote either
'during the reign of Trajan,' or 'in the presence of Trajan.' A
blundering writer like Malalas might have stumbled over either
expression." [110:1]

This is a favourite device. In case his abuse of poor Malalas should not
sufficiently discredit him, Dr. Lightfoot attempts to explain away his
language. It would be difficult indeed to show that the words [Greek:
marturein, marturia], already used in that sense in the New Testament,
were not, at the date at which any record of the martyrdom of Ignatius
which Malalas could have had before him was written, employed to express
martyrdom, when applied to such a case, as Dr. Lightfoot indeed has in
the first instance rendered the phrase. Even Zahn, whom Dr. Lightfoot so
implicitly follows, emphatically decides against him on both points.
"The [Greek: epi autou] together with [Greek: tote] can only signify
'coram Trajano' ('in the presence of Trajan'), and [Greek: emarturaese]
only the execution." [110:2] Let anyone simply read over Dr. Lightfoot's
own rendering, which I have quoted above, and he will see that such
quibbles are excluded, and that, on the contrary, Malalas seems
excellently well and directly to have interpreted his earlier authority.

That the statement of Malalas does not agree with the reports of the
Fathers is no real objection, for we have good reason to believe that
none of them had information from any other source than the Ignatian
Epistles themselves, or tradition. Eusebius evidently had not. Irenaeus,
Origen, and some later Fathers tell us nothing about him. Jerome and
Chrysostom clearly take their accounts from these sources. Malalas is
the first who, by his variation, proves that he had another and
different authority before him, and in abandoning the martyr-journey to
Rome, his account has infinitely greater apparent probability. M