======================================================================== BIBLE WITNESS AND REVIEW MAGAZINE (3 VOLUMES) by Various ======================================================================== A three-volume periodical bearing witness to biblical truth through articles, reviews, and theological commentary. The magazine addressed contemporary issues of faith and doctrine from a conservative Christian perspective. Chapters: 196 ------------------------------------------------------------------------ TABLE OF CONTENTS ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 1. Vol 01 - A Disputed Passage 2. Vol 01 - All They That Be in Asia 3. Vol 01 - As Oracles of God 4. Vol 01 - Baptized for the Dead 5. Vol 01 - Choice of Scene 6. Vol 01 - Christological Pantheism 7. Vol 01 - City of Refuge 8. Vol 01 - Conscience 9. Vol 01 - De Propitiatione 10. Vol 01 - Death Abolished 11. Vol 01 - Delivered From the Law 12. Vol 01 - Doctrine of a Future State in the Pentateuch 13. Vol 01 - Epistolary Communications: Tabernacle, Covenant, and Putting Away 14. Vol 01 - Every Family 15. Vol 01 - Fallen From Grace: Texts Misapplied or Misquoted 16. Vol 01 - Four Characteristic Features of a Christian 17. Vol 01 - Full Assurance 18. Vol 01 - Genesis 19. Vol 01 - God's Earthly Center 20. Vol 01 - Greater Than John the Baptist 21. Vol 01 - Greek Word Translated Forever, Dienekes 22. Vol 01 - Guilt and Grace 23. Vol 01 - Have We a Revelation From God?* 24. Vol 01 - He That Letteth 25. Vol 01 - Head of His Body the Church 26. Vol 01 - Life in Christ Risen 27. Vol 01 - Love and Love 28. Vol 01 - Matthew and Levi 29. Vol 01 - Melchizedek: Biblical Annotations 30. Vol 01 - Mercy 31. Vol 01 - Mount Zion 32. Vol 01 - My Brethren 33. Vol 01 - National Resurrection 34. Vol 01 - Non Eadem Imago 35. Vol 01 - Not Put Under Angels 36. Vol 01 - Note for Page 28 37. Vol 01 - Our Conflict 38. Vol 01 - Parable of the Virgins 39. Vol 01 - Perfect, Not Sinless 40. Vol 01 - Private Interpretation 41. Vol 01 - Scriptural Unity and Union* 42. Vol 01 - Shipwreck of Faith 43. Vol 01 - Son of God and Son of Man 44. Vol 01 - Soul and Spirit 45. Vol 01 - The Author of the Epistle to the Hebrews 46. Vol 01 - The Bearing of 1Pe_2:24 47. Vol 01 - The Birth of Christ Mistimed 48. Vol 01 - The Church 49. Vol 01 - The Church and Its Privileges* 50. Vol 01 - The Close of Mark Authentic and Genuine 51. Vol 01 - The Coming and the Day 52. Vol 01 - The Day of Atonement: The Feasts of Jehovah 53. Vol 01 - The Day of the Lord 54. Vol 01 - The Dependent One 55. Vol 01 - The Faith 56. Vol 01 - The Feast of Tabernacles: The Feasts of Jehovah 57. Vol 01 - The Feast of Trumpets: The Feasts of Jehovah 58. Vol 01 - The Feast of Unleavened Bread: The Feasts of Jehovah 59. Vol 01 - The Feasts of the Future: The Feasts of Jehovah 60. Vol 01 - The First Jewish Mission 61. Vol 01 - The First-Born of Every Creature 62. Vol 01 - The General Design of the Gospels 63. Vol 01 - The Gift of God That Is in Thee 64. Vol 01 - The Heavenly Calling 65. Vol 01 - The Hope Set Before Us 66. Vol 01 - The Hope of Righteousness 67. Vol 01 - The Intercession of Jesus on the Cross 68. Vol 01 - The King in Daniel 69. Vol 01 - The Land Shadowing With Wings 70. Vol 01 - The Last Day 71. Vol 01 - The Least in the Kingdom of God 72. Vol 01 - The Leprous House 73. Vol 01 - The Life, Not Judgment, of the Righteous 74. Vol 01 - The Love of Christ to the Church 75. Vol 01 - The Millennium 76. Vol 01 - The Mount of Olives Cleft 77. Vol 01 - The Olive Tree, Fig Tree, and the Vine: The Feasts of Jehovah 78. Vol 01 - The Out-Resurrection in Php_3:11 79. Vol 01 - The Parenthesis in Rom_5:1-21 80. Vol 01 - The Passover: The Feasts of Jehovah 81. Vol 01 - The Personal Reign 82. Vol 01 - The Philanthropy of God 83. Vol 01 - The Question and the Crisis 84. Vol 01 - The Ransom Money 85. Vol 01 - The Resurrection of the Body 86. Vol 01 - The Sabbath, the Passover, and the Unleavened Bread: The Feasts of Jehovah 87. Vol 01 - The Sabbath: The Feasts of Jehovah 88. Vol 01 - The Savior of All Men 89. Vol 01 - The Septuagint 90. Vol 01 - The Seven Parables 91. Vol 01 - The Seventy Weeks of Daniel 92. Vol 01 - The Spirit and the Bride Say, Come 93. Vol 01 - The Strait Gate 94. Vol 01 - The Suitability of the Evangelists 95. Vol 01 - The Transition Period 96. Vol 01 - The Two Ministries 97. Vol 01 - The Vine and the True Vine 98. Vol 01 - The Vine of the Earth 99. Vol 01 - The Wave-Loaves, or Feast of Weeks: The Feasts of Jehovah 100. Vol 01 - The Wave-Sheaf and the Wave-Loaves: The Feasts of Jehovah 101. Vol 01 - The Wave-Sheaf: The Feasts of Jehovah 102. Vol 01 - The Word Aionios 103. Vol 01 - The Work of the Spirit 104. Vol 01 - They Did Eat and Drink 105. Vol 01 - They Shall Receive You 106. Vol 01 - This Generation 107. Vol 01 - Union in Incarnation, the Root Error of Modern Theology 108. Vol 01 - Westminster Confession of Faith 109. Vol 01 - What the Church Consists Of 110. Vol 01 - Who Are "These Kings?" 111. Vol 01 - Who Shall Confirm Covenant? 112. Vol 02 - 1Co_9:1-27; 1Co_10:1-33 113. Vol 02 - 2Pe_1:19-20 114. Vol 02 - Atonement as Set Forth in the Old Testament 115. Vol 02 - Baptism Not the Communication of Life 116. Vol 02 - Bearing Sins 117. Vol 02 - Biblical Annotations* 118. Vol 02 - Brief Replies to a Few Queries 119. Vol 02 - Calvary 120. Vol 02 - Conquerors 121. Vol 02 - Did Our Lord Drink of the Paschal Cup? 122. Vol 02 - Dr. Farrar on Everlasting, Damnation, and Hell 123. Vol 02 - Epistolary Communications: The Castaway 124. Vol 02 - Examination of Mill's Logic 125. Vol 02 - Examination of Mill's Logic 2 126. Vol 02 - Examination of the Book Entitled the Restitution of All Things* 127. Vol 02 - Examination of the Book Entitled the Restitution of All Things*: Notes 128. Vol 02 - First Born of Every Creature 129. Vol 02 - God Manifest in the Flesh 130. Vol 02 - Imputation 131. Vol 02 - In Whom or Wherein? 132. Vol 02 - Is the Believer Fully Satisfied on Earth? 133. Vol 02 - Is the Bride Christian or Jewish in Revelation? 134. Vol 02 - Jesus Christ Come in the Flesh 135. Vol 02 - On the Inspiration of Scripture and the Tendency to Religious Infidelity 136. Vol 02 - On the Putting Away of Sin 137. Vol 02 - Passages Explained 138. Vol 02 - Purchase and Redemption 139. Vol 02 - Queries as to Things Connected With the Lord's Coming 140. Vol 02 - Reconciliation 141. Vol 02 - Righteousness 142. Vol 02 - Salt 143. Vol 02 - The Atonement 144. Vol 02 - The Baptism of the Holy Ghost: Is It Once for All or Continuous? 145. Vol 02 - The Body of Moses 146. Vol 02 - The Church in Sardis: Modern Phases of the Church 147. Vol 02 - The Day Star in Our Hearts 148. Vol 02 - The Doctrine Taught in Rom_11:1-36 Overlaid by Mistranslation 149. Vol 02 - The Faith of God's Elect 150. Vol 02 - The Faith of the Son of God 151. Vol 02 - The Father 152. Vol 02 - The Force of Greek En 153. Vol 02 - The Glory of God 154. Vol 02 - The Glory of the Only-Begotten 155. Vol 02 - The God of Glory With Abraham and the Son of Man in the Glory of God 156. Vol 02 - The Lord's Supper 157. Vol 02 - The Love of the Truth the Soul's Security 158. Vol 02 - The New Song 159. Vol 02 - The Sufferings of Christ 160. Vol 02 - The Sufferings of Christ Distinguished 161. Vol 02 - The Sufferings of Christ in Atonement 162. Vol 02 - The Temple of God 163. Vol 02 - The True Worshippers 164. Vol 02 - The Use of the Hebrew Verb Kaphar 165. Vol 02 - Then Were All Dead 166. Vol 02 - What Is the Church and What Are the Churches? 167. Vol 02 - Worship 168. Vol 03 - A Few Words About the Epistle to the Ephesians 169. Vol 03 - Again 170. Vol 03 - Biblical Annotations: Dan_9:24-27 171. Vol 03 - Brief Outline of the Scripture Eschatology 172. Vol 03 - Current Denials of Eternal Punishment 173. Vol 03 - Inspiration and Revelation* 174. Vol 03 - Miracles and Infidelity 175. Vol 03 - Psa_84:1-12 176. Vol 03 - Redemption 177. Vol 03 - Restoration 178. Vol 03 - The Center of Christian Worship and the Cause of Ecclesiastical Ruin 179. Vol 03 - The Christian Latreia (Service of Worship) 180. Vol 03 - The Christian Sacraments 181. Vol 03 - The Coming of the Lord That Which Characterizes the Christian Life 182. Vol 03 - The Crisis in the Free Church of Scotland* 183. Vol 03 - The Epistle of Paul to the Churches of Galatia 184. Vol 03 - The Lord's Day 185. Vol 03 - The Mosaic Authorship of Deuteronomy 186. Vol 03 - The Multiformity of Sectarianism and the Unity of the Spirit 187. Vol 03 - The Old Testament in the Jewish Church 188. Vol 03 - The Post-Captivity Prophets: The Effect of the Word of God 189. Vol 03 - The Written Word of God 190. Vol 03 - Thoughts on Jas_1:1-27 191. Vol 03 - Thoughts on Jas_2:1-26 192. Vol 03 - Thoughts on Jas_3:1-18 193. Vol 03 - Thoughts on Jas_4:1-17 194. Vol 03 - Thoughts on Jas_5:1-20 195. Vol 03 - Thoughts on Micah 196. Vol 03 - Thoughts on the Epistle of James: Introduction ======================================================================== CHAPTER 1: VOL 01 - A DISPUTED PASSAGE ======================================================================== A Disputed Passage 1 John 5:8.-It is plain that "the Spirit" (τὸ πνεῦμα) means the Holy Ghost. He only is truth (ver. 6). Allow me to take this opportunity of expressing my regret that Prof. Gaussen (Plenary Inspiration, pp. 192, 193) should venture to defend the text. rec. of the two preceding verses, and in doing so to misstate, of course through inadvertence, the evidence. He ought to have known that the alleged testimonies of some early Latin fathers are very questionable, and that the most ancient MSS. of the Latin Vulgate are against the insertion of the disputed clause, not to dwell on the fact that the three Greek MSS. containing it, against near 150 which omit it, are not older than the fifteenth or sixteenth century; at least, if the God. Neapol. belong to the eleventh century, the reading here is a correction made 500 years later. As to the two grammatical considerations which he borrows from Bishop Middleton, I would briefly reply:- 1. That the words τρεῖς οἱ μαρτυρῦντες, and oἱ τρεῖς (verses 7, 8) are no insuperable difficulty. They are masculine, it is true, while the words to which they relate are neuter; but the difficulty is nearly if not altogether the same,, if the passage remained entire, as in the common text. If in that case the principle of attaction is used to justify this irregularity, the principle of rational concord applies to the correct text; and the more especially, as τὸ πνεῦμα, that well-known- personal object whose power wrought in the saints, is the first of the three witnesses who are specified immediately after. They are, as it were, personified as witnesses, and the gender is accommodated to the sense rather than in strict grammatical form. 2. The next objection is founded on the article being coupled with ἕν, as if it necessarily supposed a previous mention, which only occurs in the retrenched clause. But this is so far from being necessary that, even if ἕν, were rightly read in verse 7, the object and force of τὸ ἕν in verse 8 is wholly different. In other words, supposing the passage in question to be spurious, the anarthrous form would be an error, and the article is required (1:e.τὸ ἕν) in verse 8; for the idea intended is not the numerical unity, but the uniform testimony of the Spirit, the water, and the blood. It may be added, that all three, I believe, of these MSS. which contain the passage, omit the article before πατήρ, λόγος, and πν. ἅγ., which I venture to say is not even correct Greek, but just such phraseology as might come from an unlearned forger translating from the Latin. It was Erasmus who supplied the article to each of these words, with no other warrant than his own erudition: ======================================================================== CHAPTER 2: VOL 01 - ALL THEY THAT BE IN ASIA ======================================================================== All They That Be in Asia 2 Timothy 1:15.-Are these all the Asian saints absolutely, or are they only the few that had been at Rome, and had shown this cowardice towards St. Paul,-that they had failed to identify themselves with him, and his testimony and circumstances? Clearly the latter: and the way of speaking of them used by the apostle (οἱ ὲν τῇἈσίᾳ) is likely due to the fact that these Asian Christians were home again in Asia when Paul wrote to Timothy about their neglect of him when they were in Rome; and that Timothy, to whom he wrote, was then in Asia also. It is rather too wide a conclusion to come to, that all the Christians in Asia had turned away from Paul. The fickleness of the Galatians would warrant us in looking for a good deal of turning away from Paul in Asia;- but this passage gives no countenance to the incredible notion that the whole of the Asian saints had given up Paul. The fact of Phygellus and Hermogenes being mentioned as two of them, shows that they were only a few. And again, the praise of Onesiphorus (an Asian), in the same connection, for seeking him out very diligently and finding him, and not being ashamed of his chain, points pretty plainly to the circumstances of the apostle as the cause of their repudiation of him, and that the scene of their so doing had been Rome. He says in effect: The Asians all shunned me when here; but instead of being ashamed of me, or repudiating me, Onesiphorus sought me out with more than ordinary diligence, and found me. 2 Timothy 1:8 shows that this was the purport of the apostle’s meaning. "Be not thou there-, fore ashamed of the testimony of our. Lord, nor of me His prisoner; but be thou partaker of the afflictions of the gospel according to the power of God." ======================================================================== CHAPTER 3: VOL 01 - AS ORACLES OF GOD ======================================================================== As Oracles of God One is quite right in thinking that the apostle’s word goes far beyond speaking according to the Scriptures, for a man might say nothing but what was scriptural, and not speak ὡς λόγια Θεοῦ. The passage implies that one should only speak when one has the certainty of uttering what one believes to be the mind of God. If there is not this confidence, one ought to be silent. It may be an artless message, possibly like that of Peter and John, displaying the speaker to be humanly ignorant and unlearned, and yet just the mind of God, suitable to the present need. This is to speak as oracles of God. Another might speak a word true in itself, but applicable to wholly different circumstances, warning where comfort was needed, instruction where the Spirit was rather calling out communion, or vice versa. To speak thus is not to speak as oracles of God. Of course, there is the other and equally imperative obligation on the part of those who hear, of examining all by the word of God. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 4: VOL 01 - BAPTIZED FOR THE DEAD ======================================================================== Baptized for the Dead 1 Corinthians 15:29.-Same find great difficulty in understanding this scripture. But I rather see no reason for doubting that an old and common interpretation is the best, as it certainly flows from the obvious construction, and a very ordinary meaning of the words employed. After the positive revelation in verses 20-28, the apostle resumes his argument with εἰ ὅλως νεχροὶ οὺχ ὲγ which he had pressed in verse 16, with its consequences as to Christ, themselves, and the dead. Here the apostle repeats the phrase’ of that verse, in view, first, of those who take the place of those who were fallen asleep in Christ; and, secondly, of a lot in this life most miserable, if hope be there only. Compare 29 with 18 and 30 with 19. To enter the company of such, if the dead rise not, would be folly indeed. Every proper lexicon or grammar will show to those who may not be aware already, that brig has regularly and not infrequently the sense "in the place or stead of," which here, in my opinion, accords best with the previous context, the general reasoning, and the actual phraseology of this particular verse. Αὐτῶν is of course to be read at the end rather than Ti’41, VEZgE42 as having the largest support of the best authorities, MSS. versions and fathers. A. question might arise, as it has arisen, whether the first note of interrogation ought to follow βαπτ. or ἐγ. but the substantial sense remains the same. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 5: VOL 01 - CHOICE OF SCENE ======================================================================== Choice of Scene It is the difference of design, which, to me, solves the difficulty stated by one objector or another. Matthew and Mark, in the body of their Gospels, are occupied with the Lord’s sojourn and ministry in Galilee; Luke with not that only, but His gradual journey to Jerusalem (9: 51; 13: 22; 17: 11; 18: 31; six. 28); and John with His ways and words in or near Jerusalem itself yet more than elsewhere, though Galilee and Samaria were assuredly not left out. What Matthew describes is the accomplishment of Jewish prophecy and the witness of Jerusalem’s unbelief; while Mark’s dwelling on the same arose, I think, from the fact that Galilee was the actual scene of our Lord’s service, to which theme his Gospel is emphatically devoted. Luke, on the other hand, brings out the lingering of our Lord’s love and pity; His face is steadfastly set on the place where He should accomplish His decease; but His slow steps attest the reluctance and the sorrow with which He visits Jerusalem for the last time, and affords the crowning proof of man’s total ruin, in His blood and cross. John, finally, regards every place and being in the light of His personal Divine glory.. Jerusalem, therefore, is no longer, as in Matthew, styled " the holy city." He was the light, the true light; all outside, and everywhere else, was but darkness, and Jerusalem needed the Son of God as much as Galilee, and was no more to Him, in that point of view, than any other spot. He could, so far as Himself was concerned, freely speak and work there or anywhere. What was " this mountain," nay, what Jerusalem, to the Son of the Father? If there was nothing to attract, there was nothing in one sense which could repel. He who was full of grace and truth accepted His entire humiliation, and found objects on which to expend His love wherever He might move-in the boastful city of holiness no less than in the barren wilderness. It is the design impressed by God upon the several Gospels which thus simply explains a fact which is seen by, but useless to, him who denies that design. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 6: VOL 01 - CHRISTOLOGICAL PANTHEISM ======================================================================== Christological Pantheism THERE is a very grave question at issue now in the professing church of God, which branches out uniformly into many collateral points, all of which, though in different degrees, affect Christianity, that is, the true nature of Christianity itself. The root of the whole question, however, is, Where is the bond, the union, the living association between what is divine and men?* (*Union with God, spoken of by both Evangelicals and Ritualists, is a thing (save, of course, in the person of Christ) unknown to Scripture.) It takes the form of Popery or Romanism, Ritualism or Puseyism, so called, in the Episcopal body in England and in this country: the Stahl and Hengstenberg school in Lutheran Germany: and in what is called Mercersburg theology among the Dutch Reformed here.* (*America.) The last is allied to a new school in Germany, propagating actively its views on the Person of Christ; but all, however various the shades of theology, are essentially the same. They all hold union to take place in the incarnation, to be with humanity, not consequent on redemption of believers with a glorified Christ; and, without in words denying it, they put redemption entirely in the shade. Redemption, in their view, is not really accomplished by the atonement but by the incarnation. Their system of union developes itself in the life-giving power of sacraments; and in insisting on the importance and organic power and authority of the church: but meaning thereby the clergy. Where the German school has infected it, it introduces the organic and historic development of Christ’s life in the world, and that in all arts and sciences, a kind of Christological pantheism: in all cases, the mystical power of the clergy, and organism of the life-giving power of the sacraments, which the clergy alone can introduce into them, is its practical character. It slights the written word and the operation of the Spirit of God; and, while speaking much of historical development, carefully avoids historical facts, as well as Scriptural statements, and the direct authority of the word of God over the soul as from God Himself. That is, private interpretation, the church, the creed, the Ecumenical Council, in result, the clergy, are to be trusted. The church has developed the imperfect elements of Scripture; and theology (which is of course in the hands of the doctors, that is, themselves) is alone full and formal truth. It is remarkable how God is set aside in this system, and man, humanity, exalted and made everything of, even in Christ and His work, as far as His work is made of any account. I shall notice some details, but I shall take up the root-question as concerning every one, for it is a question of what Christianity is,-what the truth is. The consequences are deplorable and demoralizing wherever it prevails; but, without denying that there are pious persons and real Christians ensnared by it, I affirm that, as a system, it is a denial of the truth of Christianity, of Christianity itself in its foundation and vital truths, as revealing what man is, and bringing him savingly to God. I add these last words because the error, save in the German school of the system, is not in the objective part of Christianity (or no one could be a Christian who adopted it), but in the application of its efficacious power, and the way in which God has dealt with man. They do not deny that those who oppose their system believe in the Trinity; in the incarnation; in the true humanity of the Lord; in the atonement; in the union of the two natures in one person, in the blessed Lord: as I myself adoringly recognize all this: and the true value of the two ordinances established by the Lord, Baptism and the Lord’s Supper-both, (and especially the latter as a continuous thing in the Christian’s life), precious to his soul. I may add the exercise of ministry as given and appointed by Christ. These are not the questions at issue; at least I have nothing now to do with those who call them in question. For me, as to all the first truths, there is no Christianity without them, nor orderly Christianity without the latter. The question is, Where is the point of contact between God and man, these things being true? But I go farther in what may be considered agreement with the school of error. I do not deny, but assert and affirm strongly, that the Lord established a church, that is, an assembly on earth; which, in one point of view, is His body, formed by the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven; and which, in another character, is the habitation of God on earth by the Spirit (not the clergy; they are in no sense the church), this, (and the word means nothing else,) is the assembly. But, though individual relationship with God is always put in the first place by the word of God (relationship with the Father, in grace and Christ, the First-born among many brethren, and in responsibility conscience and faith are uniformly individual); yet God did establish an assembly on earth, designated as " the body of Christ," and as "the habitation of God by the Spirit." Further, the Lord instituted two great ordinances in connection with it -Baptism and the Supper of the Lord. He established also a ministry in gifts given by Himself from on high-evangelists, pastors, and teachers, as He founded it by apostles and prophets, besides its being compacted by that which every joint supplies, so that it should, in the edification of itself, increase with the increase of God. All this is plainly stated in the word of God itself. No history is needed to give it authority or validity. The particular views of Rome, of Dr. Pusey, or of Dr. Nevin, about these things, are another question. They are not inspired; the word of God is. But I go farther still. The person of the blessed Lord is the center of all Christian affections and all Christian truth for the believer (and God has given us eternal life in Him-" He that hath the Son hath life"); as, in God’s time, all things will be headed up in Him in heaven and in earth. This is supremely dear to the believer’s heart. But how and where are men brought into living association with Him? All those to whom I refer say, in the incarnation and the sacraments. That life is and was in His person is most true. His person is the foundation of everything; but where are we brought into association with Him? The formulary among the Episcopalian Ritualists was, the sacraments are a continuation or extension of the incarnation. German, and American theology borrowed from the Germans, has added a principle of historical development before as well as after the incarnation, which the soberer Episcopalians have not adopted, as far as I am aware, but confine themselves to the continuation of the incarnation of the Son of God by the sacraments in the Church, and have not followed the reveries of the Germans; but the doctrine, as far as the truth I am occupied with is concerned, is the same. The atonement loses all its importance as a redeeming work; at-one-ment, as Irving said, and they say, was in the Word being made flesh and receiving ’humanity in His own person. Our connection with God is restored by incarnation. Many grave errors flow from this as to justification and the like; but I confine myself to the root of the matter. Thus it is stated in this country:* (*America.) "The Son of God.... assumed humanity and became the universal man, standing related to the race as redeemed in Him, as the first Adam stood related to the race as fallen in Him. The humanity of the one is as broad, as universal, and comprehensive, as the humanity of the other." " The very assumption of that nature, in its sinless perfection, was itself the redemption of humanity. In Him humanity stands redeemed already, as the source and fountain of the new race which proceeds from Him." "The church becomes, accordingly, an object of faith, inasmuch as it is a continuation of the mystery of the incarnation." " The sacrament of baptism is the divinely instituted means by which, ordinarily, the life-communication takes place." How far this goes in the hands of the followers of the Germans, and how it lowers redemption to what is human, may be seen in what follows:-" He, taking upon Himself our nature, not simply as an individual, to stand forth as one in the teeming race of Adam... but grasping the very foundation of our human existence, appropriates it to Himself as the generic force and life of our race; not a man, but the man. The second Adam, like unto the first, as the bearer of the totality of our humanity, comprehending in His person the whole of our human life." Now that He was " the last (not second) Adam" is all right, and that He took all that constitutes a man is all true, but this means a vast deal more. " For man is man, in the proper sense of the term, only as his life reveals itself in the outward forms of the institutions and relations in which it becomes actual in the world. The family, the state, learning in all its departments, the arts, the sciences, and all monuments besides of the activity of the human soul, stand not apart from, but are truly comprehended in, the constitution of our human life. These departments, if we may so call them, and all others besides, comprehended thus in the wonderful constitution of our humanity, must come at last to a vital union with the divine. Failure in this is failure equally deep and disastrous in the purpose of its being; it is death. But to attain to this is to attain to life and immortality! It was in this comprehensive sense that the Logos apprehended our nature, and took it into union with His divinity. These are the all things on earth’ which the divine will would gather up in Christ, even in Him, of which St. Paul speaks." I give this long quotation to show how entirely man, as in and for this world, is in the mind of those degraded, for such it is, by this system. Not a trace of spiritual blessing in heavenly places in Christ, to say nothing of God Himself, communion with the Father and the Son. It is bringing Christ and the effect of His incarnation to the sphere of the mere natural man; indeed this is stated in terms. Again: " Moreover, we must bear in mind that the humanity of Christ is, and must necessarily be, co-extensive with Adam’s. Its remedial powers must be commensurate with the ruins of the fall, and reveal themselves wherever these effects are to be found. We look, therefore, for their regenerating and sanctifying potencies in every department of human life. The family, the state, our social relations in all their phases, art, science, learning, and all the outward revelations of human powers, are gathered up in this supernatural constitution," etc. " There all things in earth were gathered up and completed in the person of Christ, and the mission of the church on earth is to carry forward this germinal realization to an actual development in the world." Christ come in the flesh in this world, the incarnation prolonged (to speak with them) in the church, has its object in this world to take up human development in what are man’s natural faculties. This is " the meaning and design of the incarnation of our Lord, and the constitution and powers of His holy body, the church." Of a citizenship in heaven, or affections on things above, not on things on the earth;-not a trace, save the denial of it. I add another short quotation to show it is systematic teaching, not merely individual opinion. " The gospel is emphatically a world-saving power. It enters into the life of the world in an organic way... the scheme that says, There can be no real marriage of divine and human powers, of the life of Christ with the life of the race, in an abiding, historical, sacramental union, and continuing in the world in such a way as to carry forward society in a living process of life and growth in knowledge, and in faith, and in hope, and in charity, and in all that belongs to the existence of an emancipated and regenerated humanity’... is not only unreal and unhistorical, but it seems to run directly in the face of the plainest teachings of the word of God. This teaches that God is in Christ, and that Christ is the life of the world," etc. This writer, indeed, though making God create the world by His omnipotence, yet, as to its present form, whether accomplished in six days or six long geological periods, tells us that " all nature was made to rise, by an inherent law and tendency, from one gradation of development to another, under the molding generic power of the Almighty, until, finally, the whole culminated in the creation of man," which is little less than Darwinianism, and the progress from atomic cellules by " an inherent law and tendency." But we must now see the introduction of this life in Christ. " Christological theology must be historical"... "His (Christ’s) deepest, truest, and most real coming through the Old Testament is a coming in flesh and blood, a coming in and through generations, a coming in history; not in the events of history merely, but in that human life in which lay and from which operated the life of history. Yea, more, if we acknowledge, as all Christian historians do, that the incarnation is premeditated in heathenism, we are in like manner impelled to escape the subtle deception into which the mind so naturally falls, that this same prevening heathen history could have such a relation to the incarnation, if the eternal Logos had not such an aptitude for the human as that His own life should also be in some kind of underlying and underacting communion with the life of whose activities this heathen prophetic history is the creation and the result. If such be the relation of the life of the Logos to human life and history, previous to His actual incarnation, how infinitely deeper and more certain must be that relation after He has actually entered the human in a personal way-, and so joined His own divine-human life with the life and history of the race! Let us not deceive our own minds by separating history from life. Christian history, the history of Christianity, is the coming of Christ," etc. " Thus Christ came in humanity as its genuine principle of life, before He was actually incarnate in the fullness of time. But the mystery was not completed in this pervenient union of His with humanity." Now, that the Son quickened souls, from Adam onwards, no Christian, I suppose, would deny. That in God we live, move, and have our being, so that we are, in a certain sense, His offspring, we know is Scriptural truth. But this is vastly more. It is in heathenism, as such, communion with divine life in Christ. The whole of this argument (and here the theologians run completely into the same channel both here and in Europe, with a large class of Germans whose system is infidel) confounds the wants and cravings of a being created for God, when they have Him not, with the answer that grace gives to those cravings in Christ: a very grave blunder. But I must pursue my subject. To notice all their errors would be endless. It is the antiscriptural, antichristian character of the system, as a whole, which occupies me. " That His saving life exerts its redeeming and restoring power in humanity," and " that the person of the God-man, which is constituted by the real and true union of the divine and human, is the ultimate generic principle of redemption, the generic head of the new humanity." "He was the principle of that hereditary blessing which laid hold of human life generally." Now, it is perfectly clear that in the counsels and wisdom of God before the worlds (Proverbs 8:1-36), His delight (Christ’s, as wisdom) was in the sons of men. His incarnation, as celebrated by angels, was the expression of good pleasure in men (Luke 2:1-52) They were the race of His predilection, and it was in Christ, the Word made flesh, that this was to be accomplished. But our theologians use this truth as a basis to their own speculations. Adam was only a candidate for the grace of life,* to be enjoyed only in the event of his "predetermination admitting him into the wonderfully mysterious sacrament of the tree of life." (*This is really the foundation of annihilationism. Would he have died if he had not eaten of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil?) It is " not, and never was, designed by the Creator that man should have life in himself, but only as he stood in vital union with His own being as the absolute ground and source of all life. To be out of and separated from God is to be dead, to be in union with Him is to have life." Note well: this denies the immortality of the soul, and confounds permanent life with the divine life as possessed in Christ. Either Adam, as created, had not life in himself by creation, or he was united with God already, and fell when he was. Nay, the very devils could not exist. It is a theory involving ten thousand absurdities and heresies, at once confounding death and separation from God; spiritual death with dying as a creature, and life, as existence, with divine life in communion with God. As to union with God, though used by many Christians, save as regards the person of Christ it is a wholly false and unscriptural idea; it is always with Christ become a man, and risen from the dead, that we have union. But I continue: "In what form the reunion of the human and divine would have taken place, had not sin entered into the world, it is not necessary for us here to inquire. It is enough to know that it would have taken place.... There was no miscalculation in the divine reckonings which the presence of sin for the first time revealed." However, sin came in; but "the union of the human and divine was originally involved in the plan of creation, as its ultimate design and end; in this union as it holds in the person of Jesus Christ, do we find the revelation of God’s will touching this precise interest." "The appearance of sin as a. disturbing force, growing out of man’s free self-determining power, was confronted immediately by this very resource for its effectual overthrow." It is not thus denied that Christ’s going down to death, and meeting the penalty of the law, was needed; as He took humanity, He took it as it was, subject to its penalties, and consequently died on the cross. But "though finding in sin a fresh call for the incarnation, yet this determined not the fact, but only the form under which it should hold." "The archetypal conception in the divine mind, overthrown by the fraud and malice of Satan in the first Adam, we find in this second Adam in the complete elimination of all the abnormal forces, carried along in the bosom of humanity, not only restored and realized, but perfected and advanced." This is in Christ incarnate down here. He " exhibited what, from the start, lay really and truly in the normal sense of humanity." Nay, even "the church, it fully appears, was no necessity of the fall. It existed anterior to the accident of sin; and, had the fall never occurred, would have continued, though not under the subsequent form of mediatorial offices and propitiatory agencies, but as a divine instrumentality, answering man’s normal development. It sprang necessarily out of our moral constitution and our relation to God as the subjects of His moral government." " True to this law of his own moral being, he would have been advanced, without bodily decay and decomposition, to a state of full glorification, but only through the appearance, ultimately, of the Logos incarnate." Thus sin was an accident, impotent, as is said elsewhere, to hinder the course of God’s purposes, foreseen indeed of God; and redemption by blood itself, an accident, a provision, a " change of procedure," "a subsequent form," dependent on this accident. " But it will be borne in mind that Christ was not a new humanity, a creation de novo; His was Adam’s humanity as under the power of the curse." " In its commencement it was human nature, the same as that of His virgin mother, and therefore fallen." It is added indeed, " From the moment of the holy conception sin was eliminated." But this is not the doctrine of their leading theologian, and in a discourse published by the request of the Synod he holds that "on the divine side, that which was divine was mediated by the Divine Spirit, and so found pure generical beginning in fallen and depraved human nature. In this bosom of the abnormal human the divine gradually assumed the normal human, by a steady victory over corrupt human nature in the womb, forward to the birth of the Holy Child." " So on through life, it is fully and naturally human. Though as human He is tempted, truly and really tempted, He is always victorious over defect and corruption of that nature." Under the law "which He has assumed, and which ever presses upon and vitally touches His pure life at every point, thus presenting to the world the picture... of a sinless man. Thus in His own personal human nature He obtained, first of all, a complete victory over that abnormal humanity with which He had formed a union, presenting it fully restored to its normal purity, in His own person, especially exhausting and overcoming at every point the, virus of sin and death, till He came forth from the grave victorious over its last power and penalty, and glorified human nature in the heavens. All this was one continuous silently-working, steady, victorious miracle, going forward in His own person, a victory of sinlessness overcoming depravity by the process of His divine human life in the womb. Though made of this woman... He was still made under the law, that is, His human nature had to be purely developed out of the bosom of an impure humanity." (See Romans 8:2; 2 Corinthians 13:4.) I add the quotations to show that they carry the principle on to the cross.* (*Note the absurdity of the system, a divine-human life which was sinless, overcoming depravity in an impure humanity. So He had two humanities in the womb, besides what was divine. How thoroughly mentally degrading the system is!) This is pure Irvingism. A sinless effect was produced, but by His being victorious over an evil nature within: where defect and corruption existed, He restored it to purity, but it was with corrupt abnormal humanity He had formed a union and had to overcome the virus of sin. Where was it? " This victory was first in Himself, that it might be also for us. It had to take place in Him, because He is the principle and fountain of life to all. ’For their sakes I sanctify myself, that they also might be sanctified through the truth.’ Let these great words be understood." They are wholly misunderstood. They were spoken when He was going to His Father (John 17:1-26), as He says in the passage, " Now, I am no more in the world." He was setting Himself apart as the glorified Man in heaven; not what He had been doing all His life. He knew no sin. It was a "holy thing" that was born of the Virgin Mary. So, to the same purpose, is quoted by them, " He learned obedience," and " being made perfect" " As His own divine human life thus sanctified and perfected" (think of a divine life needing sanctification!) " was to become the restoring and perfecting life of humanity, it had to extend beyond Himself, that it might begin and carry forward to a like victory fallen and depraved human nature in others." " But it must lay hold also on the fallen world beyond man." " And all the particular miracles wrought by Him are only individual manifestations of that same divine human miracle life." " The miracle is supernatural because its force is the life of a higher world." Consequently, dividing the Red Sea and the Jordan was no miracle, nor the earth opening and swallowing up Dathan and Abiram. Christ’s divine works were miracles of good: but the definition is as false as the doctrine is. I do not go into all this system, fully developed as it is in. Europe, and borrowed here. " Human nature in its creation free from all sin... was not yet perfect, but awaited process in order to become perfect. How much more was such a process of development, not only possible, but also necessary, in the fallen humanity which. the Son of God assumed." " We assent here, with Lange, that the very idea of temptation implies the possibility of sinning." " His triumph over the temptation of the devil was a personal victory, a step in the process of His own perfecting of Himself, as well as for the benefit of His people." " This view is required by the nature of Christ’s human will." It is then said, " if the human in the person of Christ had been compelled by an overshadowing power to will as it did." But this flows from their idea that the corruption and " virus of sin," of a fallen abnormal nature was there. The non-possibility of sinning did not even arise from a compelling power, for then, without that. power, He might. It would not have been the holiness of His nature, but from the intrinsic rightness of Christ’s will, in His holy person, as a man. Their darkened understandings have not been able to distinguish between morally impossible, and here absolutely so, and impossibility by compulsion; because they have a false unholy Christ. The Christ of God had no inclination to sin. His will was only to obey: and He was led of the Spirit to he tempted. As regards the sympathy of the Lord, on the ground of which His liability to inward temptations, and even His peccability, is insisted on, it fails altogether. For the sorrow and discouragement of sincere souls do not come from the existence of sin in the flesh, but much more from their yielding to it. Now, if they are to get sympathy here by Christ being in the same state, He must have failed. But then all is lost. And if not, the whole argument is proved false on its very base. Such persons do not know what true deliverance is. Nor do I ask for sympathy for sin, but the word to judge it, and deliverance from its power by redemption and the Holy Ghost, in the knowledge that I have no strength. The advocacy of Christ to restore communion if we do fail, when we are free from the law of sin and death, is founded on righteousness and propitiation. But as I am on this point, I add, they have no true Christ at all. I read, " How such human nature, as body, soul, and spirit, including a human will, could be held in personal union with the divine, so that this humanity was complete, without a human personality or ego, we cannot understand, but we believe it is a mystery revealed for faith." Where? Why does the blessed Lord say, " Not my will but Thine?" Why does He say, " My God, my God, why hast Thou forsaken me?" if there was no ego, no human personality? Why do the Hebrews quote, " will I sing praise," and " will put my trust in Him," " behold I and the children which God hath given me," if there was no I (ego)? Why does He say, "My God and your God, my Father and your Father" (not our), if there was no personality?* (*I am quite aware of and accept the ordinary orthodox statement of two natures in one person, though what was at first insisted on as orthodox as to biro ὑποστασις was afterward condemned, and the meaning of the word changed; but the statements quoted in the text are really monothelite. It shows the danger of those early discussions, for the simple faith that Jesus was God and man in one person can be easily accepted as plain and vital truth; but the moment you deny personality in the man Christ Jesus you run into a thousand difficulties and errors. What is really denied is Christ’s individuality as a man, as it is in terms elsewhere.) And this last remark, that Christ never says "our" with His disciples, I borrow from a European minister of some note, thoroughly imbued with the German system, where it is at home, not borrowed, and itself spoiled, as it is at Mercersburg. And this last statement, that Christ had no human personality, no ego, which is really heresy (though God and man were united in one person), and the mere folly of man attempting to fathom the mystery of His person, when He has said, "No man knoweth the Son, but the Father," is found in the Article of one by no means the worst of their doctors. His antecedent respect for the blessed Lord has not been destroyed, as in others of them. But all hold it was corrupt fallen human nature which He took and had; not that He took human nature from a fallen mother, but without sin, miraculously, by the power of the Holy Ghost. But he is the least bad on this point. But my object here is to bring the system fully into the light. Hence I quote several passages to show it is the system, not individual opinion. Thus another says to us, The temptability of Christ grew out of His peccability; His peccability out of the realness of the human side of His being. What is less than infinite is temptable and peccable. Christ’s humanity was less than infinite; therefore His humanity might have been overthrown." And that, note, united in one person to Godhead, without there being even an I, or human personality - a word wrongly used really-in His human nature! Was ever such folly and confusion? God united to fallen humanity, with defect and corruption and the virus of sin in it My hand revolts at writing such blasphemous absurdities. This taking the fallen human nature, the ultimate generic principle of redemption, " accounts for the striking analogy between the birth of the God-man* and the new birth of every human soul that is now born from Him. Both alike are a birth to a true and pure human life, out of a fallen and defiled humanity, by the operation of the Holy Ghost." (*Strange to say, this expression was utterly condemned as heresy in the early ages.) " This birth is vouchsafed to as many as receive Him." This last gross misapplication (indeed false sense) of John 1:12 I quote, as connecting itself with the subsequent teaching as to baptism. I add another here, to show the strange heretical confusion of those teachers: " If therefore we say that in baptism a real immanence of the nature of Christ and of human nature, a mysterious oneness of His holy essence and the sinful essence of man, is brought about, we also hold fast to the idea that this is not to be regarded as an immanence finished and immediate, but one endless beginning." Think of one endless beginning, of a oneness of Christ’s holy essence and the sinful essence of man! Is this endless oneness(!) of holy essence and sinful essence a moral oneness, or what? We have thus the Lord’s incarnation, the point where (they say) He connects Himself with human nature; not merely per sonally, or rather not personally (so they expressly say), but in nature as the new head of the race (He is not a man, not a human personality, but) with humanity, and that fallen humanity the new head of the race. This is continued in men by a new birth, the continuation of this divine human life, and this last not by the word, but by baptism, through which there is a mysterious oneness of His holy and man’s sinful essence, and this forms the body of Christ I must give some quotations to make the last point evident. The general statement is thus: " The Spirit in Christ, the Spirit having entered into the apostles in the mystery of Pentecost extraordinarily, the Spirit, by their divinely appointed ministrations, through holy baptism." Thus it grows into a holy temple. " The life of Christ infuses itself through the foundation and the entire organism of this life-building." Further, preaching presents the claims to us: " This preaching is the means by which the quickening energy of the Spirit opens the blinded eye of faith to an apprehension of the sinner’s estate as dead, and the spiritual discernment of the kingdom of life, as the power of deliverance from this ruin. Now, this faith is the organ of the human spirit by which the objective supernatural order is discerned, and its participation is made possible. But this subjective power of discernment and receptivity is by no means one with an actual entrance into it and a participation in its life. It is only the qualification and ability so to do." " But unless the human activity is met by a curative response on the part of Christ, the soul still remains under the power of death" (only it has got its eyes opened). " The office of the apostle, preparatory preaching, is then simply to effect the preparation on the part of the sinful subject for the reception of the communication of grace. The meeting of the human and divine activities we have in the sacrament of baptism." "The question now is by which of these means specifically does God design to effect this wondrous work; by the word or by the sacraments? Not by the word, that is, as we have defined it, the preaching of the gospel, and for this plain reason: preaching is directed to the mind or intellect, the moving of the affections and of the will is not reaching the life-center of the being; the intellect or mind is not the life of man; all the thinking, feeling, or willing that one can do, though assisted in their acts by a divine power, cannot of themselves make a man a new creature in Christ Jesus. This inward radical divine work must be accomplished, therefore, by the only other means-the sacraments.... Baptism is the ordinance of this mysterious union.... Holy baptism is the means of grace whereby the Holy Spirit ingrafts, for the first time in any substantial sense, the believer into Christ, and thus brings him into a state of salvation." I continue: " In that Christ as the unseen Head stands in an inward indisputable relation to the church as His mystical body-i.e., that total organization of souls which has its point of personal unity in Him, receives the power of life from Him through it, renews and animates itself, and the members themselves are all its organs-He, by means of baptism causes this universal organic relation to become effectual in each single new point of life which He appropriates to Himself and His Kingdom. As He continues His life through the church as a whole, so He also continues it through this particular mode of individual life, and therefore makes Himself the true beginning of life to it." But, faith being necessary, as they hold, "The child stands on the warm bosom of the faith of the church, which, through its parents or sponsors, is pledged in its behalf." " Neither can we say that the word is the specific means of grace, whereby men are ingrafted into Christ. The word, as preached by the apostles, was a call to Christ. This was its object, to turn the attention of men to Him, as the true Messiah, the Son of God, the Savior of the world. When they were ready to receive Him, they were baptized into Him, and thus made members of Him." " Christian baptism then, we think the Scriptures teach, is the sacrament of our incorporation into Christ." " The word has to do with truth; the sacrament with life. The one operates upon the intellect and affections; the other upon the center of the being. By the word men are brought mentally and morally into contact with Christ; by the sacrament into actual life contact." " The theology then we speak of is churchly. It believes in the church... in the bosom of which only, not on the outside of it, the gospel can be expected to work, as the wisdom of God and the power of God unto salvation. So far as this goes, of course, it owns and confesses that the church is a medium of communication between Christ and His people." (His people, then, are not the church!) "They must be in the order of His grace, in the sphere where this objective working of His grace is actually going forward, and not in the order of nature, where it is not going forward at all (but where Satan reigns and has his own way), if the work of redemption and sanctification is to be carried forward in them with full effect. In this sense, most assuredly, salvation is of the church, and not of the world," etc. Now that, as a general truth, sanctification is to be looked for in the church, not in the world, is all true enough. But the gospel, they say, cannot work outside of it; the poor heathen are in a bad way, and redemption is carrying on, and that only inside it. Salvation is not of the world, assuredly, but it is to the world, and could never have been, had it not come to it as such; nor could the church otherwise have existed. The grace of God brings salvation-where? to those already within, or without, to bring them in? There are some points I shall touch on just in detail; but I assert now that the whole of this system is totally antichristian and antiscriptural: " Christ incarnate is the point of union, and His divine-human life is continued by baptism; the word is not the means of communicating it; baptism incorporates into Christ; the accident of sin produced a change of procedure (that is all): man was to be perfected in Christ at any rate." All this is false; Scripture, as to the main points, teaches precisely the contrary: and God’s glory is wholly, totally left out in a most extraordinary way. Human perfection is the only thought. Now, that it was in the wondrous counsels of God to have man in the same glory as His Son, is, however wonderful, blessedly true. That Christ is life, our life who believe, is equally so. The question is where and how life in this system, not death, is the means of redemption. "His saving life exerts its redeeming and restoring power in humanity, not by becoming an individual man among men, and then operating on the general life of humanity, but by entering into it; and this entering is by birth, so that the new creation of human nature in its organic being falls together and co-ordinate with natural human birth. The reheading of humanity is thus effected in its very beginning by the union of the divine-human life "-(two human lives again in Christ)-"with human life in a human birth, even as man’s first creation was completed by the conjunction of the breath of God with the human lifeless form, when God made man a living soul by breathing into him the breath of life. From all this we cannot but see that the person of the God-man, which is constituted by the real and true union of the divine and human, is the ultimate generic principle of redemption." Humanity (in its nature) is redeemed by incarnation; and this is carried on by baptism I Now, all this is definitely contrary to the revelation of God; and, in that sense, a denial of Christianity. It is true that conformity to the image of God’s Son is the portion of God’s saints; true that God’s delight was in the sons of men before the world, and that the Lord did not take up angels but the seed of Abraham; true that the incarnation was the expression of good pleasure in men; true, not that the human-divine life of Christ was the generic source of the race before the incarnation, but that the Son quickened souls from Adam onwards; true that He is now the life of all believers; and the Head of His body, the church. But reunion with Christ, connection with Him, is with a glorified Christ, and with a glorified Christ alone, after He had accomplished redemption. As the first Adam sinned and was cast out before he began to be the head of the race so the perfect and divine ground of righteousness was laid and complete before Christ, as man, became head of a new race as man.. It is with a glorified Christ that the. church is united, and with no other. There are many errors and heresies in the system; but, if this be so, the whole system is fundamentally false. It is a false Christianity, "another (a different)’ gospel, which is not another," for another there cannot be. Death and redemption must conic in before we can be united to Christ. What Scripture shows us is the counsels of God before the world, for uniting us in grace to Christ in glory; then God not beginning with that, but with the responsible man, Adam. When he had failed, and, fully tested, was found an enemy of God, there came the, second Man, the Lord, to seek and to save what -was lost; and, when He (having glorified God as made sin) had accomplished redemption in His death, to unite us with Himself as gone on high. Man failed in innocence: failed under the law: killed the prophets sent in mercy: and, then, God said, "I have yet one Son; it may be they will reverence my Son." "But they cast Him out of the vineyard and slew Him." There was lawlessness without law: transgression under law: and, when God came in grace, absolute enmity against Him. The Son had quickened whom He would, no doubt, all along; and their sins were forgiven through His blood: but man, as such, was, then, fully and finally proved enmity against God. Flesh was not subject to the law of God, nor could be; and they that are in the flesh cannot please God. Not only was man driven out from God’s paradise on earth, as a sinner; but he had, as far as he could do so, driven God out when He came in grace into this world. " If I had’ not come and spoken unto them, they had not had sin; but now they have no cloak for their sin. If I had not done among them the works which none other man did, they had not had sin; but now they have both seen and hated both Me and My Father." Such was man, guilty in fact, and lost in estate. Redemption was needed: not merely a communication of life: not redemption by a mystical communication of life-a thing totally unknown to Scripture; but redemption through Christ’s blood, propitiation: not the folly of " oneness of a holy essence and a sinful essence:" but to be born anew, wholly "created in Christ Jesus;" being redeemed out of the state he was in, and associated with the Redeemer, but only when the redemption was accomplished. Christ the Lord came, as Son of God, and King of Israel, according to the second Psalm; a minister of the circumcision, to fulfill the promises made to the fathers; but the kings of the earth stood up, and the rulers took counsel together against Jehovah and against His anointed. He was the despised and rejected of men. He came into the world: and the world was made by Him: and the world knew Him not. He came unto His own: and His own received Him not. Those who did receive Him were born, not of the will of man, but of God. Still His title was good. He was also Son of man. But when was He to take this? When rejected, God gave witness to Him, as Son of God in raising Lazarus, as Son of David in riding in on the ass. One title yet remained; when was He to take that up and have others connected with Him? The Greeks came up desiring to see Jesus: "The hour is come," He says, "that the Son of Man should be glorified. Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it ABIDETH ALONE; but if it die it bringeth forth much fruit" (John 12:1-50) The Son of man must die, that others might be associated with Him. Without that, He abode alone. Hence it was, that, when He had given full testimony, He charged His disciples strictly to tell no man that He was the Christ; saying, " The Son of man must suffer many things, and be rejected, and put to death, and rise again the third day." Hence, as in the former passage, in John 12:1-50, His soul was troubled, and He said, " Father, save me from this hour, but for this cause came I to this hour; Father, glorify Thy name;" and then, " I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me." It was a dying Savior that was this point of gathering; one rejected by man, but, by sovereign grace, therein a Savior. He rises again, and is glorified to be in the place where He connects man with Himself; so that ’ He that sanctifieth and they that are sanctified are all of one, for which cause He is not ashamed to call them brethren." And if He was made a little lower than the angels, why so?-" For the suffering of death, that He, by the grace of God, might taste death for every man" (or "thing"). And then we read, " It became Him for whom are all things, and by whom are all things, in bringing many sons to glory, to make the captain of their salvation perfect through suffering." It was not by incarnation He sanctified any one. " By the which will we are sanctified, by the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all." And now see another aspect of it, the glory of God and of the Son of man Himself. It became God, in bringing many sons to glory, to make the captain of their salvation perfect through suffering. These doctors only see man, humanity, aptitude for humanity: God and His glory have no place in their system. They quote the passage, " The life was the light of men." Let me finish the sentence for them, which they do not: "And the light shineth in darkness, and the darkness comprehended it not." Rejection, and increased guilt, and proof of sin, was the only fruit in man of incarnation taken by itself. It was condemnation, not life, to others, " for this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil." When the blessed Lord, being in the form of God, made Himself of no reputation, and took upon Him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men, was it there His blessed career of grace stopped? No! " Being found in fashion as a man, He humbled Himself and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross; WHEREFORE also God hath highly exalted Him, and given Him a name above every name, that at the name of Jesus everyknee should bow" (Philip. 2.) Here it is He takes the place of head of the new creation. In John 13:1-38, as soon as Judas went out to betray Him, the Lord says, Now is the Son of man glorified, and. God is glorified in Him; and if God be glorified in. Him, God shall also glorify Him in Himself, and shall straightway glorify Him;" and He has, as man, been exalted into the glory of God. So, in John 17:1-26, " I have finished the work which Thou gavest me to do; and now, Father, glorify Thou Me with Thine own self, with the glory I had with Thee before the world was." And it is as thus perfected in glory that He has become " the author of eternal salvation to all them that obey Him." But God was glorified in Him also. All good and evil came to an issue on the cross, and there only perfectly. There was man’s absolute evil enmity against God come into the world in goodness, power in grace that removed every evil brought in by sin, even to death; but, as that displayed God’s presence, it drew out man’s enmity. The sin was not healed by it, but made fully manifest in its absolute character. They killed the Prince of Life. There the complete power of Satan over men was manifested and exercised,-the prince of this world came. There the perfection of man in Christ; the prince of this world had nothing in Him; but there was perfect love to the Father, and perfect obedience displayed by Him. Perfect righteousness against sin, in God, was displayed as nowhere else; but perfect love to the sinner. Nor could these both have been manifested together in any other way. Cutting off men might be righteous, but no love; sparing them all without atonement, held to be love, but no righteousness; nor would destroying them all be God’s glory but defeat and failure. But through Christ’s death God’s majesty, what became Him, His righteousness, His infinite love and truth -all have been glorified, and the foundation of the new heavens and new earth wherein dwelleth righteousness, laid in Christ’s appearing, in the consummation of ages, to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself. " Through the eternal Spirit He offered Himself without spot to God " (Hebrews 9:1-28) All this we are to believe is through the accident of sin, which changed the mode of procedure, humanity being the end of all! But if the Prince of this world was cast out by this wondrous work, then was the judgment of this world. Where then, in all this, was reconciliation? The incarnate Word, the Son of God, was rejected. The premediating heathen, in whom Christ’s life was germinally and prophetically, as they tell us, were-the apostle tells us (Ephesians 2:1-22)-without Christ, strangers to the covenants of promise, and without God in the world, given up in judgment to a reprobate mind (Romans 1:1-32), because they did not like to retain God in their knowledge, by nature children of wrath, walking according to the course of this world, according to the prince of the power of the air. And how reconciled-or where redemption? In incarnation, and the uniting the divine life in Christ with fallen humanity? Not at all. " And you, who were alienated and enemies in your minds by wicked works, yet now hath He reconciled in the body of His flesh through death" (Colossians 1:1-29) " God was in Christ reconciling" -not He had by incarnation done so. The world would not have Him in that character. He was occupied with that work, but totally rejected. Satan was the prince of this world, and the world came under judgment. The wrath of God was revealed: and then, Christ having died, the work was committed to His ambassadors. There was no link formed by Christ Jesus with other men by His incarnation. Preparation was made for it: but it issued in the judgment of this world. If we look to life and union in the church, the body of Christ, its fullest and highest character; is it in incarnation, or with a glorified Savior, and (for us) by a new creation? No union till He is glorified! " What is the exceeding greatness of His power to usward who believe, according to the working of His mighty power, which He wrought in Christ, when He raised Him from the dead, and set Him at His own right hand in heavenly places, etc., and gave Him to be head over all things to the church, which is His body, the fullness of Him that filleth all in all." He is not in the place of head till He is glorified. And, when we were dead in sins, God hath quickened us together with Christ, and raised us up together, and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ. We are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works. If any man be in Christ, it is a new creation: " old things are passed away, all things are become new." Therefore the apostle knew no man after the flesh; yea, though he had known Christ after the flesh, yet now henceforth he knew Him no more. Christ had come as the Messiah of the Jews, as the crown, if He had been received, of humanity; but as such He had been rejected, and now it was only through redemption by blood, and as a glorified Christ, that man could have connection with Him. Does Peter, who enters less into the counsels of God than Paul, take a different ground from this? No; " we are begotten again to a lively hope by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead." Is redemption otherwise than by blood? " We are redeemed, not with corruptible things, as silver and gold, but with the precious blood of Christ; " and we " by him do believe in God who raised Him up from the dead and gave Him glory, that our faith and hope might be in God." It is by His stripes we are healed, and if He be our life, it is as risen. In Col. as in Eph., when we were dead in sins He hath quickened us together with him: He suffered, the just for the unjust, that He might bring us to God. Hence in John also (chap. 6.), where He speaks of the bread come down from heaven, He takes care to add, " If ye eat not the flesh of the Son of man, and drink His blood, ye have no life in you." They tell us that God has gathered together all things in Christ. Scripture does not say so; but that God has made known to us the mystery of His will, that in the dispensation of the fullness of times He will do so, in whom (Christ) we have received an inheritance, and that we are sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise, which is the earnest of our inheritance, till the redemption of the purchased possession to the praise of His glory (Ephesians 1:1-23) So, in Romans, we are heirs of God and joint heirs with Christ, if so be we suffer with Him that we may be glorified together. Not only so, but we are assured that all things are not put under Christ now (Hebrews 2:1-18), but He is crowned with glory and honor, according to Psalms 8:1-9, and He is sitting, not on His own throne yet, but on His Father’s, expecting, at the right hand of the Majesty in the heavens, till His enemies be made His footstool. So Peter: The prophets, searching their own prophecies, found it was not to themselves but to us they did minister the things which are now reported to you, by them that have preached the gospel to you with the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven; and we are to be sober and hope to the end. God will head-up all things in heaven and in earth in Christ, but, though He was incarnate that it might be so, incarnation did not put Him in this place. Though all power is given Him in heaven and in earth, He is not in this headship yet. His incarnation brought Him into universal rejection: man saw no beauty in Him to desire Him; it was the time of His rejection, not of every knee bowing to Him, nor is that time come yet. Now He sits on the right hand of God expecting. These doctors make it a sanctifying of arts, sciences, etc., on earth, by penetrating life. The Scriptures make it a bearing of the cross now, separate from the world; a suffering with Him, and then a glorious Christ, under whom are reconciled all things in heaven and in earth, as reigning in glory: and that we only are reconciled now by His death, and He expecting till His enemies are made His footstool; and always (εἰς τὸ διηνεχές), now, and, till then, sitting at the right hand of God, while His joint-heirs are being gathered. Through death He has glorified God, through death destroyed him that had the power of death, that is, the devil. It is the travail of His soul that He is Himself to see. Through death He has reconciled us to God; redemption is through His blood. It is as glorifying God on the cross that He is glorified by God; it is by His blood He has redeemed out of every nation: hereby know we love, in that He laid down His life for us; He came to give His life a ransom fog many. There He was made sin for us, who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him (2 Corinthians 5:1-21) His incarnation drew out the enmity: by the cross He reconciled Jew and Gentile in one body, making peace. What He had seen and heard, that He testified, and no man received His testimony. When He came, there was no man; when He called, there was none to answer. He spoke that He knew, and He testified that He had seen, and they received not His witness. God came out to man in Christ, and man rejected Him, crucified the blessed One come in grace. But the veil was rent in His death, but never till then, and men can go to God in the Holiest. It was not by life, precious as that is, but by death that He redeemed us and reconciled us to God. The whole system is utterly antichristian and antiscriptural: moreover it is, as a natural consequence, a perverted and false system practically. It insists on the union of supernatural grace and the order of nature in this world, and makes Christ’s headship to be in enjoyable arts and sciences in this world, instead of, as He says, taking up the cross and following Him-setting our affection on things above, not on things on the earth, as being with Him dead, and our life hid with Him in God. If Christianity be true, this system is false. If it were not for the extreme ignorance of Scripture, both textual and critical, which they display, I should say the audacity of their statements would be marvelous, but I suppose much of it may be attributed to ignorance. They say that the communication of life is not by the word but by sacraments. Now what saith the Scripture? " Of His own will begat He us by the word of truth, that we might be a kind of first fruits of His creatures" (James 1:18). So Peter: "Being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the word of God which liveth and abideth forever." We are all children of God by faith in Christ Jesus. Now faith cometh by hearing (ἀχόη), and hearing by the word of God: he that heareth My word and believeth Him that sent Me hath everlasting life, and shall not come into condemnation, but is passed from death unto life (John 5:24). It pleased God by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe (1 Corinthians 1:21). Abraham believed God, and it was imputed unto him for righteousness (Romans 4:3). For this cause thank we God without ceasing, because, when ye received the word of God which ye heard of us, ye received it not as the word of men, but, as it is in truth, the word of God, which worketh effectually in them that believe (1 Thessalonians 2:13). Lastly, when the church had become utterly corrupt, as bad as the heathen, so that the times were perilous, the apostle refers to the Scriptures as able to make wise to salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus (2 Timothy 3:1-17) I shall refer to this again when I come to speak a word of the church. I have quoted only direct passages as to the word, of faith in it, quickening and vivifying. There are many other passages which speak indirectly to the same purpose. They tell us baptism is what gives life and incorporates into the body of Christ. First, as to life, no passage that I can call to mind states anything of the sort. Before Christ, and during His life, it clearly could not be. When Christ was there, the dead heard the voice of the Son of God, and they that heard lived. I can only take their quotations. They quote Peter’s statement in Acts 2:1-47, but nothing is said there of communicating life at all. They were to be baptized for the remission of sins, and they would then receive the Holy Ghost. They were baptized in Samaria when they believed; of course they were, but no word of life or life-contact. The case of the eunuch is then quoted, the writer being ignorant that the verse is not genuine: but even with it not a word about life. Lydia and the jailer were baptized, and their households: but no word of receiving life. Saul was called to arise and wash away his sins for the formal administration of forgiveness. I do not doubt this had real force, though it is not the ground of it, but the death of Christ whereby we are justified by faith: but not one of them alludes to communication of life by baptism. Our doctors claim the interpretation of she Scriptures for themselves; if any one wants to see what it is worth, he may learn from their comment on the texts they have quoted as to " the word." They prove to us that Peter does not use "the word" of the preaching of the gospel, from the fact that he says that it "liveth and abideth forever," which cannot be affirmed of preaching:-is not that profound? They seem to be ignorant that Peter only quoted a passage of Isaiah affirming that the gospel was a fulfillment of it. Did they never read " the word preached"? The word is what is preached, and so the apostle would say, "It pleased God by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe." Who does not see that it is not the act of preaching (that is the part of the preacher), but "the word preached"? But God has chosen by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe. It is wearisome to notice such absurdity. Supposing I were to say, "Eating his dinner has quite set him up, “and a Mercersburg theologian, claiming to be an interpreter of the word and refusing " private interpretation," should say," Eating cannot set a man up;" what answer can one give to such wisdom but to say, ἀπέχει, All right; I quite agree? The passage of James, ch. 1: 18, is passed over as lightly as possible-no wonder. When Paul writes of Christ sanctifying the church "by the washing of water by the word," they tell us it means water and the word, an "unmistakable testimony to the importance and force of holy baptism." What when the Lord says, Ye are clean through the word which I have spoken unto you; and note, that if so, the word as spoken of us in Ephesians 5:1-33 never can be applied to the soul again: for baptism cannot be repeated. But they have to change the passage to make their use of it. It is alleged that it is affirming that the "Holy Spirit has power to act in an extraordinary way, dispensing with the ordinary organs of communication." So indeed the Lord affirms He does as to this very matter. The wind blows where it lists, and ye hear the sound thereof, but cannot tell whence it cometh or whither it goeth: so is every one that is born of the Spirit. It is curious how they go in the teeth of the word, doubtless through ignorance. But the word of God is the ordinary means, the divinely-appointed means, of communicating life, as we have seen: which baptism is never said to be. They speak of magical operation: it is very irreverent when speaking of being born of the Spirit who is the immediate divine agent of imparting the divine nature. "That which is born of the Spirit is spirit;" but what more magical than a little clean water, and a few words spoken by a man who pretends to have power to do it, being the means of communicating divine life! Far from me to despise baptism; I believe it to be the divinely-appointed door of admission to the place where God has placed His peculiar blessings on the earth. For such a place there was in Israel, and such a place there is in Christendom, awful as its state may be: not of entrance into the body (of this I will speak), but into that habitation which God has set up, and where He dwells by His Spirit. But not only is baptism not life-giving; but it does not mean it even as a sign. It is to the death of Christ we are baptized, unto, not into; we are not baptized into anything, but unto. They were not baptized into Moses, and it is the same word: so, "Whereunto were ye baptized?" Here the translators, though they changed it when they could, could not misstate it. The answer was " Unto John’s baptism." We were baptized unto (είς) Christ’s death. How? There is no dead Christ, and you cannot be baptized into His death. We are identified with Him (σύμφυτοι) "in the likeness of His death." The only connection with life is the passage in Colossians 2:1-23 "Wherein also we are risen with Him;" but there it is carefully added, "by faith in the operation of God who raised Him from the dead:" and even there the coming up out of baptism is resurrection with Him: not simply quickening or life-giving, but formally distinct from it. Baptism is death,-reception in the visible assembly, through death of that which we were, as alive in the first Adam, the death of Christ: as to putting on Christ in Galatians 3:1-29, it is only the public profession of Him, as contrasted with Jew or Gentile, Barbarian, Scythian, bond or free, male or female. The passage itself is that which declares that "we are all children of God (not by baptism but) by faith in Christ Jesus." Nor is it incorporating into Christ. There is positive testimony to the contrary: " For by one Spirit are we all baptized into one body." The Holy Ghost come dοwn from heaven unites to the glorified Head in heaven. That baptism of the Spirit, we are told, took place on the day of Pentecost. " He that is joined to the Lord is one spirit;" others, when they came in amongst them, partook of the same Holy Ghost. But perhaps the most curious effect in detail of this anti-scriptural system is the absolute denial of all operation of the Holy Ghost by the gospel in the world. "It (the church) meets us exactly at the right point, as setting forth the form and manner in which Christ, by the Holy Ghost, carries forward His work of salvation in the world. If we are to hold fast the objective historical character of what this work was first, and still continues to be in His own person (mark the work is first in the person of Christ), it cannot be allowed to lose itself in the agency of the Spirit in a general view, it must necessarily involve for us the conception of a special sphere, this likewise objective and historical, within which only (and not in the world at large) the Holy Ghost of the gospel is to be regarded as working. This is the church." " To look for it in the world by private spiritualistic negotiations with God... is to look for it where it is not to be found." Now, I ask, in opposition to this teaching, were Paul’s evangelistic labors in the church or in the world? That the church was formed by them, where it was not before, no doubt: and doubtless the converts were all baptized. But where was the Holy Ghost of the gospel working? Was it " not in the world at large," as they say? It is as absurd as it is evil. Let us hear what he says. Did he preach the gospel in the church or in the world? He distinguishes this double ministry (Colossians 1:1-29) But the Lord Himself before Paul, " Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature.... And they went forth and preached everywhere, the Lord working with them and confirming the word by signs following them. And to Paul: "The Gentiles, to whom now I send thee to open their eyes," etc. So Paul: "Whereof ye heard before in the word of the truth of the gospel which is come unto you, as it is in all the world, and bringing forth fruit, as it doth in you, since the day ye heard of it, and knew the grace of God in truth." And what was this gospel? We read in Ephesians 1:13, " The word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, in whom also, after that ye believed, ye were sealed with that Holy Spirit of promise." He does not think it worth while to mention their baptism, though, doubtless, it took place. I said he distinguished his gospel ministry and his church ministry: Colossians 1:23, " The gospel which ye have heard, and which was preached to every creature which is under heaven, whereof I Paul am made a minister.".. Then " His body’s sake, the church, whereof I am made a minister, to fulfill (complete) the word of God." I may add here, what belongs to another point, that the reconciliation of all things, which they affirm to be going on now, is distinguished from our reconciliation now who form the true church (see verses 20 and 21, 22). Again Paul declares himself a debtor to the Greeks and to the Barbarians, to the wise and to the unwise; not ashamed of the gospel, because it is the power of - God unto salvation to every one that believeth, to the Jew first and also to the Greek, for therein is the righteousness of God revealed; and in the doctrinal part of the Romans, all is absolutely individual, only in the hortatory part is there any allusion to the church. There it comes in as a known fact. His boast is that he preached where Christ had not been heard of (2 Corinthians 10:1-18; Romans 1:5).. He would not have anything to do with the church in this service (Galatians 1:16-17). It was where Christ was not named; he went directly from Christ, " not of man nor by man, but by Jesus Christ and God the Father." (Comp. Romans 10:15-21.) What the apostle boasts of as his glory, these theologians denounce. But more, the commission in Matthew 28:1-20 was never carried out; Paul’s took its place (Galatians 2:6-9), and Paul puts his mission in contrast on these points with theirs. They may have gone abroad, as Mark 16:1-20; but this is the only allusion to it in Scripture: the tradition as to it being a very late one. But, besides, Paul declares he was not sent to baptize at all, -but to preach the gospel. I know our theologians, with the Baptists, say this was for fear of its being thought he baptized in his own name. But this is a come-off. He positively declares Christ did not send him to baptize but to preach the gospel: the cross, the death of Christ-foolishness, no doubt, to a ritualist, but to us who are saved the power of God. But is it not a strange thing if life-contact is only in baptism, he should tell us he was not sent to do the only thing which gives life, and to do that which " the Holy Ghost of the gospel" does not do? Pity he was not sent to Mercersburg. And somehow he "laid the foundation" in his ministry. As regards the full revelation of the mystery of the church, a dispensation was committed to him. The whole testimony of Paul, both as to the gospel and as to the church, is set aside by these ritualists; that is, of him to whom the mission to the Gentiles was specially committed by Christ himself, and relinquished by the apostles at Jerusalem. But let us consider this doctrine of the church scripturally and historically too: for these doctors avoid history to replace it by dreams of their own fancy. We have the church or assembly of God under three aspects in Scripture, primarily two, and then one of the two as the effect of divine workmanship, and as the effect of the work as entrusted to the responsibility of man: "The body," if we speak of that which is united to Christ, the glorified Head in heaven (Ephesians 1:1-23; Ephesians 5:1-33. Comp. 1 Corinthians 12:1-31), set up on earth, but to be complete and perfected in heaven, is not formed by baptism. Simon Magus, for instance, was baptized; but had neither part nor lot in the matter; the 120 at Jerusalem had formed the nucleus of the church, but were never baptized at all. There is no trace of it, nor anybody to do it: yet they were the church itself at its starting. It is, we are expressly told, "by one Spirit we are baptized into one body." This baptism, we know from Acts 1:1-26, was on the day of Pentecost. The truth concerning this one body was more fully developed in Paul’s ministry. But Christ exalted on high was the head, those who had the Holy Ghost the members. He that is joined to the Lord is one spirit. It is never connected with water-baptism, nor are there rotten members of Christ’s body. An unbeliever not born of God is not a member of Christ’s body. He is " without Christ;" nay, more, If any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of His." " Ye are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if so be the Spirit of God dwell in you." "There is no condemnation to them who are in Christ Jesus." " The whole body edifies itself in love; " they are "members one of another." The " Head is Christ, from whom the whole body fitly joined together and compacted by that which every joint supplieth, maketh increase of the body to the edifying of itself in love." So "there is one Spirit and one body, even as we are called in one hope of our calling; " and then "one Lord, one faith, one baptism;" and then "one God and Father of all:" the circle each time widening with the Spirit: the Lord: and God the Father. The same distinction is made in 1 Corinthians 1:2. This is one aspect of the assembly of God. There is another-it is the "habitation of God," ’,and that now "by the Spirit." But this is viewed in a double way in the word: Christ builds; and man builds. " On this rock Twill build My church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it." But here Christ is the builder, and the building unfinished, nor can Satan hinder its being built. He can catch the sheep and scatter them, but not pluck (catch) them out of Christ’s hand. So Peter: the living stones come and are built upon the living Stone, a spiritual house; no human agency is spoken of as bringing them. So Paul: "fitly joined and compacted it groweth to a holy temple in the Lord." This house is not yet finished, it is growing, grace is carrying it on; it is not that life is given by energy in a sacrament: but living stones come. But when I come to 1 Corinthians 3:1-23 it is another matter. Here man’s responsibility comes in and man’s agency. As a wise master-builder, Paul laid the foundation; but every one was to take heed how he builded thereon. If he builded with gold, silver, or precious stones, he would receive a reward; if with wood and hay and stubble, his work would be burnt up: in a word, the work depended on the responsibility of man. Looked at as to the result on earth, God’s temple might be badly built: and man, as he has ever done from Adam, has wholly failed. This I shall show. The papacy, and then ritualists, drinking in their sweetened poison through their utterly false views as to baptism (false in every respect), have confounded Christ’s work in building, yet unfinished, with their own wood and hay and stubble; or worse, they tell us that, by an organic system of clergy and baptism, it is to restore the race and bring in consecration of everything to God, uniting the supernatural with the natural as it did in Christ, or grace and nature till it culminates in glory I Now let us see what God tells us. First looked at as the kingdom of heaven: When Christ had sowed the good seed, the enemy came and sowed tares, and the evil done had to remain till the harvest; the wheat of Christ’s sowing was not spoiled, but the crop was, here. Next take Jude: False brethren crept in unawares, baptized with the organic system we must suppose, but false brethren always, no life-contact with Christ, but spots in their feasts of charity, and of these Enoch prophesied, The Lord cometh with ten thousand of His saints to execute judgment. The evil went on to the end. In John we have the other character of evil. They had gone out, apostatized, were not of them though they had been among them. The last times were already come marked by these antichrists. Paul more fully: The mystery of iniquity did already work; only there was what hindered it, and when this was gone, the man of sin would be revealed, whom the Lord will destroy by the brightness of His coming. He could say already, All seek their own, not the things of Jesus Christ. In 2d Timothy we have the Holy Ghost’s directions when the church had fallen into this evil estate. God’s sure foundation remained, the Lord knew them that they were His: and whoever named the name of the Lord was to depart from iniquity. In a great house (for such would the church become) there age vessels of gold, silver, and earth, some to honor and some to dishonor; if a man purged himself from these last, he would be a vessel to honor and fit for the Master’s use. Spiritual judgment must discern what these teachers were worth in the house, for it would contain all sorts. But further, so far from trusting the church, in the last days perilous times would come, and a description is given of Christendom, the same (save two or three words) as that of the heathen in Romans 1:1-32, not of the world without. There would be a form of piety denying its force; believers were to turn away from such. What was their resource? The Scriptures expressly: what Paul taught, and the Scriptures given by inspiration of God, that, when the church was gone to ruin, the word of God remained sure: and this was to guide. So John: If that which ye have heard from the beginning abide in you, ye shall continue in the Father and in the Son. No developed and formed theology: but that which was from the beginning. He wrote this concerning those that seduced them. But further: In the seven churches, he that hath an ear is called upon to listen to what the Spirit said to the churches. Christ was judging them. They therefore could be no authority. He that had an ear for what Christ said was to listen to His judgment of them. Thus, so far from their word being an authority or rule, we are called on to listen to the word which judges their state: and whence can we date the ruin? Paul declares that after his decease wolves from without and perverse persons from within would arise; John that they were already in the last time. It was merely, alas! what had ever happened under man; with Noah, with Israel under the law, with the priesthood, with the Jewish royalty, with the Gentile; thus, what God had set up good, the first thing man did was to spoil and ruin it. But we have the additional testimony from Paul that evil men and seducers would wax worse and worse, deceiving and being deceived; the Scriptures, and what was taught by inspiration from the beginning being the only resource of "the man of God," and able to make him wise unto salvation. John tells us that the last time was already come: so Peter that the time was come that judgment should begin at the house of God. And mark this: when Romanists or ritualists tell us to listen to the church, they merely mean themselves, the clergy; they interpret the Scriptures, doling out as much as they think proper to give us, and cooked up as they please. Paul, they would have us believe, did not know how to address the church; what was from the beginning is not what I am to hold fast! Let us see what ground there is for this apostate doctrine; this doctrine of Satan,-for such it is: he knows the power of the inspired word of God. To whom did the blessed Lord speak? To the multitude. To whom did the apostles speak and write? First to the world; but then in the Epistles-all save three short ones-to the assemblies, the mass of believers. If you choose to call them clergy, the clergy wrote to the mass of common believers. The church or mass, really never teaches. Those gifted, as sent, teach the assembly, but the Scriptures generally are addressed, always addressed, to the body of believers: God’s word is addressed to them without any interpreters. They are God’s own word to them, by which I should be called upon, if needed, to judge even apostles, with a curse pronounced upon them if they taught anything else. The church never teaches. The teachers are to be judged by the word of God. Sad it is if that be needed, for gifts of teaching there are; but, if needed to be done, God has sent His word to the saints at large. He who comes between and intercepts the message meddles with God’s rights, not merely with mine. If I own this title in the clergy, I am withdrawing myself from God’s own direct title over me as His servant; but I cannot from my responsibility, for He has addressed His word directly to me. Man cannot withdraw himself from the consequences of his own moral state in reading it; that is true, nor is he meant to do so. If be comes presumptuously, he will reap the fruits of his presumption. If he comes meekly, " as new born babes desire the sincere milk of the word," he will reap the, fruits of God’s grace. Those teachers who write " Bible-worshippers," and deny what they call verbal inspiration, may learn, at any rate the simple may, what the apostle teaches: " We" (the apostle himself and the inspired teachers) " have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit which is of God, that we might know the things which are freely given to us of God." There is revelation. " Which things also we speak, not in the words which man’s wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth." There is verbal inspiration. " The natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness unto him, because they are spiritually discerned." There is the intelligence of the things taught in the word, as it is written; and it is the distinctive character of the time of grace: " They shall be all taught of God." And, now, let us see how far the church is to be trusted,-the historical development. I affirm that the history of the baptized mass is the history of the greatest wickedness-crimes natural, ecclesiastical, and unnatural-that ever disgraced human nature, worse and more universal than among the heathen, bad as they were. Did our theologians ever read the letter of Nicolas Clemangis, rector of the University of Paris at the time of the great schism, the greatest man of his age, and his description of the state of morals? In the middle ages, so great was the violence and disorder.-one pope annulling as invalid all the ordinations of another whom he had driven out-that a book had to be written to apprise the people there were still sacraments,-unnatural crimes universal, especially among the clergy; and such a state of things in the papacy, that the great Roman Catholic historian, cardinal and Jesuit, Baronius, declares that for a century he cannot own the popes for legitimate, but only puts their names in for dates, set up as they were by the mistresses of the marquis of Tuscany, or by their mothers, mistresses of deceased popes. The pope got hold of a book written by an honest man, denouncing the state of things, and suppressed it, saying that it would be too scandalous, and that he would punish the most flagrant cases. And the gloss of the canon law on a decretal, speaking of degrading for licentiousness, declares that it cannot be for simple fornication, for then it would be universal. There is no such system of wickedness as the organic system preached up by ritualists. I challenge them, with their historical Christianity, to state honestly what history. states; nor, though more decent outwardly since the Reformation, is it really very much better now. This was the baptized organism that contained-(can I say the words?)-Christ’s life! Let us turn to an earlier date: Did our theologians ever read Cyprian de Pudentia, or Chrysostom’s two treatises on the same subject? Here we go back to, say, 240 after Christ. But a century before: what do we find-that is, forty or fifty years after the death of the apostle John? Infamy under the form of asceticism. Do our theologians, for I do not much trust their acquaintance with history, know what subintroductae, or παρείσαχτοι, in full blow at that time were? So common that it had to be taken up by councils. I do not defile my pages with what was read in the churches then as holy practice. And as to doctrine, I will give a specimen from one called an apostolic father, but who was really the brother of Pope Pius the First: " A man had a vineyard and set his servant to stake up the vines. The servant did so, but did more than he had been set to do-cleared the garden of weeds. The Lord of the vineyard consulted with his son and his friends what he should do with his faithful servant, and they agreed he should be made heir with the son. The servant was Christ, who was set to establish the clergy, but did a great deal more than God had set him to do-namely, cleared away our sins. The Holy Ghost is the Son, the angels the friends." Is not that the church maintaining and forming sound doctrine? But our theologians will tell us, it is hunting up evil and finding some obscure individual, and the church cannot be answerable. It was read in the churches, though more in the east than in the west, is quoted by Irenaeus as Scripture, and treated by Origen as questionable, if it was not inspired. They tell us, as proof of the value of the church forming doctrine, that it was only after long struggle’ that the formal truth as to Christ’s person was established. His divinity at the council of Nicaea. But what does this mean? They do not mean to deny that the truth as to Christ’s person is in Scripture. It means, therefore, that the church had lost the truth of Christ’s person. And so it was. Scarcely one of the known teachers was sound on the deity of the Lord; and those who were, as Irenaeus, were unsound on other things. And Cyril of Alexandria, who set up the title of Mother of God, was a decided Eutychian, so called afterward in doctrine, justified himself by the authority of Athanasius-it seems to me, he was warranted in so doing. He was as turbulent a ruffian as ever lived, heading the mob at Alexandria to plunder and ruin, and drive out the Jews when Patriarch of Alexandria, and spending all the possessions of the church of Alexandria, which were immense, to bribe the courtiers and empress-sister of the emperor to banish and persecute Nestorius, in which he succeeded. He canonized the man who sought to murder the governor at Alexandria who put down his rioting. The Ecumenical Council at Ephesus was as great a scene of iniquity and open violence as occurs in history, so that the emperor sent troops and put the leaders in prison, from which Cyril escaped, and they bribed the court, Nestorius’ patron having died. In the previous Council of Ephesus, the Condo Latronum, convened by the emperor, attended by the pope’s legates, with every element of a general council, the bishops beat old Flavianus, Patriarch of Constantinople, in such a way that he died of it. It was quashed afterward through shame. This was the primitive church; its organic progress to sanctify the world! They could not cure the baptized heathen (in life-contact, we are to believe, with Christ) by their baptism of getting drunk at the festivals (Memories, so called, at shrines of their relics) of the demigods: so the church allowed it, putting saints in the place of demigods; that at least they might get drunk in honor of saints instead of demons 1 The church, that is, the clergy, the interpreters of the Scriptures, did this. You will say, What proof is there of it? Augustine states it, who tried to put it down. The same state of things is mentioned in Paulinus of Nola; and Gregory Thaumaturgus left only seventeen heathen in his diocese by means of it: and it was part of the directions of Pope Gregory the First to another Augustine, sent to convert the Saxons. It is a curious fact that Sicily, which had never been converted from heathenism, went over, I may say in a body, to Christianity; and gave up their splendid temples for churches as soon as Mary was declared by the Fourth Council to be " the mother of God." God has preserved His testimony and truth in spite of the church, thus viewed: of what ritualists call the church. He cannot fail. These things were not exceptional, but the general state. But what were saints to do if they listened to the clergy as interpreters, when they turned Arian with the emperors-when, as Jerome says, the world awoke and found itself Arian? When even Hosius and the Pope Liberius gave way, were they to follow the clergy or the Scriptures? The Luciferians, a sect named by Jerome, had their name from one Lucifer, who would not go with the world when all the clergy turned Arians. Athanasius is justly held in honor as to this too; but what was the course of the whole body of the clergy? Have the clergy of the Church of Rome organically maintained the truth in the worship of the Virgin Mary, or in transubstantiation and the offering of the mass? Let us have it out plainly. Ought people under their jurisdiction to follow their interpretation, and acknowledge their authority? They are just as much clergy as Oxford or Mercersburg. They tell us that God has divided His attribute of Almightiness between Jesus and Mary;-almighty justice to Jesus, and almighty mercy to Mary. Are their parishioners to believe this? and, as the present pope has declared, that we must go to the heart of Jesus through the heart of Mary? Dr. Racy has exposed this. Very likely Mercersburg does not believe these horrid doctrines. But why am I to trust them more than their adversaries; or why acknowledge their competency to interpret more than the pope’s? Am I to believe in purgatory in Savoy, because the-clergy teach it; and cross the lake of Geneva, and hold that it is utterly false in the Canton de Vaud, because the clergy teach so there? Am I to hold transubstantiation as vital truth in France; and declare it idle fables and blasphemous deceits in England? Am I to hold that Christ is God in one parish in France, and deny it if I go into the next? for so I must if I listen to the clergy and their interpretation. Were not-though, thank God, there is a reaction-the clergy in France, Germany, Holland, as a body infidel, and still mostly are, or indifferent? It is all well to talk of the church, and hearing the church: but what church am I to hear? The body of the Reformed Church was, and in a very large and major part is (particularly the clergy), infidel. Is this the doctrine I am to receive? In Geneva the State has abolished ordination entirely. In Neuchatel it has left every man to preach what he likes: and half the national church have left and set up for themselves. In all the principal cantons infidelity reigns among the clergy; the godly laity are getting tired of them and their nothingarianism. They have said to me in France, " But if we are Christians we must have some kind of Christ;" and then not so very strict either. In Paris Christianity was carried against avowed infidelity by twelve votes of more than 2600 voters in the Reformed Church. I do not doubt that the Lord is graciously acting, but it is not generally by the clergy but in spite of them. It is vain to say things are becoming better. What became of souls if they listened or listen to the clergy when they are infidels or rationalists? When the clergy turned Arians with the emperors, were they or the word of God to be listened to? If Mercersburg or others teach false doctrine as to the person of Christ and the sacraments, am I to be saved by listening to them? Can they answer for my soul "in that day"? They insist on the peccability of Christ: we are therefore authorized in putting the case, (the Lord avert the blasphemy from every heart, that he did sin!) putting it as a supposition, for they affirm it to have been possible; " God was united forever to sinful man." Is it not enough to revolt and repel with horror every true soul? Say it, not to doctors, for God hides things from wise and prudent, but to a poor uninstructed saint: he will make short work with clergy interpretation. What simple majesty is in the statement! "The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the Highest shall overshadow thee; therefore that holy thing that shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God." For these theologians, who pry into divine secrets and pretend to know the Son, whom none knows, but the Father, "the divine" (they are sometimes afraid to say what), "having taken sinful nature up, was gradually victorious over it, purifying it." It was the power of the Highest overshadowing the Virgin Mary for Scripture: for the interpreters, it was " united in the womb to sin in the fetus, and purifying the nature." (Can more offensive folly, of which there is not a word in Scripture, be conceived?* (*Elsewhere it is: "The victory of sinlessness over remaining depravity by the process of the divine-human life in the womb.") I am ashamed to speak of it, but it must be spoken to put these pretentious men in the true light): and that, for them, is "redemption"! But we have the faith of the church in the creeds: The Apostles’ Creed, for instance, universally recommended in all ages by the church. Now this is a deception; they know its history well, they will not venture to speak of the ancient fable, for fables were plentiful in and purifying the nature Lucius with uncertain name, a coiner of false documents), that each apostle came forward to give one article. The Apostles Creed is not, as we have it, as ancient as the Nicene Creed. Some analogous formulary was gradually established in each diocese; the Roman creed was pretty much the same as what we have, save some important articles. But what we have, save these, is first given by Ruffinus (published in Fell’s Cyprian) in the fourth or fifth century; but there was no descent to hell in it, and, what is more important, no procession of the Holy Ghost from the Son. This was added, it is said, from Spain, when the Visigoths gave up Arianism, and thence passed into. Gaul; but this was quite late, and Leo put up the creed in silver tablets at Rome that nothing might be added, the Council of Ephesus having forbidden any additions. This article, added none knows how, is rejected by the whole Greek Church, and is the avowed cause of division. I say avowed, for it is pretty clear it was ambition and rivalry. I am not insisting on rejecting nor on receiving it; but what if true must be of first-rate importance in the creed has divided the professing church, instead of having a common faith by it. But these professors, as one of them says, leave the poor Greek Church out in the cold. In the recent conferences of the archbishop of Syra with the English prelates, this article could not be got over, and, then, Dr. Pusey, it is said, declared they were farther off than ever from union. A priest or patriarch in Turkey did let in an English clergyman to communion, but was severely taken to task by the ecclesiastical authority for it. I am not sure, but I rather think, he was excommunicated. But let us take the Apostles’ Creed as it stands. There is not a trace in it that Christ is God; an Arian, nay, a Unitarian, could sign it as well as, nay, better than, one who held the fundamental truth of the trinity of persons in the unity of the Godhead. Is not this rather serious if it is to be the norm of faith? The Father is God and Almighty, and the Son and Holy Ghost spoken of apart with no hint of divinity! Creation is attributed to the Father* exclusively; all that is said of Jesus Christ is referable to what He was when become man. (*it is singular enough that, while creation is, of course, ascribed to God in the unity of His being, when the persons are distinguished, it is never ascribed to the Father but to the Son and Spirit.) Now Scripture leaves no shadow of doubt on such subjects. " The Word was with God, and was God.". He became man: " The Word was made flesh." He never became (but in the beginning was) God. When all that has a beginning began, He was; and was a distinct person. As far as the creed was the expression of early faith (for it was the creed of Aquilina, and We may practically say, of Rome), the church had so lost the faith-at least its teachers the clergy-that it required the council at Nice, with the emperor presiding and keeping order among the disputing bishops, to get it on the ground of the divinity of the Lord; and larger assemblies unsettled it again, and it took council upon council to set things straight. Nor, mark, are the great branches of the baptized organism agreed which councils are general, which not. Augustine declares them to be no final rule; one correcting the other by clearer light. I know not that I have more to add. Many errors, and important ones, could be noticed, and ignorance of Scripture, flowing from following men’s thoughts and system. Thus, we are told, that the Holy Ghost after He came is not called the Spirit of the Father or of the Son. He is both: and as far as I can trust my recollection, only after His coming. But I notice this only to show the rashness of assertion. Their doctrine is false as to justification by faith; it is for them inherent or infused, though professedly not exactly Romish doctrine. But my only object was the ritualism, the person of the Lord, and the church, running into this main point: Is redemption by incarnation, or by the death of Christ? They say, formally, by incarnation (the Scriptures, as formally, by the blood of Christ); and all their system hangs on -this. As to the clergy, it is Quot homines, tot sententiae, unless we go to Rome, who treat their doctors as outside the church altogether. Take even their friends, the English Puseyites (from whom our Mercersburg doctors declare they borrow their sacraments and clerical system, not from Germany,-alas I they have no bishops, and, if their friends are to be believed, no organic succession at all, no divine channels of grace whatever: happily in Romanism and Anglicanism the clergy are not necessary to baptism,-a midwife can do it, so they may be considered to have life-contact after all!) their Christianity is just saved I As to an interpreting clergy, they are absolutely without any. A goodly system this to secure the truth for the simple I Which am I to believe? Happily I am content with what John, and Paul, and Peter, and the blessed Lord Himself, taught "FROM THE BEGINNING." "LET THAT THEREFORE ABIDE IN YOU, WHICH YE HAVE HEARD FROM THE BEGINNING. IF THAT WHICH YE HAVE HEARD FROM THE BEGINNING SHALL REMAIN IN YOU, YE ALSO SHALL CONTINUE IN THE SON, AND IN THE FATHER. AND THIS IS THE PROMISE THAT HE HATH PROMISED US, EVEN ETERNAL LIFE. THESE THINGS HAVE I WRITTEN UNTO YOU CONCERNING THEM THAT SEDUCE YOU. BUT THE ANOINTING WHICH YE HAVE RECEIVED OF HIM ABIDETH IN YOU, AND YE NEED NOT THAT ANY MAN TEACH YOU: BUT AS THE SAME ANOINTING TEACHETH YOU OF ALL THINGS, AND IS TRUTH, AND IS NO LIE, AND EVEN AS IT HATH TAUGHT YOU, YE SHALL ABIDE IN HIM. AND NOW, LITTLE CHILDREN, ABIDE IN HIM; THAT, WHEN. HE SHALL APPEAR, WE MAY HAVE CONFIDENCE, AND NOT BE ASHAMED BEFORE HIM AT HIS COMING." (1 John 2:24-28.) ======================================================================== CHAPTER 7: VOL 01 - CITY OF REFUGE ======================================================================== City of Refuge Joshua 20:6.-The true application of the type is, I believe, not to departed spirits, but to the Jews, who are providentially kept of God, but kept withal out of their inheritance, until the close of the High-priesthood which Christ is now exercising in heaven. He will then come out and bless the people of Israel, to whom the glory of the Lord shall appear. They knew not what they did when they smote and killed the Prince of Life. In the city of refuge they remain till the close of Christ’s (heavenly) priesthood, after which they are to return to the land of their possession. See Numbers 35:25; Numbers 35:28. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 8: VOL 01 - CONSCIENCE ======================================================================== Conscience Scripture shows, I think, that conscience has a twofold character, which is rarely distinguished: 1. Sense of responsibility to God; and 2. Knowledge of things as good or evil in themselves. It is evident that Adam had the first character of conscience in Eden as well as out of it; but the second he had not till the fall gave him a bad conscience. Previously he was innocent,-not holy, but ignorant of evil, as an unfallen creature in the midst of what was very good. Before the fall he did not know what lust was, nor anything else of what we call moral evil. For the eating of the apple was evil, not in itself, but by God’s command, to abstain. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 9: VOL 01 - DE PROPITIATIONE ======================================================================== De Propitiatione FRATER. CARISSIME!-Filius certe Patrem ostendit, quod dicit Ioh. 14: 9; atque hoc, ut verissimum, ita gravissimum, quicunque Deo credit libentur accipiet; quicunque autem spreverit, illius gloriam, qui hue devenit ut efficeret propitiationem, sine dubio negabit, imo ipsam propitiationem subvertet. Personae enim dignitas divinam ad opus faciendum facultatem dedit, perfecto autem operi efficaciam intlnitam. Verum ad propitiationem efficiendam opus est longe pluribus quam jure Domini divino aut peccatoris fide que illius opus et ipsum sine operibus suis sibi postulat. Ex quo fit ut si hisce Domini verbis, que hanc rem non attingunt, usus ratiocineris, necesse sit fallaris. Quid enim de propitiatione loquitur Scriptura? Nonne earn de crude Christi, de sanguine illius in remissionem peccatorum effuso, de hoc quod semel pro peccatis passus sit iustus pro iniustis ut nos ad Deum perduceret pendere dicit? Que quidem plenius confirmant haec e Novo Testamento petita, Romans 3:25; Romans 4:25; Romans 5:9-10; 1 Corinthians 15:3; 2 Corinthians 5:21; Galatians 1:4; Galatians 3:16; Ephesians 1:7; Ephesians 1:14; Ephesians 4:30; Ephesians 5:2; Colossians 1:14; Colossians 1:20; 1 Timothy 1:15; Titus 2:14; Ebr. 1: 3, 2: 9, 14; 12: 12, 14, 15, 24-28; 10: 5-10, 12-19, 12: 24, 13: 12, 20; 1 Peter 1:2; 1 Peter 1:18-21; 1 Peter 2:24; 1 Peter 3:18; 1 Peter 1:1-25 Ioh. 1: 7; 2: 2, 4: 10; Revelation 1:5; Revelation 5:9; Revelation 7:14; alia. Num debemus ilia adiicere que in Evangeliis praemissa erant qualia Matthew 20:28; Matthew 26:28; Ioh. 1: 29; multa alia? Tamen idoneum fuerit nonnulla e Vetere Testamento, que typorum ordinem haud dubie tenent, paucis attingere. Primum ergo, sanguis agni nocte paschae caesi extra, non intra, domum spargebatur, in superliminari et super postes, non ut Israel verum ut Deus aspiceret; quod ipse ita dicit, " Et videbo sanguinem, et transibo vos." In sacrificiis etiam sanguis in cornibus Dei arae effusus ipsi Deo, nunquam autem homini offerebatur. In non-nulls etiam homines, scilicet leprosi, sacerdotes, alii, sanguine spargebantur ut mundarentur, ut coram Deo praecipue mundi essent. In summis autem omnium, propitiationis die, templo inferebatur et super propitiatorio et coram ponebatur. Hoc autem quid vult nisi illud vel plenius demonstrare sanguinem pro hominibus coram Deo esse, non tantum amoris Dei erga homines documentum? Quibus ita utitur Novum Testamentum ut affirmet Christum per proprium sanguinem introiisse. Nam illud quidem, devenisse eurn et mortuum esse prae amore erga homines non minus verum, diversum autem esse videtur. Atque he quidem, aperto loquente Scriptura, nulla de amore Dei amplius quam Christi dubitatio esse potest. Misit Pater Filium, porro sic dilexit mundum Deus ut Filium swum unigenitum daret. Pariter autem constat Filium exaltari oportuisse, oportebat autem non tantum ob malum hominum, verum ob Dei verba, iustitiam, sanctam naturam, maiestatem, "que vindicari debebant ut hominibus iure ignosceretur. Que omnia, imo longe plus, efficit crux Christi. Propter peccata ille a Deo derelictus est, Psal. 22.; neque hic de Iudaeis aut Gentilibus, de Herode aut Pontio Pilato, nisi ut de improbis persecutoribus, agebatur. Etiam Deus ad crucem adfuit, qui Christum pro nobis peccatum effecerit, ut in eo nos fieremus iustitia Dei. Prius ille pro iustitia, sanctitate, gratia passus erat, pro peccatis turn passus est. Haec est propitiatio que sola credentis peccata expiare potest, neque huius exspectatio nova exstitit, quamquam novum erat factum. Nam, quod dicit princeps prophetarum;" Vulneratus est propter iniquitates nostras, attritus est propter scelera nostra: disciplina pacis nostrae super eum, et livore ejus sanati sumus." " Posuit Dominus in eo iniquitatem omnium nostrum." " Propter scelus populi mei percussi eum." " Et Dominus voluit conterere eum in infirmitate; si posuerit pro peccato animam suam, videbit semen longaevum," etc. " Iniquitates eorum ipse portabit." " Ipse peccata multorum tulit." Consentiunt Lex, Psalmi, Prophetae; pariter Vetus Novum-que Testamentum a Deo et coram Deo propter peccata nostra passurn fuisse. Christum affirmant. Nuntiavit Dominus, apostoli (Paulus imprimis) iterant, nec minima carus ille discipulus qui maxima laudat Dei amorem, auctum revera hoc cognito, quippe wires et profunditatem suam turn demum ostendentem quum poculum hoc a Patre acceptum bibisse Christum intellexeris. Non totam efficiunt veritatem Dei amor, odia hominum, Satanae potentia, imo haec omnia profunditate superat illud, Christum pro peccatis hostiam se obtulisse Deo. Sane amorem Dei infinite imminuerit is qui Christum peccatorum nostrorum iudicium a Deo factum passum fuisse non viderit. Is enim de hominum peccatis negligentiam, contemptum Dei sanctitatis, maiestatis, monitorum qualia leguntur Deuteronomy 27:26, Romans 2:9, Ebr. 10: 31, esse eurn effecerit. Contra demonstrant laudata fidei Dei vindicandae necessariam fuisse expiationem, si nocentes etiamsi crederent, salvos facere vellet. Iudicium passus est Christus ut ad peccatorem minaret gratia. Ergo iustitiam non minus quam gratiam nunc monstrat Deus. Qui ergo contendunt falsam esse omnem theologiam que aliam faciat Patris imaginem aliam Filii, negabuntne Deum contrivisse Christum, hunt a Deo derelictum mortuum fuisse crimes nostrum expiantem coram Deo qui suscitavit eum a mortuis? Que si faciunt aliud haud dubie verum pervertunt, ut aliud aeque verum at gravissimum negent. Sane ex fide non ex operibus iustificatur homo: verum perfecitne Christus illud opus cui sacrificia propitiationis die peracta velut typi praemittebantur? Vaticinatur Isaia, cap. 53., narrant Matt. et Marc. Domini passionem, ut ipse loquitur, Deo derelinquente, quod inter poenas nostrorum peccatorum vel miserrimum erat. Num Dei vindictae, passionis Christi, eadem est imago? Mihi quidem inter haec summum fuisse discrimen videtur, et tamen pacis consilium ambobus adfuit. Que ergo obiecta sent, e falsa pendent interpretatione eorum que leguntur Ioh. 14: 9, haec enim de Christi persona, non de opere eius, revera dicta sunt. Qui haec de cruce dicta accipiunt, ita ut Dominum pro peccatis nostris a Deo punitum fuisse negent, 2 propitiationis doctrinam que in Scriptura continetur, eiusque in Christo fundamenta interpretande summovent. Quid enim, nisi hoc, efficere vult controversia? Porro illud postulant, iustitiam Dei eandem esse debere atque Christi iustitiam, qui autem affirmet Patri esse bonam qualitatem qua careat Filius, eum revera negare hunt esse Deum ant Dei similem. In quo vehementer errant; est enim iustitia, ut alibi, ita his, mores idonei relationi in qua stat quisque. Patet ergo, quomodo inter homines alia est servi alia’ domini iustitia, parique modo alia filii alia parentis, uxoris alia quam que mariti, denique alia civis alia regis, ita esse iustitiam in illo "qui quum in forma Dei esset, non rapinam arbitratus est esse, se aequalem Deo: sed semetipsum exinanivit, formam servi accipiens, in similitudinem hominum factus et habitu inventus ut homo humiliavit semetipsum, factus obediens usque ad mortem, mortem autem crucis. Propter quod et Deus exaltavit ilium ergo ut non caret qualitatibus illis quas habet Pater, ita illas habet, qua homo est, quas non habet Pater, neque habere posset, quippe qui carnem nunquam sumpserit. Eius enim qui dirigit sive imperat iustitia alia est, alia eius qui paret. " Propterea me diligit Pater; quia ego pono animam meam, ut iterum sum am eam." Factum quidem ipsius, ex obedientia tamen Patris sui erat Ioh. 10: 17, 18. Personae Christi mysterium simile aliud in morte sequitur, si ergo alterum tantum in ea, sive id quod ad Deum sive id quod ad hominem pertinebat respicias, personam divides, opus evacuabis, veritatem amittes. " Nemo novit Filium, nisi Pater." Verbo quidem illius debemus parere, universo autem, non parti tantum. Filius est Iesus, qui non modo similis est Dei, nam vere Deus est, et plenel. Deus, aeque ac Pater et Spiritus Sanctus. Porro in ipso complacuit omnem plenitudinem inhabitare," et inhabitat corporaliter; ut tamen divinitatis personae non modo unam naturam, verum etiam unam mentem, consilium, voluntatem habent, ita in his manifestandis diverse agunt, quod apparet, e.g.,Matthew 3:16-17, nam tres sunt non minus quam unum. Et quidem Christus quum esset Filius Dei, didicit ex its que passus est obedientiam. Itaque fieri non potuit quip in ipso qualitates inessent perfectae in suo genere, que a Patre aberant, atque etiam ab ipso, donee servi locum sumeret, factus homo in terris. Etiam planius hoc in cruce videtur, illic enim novum incepit opus suo in genere unicum, quod sequebantur gratia et gloria infinita, aeterna; et in passione per quam factum est. Que omnia Christi divinitatem nihilo plus imminuere volunt quam negare eum Patrem manifestare aut Deum ostendere. Qui autem dubitant Patrem et Filium, dum hit in terra versatur, diverse egisse ac praecipue apud crucem, 2 non in Romanum quidem cultum verum in Sabellianorum doctrinam, que nequitia longe superat Romanam, incidunt, et longe plus pugnant cum sancta Scriptura quam cum Anselmi theologia, quam ipsam parvi equidem pendo. Neque tamen cum theologis debemus emptionem cum redemptione confundere. Totus mundus, omnes mortales, etiam mali sanguine Christi empti sunt; nulli vero nisi, credentes habent redemptionem (ἀπολύρωσιν) per sanguinem ejus, remissionem peccatorum, quamvis ὑπἐρ πάντων sit τὸ ἀντίλυτρον. Per emptionem quidem omnes eius possessio sive servi efficiuntur; per redemptionem vero potestate Satanae liberamur, Christi liberti, ut Deo liberi pareamus. Ina autem regis morientis inter vincendum pro exercitu similitudo, illudne serio agitur ut neget sanguinem Christi effusum pro peccatis sacrificium non pro hominibus tantum sed Deo protium solutum esse? Nihil est illud quidem affirmare Deum diligere mundum atque ita diligere ut Filium swum miserit qui credentibus vitarn aeternam det, hoc enim diversum est ab illo, aeque vero, quod " ipso ad destitutionem peccati per hostiam suam apparuit." Hostia vero secundum Scripturam Deo sacrificatur, nunquam autem creaturae, quod est idolorum servitus, ut est contra re motio sacrificii infidelitas. Ac certissime redemptionis opus, remissio peccatorum, per sanguinem fit, per passionem que fuit propitiationis causa in truce, non per omnem potestatem in coelo et in terra datam a Deo homini quern a mortuis suscitavit. Neque oblivisci debemus, cum Christo subiecta fuerint omnia et ills tradiderit regnum, fieri hoc non ut Pater, verum ut Deus, scilicet Pater, Filius, Spiritus sanctus, sit omnia in omnibus. " FOR THE Defense OF THE GOSPEL." Eἰς ἀπολογἴαν τοῦ εὐαγγελίου χεῖμαι―Php 1:17. ARE the foundations destroyed? Is there any longer a Christ or Christianity, the Word or the Church of God? Such is the question raised by the writings of the present-day theological speculators and modern critics. It becomes now indeed (sad to say it!) an urgent question whether there be a Bible as a revelation from God, in words which God inspired, and whether there be such a thing as Christianity or the Church of God on earth. Certainly no creed or confession formulates the Christianity of the Scriptures, and no Church in Christendom now holds to the unity of the Spirit, or acknowledges His personal presence on earth. If otherwise, which is it? The authority of the Bible having been very specially assailed in our land as well as in every country in the world, most of its leading doctrines having been either ignored, impugned, or rejected, it behooves individual Christians, who still value the Holy Scriptures as the Word of God, and who realize the awful crisis of un-faith into which the whole professing Church is drifting, to look to the Lord to maintain the standard of His own glory, and give them grace to " witness a good confession " of the truth by re-asserting the original testimony of God as given by the Holy Ghost. When the Church corporate has manifestly ceased to be " the pillar and ground of the truth," it devolves on every soul who values the Holy Scriptures and has faith in the living God, to cling to the person of the Christ of God, who reveals Himself to the faithful as the Holy and the True, " He that openeth, and no man shutteth," holding fast His Word, and not denying His name (Revelation 3:7-8). With all humility and self-judgment, yet with firmness and faith confiding in the grace of God, as one who loves the truth and confesses the name of Christ, the writer ventures to recall the faithful and loyal disciples of Christ to faith in the Holy Scriptures as the inspired revelation of God, to union with the glorified Christ by the Holy Ghost, to the fact of the Holy Spirit’s presence on earth, and to the privileges and responsibilities of membership of the body of Christ, by the publication of THE BIBLE WITNESS AND REVIEW, which has these very specially for its objects. It will seek to uphold the inspiration and authority of the written Word of God, and, by the direct presentation of the revelation of God contained in the Holy Scriptures, to expose and refute, as far as allowed of God, the deadly errors which now pervade the whole of Christendom alike Romish and Protestant. The questions now raised everywhere are vital and fundamental; and they are just such as we care to handle, for Scripture principles are catholic, not sectarian, and our periodical exists for no party, but for the edification of the saints of God in every place, and the maintenance of divine truth as revealed. All who are dear to Christ are dear to us; and one would hope that a crisis like the present may draw the children of God together in closer fellowship, that they may " stand fast in one spirit, with one mind striving together for the faith of the gospel." We rejoice that a few have given " together " their renewed testimony to Christ and Christianity and the inspiration of the Holy Scriptures, and we look to the Lord to own the truth presented, and increase the number of those who love it and are able to use it in testimony to Him. Blind is the man who does not see a more intense and widespread power of Satan put forth of late against the Scriptures and the testimony of God, and more especially through pseudo-criticism and theological speculation; and this necessitates the presentation of such papers as the Christian reader will find, it is believed, in the opening volume of our testimony, giving as they do the Scripture doctrine, and thus confronting and refuting error with truth. The front is changed. The conflict is for the very existence of a revelation from God and of Christianity; and the specific aim must be to keep this in the forefront as that in which the real dignity and moral elevation of man consist. The rights of the Creator and the creature to have to do with each other are the real question with the enemy. We shall thus "contend earnestly for the faith once delivered to the saints," bringing men face to face with the living God speaking in the Holy Scriptures. The written Word of God is our supreme authority and our only standard. "Let God be true, but every man a liar." Those who fight the Lord’s battles must make up their minds to be scorned and little accounted of on earth; but it is enough that the Lord Jesus approves of any faithful testimony rendered to His name. " Thou hast kept My word, and hast not denied My name," is no little praise in a day when the word of testimony for Christ is being sacrificed to a temporizing and worldly expediency, and when Christ’s name seems no longer to have commanding authority even amongst His own servants. There never was a time when there was more general knowledge about Him in the professing church, with more indifference to Himself,―a saying of " Lord, Lord," and yet not doing the things which He so plainly enjoins. " I will spue thee out of My mouth," is the end of this heartless and unconscionable indifferentism (Revelation 3:14-21). It is very sad that the majority of the theological professors of the day are more or less touched with rationalism, or not inclined to denounce it as incipient infidelity. A great number especially of the younger ministers are reading approvingly the popular literature of the day-which is at the best but theistic, not Christian-and making their sermons on the literary models of Anglican and American preachers of high intellect but more than questionable soundness, the pabulum for which is mainly drawn from German divines and commentators, not one of whose writings is fully orthodox. Thus, straining to become intellectual, they vitiate the truth instead of letting it judge themselves and their hearers. There is no longer, with such, a distinct preaching of Christ Himself as our living Head, and of His cross, the Spirit’s cure for worldliness in Christianity (1 Corinthians 1:1-31; 1 Corinthians 2:1-16; 1 Corinthians 3:1-23; 1 Corinthians 4:1-21.; Galatians 6:12-14). There is thus a letting down of the testimony of our Lord, an avoidance of the offense of the cross, and a mixing up of church and world in every conceivable way; as if it had been the church’s mission to attach the world to itself in all its worldliness, denying all real difference between them, and as if no such word as that uttered by our. Lord, " Ye cannot serve God and mammon," had ever been spoken. The preaching being lowered, the practice is correspondingly low, and professing Christians try to think it right to countenance all sorts of semi-worldly shows and demonstrations, and the scandal occasioned is terrible! But these are merely the fruits of unfaithfulness to Christ. The root is a more serious thing, and will be found to exist in the colorless, non-christian, yea antichristian, teaching to which we have already alluded. Would that it were uncharitable to suppose that there are professors training the future ministers of all the modern churches, who seem themselves never to have lain before a just and holy God in the judgment of their sins by the death of Christ, known by faith and in the living grace of the Holy Ghost. But surely, judged by their writings, some have merely an intellectual knowledge of the Scriptures, just as they would, by their general ability, have become proficients in any other science; and hence they teach their subjects as scientists in theology, not as lost sinners saved by the absolute grace of God. Their writings show that although they may be acquainted with critical and theological works, they are in darkness regarding the drift of Divine revelation, and cannot tell out, as men who have an unction from the Holy One, the testimony of the Holy Ghost in the holy Scriptures to the glory of God’s Son. There is not such a thing as the truth in their teaching, for they do not know it. They cannot help gleaning many true things from their multifarious reading; but, as it was to the theologians of His day that our Lord said, "Ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free;" and again, " Because I tell you the truth, ye believe me not;" so these scientific theologians know a variety of truths, but not the truth; and hence, not having it, they cannot communicate it.. It is not found apart from living contact with the Person of Christ, and the living grace of the Holy Ghost, and the true sayings of God in the holy Scriptures. The truth, being the God-thought in Christ, could these professors tell you scripturally the truth of the nature, person, life, death, intercession, priesthood, headship, kingship, church or kingdom,-present life in heaven, future glory there or reign on earth, of the Christ of God? If not, would it not demonstrate that the truth is not in them? Wherefore Christ, who is " the Truth," being unknown-His person and sacrifice, grace and glory, being misapprehended-they cannot do otherwise than make a sorry business of their professional work, and pour into the youths they misteach principles and doctrines entirely alien from the plan of God for the glory of Christ revealed in the holy Scriptures, as indeed is the whole system of their theology from its foundation to its copestone. And a human system of theology being taught in the colleges, it is in due time transferred to the churches; and if one were going into the churches or chapels over the land, would he not find the homogeneity of the erroneous teaching persistently adhered to? The country is full of this theology: but where is Christ? He is all but unknown as the Holy Ghost has revealed Him in the word of God. And what deliverance can there be since Christ, who delivers us from this present evil world, is unknown? This modern theology and preaching never contemplate separation to God in the knowledge and enjoyment of the Father’s love as new creatures in Christ; but rather a patronizing of modern literature and worldly amusements, and an annexing of the ambitious pursuits of time and sense, veneering them with religion. Hence men practically come to the, conclusion that the Savior’s words, "Ye cannot serve God and mammon," no longer carry with them their former grave meaning of moral impossibility, and they seek to " make the best of both worlds." The godly are at their wits’ end: for their falling in with the recent rage for young unproved professors, because of their alleged intellectual powers, irrespective of divine knowledge of Christ and soul-consuming love to Him and zeal for His glory, has brought them the present harvest of heresy, and the sorrowful impossibility of rooting it out. Every such sowing yields its inevitable harvest. " Be not deceived; God is not mocked; for whatsoever a man soweth,, that shall he also reap" (Galatians 6:7). But many will ask in amazement, Are the professors really unsound? The godly in Scotland and elsewhere have been disquieted in vain if Professor Smith’s article in the Encyclopaedia Britannica on " The Bible " be an orthodox production. And it is not Professor Smith only who is unsound. Are there not other professors in the same ecclesiastical sphere who are gravely suspected of unsoundness in the faith? Of even the lately published course of Cunningham Lectures a review comes from the United States which does not hesitate to characterize the book as " a convenient index to all the follies of half-heathen fathers,’ as well as the modern and semi-heathen dreams of self-satisfied Germans; and an occasion of displaying all its author had read of both. But the writer’s own statements are really painful, so that it is hard to think he has ever realized in truth what Christ is. He talks of the curriculum of Christ’s sufferings;’ of a good understanding between the Father and the Son’! (on the cross, I think); of Son of man being a pet name’ of Christ’s. How can one who uses such language have any sense of what is divine and gracious? It is offensive and revolting to every right feeling. He is, though nominally orthodox, really imbued with the poison of German infidelity, and in some of its worst shapes: his system of doctrine is not the truth, but the restoration of humanity, and connection of Christ, or rather union of Christ, with man in the flesh, in contrast with a risen Christ, the Head of the new creation, to whom we are united by the Holy Ghost. In the Mercersburg theology this is run to seed; but it is the great point in question, a grave and weighty one which lies at the basis of the nature of Christianity, and on which your theological writers are wholly away from Scripture and truth: as are Irving, and ‘Mercersburg,’ and the like. The only consistent representatives, the old pious minds, may have been kept, by the conclusion it led to, from falling grossly into it. No man could treat Beyschlag and others as the lecturer does, with any proper reverence for Christ in his heart; but it is the effect of not drawing from Scripture, and losing faith by theological speculations substituted for it. It is at the root of much error in this day, and is undermining the Presbyterian churches everywhere, where they are not infidel and Socinian." Let it not be supposed that any one body is singled out for assault. Alas the powers of evil now at work are legion; heterodoxy and skepticism in a religious as well as a profane garb are to be found everywhere. But it is no light sign of the times that a church once assumed to be careful of doctrine and discipline seems now lapsing into suicidal compromise on the part of’ her representative men counted godly and orthodox. We gladly own that there are gracious men and godly ministers of Christ in all the ecclesiastical systems, whose hearts beat true to Christ, and whose preaching of the gospel is in the living power of the Holy Ghost; but such faithful men are few, and they are daily vexing their righteous souls; like Lot in Sodom, with the unscriptural doctrine and worldly practices with which they are unhappily connected. It is a living martyrdom for a man who knows and preaches the testimony of God in any measure of fullness to be in any of ’the churches,’ for he will be constantly regarded with suspicion, and treated by his brethren as a speckled bird. This demonstrates the accuracy of our sorrowful affirmation that the truth of Christianity and the faithful confessors of it are now looked upon as intruders and exotics within the entire range of the churches of Christendom. A record of facts such as these, and their consequences, warrant, yea demand, such a periodical as The Bible Witness and Review, that we may bear witness to the truth, and give what help we may be enabled to impart to the saints of God at this solemn crisis. On the one hand, it must continue to be a painful occupation to watch and warn against an every-day departure from the truth and from God. On the other, it will prove a happy employment to point out and invite attention to publications that grasp the grand idea of "the faith of God’s elect," and what it is, and the acknowledging of "the truth which is after godliness," and where, it is! These were the original peculiarities of Christianity, as charged upon Titus (when endangered) by the apostle Paul. They were embodied and ministered first by Christ when on earth, and established with Him in heaven; but are now carried out by the Holy Ghost, as the witness from Him to us, come down to dwell with us, as the "other Paraclete." They are therefore essentially divine in their formation and display, in the midst of God’s elect below, till Christ’s shout bids them rise up to meet Him in the air. This circle of truth, which includes "the testimony of our Lord" to Timothy, and "the faith once delivered to the saints" as by Jude, stands forth in other and new relations towards God and the elect; in contrast with what was old in the former economy of Judaism. For example, ought a Christian now to allow it to be said that "the faith of God’s elect," or "the truth which is after godliness" by Paul, formed any part in the ministry of Moses? Grace, and the calling by grace into oneness with the Second Man in glory above, cannot in their nature be confounded with the recognition " of man in the flesh," placed under the law and covenants, and a worshipper in the "worldly sanctuary"! These and other distinctions must be maintained, to see the order of God in relation to the place of Israel on earth, and the present order of God as regards the church, both as to her place and portion with Christ above. She also is become the vessel of testimony to the world, but on behalf of the rejected Lord and King, till as the bride she is caught up when the marriage of the Lamb is come. The Bible thus, in its two parts, embraces the earth and the heavens, and unites both with Christ in present purpose and final blessing. It also gives the history and destiny of "the families in heaven and earth," as redeemed to God by faith in the precious blood shed on the cross. Held and maintained in its "grace and truth" by the power of the Holy Ghost, it presents the only remedy for a guilty conscience and the heart it has broken in upon in grace and love. It opens out its boundless resources, in the fullness of Christ, to us as believers, so that " the life we live in the flesh we live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved us and gave Himself for us." As ministered on the journey of life, by the grace of Christ, it is the balm for every wound. Jesus sees us, and comes to us where we are, pouring in oil and wine, and takes care of us, for He has traveled over the road that leads from Jerusalem to Jericho for Himself! How we need such a heart as His in a day like this! And is this the foul work that the enemy puts men to do against themselves, not merely to cavil at God because He is so good, but corrupt the Bible, and deny the genuineness of the records which make Him known to us, in the Son of His bosom? The devil can only repeat himself in his history with man-for sin must be against love and light to reach its enormity; and so it was not till after Jesus had dipped the sop and handed it to Judas "that Satan entered into him." "Contend earnestly for the faith once delivered to the saints" is a word in season-’for what is "the faith of God’s elect," or ".the truth which is after godliness," if we are robbed of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost in known relationships? Beyond the sorrows and cares of human life, and whilst in the midst of this evil world, where sin, and death, and Satan reign, the Bible gives us the blessed hope of the Lord’s coming to receive us to Himself, that where He is, there we may be also. The enemy’s malice is to take away this bright hope from the heart that cannot do without it; and to steal from the purged conscience its present peace with God, and to deprive the soul. of its comfort in the Holy Ghost amidst the wear and tear of every-day life. Where is succor to come from, or the hand that can wipe away the tears, or else put them into His bottle, but in the sympathy of the living love of the living Lord above, who is touched with. the feeling of our infirmities? Rude and rough is the hand that would turn any away from the sources of life and strength, outside ourselves, in the Father’s love. In the wilderness our springs are in "the Rock that is higher than we," and daily the manna comes down to us, around our tent, before even the sun is up. God’s first ’care is for his own, and He will be first! Pass we over the Jordan to Gilgal (as having done with works "in the flesh " and with the wilderness), pit is but to know Him better, and ourselves brought nearer. We are upon His: own ground there as heavenly ’mien, and eat the corn of the land. The grapes of Eshcol are ours; and we gather them where they grow. May the land, and the corn and the fruit that grow therein, be the attractive power that keeps the heart and its affections true to Christ, and so satisfied with what satisfies Him at the right hand of God, that our dwelling-place may be far up above the camp and its confusions! True, we shall the more clearly see and understand the shame of the calf and the dancing below, and the outrage of the captain, in the midst of a hesitating people, who propose a return to Egypt, instead of a closer walk with God. In these last days, the deception by " the angel of light," throughout the length and breadth of Christendom, is much in advance and far more dangerous than the " calf" and the " captain" of a visible and material economy. Satan knows how "to transform himself" to suit the character of a spiritual dispensation while the Holy Ghost is in the house. After the church is gone, he will not scruple to come on lower ground, and as " the dragon " of the Apocalypse "-give power to the beast" whom the world will worship, saying, " Who is like ’unto the beast?" " But ye, beloved, building up yourselves on your most holy faith, praying in the Holy Ghost, keep yourselves in the love of God, looking for the mercy of the Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life. And of some have compassion making a difference, and others save with fear, pulling them out of the fire, hating even the garment spotted with the flesh." What a comfort, with unhesitating confidence, and in the Calm repose of faith and hope, which admit of neither doubt nor question, to join in the doxology-" Now unto Him that is able to keep you from falling, and to present you faultless before the presence of His glory with exceeding joy, to the only wise God our Savior, be glory and majesty, dominion and power, now and forever. Amen. FINIS. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 10: VOL 01 - DEATH ABOLISHED ======================================================================== Death Abolished 2 Timothy 1:10.-In this scripture our Savior is represented as having abolished death (here personified, as is sin in Romans 7:1-25.) Of course this does not mean that men no longer die as a fact, but that He has annulled the title of death as regards His own; as in Hebrews 2:1-18 it is declared He took part of flesh and blood, " that, through death, he might destroy (χαταργήσῃ, the same word as here) him that had the power of death, that is, the devil." But He has done more: He has brought to light life and incorruption (the body being in question, and not the soul only) through the gospel. It is not said nor meant that either was absolutely hidden, for enough was suggested for the faith of God’s elect to show that resurrection and heaven were in His mind, and not earthly blessing only, as Matthew 22:23-33, and Hebrews 11:1-40 abundantly prove. Nevertheless, under the law, these were obscure subjects, because the ordinary and normal application of the law was found in present visible rewards or punishments from a God who dwelt between the cherubim on earth. The gospel does not speak of life and incorruptibility as utterly unknown before: on the. contrary, it supposes them to have been partially seen gleaming here and there through the darkness; whereas now they stand out in bold relief, the grand theme of evangelic testimony, as viewed in the person of the Lord Jesus. "Which thing," as St. John says, " is true in Him and in you, because the darkness is passing, and the true light now shineth." ======================================================================== CHAPTER 11: VOL 01 - DELIVERED FROM THE LAW ======================================================================== Delivered From the Law Romans 7:4.-It may be allowed that, in the previous verses which speak of the matrimonial obligation, ceremonial and social laws are alluded to; but in illustration of what? Clearly the Christian’s relation to the law as a whole. Death severs the marriage tie: after that, there is liberty to belong to another. Just so, Christians are dead to the law by the body of Christ, who has in life accomplished it, and in death silenced all its claims for such as bad failed under it. Our position now is, that we belong to another, even to Christ risen from the dead. The fifth verse is clear and positive that the moral law is meant, for it was that especially which provoked the passions or motions of sins in our natural state. " But now we are delivered from the law, being dead to that wherein we were held," etc. I do not deny that the righteousness of the law is fulfilled in the Christian, that he walks in the love of God and of his neighbor, which is the fulfilling of the law; but then it is because he is under grace, and not under law. He is not as a servant under this and that stipulation for so much wages; he is set free in Christ’s death and lives in Christ’s life as risen from the dead-a condition of life which the law cannot touch, however it may fulfill the righteousness of the law, and far more: for we are called to be followers of God in a way which the law never demanded. The Lord grant all his own to understand better their own blessings in His grace, that so their communion may be deeper and more heavenly, and their walk in the same proportion. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 12: VOL 01 - DOCTRINE OF A FUTURE STATE IN THE PENTATEUCH ======================================================================== Doctrine of a Future State in the Pentateuch The Apostle ’Paul tells us that life and immortality (1:e. incorruptibility,ἀφθαρσία) were brought to light by the Gospel. These truths were but dimly made known before, though there had ever been sufficient for faith to lay hold of. Thus, the very first book of the Bible shows us the care and solemnity which the wandering patriarchs attached to their burial (Genesis 23:1-20; Genesis 25:1-34; Genesis 35:1-29; Genesis 47:1-31; Genesis 49:1.); and the Apostle, in writing to the Hebrew Christians, affirms that it was by faith (not fasting, customs, or superstition) Joseph gave commandment concerning his bones. He believed in a God that raiseth the dead, in a God who will surely raise them by and by, and give them a glorious link with the promised land, as well as with the city which hath foundations-the better and heavenly country. Again, our Lord convicted the Sadducees of not knowing the Scriptures, or the power of God as to a future resurrection state, and a present living to God, of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob; and this from God’s words to that Moses who is said by Gibbon to have omitted the doctrine, but who, on the contrary, records this revelation in the same book of Exodus which contains the law of Sinai. (Comp. Luke 20:1-47) I fully admit that there was a considerable measure of obscurity on this, as on many other truths, till He came who was the brightness of the glory of God, and the express image of His substance. But this was in perfect harmony with the Levitical or Jewish system, in which the veil was not yet rent, and God was governing a nation on earth as the vessel of His presence and testimony among the Gentiles. The faith of His elect, of course, penetrated much further, as may be seen in Job 19:1-29; Psalms 16:1-11, etc. But I am now explaining one simple and satisfactory reason why we should not expect a fuller statement of a future existence in the Pentateuch. It is because the main question there is of a people called to know the manifest exercise of righteous government on the part of a God who dwelt, and that even visibly, in their midst. Individual saints saw much more all through;. but God’s government of Israel on the earth is the grand topic of the Old Testament, and the true solution of this seeming difficulty, which is really in perfect keeping with the times, place, people, and circumstances where it occurs. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 13: VOL 01 - EPISTOLARY COMMUNICATIONS: TABERNACLE, COVENANT, AND PUTTING AWAY ======================================================================== Epistolary Communications: Tabernacle, Covenant, and Putting Away Ottawa, America, Oct. 27th, 1876. MY DEAR BROTHER.... I write at once as to Hebrews 9:1-28Διά is used for a state or condition, which affects the principle on which we act or receive anything, on which anything takes place. Thus, Romans 4:11, δἰ ἀχροβυστίας;Romans 2:27, διὰ γράμματορ χαὶ περιτομῆς. So it is in Hebrews 9:11. As to παραγένομενος, though it be having come, it is not the act of coming ἔρχομαι, but being present in or for something by coming; coming into a certain condition, so that He is there, or come in view of what is to be done when arrived. The verb in the sentence is εἰσῆλθεν ἐφάπαξ verse 12. He had taken the position of High Priest of coming good things; and this office was to be fulfilled, not in the present earthly tabernacle, but in a greater and more perfect one. The tabernacle is not, therefore, I think, the incarnation, for His priesthood (save the fact of atonement) was not on earth; it is exercised in connection with heavenly things, though there securing earthly ones for Israel. παραγένομενος is entering into the condition of priesthood, not incarnation or glory, and that is connected with the heavenly tabernacle. The fact of His going in is in 24 as in 12; this referring to eternal redemption, which He had found; that, to the fact of His abiding presence before God there for us; but in both εἰσέεχομαι, the act of going in, not παραγίνομαι, what He had come to be or do, the condition entered into or in view. I do not consider διὰ αἴματος, or τοῦ ἰδίου αἵματοσς as instrumental, but to be used in the sense already referred to. The end of the ages, or consummation of the ages, are all the dealings of God with man to test his general condition. In this general sense the state of innocence comes in; but the proper connection is what is after the fall, yet not looking at man as lost, but testing his state and whether he was recoverable, or was lost and had to be saved. Without law; under law; God manifested in the flesh, were the great features of this. Hence in John 12:1-50 the Lord says, "Now is the judgment of this world." Though there was testimony, there were no religious institutions before the flood, unless the fact of sacrifices. There were after: government, promises to Abraham, showing it was grace to one separated from an idolatrous world and head of a new race, the law, the prophets, and at last the Son as come, not as offered. Then God laid the foundation of His own purposes in righteousness. The difference is that in John 1:29 it is the sin of the world, in Hebrews 9:1-28 it is to put away sin more generally. Neither will have full accomplishment till the new heavens and the new earth. In this last passage we have to distinguish between it and bearing the sins of many. The last concerns us, and purging our conscience. I do not think it has been adequately seen how all good and evil has been brought to an issue in the cross-in that place of sin before God, that is, in Christ made sin (though in the last words it is for us, 2 Corinthians 5:21). We have the absolute wickedness of man and enmity against God in goodness; the complete power of Satan, "your hour and the power of darkness; " the prince of this world leading all men, the disciples having fled; man in his absolute perfection, in whom that prince had nothing, but there was perfect love to the Father and perfect obedience, man in absolute perfection, and that as made sin before God, where it was needed for God’s glory. For it was where He was made sin that the obedience was made perfect, obedient unto death; God absolute in righteousness against sin, and perfect in love to the sinner. This, therefore, is the finished and so immutable ground of eternal perfectness. We cannot say as to the result sin is actually put away, save for us (2 Corinthians 5:1-21) who by the Holy Ghost know it; but the work is perfectly done on the ground of which there will be a new heavens and a new earth wherein dwelleth righteousness. We must not confound " sin" and "sins." He has borne the sins of many (they never can be remembered against us); loved and washed from them in His own blood: our conscience, once purged, is made clean forever. But sin is that alienation of all things, and first of all of our hearts, from God, which requires reconciliation of things in heaven and earth, which is not yet, and of ourselves which is; see Colossians 1:20-21, and many confirmatory passages. Christ then has been manifested for the total abolition of sin out of heaven and earth, defilement and alienation gone, besides our guilt being atoned for and our sins remitted; but both are by His sacrifice, in which God withal has been perfectly glorified in all that He is. The result is not yet wholly accomplished, nor will be fully till the new heavens and the new earth. The χαταχθόνια of Phil. are another thing; they bow but are not reconciled. I say this to avoid mistakes. The burnt-offering alone took the ground of sin, the sin-offering of sins. Romans also, 1: 17-v. 11, treats of sins; 5: 12-end of 8. of sin only, here only as to man on the earth. φέρειν is as to sins, ὁ αἴρων goes on to sin. Sins are borne, sin put away. Of course our sins are wholly taken away, but that is " our." He is never said to have borne the sins of all or of the world, or taken them away, but our sins, or those of many; but He is the ὁ αἴρων of sin out of the universe, the taker-away of it, the result being not yet accomplished. Εἰς ἀθέτησιν is the result proposed, ἠθἑτησε is not said. The work is done, the full result not yet brought about; but it is all in virtue of that, though power comes in to make it good, just as it does in the microcosm of ourselves, even as to the body in due time. As to the question of " covenant" or " testament": " covenant" is always right, save in Hebrews 9:16-17. Even here it has been contested; but it seems more simple to take it as "testament," an observation or allusion by the by, διαθήχη being in Greek covenant or testament or disposition. The voice of τοῦ διαθεμένου has been the great bone of contention where it has been discussed; translated, if covenant, " the appointed " [sacrifice]. But this has seemed to me forced. Some have even made Galatians 3:15-16 "testament," but this, I judge, is entirely wrong. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 14: VOL 01 - EVERY FAMILY ======================================================================== Every Family Ephesians 3:15.-I humbly think that it is wrong to speak of what we lose by giving up a wrong translation for a right one; and it is confessed that " every family" is here required. Sure I am that the true rendering suggests not merely views equally valuable, but much more so than the false one, which has really confused and prejudiced the minds of Christians against that which otherwise might have been apprehended and enjoyed. I do not doubt that the phrase embraces the sum of God’s intelligent creation, at least what is blest, whether in the heavens or on earth, angelic or human. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 15: VOL 01 - FALLEN FROM GRACE: TEXTS MISAPPLIED OR MISQUOTED ======================================================================== Fallen From Grace: Texts Misapplied or Misquoted Galatians 5:4.-Often quoted to prove that Christians may, by falling into sin, jeopard the life which they have got in Christ. But the text speaks of those who had appeared to receive the Gospel letting. slip the grand foundation of God’s grace for ordinances, or, in other words, abandoning the ground of faith for religiousness. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 16: VOL 01 - FOUR CHARACTERISTIC FEATURES OF A CHRISTIAN ======================================================================== Four Characteristic Features of a Christian DEAR BROTHER-I have been interested just lately by what is written in Ephesians 4:30; Ephesians 5:1-3, and send you a few thoughts on it. A Christian in apostolic days was sealed by the Holy Spirit of God, and he knew it. He was forgiven of God, and he was conscious of it. He shared in the love of Christ, and was sensible of it. He was a saint of God, and was reminded of it. Very great were these favors, and for the most part very wonderful; yet each of them could furnish ground on which to base most practical exhortations for every-day life. Sealed by the Holy Spirit of God, the Christian was not to grieve Him. Forgiven of God in. Christ, they were to forgive one another. Loved by Christ, they were to walk in love. As saints, they were to refrain even from the naming among themselves of those unclean ways by which men are so often defiled. Their being thus exhorted showed into what, unless watchful, they might fall. The terms, however, in which they were addressed, proved that they never could be lost. For God had forgiven them, and they were sealed by the Spirit unto the day of redemption. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 17: VOL 01 - FULL ASSURANCE ======================================================================== Full Assurance Allow me to suggest that the common thought as to this phrase in Scripture is incorrect. It is not true that "full assurance of understanding" is the first of the three mentioned by St. Paul, but the last and highest. "Full assurance of faith " is the first: it rests upon the blessed work and sacrifice of Christ as a finished and accepted thing (Hebrews 10:1-39) The next is "full assurance of hope," which looks for and anticipates with joy the time of glory and the inheritance of the promises (Hebrews 6:1-20) "Full assurance of understanding" supposes intelligence of God’s ways in their height and depth, as developed in the mystery of Christ’s heavenly glory, or, as it is said, "to the acknowledgment of the mystery of God." How many there are who are perfectly clear as to their acceptance, and who enjoy the hope of Christ’s return and reign, and yet are most indistinct and uninstructed in "the mystery," as taught in Ephesians and Colossians. So utterly false is it that " the full assurance of understanding," spoken of in Colossians 2:1-23 gives birth to the other two. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 18: VOL 01 - GENESIS ======================================================================== Genesis This first book of the Bible is the remarkable preface, as the Apocalypse is the equally striking conclusion, of the revelations of God. It presents the germ, in one form or another, of nearly all the ways of God and man, which we find separately developed in the suceeding books of Scripture; just as the Apocalypse is the natural close, presenting the ripened fruits even for eternity of all that had been sown from the first, the ultimate results’ of every intervening interference of God and of His enemy. Thus, we have in Genesis the creation of which man is chief (1.); the principles of moral relationship with God and His creatures (2.); the temptation of Satan and his judgment by the seed of the woman; sin against God and man (and especially against Christ in type), sacrifice and worship, the world and the household of faith (3. 4.); the heavenly and the earthly testimonies to Christ’s coming (5.); the apostasy of man (6.); God’s warning by His Spirit and judgment in the deluge, with the salvation of a spared remnant in the ark, and mercy to the creature (7.); reconciliation in its relation to the earth and not to man only (8.); God’s covenant with creation (9.); government and the history of the present world in its early rise and progress (10. 11.); the call and promises of God, and the history of the called (12.); the heavenly and earthly callings (13.); the Melchizedec priesthood (14.); the Jewish portion unfolded and confirmed, with the disclosure of long oppression previously from those who are to be specially judged (15.); the typical introduction of the law or Hagar covenant (16.); and the intervention of God’s grace sealed by circumcision, and displayed in the heir of promise (17.); whose further announcement is linked with the divine judgment about to fall once more, and with intercession as the due place of those who, outside the evil, enjoy communion with God (18.); salvation so as by fire out of the tribulation and judgment which swallow up the ungodly (19.); failure of the faithful in maintaining their real relationship before the world (20.); the son of promise is born, and the child of the law, according to the flesh, is cast out, followed by the world’s submission instead of reproof (21.) Then follows the grand shadow of Christ’s death, as the provision of the Father’s love, and His resurrection (22.); the covenant form of blessing disappears (23.); and the calling of the bride for the risen bridegroom ensues (24.) Finally is seen the sovereign call of him, afterward named Israel, who is identified with the sorrows, wanderings, and ultimate blessing of that people (25.-1.); with the striking episode of his son Joseph, who is first rejected by his brethren after the flesh, and suffers yet more at the hands of the Gentiles; next is exalted (as yet unknown to his natural kindred) to the right hand of the throne; and lastly is owned in glory by the very brethren who had rejected him, but now owe all to his wisdom and majesty and love. Genesis is at once a book of matchless simplicity to him who glides over its surface, and of infinite depth to him who searches into the deep things of God. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 19: VOL 01 - GOD'S EARTHLY CENTER ======================================================================== God’s Earthly Center Deuteronomy 32:8.-The truth taught is plainly confirmed by the rest of the Old Testament, that Israel is God’s earthly center, around whom the nations are yet to revolve, when the Messiah takes His kingdom here below; for the Jews (not the church, which has higher hopes) are the objects of God’s counsels, as regards the earth and the nations. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 20: VOL 01 - GREATER THAN JOHN THE BAPTIST ======================================================================== Greater Than John the Baptist Matthew 11:2-3.-I apprehend that one reason which has hindered many from seeing the failure of John Baptist is, that we are all slow in learning and owning our own weakness. The heart that has proved its own faltering in devotedness and testimony for Christ, will readily understand how John, as Well as his disciples, may have been cast down, when the herald of Messiah was himself bound and gone to prison in sorrow, instead of the ransomed of the Lord coming to Zion with songs and everlasting joy upon their heads. But if the Lord notices indirectly, in verse 6, the stumbling of His tried servant (or certainly the blessedness of him who is not stumbled), He turns round to the multitude and graciously indicates the more than prophet place of John 1:1-51 do not believe that verse 11 contains the least reflection on the Baptist, any more than verse 13 does on all the prophets. On the contrary, the former verse asserts for him the most distinguished place possible in the old economy; while it discloses at the same time the surpassing glory which attaches to the least in the kingdom of heaven (1:e. the new dispensation, which was then preached, but only set up when the Lord, rejected by the earth, took his seat in heaven). I am aware that some shrink from what appears such strange and undue exaltation of the New Testament saints; but our wisdom is to accept whatever God gives in sovereign love. It is His to order all for the glory of His Son, while Satan would cheat us of His blessings through a spurious humility, which is really unbelief; especially as the privileges given are the measure of responsibility. If we lose sight of what God intends, we shall proportionately fail in our walk and worship. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 21: VOL 01 - GREEK WORD TRANSLATED FOREVER, DIENEKES ======================================================================== Greek Word Translated Forever, Dienekes I am of opinion that εἰς τὸ διηνεχές, " forever," ought to be construed in this verse, not with προσενέγχας θυςἱαν, but with ἐχάθισεν χ.τ.λ(1:e. with " sat down"). It is not exactly a question of the general sense, for there is good sense either way; and still less does it turn upon Greek construction, for the words might be taken before or after the verb or participle, as it seems to me. The real point is the special contrast of vers. 11, 12. Instead of offering oftentimes the same sacrifices, Christ has offered once: instead of standing daily ministering for man, He has forever sat down at the right of God. Of course this expression, " forever," is not absolute, but relative to the work of atonement. He is seated in perpetuity before God, because His sacrificial work is done perfectly for man. As to the abuse, justly objected to, the aorist cuts off the force which Papists, and those who think with them, might give it, for where continuous offering is intended the present tense is employed, as in verse 1. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 22: VOL 01 - GUILT AND GRACE ======================================================================== Guilt and Grace Romans 5:15-17.-No exposition of this passage which I have seen has appeared to me quite satisfactory. My opinion is, that every one of these verses contains a separate thought, which is fitted, by its position and progression, to magnify the grace of God. The apostle is illustrating the leading truth of the Christian system, justification by divine righteousness accomplished in Christ; and, in order to establish conclusively the gratuitous nature of it, he draws his illustration from the way in which we became guilty, viz. by the guilt of Adam’s first sin. As we are reckoned by God, and treated, as in fact guilty persons, before we do anything personally to involve us in guilt, so we are reckoned by God as righteous persons, and are treated as such, before we do anything to make us righteous. There is thus a striking analogy or resemblance between guilt and grace -the fall and the restoration. But the apostle begins to show, at verse 15, that this analogy does not hold in all respects: " But riot as the offense so also is the free gift." This he does by showing that the side of the parallel formed by materials drawn from the new and gracious dispensation is the broader, deeper, and more outstanding and noticeable. It illustrates grace superabounding and triumphing over guilt in three particulars 1. In its provision (verse 15); 2. In its communication (verse 16); and 3. In its consummation (verse 17). 1, The Source.-Verse 15 points us to the fountain-head or source of sin and righteousness; of guilt and grace. There is evidently a comparison of stocks or stores in this verse; and grace gets a triumph over guilt when we look to Jesus, in whom, as in a storehouse, all fullness of it dwells. If we are condemned for the sin of Adam, a mere creature like ourselves, shall we not much More be justified by grace for the sake of the Divine One, Jesus, who is "full of grace and truth"? If natural connection with the creature has brought us so much evil, much more shall spiritual connection with the God-man, Jesus Christ, bring us good. 2. The Communication.-Verse 16 shows that the communication of grace far exceeds the communication of guilt. Adam shares what is his with his race, so Christ shares what belongs to Him with. His seed; but the righteousness which believers enjoy in Him covers far more than the guilt they inherit from Adam, for by Christ we are justified not only from the guilt of this one sin, but also from the aggravated guilt which we have contracted by our " many offenses," 1:e. all our sins. Besides, we were involved in Adam’s guilt by generic necessity; we are put in possession of righteousness in Christ as " a free and gracious gift." 3. The Consummation.-Verse 17. Here we have the rich excess of grace over guilt in its consummation, or in what it will do for believers when communicated to them and possessed by them. The point contained in this verse is this: If all connected with Adam are made subject to death for his one offense, much more shall all connected with Christ (who receive abundance of grace and of the gift of justification) not only have their original condemnation to death removed, but also reign in life with Him, on account of His obedience even unto death, and his resurrection, as their representative and living head, to the enjoyment of an endless life. Their connection with Jesus not only frees them from death, but it gives them a right to life, not only here, but in the glorious kingdom to come: " Being reconciled, we shall be saved by His life." He is now possessed of an ever-during life in resurrection, and all believers are sharers with Him in this life, for " He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life." Just as death began in Adam the moment he sinned, so life begins, in believers the moment they believe in Christ: ". God hath given unto us eternal life, and this life is in His Son." And as the time is fast approaching when Jesus, the Son of God, who once suffered for sins, shall return to reign, all His saints shall then reign in life with Him: "For as in Adam all die, so in Christ shall all be made alive." "Thou hast redeemed us, and made us unto our God kings and priests, and we shall reign on the earth." The analogy being thus explained, limited, and illustrated, the apostle resumes his argument, and sums up the whole matter in verses 18 and 19, which contain his main position, which, in nearly the words of these verses, may be thus stated:-" As by one offense of one all connected with that one are condemned; so by the accomplished righteousness of one all connected with Him have `justification of life.’ For as by the disobedience of the one (the representative) the many (the represented) were constituted sinners, so by the obedience of the one (the representative) will the many (the represented) be constituted righteous." I should be glad to see the above passage in Romans thoroughly examined by you and your correspondents. It is one of the most vital, seeing that it forms the keystone of the gateway of grace. [See a paper by another writer at p. 348. -Ed.] ======================================================================== CHAPTER 23: VOL 01 - HAVE WE A REVELATION FROM GOD?* ======================================================================== Have We a Revelation From God?* IT is evidently an all-important question, Have we a revelation from God? a communication of His thoughts on which we can rely? Is there nothing certain, nothing certainly known, nothing which enables. me to say, I have God’s truth? Have I from God such a revelation of His mind as is authentic and authoritative, such that I can know from Himself what God is? (*Encyclopceclia Britannica. Ninth Edition. Article " Bible.") I cannot trust in man. Man who has not had such a revelation is lost in what degrades human nature. I cannot trust the church or doctors. They too have their history, and what a history it is!--and in these days they are a reed which, if a man lean on it, breaks and pierces the hand. Where am I to turn to be able to say, Here I have the truth I can love and rest on? Here is what God has given me from Himself? To have this I must have two things-a revelation from God, if every man is a liar, here is truth. But I must have it also communicated authentically to be able to reckon it. It is a matter of fact that men have not known God, nor His character, without a revelation. Universal heathenism, civilized and uncivilized, is the witness of it. They have not liked retaining Him in their knowledge when He was revealed to them. It is no use telling me that the worship of Lingm and Yoni, of cats and monkeys and fetishes, is a true knowledge of God. It may prove that man wants a God, that he cannot help having one; but, if so, that he cannot find Him, or will not have Him. The case then stands thus: I look all around to find God and His truth. The heathen cannot point Him out; I cannot find man among them that is not degraded. He deifies his passions and adds degradation to them. I am told perhaps, But Plato, does he tell us nothing of God? Well, if I leave the universal heathenism, and enclose myself in the narrow groves of the academy, I find one who teaches the grossest communism, women and all, and makes men and women a mere stock for breeding human beings for the republic, and holds that the supreme God can have no direct communication with the creature; but that it must be by demons, and immediately, perhaps, the λόγος. He was, with the Rabbinical Jews, strange to say, the inventor of purgatory. The later forms of it brought in Arianism. I cannot find it among Mahomedans, nor their paradise of Houris above and the sword below. The Koran, which on the face of it is a wretched imposition-revelations invented for the occasion that called for them-the Koran or the sword is not a revelation of God, save as a judicial scourge of Christendom. The Jews cannot tell me of God, cast out from Him according to their own Scriptures. Am I to learn it in the intrigues of the Jesuits, rendering every nation under heaven restless? or in the infallibility of the Pope, which nobody, but grossly ignorant partizans, believes and history gives the lie to? am I to worship the golden idols of the mother of God set up on steeples and highways where there is power to do so? Is this to be my resting-place? Shall I turn to Protestants? But the mass of teachers amongst them are infidels in most parts. Perhaps I may have the choice of Puseyism or liberalism, or countless opinions and heresies which contradict and destroy each other. Am I told that there is a real consent in the evangelical creeds? I do not quite admit it; Luther did not think so. They all agree in one thing-baptismal regeneration. But if I inquire whether the teachers believe in the formularies they sign-not one of them: they are obsolete. What am I to do? Say with Pilate, What is truth? and wash my hands in despair and give up Christ to His enemies? But we have the word of God to rest on. Ah, here there-is something-God worthily revealed. But-`the most unkindest cut of all’-it is not, I am now told, the word of God. It is a compilation of various traditions and documents some seven or eight centuries after it professes to be Written, drawn God knows whence (only not from Him), and by God knows whom; partly a law produced some seven or eight hundred years after it professed to be written, with some of its documents recognized as already existent, perhaps, at that date; professed prophecies put together by some compiler frequently under some name they do not belong to; a long conflict having subsisted between the moral element and the ceremonial or priestly, but the former got the victory in Ezra’s time, but only then, though they never had the law as it is till Josiah’s time! and yet, strange to say, they got the victory only to fix the nation in ceremonialism and the authority of priestly tradition which it had never been before! Besides the two chief documents, however, from which the early history is compiled, and other parts suited to them by the compiler, another author has been discovered whose writings are intermingled with the two chief ones, and whose object is to attach importance to the progenitors of northern Israel. Prophets claim an intuition coming from God; still their great object was not future events. Such are the Scriptures. They are, if we are to believe these learned men, not the word of God, but an uncertain compilation flowing from the progress of ’Israel’s history, partly from priests, under whom the laws grew up, never complete till Ezra, partly from prophets contending with their principles (not, mind, with their sins against God or their breaches of the law, it was not formed yet), partly from lay life in the midst of the people. These are the factors (that is the word) of the Old Testament. As to the New: well, four epistles may be Paul’s, the expression of the higher spiritual life in the Christian; the rest spurious or doubtful, and much of it comparatively a modern attempt to reconcile the Pauline and Petrine factions in the Church, or a late fruit of Alexandrian philosophy and reveries or Jewish symbolism. It is no great wonder if a very large body of the French Protestant clergy declared they would sign nothing, no Apostles’ Creed, nor anything else; they supposed men would have to believe something, but they did not know what it was yet; and the poor laity, not so learned, but more of babes, said, as I know them to have done, " Pourtant, si nous sommes des Chreti3ens, nous faut un Christ quelconque" (Well, but if we are Christians, we must have some kind of Christ). Such is the point to which what is called the church has brought us. Not now priestly ceremonies and traditions combated and corrected by prophets professing divine intuition, but priestly and ecclesiastical ceremonies and traditions bringing weariness to the spirit (where it does not rush to popery as a refuge), merging into heartless and flippant infidelity, living in a speculative pseudo- historical outside, without one spiritual apprehension of the divine substance of what lies at their door and before their heart-speculations which last some twenty years or so, first Paulus’ gross denial of miracles and resurrection, then Strauss with his mythical Christ, and then Baur and the Tubingen school, the false speculative fancies of which are already judged, and given up;* and now the later forms of these and De Wette and the like, warmed up anew for Scotland; as the English in such things generally do when they have passed their day in their native country. (*That I may not be thought from scriptural prejudice to overstate the judgment formed on Baur’s theory, I may refer to a laudatory article on Baur in the columns of the Encyclopedia Britannica, in which the article of Professor Smith which has given rise to these remarks is found. " Unhappily," so the article closes, " his own opinions were influenced, not merely by his study of facts, but by a great speculative system which dominated his intelligence and prevented him from seeing," etc.) It is admitted that Professor Smith has exaggerated what a child may see in Scripture, and, I add, through ignorance of Scripture not understood it, and that his system as to the books of the New Testament cannot hold water. I shall be told that for all that Astruc’s theory and Baur’s reasoning have produced, an immense effect. They have in those not taught of God; not in substituting any certain system, but in turning lifeless. dogmatism into speculative infidelity and skepticism. And where is the word of God? where it always was, as light is in the sun. Men may have found olive leaves, and these be broken up into small patches of light, or hang over the spots in a way not to be explained. It may be found that the spots are coincident with auroras and magnetic disturbances; but those who have eyes walk, as they ever did, in its full and clear divinely-given light. It shines as it ever did, and the entering in of the word gives light and understanding to the simple. They have a nature that can estimate it in the true character God gave it, which these learned men have not; for He hides these things from the wise and prudent, and reveals them unto babes. " They shall be all taught of God," is the declaration of the Lord and the prophet for those who can hear. That the Old Testament Scriptures were collected into their present form a good while before the Lord was on earth, no one is interested in contesting; indeed, far from it, for Christ owns the divisions which now exist. Attributed to the great Sanhedrim, on (it is said) insufficient ground, or referred to Ezra, they were at any rate so collected; though Mr. Smith slurs it quickly over to refer to’ doubts as to Esther. Josephus is very express. There are not, he tells us, a multitude of books, but just twenty-two: that they had histories and writings after Artaxerxes, but they had not the same authority, they were not tested by prophets. That the books were collected, we can thank God for. Whether the history of Ruth be connected with Judges, or the Lamentations with Jeremiah, or relegated to the Ketubim, is of no sort of consequence. Their ’place in the history is plain upon the face of them. It is not to the believer a question who wrote Ruth. He receives them as the word of God. God is their author. It is, as Matthew expresses it, ὑπὸ Κυξίου διὰ τοῦ πξοφήτου- of the Lord by the prophet. It is also true that, in collecting the books, short notes may have been added, such as, There they are to this day, or other brief note of the kind. Such there are, interesting as divinely-given history, but in no way affecting the revelation. The book clearly shows that as a whole it is inspired and ordered in its structure by God; and when all this was done to make it a whole, this divine ordering of God’s hand and wisdom may be in such notes as elsewhere. The question is, Is this book given to us of God as a revelation, given to us as it is? Is what is in it revealed of God, or man’s thoughts? The book professes to be an account of all God’s ways from the creation (and even in purpose before it) till the Lord comes, and even to the end of time, till God can say γέγονε, It is done; I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the ending. It professes further to give us a revelation of the Father in the Son. Is this immense undertaking, a revelation of God, or a development of national life in a little petty nation, for our learned men can see no more? No man bath seen God at any time: the only-begotten Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, He bath declared Him. Is that a revelation of God or not? That is, is the account I have of it of God, as God has given it to us? for otherwise it is no revelation to me or to any one else. Serious questions these. The very undertaking proves its source. Had man done it, what should we have had? What have we outside this wondrous book? Their theory is, it is an imposture; for giving statements hundreds of years later than their alleged date, as if all were written by inspiration at that date, is an imposition, and this from a nation constantly running into idolatry, and condemned by the book! And further (can any but learned men be blessed with such credulity?) persuading the people whom the forgers were condemning by it, that they had always had this law as a law from God Himself, when, if these doctors and the Josiah theory be true, they never had had it at all, it was bran new, or some old traditions furbished up from different old documents for the occasion; and remark further- for this we must now look into-that Christ and His apostles either from God confirmed the delusion or deceived the people, and all those they taught, on purpose! That an imposture, moreover, is the holiest production that ever appeared in the world, bearing to every one that has any moral sensibilities a divine stamp upon it, which nothing else in the world has, credat Judaeus Apelles. As Rousseau said, it would have been a greater miracle for man to invent such a life as Christ’s, than to be it. I will touch on some of the grounds they build their theory on; but I first turn to the book itself. First of all, it is treated as a whole by Christ and His apostles as having a well-known and specific character. "The Scripture cannot be broken" (John 10:35). "Then opened he their understanding, that they should understand the Scriptures" (Luke 24:45). " Search the Scriptures" (John 5:39). They were a recognized collection which the Lord owned. And, yet more precisely, owned as we have them now and the Jews had them then. All things must be fulfilled which are written in the Law of Moses, and in the Prophets and in the Psalms, concerning Me. Here is the Torah, Nebiim, and the Ketubim,-the three divisions which the Jews distinguish by the Gradus Mosaicus, Gradus Propheticus, and the Bath Kol; in the two first, authorized by Numbers 12:6-8, the latter human, in which their idea is that the writer, though inspired, expressed the sentiments animating his own mind, not knowing that all that was contained in it was the mind of the Holy Ghost; which is doubtless true often in such books as the Psalms. Christ owned, then, what we call the Old Testament, and owned it as we and the Jews have it. But He goes farther; He owns them according to their present character and authors. "Hid not Moses give you the law, and yet none of you keepeth the law?" (John 7:19). " Moses, therefore, gave you circumcision, not because it is of Moses, but of the fathers" (22). There is one that accuseth you, even Moses in whom ye trust; for had ye believed Moses, ye would have believed Me; for he wrote of Me. But if ye believe not his writings, how shall ye believe My words? " (John 5:45-47). " If he called them gods, unto whom the word of God came, and the Scripture cannot be broken " (10: 35). This alludes to the Judges being called Elohim in Hebrew. They shall bring him to the "judges" being very commonly Elohim in, god or gods. "Abraham said unto him, They. have Moses and the prophets, let them hear them. And he said, Nay, Father Abraham; but if one went unto them from the dead, they will repent. And he said unto him, If they hear not Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded though one rose from the dead " (Luke 16:29-31). How true it has been with these poor Jews and these unhappy infidels! Christianity and the resurrection of the Lord are of no avail if Moses and the prophets are not believed, and believed in their writings, for surely they had them. " He wrote of Me. If ye believe not his writings, how shall ye believe My words?" Remark further here that Septuagint translations, the " Compiler’s" additions, and all that these speculators allege, were there then the same as now, the same collection, the collection as we have it; and Christ owned and insisted on the authority of that, and that as being Moses’ writings. But further, after His resurrection, not even when dealing with Jews who owned them, but of and from Himself for His disciples, the risen Lord, "beginning at Moses and all the prophets, expounded to them in all the Scriptures the things concerning Himself" (Luke 24:27). Think of the risen Christ expounding to his disciples a set of ill-compiled and contradictory old documents, pretended to be Moses and the prophets. But this is not all; they will say perhaps-for what will the folly of learned infidelity not say?-they were only the things concerning Himself which He selected. "These are the words which I spake unto you while I was yet with you, that all things must be fulfilled which were written in the law of Moses, and in the Prophets, and in the Psalms, concerning Me. Then opened He their understanding that they might understand the Scriptures, and said unto them, Thus it is written." Ah! the written word is what He valued. Only just think of the risen Lord opening with divine power His disciples’ understanding to understand a spurious compilation professing to be written by Moses and others! That He should do so that we might understand the Divine Word we can well conceive, and, if taught of God, we know the need of it; but to do it for an imposition, pretending to be what it is not, an infidel speculator alone would believe. But the "unjust knoweth no shame." Again, the Lord recognizes the prophets as we have seen, and specifies the one most called in question, Daniel, " the abomination of desolation spoken of by Daniel the prophet." The reading is called in question in Mark, but not in Matthew, and the reading in Mark confirms the genuineness in Matthew, and further recognizes the commandments as given by Moses to be spoken by God; for God commanded, saying, Honor thy father and thy mother (Matthew 15:4); and again Isaiah (verse 7), Well did Esaias prophesy concerning you, saying.. This is in the first part. But He takes up also the second part of the " Great Unnamed." There was delivered to Him the book of the prophet Esaias, and when He had opened the book, He found the place where it was written (ah! that is the word), The Spirit of the Lord is upon me And He began to say, This day is this Scripture fulfilled in your ears. He was content to accept it as Isaiah, and affirms, what is of far more importance, and only really so, that it was of God Himself (Luke 4:17-21). In. the same chapter He authenticates the books of Kings and the history of Elijah and Elisha. He indirectly authenticates again the last part of Isaiah (Luke 7:27) in the prophecy of John Baptist (Isaiah 40:3). I need hardly quote more passages. The discourses, life, and outgoings of the Lord’s soul, though going necessarily far beyond it, and showing it was to be set aside, as under the old covenant, for the accomplishment of far more glorious counsels, that the law and the prophets were until John, since then the kingdom of heaven was preached, -the whole discourses and life of Jesus, I repeat, if the Gospels be read in simplicity of heart, will be found interwoven with the truth of the law and the prophets as they are presented to us in ordinary Bibles, authenticating them as they are, so that you must tear away all the revelation of Christ in them to remove the authority of the law and the prophets. He did not come to destroy but to fulfill them. Fulfill what? A poor compilation of Ezra’s time, or fragmentary documents made up by man, gradually grown up into a law unknown at the beginning? or the word of God given by inspiration to Moses and those whom Jehovah had sent? He was born in Bethlehem, because by God’s will the prophet had said so. He dies, because if not, how then shall the Scriptures be fulfilled that thus it must be? Till heaven and earth passed, not one jot or one tittle would in anywise pass from the law till all be fulfilled. I may turn then to the servants of Christ when He had been rejected, the apostles and writers of the New Testament, The apostles, those authorized and sent by Him to announce Christian truth, and inspired by the Holy Ghost for this service, and the other inspired writers of the New Testament affirm, or, which in a certain aspect is stronger, assume, everywhere that the Old Testament, as we and the Jews (enemies of Christianity, but in this witnesses with it) have it, is an inspired record, written by those to whom it is ascribed, and given of God. I can understand that the Baurs and Smiths (who, as rocks that, originating nothing, can only repeat a sound, echo them) think themselves more competent to tell us what Christianity and the truth is than Christ and his apostles. I have met such, men who did not scruple to say so, though checked somewhat by the scandal so speaking of Christ gave; I have met them in Europe and the United States; but all are not quite fit for that yet. Such thoughts are soon sunk in the deep sea of lifeless infidelity. Let us inquire then what the apostles or others do say. And first I will take what are called the great epistles of Paul, what Baur takes as the sure ground of historical Christianity. To begin with the Romans, though chronologically the last of the four. Paul, he tells us, was separated to the gospel of God which He had promised before by the prophets in the Holy Scriptures concerning His Son Jesus Christ our Lord, made of the seed of David according to the flesh. Here holy Scriptures, holy writings are owned; the prophets are God’s prophets; and the whole system announced by them of the promise to the Seed of David running through the prophetic writings and Psalms, from Samuel and all the prophets, is fully and clearly owned. Paul founds his own teaching on them, adding of course the fact of the resurrection. What advantage had the Jew? Much every way, but chiefly what?-that unto them were committed the oracles of God. Such were these holy writings. The special blessing, and they had many, was that they had the oracles of God. Poor Paul! to be so dark, untaught, as I have heard such say, by modern science. But what was the force of this?-man’s unbelief could not make the faith of God of none effect. These oracles were so thoroughly of God that His faithfulness was involved in them, in making them good. But He shows Jews and Gentiles all under sin. How is that? It is written 10). The Psalms and Isaiah are warrant for the assertion, and as to the text, the "Great Unnamed" has the passage. (Isaiah 59:1-21) It may be wearisome to quote so many texts, but they show that it was not merely a quotation to support a point, but that the apostles lived in and based their teaching on what modern rationalists deny. What (Romans 4:1-25) saith the Scripture? Abraham believed God, etc. Here Genesis is authenticated as the Scripture, the word of God. Next David describeth the blessedness of this man. Here the Psalms are authenticated. Again, 5: 14: it is Genesis 5:13. Death reigned from Adam to Moses. This was until the law. Here the whole history of Genesis as to the fall of Adam under a law as to the forbidden fruit, no law till Moses, but death reigning by Adam’s fall, then the law being given by Moses changing the ground on which man stood, not as to sin and death but as to transgression, when there was (as in the two cases of Adam and Moses) an actual law, is treated not merely as a Jehovistic or Elohistic fragmentary compilation, but as God’s account of man’s whole moral standing with Himself till grace was rejected, in the gospel prophesied of indeed, but now actually meeting man’s need as taught by the apostle in this epistle, which, precious as it is, it is not my business to enter into now. I pass over some passages confirmatory of this use of the Old Testament, and stop for a moment at chap. 9. Here Israel are dear to Him as having law and promises, and even Christ as concerning the flesh. But where was all this shown to be so when they were a rejected people? Not as though the word of God had taken none effect; and then all the history of Genesis is treated as the word of God, and the account in Exodus is cited, first, as declaring that God spoke to Moses, and then as to the history of Pharaoh. And here it is as Scripture says it. This is for Paul the same as God saying it. Next Hosea is cited as the word of God. " He saith in osee." Esaias also crieth, quoted as of the same authority as God speaking in Osee; and this estimate of Scripture we shall find uniform. If he quotes the law (10.), Moses describeth the righteousness which is of the law. And here note Deuteronomy is quoted as what Moses says. For the learned men this is the Deuteronomic law first recognized by Jeremiah in Josiah’s time. Perhaps from the latest hand of all, at least if we are to believe Graf. But farther it appears that the " Great Unnamed" was for Paul Isaiah himself. For Esaias saith, Lord, who bath believed our report? (Isaiah 53:1-12) Then Deuteronomy is again quoted as written by Moses, and the " Great Unnamed" again as Esaias, who is very bold (Isaiah 65:1-25) Then we have the book of Kings authenticated (Romans 11:1-36) God has not cast away His people. How can I know this is God’s mind? Wot ye what the Scripture saith of Elias?.. But what saith the answer of God unto him? I can reckon on the Scripture as giving me God’s mind and purpose. So if Israel be blinded for a time it is written (11: 8), quoting Deuteronomy 29:1-29.; " And David saith;" so the Psalms were a true testimony or God to what was going to happen. Again in Romans 15:1-33 we find Deuteronomy quoted as He;" that is, in the formula of quotation, the Scripture is God speaking. The Psalms and Isaiah himself are quoted as the word of God. In Corinthians, a book of church details, the quotations are not so many, but it shows that it is taken for granted it is divine. The law is the law of Moses (9: 9); and this is God’s mind, taken for granted as being so. "Doth God take care for oxen? " What Moses taught was what God taught. The history of the Exodus and the wilderness was God’s history of His people, and His dealings with them recorded for our instruction (1 Corinthians 10:1-14). Again (11: 9), the creation of Adam and Eve (Genesis 2:1-25) is quoted as a divine account sufficient to build moral duties on. In chap. 15: 54, 55; Isaiah and another of the prophets are quoted as fulfilled in resurrection. In 2 Corinthians 3:1-18 the account of Moses veiling his face is quoted from Exodus as showing the true character of the law, and Israel’s state. Galatians gives us the same testimony. Take chap. 3. The Pentateuch is referred to as a sure and certain testimony for faith, and Scripture spoken of as God Himself, being His word. "The Scripture foreseeing that God would justify the heathen through faith," than which nothing can be stronger as to the inspired apostle’s estimate of it. Nor is this all. The teaching of Genesis, and promises there made and confirmed (Gen. 12: 22.), and the history of Mount Sinai, are taken in their order as the basis of God’s ways. A promise made unconditionally could not be disannulled or modified by additions 430 years after, and all this identified with its fulfillment in Christ in due time. The place the law holds in God’s ways, and the epochs of it, are made the basis of his argument and of the true character of Christianity. The promise was what God gave, Christ was its fulfillment, the law came in between, 430 years after the promise, added because of transgressions, till the Seed should come to whom the promise was made. What for the rationalist is an uncertain compilation of uncertain fragments, the development of national life, is for the inspired apostle the orderly revelation, as it is given in our Bibles, of God’s ways, His own revelation of them historically, so as to form the basis of the true character of Christianity which was in question among the Galatians. The accounts of Hagar and Sarah are for him sure ground to stand upon. Nor has he ever any other thought. If he answers to King Agrippa, he spoke none other things than those which the prophets, and Moses in the law, did say should come. Finally, we find in 2 Timothy 3:1-17 a formal testimony to the holy Scriptures, when the church should have the form of godliness and deny the power, with the direct declaration that all Scripture was given by inspiration of God. John gives us the formal testimony that the law was given by Moses; and John the Baptist’s declaration, quoting the latter part of Isaiah as being of him, and himself the fulfillment of it, as a sure prophecy, and of God. Moses in the law and the prophets did write is recorded as a known and received truth; the Psalms equally so. In chap. 2. " the zeal of thine house hath eaten me up." Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness (chap. 3.) What Moses gave (the manna) was not the true bread from heaven; where Exodus and the Psalms are alike authenticated. " It is written in the prophets " is sufficient for the Lord Himself; not a bone was broken, that the Scripture might be fulfilled; and His side was pierced that another Scripture might be fulfilled, quoting Isaiah. They shall look on Him whom they have pierced (chap. 19.) Peter on the day of Pentecost rests on the authority of Joel, of David in Psalms 16:1-11 (Acts 2:1-47) Moses it was who promised the prophet like himself. Yea, Samuel and all the prophets had spoken of those days, and all the holy prophets are brought in declaring the future blessing that was to come, the heavens receiving Jesus till then. The second Psalm was being fulfilled (4: 25). Peter formally declares that the Spirit of Christ was in the prophets, who studied their own prophecies to know what He (1 Peter 1:11) did signify in them, and quotes Isaiah, what is contained in the Scripture, as of sure authority, warranting what was now going on (2: 6). He accepts the account of the flood in Noah (3: 20). The Gospel of Matthew [which specially presents Christ to us as the Messiah of the promises, Emmanuel, and, on His rejection, the substitution of the kingdom in mystery (13.), the church (16.), the kingdom in glory (17.)] bases, I may say, all its statements on the testimonies of the old prophets. Christ is Son of David, Son of Abraham. So numerous are the quotations that I can only notice the formal character of them, and one or two in particular. The formal character is spoken of (ὑπὸ) the Lord by (διὰ) the prophet, a definite assertion of their true character. He quotes some as giving the events happening, ἵνα order that" the prophecy might be fulfilled, ὅπως "so that" there was a fulfillment, τότε " then" when it is only a case in point. The latter part of Isaiah is " Esaias the prophet." I need hardly quote more from the writers of the New Testament, besides a multitude of allusions in those I have referred to, to show that Christ and the apostles accepted the Bible as we have it (I mean the collection of the books of the Old Testament as a whole) as of divine authority, as the word of God, inspired, and of absolute authority with them. It is that by which the Lord overcame Satan, to which Satan resorted to cover his guile. Man had to live by every word which proceeded out of the mouth of God.1 Such is Scripture to the believer by its own intrinsic authority, and the words of Christ and the apostles carry an evidence which no cavils of infidelity can shake, while they call themselves Christians; and the authority of Christ Himself and of the apostles weighs more than the speculations of men, based by each on some new fancy of his own, and, though helping on infidelity as it passed and the ruin of man’s hopes, passing away with the influence of the mental energy which created it. I only, in addition, beg my reader to remark that these quotations authenticate the writings and the writers, and the writings as being those of the writer whose name they bear, as well as the truths contained in them as given of God, and that with the authority of Christ and His apostles. We are left then, according to this system, with no certainty at all as to any truth of God. Objectors have subtilly spoken of authority, but there is no certainty. Not even the statements of the Lord Jesus and the apostles give us any; and, if not, these are uncertain and unauthoritative too, and we are left to the dark mists of infidelity and a world which has historically proved itself wicked and blind, without one sure communication from God. Before I turn to the more interesting and instructive proofs of the unity of the Old Testament from internal proofs, it may be well to consider for a little the article which gives occasion to these comments. It seems to me slovenly both in substance and in form. On the latter I need not dwell; but when a writer tells us of Jesus speaking of the new dispensation founded on His death as a New Covenant, citing 2 Corinthians 11:25, I am justified in saying it is slovenly. I thought this might be a misprint, but I really cannot make out to what he This, as all the Lord’s replies to Satan, is quoted from Deuteronomy, as the word of God-words proceeding out of God’s mouth, sufficient for Him, and sufficient to leave Satan without reply refers. No scripture ever calls this dispensation a New or the New Covenant, though we get all the blessings of it spiritually. Christ’s blood in the institution of the Lord’s Supper is called the blood of the New Covenant; and Paul (2 Corinthians 3:1-18) says he was a minister of the New Covenant, not of the letter but of the Spirit. But this does not call for protracted notice. But, though the writer speaks of Genesis, having lost sight of the divinely-given use of the Old Testament, all resolves itself into the development of a little nation, with a national God, and more or less priestly superstition. But in Genesis we have the history of the world from the creation to Israel’s going down into Egypt and his death, with all the great principles of God’s relationship with man, except what are properly dispensational. There is not the law, nor the church, the’ two great subjects of God’s ways afterward for heaven and on earth. But, leaving them aside, you have all the great root-principles of man’s state and relationship with God, and in promise the cradle of all his hopes. Of these we must expect no trace in these heartless systems, but Elohistic and Jehovistic fragments, and interweaving by a compiler, one referring to the priestly party in Israel, the other not; why put together by the compilers, we are not told; but of the state and interests of man, or the glory and purposes of God-though both, as we have seen, are fully wrought into the New Testament, as the basis of eternal truth-no hint, no trace. Man fallen, a world judged (a story to which Christ sets His seal), Christ promised, Israel’s hopes founded, and their apostasy, and God’s ’deliverance of them foretold, all in vain. Grace and judgment, and all God’s ways, Christ promised and come, and unfolding them, as did also the apostles, in all their momentous bearings, must give way to Ewald’s " Geschichte," and Mr. New- man’s " Hebrew Monarchy," and Baur, and Hupfeld, and Mr. Smith, in speculations which only show they can see nothing where God has, in its germ, laid down everything that Casts light upon a ruined world (for a ruined world it is), and God’s dealings in grace with it. But it is only fair to show that the statements are slovenly: perhaps flimsy or superficial would be a more correct word. The theory is that there was a gradual development of the law. From Joshua to Samuel national feeling was much weaker than tribal jealousy. That there was a general dissolution, through idolatry and all seeking their own, is true, and Ephraim claimed a place hardly owned by others; but this broke out far worse afterward even in David’s time, and after Solomon’s death divided the kingdom. During the time of the Judges, we are told, the sanctuary and priesthood of the ark was the chief center of monotheism. Of course it was at all times; there could be no other. There was no mercy-seat but there, there could be no day of atonement without it. Samuel, it is said, was by education a priest; but it was as prophet, not as priest, he accomplished his work. He never was a priest, and could execute no priestly office. Afterward, to show the progress, we are told that he fully sanctioned Exodus 20:24, and did not act on Deuteronomy 33:19. All this is utter neglect of both the letter and the mind of Scripture. There was no sanctuary at all during Samuel’s activity. A tremendous judgment had fallen on Israel. Jeremiah refers to it (12.) as prognostic of what would happen to Jerusalem. There are three offices, as is often said, through which God has to do with His people-prophet, priest, and king. The priesthood, which was set to guide even Joshua, had utterly failed. Eli died broken-hearted, his two sons slain, and the ark of God taken. There was no restoration of the ark till the king restored it, though God sustained His own glory. The link of the people with God on the ground of their own responsibility, with priestly mediation, was entirely broken: no day of atonement, it could not be; Ichabod was written on it all. God had "delivered His glory into captivity; His strength into the enemies’ hand." But a prophet is sovereign interference, and God could not be debarred that, and He had prepared Samuel as He had prepared Moses. Samuel maintained the worship of Jehovah as an acknowledged prophet and judge. But as a system the people failed here too, and demanded a king; and God gave them a king in His anger, and took him away in His wrath: Then God by Samuel called David, who became king, and brought back the ark, but to Zion, not to the tabernacle; it was no longer at Shiloh, but at Gibeon, without any ark or mercy-seat at all; it was not owned by David. Solomon went there; but David, guided as he was and taught of God, placed singers at the ark to say " His mercy endureth forever." In spite of all their sins, power in grace had wrought restoration. The record is repeated in Nehemiah of the same faithfulness of God, and in the closing psalms; predictive of Israel’s future blessing, prepared to be sung with greater testimony to its truth than ever, after Israel has received at the hand of the Lord double for all her sins (Isaiah 40:2), and that in the kingly power of Christ in grace. Hence, in Hebrews Zion is contrasted with Sinai the place of the law and the Old Covenant. Such is the scriptural statement of the matter. The thoughts about Samuel and the difference οf the altars overlooks the whole real history of Israel at that time. Samuel acted with prophetic authority when there was no ark, and the whole priestly order was judicially set aside. The prophets did refer to the moral state of the people largely, but prophesied of a Messiah to come and grace for Israel and a New Covenant. But God owned no covenant as the Old Covenant, but what He had made with Israel in coming Out of Egypt. This is what is expressly referred to. There is no thought of a development of religious ordinances from a relatively crude and imperfect state. The prophets recalled Israel to a well-known system, but it will be found that the blessings and judgments in Judah, which still owned the temple and Jehovah, were invariably dependent on the conduct of the king, under whom they were placed, and on whose conduct blessing or the contrary depended. We are told, indeed, that the proof of the development view " cannot here be reproduced." It is a pity: still the author does his best. I only remark that, while there was progressive prophetic light, the kings ordered the details of priestly service, as David did, and was inspired for it. As a system, the headship of the priest was given up in Shiloh, though not their exclusive service. We are told that the prophets, when they failed to produce immediate reformation, began from the eighth century, if not earlier, to commit their oracles to writing. Reformation of what? Who were these prophets? The eighth century was Hezekiah’s reign. That was about 400 years from Samuel. There were from time to time prophets who gave warnings; but what reformation were they attempting? All this is fable. David set up the new system, and " Solomon built Him a house." Ten tribes went off because of the folly of the king, had no priests but false ones, and afterward two most remarkable prophets, who wrought miracles authenticating their mission; which the Jewish ones did not, because Jehovah was publicly owned, and the whole system they recalled Israel to was fixed long ago, and owned by the people. The reforming prophets from Samuel to the Eighth century is a fancy of the writer’s. The former prophets, Samuel, and Kings, give us the history, and that was what God meant them to do. That they were the chroniclers is often repeated and easily shown. But to return to inquire for the proofs of the development of crude ordinances:-if I read Exodus and Leviticus, they may be wise or not, but they are not crude, but elaborately detailed, and, if true at all, framed according to a pattern shown on the mount. If they were not established by Moses, the whole history is a fable, utterly false from beginning to end; for " Jehovah said unto Moses " is the emphatic authority, save a few to Aaron, where it was special priestly service in what was established; and, I ask, was the pattern shown on the mount a crude thing, to be developed by Moses? But the proofs.-An altar of earth or unhewn stone is commanded, if they made one (Exodus 20:1-26), and this Samuel did when there was no priestly service and Shiloh was judged; and so did Elijah when Israel had left the temple. It guarded against idolatrous imagery. But we are reminded that God was to put His name in one place, according to Deuteronomy, and so He did, and faithful kings were constantly destroying the high places (for planting trees was equally forbidden), thinking to bring back things to order, not to make progress or develop. In Exodus 20:1-26 He speaks of recording His name in a place, and there He would meet them -blessed promise But the next thing in the same book is the history of the tabernacle, to which in the wilderness they were bound to bring every animal they killed in the camp or out of the camp, under pain of death; and in the same Jehovistic account, if you will have it so, they are to appear before Jehovah at the three great feasts. Talking of development as to this is really nonsense; the earthen altar is the first ordinance given-a development, I suppose, on the crude details of the tabernacle given after, and then we jump to Samuel The quotation of Deuteronomy 33:1-29 is a prophecy of the last days of Israel in the blessing of Moses, the man of God. Even so they call the people to the mountain. What mountain? There they shall offer sacrifices of righteousness. Why should it not be the mountain of Jehovah’s ’house established on the top of the mountains? This is a prophecy for the last days too. In Deut. we have the three great feasts, and their going to the appointed place obligatory, and images and groves forbidden, -all Jehovistic. The full directions as to going to the place where God had set His name are in Deuteronomy 12:1-32, when the Lord should have given them rest, and what they might eat at home and what not. But this had been even more strictly imposed in the camp, because in the land the distance might be too great, an altar of brass being made, in the same book and place, according to the pattern shown on the mount. Deuteronomy is a peculiar book, penned evidently for the confusion that might be found in Israel when scattered about the land. The Levites hold a much more considerable place, and the people. The Levites are not priests, as the article says, but the priests are very rarely mentioned, and provision made for this state of things, yet anything but development of ordinances. It is for the land entirely. Exodus and Leviticus, with very rare exceptions, exclusively for the wilderness. Probably, from what Amos and Stephen say, not one sacrifice, unless the regular daily ones, was ever offered. The history, though doubtless their duty then, is one of types, and written for our instruction, on whom the ends of the world are come; and though this be said of their history, yet the types of the sacrifices and the like are precious to every one that knows Christ. He knows. Christ, our Passover, is sacrificed for us; he knows what Pentecost prefigured; and, if intelligent in the things of God, what Tabernacles are too, not yet fulfilled; but to these things I will revert. Thank God, they were perfect at first, and only properly so then. All was made according to the pattern shown to Moses on the mount. Rationalists may despise the New Testament too, and despise Alexandrian Epistles to the Hebrews; but we have not yet learned that the most wonderful display of grace, holiness, and wisdom, wrought into a whole that none can rend, is only an imposture. But the other proofs?-Ezekiel’s temple. This is instruction for the restoration, not the historical one. Then, instead of Jehovah-Shammah and the Prince, they were miserable captives to the kings God had set over them in His anger; at least so Nehemiah thought. It is prophecy for a time after Gog is destroyed, so that all the nations may know that Jehovah is Israel’s God, who had led them into captivity, and brought them out, and left none of them there at all. For there will be such days, let rationalists think what they like. It is a prophecy; in nothing an historic proof of any development made after the Exodus. When Ezra fixed the legal state of Israel, he did not fix Ezekiel’s temple. This is really child’s-play, fit only for rationalists. This, the writer tells us, is his " clearest proof," unless we may suppose the unreproduced ones may be. But there remains yet one as to which the writer makes a pretty round assertion-Josiah’s book. " The legislation of this book does not correspond with the old law in Exodus, but with the book of Deuteronomy." So it is stated. I must suppose he refers to there being one place of worship; but this was more strictly fixed in Exodus when the tabernacle was set up, that is at first, than in Deuteronomy, only one for the land, the other for the wilderness. But of the contents of the book there is not one word in the Kings. I do not exclude from what Josiah says Deuteronomy more than Exodus or Leviticus, in which last we have the most terrible threatenings of all (see 26.) Josiah heard the words of the book of the law, and his heart was tender, but he had no idea of a new book or a new law. It was the book of the law that was found. In the long reign of Manasseh it had been utterly neglected; but he speaks of it as no new thing. ’" Great is the wrath of Jehovah, that is kindled against us, because our fathers have not hearkened unto the words of this book." I have now completed the consideration of the produced proofs of the development of crude ordinances under the Jaw. Rebellion, idolatry, desertion of Jehovah, gracious dealings on His part, and " hewing " them by prophets there was, and growing light as to Messiah; a new order of the details, of service as to song and temple service by inspiration through David; a provision for walk in the land and failure in Deuteronomy; but of development from the pattern shown in the mount not a trace. The writer tells us Ezra came with " the book of the law of Moses." But, according to him, it was not the law of Moses; but, if the Pentateuch be not all false, an improved code on what God had established by Moses. How " a nation which had attained a high degree of literary culture " was to be enlightened "in spite of the crass and unspiritual character of the mass of the people," I may leave to rationalists to explain. It is grammatico-historical exegesis, I suppose. Was I unjust in saying the article was superficial in form and substance? I refer to one passage more. He alleges 1. Sam. 8: 7 as contradicting Deuteronomy 17:1-20. But how God in anger, as Himself rejected and giving the people their own way, and telling them how it would turn out, is a contradiction of a statement of how it ought to be done, is beyond me. If my reader is not weary of such futilities, I am; they are characteristically rationalist* (*The allegation, that "there are six laws as to the passover, which, if not really discordant, are at least so divergent in form and conception that they cannot be all from the same pen," is another of these careless assertions without a shadow of foundation. In the first place, they are not all of the passover, but some of unleavened bread, which, though connected, was a different feast, and the difference morally important; and in two cases specially connected with the consecration of the first-born. As to the rest, we have the historical account in Exodus, and reference to it when the three great feasts are particularly directed to be kept. How these are divergent, my reader must find out; I cannot. It Will be found that in Exodus 13:1-22 there is a special additional direction as to the firstborn and unleavened bread, and no law as to the passover at all. So in ch. 34: 18. Moreover, they are all Jehovistic; so that the Jehovistic and Elohistic documents, as of two definite authors, come to nothing. But the statement is ridiculous, a proof of the folly and levity of all that is alleged.) I may turn to Astruc’s and his followers’ Jehovistic and Elohistic documents. According to Mr. F. Newman, they can be separated by mechanical means-a pair of scissors, for instance. With this I agree. It is an apposite statement. They can be separated with nothing else. But are these learned men incapable of making a difference between God abstractedly as a supreme and self-existing Being, and a relative name in which He makes Himself known to men, so as to be in special relation with them? My father is a man; but, besides that, he is my father without ceasing to be a man. Supposing I took the. New Testament and said there must be two documents which scissors could separate because He is called God and Father? But Father is as much given as a relative name in the New Testament as Jehovah in the Old. Abstractedly I have no objection to more documents than one, provided I have the result from "the mouth of God;" but in their reasonings after Astruc I see no proof of anything else than the absence of moral or any sense, and that, being empty in mind of Divine truth, this fancy of Astruc’s was one they could spin cobwebs out of. What fly but a rationalist would be caught by Hupfeld’s third author of the northern party, and Mr. Smith’s curious remark on it" His literary individuality is, in truth, sharply marked, though the limits of his contributions to the Pentateuch are obscure "? That is strange! " literary individuality sharply marked, but the limits of the contributions obscure: " their character very sharply. marked, but obscure where they begin and end. Who will explain that for me? But how does Scripture present the subject? God is God, but God has entered into relationship with men. These relationships are fourfold in Scripture, all referring to God abstractedly as such: El Shaddai (God Almighty); Jehovah (unhappily translated in English LORD in capitals, as a rule; better in French, I’Eternel); Father, which, save in mere figures, is entirely a New Testament name; and Elton, Most High, which, while revealed in promise, is God’s millennial name, will be displayed as possessor of heaven and earth, all antagonistic power being set aside. And these are clearly thus set forth in Scripture, though the last be less clearly, as being yet future. The two first are expressly distinguished. Thus Exodus 6:2-3 : " And Elohim said unto Moses, I am Jehovah; and I appeared unto Abraham, unto Isaac, and unto Jacob by the name of El Shaddai, but by my name Jehovah was I not known to them." Not that He was not Jehovah, but He did not give Himself that name in His ways with them. See Genesis 17:1-27; Genesis 28:1-22; Genesis 32:1-32. With Israel He was then Jehovah, as the great question was settled on Mount Carmel; " Jehovah, He is Elohim." With Christians, the Son Himself being come, the Father is revealed, as the Lord Himself says (John 17:1-26): "I have manifested thy name to the men thou gavest me out of the world..... Holy Father, keep through thine own name. And I have declared unto them thy name, and will declare it, that the love wherewith thou hast loved me may be in them, and I in them." So Paul: " When the fullness of time was come, God sent forth His Son, made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons; and because ye are sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit of His Son into your hearts, crying, Abba, Father." Blessed privilege I peculiar to those to whom, through faith in Jesus, He has given the title to take the place of sons, for we are all the sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus. The first time we get Most High, is when Melchisedek comes out to meet Abraham. Not that God was not ever the Most High, but He had not taken it as a revealed name with His people on the earth. Here was a greater than Abraham, who blesses him after his full victory over his enemies. And God takes this title, not in connection with Abraham (that was El Shaddai, though he owns Him as such and as Jehovah too), but with the mysterious personage, figure clearly, according to Psalms 110:1-7, as developed also in the Hebrews-of Christ, King of Righteousness, King of Peace, now sitting on the right hand of the Father, on the Father’s throne (Revelation 3:21), not yet on His own, a priest after the similitude of Aaron now; though not after his order, but who shall come forth at the sounding of the seventh trumpet, when Jehovah-Elohim Shaddai shall take to Him His great power and reign; the Ancient of days who sits on His throne, but the Ancient of Days who comes (Daniel 7:1-28), whom the King of kings and Lord of lords, the blessed and only Potentate, shall show, but who is King of kings and Lord of lords; when, after the last confederacy against Israel (Psalms 83:1-18), through the judgment of the confederate enemies, men shall know that He whose name alone is. Jehovah is the Most High, Elion, in all the earth, as the punishment of the host of the high ones on high shall have shown Him Most High there (Isaiah 24:21), the Son of God and Son of man, to whom all judgment is committed. So when the Gentile power, which God set up when He took His throne from Jerusalem, Nebuchadnezzar, comes to his senses, he writes; " I Nebuchadnezzar lifted up my eyes unto heaven, and mine understanding returned unto me, and I blessed the Most High, and I praised and honored Him that liveth forever, whose dominion is an everlasting dominion, and His kingdom from generation to generation" (Daniel 4:34). I do not quote Daniel 7:1-28 for Most High, save verse 25, because the word is plural and means, I doubt not, the high " or " heavenly places." In verse 25, however, the beast speaks words against Elion bringing in judgment by them. But the kingdom of the Son of man is then set up. The little stone will have dashed the feet and toes of the image to pieces in judgment, and becomes then a great mountain which fills the whole earth (Daniel 2:1-49) Who then is this Most High? This is the question so beautifully discussed in a poetic dialog in Psalms 91:1-16 There are two great subjects in Scripture when personal reconciliation to God is settled. Sovereign grace puts poor sinners in the same glory as the Son of God, that He may be the first-born among many brethren, which is not our subject now,-displayed in the transfiguration.* (*Both the celestial and the terrestrial parts are revealed in Luke 9:1-62) The other is the government of this world (See Deuteronomy 32:8-9), of which the Jews are the center, as the church is of the heavenly glory under Christ. Our present subject is the Old Testament, the earthly part. Here then Jehovah, the Jewish name of Elohim, is in question. Who then is the Most High? He who has this secret will be blessed. He who dwelleth in the secret place of the Most High shall abide under the shadow of Abraham’s God, the Almighty. Who shall say where the Most High is to be found? Messiah says, I will take Israel’s God (Jehovah) as the Most High; I will say of Jehovah, He is my refuge. Ver. 3-8 is the answer. Then Israel speaks, Because Thou hast made the LORD (Jehovah) which is my refuge, even the Most High, Thy habitation, there shall no evil come nigh Thy habitation. Ver. 10 13 continues this. This is the passage by which Satan sought to tempt the Lord Jesus to try Jehovah if He would be as good as His word, acting in self-will out of the path of obedience: efforts which crumbled to nothing in impotency before the authority of that word which rationalists deny, but which the Lord trusted and authenticated as proceeding out of the mouth of God. In verse 14 to the end, Jehovah declares His mind, closing grandly the dialog, and putting His seal on Messiah’s confidence in Himself, on whom He had set His love as having taken the form of a servant. Here Jehovah, Israel’s God, is shown to be the Almighty and Most High, in the latter character bringing in the blessing of the earth: Jehovah, my God, even the most High, has the blessing promised to Abraham. " Father " is of course left out, the name which belongs to the heavenly family when the Jews are cast off for having rejected Jesus, a state of things coming in between the end of the sixty-nine and the last half of the seventy weeks of Daniel, " the time of Jacob’s trouble." (See Daniel 9:1-27) Hence, in the Scriptures of the Old Testament, Jehovah is the name regularly taken up by the writer, whose whole calling was by the revelation of it (Exodus 6:1-30), and by all the prophets of the nation whose God He was. But it was of all importance to them that He was that God who is the אשדאהידאשד " I am that I am," God ever existing, subsisting in Himself and creating all else. And this is one great truth of what I may call the translation of the name in the Apocalypse; not " who was, and is, and is to come," but who is (ὁὤν), who was the God known of old, the promiser withal, and who is the coming one ὁ ἐξχόμενος, when He will be Ancient of days, and Most High, possessor of heaven and earth, and His name known (even that Jehovah, and Jehovah alone is so) over all the earth. Hence, too, it was all important that this same Jehovah should be known as Abraham’s God who had, and first had (save Christ prophetically) the unconditional promise. (See the historic basis of all this which Joshua 24:1-33 gives us.) Even Shem’s race had fallen into idolatry (of which there is no trace before the flood), and Abraham’s own family. Then God calls out Abraham out of the order and connection He Himself had formed, country, kindred, and father’s house, to be to Himself, to a country He would show him. Sovereign grace which chose him, the calling of God, and the promises were the great principles brought out when the world was not only wicked before God, but had put demons in. His place. The revelation of the church was only after Pentecost: but Abraham is the root and starting-point of the blessed race. Adam was the head of a fallen race; individual saints we have from Abel, and the judgment of wickedness in the flood, and government set up in Noah to restrain it; but in Abraham first the head of a race that belonged to God in the earth, be it according to the flesh or the Spirit, the root of the olive tree of God (Romans 11:1-36) Many are the important lessons connected with this, but I cannot touch on them now. Jehovah, the God of Israel, was the God of Abraham, of Isaac, and of Jacob. This was His name forever, this His memorial for all generations (Exodus 3:15). God as God, the Being who is, not a creature who begins (ἔστι, not γίεται), but exists in Himself,-the Almighty, who called the vessel of promise without condition, and Jehovah the God of Israel under whom the Jews took the promises under condition of obedience,* must be identified. (* The whole doctrine of the "four great epistles" of Paul, particularly of Galatians, and those foundational epistles, is based on this difference of Abraham and Sinai respecting Christ the title to promise.) Hence, while it was of all importance to keep God’s essential name of God, and God self-existent contrasted with every creature, and to keep this essential character present before their minds, it was equally so to show Jehovah was that God, not a mere country god as those of the heathen. This, and the difference of promise on condition, and unconditional, we shall find running through the Old Testament from the Pentateuch to Nehemiah; * and the distinction is the basis of Paul’s reasoning in the New Testament. (*Thus, in Exodus 32:13, Moses appeals to God’s promise without condition, to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob; Solomon for the temple, and the blessing of Israel in connection with it does not go beyond Moses and the Exodus (1 Kings 8:1-66), on which judgment was pronounced when the Lord cursed the fig-tree, and in fact this was all lost and finally under that covenant. So in Leviticus 26:1-46., where Jehovah goes through all His judgments as governing the people to the end, He goes back, not only to Moses, but to the original unconditional promises to Jacob and Israel and Abraham. They will have the blessings of the promises under Moses, but through God’s remembering His unconditional covenant, which comes first. Nehemiah refers only to Abraham as a covenant, though He speaks of their deliverance by means of Moses, for this was a deliverance by grace. We have only to read Ezra and Nehemiah to see the utter folly of Jehovistic and Elohistic accounts. I suppose Ezra and Nehemiah were not compiling their own history from Jehovistic and Elohistic fragments. The reader may also notice another title, the God of heaven, as now no longer sitting between the cherubim, a distinction which will help him in understanding the book of Revelation also (see Revelation 11:4; Revelation 11:13).) We find then, when it was what God as God did or was, it is God, Elohim; where it is the account given by those who knew Jehovah, it is Jehovah; and when the solemnity of the name of God as such is to be added to God known in relationship, it is Jehovah Elohim; when in special bearing upon Israel, it is Jehovah thy God, or our God. So constantly as a personal address in Deuteronomy. A spiritual-minded person will always feel the difference between the two. It may be the mere state of feeling sometimes expressed in it; sometimes it is of real importance when God’s glory, as such, is concerned in it. An analogous difference is found in the New Testament. Not only is it said, Come out from the world, and ye shall be my sons and daughters, saith Jehovah Shaddai; but in Hebrews, where the question is how man can approach God, as such, we never find the Father---Lit is always God; nor in the Rev. (save 14., where His name is written on the foreheads of the special remnant there mentioned, but it is His Father). It is the throne of the government of the world which is in question, and it is Jehovah Elohim Shaddai, Lord God Almighty, as in 4., 11., 15. In John’s writings, while as to what concerns the nature of God, the name God is used-as " God so loved," " God is love," " God is light "-and the same as regards our responsibility in respect of it: the moment the Divine action in grace is spoken of, it is Father; thus, chap. 4., God is a Spirit, and they that worship Him must worship Him in. spirit and in truth, " for the Father seeketh such to worship Him." This comes out in a striking way in the first four verses of 1 John 1:1-10, and in the rest of the chapter. So in 1:18 of the Gospel, and it will be found to run through all his writings. Suppose I were to say, Here is a Patristic and a Theistic document, and use " the scissors " to make the difference: it would prove nothing but alienation from God and moral incapacity. The principle is just the same. In the Psalms the difference of Jehovah and Elohim is most marked. In the first book it is always Jehovah, the remnant is in Jerusalem, covenant blessings not lost. In 42. they are confessedly outside, worship in Jerusalem is remembered. There it is God. So in 63. it is God Himself. In 84. it is the tabernacles. of. Jehovah, though still of course God there. In the second book Messiah having been brought in, in 45. it passes from God to Jehovah and the God of Jacob. God Himself having interfered- in their favor, and deliverance having come, He is Jehovah Elion (Most High) and a great King in all the earth, though (48.) He reigns in Zion. I might go through the book of Psalms (and indeed have done it), and show the constant fitness of the names used. There the truth that God Himself is their God, Most High,. Jehovah, is fully developed: but their Father would not be found from 1. to 150., nor the Spirit of adoption which uses it. It is the government of the world, and that as Jehovah, great in Zion, God Himself, their (Israel’s) God. But these instances must suffice; the attentive reader, waiting on the Lord, will readily, on reading the Psalms, apprehend the force of the expressions. To make two writers is simply absurd. Mr. Smith tells us that "in a large part of the Psalter a later hand has systematically substituted Elohim for Jehovah; " and the proof? Stat pro ratione voluntas. There is simply none: a more utter incapacity for seizing the Divine side of the con tents of Divine writings I never saw than in the remarks on the Psalms. The structure of the book, even as plainly shown in its contents, and the different subjects of the five books or divisions found in it, there is not a glimpse of, though it lies really on the surface of the collection, and indeed shows a Divine hand in collecting them. But this would be too large a subject to enter on here. I only remark that to get rid of the proof of the absurdity of the Elohistic and Jehovistic scheme, for which even the "mechanical means" would not suffice here, he boldly asserts they have had one name substituted for another, without an attempt at proof, or shadow of it. They are not " reproduced." The stupid remark as to Elihu, borrowed from Mr. F. Newman, or perhaps by him too from " some learned German," recalls me to Job. In the most perfect way Elihu comes in, when the friends would have it that this world was an adequate proof of God’s moral government, which Job rightly denied, though his heart rose up against God too, and as the interpreter, one among a thousand, he shows there is a discipline of the righteous, blaming the friends, yet showing how Job was wrong too. He stands in a mediatorial character, a kind of daysman, to explain God’s way, before Jehovah comes in in His majesty. I cannot conceive more total want of spiritual perception than this borrowed judgment as to Elihu Yet I might have left this, but that I would remark that, in the introduction and in the account given at the end, Jehovah is found in the writer’s part; in all the intercourse of Job with his friends, and Elihu, God and Almighty. What can the scissors do here? cut the head and tail off, and lose the key to and the conclusion of the whole story. Take another case. In the Proverbs it is always Jehovah -)I think there is one exception)-the direction of practical wisdom for those who had Jehovah for their God. In Ecclesiastes it is always God, because it is the vanity of man’s path and efforts after happiness here below in contrast with what God is as such. It is not a condition of covenant relations but man as such, and it is not therefore Jehovah. Now in Genesis 1:1-31; Genesis 2:1-25. to the end of verse 3 we have the great fact that God created. It is simply this truth known to no heathen (not that Jehovah, God known under a particular name of relationship, but) that God created the universe, and creatures, and man, and rested the seventh day. This completes that all-important statement. We know it by faith. (Hebrews 11:1-40) Then begins a new subject, not a new account of creation. This is not so. It is barely and very briefly alluded to in connection with there being no man; and then the condition, nature, and moral position of man is detailed, where God put him, under what conditions, the place of animals, and the woman. It is not that God created, but the condition and status of man before Jehovah Elohim That God who was the one true God with whom man had to do, but had revealed Himself as Jehovah to him who told the story of all His ways from the fall, and man without law, and a judged world, and restraint, and promise, and law, and, indeed, the whole condition of man with God till grace came and the Father sent the Son to be the Savior; though of course the historical details up to law are given afterward, God having taken up a people by redemption so to try man. Every principle of the whole history is given us in Genesis, only on the basis of promise, not of law and redemption and God’s presence on the earth, which is in Exodus and what follows. But he who learned this plan at the first, connects that name Jehovah-a God of judgment-with the origin of it all. The Elohim of chapter 1. is the Jehovah of Exodus 6:1-30, and the narrative of Jehovah recounts all the history, up to law, of the true Elohim who now reveals Himself as testing man under law. To say that there are two accounts of creation is utterly untrue; there is nothing of the kind, no trace of it, but a special statement of man’s state and condition as to God and all the creation around him; let it be shown if there be. In the third chapter we have the writer using the term Jehovah Elohim. The great truth now comes out, but Satan saying in the same sentence, " Yea hath God said? " to Eve; speaking in no sense of revealed relationship, God the Creator had said, so Satan again " God doth know." But the writer says they heard the voice of the Lord God (Jehovah Elohim), and so of all that follows. To make the first verse two distinct documents is just simply absurd. In 4. Eve, taking up a promise, says, though mistakenly, "I have gotten a man from Jehovah." Here we have always Jehovah not Jehovah Elohim, a simple history, not the solemn tale of man’s ruin in his relationship with God. Is this a third document? In verse 25 God, says Eve, has appointed me, This speaks merely of the fact of what God, who works all things, had given her. In chap. 5. we have God again as such, nor could you say in the likeness of Jehovah, because it is a relative name, one specially revealed as to God, not that of the Creator, the Divine Being. So Enoch walks with God. The earth (6.) was corrupt before God as such. Yet the writer always speaks of Jehovah and His dealings, 3, 6, 7. And He deals with the earth as so corrupted. Again as " God " commanded him, not Jehovah. Then in 7. Jehovah said to Noah, and as Jehovah commanded him; then as God commanded him, and again as God commanded him, and Jehovah shut him in. Here again if you separate the verse into two, the last part refers to and connects with nothing, for Elohim is the word used when he went in. In Deuteronomy 4:32-34 where Elohim stands by itself in its proper force of Elohim, did God ever do such a thing as Jehovah our God has done? It is the force of the words, not two different accounts. To Joshua 24:1-33 they presented themselves before God as such, and Joshua said, thus saith Jehovah, the God of Israel. That is not only I find cases to which the fancies of Astruc cannot apply, but I find the reason why there are the two words. One more case remains to refer to, mentioned by the article, that of Joseph. This is to be by Hupfeld’s third author, a northern. It agrees, we are told, with the Elohistic author in a great part in the use of the name of God (Elohim), but is widely divergent in other respects. But this slurs over the facts to cover what upsets the theory. The first part of the account is Jehovistic; that is, the writer’s account of Joseph uses the name of Jehovah. He says Jehovah was with Joseph. That is, Moses knew the faithful One who bore this name with Israel, as he says, when God commanded. Noah, and he went into the ark, Jehovah shut him in; when he recites what passes between Joseph and the dreaming servants of Pharaoh and Pharaoh himself, he of course says God. What had they to do with Jehovah, or any relationship with Him? In the rest of the recital of facts it is Elohim But a second account is out of the question; they are two parts of the same one. What brought Jehovah and God both into it? Was it a northern author? Jacob in his trial turns back to the God of promise and calls him El Shaddai. And, in Joseph’s discourse to his brethren, it is clearly God as such in contrast with his brethren’s (man’s) doings. In Jacob’s blessing Ephraim and Manasseh, while referring to God Almighty, he naturally desires a blessing from God upon them, not covenant blessings from Jehovah, but God’s blessing on them. What the widely divergent things are, we are left to guess. It is well to remember that these German writers start with the assumption that no account which relates miracles can be historical. That is, they beg the whole question to begin with. Inspiration is itself a miracle, Creation, is the greatest miracle of all; the intervention of God’s will and power to produce that which would not have been without it. I am quite aware of the question of general laws, which, after all, are only the constant operation of God’s will, and cannot therefore preclude its action. Let us remember, too, that the absolute denial of action, independent of general laws, denies Christianity altogether; for resurrection is not a general law nor natural sequence. Death is not a cause of resurrection. But if Christ be not risen, our faith is vain, and, as Paul tells us, the witnesses of Christianity are false witnesses. Let me add the remark here, that, in a book otherwise interesting and useful, the Duke of Argyle has slurred over this point. If miracle cannot be historical, Christ is not risen, and if Christ be not risen, Christianity is not true. This is not the ground, if I understand the article in the Encyclopedia Britannica, which its author takes; but this will come up if we go on to the New Testament: as yet we are occupied with the Old. Now as to this, if the German theory be true as reproduced in the article, the whole of the Old Testament is an imposition; I mean if the law be not a system established of God by Moses, as we find it, but a late compilation in which crude materials were adjusted and a system developed out of national life. As far as the law goes, it all professes to be words addressed by God to man through the mouth of Moses. Genesis has necessarily another character, equally requiring direct inspiration; for who among men can give an account of creation and the world’s history, and a history on which all God’s dealings with men (save the church and the law of which we have spoken) are founded in their principles, and, as we have seen, the New Testament is based? Nor, indeed, can the beginning of Exodus be separated from the end of Genesis 1:1-31 need not quote texts to show that " Jehovah said unto Moses," and in this way communicated His will to the children of Israel, is the constant language of the law. It is a clear positive revelation of God’s words and will by Moses as it stands, or it is an imposture. In Deuteronomy Moses rehearses it all, and speaks to the people, insisting on obedience, and recalling all that had passed in order to enforce it and keep them from idolatry, adding details of civil government for the land. Documents may or may not have been used; but the whole contents are, either a history and the original establishment of God’s law for the people, with the deepest typical instruction for us, given by Moses from God, or an imposture. The adding an account of Moses’ death at the end of Deuteronomy does not touch this question. Mr. Smith tells us that copyists added what they liked, and did not feel themselves in the least bound to distinguish the old from the new; there was no notion of anything like copyright, they took large extracts and harmonized them by such additions and modifications as they thought necessary. A nice thing to rest one’s faith on as the word of God, Scriptures that cannot be broken! But lawyers say, " Allegatio ejusdem rei cujus dissolutio petitur nil valet; " and what is the proof the Semitic genius, the Bible, is a stratification, not an organism? What proof has he of the Semitic genius? The Bible. There is no other ancient Hebrew book. And the question is, Is it such an inauthentic compilation? We have nothing but his assertion about the Bible itself, except that there were cells in the temple-that of course not being arranged according to God’s direction either, it was the Semitic genius! I need not say that the prophets openly declare their inspiration, that " The word of Jehovah came to them," "Thus saith Jehovah," and the like; that in the history, as of Kings for example, it is openly stated that they used the royal chronicles; but prophets used them and drew them up, as we have the example in Isaiah, that we might have them as the word of God. That God is not mentioned in Esther is just apposite, as showing the secret providence of God keeping His people when they were scattered and disowned of Him as a nation. Thus not only the Lord and the apostles have owned the Old Testament as we possess it as God’s inspired word, but it presents itself, as to the law as the direct fruit of Moses’ communication with God, given fully and in detail originally, and the prophets, as the direct communication of God’s mind and words from Himself; and all of it-history, psalms, and all-as an organic whole owned of the Lord Himself, and whose perfection, as such, will be perceived by those whose understandings He has opened, and who learn there the whole scheme of God Himself. In passing from the discussion of particular points and objections to a direct inquiry into more positive and essential evidence from the contents of Scripture, I recall to every heart that the question is-Is there a revelation from God? Man is departed from God. Is there any revelation from God by which, as far as the revelation of God goes, man can know Him? We know what man has come to without it. Are we to be left as the heathen, if haply we may feel after Him and find Him? or is there really a law given by Moses, and are grace and truth come by Jesus Christ? We have seen that the Lord declares the writings which the Jews received to be the writings of Moses, and does so, not only to the Jews, but to His disciples, and that He opened their understanding to understand them- the apostles the same-basing their arguments on the truth and contents of them. To one who is not audacious in incredulity this is sufficient. To those who affirm that a miraculous history must be unhistorical, that God cannot act, or will not at all now, having once established an order of nature, and so decide the question before it is examined, the statements of Christ or the apostles have no weight. But then it is pure impudence to call themselves Christians. It is flagrant dishonesty to accredit themselves with a name while they reject all it imports. We may earnestly desire their conversion, but that is all. They labor on what they hold to be an imposture, and profess to be followers of the imposture, and would have us believe that the holiest, most gracious, deepest, and yet truest and fullest communication of the knowledge of God is by an imposture. This is hard to think; but it is this we have to do with. But, again, there are those who believe there is a revelation, yet no inspired divine communication of it to others. Some allege that it is not even claimed. Now, see how rational this is. God has thought good to give a revelation of Himself, His truth, His grace, to men at large for their good; He has made this revelation, but in such a manner that it can go no farther in its perfectness than the person who receives it. It is given communication of it is His work too-thus saith Jehovah, or Jehovah said, in the Old, or in words which the Holy Ghost taught in the New; so that what we have is the word of God. It is " of the Lord by the prophet," or in words which the Holy Ghost taught. God did not leave us floating about in uncertainty. Only when it is presented, it is discerned spiritually, or, if rejected, is hid to them that are lost. With this as to the history, we find it drawn up by the prophets, and sanctioned by the Lord and the apostles. It may be said that there are errors, and that we have only translations. I recognize that it was committed to the responsibility of man, just as in a certain sense man’s personal salvation is; yet he is kept by the power of God, and it is so too, liable to the effects of human infirmity. It is quoted, recognized, and authenticated by the Lord and the apostles, and the Law constantly referred to in the earliest writings of the prophets. As to translations, no one gives any as a criterion of truth; they are a means of communicating it, and the criterion remains as it was, providentially preserved of God; the New (as Mr. S., I thank God admits) adequately proved to be authentic, and, if so, the Old authenticated, as no other book in the world is, by it, that is, by the Lord and his apostles. It is alleged the LXX. is quoted. This is confessedly a translation, and, as commonly known and used, is commonly quoted; but it is not when the writers of the New as taught of God had any reason for doing otherwise. They authenticate it only as to that for which they quote it. But I turn to a pleasanter part of my attempt. I would speak of the unity of mind in the whole Old and New Testament. Whatever controversy may be raised as to dates, there is no question ’of their being writings separated by wide distances of time. Infidels do not question that. In some shape Jewish literature began with Moses. Jehovistic and Elohistic documents may be compiled, but there were for the good of all, and perfectly given, but it stops at the first person who is the vessel of reception and communication, and to the rest comes only in the imperfection of man as to apprehension and communication; a divine communication for men, but by divine arrangement so communicated that it never reaches men as such. Nothing they can trust as divine is communicated to them. Can anything be more absurd? But Paul states the case: When it pleased God, who separated me from my mother’s womb, and called me by His grace- to reveal His Son in me, that I might preach Him among the heathen. There was a revelation to him for this purpose by God, but he could not do it! though for others, it could not reach them, actually given for them, but in such a manner that it could not reach them. This is the theory. But he did not handle the word of God--mark what it was-deceitfully; he did not adulterate the pure wine, but by manifestation of the truth commended himself to every man’s conscience in the sight of God (2 Corinthians 4:1-18) So the Thessalonians received it, not as the word of man, but, as it was in truth, the word of God (1 Thessalonians 2:3); so that if (2 Corinthians 4:1-18) his gospel was hid, it was hid to them that were lost. Their minds were blinded by the god of this world. In 1 Corinthians 2:1-16 he states it formally: "Which things also we speak, not in words which man’s wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth.... But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God they are spiritually discerned." They are revealed by the Spirit (10-12); communicated in words which the Holy Ghost taught, that others might have them as God revealed them to Paul (13), and discerned by the Spirit (14). (Comp. verses 4, 5.) And such he asserts everywhere. The things which he wrote were to be received as (and were) the commandments of the Lord. The Old Testament prophets and Moses declare what they communicate is Jehovah speaking; so does the apostle. Not only, then, is the Bible a revelation from God, but the such documents to compile. There were prophets many centuries before Christ; there were psalms composed by David, the sweet psalmist of Israel, as by others contemporary or more recent, as some assuredly were. There are different authors, different styles, different epochs; the grammar even became changed in its details in the process of ages, as the use of Hu for the feminine and Nahar marks early Hebrew. Various authors and styles, in a word, follow each other through a series of some 1500 years. In the New Testament there is a development of truth and divine counsels, part of which is declared to have never been previously revealed, and in the nature of things could not have been so: I mean the mystery of which Paul, and Paul only, speaks-the union of Jew and Gentile without difference in one body for heavenly places, which it was impossible to reveal while Judaism subsisted, as setting it aside absolutely in its nature. For Judaism kept up, while Christianity broke down, the middle wall of partition. Now, if with all these authors and epochs (in the last case setting aside the previously existing system, though fully sanctioning it as divine), place, and time,-if through judgment, promise, law, gospel, and the revelation of the church completing the word of God, I find one plan, one mind, through the whole, whose is it? Unconscious of the bearing of it on the whole, each occupied with the present moral bearing of that which was confided to him, ignorant in large measure of what others might have to say, or even setting aside what had existed and occupied others, I yet find all minister to one single plan. I find the clearest and strongest proof that one mind, one inspiring power, which knew the end from the beginning, and had this plan before it, is the real author of what we call the Bible. I insist upon its being a number of books (Jehovistic and Elohistic documents if you please, employed, though I do not accept what is said) of different ages and characters. Prophecy, history, poetry, moral lessons, man before law, man under law, a narrow system to maintain the true unity of the Godhead when all was idolatrous, and a large system to every creature under heaven, which maintained the authority of the law, but set it totally aside as a way of relationship with God, but through all one single thread of divine purpose running, which makes every part subservient in its place to the whole, making over sixty books (or, taking Jewish computation of Old Testament, forty-nine) one single book-the Bible. I can only in such a paper as this take some special elements as showing this, after stating from Scripture what the divine purpose is, only noticing what is of the last moment, that it is not a mere purpose as to facts to be accomplished, but that these involve the whole moral basis of man’s relationship with God: innocence, loss of it, moral responsibility, the law given as a perfect measure of it with divine authority, man doubly guilty by breaking it, remedial means in the testimony of the prophets and in the coming of the Son of God Himself, all in vain issuing in the judgment of the world, and every mouth stopped, and all the world guilty before God, and a perfect salvation by grace on God’s part, according to His own nature and glory, laid hold of in promise throughout all ages, and then fully revealed; and finally heavenly glory, and a restored earth under the first and the new covenant, and then eternity; and, I may add, the church’s special place in all this, which is peculiar, all made manifest and unfolded in the development of this purpose, and issuing in the fullness of the divine glory, and the infinite and eternal blessing of those who believe. The purpose is this, as stated in Scripture (Ephesians 1:1-23), that for the administration of the fullness of times He should gather together in one (ἀναχφαλαίωσαθαι) all things in heaven and in earth in Christ (the Son of God and Son of man), in whom we have obtained our inheritance. In this there are two great scenes- heaven and earth, and as to them two great objects of revelation under Christ - the church and glorified saints in heavenly places, and the Jews in earthly-the one reigning with Christ, the others reigned over, as is all the world, by Him as Son of man, raised and glorified, with the Father’s house, where He is gone, as our home-one being the expression of the sovereign grace which has put us into the same glory as the Son of God; the other, the government of this world. See Ephesians 1:22-23; Ephesians 1:9-11, and Deuteronomy 32:8-9, for a brief statement of the Jewish part, verses 8 and 43. All are under the Son of man, or united to Him. This latter part, as peculiar to the church, I leave aside for the moment. God began, not of course with the Second, but with the first Adam-not with the Man of His purpose, but with responsible man. This responsibility, as traced and followed out in innocence, fallen and without law; then (passing by promise, which was of grace and brought out in Abraham) under law; then in sending Christ after patient warnings and encouragements by the prophets, saying, They will reverence my Son; but they cast Him out of the vineyard and slew Him. Then, the probation of man having been thus fully gone through, man is treated as lost: only a full salvation provided for him in the work of the Lord Jesus Christ, in whom, the Second Adam, the Son of man, all the promises and purposes of God are to be fulfilled. He is the man of God’s purpose, all promises in Him Yea and in Him Amen; taking the inheritance of all things man was to have in the purpose of God, according to the redemption in which God was perfectly and in every respect glorified. Through all we have the great adversary revealed in all that was needed, that we should know clearly the position of those concerned, but no further. The result of all this and its general principle is already brought out in the garden of Eden; not a promise to the first man-there is none, but the purpose of God when the first man had failed in responsibility. This responsibility he was put under, tempted by the adversary, and failed. The Lord God judged the woman for listening, but makes known the Second Man, the last Adam. He, the Seed of the woman, was to bruise the serpent’s head, the serpent to bruise His heel-the latter in the cross, the former. when He comes in power. This is no promise to the first man, though his faith might lay hold of it, but a revelation of the Second. Adam assuredly was not the Seed of the woman. The history is referred to as unquestionable truth by Paul (1 Timothy 2:9-15), as a ground for minute details as to woman; as a basis of the profoundest doctrine (Romans 5:12-21), showing sin to have been there by this means before the law, and when there was none; but referring to Hosea 6:7,* showing that Adam was under a law (not to eat of the tree of knowledge), but that from him to Moses man had none, confirmed as to the character of judgment (Romans 2:12), those that have sinned (ἀνόμως) without law being distinguished from those who have sinned under it. So for watchfulness it is referred to in 2 Corinthians 11:3. So the whole order and structure of God’s plan in Christ, connected with ruin in the first Adam, is unfolded in 1 Corinthians 15:1-58, specially 20-28 and 45-49, and that in resurrection. The accomplishment in Jews, Gentiles, and the raised saints is founded on Isaiah 25:6-8. (*For " men " in text, read Adam. as in Hebrew and margin.) But there were other and special promises made to the seed of Abraham according to the flesh, renewed in David and confined to Israel, though mercy was to be extended to the Gentiles on their failure. Of this Genesis is full, and the state of Israel under promise and failure is the whole subject of the Psalms, besides Christ personally brought in as connected with them. (See Genesis 15:17.) These promises, given unconditionally to Abraham, were taken up conditionally at Sinai; so that, though the promises remained, yet under Moses the law was introduced, and on the ground of the old covenant their Accomplishment depended as much on Israel’s fidelity as on God’s. God said, If ye obey my voice; and Israel said, All that Jehovah hath spoken we will do. Thus not only historically Israel stood on the ground of the old covenant, but an immense principle was established and question raised, Is man’s righteousness the ground of his standing before God, or is God’s righteousness that on which a sinner can be accepted? But Israel also thus stood on a double ground-promises made to Abraham, and righteousness under the law; and yet grace, unless God were the God of the Jews only, must reach out to the Gentiles, and this must be in Christ, and as taking His power as head over all things, as we have seen, as Son of man. During the subsistence of the middle wall of partition, the blessing of the Gentiles was not shut out in hope, but left, as they were, in obscurity and darkness. When the -world was idolatrous, the maintenance of the knowledge of one true God made this necessary, and, so perverse is man, was with the utmost difficulty maintained. In the promises to Abraham it is as clearly as possible revealed in Genesis 12:1-20, and after Isaac’s being offered up as a figure, and so received as raised from the dead, confirmed to the seed. All nations were to be blessed in Him. When Moses and the law had come in, then it was only on the judgment of Israel that this blessing came out, and that through Christ (see Romans 11:1-36) So Deuteronomy 32:28, the judgment being solemnly insisted on in what precedes both of Jews and Gentiles, though sparing a remnant in Israel, ’owned in verse 43 as His people, but the nations to rejoice with them. We have seen these two recognized in Isaiah 25:1-12, with the resurrection added, and all united with Christ’s reign in 1 Corinthians 15:1-58, quoting Isaiah. The contrast of law and gospel is fully discussed by Paul, and the promises without condition, and the law with both promises and gospel, in -Romans and Galatians. In Galatians 3:1-29 he insists on the promise without condition, and that the law 430 years afterward could not be added to an unconditional promise confirmed to the Seed, nor that promise disannulled. The law was broken, and that, as it depended under the old covenant on Israel’s obedience whether the blessing was to be fulfilled, was easily disposed of. But the promises? They were to be made good through the promised Seed, the Messiah, a fact made clearer and clearer as Israel’s disobedience grew more and more manifest, and indeed fully established in the promise to David; but then it must be through bruising the serpent’s head and wider than Israel. When failure under priesthood in the land in Eli, and under prophecy in Samuel, and the direct government of God by these means had been fully. manifested, God’s King, the be-loved, was raised up; and this double blessing of Israel and the Gentiles and man’s glory as in Christ was brought to light, grace in power, though it was but a remnant in Israel who would finally profit by it. But here the difficulty of the unconditional promises came in, and the promises to the Seed in whom they were to be fulfilled. The law, as I have said, was clearly broken from the days of the golden calf. But the promises were to be fulfilled in the Seed, in the Son of David. Israel rejected Him, and lost all title whatever to any promises. God had taken away His throne when they went captive to Babylon. The cherubim and the glory that sat there judged the city and went up. But the promises? A residue was preserved and brought back, shorn of its glory as God’s people, but still having these promises; and Messiah came, the promised One, a minister of the circumcision for the truth of God, to confirm the promises made to the fathers, and they rejected Him, and God wrought a salvation effectual for man. His salvation to the ends of the earth yet will accomplish His promises to Israel, only on the ground of pure grace, while He takes those that own the rejected One to be His companions in glory in heaven and to reign with Him. It is this that makes the apostle exclaim, 0 the depth of the riches. Now as Galatians 3:1-29 and Romans 2:3-4. (and 7. yet more experimentally) discuss the law and grace and promise in its moral bearing for any, so Romans 9:1-33; Romans 10:1-21; Romans 11:1-36 discusses it in reference to Jew and Gentile in a dispensational way. In 9. God must be sovereign, or Ishmaelites and Edomites must be let in, and all Israel save Moses shut out, and God would use His sovereignty to let in the Gentiles. Then Israel’s rejection and stumbling at the stumbling-stone was all foretold, and God’s being found of the Gentiles (10.) But it was not final rejection. Paul was a Jew, so there was a remnant (Deuteronomy 32:1-52) The letting in of the Gentiles was to provoke them to jealousy; but lastly, according to infallible promise, the Deliverer would come to. Zion (Romans 11:1-36) Thus in the law we have, not only a dispensation of God with Israel, but the great question of human righteousness raised for every soul. It was not an arbitrary rule, but God’s perfect rule for man, taking up all the relationships in which He had placed man as now fallen, with Himself and each other, and requiring man’s acting up to them, and he should live; but the flesh, man in his Adam-nature, was not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be so; then they that are in the flesh cannot please God (no one in Adam’s standing). Man’s righteousness not only does not exist in fact, but is set aside in principle; but, as we have seen, without law, man was lawless, under it a transgressor, and, when God was manifested, then the Lord Could say, Now they have both seen and hated both Me and my Father. Hence we read, Now is the judgment of this world; but, thank God, Now is the prince of this world cast out. And I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me. But now once in the end of the world (the consummation of ages) He hath appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself. The heel of the Seed of the woman was bruised, but the work done gave Him a title in righteousness, according to God, to bruise his head. The power of the enemy was, by death, disannulled morally (ἵνα χαταξλήσῃ), and will be wholly set aside in heaven and earth when the Son of man shall come in His glory: not all enemies, it is true, subjected at once, but He having taken to Him His great power to reign and do so. But not only were the Gentiles left in darkness during the narrow period of testing man under law, and the promises confined in their actual application to a peculiar people, but life and incorruptibility were brought to light only under the Gospel, and access to God allowed. The state under the law was marked by the veil, and the barriers which forbade it; now the holiest entered, God’s righteousness being by faith for Gentile as well as Jew, and all the higher glories revealed in connection with resurrection, and a new state of man and a new creation, of which Christ risen and glorified is the first fruits and head, " the second Man from heaven," (ὁ δεύτερος ἄνθρωποδ ἔξ οὐρανοῦ) and now gone back there as Man. The reader who is acquainted with. Scripture will have seen that I have only made an abstract of its statements in all I have said, and put them together so that we may see that it is one complete plan of God, of which the moral principles and the historical development, though distinct subjects, cannot be separated. But let us see if we cannot, in some leading details, trace it through the Scripture, showing them more in detail, enchained by the plan of one mind. Indeed it begins before the world, of course then in the thoughts of God, but revealed to us, though mercy, not till the gospel came, not till the first man had been fully tried and tested in his responsibility. Thus we read (Proverbs 8:1-36), speaking of wisdom (and Christ is the wisdom of God and the power Of God- was (before the creation, Which is poetically described) daily His delight, rejoicing always before Him, rejoicing in the habitable parts of His (Jehovah’s) earth; and my delights were with the sons of below (Luke 19:38): though, then, it was babes and sucklings that were found to utter His praise to still the enemy and the avenger, or the stones would have cried out. It is when He comes again that evil will be put down. But to come to the citations of passages of Scripture: in Psalms 2:1-12, after giving the character of the remnant in Psalms 1:1-6, we have the determination of Jehovah to set His King on the holy hill of Zion, the anointed Man, the Son of God as born in this world, who is further to ask for dominion over the heathen whom He will rule with a rod of iron, and break in pieces like a potter’s vessel (comp. Revelation 2:26-27). But for the present He is rejected. The kings of the earth and the rulers take counsel together against the Lord and against His anointed (Christ or Messiah). Adonai, sitting in the heavens, shall laugh at them. In Acts 4:26-27, the Holy Spirit expressly applies this to Christ’s rejection and death. In Psalms 3:1-8; Psalms 4:1-8; Psalms 5:1-12; Psalms 6:1-10; Psalms 7:1-17 we have the consequent sorrows of the remnant, on which I do not enter. But in Psalms 8:1-9 Christ is celebrated in another character, when the Jews can celebrate Jehovah’s name excellent in all the earth, and as having set His glory above the heavens, and as their Lord or Adon a state of things not yet accomplished in fact, while the second verse is used by the Lord in the passage first quoted from Luke, as the testimony enforced, so to speak, by God, when the Savior was here and rejected, quoting also Psalms 118:1-29, of which we may speak as specially referring to this future time of Christ’s return in power. Now I quote this to show that it is identified with man’s being set over the works of God’s hands. The Son of man, which the Lord constantly applies to Himself,* coming specifically into view, a passage as applied to Him in its full import as inheriting all God’s purposes as to man; used as defining the whole position in the results of divine administration more than once by the apostle Paul, as (Ephesians 1:22) " And hath put all things under His feet, and gave Him to be head over all things to the church, which is His body " (comp. Colossians 1:15-18); and again, in 1 Corinthians 15:20-28, when all things are to be put under the feet of the risen (the second) Nan; except Him who put all things under Him. Here the whole scheme is unfolded; and again in Hebrews 2:1-18 we are told that we see not as yet all things put under Him; but we see Jesus made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death, crowned with glory and honor. Nothing can be more precise to both the divine purpose and the measure of its accomplishment, than these passages. (*He never calls Himself the Christ save to the woman of Samaria (John 4:1-54) when He had left Judaea.) The general fact is again brought before us, in quite another part of Scripture, in contrast with the earthly power of evil, in Daniel, seventh chapter. The chapter is divided by the expression " I saw in the night visions," 1-6, 7-12, to give the last beast, the principal one, more particularly, then 13, 14; from 15 to the end, inquiry and explanation, bringing in both the saints killed by the beast (and who, as is confirmed in Revelation 20:1-15, go into heaven) and Israel. I quote 13: "I saw in the night visions, and, behold, one like the Son of man came with the clouds of heaven, and came to the Ancient of days, and they brought Him near before Him," etc. This was when the thrones had been set for judgment. But afterward we find it was the Ancient of days who came when judgment was given (22) to the saints of the most high (the high places). So in Psalms 80:1-19, where Israel is crying out (not merely Jews) for their final deliverance, it is (17):"Let thy hand be upon the man of thy right hand, upon the Son of man whom Thou madest strong for Thyself." Thus the rejected Messiah, cut off, and who took nothing of the kingdom and glory, but cut off Him- se’ f, the one who is the head over all things as Son of man according to the purpose of God. This truth runs through the Gospels where no passage perhaps men"-here, in the nature and principle of His place, the Son of man. Hence, when Christ was born, we find the angels celebrating his birth with Glory to God in the highest, on earth peace (not good will towards, but) good pleasure in men. He did not, as it is written, take up angels, but He took up-here narrowing it to grace and promise-the seed of Abraham, consequently associating it at once with Old Testament history. So we read in 2 Timothy 1:9 : "Who hath saved us, and called us with an holy calling, not according to our works, but according to His own purpose and grace, which was given us in Christ Jesus before the world began, but is now made manifest by the appearing of our Savior Jesus Christ." So Tit.: " In hope of eternal life, which God, that cannot lie, promised before the worlds, but bath in due times manifested," etc. So 1 Corinthians 2:1-16 "We speak the wisdom of God in a mystery, which. God ordained before the world for our glory." Now, till the rejection of Christ, these counsels of God in grace were not brought out to light as we see stated here, because the first man, and the possibility of his recovery, were being tried, though God, who knew what man was, was quickening souls from the beginning. Still we shall find full traces of all that concerns both the history of Christ, His rejection and future glories, or, as Peter expresses it, the sufferings of Christ, and the glories that should follow. Let us take Messiah and Son of man, and the connection of their titles with Israel and the future glory of Christ. In Psalms 1:1-6 we have the remnant carefully distinguished from the ungodly, as Isaiah says: "Except Jehovah of hosts had left us a very small remnant, we should have been as Sodom, and like unto Gomorrah." But it is well to note, before we proceed to the chain of texts, that the Lord expressly tells us that this peace on earth was not to be accomplished by His first coming. " Suppose ye," He says, "that I am come to give peace on earth? I tell you, Nay, but rather division: for, from henceforth, there shall be five in one house divided, three against two, and two against three " (Luke 12:51-52), practically a quotation from Micah 7:1-20, where it is presented as the extreme of evil, evil drawn out in its worst forms in fact, by the perfect manifestation of good, of God Himself, shown in the death of Christ, and in hatred of those faithful to Him; for all that will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution. But as to Christ, He was to suffer and make atonement, sit not yet on His own throne, but on the Father’s, at the right hand of God-expecting till His enemies were made His footstool; where He is now, the work perfectly accomplished which perfectly glorifies God, gives us a perfect conscience, destroys in title the whole power of Satan, is the sure foundation of eternal blessedness, the new heavens and the new earth: but, through which, we are called to take up our cross and suffer, who are to have the heavenly inheritance, and be like Him in glory, but must wait here with Him now, and while He waits, having the sympathy of our great High Priest, or, with Him, as to our spirits if called away before He comes. If He is crucified, we must suffer, not reign, till He takes to Him His great power and reigns: till then Satan is still the god and prince of this world, not cast down from the heavens. From the beginning man, under his influence, has spoiled what God set up good-spoiled it the first thing: so the first man himself, so Noah got drunk, so the golden calf was made, so Nadab and Abihu offered strange fire, and the holiest was closed to Aaron save one special day; so through Solomon’s sin the kingdom was divided; and, under Nebuchadnezzar, the Gentile power became a beast; so always, and apostasy set in before the apostle’s eyes were closed. But Satan will be cast down from heaven (Revelation 12:1-17), where he is now the accuser of the brethren. Then we shall haw, as Luke tells us, peace in heaven, glory in the highest; and " Blessed be the King that cometh in the name of the Lord" here is quoted. Nathanael owns Jesus to be the Christ according to Psalms 2:1-12 " Thou art the Son of God, the King of Israel." " Thou shalt see greater things than these," says the Lord. "Henceforth thou shalt see the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of man." He takes His place as Son of man in contrast with and beyond that of Psalms 2:1-12 In John’s Gospel the Jews are treated as rejected and reprobate from the first chapter (1: 10, 11), a remnant, born again and believing, alone owned, because Jesus is God, and Him man never received, but was enmity against. The three other Gospels present Him as Messiah, Emmanuel, Jehovah, the Savior (Matt.); the prophet-servant (Mark); and Son of man in grace after the first two chapters, a lovely picture of the remnant in Israel (Luke). Hence we have genealogy, from Abraham and David in Matthew, up to Adam in Luke.* (*I should read Luke 3:23 : (" Being, as was supposed, son of Joseph), of Heli," etc. τοῦ Ηλί is connected with Jesus, not with Joseph.) When the Jews are utterly rejected at the end of Matthew 12:1-50, so that He no longer seeks fruit in his vineyard and fig-tree (46-50), He goes out to sow, but He that sows the good seed is the Son of man; the kingdom in mystery, 1:e. without a present king (13.), the church (16.), the kingdom in glory (17.), are substituted for Israel under the Old Covenant, but in 16: 20 they are charged to tell no man that He was the Christ: The Son of man (17: 12) must suffer of them; more immediately contrasted, in Luke 9:1-62., which ends the chronological history (see verse 21), when Peter, taught of God, owns Him to be the Christ, " He straitly charged them and commanded them to tell no man that thing, saying, The. Son of Man must suffer... but be raised the third day;" and then He shows them the glory of the coming kingdom; the Son of man would come in His own glory, in the Father’s, and of the holy angels, as Son of Man, Son of the Father, and as Jehovah. But (Matthew 17:9) this belonged to another scene, and man as a new creation. They were not to tell it till He was risen again from among the dead, and (Luke 9:36) they kept it close, withal wondering what rising from among the dead should mean* (Mark 9:10), and from that day began to press upon them that the Son of man must suffer (Matthew 16:21, Mark 9:31, Luke 9:44). In John we have this under another form, namely that of a full testimony from God, when Israel had rejected Him, as Son of God, Son of David, and Son of man. The first is raising Lazarus (11: 4). " This sickness is not unto death, but for the glory of God, and that the Son of God should be glorified thereby."** He is the resurrection and the life. (* All as Pharisees believed in the resurrection of the dead.) (**The stupid. rationalists cannot, of course, see why this miracle was brought in here.) Then (12: 13) they meet Him, according to Psalms 118:1-29, crying, " Hosanna I (save now, I beseech thee) blessed is the King of Israel that cometh in the name of the Lord." Then the Greeks (Ελληνςς) coming up, the wider scene of Gentiles, the Lord says: "The hour is come that the Son of man should be glorified. Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone; but if it die, it bringeth forth lunch fruit;" and (32), "I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me." So in His rejection, abjured by the High Priest, He owns He is the One spoken of in Psalms 2:1-12, the Christ, the Son of God, but adds: "Nevertheless, I say unto you, Hereafter shall ye see the Son of Man sitting on the right hand of power and coming in the clouds of heaven." Thus that which dispensation ally set aside the Jews under the Old Covenant, and ended their title under the promises, brought out the far deeper truths of the enmity of man’s heart against God in goodness-" They have both seen and hated both me and my Father "-but the accomplishment of that glorious work in which salvation was provided for Gentile as well as Jew, and God perfectly glorified in all that He is; the Christ rejected, Messiah cut off, as Daniel declared; but that as Son of man, not now taking the glory, but as suffering, yet vindicated of God as such; the whole truth of Psalms 2:1-12; Psalms 8:1-9., Adam the image of Him that was to come (Daniel 9:1-27, Daniel 7:1-28) brought into light and accomplishment, and this not in quoted passages, but in realizing facts: and then, when the Holy Ghost was given, the passages applied and explained, as in Acts 4:1-37 and Ephesians 1:1-23, 1 Corinthians 15:1-58, Hebrews 2:1-18, with no appearance of putting together or arrangement by those who uttered these things, but showing one mind and thought and plan behind it all, the word and counsel of God. I might multiply passages as to the use of Son of man, but I have only quoted what brought the bearing of Psalms 2:1-12; Psalms 8:1-9. together. But the death of Christ closed the earthly history of Scripture, till the Son of Man shall come in His glory. Hence Stephen, summing up that history, from Abraham, when the promises began, shows the law broken, the prophets killed, the Just One betrayed and murdered, and the Holy Ghost resisted; and then sees the Son of man standing at the right hand of God. He had taken His heavenly place, though not yet set down. Now He sits at God’s* right hand till His enemies are made His footstool, having by one offering perfected forever (εἰς2 τὸ διηνεκές) them that are sanctified. (*Christ had interceded for them on the cross, to which Acts 3:1-26 is the answer; but this also, Christ glorified, is rejected; and so all man’s history closes in Stephen, and He sits down till Christ’s enemies are made His footstool.) It was the time of the church, His body, and the habitation of God through the Spirit. Hence the Son of man is no longer spoken of save as giving Him His place on high (Hebrews 2:6). But as soon as I come to the Revelation, what Christ had declared before the high priest, partly as seen by Stephen and taught in Hebrews 2:1-18, the accomplishment of Psalms 110:1-7 is, as to the latter part, brought out prophetically in 14., coming as Judge for the ripe harvest of earth and the vintage of God’s wrath (14-20). We find Him judging the church as responsible on earth in chap. 1. But from Acts 7:1-60 to Revelation He is never spoken of as Son of man, save that Psalms 8:1-9 itself is quoted (Hebrews 2:1-18), to show where we are in this history. Even then He is not called so. I may briefly refer to some other points where this unity of mind is developed. The three great feasts of Israel, ordinances which pointed to the great principles and power of the gathering of God’s people. There were other feasts: the Sabbath, a sign of the covenant Made with them, but also that His people are in due time to enter into God’s rest; here that of the first creation, for us of the new creation, as risen: the new moon- a sign, I doubt not, of the restoration of Israel, as the tenth day of the seventh month was of their future mourning, and entering into the delivering power of the atonement; but on these I do not here enter. At the three other feasts, Passover (with unleavened bread), Pentecost, and Tabernacles, all Israel was to go up to the place where God had put His name. Full of interest as they are in themselves, I must now confine myself to them, as forming a chain of unity in the history. PASSOVER has an unquestionably historical character. It was " a night much to be remembered," when, protected by the blood from judgment, they ate their unleavened bread in haste, preparing to depart out of Egypt. There is no evidence that I am aware of that they kept it after Sinai (Numbers 9:1-23) till they were in Canaan. Those born in the wilderness were not fitted to do so, being uncircumcised until across Jordan; when, under Joshua, they were, they did so (a very instructive figure, but a little beyond my purpose now). I only add, it is only when dead and risen with Christ we are circumcised, knowing what it is, and "the reproach of Egypt rolled away." Patience and proving in the wilderness does not belong to this. Hezekiah kept it, and Josiah kept it, as it had not been kept for long years. This criminal neglect of Israel is constantly used as an evidence by the Germans that the law was not given. It was clearly established, in commemoration of God’s sparing the people when judging Egypt and Pharaoh at the time of their deliverance from the bondage they were in. So it was ordained to be kept, and, as far as kept, was so. In Deuteronomy 16:1-22 it will be found to have a peculiar character; for there the three great feasts are spoken of in connection with the state of soul under the effect of that which they figure. In the Passover, the unleavened bread, type of holiness and the absence of sin, is the bread of affliction; and they were to turn to Him in the morning and go to their tents, though the feast lasted seven days. There is no thought of common joy, as in Pentecost and Tabernacles, though in these in different measure. When in presence of judgment, though spared, holiness is bread of affliction, the spirit of repentance is the form of purity, and it is necessarily solemn and individual. But the great idea of security from God’s judgment was there in the blood of the paschal lamb afterward, of course, only a memorial of it. Every Christian knows that Christ was the true Passover. The chief priests sought to hinder His being taken on the feast day; but God’s purpose did not await their decision, and on the day of the Passover He was sacrificed as the true paschal Lamb, "the Lamb of God," to take away sin. Eating at table with His disciples,* the Lord Himself so instructs us: (*For the Jews the same day, though not for, us, and at the time when leaven was put away for the feast.) “With desire have I desired to eat this passover with you before I suffer; for I say unto you, I will not any more eat thereof till it be fulfilled in the kingdom of God" (Luke 22:15-16): So that we have a clear instance of the intention of God in an institution formally established by Himself, by the hand of Moses, celebrating their escape from judgment in Egypt, yet definitely purposed to be indicative of a better and more lasting deliverance from the bondage of sin and Satan, and more directly from the judgment of God, by which we were bound down under its consequences. Christ, our passover, is sacrificed for us." When God sees that blood, He passes over, where faith has believed the word. PENTECOST we know to have been connected with the coming of the Holy Spirit. It was the feast of first-fruits (not the first of the first-fruits, the wave-sheaf the morrow after the Sabbath, that is Christ risen on the first day of the week, but) when the harvest was reaped. Here, leaven was to be in the two cakes offered (for sin is always found in man) even if offered to God in the power of the Holy Ghost. At the same time a sin-offering was to be offered to meet this defect, not offered in the previous case of the wave-sheaf; but they could not be burned themselves as a sweet savor to Jehovah.. Then, as it was connected with the Holy Ghost, they were directed, in Deuteronomy 16:1-22, to rejoice together in grace, and bring a free-will offering, according as Jehovah had helped them. All this abides in its true force-its purport accomplished at Pentecost, and its effect abiding to this day. Was it arranged of man for the future in its institution? or was its accomplished antitype, the Holy Ghost come down from heaven, arranged by man on that day? We have it in Leviticus: we have it, with other details, in Deuteronomy: one, Leviticus 23:1-44, a history of the whole time from Egypt till the Lord comes again at the feast of Tabernacles; the other, Deuteronomy 16:1-22, the characteristic detail, of which gives the moral ’import of the observance. If not arranged by man, it is a testimony to that purpose of God which makes the whole book one in the revelation of His mind. We have yet the feast of TABERNACLES, but without any antitype at all, which makes it the more remarkable. This was for the land solely. They were to dwell in booths, a testimony that Israel had been wanderers; but that now the promises were fulfilled, and that they were at peace in their land, never, as Amos says, to be plucked up any more; and, as Ezekiel has it gathered back all of them. It was to be kept after the harvest and the vintage; in result, when ingathering and judgment were accomplished. We have seen in Revelation 14:1-20 the Son of Man reaping the harvest of the earth, and treading the wine-press of the wrath of God. In this character He comes, chapter 19. In this character He is prophesied of, Isaiah 63:1-19, when He comes in dyed garments from Bozrah, when the day of vengeance is in His heart and He treads the peoples in His anger. Compare Isaiah 34:1-17; Isaiah 26:9, and Zephaniah 3:8 : and in each case the promises to Israel following. How could the Lord keep this feast? He could not. He will appear and show Himself plainly enough to the world when He executes judgment on the quick, and so we find it in John 7:1-53, "If Thou do these things," said His unbelieving brethren, " show Thyself to the world." Then Jesus said unto them, "My time is not yet come, but your time is always ready. Go ye up unto this feast. I go not up* unto this feast, for My time is not yet full come." (* The "yet " is not genuine.) But, then, there was another thing in this feast, an eighth day, a specially solemn day; it reached beyond the seven full days of this world’s week to the first day of another which began afresh. On that day, " that great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried, saying, If any man thirst, let him come unto Me and drink. He that believeth on Me (as the Scripture said) out of his belly shall flow rivers of living water. But this spake He of the Spirit which they that believe on Him should receive, for the Spirit was not yet [given] because Jesus was not yet glorified" (John 7:1-53). He could not associate Himself with Israel at this feast, but He could tell them on that special day, which went beyond the order of this world, that the Holy Ghost would be given consequent on His taking a heavenly and glorious place as man, with which that Holy Spirit associates us. With the rest of Israel on earth comes in, what is yet a hope for us too, association with Christ in heavenly glory, as shown in its manifestation in the kingdom on the mount of transfiguration. of which the Holy Ghost is given to us as earnest while Christ is entered as a forerunner, expecting till His enemies shall be made His footstool. Then He shall have all things gathered together in one in heaven and on earth, and then shall be fulfilled in Israel, and far better for us, the declaration of Deuteronomy 16:14 : "And thou shalt rejoice.... because Jehovah thy God shall bless thee in all thine increase, and in all the work of thine hands; therefore thou shalt surely rejoice." It was a feast hardly kept, and no wonder, in all their history; in Solomon’s dedication, lost in the general joy, so to speak, and observed in Nehemiah’s time (chap. 8: 14), when they had learned, though sore smitten, to sing again David’s song: " His mercy endureth forever." Is all this without a purpose or an order, in Leviticus, Deuteronomy, and in the Lord’s remarkable conduct and words in John? while all the testimony of the Lord’s judgments, and of the rest of heart, far too numerous to quote here, confirm the truth of it, and lead, as it will, to the full singing of that lovely word so repeated in the end of the Psalms, חםְדּולְשלָם, "His mercy endureth forever:" while we have better things in glory with Him where He is gone; yet all things to be gathered into one under Him "for the administration of the fullness of time " (Ephesians 1:10). The SACRIFICES and other TYPES of the Old Testament connect the whole Bible from Abel to Christ evidently. Moses made the tabernacle after the pattern shown him in the Mount. There was therefore a purpose and intention in it. Christ has passed through* the heavens, as Aaron entered into the most holy place. The history is taken up, not only in the Hebrews where the whole is gone into, but in 2 Corinthians 3:1-18 And, as to Hebrews, it is not a partisan confirming Jewish ceremonial; but while treating it as of God, putting it wholly aside, and contrasting it with Christianity, the heavenly thing. The whole system is judged; "a shadow, indeed, of good things to come," and yet fully recognized; and, observe, not the temple which they had before their eyes, and which men would have thought of (this is never alluded to in Hebrews), but the tabernacle in the wilderness; for there the Christian is, though with a heavenly calling. It had a full moral and spiritual signification for us; yet was all contrast, a veil that closed the way to the sanctuary, not a rent one which opened the way in; a priest sitting down because all His sacrifice work was finished, not standing because it never was accomplished. The whole history, I may say, of the wilderness is recorded in 1 Corinthians 10:1-33, and applied to Christianity. (* Not into, as in the English version (Hebrews 4:1-16)) We have the ark in Joshua; under Eli; and David; and the history of Aaron’s rod, and the manna confirmed in Solomon’s temple, and that by an allusion, as to a well-known thing, the strongest confirmation possible; though having a moral force that the means of journeying were gone when the rest was come, 2 Chronicles 5:10. The temple order, substituted by David and Solomon for the tabernacle, is found, though slighted, and the temple defiled, all through the Kings. Now, though fifteen centuries separated the establishment of the two systems, the first has far more sense and import now to them that understand, than they had then. They were "shadows of goods things to come," but "the body is of Christ," Colossians 2:17. This applies to every part of the ordering of the tabernacle, where though priests could go and others could not, yet in contrast, as I have said; for the veil is rent, and the holy and holy of holies have, so to speak, become one. What the altar, what the laver meant, details alluded to, I doubt not, in John 13:1-38, has its full force now. The mind which gave Moses the pattern in the mount thought of Christianity in giving it, and Christianity, while setting the shadows aside, more than fulfilled their import. With THE HISTORY, if less obvious, it was equally the case, "All these things happened unto them for ensamples (-61roi), and they are written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the world are come " (1 Corinthians 10:11). Hence we find them knit, as they are found in the Pentateuch, with the constant instructions of the new, and the aptness seen by every intelligent Christian; indeed the whole history acquires its value from its present application to everyday life, with the utmost and most instructive exactness. Historically the accounts of the Pentateuch are referred to and used for the judgment and instruction of Israel, as all the dates at which the Psalms may have been written, as 43., 14., 78., 99., 105., 106., 81. So the history of Judges in Psalms 83:1-18 The minuteness of the allusion in Psalms 80:1-19 shows more than any quotation how their minds were imbued with the history, God using it by His Spirit. God is appealed to as Shepherd of Israel, and leading Joseph like a flock to shine forth from between the cherubim; and, it is added, " Before Ephraim and Benjamin and Manasseh." Why these tribes? They were the three next the ark at the rear of the tabernacle. The allusions are numberless. The spirit of the people from David to Babylon was filled-saturated-with the history in the Pentateuch, Samuel, and the Judges. The public neglect of Jehovah was great, and the judgments many; but their recollections and their desires lived in the history (see Judges 6:13) we learn in the Old Testament, and what their prophets told them of the future. It was what made them know God. If we turn to THE SACRIFICES we find the same neglect of God as in everything; but the full intention and unity of intention is evident, indeed plainly stated. We find it, from Abel onward, the only legitimate ground of access to God. " Without shedding of blood is no remission." " It is the blood that makes atonement for the soul." Sacrifices were offered to God, but for men; worship was connected with an altar, a deep and important principle notified to us in Cain and Abel, and in the patriarchs; nor in the tabernacle service could any strange fire be used to burn the incense, the neglect of which cost Nadab and Abihu their Eves, and closed the entry of the holiest to Aaron save on the great day of atonement. Sin and death had come in; and death and the acknowledgment of sin must come in for man to approach God; and, when all was ordered of God, a clean and spotless victim must be offered. Such offerings occur, and mark the career of the godly (the Abrahams, whose earthly life was a tent, his divine life an altar),* and repeated too often to call for any individual notice. (*He had none in Egypt, nor till he returned to Bethel.) When all was ordained in connection with the tabernacle, and detail entered into, there was the burnt- offering which was on the ground of sin being there and atonement made (though not for particular transgressions), but was all burnt to God, an absolute sweet savor; the meat-offering, in which was no leaven (figure of sin), but all kneaded with oil. and anointed with oil, and that in each minutest part; much frankincense, but all burnt to God, fully tested by holy judgment and only sweet savor. Then others feasted on what was slain, as did the offerer, priest and priests, and God too, while the same abiding law held good as to the blood and fat; and, lastly, when there had been actual sins, there were offerings for them confessed on the victim’s head; and if the blood was carried into the sanctuary, the body burnt without the camp. If the efficacy of the atoning blood went into heaven, the victim was rejected outside the camp, an earthly religion (connection of a people with God upon earth) ceased, and was impossible. And especially on the great day of atonement the blood was carried into the holiest of all-God’s own presence, according to what He was, not merely man’s responsibility met by what was done on the altar of burnt-offering without. Besides this there was a sacrifice connected with their journey through the wilderness, for any uncleanness contracted there, unfitting any, otherwise entitled, to go up to the worship of God. This last was carried out, not by the shedding or sprinkling blood again, but by sprinkling with living water, into which the ashes of the burnt heifer had been put. The blood had been sprinkled seven times where God met the people. All this had a purpose and a meaning. The Prophets and Psalms refer to it as, with more or less order, it was historically continued. The resting on the mere outward offering with an unbroken heart is judged; but, as in Isaiah 53:1-12, there was One stricken for the transgression of God’s people who made His soul an offering for sin, offered to God because sin was there; but a whole burnt-offering of a perfect sweet savor, God glorified in Him as the meat-offering, pure as man conceived of the Holy Ghost, anointed with the Holy Ghost, and all He did by the Spirit, all sweet odor of grace going up to and referring to God above, though priests may scent its sweetness, fully tested by the fire of God’s judgment; no leaven was there, all was a sweet savor to God. We feed on this sacrifice as the peace-offering, though the life and its energies were all offered to God-feed on it indeed, as bread come down from heaven, and as a sacrifice in death, only that death is become sure life to us, and what was absolute ruin before is now redemption and life, and we drink the blood too; not only atonement made for our sins and guilt taken away in our believing, but God perfectly glorified in His nature and intrinsic righteousness, measured by what He is and not merely by what we owe, and all our sins gone where they never can be found again. Such was the special offering of the great day of atonement. There is for the believer no more conscience of sins; he is perfected forever as to his conscience, while provision is made for restoring communion if we have defiled ourselves, the Holy. Ghost by the word restoring the self-judging soul in virtue of that which shows sins forever put away. He appeared once in the end of the world, to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself (complete in result in the new heavens and the new earth); and as it is appointed unto men once to die, and after that the judgment, so Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many. God is perfectly glorified in His nature through redemption, and the believer’s sins gone forever, so that he has boldness to enter into the holiest. I cannot, of course, here enlarge on so wide a subject as the sacrifices, profoundly interesting as it may be. What I havethere to note is, that the word of God affords us, from Abel’s time, a distinct line of thought, brought out in detail in the law of Moses, and prophetically applied to God’s coming Servant in Isaiah, spoken of in the Psalms in words used by the Lord Himself on the cross; and then in the Gospels plainly declared "the Lamb of God that takes away the sin of the world," the Son of man come to give His life a ransom for many; and reasoned on, as every one knows, in the Epistles, showing Christ who died for our sins, according to the Scriptures, the just for the unjust, a Lamb without blemish and without spot. The lamb of Abel’s faith is the Lamb in the midst of the throne, whose bride the heavenly Jerusalem is, Himself the light and glory of it-" a lamb as it had been slain." The same divine thought runs through Scripture from the beginning of Genesis to the end of Revelation; the divine thought, prefigured in Abel, in the Exodus, and the sacrifice of the tabernacle, sung in holy strains in the Psalms, prophesied of by the prophets of God, even to the price He was to be sold for, and accomplished in the Word made flesh, and unfolded in the instructions of the Holy Ghost-God’s precious Lamb, whose blood cleanses us from all sin. Was it a compiler of fragmentary documents in Ezra’s time, or God, who has taught us all this, one immense moral truth from Abel to the consummation of all things, the foundation of the stability of the new heavens and the new earth which makes grace righteousness- the righteousness of God, and sets man at His right hand in glory, opening heaven to us now, and in time taking us there? It was God’s thought, God’s work of love, and God’s revelation, never lost sight of, as it never will be when even the kingdom shall be given up that God may be all and all. These may suffice as illustrations of how divine thought runs as a continued stream of purpose through the Bible as a whole. I insist upon its being many books, by many authors, collected no man knows by whom (not the "learned Germans" more than I or Mr. Smith), but proved to be divinely inspired, individually and collectively, by the divine oneness which pervades their contents, and the more from their being many authors in remote ages. But I will now take two special parts of the great collection; for collection, whoever made it, every one admits it is, the Lord Himself setting His seal of acceptance on it as such-I mean the Gospels and Psalms-to show the divine mind in each. The traditions of Mark’s Gospel, composed at Rome from Peter’s testimony as its source, and Luke more or less from Paul’s, I attach no importance to. It is quite alike to me whether a secondhand tradition (not very early either) be true or false, if an apostolic source be true or not. The question is whether God is the source. If so, the human instrument is of no moment. Mark was intimate probably with Peter, and certainly Luke with Paul; but the latter could not have himself given testimony from personal knowledge to him, and Luke attributes it to another source. This is true, that the tone and import of Luke’s Gospel falls in more with Paul’s ministry of grace to all; but all the preaching in the Acts (and we have only sermons to Jews from Peter and Paul) is based on the commission in Luke, for they are distinct in each Gospel. It is very doubtful if the Epistles of Jude and James are from apostles. This is not the real question. That the apostles had a special mission, whether the twelve or Paul, for these also are distinct, is sure to every Christian; but if God inspired others, their word was just as sure; and if an apostle spoke or wrote or acted not by the inspiration of the Spirit, this was not the word of God. Those who believe in inspiration have, just as these historical critics, rested on traditional circumstances or proofs, or human evidence, strong indeed, I admit, for authenticity and the letter, but which leaves the real question, Are they inspired of God? untouched. The proof of Scripture in this respect is in Scripture, in the power of the word wielded by the Holy Ghost. When in that power it reaches the heart and conscience, its character, its divine character, is known, not only in the particular point in which it reaches them, but as to the true power and character of that which has done so. The woman of Samaria does not say when thus reached, " What you say is true," but, " Sir, I perceive that thou art a prophet." What He said came from God. His character and word were known to her. So it is with the Bible when a man is taught of God. It is recognized as His word, as Christ was recognized by those whose eyes were opened to see what was divine. Human testimony may prove the folly of human doubt, but no more, and so be useful; but divine operation alone gives divine faith. " He hath opened mine eyes." When men believed only through proofs to man, by miracles, Jesus did not commit Himself to them; He knew what was in man. It was man’s judgment about Him, very justly formed, but only man’s judgment, no revelation of the Son of God to the soul: this is by the word through the operation of God; and then a man is born of God and sees. But I must pursue my inquiry. As to the Gospels then, they carry their own testimony with them. Men may make Harmonies or seek to prove discrepancies, or give us Eusebius’ account of traditions, or, if we are to believe Eusebius, the foolish old man Papias’ account of his pleasure in hearing legends of what Christ said-a good pious old man, I doubt not. One has only to read the Apocryphal Gospels to see what they are worth, the utter nonsense that is in them.* But each Gospel bears its distinct character, proving itself and completing the others. (* One tells us that Jesus was as a child the death of so many who meddled with Him, that His mother kept Him in the house at last. He was making mud birds one Sabbath and ponds, and a big boy came and broke His ponds. The birds took life and flew away, and the Child said, "As you have dried My ponds, you will be dried up;" and so he dried up and died.) For while each can give us enough to show what the blessed Lord’s life was, yet the account would not be complete according to divine thought without all. First, there is a characteristic difference between John’s and the Synoptical Gospels. They present Christ to be received as Son of David, Son of man, though of course the Christ and the prophet-servant, and in all He is rejected. In John, being God and the Son manifested in the world, the real ground of His rejection, we read in the first chapter that the world knew Him not, and His own received Him not, and they, the Jews, are treated as reprobate all through, and He is always come into the world, and sovereign and quickening grace alone leads to His reception. And what He is in person, and the Holy Ghost’s coming, are fully treated of. But let us see briefly these characteristics, so as to show, in some measure, the divine completeness of the whole; and it is not pretended there was a clever compiler of the four here. I can only touch on a few leading heads. In Matthew He comes as Messiah, Emmanuel, Jehovah, to His people, yet if Messiah, of course, as Son of David. Hence His genealogy is traced to Abraham and David, the great vessels of the Jewish promise of the Seed. He was Emmanuel, Jesus, that is, Jah Hoshea, Jehovah the Savior, for He shall save His people from their sins. Born at Bethlehem according to prophecy, the anti-king seeks His destruction, and He flies to Egypt, called back out from thence to be the true Son of God here below. Then John the Baptist executes his mission. Both here and with the Magi, while the Jews are the immediate object, yet a remnant only is owned in Israel morally, judgment is at hand, and grace can make of stones children to Abraham, and in the Magi the Gentiles are owned but in connection with one born king of the Jews. Then Christ takes His place among this remnant, and immediately heaven is opened, He is anointed with the Holy Ghost, and the Father owns Him as His Son. The whole Trinity is for the first time fully revealed, and man’s place (for us in redemption), according to God’s counsels, made good in Him when He takes His place amongst them, Son of God there. Owned such He goes up, led of the Spirit, to meet Satan; for us refuses, if Son, to leave obedience in His taken place of servant, and overcomes Satan for us in perfectly waiting on God’s will to act, overcomes his wiles, and sends away the adversary, and then goes to Galilee to the poor of the flock, calls disciples, and all the history of His service in Matthew is given in verse 23 of chap. 4. Then He describes the character of those who would have part in the kingdom without speaking of redemption. Israel was on the way with. God to judgment (comp. Luke 12:49-59), and if they did not agree would he cast into prison, and not come out till they had paid the last farthing. And there they are, to this day. In 8. He is Jehovah, and the Gentiles are again noticed. In 11. we have the character of His ministry, which is forgiveness and power in grace (according to Psalms 103:1-22), and characterized by grace. In 10: mission exclusively to Israel in His own time, then, to the end of 15; after He was gone from 16, and that to the end till the Son of man should be come. In 11. John the Baptist’s ministry and His own are both rejected by Israel, and He takes the character of Son of God, unknown because of His person, and alone able to reveal the Father to the comfort of the heavy- laden, and as the obedient man showing the yoke they must bear to get rest. In 12. the Jews are formally judged, and He disclaims any relationship on earth except that produced by the word. In 13. He seeks fruit no more in His vineyard, but as Son of man carries out the seed which was to produce fruit; but the field is the world and the kingdom of heaven is described, that is, God’s kingdom when the King is in heaven, taking the place of His presence on earth. He will come in judgment as Son of man, and the righteous shine forth as the sun in the Father’s kingdom. In 14. He still continues His ministry in grace, but Israel and man are judged in 15., and grace to the farthest from God according to Jewish dispensation vouchsafed to those who had no promise in His person. In 16. we have the church Christ builds (founded on the title " Son of the Living God," proved in resurrection) to replace Israel, as in 13. the kingdom in mystery, in 17. the kingdom in glory. The disciples are forbidden to say any more He is the Christ, for the Son of man must suffer. In 18., to the end of 20: 28, we find the principles, which were to guide the disciples and characterize their walk when He was gone- lowliness, His presence among them, forgiveness, judging the inward man of the heart instead of observing the outward law, and other great principles of conduct and service. In all the Synoptics, the history of the last events, another chapter of the Lord’s history, His death and not His life, begins with the blind man of Jericho. And He begins by again taking the character of Son of David, and presenting himself to Jerusalem as such. Then the Jews and their various sects come up one after another and are judged. The testimony of God in Judah till the Lord comes (24: 1-31), with exhortations to 44; the judgment of Christendom in 24: 45 to 25: 30, and 31 to the end the judgment of the Gentiles, to whom the message of the kingdom had been sent in those last days; in 26. 27., the last scenes, in which He is specially the victim here, led to the slaughter and dumb before His shearers, and every human comfort looked for in vain, the Christ the Son of God but henceforth Son of man in glory, the veil rent. Then His resurrection and joining the poor of the flock again in Galilee, but no ascension: the twelve being sent out to disciple and baptize the Gentiles, a commission from Jesus risen, of the accomplishment of which we find no history in Scripture. The mission to them is surrendered to Paul, as recorded, in Galatians 2:1-21 The perpetual quotation of and reference to the Old Testament Scriptures is evident to the most careless reader, with ἵνα, when it is the object of the passage cited, ὅπως when it is an accomplishment of it, τότε when it is only an instance of the thing. I have only noticed of course here what shows a perfect and systematic course of teaching, all based on the essential character of the Gospel. The events are not given in historical order in the life of the Lord, though generally following it, but are subjects treated of. The whole history of His life and ministry is in one verse, and then what characterized it,-the mind of God in it. The rationalist may search very imperfect legends how it originated and was put together,* conjecture or reason on a Hebrew original or the contrary, and the Nazarene Gospel. The Christian taught of God sees with perfect certainty the character of the Lord as Messiah, Emmanuel, Jehovah, a Man amongst men, but Son of God, presented to Israel with all the principles He brought as such, and rejected by Israel to make way for deeper counsels and a better salvation: stating indeed a heavenly place for those rejected for His sake, but carrying on the testimony, not from heaven, but from resurrection. (*If any one be curious, he may read Marsh’s conjectures.) The Gospel of Mark 1:1-45 need not dwell on. It is the ministry of Christ, and is more exactly in chronological order, the same as Luke when he is chronological, but not calling for special notice for the purpose for which I comment on the Gospels. The reader may notice that the Lord’s life closes here too with Galilee, as far as the Lord’s words go; 16: 9-20 giving a short summary of what is recorded in Luke and John. I turn to Luke, but only for some brief remarks, with a view to my special object. It begins with a lovely picture of the godly, remnant in Judah, and the prophetic Spirit amongst them, hidden in the midst of the abounding iniquity of Israel; but where, as in the cave of Adullam, a godly priest, the true king, and the Spirit of prophecy are found. But the Jews are under the power of the Roman "beast," and events are dated by his reign. Then comes a genealogy,* which traces Christ up to Adam, He is Son of man come in grace, not the heir of promises to Abraham and David. (*3: 23 should, I have no doubt, be read " (Being, as was supposed, the son of Joseph) [the son] of Heli; " that is, son of Heli refers to Jesus, not Joseph; there is no " which was " in Greek. The Talmudists make Mary the daughter of Heli to be tormented in the other world. The vision of Isaiah (A.D. 68), it is said, makes Mary to be of the lineage of David. So does Tertullian according to Kaye. But this only by the by.) At once, in chapter 4., He shows God’s goodness extended to the Gentiles, so that they were going to kill Him. Then we have His power over demons and diseases,-cleansing the leper and forgiving sins on earth; He is come to the sick. His disciples could not fast then,-the bridegroom was there;-nor could new wine be put into old bottles, the truths of grace and the gift of the Spirit into Jewish ordinances. He is found (as constantly in Luke) praying as Son of man, and slighting their thoughts of the Sabbath; He was Lord of it as Son of Man: it was the sign of the covenant with Israel (Ezekiel 20:1-49) He gives then the summary of blessings and woes, (the disciples are "ye poor,") but not the principles on which they would enter into the kingdom. There is more faith in a Gentile than in Israel; and then He raises the dead. The poor multitude and publicans justified God; the Pharisees rejected His counsel and are rejected. But wisdom is justified of all her children; and the child of wisdom is shown in the poor woman, a sinner in the city: not in the Pharisee who, with God in his house, decided, as rationalists do, that He, most clearly, could not be a prophet. But forgiveness, salvation, and peace are the portion of the poor woman, to whose heart and conscience God had revealed Himself in Christ as light and love. Then, in chap. 8., the sowing the word is spoken of; but we have not the mysteries of the kingdom. This Gospel is not dispensational; but the Lord rejects association, according to the flesh, with Israel. We have then an account of the expulsion of the legion of demons in Gadara, and, as often in Luke, moral details as to the man. He would go away out of his home in this world with Christ, but was sent back for a testimony. The world gets rid of Jesus; and, I have no doubt, the rushing of the herd of swine is a picture of Israel’s conduct when He was gone; but this is a mere figure I leave to every one to judge of. He goes to heal Jairus’ daughter, but has to raise the dead. Only whoever touches Him with faith, in the way as He then was, is healed. After feeding the multitude He is transfigured; and in the Gospel of Luke only we have the talking of His decease, and the going into the cloud, the heavenly part of the kingdom, a very important element Their selfishness is detected in every form from the grossest to the most refined; and Christ is to be everything. This closes the orderly historical part of Luke. Christ’s time was come for Him to be received up, and He steadfastly sets his face to go to Jerusalem. In the beginning of 9. He had given His last testimony to Israel, only there was no inquiry who was worthy; and then comes the kingdom in glory, and entering into where the Father was, the excellent glory, and the strict prohibition any more to say that He was the Christ. We have no going through the cities of Israel till the Son of man be come,-no prohibitory notice of Samaritans and Gentiles; we have the history morally, not dispensationally, given: here, too, He was praying when He was transfigured; no replacing the Messiah in Israel by the church founded on the title Son of God, but the heavenly and earthly glory when the Christ was rejected, and the cross, in bearing which they were to follow Him. On this He insists, while the multitude wondered at His present power. He sends His messengers before His face on His way to Jerusalem, the parting testimony to Israel; but the disciples were to rejoice, not because devils were subject to them, but because their names were written in heaven. ’Grace is taught, independent of Judaism, in the man that fell among thieves. Then we have hearing His word, and prayer. He was the test of every soul The evil generation, as pictured in the return of the unclean spirit, is left out. Still the nation is judged morally. The folly of the world in its desires is taught, and the fear of man to be conquered, and for disciples full trust in God exercised; while the heavenly portion of those who watch, and the rule in the return of Christ of those that serve, is beautifully brought out. The effect of His present coming in dividing nearest friends is told, and the application of being in the way with the adversary made clear. Judgment was on all the nation, the Sabbath is set aside in the work of grace, the kingdom very briefly announced in its external form, but in connection with entering in at the strait gate. He would often as Jehovah have gathered Jerusalem, but now her day was past. The Sabbath again yields to doing good, and the call to the great Supper and its result is spoken of: only the sick and the poor of the flock is added to what is in Matthew. We have then, what is in Luke only, grace in seeking and grace in receiving by the Father, God’s joy in the salvation of a sinner thenceforth; what map, a steward out of place, is to do with his Master’s goods in view of everlasting habitations; and the veil withdrawn from another world, putting the outward blessings in this, promised to Israel, in their own true place. This morally substitutes Christianity for Judaism. After some moral principles, He is substituted for the temple and Judaism in the case of the healed Samaritan; the kingdom of God was there. Prayer is urged, but when the Son of man cane where would be faith? and self-judgment preferred to self-righteousness, and the heart searched instead of the commandments outwardly kept. There is none good but God. Salvation is only of Him. He approaches Jericho; the story of Zaccheus is added, full grace to a publican, but responsibility in service when He should be gone, and reward according to labor. Then in approaching Jerusalem on the ass, the remarkable expression, Peace in heaven. Till Satan should be cast out thence, no rest on earth could come. Jerusalem is wept over in grace. In the prophecy to His disciples (chap. 21.) we have no abomination of desolation, but the siege of Jerusalem by Titus not mentioned in Matthew. The true secret of Peter’s fall brought out, and the entire change in Christ’s position now, as being there, not as Emmanuel, King in Israel as He had been, but as a malefactor on the cross. In Gethsemane more deep human sorrow than in any Gospel; on the cross none. He is the perfect man: not here the victim before God, true as that ever remains. He went through the sorrow with His Father; and there was calmness itself when the sorrow was actually there. We have the account of the converted thief, and the assurance of a blessed intermediate state before He came into His (Christ’s) kingdom: a most instructive and important history. I should have added that in instituting the Lord’s Supper He does not speak of eating it new in the kingdom, but of the present thing, its being fulfilled in the kingdom of God. We have the lovely history of the disciples’ journey to Emmaus; and, passing rapidly over the circumstance of the resurrection, no going to Galilee, but going out to Bethany; the ascension related, and their blessing in connection with His going to heaven. It is He himself, the same Jesus who is risen: He eats to show it: opens their understandings to understand the Scriptures: repentance and remission of sins to be preached in His name; but they were to wait for power at Jerusalem for the promise of the Father-that is, the coming of the Holy Ghost. It is on this commission, as I have said, that the preaching of the Gospel took place, as related in Scripture. The whole Gospel gives us the moral change, and introduces the present and heavenly state of things, not dealing with dispensations, though of course with the setting aside of Judaism. It is the Son of man, and in divine grace. While Luke is especially characteristic, it is less easy to reproduce its character in a summary, because it is many minute traits which form that character: grace in the Son of man. Still the introductory chapters, the place and scope of the genealogy, the introduction of the parables in 14, 15, 16. the introduction of going into the cloud in the transfiguration, the ascension, the thief on the cross, the woman that was a sinner, the frequent praying of Christ, the introduction of Gentiles, all marked grace that reached out beyond promises to Israel, and the Son of man in whom that grace came. The Gospel of John, on the contrary, gives very broad lines of truth as to the person of Christ and the coming of the Holy Ghost. Its character is totally distinct from the other three gospels. It is not a history to display what Christ was here, His is rejection and death, but a statement of all that He was in Himself The. Jews are all set aside, and indeed man, in starting; but all that Christ is, save His relative characters, is found already in the first chapter: in the third, what was revealed and needed for Israel and man to have part in the earthly and heavenly blessings. We have only to follow the contents of the Gospel to see its bearing. The sovereign operation of needed grace is found also from the beginning. What was found by results and experience in the first three Gospels is taught as truth here. The first chapter begins before Genesis, because it treats of what was, not of what was done. As to Christ, He is God, in nature a distinguishable person with God, not become so by incarnation, but With God in the beginning. He was, when all began. In Him was life, and the life was the light of men; but the light shone in darkness, that is, amongst men, but the darkness comprehended not. God, in patient love, sent a witness to draw men’s attention to that light. Next, verse 14, He became flesh, ἐγένετο, became, not now ἦν, was He became flesh, was this amongst men as man, was a Son with His own Father, dwelt among men full of grace and truth. Christians have all received of His fullness, and grace for grace. Grace and truth came by Him, they were there, ἐγένετο. The law was given by Moses. Then His work: He is the Lamb of God, the taker-away of the sin (not sins) of the world, and the baptizer with the Holy Ghost; He was anointed and sealed with it Himself. Then, as John had witnessed to Him as Lamb of God, His disciples gathered round him. He is Son of God and King of Israel. But much more: henceforth the heavens would be seen opened, and the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of man. He is not the Christ for Israel in this chapter; nor Priest above; nor Head of the church. John does not own the Jews, nor has he indeed to do with the Church all is individual, not counsels, but God revealed in the Son declaring His Father; and eternal life come down to be imparted to man, the Word become flesh. In the second chapter we have the result when the history of the gathered remnant closes, the joy of the marriage, the purifying water turned into wine, and the temple purged of all that profaned it. This closes the introductory part as to all that concerns Christ. We have now what concerns men. But the incarnation is the introduction of what was before the beginning of all things, in the power of life in a Man, into the scene of the all things, to be eternal life indeed as from everlasting in His person; but a wholly new thing though a true Man amongst men-a new beginning. But the mere human conviction by evidence was nothing, and not to be trusted. Man must be born again (ἂνωθεν) wholly anew. Nicodemus ought to have known this as a teaches of Israel. The prophets (see Ezekiel 36:1-38) showed it plainly that, even for Israel to enjoy the earthly promises, there must be a new birth; how much more to have part in the heavenly! which He would teach as coming thence, as no one else had to tell it, the Son of man, who was even then divinely in heaven. But the Son of man must be lifted up, that a people separated by faith should have a part in these heavenly things. The need was there on man’s side, and the Son of man met it. The love of God was there on God’s side, and the Son of God was given; but it is the world, not Israel. The condemnation now was that light was come into the world; and, man hated it, and did not come to it. In the rest of the chapter John the Baptist unfolds who he is, the testimony being closed by the evangelist himself with the Father’s love to the Son, and His having put all things into His hand: he that believed on Him had everlasting life. Man, God in grace, Israel, the world, and the Son of God come in grace revealing the Father, bringing eternal life, grace and truth-all find their place here; what Christ is, and the truth as to man, the being born again, and the atonement on the cross. This closes the introduction, the epoch being marked by John being not yet cast into prison; after which Christ began His public ministry. In the fourth chapter the Lord leaves Judaea, His country as come amongst the Jews, and we find grace with a Samaritan, prerogative mercy above Jewish relationship, and connected with His person and humiliation, but no understanding of it in man; and this produced by dealing with the conscience. Worship must be in spirit and in truth, for God is a spirit; but the Father, His name in grace, revealed in the Son, seeketh such, In ch, 5. we have the benefits under the law dependent on the power of the person who is to use them, and there is none; the disease to be cured has taken away the force to use the remedy: Christ as Son of God brings it with Him. The Father raises the dead, and quickens them, so the Son quickens whom He will; and he who believes has eternal life: then man’s responsibility as to it, life being come in His person, with the evidence of John Baptist, His own works, the Father, their own Scriptures: they would not come to Him to have it. In ch. 6. He is Son of man, owned prophet, refusing to be king; He ascends up for priestly service, and the disciples go away alone; He rejoins them, and they are immediately where they went. Our food, meanwhile, is Christ humbled, the bread from heaven, and His flesh and blood; but if this last, His death, be not fed on, there is not life; in such case their portion is resurrection in the last day, in a state man never was in, even innocent. In ch. 7. the Holy Ghost takes the place of Tabernacles, as we have seen, of which there is yet no antitype; in ch. 8. His word is rejected; in ch. 9. His work; in ch. 10. He will have His sheep at any rate out of Israel and the Gentiles too; in chs. 11. 12. we have the testimony rendered of God, as we have seen, to Christ when rejected as Son of God, Son of David, Son of man: but then He must die. This closes His history, and He is now looked at as going to His Father-this from ch. 13. He must leave His disciples; but if He cannot stay with them, He must have them with Him gone now to God. For this He abides a servant, and washes their feet; for being washed (converted), that is done once for all. Their walk remains to be seen to. Further, God is perfectly glorified by Him in His death, so man goes into God’s glory. In ch. 14. He went to prepare a place for them above, and will come back and receive them. They knew where He was going, for He was going to the Father, and they had seen the Father in Him, and so knew the way too. Further, when the Comforter was come, they would know not only that He was in the Father, but that they were in. Him and He in them. In ch. 15, Israel was not the true vine, though a vine brought out of Egypt. He was so: and they the branches and this on earth. Then the work of the Comforter fully developed in ch. 16.: sent by the Father in 14. in His name: by Him, from the Father, as the glorified Man in ch. 15., 16. In eh. 17. speaking to His Father-wondrous grace that we should be admitted to hear Him-He puts the disciples (founding it on His work, and glorifying, and revelations of the Father in Himself) on the same ground as Himself with the Father and with the world. Then we have Gethsemane and the cross ch. 20., His revelation of Himself to Mary Magdalene and to the disciples: and this whole period of Christian blessing characterized. The Jewish remnant, who loved Him, could not now have Him back in bodily presence, but they were now His brethren; He went to His Father and their Father, to His God and their God: He is in their midst, communicates life in resurrection in the power of the Holy Ghost, as God breathed into Adam, commits the administration of forgiveness of sins on earth to them. Thomas represents the remnant in the latter day. In ch. 21. we are in Galilee again with this remnant; and the service of Peter, who is blessedly restored through grace, and of John: one as the apostle of the circumcision to find his labor in Israel come to nothing as regards the nation, and he a martyr, as Christ; and John to linger over the condition of the church till He came. It is purposely given mysteriously, and in part refers to the last days. The net is the millennial haul, and does not break, as the gospel net did. (Of Paul’s ministry we have nothing; it stands by itself, a dispensation committed to him.) We have no ascension in St. John’s gospel. It will be remarked that, all through, it is the divine side and the purpose of God as to Christ, which is treated here; with the Holy Ghost who takes His place on earth. I would still notice the distinction of the closing scene in the Gospels. In Matthew Christ is the victim, perfect in calmness and patience, with no ray to comfort Him, no heart to feel fob’ Him; He is led as a lamb to the slaughter; man’s wickedness frightfully brought out, but a perfect victim of propitiation, told out on the cross by the solemn words, "My God, My God, why hast thou forsaken Me?" In the midst of plans of the priests and the vacillation of Pilate God’s purpose is carried out in the true passover: and Christ is, before both, condemned for His own testimony to the truth. In Luke you have deeper human conflict in Gethsemane, though perfection in it: being in an agony, He prayed more earnestly. On the cross there is none: He had gone through it as man with His Father, and the perfect result is peacefulness on the cross. Also, here, as man, He commends His spirit to His Father. In John we have the divine side-no sorrow in Gethsemane, none on the cross. In Gethsemane they go backward and fall to the ground, and He delivers up Himself, saying, " If ye seek Me, let these go their way." On the cross He puts His mother under John’s care, and delivered up His own spirit when all was finished in the work He had to do. We have to learn in part, and the various parts separately, that we may know all. John was nearer Christ in His agony, but Matthew gives it, not John. Matthew saw the people go back and fall, but says nothing of it. The Holy Ghost gives by each what suits the whole tenor and subject of that Gospel. But our Baurs and other Germans can see nothing but a composition to make peace among Christian squabblers in the end of the second century. Can there be greater poverty, more total moral darkness? Mr. Smith, professing for some other reason to believe, debits out this threadbare infidelity, without a ray of light to lighten the darkness, or say it is not true; or he would persuade us that Christ sanctioned, as written by Moses, and as the word of God relative to Himself, what was not written by Moses at all,-an imposture in which he, forsooth, can see no harm, and would have us believe that the Lord and the apostles were all wrong; and Dr. Baur and himself right. I have referred to the Psalms as another illustration of unity of purpose and mind as collected. It is well known there are five distinct books, each ending with ascription of praise to Jehovah-1.-41.: 42.-72.: 73.-89.: 90.-106.: and thence to the end. Each book has its own object and character. The first two psalms, however, are an introduction, and give the key to the whole 150: In Psalms 1:1-6 there is a remnant distinguished from the ungodly of the nation. Psalms 2:1-12 gives the counsels of Jehovah to establish, in spite of rejection by Jews and Gentiles, Christ (the anointed) as King on His holy hill of Zion; also His Son, as born into the world; and, finally, to subdue the Gentiles with a rod of iron. I would now mention a principle of order which helps us to understand the connection of many psalms. One or more psalms give the platform on which the thoughts and feelings of the following psalms are based.’ But, first, as to the character of the five books. In the first the remnant is still in Jerusalem, and the name Jehovah is used throughout, though in two Elohim be introduced. And here we have more prophetic reference to Christ, though rejected. In the second book the remnant is out of Jerusalem; but their state is pursued through rejection till the authority of the Son of David be established. This begins with Elohim; but after Psalms 45:1-17., when the King is brought in in power, we find Jehovah, and triumph. Blood-guiltiness is owned, the sufferings and sorrows of the people under oppression and hostile power are recounted: and Elohim is largely, sometimes exclusively, used in contrast with man powerful in wickedness. Still judgment is looked for in faith, and true repentance in Israel. But the remnant all through are cast out, though their praise is ready (65.) when restored. In 69. Christ associates Himself with Israel, bearing their sins, and carrying their sorrows in His heart, though rejected of them; and here Jehovah comes in again. It closes, as already said, in the Son of David being established in glory and power. It will be found in individual psalms, the first verse or two giving the thesis, the rest what leads to it. The third book goes "beyond the Jews, and takes in all Israel. They are to be received after the glory, and though faith does bring in Jehovah at 73: 28; and 78: 21; 80: 4; 81:10, still Elohim is the constant cry: they are not yet restored by the glory. Still we have this prophetically, and all the exercises of heart and faith and hope about it furnished to them by inspiration. Here too the old associations of Israel as a whole are far more fully before us. In 83. Jehovah comes fully in again, on the judgment against the last confederacy being executed, and is used even in the depth of their humiliation, their guilt under the old covenant (88.) In the next psalm mercies are recounted and Christ brought in (verse 19 called holy one wrongly. It is still Chesed, so the same as in the first verse generally; in verse 18 Kodesh,) That is, Jehovah. This closes the book. The fourth book is the bringing in the first-begotten into the world. Jehovah has been ever Israel’s dwelling-place. Of 91. I have spoken where Jehovah is identified with the Most High, in the accomplishment of the promises to Abraham. This is celebrated by faith in the next psalm. Then, with 93. as a preface, the introduction of Jehovah Messiah into the world, from the appeal of the suffering remnant who inquire if Jehovah is going to reign conjointly with the power of evil, verse 20, on to the calling up the Gentiles to worship at Jerusalem, where the presence and glory of Jehovah are fully established, in Psalms 100:1-5 In 101. we have the principles of the earthly kingdom; and 102. how Christ, who was cut off, could be there. He was Jehovah Eternal in nature (Atta Hu), and His years, too, as man should never fail (see Hebrews 1:1-14) Psalms 103:1-22 celebrates Christ as Jehovah (comp. Matthew 9:1-38) in Israel; in Psalms 104:1-35 it is the God of creation who is celebrated; in 105. the God of Israel of old, but whose judgments are now in all the earth. In 106. Jehovah’s faithfulness is looked to in spite of all their misdeeds. The fifth book, from 107. to the end, is more general, but we have them gathered out of all lands. The great revelation that Messiah Melchisedek was to sit on Jehovah’s right hand till His enemies were made His footstool, then His power would come out of Zion. It is fully celebrated "that Jehovah’s mercy endures forever." The circumstances of deliverance are rehearsed in the Mahaloth, the law written (119.) in the heart of Israel who had gone astray like a sheep that was lost; and finally the great Hallelujah of now accomplished deliverance. Psalms 72:1-20; Psalms 145:1-21. alone, as far as I remember, describe the millennial state itself: the first as to Christ; the second as to His association with the people. The 118. is the full description of the return of Israel’s heart to Jehovah, recognizing His ways and their own fault, and is constantly quoted by the Lord in the Gospels, and brought out by the power of God in the last entry into Jerusalem: and it is quoted also in the Acts. I return to note a few details based on the principle referred to at the outset. Psalms 1:2. are the preface and key as I have said; then Psalms 3:1-8; Psalms 4:1-8; Psalms 5:1-12; Psalms 6:1-10; Psalms 7:1-17 the thoughts and feelings Christ’s rejection has given rise to in the remnant, ending in His character as Son of man, Psalms 8:1-9 Of this I have spoken before. Psalms 9:10.* are the sorrows of the Jews and the delivering judgments of God; in 11.-17. their thoughts and feelings, Christ’s resurrection, trust and righteousness being introduced, ending in 18., when Christ’s sufferings are made the key to Israel’s history, from Egypt to the establishment of the kingdom in power. (*I do not understand how Mr. S. makes there an imperfect acrostic. It is looking inexactly and superficially at the outside, and missing all the force of the Psalms. We have א,א,כ,ב to begin with in Psa., 9.; ל,ב,ב,ר in Psalms 10:1-18.) Psalms 19:1-14; Psalms 20:1-9; Psalms 21:1-13; Psalms 22:1-31 are deeply interesting, creation testimony, the testimony of the law, of a Christ suffering from man exalted to glory and punishing all His enemies, of a Christ suffering indeed from man, but then crying to God and forsaken, yet perfect and making atonement; nothing but wider and wider blessing flowing from it to the remnant which becomes the church, literally accomplished in John 20:1-31, to all Israel, to the world, and those born in the millennium: " He hath done this." Psalms 23:1-6 forms another starting-point: Jehovah the Shepherd who cares for His tried one; Psalms 24:1-10 Christ the Jehovah who enters in triumph into the gates of righteousness on earth. The exercises on this go to Psalms 39:1-13 Then we have the accomplishment of the counsels of God, undertaken by a suffering obedient Christ, the key to all; and then the blessing on him (41.) who understands the poor, as He said, Blessed are the poor in spirit, "ye poor;" and we can say, This poor man cried, and Jehovah heard him. I need not go any farther to illustrate general principles, which is all I can attempt to do now. The divine sequence and connection of the Psalms is, I think, evident; yet they are confessedly isolated songs, composed at different times, even if mostly David’s: a collection, but the mind of God shines through them as a collection; His purposes in Christ and in Israel, when Jehovah shall be owned as Most High in all the earth, a suffering remnant and a Messiah who has entered into their sorrows. Of course the Father’s name is not and cannot be found in them, nor the Spirit of adoption. It is deeply interesting to see that, while His human sorrows can be viewed in Psalms 20:1-9, His atoning sufferings can be expressed only by His own mouth (22.) I would say a few words on Petrine and Pauline teaching, as it is greatly dwelt on by these "learned Germans." It is folly, as they take it with their speculations, but most interesting, when rightly looked at. That the Jews had the strongest prejudices against the Gentiles is notorious, and that the Jewish Christians were not exempt from them is evident upon the face of the New Testament history. We possess in the Acts of the Apostles the case of Cornelius, and it is plainly in point both as regards Peter himself and those at Jerusalem. The affair between him and Paul (Galatians tells the same tale, and reveals, as do other passages, the effort to force circumcision on the Gentiles. The council in Acts 15:1-41 under God decided otherwise at Jerusalem itself, which was the important point. But, clear as may have been the Christian decision, prejudices remain behind decisions acquiesced in. " Certain came from James" marks this clearly. Only in Hebrews (13: 10-13) are they summoned to give up Judaism. But there was much more than this. The writings of Paul contain a doctrine unknown to all other parts of Scripture-the church as the body of Christ. It is not mentioned by any other New Testament writer. The word is not used. It was a dispensation committed to him, besides the gospel, to complete the word of God. He was the wise master-builder who laid the foundation. It had been hidden from ages and generations: in proof of this, see Romans 16:25; (read "prophetic Scriptures," not Scriptures of the prophets) Ephesians 3:1-10; Colossians 1:24-26. John had nothing to do with this question: his ministry did not reach out to it. It was the revelation of eternal life, and the Father in the Son, and His becoming our life; but his ministry is always individual. If the children were to be gathered together in one by Christ’s death, as well as the nation died for, it is individually as a family, not as the body of Christ. And in the mysterious end of his Gospel it passes from Peter closing his life and ministry as Christ did, and passes on to Christ’s coming: in ministry fulfilled in the Apocalypse. In this last chapter of John, Paul does not come in at all. John speaks of Christ’s and our going to heaven but four times, as far as I remember (6. 14. 16. and 17.) His ministry was the display of what was divine here below: hence its attractiveness. Paul presents us in Christ before God: and this leads to union with Christ as His body. Peter’s ministry, after presenting grace, redemption, and birth by the incorruptible seed of the word, and speaking of Christ’s bearing our sins, very clearly dwells as his specialty on the government of God: in the first Epistle as to the saints, in the second as to the ungodly. I speak in all these cases of what characterizes them. But none ever touches on what constitutes Paul’s special ministry. I may add, John still speaks of preachers who had gone out taking nothing of the Gentiles, of Christ dying, not for our sins only, but for the whole world. He puts our standing clearly in Christ (1 John 4:17); but it is still individual. The Platonism of John is a fable; it is anti-Platonic in its revelations, and expressly so. The notion even of disputes after the destruction of Jerusalem seems to me unhistorical -save some Nazarenes and Ebionites in Palestine, soon sunk into insignificance-Judaism proper sunk into oblivion. The Alexandrian corruption of Christianity issuing in Arianism was later and connected with Neoplatonism. Justin Martyr (A.D. 140) was infected with it, and others of that school of his time. But it was another, thing. This is true that the full doctrine of redemption as taught by Paul never took root in the church: the church itself Judaized, and has remained in this state to this day. The return to Paul’s teaching, and partially John’s, is what is disturbing its slumbers at this day. What was special in Paul’s doctrine was that by the descent of the Holy Ghost believers, perfectly saved, were united in one body to Christ, Jews or Gentiles: and the fullness of redemption in a new creation was manifested, by the glorifying of Christ, as man, on high. Paul’s conversion connected itself with this. He never knew Christ on earth-was a strict legal Jew. Christ was revealed to him in glory, and Christians spoken of by Christ as being Himself. He was delivered from the people and from the Gentiles, and sent to these last in connection with a glorified Christ, all disciples being one with Him: and the apostles at Jerusalem give up to him their mission to the Gentiles (Galatians 2:1-21) Of course this gave a special character to his mission, though the gospel, the basis of personal salvation, re mained the same. It was a dispensation committed to him, a mystery kept secret since the world began. This is the reality of the difference between Petrine and Pauline teaching, which is sufficiently important. But this was too early lost, and the Pauline doctrine of redemption and the church merged in outward forms and organization, to have been a ground for any great controversy. None held Paul’s doctrine. The Pope is the successor of Peter, not of Paul, though the last may be smuggled in to appropriate and hide him. John’s teaching had nothing to do with the question. Indeed the Baur theory is pretty much given up. I speak of it to free the intrinsic importance of the additional truth taught by Paul: for it is no difference of gospel, but a very much larger revelation of the counsels of God, from the idle, and (they must forgive me) low, husky, speculations of those who know nothing of the real contents-husks half gone already; for rationalist speculations cannot be expected to last above twenty years. The accusations of plagiarism I do not make much account of. But I do not see original research in the article "Bible." It is the current speculation of the day. But that must be borrowed somewhere. De Wette, Ewald, F. W. Newman (who borrowed it from the Germans), Hupfeld, all give it to us: and I now see it in Professor Kuenen, whom I have just read. It is a mere reproduction of what these teach, and, unless there was real personal research, it could hardly be anything else. " Opinionum commenta delet dies, naturae iudicia confirmat; " only for "naturae" we must substitute " aeternae veritatis." You may consult Eichhorn’s (a rationalist’s) judgment:(1) None but ignorant and thoughtless doubters can suppose the Old Testament to have been forged by one deceiver; (2) They are not the forgery of many deceivers... But how could they forge in a way so entirely conformed to the progress of the human understanding; and was it possible in later times to create the language of. Moses? He goes through other suppositions, and says, How could a whole nation be often deceived and at different periods, and by what degraded themselves? The whole passage, too long to quote here, may be read: Moses Stuart has translated it. The writers all quote, he says, or refer to what has been written before. Profane history refers to Moses as the lawgiver of Israel. It would be a serious difficulty, if anything be a difficulty to a theorist, to see how or why an elaborate system of tabernacle arrangement, professing to come by direct inspiration from God, should be recorded, when a totally different one was before their eyes. No one reading the Old Testament for himself but must see a clear and orderly succession of historical events, though much more-collected afterward, no doubt, into a volume-and that the effort to invalidate it supposes more absurdity than any other theory. It is bound together historically too closely. All is false if the whole be not substantially true as it stands, for it all hangs together and supposes itself all throughout. But faith depends on other workings in the soul than these external proofs. Doubts may be easily awakened, but did these reasoners ever present us with one certain solid truth? As the matter has come publicly before all the world, I must say that Mr. S.’s defense is worse than his previous acts. To disseminate pure infidelity (for this it is), destroying the inspiration of the Bible as we have it, without a hint of anything else, and then say he believes it for other reasons, is too bad to be qualified by any term I could use. It results in making it no matter to falsify the real origin of the books; and in making Christ and the apostles put their sanction on such a course, or declare one to be the true author when he was not. And if it were true, where was the inspiration of the writer? The question is not as to Professor Smith (of whom I know nothing but what is published); but, Are plain souls to have the word of God, what "proceeds out of the mouth of God," quoted by the Lord and His apostles as such, and Christianity communicated in words which the Holy Ghost taught, or the fancies of Astruc and Baur and Smith, with no real communication from God Himself? What is my soul to lean on? Happily when the great conflict between man in the Second Adam and Satan took place, words which proceeded out of the mouth of God were sufficient for the Lord and for Satan, as they ever will be; and in the hour of His deep and atoning agony sufficed to express what was in His heart, that which no other heart could ever fathom or express. If there be a blessing in the world besides the Lord Himself in grace, it is to have God’s word as He Himself has given it to us, like that Lord Himself, what is divine and heavenly but perfectly suited and adapted to man, in the heart of man: the Old Testament as a pipe which brings it, partially drunk at by those who conveyed it; in the New the heart itself, first the vessel drinking for its own thirst, and then the water flowing forth from the inmost man. " When it pleased God, who separated me from my mother’s womb and called me by His grace to reveal His Son in me, that I might preach Him among the heathen." All of it is that word of God which works effectually in them that believe. "If that which was from the beginning abide in you, ye also shall abide in the Son and in the Father." ======================================================================== CHAPTER 24: VOL 01 - HE THAT LETTETH ======================================================================== He That Letteth 2 Thessalonians 2:6-8.-It appears to me that the Spirit here treats of the restraining influence and person with a certain studied obscurity, and that, if wise, we should not too hastily form conclusions. It must be borne in mind that the epistle was an early one, written to young converts who had enjoyed the apostle’s oral teaching on the subject of the kingdom of the Lord Jesus (cf. Acts 17:7, with 2 Thessalonians 1:1-12), as well as on the matter in question (ver. 5). Further, if we attach any value to the idea, so prevalent in the early church, that the Roman empire was " the letter," or " what withheld," it is natural that the intimation should be but dim, especially if previously taught by the apostle. If the hindrance consisted in the presence and power of the Holy Ghost, whether personally in the church or governmentally in the world, one can understand how nothing more is here given than the assurance of a restraint up to a certain point. Thus, while the powers that be (whatever the form) are ordained of God, there is a time coming, as we know from Revelation 11:1-19; Revelation 12:1-17; Revelation 13:1-18, when this shall cease, and the beast shall rise out of the bottomless pit (1:e. be resuscitated by diabolic agency in an exceptional and frightful way), when the dragon (1:e. Satan) gives him his power and his throne and great authority. The withholder will have then disappeared, or at least cease to act as such. The apostasy will have come, and the man of sin be revealed in the fullest way: for I do not deny a partial application of the prophecy to the papacy, while looking for a far more complete development of the evil. The revelation of the lawless one, who is clearly, I think, "the king " of Daniel 11:36; Daniel 11:40, will be characterized by an unprecedented energy of Satan " with all power, and signs, and lying wonders," similar language as St. Peter uses of Jesus, "a man approved of God" by miracles, and wonders, and signs which God did by him. It is quite a mistake to suppose that verse 6 will bear "and ye know what is now restraining;" for νῦν is here a particle of transition, and fairly enough given in the English version. No more is implied than their general knowledge that there was a some one or thing which restrained; but ὀ χατέχων ἄρτι in verse 7 does mean that he restrains now. Next, ἐχ μέσον is correctly rendered " out of the way." It is its regular known force in sacred and profane authors, whether connected or not with verbs implying separation, as any good lexicon may satisfy any one. Thus, in ἐχ τοῦ μέσου χαθέζεσθαι (Herod. 3: 83) the verb has nothing to do with that sense, which the phrase does carry. See also Dem. 323, 327 (Reiske). Accordingly the authorized version rightly connects ἕως ἐχ μ. γ. With ὁ χατέχων, while the beginning of verse 8 answers to the beginning of the 7th. If the phrase ἕως ἐχ μ. γ. applied to "the wicked one," and meant "till he appears," the force of χαὶ τότε ἀποχ. would be weakened and useless. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 25: VOL 01 - HEAD OF HIS BODY THE CHURCH ======================================================================== Head of His Body the Church Colossians 1:18.-Christ ’only took the place of head of the church after redemption was effected, and in heavenly glory as its result, and the formation of what the Bible calls His body demanded this as a basis, and the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven as the power of its unity. It must be borne in mind that, when Scripture speaks of the "one body," it is in reference to the earth. It is now, and on earth, that the saints are baptized by the Holy Ghost into one body, though I am far from believing that such a relationship will cease by and by in heaven. It is as first-born from the dead that Christ is the beginning even though He was from everlasting the only begotten Son, and the Eternal Life with the Father. Hence said He to Peter who had confessed Him to be the Son of the living God, "Upon this rock I will build my church." It had not yet been built or begun to be built. The foundation was not laid: it was laid afterward in His death and resurrection. Then ascending to heaven, He became the head, and the Holy Ghost came down in person to gather into union with Him as so risen and ascended. This and this only is what the New Testament designates His body; for, according to the figure, there could not be a body without and before the head. The exceedingly precious mercies of God to all saints are unquestionable; and to some it may seem presumptuous to predicate peculiar privileges of those called since Pentecost. But, evidently, the question is one not of man’s reasoning, nor of preconceived notions, but of God’s word and will. And it is plain that Ephesians and Colossians, not to speak of other Epistles, dwell much on certain blessings now conferred on the saints which never were enjoyed by, nor promised to, the Old Testament saints. They are the church’s blessings brought out of God’s treasury in this present dispensation, for the glory of Christ, and to show the riches of His own grace. The arguments of those who have assailed the point do not even touch the question, which they do not seem even to understand. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 26: VOL 01 - LIFE IN CHRIST RISEN ======================================================================== Life in Christ Risen Romans 8:1.-It may help the reader to bear in mind the observation of another, that the apostle, in the beginning of this chapter, is alluding to and summing up his previous reasoning. Thus, verse 1 answers to chap. 5.; verse 2. to chap. 6.; and verse three to chap. vii; as a moderate degree of attention and spirituality may easily discern. "Justification of life" is what the first verse supposes, the possession of a new and risen life in Christ, to which sin is not and cannot be imputed. When God sent forth His Son he was made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem, etc. But now that redemption is accomplished and Christ raised from the dead, it is not merely the holy life which it always was, but it is life in resurrection after all the question of sin is settled. It is riot merely justification in view of a foreseen work, nor a standing on the ground of promise-the promise of One who could not lie. The work is done, the promise accomplished-all the promises of God yea and amen in Christ: according to this is our standing as individual saints in Christ Jesus, and of this Romans 8:1-39 treats. Corporate union is not discussed save in chap. 12: But many of our individual privileges, as well as our corporate ones, could not have been predicated of believers till Christ had finished His work on earth and sent down the Holy Ghost from heaven. I suppose (in spite of A D² and some good versions that have μὴ χατὰ σ. π. or D² E I K, etc., for ἀλλἀ χ. πν.) that the last clause was added to guard the full grace from verse 4, where the same words rightly occur. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 27: VOL 01 - LOVE AND LOVE ======================================================================== Love and Love John 21:15-17.-I do not think that the student will get much satisfaction by reading the remarks of the late Dean Alford on this affecting scene. There is more, perhaps, in what the Archbishop of Dublin, Dr. Trench, has observed in his New Testament Synonyms. But the true difference seems to me much more simple than either of these gentlemen apprehend. ’Aγαπάω, is the broad, generic term for loving. It is susceptible of all applications, of superiors, inferiors, and equals. It is predicated of God towards man, and of man towards God. It describes God’s feeling towards the world in giving His only begotten Son. It describes Christ’s tender and full affection towards the church. On the other hand, φιλέω is a narrower word. It is distinctively the love of feeling, of endearment, and hence frequently it is used of the outward sign of fondness, and also in a vague way of that fondness which produces the habit of this or that action, though this is true of ἀγαπάω, too. Both are said of God’s love to His Son. Dean A., if I remember rightly, considers that the Lord drops the word of reverential love (ἀγαπάω) which he had twice used, comes down to the word of human affection, Peter’s own word (φιλέω), and this third time questions, not merely his loyal love for his master, but the very human regard of his heart. On the contrary, it appears to me, that while the Lord thoroughly judges Peter’s confidence in his own love to Him, in its so exceeding that of others that he could stand where they fled, He not only hears Peter’s repeated declaration of his true and near affection for Him, but Himself takes it up the third time, and that this, flashing on Peter’s threefold denial, went to his inmost heart. The Greek concordance utterly dissolves the idea that reverential love is the dominant thought in ἀγαπάω. We are not called so to love our enemies, nor even our neighbors (Matthew 5:43-44; Matthew 6:24). Nor was it so that Christ loved the rich young man; and certainly none can pretend that God reverentially loved the world (John 3:16); and this is not a tithe, perhaps, of the absurdity that follows Dean A.’s distinction, if I understand him. As little can 9A.ir4 be reduced to the mere human regard of the heart.. It is not thus that the Father loves the Son (John 5:20), or even us (John 16:27); nor can anything be more opposed, as it appears to me, to the true scope of 1 Corinthians 16:22; Titus 3:15; Revelation 3:19, where φιλέω occurs. Let the reader judge. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 28: VOL 01 - MATTHEW AND LEVI ======================================================================== Matthew and Levi May I be permitted to express the following objections to Dean Alford’s reasons, and, above all, to his conclusion, that Matthew and Levi are distinct persons? It is agreed (1), that " the three narratives relate to the same event;" and (2), that " the almost general consent of all ages has supposed the two persons to be the same." But, so far from allowing that his third fact is almost inexplicable, I can only admire, with Eusebius, the humility and candor of Matthew, who gives himself the same name at the receipt of custom by which he was afterward known as an apostle. The other two Evangelists call him Levi as a publican, and Matthew as an apostle, which is surely a very intelligible thing on the supposition that he bore both names. Thomas is called Didymus by John only; and Thaddeus (or Lebbeus, as in Matthew and Mark) is called Judas by Luke and John, not to speak of his own epistle, with scarcely a note of identification. As to the fourth point, or " early tradition," that which separates the two persons is as minute as it is suspicious. Clement. of Alexandria quotes the heretic Heracleon to the effect that’ Philip, Thomas, Levi, and many others, had not suffered martyrdom. Is this most vague statement of a Gnostic-even if it were clear and certain, which it is not, that he means by this Levi the Levi of Mark and Luke-to weigh against the plain and strong presumptions of 1 and 2? As to (5) Origen’s testimony (contra Cels. 1:), it seems in this passage to distinguish between Matthew and, not Levi, but Λεβης. It is notorious that, elsewhere, Origen identifies Matthew with Levi. So that I am wholly amazed at the Dean’s No. (6): " It certainly would hence appear as if the preponderance of testimony were in favor of the distinctness of the two persons." His notions of evidence must be strange indeed, to set the assertion of Heracleon, even if precise instead of being loose, and the statement of Origen, if confirmatory instead of being adverse elsewhere, and, as I think, even here, above his own first two arguments; especially. as he is compelled to own how inexplicable on this supposition it is that Matthew should, in his account, omit all mention of Levi. In fact, such a theory, if true; would turn the seeming modesty of Matthew into a scarcely honest concealment of him who really gave the great feast. I have no doubt therefore, that the common view which identifies Matthew with Levi, as two names of the same individual, is perfectly sound, and the only tenable one. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 29: VOL 01 - MELCHIZEDEK: BIBLICAL ANNOTATIONS ======================================================================== Melchizedek: Biblical Annotations Hebrews 7:8.-There is really no solid ground for denying that Melchisedec was a man, as simply as Abram, Lot, or any other personage that figures in the description of Genesis 14:1-24 The mystery consists not in the person, but in the way in which the Spirit of God records his appearance and action in the scene, so as to make of him a suitable type of the Lord Jesus. Thus not a word is said of his birth, or of his death; there is total silence as to his ancestors; and no hint is given of the lapse of his office, or of any successor. The Holy Ghost, by Paul, argues from this silence (which is so much the more striking as contrasted with the well-known pedigree and succession of Aaron), and thus illustrates Christ’s priesthood, which had really those features that are here shown to be typically foreshadowed in Melchisedec. For instance, while verse 8 refers to Melchisedec, all that is meant of him is that the testimony Scripture renders is to his life, not to his death; whereas it frequently speaks of the death of Aaron and his sons. The same principle applies to his ".abiding a priest continually." The Bible does not speak of his institution, nor of his resignation. When first we hear of Melchisedec he is a priest, and as such we leave him; no son, no successor, appears. The name, " King of Righteousness," the place, " King of Salem; " his sacerdotal office, especially in connection with so peculiar a title of God, "priest of the Most High God" (which, in its full import, implies the possession, de facto as well as de jure, of heaven and earth); the circumstances (" met Abram returning from the slaughter of the kings"); the character of his actions (" blessed him," and not merely sacrifice and intercession),-are all obviously and eminently typical. There is scarcely more difficulty as to Melchisedec than as to Jethro, priest and king of a later day; though of course the latter could not furnish so apt an illustration, in the circumstances of the case, as the former. Both were real, historical, and not merely mystical, persons. Two remarks may be made towards the better understanding of this chapter and epistle. The first is, that, if the order is that of Melchisedec, the exercise is that of Aaron, as is most plain in Hebrews 9:10 : The second is, that in verses 18, 19 of our chapter, we must take " for the law made nothing perfect " parenthetically, and suppose an ellipse of γίνεται (not of ἐτελείωσεν) with.ἐπεισαγωγὴ In other words, " did" ought to be left out of the authorized version. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 30: VOL 01 - MERCY ======================================================================== Mercy The reason for the introduction of " mercy " to Timothy and Titus, while St. Paul simply wishes grace and peace, in addressing churches (Philemon, because of the church in his house, coming under the last head), is plain. The church, or corporate thing, is viewed in its full privileges; the individual, however favored, recalls the thought of need day by day: "mercy" therefore is appropriate in the latter case rather than in the former. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 31: VOL 01 - MOUNT ZION ======================================================================== Mount Zion Hebrews 12:23.-The phrase "general assembly " (πανηγύρει) is clearly, in my judgment, epexegetic of the preceding words, "the innumerable company of angels," just as, in the clause before, "the heavenly Jerusalem " is a further explanation of "the city of the living God." The conjunction χαί introduces each new clause, which arrangement is destroyed in this particular instance, but observed in all the other parts of the sentence in the English Bible. The same confusion appears in Beza, Diodati, the Dutch, Martin, Ostervald, the Lausanne, etc. Bengel rightly objects to this construction. "Nam et polysyndeton retinendum est; et aliorum sine dubio est panegyris: aliorum, ecclesia, quis enim conjungeret synonyma, panegyris et ecclesia? Ecclesia, primogenitorum est; panegyris igitur; angelorum." But then he falls into the mistake of making, not only the angels, but the church of the first-born ones refer to the myriads, which is equally, as it seems to me, contrary to the linking of each separate term by the conjunction, not to speak of other objections. The Syriac and Vulgate, with those that follow them, Luther and the Elberfeld, avoid either error, and give the true sense with more or less clearness. The apostle ascends from the lowest point of millennial glory which unites heaven and earth, the seat of royalty raised up in pure grace (after Ichabod was written on Israel, and the king of their choice was slain), in contrast with Sinai, which was the place and expression of the nation’s responsibility. He then words in John 6:51 (εἰς τὸν αἰῶνα) are the commonest possible expression of eternity, or "forever," whether absolute or relative, which of course depends on the context and nature of the case. See Matthew 21:19; Mark 3:29; Mark 11:14; Luke 1:55; John 4:14; John 6:58; John 8:35; John 8:51-52; John 10:28; John 11:26; John 12:34; John 13:8; John 14:16; 1 Corinthians 8:13; 2 Corinthians 9:9; Hebrews 6:20; Hebrews 7:17; Hebrews 7:21; Hebrews 7:24; Hebrews 7:28; 1 Peter 1:23; 1 Peter 1:25; 1 John 2:17; 2 John 1:2; which are, I think, all the occurrences in the New Testament. Εἰς αἰῶνα (in 2 Peter 2:17) has been dropped by some editors, though even they admit the same phrase in Jude 1:13. The omission of the article implies that the phrase is characteristic, 1:e. adjectival of the sense; and "everlasting," as "forever," pertains to τοῦ σχότους, rather than to the verb. The plural form often occurs, as in Romans 1:25; Romans 9:5; Romans 11:36; Romans 16:27; 2 Corinthians 11:31, etc.; or with πάντας, as in Jude 1:25; or yet more emphatically εὶς τοὺς αἰῶνας τῶν αἰῶνω, as in Galatians 1:5, and often elsewhere. The idea here is not so much one unbroken eternity (expressed by the singular, simple or complex, as in Hebrews 1:8), as the constant succession of age upon age, which is pretty well given in the English " forever and ever." Ephesians 3:21 is the most peculiar of all; for γενεάς expresses ordinarily human generations, τοῦ αἰῶνος of itself would convey the thought of an undivided everlasting; and τῶν αὶώνων closes the series with successive ages sweeping on. The whole phrase intimates, I suppose, a future beyond the bounds of every measure of time. The anarthrous form εὶς αἰῶας αἰώνων occurs in Revelation 14:11 (where, however, C. has αὶῶνα αἰῶνος), which, as we have seen, modifies the sense so far as to present no positive object before the mind, as in Revelation 19:3, and simply in this case characterizes the action of the verb. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 32: VOL 01 - MY BRETHREN ======================================================================== My Brethren Matthew 25:40.-I think that it is clear and certain that those whom " the King " designates as His brethren here, are a distinct class from the sheep. It is not denied that all. God’s saints are, or may be, viewed as " sheep." All that is now contended for is, that in this scene we have certain godly Gentiles blessed and inheriting the kingdom prepared for them from the foundation of the world, but at the same time distinguished from others styled the King’s brethren, who had previously put these sheep to the test, and been the occasion of showing their difference from the goats, or the unbelieving Gentiles, who had dishonored the King in His messengers. I add that the scene is a millennial one; not the gathering of the saints risen or changed before the millennium; not the judgment of the dead after it, but a scene on earth of living nations dealt with according to their reception or rejection of the King’s brethren just before this judgment (Matthew 24:14). ======================================================================== CHAPTER 33: VOL 01 - NATIONAL RESURRECTION ======================================================================== National Resurrection Daniel 12:2.-Many Christians, whose judgment is to be respected, apply this passage to a literal resurrection. But they are involved in difficulties, from which ingenuity essays in vain, as I think, to extricate them. Instead of commenting on what appear to me mistakes, let me state my firm conviction that a national resuscitation of Daniel’s people, 1: e. Israel, is in question here, as in Isaiah 26:1-21 and Ezekiel 37:1-28 This being understood, the entire context is plain. It is at the time of their deepest distress that Michael stands up, and not merely are all those elect Jews delivered who have been glanced at in the previous parts of this prophecy, but many who are dispersed, as it were buried, or at least slumbering, among the Gentiles, awake, some to everlasting life, and some to shame and everlasting contempt. (Compare Isaiah 66:1-24sub finem.) Then follows the peculiar blessedness of the " Maschilim," 1:e. the understanding ones, that instruct the mass in righteousness, who, instead of going out like the moon, though it may appear again, shine as the stars forever and ever. This figurative application of a resurrection to Israel’s circumstances at the close of the age is of course perfectly consistent with a real bodily resurrection of saints before, and of the wicked after, the millennium, as in Revelation 20:4-12. I am aware of the assertion that the phrase וְאֵלֶּה-אֵלּِِِה is never used elsewhere in Hebrew as distributive of a general class previously mentioned. But I believe it to be unfounded. The reader has only to examine Joshua 8:22, and he will see that the pronoun is used in a similar way, Israel being the general class, and the same expression as here taking it up distributively. Accordingly, our English Bible in both cases, and in my judgment rightly, translates ".some... and some." Of course it is not denied that in certain circumstances " these" and " those " would well represent the meaning. My opinion is that the other is an equally legitimate rendering wherever required by the context, as I conceive it to be in both the texts cited. And such, I find, is the view of the Vulgate and Luther as to Daniel 12:2. Again, I have no sympathy with those who apply this verse to mere temporal deliverance. But it is not a necessary inference, on the other hand, that the words " everlasting life" imply a resurrection-state. People forget that the saved Israelites in question are supposed to possess eternal life, which certainly may be before any change as to the body. It may help some readers to notice a somewhat parallel case, both in good and evil, as respects the Gentiles in Matthew 25:46. Plainly they are the nations at the beginning of the millennium discriminated as sheep and goats, and dealt with by the King without delay. " And these shall go away into everlasting punishment; but the righteous into life eternal." So, when Israel reappears in that day, sad examples are to be there, whose " worm shall not die, neither shall their fire be quenched, and they shall be an abhorring to all flesh;" while others are to be brought an offering to the Lord, who shall not labor in vain, nor bring forth for trouble; for they are the seed of the blessed of the Lord, and their offspring with them. These awake to everlasting life; the others are abandoned to shame and everlasting contempt, apart from the question of resurrection. It will be a time, not of national deliverance merely, but of signal mercy and judgment from God; and this for Israel after their long sleep among the Gentiles, as well as for such Jews as will have figured more in the previous crisis in the land. The Maschilim seem to be a special class still more distinguished (ver 3). ======================================================================== CHAPTER 34: VOL 01 - NON EADEM IMAGO ======================================================================== Non Eadem Imago OPTIME, CARISSIME!-Literas tuas accepi….. Vides inter me et to nonnihil discriminis esse. Tibi non placuit, quod prioribus literis scripsi. Interrogas, cur Ioh. 14: 9 in hunt locum adhibuerim ac non talem locum, qui esset de ipsa re de qua ageretur. Imo satis est respondere, ilium locum ad bane rem pertinere. Certissima sunt haec duo: 1°, qui Filium videt Patrem videt; 2°, ex fide non ex operibus est iustificatio. Que si certissima sunt, haec aeque certa sequuntur: (1°), falsa est omnis theologia, que aliam facit Patris imaginem aliam Filii; (2°), falsa est omnis theologia, que ex operibus pendit iustificationem. Qui vero docet, Patrem postulasse, Filium solvisse, pretium quoddam Patri postulanti, is aliam facit Patris imaginem aliam Filii, imo aliam facit Patris aliam Filii iustitiam. Quod si haec, que in Patre est iustitia pretium postulans, bona qualitas est, Filius non Deus est neque Dei similis; invenitur enim bona qualdtas, qua caret Filius; qui vero bona quadam qualitate caret, Deus non est. Si vero haec iustitia pretium postulans etiam in Filio est, necesse est alius Filio pretium quod debeatur solvat; quod si ita est, in Romanum cultum incidimus et ex operibus pendet iustificatio. Optime frater, multa dicta sunt et multa dicuntur et laudantur, ut haec que maxime est simplex res obscuretur, atque scio et apud vos et apud nos theologum maxime profundus haberi et vocari, qui maxima subtilitate possit oculos et aures legentium et audientium obturare, ne videant quam immensum sit intervallum inter S. Scripturam et Anselmi theologiam, quam sequuntur. Nulla vero subtilitas efficere poterit, ne certum sit in Ioh. 14: 9 frangi omnem theologiam, que aliam faciat Patris aliam Filii imaginem. Neque est locus, imo ne unus quidem, ubi doceat S. Scriptura, pretium quoddam Filium Petri solvisse. Dum in villa mea versabaris, ostendi tihi permultos locos, et ex N. Test. et ex LXX. sumptos, qui liberationem, salvationem, ἀπολύτρςσιν vocant et λύτρον illud, per quod fit salvatio (Luke 2:38; Luke 21:28; Romans 8:23; 1 Corinthians 1:30; Ephesians 1:14; Ephesians 4:30; Ebr. 11: 35; Psalms 119:154; Psalms 69:19; Psalms 111:9, etc.) Atque prorsus eodem modo ea salvatio que est per Iesum ἀπολύτρωσις vocatur et illud λύτρον quod nos salvavit. Si rex sanguinem et vitam profundens exercitum suum salvat et praeclaram victoriam vincit, dicitur etiam nostra et vestra (credo) lingua maγνοpretio victoriam peperisse; quod si quis interrogat, cui illud pretium solvens victoriam exercitui pepererit sive emerit, nemo respondebit. Atque scio, si missam feceris illam, qua imbutus es, Anselmi theologiam et S. Scripturam perscruteris, to facile illud inventurum esse. Quamdiu vero illa theologia oculos obscurat, fieri non potest ut quis S. Scripturam intelligere possit. Ubicumque enim videt veritatem gratiae descriptam tamquam subiiciet ei illain pretii-solvendi-doc- trinam. Haec vera est Scripturae ratio: 1°, Deus amavit mundum; 2°, propterea quod Deus amavit mundum, Filium misfit, non ut sibi solveret quod deberet mundus, sed ut mundum salvaret; 3°, ut illud opus efficere posset Filius, Pater ei omnem potentiam in coelis et in terra tradidit; 4°, Filius Patri obediens venit, mortuus est, etc.; 5°, iam in dextra Patris sedens regnat, donee substrati sint hostes; 6°, postrema quum ei situs erit extremus hostis (1:e. mors), regnum Patri reddet et ipse se Patri subiiciet (1 Corinthians 15:1-58). ======================================================================== CHAPTER 35: VOL 01 - NOT PUT UNDER ANGELS ======================================================================== Not Put Under Angels Hebrews 2:5.-There is no intimation that I can see that the world, under the old dispensation, was subjected to angels, but the statement that all things are put under the glorified man, even Jesus, already crowned, though now we see not yet all things put under Him. He is to be displayed the king of the world to come, the future habitable earth, and not of heaven merely. It is a negative statement, excluding angels, who were familiar to the Hebrew mind as the most exalted creatures known to them, from that government which pertains to the Son of Man, who had been already (in chap. 1.) shown to be, in a special sense, Son of God, yea God himself, the adored of all angels, the Creator. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 36: VOL 01 - NOTE FOR PAGE 28 ======================================================================== Note for Page 28 In order to chew the advantage of reading the foregoing along with the article on which it animadverts, we give a quotation from it on alleged " Parallel Narratives " and divergent laws, in the Pentateuch:- " This view is supported by the fact, that even as it now stands the history sometimes gins more than one account of the same event, and that the Pentateuch often gives several laws on the same subject. Of the latter we have already had one example, but for our present argument the main point is not diversity of enactment, which may often be only apparent, but the existence within the Pentateuch of distinct groups of laws partly taking up the same topics. Thus the legislation of Exodus 20:1-26; Exodus 21:1-36; Exodus 22:1-31; Exodus 23:1-33 is partly repeated in ch. 34., and on the passover and feast of unleavened bread we have at least six laws, which, if not really discordant, are at least so divergent in form and conception that they cannot be all from the same pen. (Exodus 12:1-28; Exodus 13:3-10; Exodus 23:15; Exodus 34:18; Leviticus 23:5-14, Deuteronomy 16:1-22) Of historical duplicates the most celebrated are the two-fold history of the creation and the flood, to which we must recur presently. The same kind of thing is found in the later books; for example, in the account of the way in which Saul became king, where it is scarcely possible to avoid the conclusion that 1 Samuel 11:1-11 should attach directly to ch. 10: 16 (of. 10: 7). " The extent to which the historical books are made up of parallel narratives, which, though they cover the same period, do not necessarily record the same events, was first clearly seen after Astruc (1753 A.D.) observed that the respective uses of Jehovah (Lone) and Elohim (God) as the name of the Deity afford a criterion by which two documents can be dissected out of the book of Genesis. That the way in which the two names are used can only be due to difference of authorship is now generally admitted, for the alternation corresponds with such important duplicates as the two accounts of creation, and is regularly accompanied through a great part of the book by unmistakeable peculiarities of language and thought, so that it is still possible to reconstruct at least the Elohim document with a completeness which makes its original independence and homogeneity matter of direct observation. The character of this narrative is annalistic, and where other material fails, blanks are supplied by genealogical lists. Great weight is laid on orderly development, and the name Jehovah is avoided in the history of the patriarchs in order to give proper contrast to the Mosaic period (of.Genesis 17:1; Exodus 6:3); and, accordingly, we find that the unmistakeable secondary marks of this author run through the whole Pentateuch and Joshua, though the exclusive use of Elohim ceases at Exodus 6:1-30 Of course the disappearance of this criterion makes it less easy to carry on an exact reconstruction of the later parts of the document; but on many points there can be no uncertainty, and it is clearly made out that the author has strong priestly tendencies, and devotes a very large proportion of his space to liturgical matters. The separation of this document may justly he called the point of departure of positive criticism of the sources of the Old Testament; and present controversy turns mainly on its relation to other parts of the Pentateuch. Of these the most important are-1. The Jehovistic narrative, which also begins with the creation, and treats the early history more in the spirit of prophetic theology and idealism, containing, for example, the narrative of the fall, and the parts of the history of Abraham which are most important for Old Testament theology. That this narrative is not a mere supplement to the other, but an independent whole, appears most plainly in the story of the flood, where two distinct accounts have certainly been interwoven by a third hand. 2, Many of the finest stories in Genesis, especially great part of the history of Joseph, agree with the Elohim document in the name of God, but are widely divergent in other respects. Since the researches of Hupfeld, a third author, belonging to northern Israel, and specially interested in the ancestors of the northern tribes, is generally postulated for these sections. His literary individuality is in truth sharply marked, though the limits of his contributions to the Pentateuch are obscure." [The reader, by turning back to p. 28, and reading on, will be able to decide for himself whether this be sound learning and valuable information, or rationalistic folly and utter incapacity to grasp the mind of the Spirit in Divine Revelation.-Ed.) ======================================================================== CHAPTER 37: VOL 01 - OUR CONFLICT ======================================================================== Our Conflict Joshua 5:9.-With the Epistles to the Colossians and the Ephesians before us, I am of opinion that the wars of Israel have their answer in our wrestling with the powers of darkness; that the gradual acquisition of their land corresponds with our setting our affections on the things above, where Christ sitteth; and that we too have our circumcision, first in Christ, in whom the flesh has met its doom; and, secondly, in the practical way of mortifying our members which are upon the earth, etc. To neglect these cross-lights of the Old and New Testaments is to despise, unwittingly, the means of heavenly wisdom. THE WORLD’S JUDGE. Acts 17:30.-It is evident that the point of which St. Paul avails himself in order to reach the conscience of the Athenians is their own confessed ignorance of God (verse 23). " The times of this ignorance God winked at." But now St. Paul was declaring to them the God whom they knew not. The true God shines out in the death and resurrection of Christ. Not to receive what is proclaimed therein is to reject the counsel of God against oneself. Heathenism was essentially wrong; at the best it represented God as an hard master, as one (if one) who needed all that man could muster, instead of allowing Him the blessed place of the Giver, which even creation and providence proved Him to be, and much more redemption. Accordingly, as the full light of God is shining the world over like the sun, and the sound of the Gospel is published in all the earth (in principle I mean), man is without excuse. For his case is not merely, like Israel’s, failure under legal requirement, but the despisal of the full and free grace of God, who is now commanding all men everywhere to repent, to turn from their idols and their self-righteousness, from themselves in short to Him, and what He has demonstrated Himself to be in Christ towards the worst of sinners. To refuse is not merely to lose His everlasting mercy, it is also to brave His righteous judgment of this habitable world, for Christ is by Him ordained to judge it (and not only the dead raised before the great white throne), of which His resurrection is the proof. The world slew Him and God raised Him up, the sure proof that it is morally judged already, as it actually will be when. Christ comes in the clouds of heaven. Up to Christ’s first advent, and especially His resurrection, the Gentiles lay hid, as it were, as to public relations with God. Salvation was of the Jews. Christ’s resurrection is a groundwork for faith unto all, Gentile as well as Jew, for death cuts all specialties in the flesh. Hence the special call to repent ever since; always obligatory, repentance is now urgent. So as to the day for judging the habitable world: the preached resurrection of Christ, who is about to judge it, puts men under fresh responsibility. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 38: VOL 01 - PARABLE OF THE VIRGINS ======================================================================== Parable of the Virgins Matthew 25:1-13. - Whether the lamps had gone, or were only going out, makes no real difference as to the grand teaching of the parable; and, as far as this goes, either the one or the other is quite compatible with the absence of oil. The statement that the foolish "have some oil" is most objectionable: not a word implies it; nay, what is said both by the wise virgins and the Lord would imply the reverse, even if we had not the plain and positive declaration that the foolish "took their lamps and took no oil with them." Why might not wicks be lit, and relit, without oil? I agree that " are going out" is a more correct rendering than the ordinary version; but it in no way shows that the virgins had oil, or that they were more than professors without the Holy Ghost, though responsible for and designated according to the position they assumed. As to the unconverted being called "virgins," there is no more difficulty there than in the "servant" of the preceding parable. In either case they took that place, and were judged accordingly. There are Christians who love Christ’s appearing in the midst of much ignorance as to its details. There are professors who talk much of the Second Advent, and hold it to be premillennial. But I assuredly believe that the former, if they are alive and remain till the coming of the Lord, will be caught up to meet Him, and that the latter, if they abide unregenerate, must have their portion outside, where shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth. As unfounded is the idea that τάγματι in 1 Corinthians 15:23, means " company," " band," " regiment," while fully admitting of course that such is a frequent signification in profane authors. But here the context is decidedly adverse, whether τὸ τέλος be applied to the wicked dead, or to Christians uninstructed in the, Lord’s second coming and kingdom. All or most of the versions at all known and accurate (as the Syriac, Vulgate, Beza, Luther, De Wette, Diodati, Martin, Ostervald, the Lausanne, etc.) seem to agree with the authorized version in giving " order." Indeed, the way in which our Lord’s resurrection is introduced appears to me of itself to exclude such a translation; for His resurrection is the first step, which perfectly agrees with " order," but not with " company." Again, such a view necessitates the harshest possible construction of " the end" (τὸ τ6έλος), which, by a figure, must be tortured to mean the good (or bad) who are raised then; whereas, in truth, it is most plain that "the end" is really after the kingdom is given up, and, a fortiori, subsequent to all judgment. The white-throne judgment of the dead is one of the closing acts of the kingdom, after which cometh " the end." Lastly, it would be incongruous to suppose that after " they that are Christ’s " rise, another regiment of Christ’s should remain to rise. Not a class, but an epoch, is meant by "the end; " an epoch subsequent to the resurrection of the wicked and their judgment. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 39: VOL 01 - PERFECT, NOT SINLESS ======================================================================== Perfect, Not Sinless Matthew 5:48; 1 John 3:9.-The first of these texts has no bearing whatever on the question of perfection in the flesh. It is the revelation of the name of our Father which is in heaven, and the character practically which suits the kingdom of heaven. The -mere Jew was responsible to render testimony to the righteousness of Jehovah; the believer now is responsible to show forth the grace of " our Father." Vengeance on the Canaanites was then a righteous thing; now "if, when ye do well and suffer for it, ye take it patiently, this is acceptable with God." The children are bound to sustain the family character, " that ye may be the children of your father which is in heaven, for He maketh His sun to rise on the evil and on the good, and sendeth rain on the just and on the unjust.... Be ye therefore perfect, even as your Father which is in heaven is perfect." Other Scriptures prove, if proof were needed, that sin still abides in the saint here below, however bound he is to disallow and mortify it. This text simply exhorts us to imitate our Father’s grace, even to those who deserve His judgment. The other Scripture (1 John 3:9) regards the child of God in that point which distinguishes him from the world, in the possession of a life from God which is absolutely sinless. No intelligent Christian will therefore forget that the flesh is still in us, though we are no longer in the flesh, but in the Spirit. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 40: VOL 01 - PRIVATE INTERPRETATION ======================================================================== Private Interpretation 2 Peter 1:20.-Permit me briefly to show why I consider the common view to be erroneous. In the first place it gives no reason for taking προφητεία as equivalent to an inspired declaration, predictive or not. Indeed, I am not aware that the word in the New Testament ever has this loose meaning, and I am quite clear that the verb from which it is derived countenances nothing of the sort in 1 Corinthians 14:3, but simply contrasts prophesying with speaking in a tongue. In other words, that verse in no way defines prophesying, but compares its character with the gift of tongues. But, even if it were ever so used beyond a doubt in the New Testament, I am of opinion that the context here decidedly restricts προφητεία to the revelation of future events. It is agreed that ἐπἱλυσις means interpretation, or the act of interpreting, though some, as Calvin and Grotius, have been rash enough to venture on the conjecture ἐπηλύσεως, and many more have given the force of " movement " to ἐπίλυσις, while it would really require ἐπήλυσις (= approach), or some such word. The main question remains as to the force and reference of ἴδιος. One critic reasons from its frequent opposition to χοινός. But this is too narrow a foundation, because each of these words possesses significations not thus opposed. The fact is that, beside the elliptical χατ’ἰδἰαν, ἴδιος occurs near a hundred times in the New Testament, and always means " own" (his, her, its, etc., according to the case). I have little doubt, both from general usage and from the verses before and after the passage under debate, that,ιδίας here refers to the subject of the sentence, προφητεία, and that the meaning is, "No prophecy of Scripture is (or is made) of its own interpretation." Taken by itself, it is not its own interpreter, but must be viewed as part of a grand whole, whereof Christ’s glory is the center. I must be excused, therefore, if I believe the idea of some to be as thorough a perversion of the text as the Romish one. One contends for the general right of man, they for the exclusive prerogative of the church so-called-both, in my judgment, dangerous errors, however concealed or explained. The Holy Ghost leads us to connect facts with God’s purposes in Christ, and thus to understand and expound prophecy, which taken by itself is never rightly known. Even Rosenmuller, Wahl, etc., seem to agree with the view here contended for. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 41: VOL 01 - SCRIPTURAL UNITY AND UNION* ======================================================================== Scriptural Unity and Union* My object is in no way to assail Dr. Moody Stuart, of whose personal worth and piety (though myself unacquainted with him) I have no doubt, but-to take up the true grounds of unity and union, points not only of great importance but occupying the hearts and minds of Christians everywhere. (*A review of Dr. A. Moody Stuart’s sermon-" Jesus Christ, the Bond of the Holy Universe "-preached at the opening of the Free Church General Assembly, Edinburgh, on Thursday, 18th May 1876.) The desire of unity flows, I cannot doubt, from the Spirit of God. True unity and true union are from Him, and according to His mind He will bring all things that are blessed around Himself as a moral center. It evidently must be so, for He is God and the true center of all blessing. That according to this there is a special effectuation of this in Christ, in the fullness of times, is clearly also revealed to us in Scripture. Our question is: What, and of what, and how, is this unity or union? How far is it unity, and how far union? These are not the same. Scripture must be our guide in the inquiry. And it is as precise as Dr. Stuart is vague. It reveals the purpose of God according to the good pleasure of His will, for the administration of the fullness of times to gather together in one (ἀναχεφαλαιώσασθαι) all things in Christ, both which are in heaven and which are in earth. It reveals an eternal state when Christ shall have given up the kingdom to God, even the Father, that God may be all in all-surely ever Father, Son, and Holy Ghost; but God as such all in all, not the subsistence of the kingdom held by Christ as man; as man the Son will then be subject, as we know He was on earth, though God over all blessed forever, all the fullness of the Godhead in Him bodily. I only add this to guard from error, as I have alluded to the passage in which His giving up of the kingdom and His subjection are spoken of. There is another unity spoken of that is, of saints on earth, and I may add in glory; and in a twofold way. First, as individual saints, a family I may call it, as it specially refers to the Father-Christ being the firstborn among many brethren. Of this John speaks; of the church as the body he never does. Its second aspect is this. Those in whom the Spirit of God dwells are really united to Christ by the Holy Ghost, are members of His body, who, as man, is exalted to the right hand of God, in the glory He had with the Father before the world was. Both these will be perfected in heavenly places. The sons will be in glory conformed to the image of the Son. They have born the image of the earthly; they will bear the image of the heavenly, made perfect in one. He will be the head of the body, the church, over all things. I have thought it better to state briefly the Scripture revelation as to unity. My statements are little more than Scripture texts strung together, so as to show what its doctrine is distinctly, before any comment on the statements of Dr. Stuart’s sermon. For the truth itself is what enables us to discern any departure from it and ideas which are purely human in their true light. True unity is too precious a thing, too much according to the heart of God, and must be, not to seek to guard against any erroneous views as to its nature. The passages I would refer to, some of which I shall be led to notice more fully, are John 17:11; John 17:20-23, three distinct unities. Ephesians 1:19-23, compare Colossians 1:15-18, the same twofold headship. 1 Corinthians 15:24-28; Ephesians 1:9-10; Romans 8:29-30. I am somewhat surprised, not at the sermon’s producing an impression, but that its vague statements were not estimated more justly by those who sought its publication. I suppose want of Scriptural habits of thought is what accounts for it. Its references to Scripture are everywhere loose and inaccurate. The text itself connects part of verse 23 of John 17:1-26 with verse 21, leaving out verse 22, which makes a total change in the phase of unity treated of; and the effect of that in verse 24 is left out, or the discrepancy would be manifest. There are three unities spoken of in John 17:1-26 First, of the immediate disciples of Christ. The application-of this unity to them is incontrovertible, as is evident from the language of verse 12. The second (20, 21) is of those that believe through their word, " one in us," and this was to the intent that the world may believe. The third is unity in glory, the glory given to Christ Himself of the Father, when the saints are made perfect in one, that the world may know He was sent of Him, and, seeing them in the same glory as Christ, know (most wondrous word!) that we have been loved as He was loved. May our souls admire such grace, and know what it is to dwell in it I Dr. Stuart omits the statement of their being in glory (verse 22), and connects the world’s believing with their being made perfect in one, This is not the right way of dealing with Scripture, and Scripture so solemn and precious in its import as this is. He tells us farther, " The union of the true believer to Christ is set forth in our text, and secured by the double bond of a mutual indwelling." Now there is a mutual indwelling blessedly set forth in John 14:1-31 as known to saints when the Holy Ghost should be given, as He was on the day of Pentecost. But no union with Christ is spoken of in the text, nor indeed does John ever speak of it. It is another thought-one which in his Epistle he carries on to dwelling in God and God in us, known by the Spirit He has given. Perhaps it is even a more precious thought than union, if in such infinite and unspeakable privileges, conferred by grace,-of which, His grace, God will show in the ages to come the unspeakable riches in His kindness towards us through Jesus Christ,- we can speak of more and less. On this mutual indwelling of Christ and us D. Stuart insists much. There is not a word of it in John 17:1-26 The mutual indwelling of the Father and the Son is spoken of as " Thou Father art in Me, and I in Thee," but not so of Christ and the believer. Dr. Stuart has been misled by the sound of the words in them and Thou in Me;" but there is no mutual indwelling here at all. It is display in glory-Christ in the saints and the Father in Christ. The whole statement is a mistake. We have only to read the passage to see it; and in privileges so wondrous, and thoughts so deep, it behooves us to keep close to Scripture. If we do not, we shall lose much, following our own thoughts. I cannot doubt that so excellent a person as Dr. Stuart has done so here in giving course to his own thoughts instead of cleaving close to the word. I do not dwell much on the " oneness of evil." There is a oneness in evil in one sense. It is in man self-will departed from God, and enmity against Him, whatever its form, lawless lust, transgression of the law, and hating Christ, and therein His Father. Still the statements of Dr. Stuart seemed to me to hang little together. " The oneness of evil is among the most marked of its characteristics," yet " sin and unity are everlasting opposites." However, as my object is not to criticize but to treat the subject of true unity, and there are important moral observations in the remarks of Dr. Stuart on the oneness of evil, I do not comment on it farther. I should wholly object to his use of John 15:1-27, which is hortatory; and the true vine applies immediately to the then state of the disciples, "Now ye are clean" being really "Ye are already clean " (ἥδη). Hence, as the blessed Lord knew them, verse 6 changes from " ye" to " if a man," and returns to " ye" in verse 7, when fruit-bearing, not withering and burning, is the subject. The true vine refers to the vine brought out of Egypt. Israel was not the true vine, but Christ; as Christ, not Israel, was in result the servant owned of God (Isaiah 49:1-26) It is not church union. That is union of members to Christ the Head in heaven, where it is not a question of cutting off, nor of fruit-bearing, nor of purging. I quite admit that there is the general analogy now, and the applicability of the exhortation. But I cannot go farther into the interpretation of the passage here. It has no application to Dr. Stuart’s object, for it is at-all events-an exhortation. All this part of John takes up the responsibility of saints with the Father. It is "a lower sense" in which the disciples are said to be in Christ; namely, their connection with Christ then upon earth (ἤδη, already), not when He was the exalted Man in heaven, which alone is church union, as Ephesians 1:19-23 makes evident. But I pass on from this section (which is a matter of interpretation on which I should be glad to hear any godly person, though not doubting the justice of what I have said), only remarking that when Dr. Stuart says " a lower sense," it cannot have two senses, and I suppose he would not deny that, if it speaks of " temporary believers," it cannot refer to union with Christ as members of His body. In the following section I admit the difference between the individuality of angels and the one race of which Adam was the head. And that Christ was the head of a spiritual race, taking Adam’s place in a higher way, every intelligent Christian taught in the word will admit, and will moreover feel the importance of it. Romans 5:1-21 and 1 Corinthians 15:1-58 are clear on the point. Dr. Stuart has given us, too, some interesting observations on the elements of all being united in Christ’s person, the full justness of which I am not prepared to speak of without weighing them more than I have, but which are quite worthy of being weighed, and which I pass from only to pursue my main subject, union and unity. Here all is confusion, and sometimes difficult to seize from the way it is expressed. Union and unity as here used have no Scriptural intelligible meaning. That God is the fountain of all angels’ good, and the source of their happiness, and the center of their harmony, is certain. But what means their being "united to Him" 2 Who ever heard, in Scripture at least, of angels being united to God? No trace of such a thought is in Scripture. I am sure Dr. Stuart means no harm in it, but it is this loose thinking, away from Scripture, which has deprived the church of so much precious truth. We, that is, all those who have the Holy Ghost, are united to Christ, the glorified man, as members of His body. " He that is joined to the Lord is one spirit." But angels united to God is really in itself a blasphemy-though I am quite sure Dr. Stuart means such as little as I do. But the reality of union with Christ is lost through this loose way of speaking. When Dr. Stuart says, " Many of them fall away," I thought at first it might be a misprint for "fell away," as we read of angels who kept not their first estate, and are reserved in chains of darkness to the judgment of the great day. But he says the elect angels abide, in the present tense too, as is the whole statement. The rest of the paragraph is really one mass of confusion. Their everlasting union to the center of all good appears to be increased, confirmed, and secured. As I have already said, there is no union to God. Angels, and principalities, and powers, are made subject to Christ, and the whole state of things will be reconciled to God in His fullness, and brought into order under Christ, when the fullness of time has come. God has given to Him, the exalted man, to be head over all things to the church, which is His body, the fullness of Him who fills all in all (comp. Ephesians 4:9-10); but increasing, conjoining, securing of union with God, is an idea utterly foreign to Scripture, and excludes what is in Scripture by what is substituted for it. I will just remark that goodwill to men is not the form of the angels’ words in Luke, but good pleasure (εηδοχία) in men. He does not take hold of angels, but He taketh hold of the seed of Abraham; and it is beautiful to see the unjealous delight of these holy beings in the plans of God’s glory, though in others than themselves, for "His delight (Wisdom’s) was in the sons of men." But the reciprocating song of earth, when He had finished His work, is all confusion. The babes and suckling’s spoken of in Psalms 8:1-9 are celebrating Messiah according to Psalms 118:1-29, a prophecy of which several verses are cited as to the latter days by the Lord and the apostles, particularly by Peter, the apostle of the circumcision. It-is the anticipation-of that day, "the day which the Lord hath made," when hosanna to the Son of David will resound, not from the mouths of babes and suckling’s, and the crowd that were divinely compelled to do it, lest the stones should have to cry out, but from a people willing in the day of His power, when His heart will set Him in the chariots of His willing people. And note here, in this remarkable anticipation of that day, the expression "peace in heaven." It is not till Satan and his angels are cast out thence that the full accomplishment of this will take place. Then in due time they shall say, Blessed is He that cometh in the name of the Lord. Till then their house will be left unto them desolate, and they will not see Him. He meanwhile sits, not on His own throne, but on His Father’s, as He expressly states in Revelation 3:1-22, according to the word: Sit on My right hand until I make Thine enemies Thy footstool. Then Jehovah will send the rod of His power out of Zion, and He will rule in the midst of His enemies.* (*The careful reader of Scripture will see that, when rejected, His God and Father took care that testimony should be rendered to Him as Son of God in the resurrection of Lazarus, Son of David in riding into the city, Son of man when the Greeks came up. The last involved death.-John 11:12.) The Lord had not finished His work when He entered into Jerusalem. His course down here may be said, in a certain sense, to have closed. His work He was just about to accomplish. But it is here summed up by Dr. Stuart, as God in Christ reconciling all things to Himself, whether they be things in earth or things in heaven. There is no such passage, no such statement in Scripture. Two passages are confounded, and both misapplied. God, we read in the end of 2 Corinthians 5:1-21, was in Christ reconciling the world unto Himself, not imputing to them their trespasses. But the world would not have Him: and, having accomplished the work of atoning redemption and gone into glory, having been made sin for us, He sends out His ambassadors to beseech men to be reconciled to God. Blessed gospel testimony and grace! There is another passage on quite a different subject, in Colossians 1:1-29 All the fullness (πᾶν τὸ πλξωμα, a word of all moment against the Gnostic heresies-compare 2: 9) was pleased to dwell in Him, and... by Him to reconcile all things to itself, by Him I say, whether they be things in heaven or things in earth,* and you hath He reconciled, in the body of His flesh through death. (*Note here, when it is declared all knees are to bow, a third class is added, τὰκατχθόνια, infernal things. They are gone out of heaven and earth, and are not put in the classes reconciled.) Here the reconciliation of believers through the work of the cross is clearly distinguished from the reconciling all things. They were reconciled. "You bath He," etc. But God was by Him to reconcile all things. This was to be done. The duality is maintained all through the passage. First-born of every creature, first-born from the dead, head of the church, His body. This is summed up at the end of Ephesians 1:1-23 These two passages in 2 Corinthians 5:1-21 and Colossians 1:1-29 are mingled together (by Dr. S.) and connected with His going on the ass to Jerusalem, and utter confusion is the natural result. There is an utter confusion too in all this part, one which has brought in abominable error as to Christ, in the foremost of the evangelical German divines, and in the Dutch reformed in America through them, namely, as if man was being restored. Adam was the image of Him that was to come. But all is utterly fallen and ruined in the first Adam. Now, says the Lord, is the judgment of this world; and again, Now once in the end of the world (συντελεία τῶν αἰὠν hath He appeared to put away sin. The head of the blessing is man in a new state, risen and exalted. Man, as in the flesh, has seen and hated both Him and His Father. As a general truth Dr. Stuart would not, and does not, deny that we all fell in Adam. But there is more than this. Man has been fully tested as to wheth.er as such he could be restored. Without law he was so bad that the flood was needed even in this world; under the law his sin became exceeding sinful; and when God after this came into the world in grace, making Himself of no reputation, to bring love to sinners, and yet showing divine presence and power in removing every effect of sin here below, they spat in His face and crucified Him. Now, says the Lord, is the judgment of this world. And we shall find that, whatever God set up good, the first thing man did was to spoil all, though God went on in grace. Man himself fell the first thing. Noah got drunk the first thing. The golden calf was made before Moses was down from the mount. Strange fire was offered the first day, and Aaron never went into the holiest in his robes of glory and beauty. Solomon, son of David, departed from God; and Nebuchadnezzar put the faithful ones in the fire and became a beast. Finally in the rejection of Christ, after all remedial means which were at God’s disposal, it was demonstrated that the mind of the flesh was enmity against God. They had seen and hated both Him and His Father. Man must be born again (ἅνωθεν). It is a new creation when men were dead in sins, connected with the Second Man rejected by man, and now raised from the dead and exalted to the right hand of God. That the blessed Lord was a true real man in flesh and blood is as essential to Christianity as that He was God. In this I trust. I have no controversy with Dr. Stuart. The Word was made (ἐγένετο) flesh and dwelt among us; and, as the children were partakers of flesh and blood, He also Himself likewise took part of the same, made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death. This lies at the root, and is of the essence of Christianity, and a blessed truth it is, unspeakably so to us human beings, that if a sinless man He was a true man, body and soul, and, one may add, spirit. This was called in question by heresy as soon as His deity was. I think Scripture is more guarded than Dr. Stuart here, but he is more guarded than some. Scripture never says, as some have, bone of our bone, and flesh of our flesh; and Scripture is wiser than we are. This has been used to make union in incarnation, which is quite unscriptural. It issued in Irvingism; but the seed was under the clod in Scotch Presbyterianism, and is still cherished as a garden plant in the semi-Irvingites of that body. Dr. Stuart only goes so far as to say, flesh out of our flesh, bone out of our bone. Still it leads him half-way into the evil. A new creation must in its nature leave out fallen man, as fallen, for he is not a new creation but the old one, that which is put off-no doubt the same person-but he is of, and lives in a new creation, if in Christ Jesus And what would the new creation have been, as to moral beings, if fallen man was left out as the object of it? The elect angels have not left their first estate. Dr. Stuart is as usual very vague. " The operation was to be in man, already existing, and defiled by sin, which separates while it defiles. It was from our corrupted stock He drew His holy manhood, because not merely man like us, but of us." What has this to do with the new creation? Was union in incarnation? Dr. Stuart does not say so, but what do his words mean? " Was Christ a new creation," he says, " casting Himself into the head of the existing family, and from it deriving His own everlasting manhood?" He does not Say it was union; that he puts differently. But he states it while admitting He was holy, harmless, undefiled, so as to lead the mind to a connection of Christ with man in incarnation, which, while from its uncertainty and vagueness it almost eludes the grasp, is perilous from the way it leads the soul to the verge of union in incarnation. Christ assuredly was, as born into this world, and ever,. holy, harmless, undefiled; but it shows the habitual confusion of thought as to Christ, if we remember that this is spoken of Christ as high priest (Hebrews 7:1-28) and carefully presented as separate from sinners, in contrast too with high priests "taken from among men." When Scripture speaks of His taking flesh (a vital truth for us, as I have already said), not only is it said "a body hast Thou prepared Me;" but, in stating His doing so, the language is careful not to speak as Dr. Stuart speaks. The children χεχοινὠνηχεν of flesh and blood; of Him, μετέσχεν παξαπλησίωδ is used. Now I repeat that there may be no mistake,- I hold His being truly a man in flesh and blood, and with a human soul as well as a body, to be a vital truth. It is the subject of the adoring joy of my soul, nor do I think it is half enough taught or believed, that He was a true man, while a sinless and holy man. What is false is connecting this with the idea of union with us. This vagueness as to union with man is so much the more perilous, as Dr. Stuart insists that there is a greater difference between the brutes and man, than between man and God. I suppose he refers here to the low and degraded form of infidelity called evolution. In his horror of this (perhaps, for my part X should say contempt) I should heartily join Dr. Stuart. But as to our present point he leaves out the present condition of man. Man was created for God; but preferring to believe the deceiver, he did his own will. He has been driven out of Paradise, where he had to say to God, he was without God (ἄθεοδ) in the. world. His adaptation to God was eternal misery as having lost Him, and now this is not all the truth. Man, as far as his will could do it, has turned God out of this world when come into it in grace. The mind of the flesh is enmity against God. In the moral sense he is infinitely farther from God than he is from the brute. If left to himself he can follow the brute and worse, and as regards God has no understanding. He was in the world, and the world was made by Him, and the world knew Him not. Man must be born anew to have anything to say to Him, save enmity, sins, and judgment. Conscience-the knowledge of good and evil-acquired by the fall he has. Nor does gracious invitation restore him. "Wherefore, when I came, was there no man? when I called, was there none to answer?" What He had seen and heard, that He testified, says John, and no man receives His testimony. The real question is not, Did Christ come in grace to such? but did He unite Himself to them? or are renewed souls united to Him when, having accomplished redemption; He is exalted to glory? Scripture speaks of the latter, and positively denies the former. As to union in life, as I have said, Dr: Stuart is vague, and uses figurative expressions, which may mean nothing or anything. But he is distinct in identifying. Christ’s uniting Himself to us, and taking sinners into union with Himself. This last was the problem, he says, and solved by His uniting Himself to His people in death. Now Christ’s uniting Himself to His people is unknown to Scripture. He does not unite Himself to sinners, nor does He even to saints: they are united to Him by the Holy Ghost, when He is in glory. They are members of His body (not He members of them), members of it when the Head is glorified, and they are created again. The end of Ephesians 1:1-23 and early part of Ephesians 2:1-22 are clear as to this point, and how it takes place, and, where this is not seen, the real truth of unity is wholly lost. How can the Holy One be united to a sinner, if the union be real and spiritual? " He that is joined to the Lord is one spirit." Is that true of a mere sinner? And Scripture is express in denying it. " Except a corn of wheat fall INTO THE GROUND AND DIE, IT ABIDETH ALONE." Hence in Ephesians, where union is spoken of, He is not seen till raised from the dead and set at God’s right hand in heavenly places. And then, we being dead in sins, He hath quickened us together with Him and made us sit in heavenly places in Him. Then only is Scriptural and real union; not in Christ born into this world, united to sinners in their sins; not a Christ on the cross and, when He was most especially alone, united to those for whom He was substituted before their sins were canceled by His precious blood; not even a Christ glorified, united to sinners or to any down here. Scripture never speaks of His being united to us, but of saints being united to Him in glory in a totally new life by the Holy Ghost, so that they become risen and heavenly people. Remark too here, that where the Lord says He abode alone till after He had ’died, He is speaking of the Son of man. Testimony to His being Son of God was given in the resurrection of Lazarus, to His being Son of David in His riding into Jerusalem. The Greeks come up, He says, " the hour is come that the Son of man should be glorified." But to take this title according to the counsels of God He must die. Son of God according to Psalms 2:1-12 He was; King of Israel, Messiah according to the same Psalm, He was; and surely, as to His personal title to it, Son of man, but the kings of the earth stood up, and the princes took counsel together. In a word, He must be. rejected to take up the place of Son of man according to Psalms 8:1-9 So in John 1:1-51 Nathaniel owns Him according to Psalms 2:1-12. Son of God, King of Israel. The Lord’s answer is, that he should see more henceforth for Israel in John is rejected in the first chapter, to own those born of God alone), " the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of man." When Christ’s birth, or His so wonderfully associating Himself with the called and repentant remnant of Israel in John’s baptism, is spoken of, His title is Son of God. not Son of man. " That holy thing that shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God," and the Father’s voice, when heaven was opened; and the Holy Ghost descended on Him alone, " This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased." Son of Man He delighted to call Himself, but (forbidding, when His testimony was rejected, Himself to be announced any more as the Christ: Matthew 16:1-28; Mark 9:1-50; Luke 9:1-62) the Son of man must suffer and be rejected, put to death, and rise again the third day, that as the risen man in a Wholly new position He might take the place revealed Of the Son Of man in Daniel 7:1-28 and Psalms 8:1-9 This doctrine of union of the Son of God with sinners in their sins falsifies the whole nature of Christianity, a new creation, and man in a new life, united to a glorified man in heaven, by the Holy Ghost dwelling in him, consequent on the-accomplishment of redemption. Dr. Stuart says, " Christ united Himself to His people by taking them to Himself in His death on Calvary." If this be so, all the vague language of Dr. Stuart, and the plain language of bolder men, as to union in incarnation, and also the utterly unscriptural doctrine of His bearing our sins all His life, is wholly set aside: But what does union here mean? "That He might receive us into oneness He stood in our place." This I believe, but it contradicts what is said a few lines higher up. That all His people were seen as if they were there, because He represented them, and as He bore their sins, so also they died with Him is, blessed be God, true. But that has nothing to do with union. It is another great and precious truth, substitution. He stood in our place, as Dr. Stuart most justly says; but that is not union but the opposite of it. He accepted our penalty. Thank God, and blessed be the name of Him who has loved us, He did. But that is not union, but standing there for us alone. All that Dr. Stuart says of its effect as to our sins I cordially say Amen to, as a poor sinner profiting by it, though it has done far more also for us, and glorified God Himself, so that man goes into His glory. But this is not union. Union with Christ is in living saints when He is exalted as man to the right hand of God, the work of redemption, of perfect redemption, being accomplished when He was alone. All that Dr. Stuart says as to His being broken in pieces is all wrong. A bone of Him was not- to be broken. In the passage " This is my body which is broken for you," " broken " is not really in the text. But on this I do not dwell farther. As Dr. Stuart says, " He who was to be-the-bond-of -union-forever was left alone as no other ever was, or can be." With what is here said my heart unites, but He was then alone. Only I must remark the customary looseness as to Scriptural truth in the words " The Lamb of God taking away the sins of the world." This is quite unsound, and nowhere found in Scripture. The sins of the world are not taken away, or there could be no judgment; indeed all would be saved: The end of this paragraph, in page 15, I think very objectionable, but it does not specially bear on my subject. All that which follows, loose and unscriptural though it be in expression yet true in result, contradicts consequently all the statements as to union before or on the cross. "Through His death the Lord Jesus sends His Holy Spirit into the hearts of His redeemed; and by that Spirit, in the day of our effectual calling, we are brought into a wondrously high and holy union with Christ and with God." Now I have already said, in the Scripture it is by the Spirit, when we have received it, we are united to a glorified Christ, the only true and Scriptural union, and we may add, so of all true saints with one another, is by the same one Spirit who dwells in each of them. No doubt Christ had to die to send the Holy Spirit down here: a plain proof if we are brought into union with Him by it, that He was not united to us in death; but " Sends through His death" has really no sense. We were unfit to receive it, save as washed in His blood and forgiven; but sending through His death has really no sense." The Holy Ghost was not yet [ given] (was not as known in the New Testament, down here, though as a divine person of course eternal in His person, and operative in every work of God), because Jesus was not yet glorified," is what Scripture says, John 7:1-53 If He went not away, the Comforter would not come: showing clearly the place Christ must be in, as man, before we could be united to Him, He the head (Ephesians 1:1-23) and we the body. We, sons by faith in Jesus withal, and He the Spirit of adoption, making us, being sons, cry Abba, Father, the power, and giving the consciousness of this new relationship with the Father, and membership of Christ. But Scripture never says, His Holy Spirit. It is incongruous, though He be called the Spirit of Christ, as present in us, in Romans 8:1-39. Nor is union with God a thought known to Scripture: a common one I grant it, but common to the unscriptural carelessness so usual among Christians. All this is loose confusion. And let it not be supposed that these things are immaterial. The true consciousness of our relationships with God and the Father and with Christ is the atmosphere in which our Christian affections breathe and are developed. Communion with the Father and with His Son Jesus Christ, and with God, Scripture speaks of, and it is our highest blessedness, but of union with God never. It is unintentional blasphemy. Union is with Christ, the man in glory. Speaking of union with God only destroys the very idea of union. The statements of Dr. Stuart on the Trinity are hazardous, going beyond Scripture; but I suppose he means what is truth, and it is not my present subject, so I leave it there. The history of the doctrine of the procession of the Holy Ghost, which professedly divided the Greek and Roman Churches, and which was a metaphysical novelty, forbidden even at Rome in the time of Leo the Great, ought to have taught Christians in these days (whilst holding the doctrine of the Trinity personally, and unity in the Godhead without wavering,) to avoid metaphysical theology in such holy matters, for this question of procession is mere metaphysics in divine things. I now turn to " some of the great properties of this oneness." Now in Dr. Stuart’s remarks on these, I gladly recognize piety and personal delight in Christ. But true union is lost in his remarks. He speaks of gathering together in one all the redeemed in earth and heaven. Of this Scripture never does speak. It speaks of heading up all things under Christ. And it speaks of dying, not for the Jews only, but to gather-together in one the children of God. which were scattered abroad; so that then they had not hitherto been gathered. The unity of God’s children down here is spoken of in a double way: the unity of children in a family, in their relationship with a holy Father, as in John 17:1-26, Christ the first-born among many brethren; and the unity of the body united to Christ, the head in glory. But this Scriptural unity and oneness is lost in the vagueness of all the redeemed in heaven and earth. That the unity of the saints in the New Testament will not cease when they are in glory, I surely believe; they will then be made perfect in one. That the body will then be complete, also, the Church of the first-born, and the just men (the saints of the Old Testament) perfected, I do not doubt, though God has reserved some better thing for us. But the unity spoken of in Scripture is by the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven. As to the body, by one Spirit we are all baptized into one body, Jews or Greeks, Barbarian or Scythian. This clearly could not be before. The Jew, on the contrary, was strictly bound to keep up the middle wall of partition, and sinned if he did not. Now by the cross it is broken down; and He has made both one, and reconciled both in one body to God, having slain the enmity, and we are builded together for an habitation of God through the Spirit. There is one body and one Spirit. There was the unity of a nation before, the great body of whom were not converted at all. The glorified head, the man in glory, did not yet exist, who is head over all things, head of the body. It is not as the creating life-giving Word and Son of God that Christ is head over all things, and to the Church His body. It is, as is evident from Ephesians 1:1-23, the man whom God has raised and set at His right hand. Then only, too, the Holy Ghost was sent down from heaven; He could not be (John 7:1-53) till Jesus was glorified. And as we have seen, from 1 Corinthians 12:1-31, then it was by the baptism of the Holy Ghost that the saints were baptized into one body. So also it is as to known sonship, and the unity connected with it. " The heir, so long as he is a child, differs nothing from a servant though he be lord of all.... But when the fullness of the time was come, God sent forth His Son, made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons; and because ye are sons God hath sent forth the Spirit of His Son into your hearts, crying Abba, Father." Thus they are brought into known relationship with the Father, to be fully accomplished in glory, when they will be made perfect in one, Christ the first-born among many brethren. There are two unities, that of the family and of the body: one a relationship with the Father, Christ being the first-born; the other true union with Christ the head, formed by the Holy Ghost come down from heaven, consequent on His being glorified as man:-unities of which Christians were bound to maintain the manifestation on earth, according to John 17:1-26 and Ephesians 4:1-32 In both respects they have failed. The wolf has caught the sheep and scattered them (thank God, he cannot pluck (catch) them out of the good Shepherd’s hand), and he has set up the travestie of unity in Popery, and all sorts of churches, first national, and then free, among those who could no longer bear the corruptions of Romanism. Scriptural unity and union is lost, nor scarce cared for, save that God is awakening a craving after it in these last days. It is confounded with communion, and union of organizations, which. cannot be the unity of the body nor of the family of God. Duty as to it is forgotten, and men are content to leave it to be fulfilled in another world. Let us see what Dr. Stuart makes of it in these last pages of his sermon. The bond of children is confounded with the membership of the body, and this is said to be similar to the union between the Father and the Son, a gross and utter mistake; as if the analogies of John 17:1-26 could be applied to the union of the members with the head. Apply only the teaching of Ephesians or 1 Corinthians 12:1-31 to the wondrous statements of John 17:1-26. and see how it offends every moral sense and feeling. The rest of this paragraph, describing communion, I have not a word to say against. Only in strange confusion using an account of the state of the world (habitable earth) under Christ’s reign, Dr. Stuart makes the spiritual flock to be a " mingled " one composed of wolves and lambs together, a sentence which I profess myself wholly unable to comprehend: if he had merely used it as a vague statement of peace, I should, but he says, it is a mingled flock. I first thought it meant unconverted and converted together; but he goes on to speak of spiritual communion together, and what the mingling is I do not know. How wholly union, in the Scriptural sense, is lost, in the thought of the state of the soul, is seen in what follows. That Adam was the head of his fallen race no Christian denies: but what union is to a covenant, what, " as in Adam all die" has to do with dissolving union with his covenant, I know not. Next. it is union to the world in its allurements and power. What has this to do with ’the reality of union? Then we have union to sin, which has no sense at all. Sin in the flesh we read of, captivity to it, deliverance from it; but union to it only bewilders the mind. It is there always in the flesh, though we are no longer under the law of sin and death, Christ having died to sin once, and He being our life in the power of the Spirit.’ Then we read of union -to self. Self is self. I do not live to self if I know the power of redemption; but all this has nothing to do with union or unity. It is my personal state as having died in Christ, and the risen Christ being now my new life. As to crucifying being a lingering death but a certain one, it is all a mischievous delusion. If I am crucified with Christ, I am dead-dead with Christ, dead to the law, ye are dead, crucified with Christ, nevertheless alive; but not I, but Christ living in me: there is no lingering or gradual death spoken of in Scripture. I am to reckon myself dead, and then for practice to bear about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus. Only when actually dead, can it be said there is no sin in me. The whole theory here is unscriptural; but this by the by. Union is lost in the vague use of it for the state of the soul. Union with Christ is not simply life. As the Father raiseth, up the dead and quickeneth them, so the Son quickeneth whom He will. This is divine work. Union is connected with Christ seen as a man whom God has raised from the dead, and us together with Him. In connection with union He is not seen as life-giving Son, but as a man raised by God when He was dead. Hence in Col. it is also connected with our having been forgiven all trespasses. As to the vine Dr. Stuart is contradicting himself, for he has recognized in this sermon that there are temporary branches which are taken away. I believe no member of His body will ever be separated from Him, but the application of the vine does not hold good. How we get strength from His crucifixion in weakness I know not, save perhaps by moral experience realizing it. Scripture does not speak of it. We abide in Him, if we eat His flesh and drink His blood, and, in this sense eating Him, live by Him. But it is never said that we derive our strength from His crucifixion. Joy and fruit are our state. Union is another thing. Such statements deny its reality, and confound communion and union. The last paragraph is sorrowful-sorrowful that Dr. Stuart’s heart and conscience were not affected by what he speaks of. He recognizes that the world’s admiration has been turned into a taunt, with a saying sometimes,-" Behold how they hate one another." Yet their mutual love is as genuine, and in the same circumstances would prove as intense, as eighteen hundred years ago. This is to be power for the salvation of the world. What is? That it would prove as intense in the same circumstances. Does the world say now, " Behold how these Christians love one another "? Does it not mock at their divisions? Is not corrupt Christianity taunting them with it? Is not the turning openly infidel? What is this change of circumstances but the worldliness and scattering of Christians? Besides, how is it to be power for the conversion of the world, when, in the loftiness of his heart, he (the worldly man) would count it despicable in himself to be capable of such an affection? " It speaks as a living witness in the hour when the Spirit moves on his heart." No doubt, but then it is not by it he was attracted when worldly. It is the individual already under the influence of the Spirit who is attracted by it. " To the world," Dr. Stuart tells us, " Christian love is incomprehensible." Yet it has great power in converting it. It is despicable in its eyes, but it is an attractive spectacle, ordained for the world’s conversion. The next property or power in it is in our seen union with Christ in heaven. What this means I know not. Men may see the fruits of it perhaps, but, as distinct from these, where the affections are set on heavenly things, it cannot be seen at all. There is nothing to say to it in the passage Dr. Stuart quotes. The chief priests, etc., took knowledge of them that they had been with Jesus, that is, when on earth. The general effect of communion with the Lord I surely do not question; but this confusion of communion with union, both in its reality and in its forming one body on earth, is one of the great evils of the day. It really denies union and promotes disunion among saints. If they can have communion from time to time, shake hands across the hedge, as has been said,-they are content. But there is a craving, and from God. Union has therefore been sought in other ways. Of this even the " Evangelical Alliance" was and is a witness; but the name betrays its true character.. For an alliance there must be two or more. They agreed to remain sects, and to meet notwithstanding. Indeed they confessed, they had pretended to attain to too much-unity, and they must be content with union. In America it has been sought by interchanges of pulpits. But there error and truth are all mingled together, and indifference to truth is cultivated. In the English Establishment unity is sought in the same way. The most marked effort at unity is in the Presbyterian bodies. In Canada they have coalesced. In the United States the New School and the Old School, that is, Arminians and Calvinists have joined. Dr. Stuart alludes to the union of the Reformed Presbyterians with what is called the Free Church of Scotland. As an outward thing one may rejoice in seeing fewer division among Protestants. As far as my acquaintance with their state goes, the "Covenanters" were, perhaps from their small numbers and adherence to principle, as a general thing, the most godly and living of the Presbyterian bodies. I trust they may not lose it in being swamped in a larger one. But it has nothing to do with the unity of the body of Christ. Imperfect as the views of Dr. Stuart, as to unity are, as he sees merely the building of Christians together as the children of their heavenly Father (a blessed union surely, but not the body of Christ, union by the Holy Ghost to the man Christ Jesus in glory, so as to form His body); inadequate and defective as is his general idea of gathering into one all the redeemed in heaven and in earth, of which indeed Scripture does not speak, the unity he does know is wholly inapplicable, and indeed contrary, to these unions of ecclesiastical bodies. They have not the pretension to be all saints. I do not now discuss whether multitudinous bodies are right or wrong; but they are multitudinous bodies, not a gathering of saints, as such, to Jesus’ name. They are not, cannot pretend to be, the body of Christ, nor a part of it, nor even the true family of God. Further, their object is to impose religion on the state, to make the state act on Christian principles. The gathering together in one the children of God which were scattered abroad does not enter their minds, but getting the state to act Christianly; and they insist on the authority and independence of the church exactly on popish grounds, not that of a little despised flock suffering under its persecution, but pressing its own principles on the state. That Christianity has modified men’s habits is quite true. Men do not do in the light what they do in the dark. But making the world Christian in its ways is not gathering the children of God. It is a return to Judaism,* as indeed the " Covenanters," true-hearted people as they were, clearly did. They took the sword, and perished with the sword. (*For the American war no suitable hymns, we read, were found; they were obliged to use the Psalms. There is Israel; they could sing and fight. So indeed in Scotland.) As to the unity of the body, it does not seem to cross their minds, formed on earth as it was by the baptism of the Holy Ghost. But the whole Free Church principle was a delusion. Christ is not the King of the church. Where is such a thought in Scripture? "King of saints" in the Revelation is a false reading for "King of nations," borrowed from Jeremiah. King of the Jews Scripture and the world’s mockery own Him to be. That He will rule over the nations is clearly revealed. He will take to Him His great power and reign when divine wrath comes. The kings of the earth did rise up against the Lord and against His anointed. They will make war with the Lamb, and the Lamb will overcome them.; for He is King of kings, and Lord of lords. But Christ is not now sitting on His own throne at all, but on the Father’s (Revelation 3:21). God has said to Him, " Sit on my right hand TILL I make thine enemies thy footstool." And there the blessed One is in glory, gathering now -His joint-heirs, by the Spirit sent down from heaven through the gospel, joint heirs, once all united, and the manifested body of Christ, but whom the wickedness of man and craft of satan have long ago scattered,-caught the sheep and scattered them-yea, made of that which was the church the most heinous corruption under heaven. The union of Presbyterian or other bodies- may remove partially the reproach of Protestantism; with the unity of God’s children as a family it has nothing to do, and, as to the unity of the body of Christ by the Holy Ghost here below, wholly ignores it. King of the church is an utterly anti-scriptural thought. When He will reign, we shall reign with Him. He is now sitting at the Father’s right hand awaiting that time. Meanwhile, as children of one heavenly family, in relationship with the Father, as members of one only body, the body of Christ, the church, we should be one by the Holy Ghost. For Christians the crucial truth now is the unity of the body formed on earth. Where is it? As I have often said, if Paul addressed a letter to the Church of God which is at Edinburgh, who would get it? It would go to the dead-letter office. Alas! that it is so. May our hearts and consciences feel for the ruin of the Lord’s once beautiful flock; look with desire for the unity of the scattered sheep; and the unity of His Spirit manifesting His body on earth. The arrangements of ecclesiastical bodies cannot effect this. That I have not misstated the link of Church and State as desired by Free and Reformed Churches, we have only to read. Dr. Goold claiming acceptance of " Covenanters’ " principles, Dr. Rainy, and Mr. M`Dermid, where it is stated in language stronger and more positive than that which I have used. The church claimed to have free entrance into every chamber of the national life. They are to bring nations, in their national capacity, into religious subjection to God, and conformed to His will. I only notice it now, not to controvert it as a system-a system in which Popery has a far better chance-but to show that their system, and their unity, have nothing whatever to do with gathering together in one the children of God which were scattered abroad, or with the Unity of the body. ’What is called for is the full recognition of and submission to the authority of the Word of God, the Scriptures, the recognition of the presence of the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven consequent on the accomplishment of redemption, and Jesus as man being at the right hand of God, sent down to abide with us forever, and dwell in believers and in the assembly, and the waiting for God’s Son from heaven. The unity of the Spirit is the only true unity, till God heads up all things in heaven and earth in one under Christ. He gave Himself to gather together in one the children of God which were scattered abroad. The unity of the body God will maintain till it be displayed in glory. The members of Christ’s body will not be separated from Him; but the manifestation of this on earth, by the power and grace of the Holy Ghost, according to 1 Corinthians 12:1-31, was the calling of the saints, and, though shorn of much of its glory, their responsibility now. They have the promise of all needed grace and gift in Ephesians 4:1-32, according to His faithfulness who gave Himself for us to redeem us from all iniquity, and to purify to Himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 42: VOL 01 - SHIPWRECK OF FAITH ======================================================================== Shipwreck of Faith 1 Timothy 1:19-20.-There does not appear to be any real difficulty in understanding how a believer might concerning faith make shipwreck, more than in practical holiness. Surely this was exactly what befel the late Mr. Irving, not to speak of Tractarian or Popish perverts. There is no doubt but that godly discipline may take its course, even to the extreme act of putting away in the case of real Christians, if they have got under the enemy’s power in conduct or doctrine. The proper sphere of discipline is within (1:e. in the circle of those who bear Christ’s name). Them that are without God judgeth. Those who keep the true Feast are bound to put out leaven; and, if leaven in practice, still more in doctrine. For a little leaven leaveneth the whole lump. (Compare 1 Corinthians 5:1-13 and Galatians 5:1-26) ======================================================================== CHAPTER 43: VOL 01 - SON OF GOD AND SON OF MAN ======================================================================== Son of God and Son of Man I. The title " Son of God " is predicated of the Lord Jesus Christ in three different applications. 1. In the sense of His being born in time. This Psalms 2:1-12 sets forth: " Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten thee "-in connection with His kingship in Zion, presented to Israel’s responsibility at His first advent, but postponed till His second, because of their then and present unbelief. So Isaiah 9:6 : " Unto us a Child is born, unto us a Son is given." Compare Luke 1:32 : " He shall be great, and shall be called the Son of the Highest, and the Lord God shall give unto Him the throne of his father David." And further, ver. 35: " Therefore also that holy thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God." "Son of God" as risen from the dead. Thus, Acts 13:33-34, shows Jesus in these two positions; ver. 33, as raised upon earth (" again" should be omitted here, as it is in ch. 3: 22, 26, the meaning both there and here being the Messiah born in this world); ver. 34, as raised up from the dead. See also Colossians 1:1-29, where ver. 15 seems to refer to His birth into the world, where He necessarily was the first-born or chief of every creature, as being the Creator; and ver. 18, to His place of pre-eminence as risen, " who is the beginning, the first-born from the dead." Hebrews 1:5-6 : ver. 5 speaks of Him in the first of these two positions; ver. 6, probably in the second, especially if the marginal rendering (which is most likely the correct one) be taken, which would connect His introduction into the habitable world with His second coming. Revelation 1:5 may confirm this. Hebrews 1:1-3, evidently speaks of our Lord as Son in the highest sense, that is, as divine. So almost everywhere in the Gospel and Epistles of St. John. " The only begotten of the Father" does not refer to His place as born on earth or risen from the dead, but expresses His eternal relationship as a divine person. 2. John 5:1-47 as it shows us the Son quickening whom He will in virtue of His divine glory, so it declares that all judgment is committed to Him as Son of Man. This title refers to His assumption of that nature in which He is first rejected, and secondly exalted as universal Lord and Judge. See Psalms 8:1-9, compared with Hebrews 2:1-18; Daniel 7:1-28; the Gospels passim. Hence also He is seen as "the Son of Man" in connection with the judgment of the seven churches in Revelation 1:1-20 Hence cherubim as the witness of judgment were wrought on the veil, the type of His flesh. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 44: VOL 01 - SOUL AND SPIRIT ======================================================================== Soul and Spirit Hebrews 4:12.-I think that, where distinguished as here, "soul" and " spirit " refer respectively to the seat of individuality and to that of capacity. Every man has both soul and spirit, and they are so linked and close that the word of God alone can rightly divide between their sometimes conflicting emotions and judgments. It judges all, searches into "the thoughts and intents of the heart." But then we have Christ as our high priest interceding for us, and maintaining us in spite of the sifting process, according to the value of His work. EVERY FAMILY. Ephesians 15.-Ti2au,rwrgui.,-Our translators were probably influenced by their theological views not to follow the grammatical rule, that πᾶς connected with a substantive without the article means every, not the whole. There is no doubt that "every family" is the right translation-embracing perhaps the various classes named in Hebrews 12:22-23. And I am confident that the view thus sought to be maintained is a confusion of things that differ -all believers under every dispensation being taken together in the mass as " the church of God." But let scriptural proof be shown for the application of this term to any save the Jews and Gentiles baptized into one body between Pentecost and the Lord’s second coming. The special features of "the Church," union with Christ in heaven by the Holy Ghost sent down thence consequent on His ascension-baptism of Jews and Gentiles by "one Spirit" into "one body "-the full enjoyment of the knowledge of God as " the Father "-are to be sought for in vain in either the past or future relationships of God with His earthly people Israel. Moreover, while prizing the Psalms and other Old Testament portions of the word of God, I cannot agree that their language is equally applicable to our own position. "Now we know," says St. Paul quoting (Rom. from the Psalms, " that what things soever the law saith, it saith to them who are under the law." St. Peter declares, " Of which salvation the prophets have inquired and searched diligently, who prophesied of the grace that should come unto you "-the Spirit of Christ in them testified beforehand of the sufferings of Christ and the glories that should follow, 1:e. their knowledge of the way of salvation was only prophetic-a very different thing from that which is our blessing "the Gospel preached, with the Holy Ghost sat down from heaven "-the blessed witness to a fully accomplished work. Scripture contradicts the idea that " the Spirit of adoption’ indited the language of the Old Testament (see Galatians 4:1-31); and the condition under the law is expressly contrasted (2 Cor. with " the ministration of the Spirit." Therefore the application to ourselves of many of the sentiments of the Old Testament saints would be most inappropriate to the full position of grace in which the believer now stands. The actual manifestation of the righteousness of God on behalf of the sinner-the conscience purged by the blood of Christ -the knowledge of justification through His resurrection, and consequent "peace with God" and the clear sunshine of "no condemnation "-such truths were unknown save in measure by anticipation under the age of the law, and form part of " the ministration of the Spirit." ======================================================================== CHAPTER 45: VOL 01 - THE AUTHOR OF THE EPISTLE TO THE HEBREWS ======================================================================== The Author of the Epistle to the Hebrews There are not wanting those who reject the commonly received opinion that St. Paul wrote this epistle. It may therefore be interesting to look at the historic proof of Paul being the writer. There are several particulars relating to the personal history of the writer:- 1. He was not one of our Lord’s disciples, and probably did not know Christianity till after our Lord’s ascension (Hebrews 2:3). St. Paul we know was converted after the ascension of our Lord. (Acts 9:1-43) 2. The epistle was, written from Italy (13: 24). Paul was in Italy for some time. 3. The writer mentions some hindrance which prevented his leaving Italy (13: 19). This agrees with what we know of Paul, who was in prison there (2 Timothy 1:16). 4. The writer desired the prayers of his brethren for the removal of this hindrance (13: 19). This is conformable to the custom of Paul in his other epistles (Romans 15:30; Ephesians 6:19). 5. The writer knew of Timothy’s release from prison. Paul mentions this in 1 Timothy 6:12. 6. Timothy was not with the writer in Italy, but was shortly expected (13: 23). This agrees with what we know of the situation of Paul when in prison (2 Timothy 4:9). 7. The writer looked forward to traveling with Timothy to visit the Hebrew Christians. Timothy was Paul’s constant companion in travel Here, then, are several particulars respecting the writer of the epistle, all of which agree with what we know of the history of St. Paul, but do not suit with what is known of any other eminent New Testament saint. It is highly improbable therefore that any other New Testament writer but. Paul wrote this epistle. Further: to none of the assigned writers do all the circumstances here noted suit, as far as we are acquainted With their histories. We know not that Apollos or Barnabas was ever in Rome, or suffered imprisonment there for the truth’s sake. Luke and Clemens were in Rome, but we have no information of their having been imprisoned there; and further, neither were Jews (Colossians 4:11; Colossians 4:14), which it is probable the writer of this epistle was. In the absence of certainty, there is evidence enough; from the personal remarks of the writer, to lead us to the conclusion that Paul wrote this epistle. [2 Peter 3:15 seems to me decisive that Paul wrote to the Jewish saints; and this of course is no other than "Hebrews."-.Ed.] ======================================================================== CHAPTER 46: VOL 01 - THE BEARING OF 1PE_2:24 ======================================================================== The Bearing of1 Peter 2:24 ======================================================================== CHAPTER 47: VOL 01 - THE BIRTH OF CHRIST MISTIMED ======================================================================== The Birth of Christ Mistimed In " The Phoenix," " a collection of manuscripts and printed tracts, nowhere to be found but in the closets of the curious (1707)," there is a paper with the above title, " proving that Christ was not born in December." The book is not very scarce, so I need not transcribe the article. The following is the substance of it which may prove interesting:- " David divided the year’s service of the priests into twenty-four courses, and the eighth course fell to Abijah (1 Chronicles 24:10). " The Jewish ecclesiastical year, commencing with the month Abib or Nisan, nearly corresponding to our March, 0.S., the eighth course would occur at the end of June or at the beginning of July in our computation. "Zacharias, the father of John the Baptist, was of the course of Abia, and as he was ministering, in the order of his course’ (that is, in June or July), when the angel appeared to him, and that immediately on his return home his wife Elizabeth conceived, it follows that the conception of John the Baptist was about Midsummer, where we place his birth. " In the sixth month of Elizabeth’s pregnancy (Luke 1:26-36), 1:e. in December, where we place Christ’s birth, the angel Gabriel announced to the Virgin Mary that she should be the mother of the Christ; and, counting onward for nine months, we come to the month of September, and to the Feast of Tabernacles, which was a type of the incarnation of the Son of God, as the period of the Savior’s birth. " In which feast-time of eight days, Christ pitched in the tabernacle of His flesh amongst us, as appears, John 1:14 : ’ And the Word was made flesh (χαὶ εσχήνςσεν ὲν ¨ημῖν), and pitched his tabernacle amongst us:’ He became a Scaenite. Thus (we) behold the sweet harmony between the type and the thing typified, for Christ came not to break the law, but to fulfill it." The error appears to have arisen from supposing that Zacharias was the high priest, in which case his ministry would have occurred in September. [Is there any other thought of this subject?] ======================================================================== CHAPTER 48: VOL 01 - THE CHURCH ======================================================================== The Church The Holy Ghost, in the Old Testament, brings before us either individual saints or a nation as the objects of God’s favor and counsels. It is of that nation (Israel) that the Spirit uses the term "congregation" in the Old Testament, which our translators have given as the " church in the wilderness," in Acts 7:38. But Bishop Pearson admits, as indeed every fair man must, that this is a quite distinct thing from what is called " the Church of God," etc., in the New Testament. For the Epistle to the Ephesians, with great fullness, shows that the body of Christ, God’s Church, is founded on the abolition of the distinction between Jew and Gentile, and, therefore, could not be till the cross broke down the middle wall of partition. Nor could believing Jew and Gentile be builded together for an habitation of God, till the Spirit came down in a fuller way than before, as the fruit of Christ’s victory and ascension on high, where He took the new place of Head of the Church (not merely of King in Zion). When will they understand that this was an entirely new work of God, and that Scripture gives to this new assembly of believing Jews and Gentiles (bonded together by the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven in the name of Jesus) the name of "the Church of God"? It is not merely that the term " Church of God" is never, in the sense now spoken of, applied to the Old Testament saints; but the state of things could not be before Christ’s death and resurrection as the basis, and the Holy Spirit’s personal presence (not influence, gifts, etc., merely) as the power of this unity. It is founded on Christ exalted in heaven, after having accomplished redemption; and it is formed by that operation of the Spirit which not only quickens but unites Jewish and Gentile saints now to Christ in heaven and to each other on earth as one body. Now, indubitably, such was not the case in the wilderness, nor in the promised land Jew and Gentile, whether believing or not, were rigorously severed by Divine command, and the saints were sustained by a promised Messiah, instead of resting on the accomplished work of a Savior., Life, of course, divine life, they had through faith, else they would not have been saints. But there was no such thing as union with a glorified Head in heaven. Nay, it did not exist even when our Lord was upon earth. The disciples had faith and life, but they were forbidden to go to the Gentiles, instead of being united to them, till Christ rose from the dead. But the moment the Spirit came down, consequent on Christ’s exaltation above, the various tongues proclaimed God’s grace to the Gentiles as well as Jews; and for the first time we read of "the Church," in the full and proper sense, as now subsisting on earth (see Acts 2:1-47) Christ had now begun to fulfill His promise, " Upon this rock I will build my Church." How could this mean the old assembly which fell in the wilderness? It was a new and future building. No point is evaded, as indeed there was no temptation; for the truth on this subject is clear and certain, though I do not expect to convince every one. What I have remarked in this paper spares me the need of replying to what is urged now, which is altogether beside the mark. The only thing of the least shadow of weight is Acts 7:38, which has been fully explained (1 Corinthians 10:1-33), and proves that Israel was typical of us. How does that show that they and we form "one body"? Christ was the Lamb foreordained before the foundation of the world (not slain from it). How does this prove that believing Jew and Gentile formed one body of old, as unquestionably they do now? P.S.-The author of a paper (on Colossians 1:18) admits much, too much I think, to allow of a long or successful resistance to the rest. He allows that the "scriptural proofs of the peculiar blessings belonging to the Church, since" what he terms " its Pentecostal formation," are convincing; but he seems to conceive that the Old Testament saints may have had those privileges extended to them also, though in the separate state and removed from earth to heaven. He does not pretend to cite Scripture for this very imaginative mode of embodying the Old Testament saints in the Church, which I apprehend will satisfy those who oppose my views as little as myself. He tries to make it out by the illustration of the French empire, established after some distant colony was formed, and then granting its imperial advantages to the colonists. But the answer is plain. Scripture, in presenting to our faith the groups of glory, distinguishes the spirits of just men made perfect (1:e. in resurrection) from the Church of the first-born. There is no such thought there as merging all in one; whereas a positive decree of the emperor would be needful to make good the claims of the colonists. Psalms 68:18 does not refer to departed saints, but to Christ’s triumph over the evil spirits who had previously led His people captive. Another writer has referred to Romans 11:1-36. and Galatians 3:1-29 in proof that the Church actually existed as such in Old Testament times. But this is evidently to confound things that differ, because the inheritance of the Abrahamic promises, of which their chapters treat, is not identical with the enjoyment of the Church’s privileges; whereas their identity is assumed in the argument. It is allowed that the New Testament saints do inherit those promises, but that is an essentially different thing from the blessings revealed, e.g., in the Ephesians. The olive is not the heavenly church but the earthly tree of promise and testimony, of which the Jews were the natural branches. Instead of the broken-off unfaithful branches, Gentiles are now grafted in; but, on their unfaithfulness, excision is the sure threat of God, and the Jews will again be brought into their own olive tree; 1:e. for the millennial inheritance. This is the plain teaching of Romans 11:1-36. and though as Gentiles we may be grafted in, and as individuals we may be Abraham’s seed, the special position of Christ’s body, as made known in 1 Corinthians, Ephesians, Colossians, etc., is too distinct to require argumentation. When " the body" is spoken of there is no cutting off nor grafting in. There is in it neither Jew nor Gentile. All is above nature there. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 49: VOL 01 - THE CHURCH AND ITS PRIVILEGES* ======================================================================== The Church and Its Privileges* THINGS, truths, not words, are my objects. But I had supposed that Kuriake (Κυριαχὴ) was the source of Kirche in German, Kirk and Church. (" Kyroike"** I never heard of. It may be all right.) Some philologists now say that this is all wrong, and that kirk or church comes from the Saxon. I can only say (*We have just received from some kind friend in America a copy of a periodical of this year, containing an article, "The Old Testament Saints part of the Church; " and inside it a letter, by the author of "Have we a Revelation from God," reviewing and refuting it; and, as we think it likely to be useful to our readers, we will give them the opportunity of perusing it, and of judging whether " the visible church is identical under both dispensations; " and whether " nothing more can be said of the church now " than could be said of Israel. (** The word used by the writer of the article.) I really do not know, nor have at this moment the means of ascertaining: if, indeed, it be ascertainable with any certainty. But the truth is, I have a great dislike of the word " church," because no man knows what it means. What does it mean? Mr. G.’s congregation might build him a new church. Then it means a building. Or Mr. S. may be a member of Mr. G.’s church. Then it means an assembly under the presidency of Mr. G. In England, " he is going into the church," means, he is going to become a clergyman: he is gone to church, means the public service or worship: gone to the church, means the building again. The Roman Catholic Church, and the Greek Church, are large bodies of persons professing Christianity, associated under these designations. So of Presbyterians, and Covenanters, Lutherans, Episcopalians. If you press the matter, the church is the teaching authoritative part of it. This is so even among Protestants. The Thirty-nine Articles of England tell us the church can decree rites and ceremonies, and has authority in matters of faith. So that we have to know what a person means by " the church" before we can reply to a question as to it. But I will just mention a little bit of history which refers to this, and why it is so current a word. When James 1:1-27, or, as we should say with Scottish Covenanters, James VI., had the Bible translated, the translation in popular use was the Geneva one made by the refugees in Queen Mary’s time. This always used the word " congregation." Now James had had a long experience, or knowledge at least, of his mother’s conflicts with John Knox, and was not very fond of Scottish principles embodied afterward in the Covenant, and used to say, " No bishop no king." He gave strict orders to have the word " church" everywhere, and not " congregation." Hence the prevalence of a word in the English Translation of the New Testament which has really no fixed meaning. Say " assembly," which is the meaning of ὲχχλησία (ecclesia), and all ambiguity disappears. Ecclesia was the assembly of those who in the small Grecian states were citizens, and so had right to vote; and then it was applied to analogous bodies or meetings. We all know what an assembly means. Only now we have to do with God’s assembly. For example, " Take with thee one or two more," etc.; " if not, tell it to the church." To whom is it to be told? Well, the minister, or perhaps the presbytery! With the Roman Catholic, " if he will not hear the church" assumes awful proportions. Now say, as it really is, the assembly, and how simple all is. If wronged, go yourself first alone; if in vain, take one or two others; if still in vain, matters being ascertained, then "tell it to the assembly." For the present mixed state of things this may seem inconvenient: but the sense of the words is plain enough. Now apply this to Acts 7:1-60, " This is he that was with the assembly in the wilderness." Can anything be simpler? Israel was a vast assembly in the wilderness, and assembled themselves at the door of the tabernacle of the congregation. For though a different word in Hebrew, the tabernacle got its name from its being the place of meeting. But then, all possible reference to the church, in the. Christian sense, disappears. Who denies that the six hundred thousand men who came constantly to the entrance of the court were an assembly? There were three words used for it, Kahal, as is stated by the writer, from Kahal the verb to call together, Moeed and Heeda or Gneedah, the two last from Yaad, to appoint a place or time of meeting. Hence the tabernacle was called Ohel Moeed, the tent or tabernacle of the congregation. Israel was a great assembly or congregation, as none can dispute, but which proves simply nothing as to its being what God’s assembly is, according to the word, now. It is Ecclesia, an assembly, in Acts 7:1-60, and the word being simply an assembled multitude, says just no more than that. ’The identical word is used when it is said, Acts 19:1-41, "having so said, he (the town clerk) dismissed the assembly." Put " the church " there and what nice sense you will have! I quite understand it will be said, " Yes, but they were God’s assembly in the wilderness." Admitted; but the whole question remains; that is-Were God’s assembly then, and God’s assembly now, constituted on the same principles, on the same basis? There was no question then of conversion, or faith, or anything of the kind, or even profession. They were, as Scripture expresses it, of the fountain of Jacob, descendants of Israel ’according to the flesh, and under condition of being circumcised the eighth day (which by the by none of those born in the wilderness were at that time). That assembly was a nation. God’s assembly now is not. The fact of being an assembly, or the word, proves nothing; the whole question remains:-Are the Israelitish nation, and God’s assembly called by grace, the same thing, or assembled on the same principles? This writer makes some enormous statements.: First, "The church of. Pentecost was Israel." Why, the Jews had openly rejected the Lord, and Peter in his sermon says to those who had ears to hear, " Save yourselves from this untoward generation," and the Lord Himself had said, " Behold your house is left unto you desolate; for I say unto you, ye shall not see Me henceforth until ye say, Blessed is He that cometh in the name of the Lord." They were a judicially rejected people, though not forever: and they are so to this day. They were "men of Israel:" but the assertion, inconceivable as it is, only shows how far a false principle can carry any one. God did not say in Joel " He would give the great outpouring of His Spirit to Israel." He said He would pour out His Spirit on all flesh. In patience with Israel He dealt with them, and began at Jerusalem: but it was the Holy Ghost being given to Cornelius that opened fully Peter’s eyes, and the eyes of the Jewish Christians. But let us enter a little more into the heart of the matter. This writer says of Israel, " ’ To them were committed the oracles of God:’ To them pertained the adoption, glory, covenant, giving of the law, service, and the promises’ (Romans 9:4). Nothing more can be said of the church now." Now here is the nucleus, the heart of the question: not the introduction of Old Testament saints into church privileges (unscriptural as that is), but reducing God’s assembly now to the measure of Jewish privileges. The former might, alone, be treated as a mistake; the latter deprives God’s assembly of its true divine standing, and that is what makes it of moment. The law was given by Moses: grace and truth came (i7ivgro) by Jesus Christ. Let us see what Scripture says on the matter. In the tabernacle there was a veil, behind which God sat between the cherubim; the Holy Ghost thus signifying that the way into the holiest was not yet made manifest, while as yet the first tabernacle had its standing. Now, by Christ’s death the veil is rent from top to bottom; and we have boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way, which He bath consecrated for us through the veil, that is to say, His flesh. We can walk, and are to walk in the light, as God is in the light. Is this "nothing more" to this writer? I will not insist on God’s righteousness being declared now (the righteousness of God being revealed, not prophesied of) because I desire to take what is most positive and on the very surface of Scripture. See Galatians 4:1-31 "Now, I say, the heir, as long as he is a child, differeth nothing from a slave, though he be lord of all; but is under tutors and governors until the time appointed of the father; even so we, when we were children, were in bondage under the rudiments of the world. But when the fullness of the time was come, God sent forth His Son, made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons; and because ye are sons, God bath sent forth the Spirit of His Son into your hearts, crying, Abba, Father. Wherefore, thou art no more a slave, but a son." Is it " nothing more" to be brought to be sons of God by known and accomplished redemption, and know it; to live in the relationship, instead even of an heir differing nothing from a slave? Will the writer allow me to ask him, Were the Jews under the first covenant, or the second, in their relationship with God? Are we under that first covenant? But more, we have the difference clearly brought out in Hebrews 10:9, " He taketh away the first that He may establish the second." It will be said that these were ceremonies; but what ceremonies? The priesthood is changed; is that merely a ceremony, a better hope by which we draw nigh to God. And see the difference: the sacrifices could not make the corners thereto perfect as pertaining to the conscience. There was a remembrance of sins every year; now, we are perfected forever who are sanctified; so that Christ, when He had by Himself purged our sins, sat down at the right hand of the Majesty in the heavens. He is seated there, because all is done, till His enemies are made His footstool: and our sins and iniquities are remembered no more. The worshippers once purged are so in such sort that they should have " no more conscience of sins," instead of a remembrance of them every year. We have eternal redemption, a purged conscience, because the sins are purged once for all; and boldness to enter into the Holiest: " Giving thanks to the Father, who bath made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light" (Colossians 1:12): Having the knowledge of salvation given to His people by the remission of their sins. Is all this " nothing more" than Israel had? Take what is said by the Lord, and this will lead us to the question of the Holy Ghost. Than John Baptist no greater prophet had ever arisen, nor of those born of woman any one greater; "but the least in the kingdom of heaven is greater than he." Many kings, prophets, and righteous men, had desired to see the things which the disciples saw, and had not seen them; but " blessed," said the Lord, " are your eyes, for they see." They were more blessed than their kings and prophets-they had Messiah with them. Yet so great was the privilege and advantage of having the Holy Ghost, that it was " expedient" that Christ should leave them; for, if He did not, the Comforter would not come; but, if He went away, He would send Him. What a thing to lose, Christ’s personal presence in grace 1 Yet so great was to be the effect of the coming of the Holy Spirit, that it was better He should go. Yet they would persuade us that He had been there all the time of the Old Testament! See 1 Peter 1:1-25. They searched their own prophecies and found they did not minister to themselves but to us the things now reported by the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven. Was the promise to pour out the Spirit, or His presence nothing"? Clearly it was not anything if He was there all the time as when poured out. And now mark the foundation of this immense truth. God never dwelt with Adam innocent, nor with Abraham or others; but as soon as even an external redemption was accomplished, we read "They shall know (Exodus 29:1-46) that I am the Lord their God, that brought them out of the land of Egypt that I may dwell among them:" and the Shechinah of glory came down and sat between the cherubim, and led them in the wilderness. So it was, when an eternal and full redemption had been accomplished, and man (though much more than a man) sat down in virtue of it at the right hand of God, that the Holy Ghost came down to dwell in God’s people individually and collectively. We must not confound between the divine action of the Holy Ghost and His coming in person to make His abode with us. I think it will be found in Scripture that all direct action of God from the creation is by the Holy Ghost. Even Christ could say, " If I, by the Holy Ghost, cast out devils." At any rate, He moved on the face of the waters. By His Spirit God garnished the heavens. He inspired the prophets, and wrought all through the divine history; but that was not His personal coming. So the Son created all things; but He did not come until the incarnation: " I came forth from the Father, and am come into the world; again, I leave the world and go to the Father" (John 16:28). So speaks Christ of the Holy Ghost: " If I go not away, the Comforter will not come unto you; but if I depart, I will send Him unto you; and when He is come," etc. (John 16:7-8). And this was so distinct a thing that it is called " the Holy Ghost," without saying came, or given, or anything else. Thus, John 7:39, "For the Holy Ghost was not yet" (given, is added, it is not in the text), "because that Jesus was not yet glorified." So, the disciples baptized by John,. In Acts 19:2, said, " We have not so much as heard whether the Holy Ghost is." All Jews knew there was a Holy Ghost; but this was His promised presence: and this is easily understood as to John’s disciples, because he had spoken of Christ’s work as twofold: He was the Lamb of God; and He it is that baptizeth with the Holy Ghost. It was the second great part of His work baptizing with the Holy Ghost; and it could not be done till He was glorified. So He tells His disciples after His resurrection, " Ye shall be baptized with the Holy Ghost not many days hence." He Himself was anointed and sealed with the Holy Ghost when He stood, the first man fully, perfectly, acceptable to God, who had ever existed since evil entered,-perfect in Himself. "God anointed Jesus of Nazareth with the Holy Ghost and with power" (Acts 10:38). And what is the effect of the Holy Ghost’s dwelling in us? The love of God shed abroad in the heart by the Holy Ghost given to us (Romans 5:1-21) We know that we are in Christ and Christ is in us (John 14:1-31) We know that we are sons and cry Abba, Father, the Spirit bearing witness with our spirit (Romans 8:1-39) He takes of the things of Christ, the glorified man on high, and shows them to us (John 16:1-33) Our bodies are temples of the Holy Ghost which we have of God (1 Corinthians 6:1-20): so that God dwells in us and we in Him, and we know it by the Holy Ghost given to us (1 John 4:13). What eye bath not seen, nor ear heard, nor bath entered into the heart of man, God hectic revealed unto us by His Spirit (1 Corinthians 2:1-16) Where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is liberty (2 Corinthians 3:1-18): and Christ living thus in us, the body is dead because of sin, the Spirit life because of righteousness (Romans 8:1-39) Man at the right hand of God in righteousness, and the Holy Ghost dwelling in the believer as the consequence of it, characterize Christianity. All this is lost by this system [which tells us "that the visible church is identical under both dispensations "]. What made it expedient for Christ to leave His disciples, we are told, is all the same as what they had before He came! The anointing of the Holy Ghost is nothing "! Besides, "he that is joined to the Lord is one Spirit," and this leads to the corporate difference. Till Christ ascended up on high, there was no Man at the right hand of God, no one to whom the believer could, as a present fact, be united; and, consequently, as we have seen, no Holy Ghost come down to unite him to Him. But Christ ascended up on high, a Man, in righteousness, and the Holy Ghost consequently came down: not to the world but to believers. Let us hold fast this great truth which is the essence of Christianity, as the cross and God’s love are the foundation of it. The Head being on high, we are quickened together with Him, according to the power with which God wrought in raising Him from the dead and setting Him there; and raised us up, Jews and Gentiles together, and made us sit together in heavenly places in Christ: (not with Him yet, Ephesians 1:19-23; Ephesians 2:1-7). Neither part of this was true before Christ was glorified. There was no such glorified Man; no Holy Ghost come down from heaven. On this, Scripture is as clear as possibly can be. There was the Son of God who could quicken; but no raised glorified Man, whose going to the Father was the testimony of God’s righteousness; nor the Holy Ghost come down, the divine witness of it. We are members of His body: He has given Him, as so exalted, to be head over all things to the church which is His body. Thus, "by one Spirit we are all baptized into one body," Jews or Greeks. Israel had lost his place as such. There was no difference now. By the cross the middle wall of partition was broken down, and of twain one new man to be made; and both reconciled to God in one body by the cross (Ephesians 2:1-22) Now the duty and essence of Judaism was the keeping of the wall up; Christianity as a system on earth is founded on its being broken down. Were the Gentiles in the church brought into the Jewish state as is alleged? No, He makes of twain one new man and reconciles both, and came and preached peace to those afar off and those nigh; for neither of them had it. The apostles and prophets (the prophets are the prophets of the New Testament, see Ephesians 3:5) were the foundation of a new edifice, "a habitation of God through the Spirit." This had never been promised, never revealed at all, could not have been. To say there was no difference between Jew and Gentile would have destroyed Judaism at one stroke. It was not revealed at all (Ephesians 3:4-11; Colossians 1:26; Romans 16:25-26. In 26th verse it is not "the scriptures of the prophets; " but now is made manifest by prophetic scriptures,γραφῶν προφητιχῶν. But the grand point is the coming of the Holy Ghost consequent on the exaltation of Christ as man in righteousness to the right hand of God. So when Christ says, "I will build my church" (on the revelation made by the Father to Peter), what was the meaning of that if He had been building it all the time, from Abel onwards? The church, then, the body of Christ, is formed by the baptism of the Holy Ghost, consequent on the exaltation of Christ to the right hand of God (1 Corinthians 12:12-13). The Holy Ghost as so come " was not yet," when Christ was not glorified; and this " baptism," as is declared in Acts 1:1-26, took place a few days after, that is, on the day of Pentecost (Acts 2:1-47) Romans 11:1-36 has nothing to do with the church, " the body of Christ." It is the olive tree of promise (and the church was never promised even); and it is accompanied with a revelation that, when the Jews are grafted in again, the Gentile branches would be broken off. There were promises and prophecies at any rate, which apply to Gentiles as, "Rejoice, ye Gentiles, with His people; " but if Israel be God’s people, the church cannot exist with it; for there (that is, in the church) there is no difference of Jew and Gentile, and blindness in part is happened unto Israel till the fullness of the Gentiles be come in. They are enemies as touching the gospel; and "the casting away of them is the reconciling of the world." The church is "the body of Christ" formed by the Holy Ghost on earth, while Christ sits on the right hand of God. I should have many things to note if I merely took up the article. "House of the Lord," or any application of it to the place where the people meet, is wholly without it foundation in Scripture. "The church of the wilderness " is also unscriptural. " The kingdom of heaven " is not the church at all. It is really too bad to say, " the apostles do not say a word about a new organization." " There is a disannulling of the commandment going before for the weakness and unprofitableness thereof." Did not Paul organize the church? Were the priests and Levites, priests and Levites of the Christian church? There would be another difficulty which has not been noticed at all:-That before exodus there was no assembly of any kind at all. Individual saints, Enochs and Noahs and Abrahams there were, but there was no assembly; but I do not go beyond what is on the surface of the article. What I press is this, that the Holy Ghost is come; and that, when He came, the baptism, by which the saints were made one body, took place; the assembly is the body of Christ and the dwelling place of the Holy Ghost on earth: and it never existed before that baptism, and could not; for the Head did not exist; nor was the Holy Ghost, in consequence, descended to unite men to Him so as to form His body. He gave Himself not for that nation only, but to gather together in one the children of God which were scattered abroad. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 50: VOL 01 - THE CLOSE OF MARK AUTHENTIC AND GENUINE ======================================================================== The Close of Mark Authentic and Genuine Mark 16:9; et seqq.-Having long since protested against those who treat this passage and the beginning of John 8:1-59 with suspicion, I proceed to state my reasons, passing over the disputed place in John, which has been already well defended in another place. Even Dean Alford, who certainly does not err on the side of credulity, admits that the authority of the close of Mark is hardly to be doubted. Eusebius, and the Vat. and Sin. MSS., omit it; and several others note its absence in certain copies, but generally add, that it appears in the oldest and best. All else of the Greek MSS., all. the Evangelistaria, all the Versions (except the Roman edition of the Arabic), and a large proportion of the earliest and most trustworthy Fathers, are allowed to be in its favor, Lachmann,. in spite of his notorious tendency to follow the very slips of the most ancient copies, edits the entire section without hesitation. In his notes the Dean urges that the passage is irreconcilable with the other Gospels, and is disconnected with what goes before; that no less than seventeen words and expressions occur in it (some of them repeatedly) which are never elsewhere used by Mark, whose adherence to his own phrases is remarkable, and that, consequently, the internal evidence is very weighty against his authorship; that is, he believes it to be an authentic addition by another hand. Before examining these criticisms, I must object to a reasoning which affirms or allows that to be scripture which is irreconcilable with other scriptures. If its authority be clear, every believer will feel that, with or without difficulties, all must be really harmonious. But., it is said, the diction and construction differ from the rest of the Gospel Did the Dean or those who think with him adequately weigh the new and extraordinary circumstances which had to be recorded? In such a case strange words and phrases would be natural if Mark wrote (nor does he by any means want ἅπαξ λεγόμενα elsewhere); whereas, another hand, adding to Mark, would as probably have copied the language and manner of the Evangelist. Πρώτῃ σαβ. (ver. 9) is alleged to be unusual. Doubtless; yet, of the two, it is less Hebraistic than τὴς μιᾶς σ.(ver. 2), and each might help the other to a Gentile or a Roman ear. And, so far from being stumbled by the way Mary Magdalene is mentioned here, there seems to me much force in Jesus appearing first to her out of whom He had cast seven devils. Who so suitable first to see Him and hear from Himself the tidings of His resurrection, who through death annuls him who had the power of death, that is, the devil? As to the absolute use of the pronoun in 10, 11, is it not enough that the occasion here required what was needless elsewhere?-If.πορευ is found only in 10, 12, and 15, it is because the simple word best expressed what the Holy Ghost designed to say, whereas elsewhere the evangelist employed its compounds in order to convey the more graphically what was there wanted. Thus, he uses εἰσπορ. eight times, while Matthew, in his much larger account, has it but once. Is this the least ground for questioning Matthew 15:17? So, again, Mark has.παραπορ in four different chapters, Matthew once only (27: 39),Luke and John not at all.-Leaving these trivial points, the phrase τοῖς μετ’ αὐτοῦ is to me an argument for rather than against Mark’s authorship. Compare with it chap. 1: 36; 3: 14; and 5: 40. As to ἐθεάθη ὑπ’ αὐτῆς and its difference from τοῖς θ. Αὐτόν, the answer is, that the word is most appropriate here and uncalled for in other places, and if the difference prove anything it would show two hands instead of one supplementing Mark’s narrative! Thus, for instance, the same verb occurs but once in all the epistles of Paul: are we, therefore, to suspect Romans 15:1-33? Matthew has θεωρέω only twice; are we for a score of such reasons as these to speculate that " another hand" added Matthew 27:1-66; Matthew 28:1-20.? As reiterated mention of unbelief, and the Lord’s upbraiding the eleven with it, what more instructive, or in better keeping with the scope of the context and of the Gospel? It was wholesome for those who were about to preach to others to learn what their own hearts were, and the Lord in His own ministry sets them right before announcing their great commission. Even if we only look at the word ἀπιστία, it occurs in Mark 6:6; Mark 9:1-50 If the verb is found only in ch. 16: 11, 16, what more marvelous than Luke’s having it only in his last chapter (ver. 11, 41), and never once using the substantive either in the Gospel or in the Acts of the Apostles?-It is true that μετὰ τ. and ὕστερον are found in no other passage of Mark, but his customary precision may be one reason why the former is not more common; and the latter occurs once only in Luke and John.-It is confessed that τὸ εὐαγ. Π. τῇ χτίσει is in Mark’s style. The fact is, neither of the later Gospels contains the noun εὐαγ. and Matthew always qualifies it as " the gospel of the kingdom," or " this gospel; " whereas, whether or not Mark has the qualified phrases in 1: 14 and 14: 9 (for MSS. etc. differ), he repeatedly has " the Gospel" elsewhere, as chap. 1:15; 8: 35; 10: 29; 13: 10. This, then, affords no slight presumption that the passage is the genuine production of Mark, as well as authentic. Παραχολ. in 17, and ἐπαχολ. in 20, occur nowhere else in Mark, and that for the best of reasons; the accuracy which the compounded forms impart was demanded here, and not before, where the simple form sufficed. And this is the less surprising, inasmuch as the former appears only in Luke’s preface, the latter nowhere else as far as the four evangelists are concerned. As to the singularity of χαλῶς ἕξουσιν, what simpler, seeing that this promise (as well as that about the new tongues, serpents, etc.) is revealed here only, and was unquestionably verified in the subsequent history? It is the natural converse of a common Scriptural designation for the sick οἰ χαχῶς ἔχοντες, and if the occurrence of ἄῤῥωστος should be here objected to, the reader may find it twice already in Mark 6:1-56, while Matthew and Paul use it each only once. Only one further objection remains worth noticing, the use of χύριος in 19, 20. In Mark 11:3, I suppose it is equivalent to Jehovah, and at any rate I would not press this as in point.. But the absence of such a title before seems to me a beauty, not a blemish, in Mark, whose business was to exhibit the service of Jesus. But now that God had vindicated His rejected Servant by the resurrection, now that He had made Him both " Lord" and Christ, what more natural, or even necessary, than that the same Gospel which had hitherto traced Him as the Servant, Son of God, should make Him now known as " the Lord"? But this is not all. The. Lord had uttered His charge to those who were, at His bidding, to replace Him as servants, and in a world-wide sphere; He was received up to heaven, and sat on the right hand of God. Now it was Mark’s place, and only Mark’s, to add that, while they went forth and preached everywhere, the Lord was working with them. Jesus, even as the Lord, is, if I may so say, servant still. Glorious truth! And whose hand so suited to record it as his who proved by sad experience how hard it is to be a faithful servant; but who proved also that the grace of the Lord is sufficient to restore and strengthen the feeblest? (Compare Acts 13:13; Acts 15:38; Colossians 4:10; 2 Timothy 4:11.) ======================================================================== CHAPTER 51: VOL 01 - THE COMING AND THE DAY ======================================================================== The Coming and the Day 2 Thessalonians 2:2.-It is quite right to distinguish between "the coming" and "the day of the Lord." They are not the same thing, though of course closely connected. Again, it is certain that ὲνέστηχεν means "is actually come," or "is present," and not " is at hand." But it is a mistake to assume that the Thessalonian saints then knew the relative order of these two things; and this ignorance on all sides gave occasion for the false teachers to trouble them with the cry that "the day of the Lord was there," which would have been trying enough, even with the thought of being caught up during or after it. This the Spirit meets by intimating that the coming precedes the day, which, besides, awaits a fuller development of evil. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 52: VOL 01 - THE DAY OF ATONEMENT: THE FEASTS OF JEHOVAH ======================================================================== The Day of Atonement: The Feasts of Jehovah Next we come to a still more solemn feast, the great Day of Atonement, from verse 27: " Also ’on the tenth day of this seventh month there shall be a day of atonement." And it is well that we should observe how events are crowding on during this eventful month. God is finishing His work on the earth. He is going to put out the evil that had so long ravaged among men, and to bring His ancient people into fullness of blessing. On this day Israel are to be brought under the atonement of Christ. For first let me remind you how impossible it is to think that this day can be for us in the chronological scheme of the feasts. We have seen Christ as our sacrifice in the Passover long ago, and do not want it a second time here: to repeat the work for us would be to impeach its everlasting value. It is really the work of Christ applied to Israel. They had the testimony to the Lamb; but they refused it. We meanwhile by grace have been brought into the blessing. Are they to be left out? Assuredly for a time only. The day of Atonement in the seventh month, so long following the Passover, indicates, not that the work is to be done over again, but that there is to be a second application of that work, and of course to a different people. Do you ask me for Scripture proof of this? My answer is John 11:51-52 : "And this spake he not of himself; but, being high priest that year, he prophesied that Jesus should die for that nation; and not for that nation only, but that also He should gather together in one the children of God that were scattered abroad." In this passage then we have most clearly put this double aspect of the work of Christ; but " that nation," the Jews, refused it, for it was to the Jew first that the offer was made. Next, you notice, it is not only for that but to gather in one the children of God. They are both saved and also gathered into one. It is the church baptized by the Holy Spirit. But then there remains for Israel their blessing by and by. It is suspended for the present; but the precious blood, the death, of the Lord Jesus in all its efficacy cannot fail for them also-for the very people who of old refused it. How patient the grace of God On the tenth of the seventh month, in God’s time, the day will surely come; and you may find the most sensible difference in the language employed here and that which is used of us: " And ye shall afflict your souls, and offer an offering made by fire unto Jehovah." You do not find such words as these under the paschal lamb; and no wonder. For God will make them feel their sins, as He could not be unobservant of their long unbelief; and when their day of blessing comes, do you think they will be insensible? Is it conceivable that Israel will regard themselves as other sinners? Certainly not. They will say, We are the guiltiest people on earth. The Messiah, the Christ of God, was sent to us, and we refused Him. He was not yours yet you bowed to Him. It is the Messiah rejected by Israel who is become the suffering yet exalted Son of man, and the Gentiles do hear Him. Joseph rejected by his brethren was in another land exalted to the throne; and there too he had a bride unknown to his brethren, while next to the one who set him in the highest place. And when the true Joseph presents himself to the sons of Israel, will they not afflict their souls as Joseph’s brethren did when the house of Pharaoh heard? There never was so genuine a mourning as this for the seed of Jacob. And so yet more, yea incomparably, will it be in the day that is hastening. And it could not be otherwise, if God wrought real repentance as He will in Israel. The day of atonement bears the distinct mark of what will only, or at least most fully, apply to His people in that future day, when God’s plans for the earth are being completed. But this is not all. In verse 28 we read, "And ye shall do no work in that same day; for it is a day of atonement to make an atonement for you before Jehovah your God." Could this be said so fittingly and emphatically to any other people? Were they not the people of all others who boasted of their works, and so, going about to establish their own righteousness, "stumbled at the stumbling-stone"? Acceptable works are found only in believers. We know that those who have the Spirit of God working in them really show forth the fruits of the Spirit and do not boast. Where all is felt to be of grace, how could they boast? Others who slight faith and consequently talk of the law do in fact nothing. The righteousness of the law is fulfilled in those who are under grace, not law. The Jew boasted but stumbled over the lowly Nazarene, the crucified Savior; but it will not be so in that day, when the reality of faith will not only work repentance but exclude pretension to work. Not that works will not follow, but the day of atonement will shut out everything, if I may so say, but Christ, their propitiation and substitute; so that their self-loathing will be as complete as their abandonment of their own works. The very fact of their now believing what God had done for them in Christ makes them ashamed of the least reference to any works of their own. There are the two effects: on the one hand, affliction of soul in the confession of their sins; and, on the other hand, no mingling any work of their own with that which Christ suffered for them before God. In verse 29 you see the same sentiment repeated: " For whatsoever soul it be that shall not be afflicted in that same day, he shall be cut off from among his people. And whatsoever soul it be that doeth any work in that same day, the same soul will I destroy from among his people." Again, in verse.32: " It shall be unto you a sabbath of rest, and ye shall afflict your souls." The two things, no work and affliction of soul, mark this day of atonement. How blessed when Israel know and feel this! And here again I may appeal to other parts of Scripture. Let me refer you now to one of the prophets in connection with this day of atonement, Zechariah 12:9-14 : "And it shall come to pass in that day, that I will seek to destroy all the nations that come against Jerusalem." You see the nations are now jealous and hostile to Israel. "And I will pour upon the house of David, and upon the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the spirit of grace and of supplications." Is not this the day of atonement? " And they shall look upon Me whom they have pierced, and they shall mourn for Him." It is a day of afflicting their souls: " As one mourneth for his only son, and shall be in bitterness for him, as one that is in bitterness for his first born." " In that day there shall be a great mourning in Jerusalem, as the mourning of Hadadrimmon in the valley of Megiddon. And the land shall mourn, every family apart, and their wives apart." Conscience leads one to be alone with God, that confession may be true and deep. Such is the effect of real Spirit-wrought sorrow; for the conscience, when it is thus really reached by the Spirit of God, always isolates itself-it makes the soul desire to go alone to God. To whom alas! could I tell out honestly all I am? What good would it do to any one else? It might do harm. It is to God then we must go, and to God we must confess. And it is good for the soul; for God wants sterling honesty; He wants guile to be taken away; and this is accomplished by His own grace. It is the day of atonement, when Israel hide not like Adam, but their sins are poured out into the bosom of God. " Every family apart." So close, so real, is the work that it is said, even " their wives apart:" the nearest and closest relationships are apart, that there may be now, for the first time, " truth in the inward parts." And what are the families named? "The family of the house of David apart, and their wives apart; the family of the house of Nathan apart, and their wives apart." Why David and why Nathan? Once there was a time when the king trembled as he stood thoroughly convicted, and the faithful prophet was strengthened of God to convict him " Thou art the man." Now what a change I It is no humbled king nor convicting prophet. All are convicted, and so profoundly filled with the sense each of his own sins, that they feel thoroughly the need to be alone with God. It is not only real but deep work; it is not the mere effect of feeling or sympathy fed by a weeping crowd. They go alone, each before God, that all may be out and clear. And surely this should be a word of warning as to the danger in these days of multitudinous meetings, revivals, etc. I do not say it to weaken any one’s confidence, but that all may see how momentous it is for souls to get alone with God as to their sins. Nor is this the only picture; we have two others to complete the scene. " The family of the house of Levi apart, and their wives apart; the family of Shimei apart, and their wives apart." The margin gives " Symeon " as the alternative, and so does the oldest version, the Septuagint. Of course there is a difference of opinion as to this as in all things; but it is a common thing in Scripture to find two names for the same person, as, for instance, Paul and Saul, Silas and Silvanus, Jude and Thaddeus. But if we accept the view of the Greek translators, they were two sons of Jacob of painful notoriety in their earliest history-. It was revenge then brought them together. No doubt the Gentile was guilty of gross wrong, and dishonored their sister; but their wrath was cruel, and their revenge as deceitful as outrageous, and Jacob was ashamed of his unworthy sons, who had been united in deadly purpose under the guise of religion. But now they have found the Savior, or rather the Savior has found them, and they are confessing each his own sins. Thousands of years had passed over; but here are the descendants of these two fathers in Israel bowing down before the Lord who died for them. This is the true meaning of the Day of Atonement as applicable here to Israel; and let us rejoice that God will extend thus His grace, through that blessed Savior, even to guilty Israel, kept for this and other great ends of God. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 53: VOL 01 - THE DAY OF THE LORD ======================================================================== The Day of the Lord 2 Peter 3:10.-I think it will be found that, while all three Scriptures are equally inspired, and therefore certainly and unmixedly true, our text takes a middle. place, as to measure of light given, between the prophecy of Isaiah (65. 66., to which the reference is clear) and the Apocalypse. And this exactly accords with its season historically. The Apostle of the Circumcision adds to the light we might have gathered from the Jewish prophet; for he discloses new heavens and new earth, not merely in a moral and incipient way, which finds its center if not its scope, in the millennial condition of Jerusalem and her people, but in a full, physical sense, consequent upon the day of the Lord wherein the heavens pass away and the earth is burned up. But it was not the business of Peter but of John to lay down the positive landmarks of time, though he does not give us certain elements with more precision than the Old. Testament promise he refers to. Accordingly it is in the Apocalypse that we meet the unambiguous statement that the reign of Christ and the glorified saints for 1000 years, besides a brief space after that, takes place after the partial accomplishment of Isaiah 65:1-25 and before the fulfillment of Revelation 21:1. It appears to me that 2 Peter 3:1-18 embraces both these thoughts within the compass of "the day of the Lord," which is used in the largest application of the term, so as to include the acorn of Isaiah and the full-grown oak of St. John, who alone was given to see, or at least to make known; the exact times and seasons and years connected with the entire scheme. If we bear in mind that the millennium is styled "the regeneration" in Matthew 19:1-30, it may help us to see that the difficulty is not insuperable. " If any man be in Christ he is a new creature," or there is a new creation. That work done in the soul, one can take up the language of faith and say, " Old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new:" while yet it is evident that, as to fact, the full change does not pass over the man until the coming of the Lord. Just so is it with the earth:-the millennium is "the regeneration," and so, even then, Isaiah can speak those rapturous words which, nevertheless, will not have their actual physical completion till that dispensation is closed. Besides, if the latter is to be insisted on, Mr. B. has no right to include the millennial Palestine, or what he calls " the earthly paradise," among " all these things" that shall be dissolved: for Peter is speaking solely of present things, or things of a like nature, whereas the hypothesis Mr.. B. combats supposes a vast and essential difference, at least as to Palestine, commenced at the beginning and complete at the end of the day of the Lord; not as regards that land only, but the earth and the heavens as a whole. Now it is of the last or perfect change that Revelation 21:1 speaks, as it is there that we get the fullest light which revelation affords on this subject. And I must remind him of Bengel’s wholesome words, " Antiqui et ea autem et involutiora dicta ex novissimis quibusque et distinctissimis interpretari, non illis ad haec enervanda et eludenda abuti debemus." Isaiah 65:1-25 and 2 Peter 3:1-18 give no countenance to, while Rev. 20: 21. positively excludes the wild fancy which has been revived, after a long slumber, that the nations, Gog and Magog, are the wicked dead resuscitated. And this is only one of the many absurdities into which a departure from the plain drift of these chapters reduces the wanderer. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 54: VOL 01 - THE DEPENDENT ONE ======================================================================== The Dependent One Psalms 16:2-3.-I am of opinion that the main idea of the Psalm is the perfectness of Messiah’s dependence on Jehovah, shown in His humiliation here below (Hebrews 2:1-18), and vindicated in His resurrection (Acts 2:1-47) Hence it is that, while a divine person, yet taking the place of a servant, His soul (for it is feminine) said to Jehovah, " Thou art my Lord; my goodness is not to Thee." It is the expression of his self-renunciation as man, which was in truth His moral glory. (Compare Mark 10:17-27; Luke 18:18, etc.) On the other hand, He said, " To the saints who are in the earth, and the excellent; All my delight is in them." This latter was acted out in His baptism, when He thus fulfilled all righteousness and identified Himself in grace with the godly in Israel. As man, He did not exalt himself, but gave the entire glory to God; and this not in austere distance from the despised remnant who bowed to the testimony of John the Baptist, but graciously entering into and sympathizing with their true place before God. " He that sanctifieth, and they who are sanctified, are all of one." ======================================================================== CHAPTER 55: VOL 01 - THE FAITH ======================================================================== The Faith Galatians 3:23.-" Faith" is not here put for its object, I think, but is contrasted with the law when fully declared to be the sole means of justification, as it was after the cross of Jesus, when all pretension to stand before God on the law was manifestly at an end. Faith was always that whereby saints were justified really, even while the Levitical system had its place, and, if I may so say, obscured the faith which wais within: then all that was outward fell, and the faith stood revealed. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 56: VOL 01 - THE FEAST OF TABERNACLES: THE FEASTS OF JEHOVAH ======================================================================== The Feast of Tabernacles: The Feasts of Jehovah Then begins the last feast in verse 34: " Speak unto the children of Israel; saying, The fifteenth day of this seventh month shall be the feast of tabernacles for seven days unto Jehovah." For seven days! It is to be remarked that we have had nothing about seven days since the feast of Unleavened Bread, and this, as I showed, signified our walking in sincerity and truth, in Christian holiness, the true import of that feast, because Christ our Passover was sacrificed for us. It is the whole course of those who are under the pilgrimage of grace. Now here are seven other days for a different purpose; and what are they? Seven days of glory on the earth. This may startle some; for there are very many Christians who, when they think of glory, always connect it with heaven. So they speak of souls having gone to glory at death. Now I am very far from denying that the Christian is destined to heavenly glory. We do belong distinctly to Christ on high. We depart at death to be with Him. But I am far from thinking, with a valued countryman of yours, that the glorified Church is to live and reign on the earth. It is not in a likeness of heaven we are to dwell forever; we are going to heaven itself. The Father’s house does not mean the earth, however sublimated or etherealized, but heaven, and the brightest part of heaven. It is not some distant corner or outskirt of glory; it is where the Son abides, where the Father’s love satisfied itself in receiving the Son. There shall we be with Him, in the Father’s house of many mansions. " And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am there ye may be also." It is- where He is. The portion of the Christian is Christ in the Father’s house; so we shall be ever with the Lord. He would not tell us so if it would raise our hopes too high. He did so tell us that He might inspire us with the same expectation that filled His own breast. The bride is to be with the Bridegroom. I reject the notion therefore, as unfounded, that the scene of our glory is to be en the earth; and, no matter what the piety of men who have such low views, I reject them as doubly injurious. They deny the Church’s glory to be distinctively heavenly, and they do not leave room for Israel’s future glory according to promise on the earth. It is really therefore a mistake of grave consequence, which affects our interpretation of all the. Bible, and confuses the entire scheme of God’s ways. Hear what the New Testament teaches: "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed us with all spiritual blessings in heavenly places in Christ." We are blessed there in title already in Christ as we shall be there in fact with Him after His coming for us. But in the portion before us we have another thing brought out. Here it cannot mean our going to heaven, for we do not speak of " days" there. It is one eternal day in that sphere of unchanging light and blessedness; and by a figure it may be called very well the " day of eternity." Indeed this is the way the apostle Peter does speak in the last verse of his Second Epistle: " To Him be glory, both now and to the day of eternity." But glory will assuredly come to the earth. Thus: " Arise, shine; for thy light is come," etc. Where is that? In heaven? No; Zion is here on the earth; really it was that mountain on which the king’s palace was built, and now significant of grace yet to build up the broken house of Israel, when God will give them the true David! Let me draw your attention here to two schools of theology, as the truth in question is of practical moment as well as doctrinal. It may be instructive to see how both fail and come short of what the Holy Spirit reveals for the glory of God. As to this then we find these two schools in opposition. One says that the scene of future glory is to be the earth, where Christ died and God has wrought so graciously, and as to which He has promised such glorious things. Fully do I admit this; but their inference as to our being glorified there is unsound. The other school holds that heaven will be the only scene of glory, and this so exclusively as almost, if not quite, to forget the body and its future resurrection from the grave. They are in danger of thinking only of the soul, and of heaven as a place of pure spirit, which, I submit, is a poor substitute for the Christian’s hope, and not at all what the word of God teaches. It is quite true and blessed that even now the separated spirit goes to be with Christ; and no believer should seek to weaken this truth. A recently- converted robber was to be that day with Him in paradise. It is lamentable to know how little this is believed by modern theologians; and I doubt not that their feebleness here is due to their scanty knowledge of Christ and redemption. But this intermediate blessedness is not resurrection; though departed saints, when risen, shall be, as now, in the "paradise of God." As the paradise of Adam was the brightest spot on earth, so the " paradise of God " is the brightest spot in heaven. Sinful man was cast out of the one; believing man is received into the other. Christ was the first fruits, as was due to Him, the Son. and Savior; afterward those that are Christ’s at His coming. But there is, another thing, the kingdom of God, which has " earthly things," and for these needs new birth (John 3:1-36), as well as for " heavenly things." So it will neither be heaven alone, nor the earth alone, but both. (Compare Ephesians 1:10 and Colossians 1:20.) In Scripture faith finds no real difficulty, and is far larger than theology, which is invariably short of the truth of God. Theology is an attempt on the part of man to reduce the word of God to a science, and a science for man, converted or not, to learn. No wonder that this is always a total failure, as it deserves to be. You cannot squeeze what has life into this iron vice of theirs without destroying its strength and tissues and beauty. Both heaven and earth are to be under Christ, the distinct but united spheres of His reign to God’s glory. In the fullness of the times God is going to gather all things under Christ; not all persons, for this will never be. Alas! those who despise the Lord Jesus will, at the end, be cast into the lake of fire. But all things, the groaning creation, guilty of no sin but suffering from the sin of man, will be delivered through the victory of the Second Man. For this we and it are waiting. It is not true, therefore, that the earth is the only scene of glory, but also heaven. I might prove this from other Scriptures besides Ephesians and Colossians. But I would remind you that it is no good sign to require many passages. One, if plain, is conclusive. Who would admire the state of soul that, when one Scripture is given, asks for another? Even if you had only to do with a man’s word, do you wish him to repeat the same thing half-a-dozen times over? In fact, if he were to do so, it ought rather to arouse suspicions. But, if such is the case with man, is it not most dishonoring to God to look forever so many assurances from Him 2 I grant that in certain cases He may present the same thing in various forms, but this is only pure grace in consideration of the weakness of man. But I direct you to Psalms 73:24, and I do so in order to clear out a singular mistake of our translators. There we read these words, a favorite text with many: "Thou shalt guide me with Thy counsel, and afterward receive me to glory:" very good Christian doctrine; but is it the object of the Psalm to teach anything of the sort? Let us be subject to Scripture. You see the word "to " is inserted. And what is the reason for it? "To" would require authority, for it cannot be inserted or left out in this sort of way. The truth is that our translators could not understand the meaning of the words as they stand, especially as it was taken for granted that the Psalm was speaking of what we Christians want for our comfort and so they thought it must mean, " Thou shalt guide me with Thy counsel, and afterward receive me [to] glory." They never thought of the peculiar hopes of Israel, and so they could not find out the meaning. It is confusion if you apply these to the Christian. But then they did not know anything worth mentioning of God’s ways for the future, when Christ shall reign over the earth. Now, let me tell you, people are learning to translate accurately, whether they understand the meaning or not. This may not be pleasant, still it is more honest; and thus grace may the sooner use some one else to help them to the meaning. But, further, I may say that one of our American kinsmen has lately brought out a new translation of the Psalms. The late Dr. J. A. Alexander, of Princeton, was a man not to be despised. His book on the Psalms, as a version, is respectable, though some of us would think its exegesis rather dark. He did not understand what he was writing about; yet he was a scholar, and translates uprightly his text. But let me add, that being a scholar will never enable one to understand the Scripture. The one and only means of understanding it is by the Holy Ghost, who gives us God’s mind in it. If it is the church in the New Testament, I must see it in its relation to the Head; if it is Israel in the law or the Psalms, I must see them as they stand related to their Messiah. Now the late Dr. Alexander never saw the true distinction between Israel and the Church, but being honest and competent, though he did not know what the passage meant, he translated it as it really stands, " In or by Thy counsel Thou wilt guide me, and after glory Thou wilt take me." Now what is the meaning of this? The last clause is obscure, he says. The Christian, no doubt, is received now, and will go up at the coming of Christ to heavenly glory; but His, dealings with Israel are quite different. He will come in glory to the destruction of their enemies, and bring them in deep penitence to -Himself; -and then they will be received-as His people before the universe. This will only be "after glory." The glory will have shone first. Take Saul of Tarsus for an instance, though he was a pattern not only of the Jew but of the Gentile. All will remember that he had a vision of the Lord in glory, and after that he was brought into acceptance before God. When we see this, it helps us to understand how the children of Israel will be brought into their blessedness. There were to be seven days of suffering grace, as we have now (that is quite a distinct thing), and seven days of glory in the age to come. This will be the feast of Tabernacles in its ordinary character for Israel on earth. Then, further, verse 39: "Also on the fifteenth day of the seventh month, when ye have gathered in the fruit of the land, ye shall keep a feast unto Jehovah seven days." When they had gathered in the fruit of the land, when the harvest was past, and the vintage over; what is the meaning of this? That judgment will have taken its course. The harvest is that character of judgment where the Lord discriminates the good from the bad. The vintage is where He will trample down wicked religion unsparingly. It is the infliction of divine judgment, and mark, it is of the living: the judgment of the dead is at the end of the kingdom, which is not spoken of here. This is the judgment of the quick at the beginning of the kingdom. Now we get something further (verse 39): " Ye shall keep a feast unto Jehovah seven days: on the first day shall be a sabbath, and on the eighth day shall be a sabbath." It is not only that there is a complete term of glory as we are now going through a complete term of grace. In one feature, we may see, the feast of Tabernacles stands distinct from all the others; and what is that? The eighth day. There has been no mention of this in the other feasts. The seven days we saw were glory for the earth; but there is the "eighth day too." It is heavenly and eternal glory! So it is not "days " now, but this one " day," " the eighth day," and therefore it has a beginning, but it will never have an end. We have seen then in this chapter-first, the purpose. of God generally sketched; next, the mighty work of the Lord Jesus, with the holy call it involves on all blessed by it, and the witness to Christ’s resurrection in those risen with Him But the application of that work is first to the Gentiles now called in. By and by, too, Israel will be awakened and confess their sins, when the days of glory dawn on earth, and not only this, but with a glance at that which is heavenly and eternal in the eighth day. May the Lord bless His own word, so that you may be simple and clear and wise in the truth unto salvation! And may you have your faith strengthened as you see how God has given a complete cycle of His ways in one of the most ancient books of the Bible. When the theological professors of our day are misusing their position to give currency to the cavils of unbelief, which have lost much of their acceptance even in freethinking Germany, it is time for men whose fathers valued revealed truth to wake up to these insidious efforts at undermining their faith under the pretentious claim of learning and science. The best of all answers to Satan is a deepening entrance by the Holy Spirit into the truth, and an enlarged sense of that divine wisdom and grace in the word, which is as much superior to Elohistic and Jehovistic theories, or such like vanities and speculations, as the Second man is above the first. " Sanctify them by Thy word: Thy word is truth." ======================================================================== CHAPTER 57: VOL 01 - THE FEAST OF TRUMPETS: THE FEASTS OF JEHOVAH ======================================================================== The Feast of Trumpets: The Feasts of Jehovah Having given this brief summary of what was before us in the central portion of the chapter, we find ourselves in presence of an entirely new scene from verse 24: " Speak unto the children of Israel, saying, In the seventh month in the first day of the month, shall ye have a sabbath, a memorial of blowing of trumpets." So far from the gospel being a continuous work to the end of the world, as many suppose, we see here that the Lord will begin a fresh testimony with a suited instrumentality for this new work when the church is gone. Observe that it is said here " in the seventh month: " this was the last month in which Jehovah instituted a feast. He brings to a completion the circle of His ways on the earth and for Israel. In the very beginning then of this closing period of God’s dealings, we have what? " A memorial of blowing of trumpets." God then is inaugurating a fresh testimony. The trumpet is always a figure of God’s intervention to bring in some signal change. It may be for judgment, as we find in some cases; or it may be a distinct testimony in grace, as we know in other cases. It is clearly a loud summons from God to people on the earth. And here we find it is not merely a blowing of trumpets, but " a memorial " of blowing of trumpets. It is a recall of what had long passed out of memory. It is God calling to mind what had once been before Him, but long dead and gone. What can this be? It is the recall of His ancient people on the earth. The Jew is again brought into remembrance before God. No wonder that there should be such "a memorial of blowing of trumpets!" Hundreds, one might say thousands, of years had passed since they had stood before Him as His people. The return from Babylon was only a partial work:, as a whole, Israel never returned but were dispersed all over the world. Where was the bulk of them? They were lost among the °Gentiles; and so to this day they have remained in a peculiar condition, unlike any other since the world began. They are in all countries without possessing their own, and yet a people; they are without a king, and yet a people; without a prince, and yet a people; without the true God, without a false god, and yet a people; a standing rebuke to the infidel, yet largely, deeply infidel themselves! But that very people are yet to return to their land, and seek Jehovah their Lord and David their king; and shall fear Jehovah and His goodness in the latter days. But what does God do in the first place? He awakens them. The day of shadows is gone forever. The cross of Christ has closed unrealities. By the power of His resurrection the Christian is introduced into the new creation. The old is gone, the new come; and before God we have our place in Christ. When this work is finished, grace will begin to act in Israel, and they will be awakened. Nothing more distinctly proves that God will have done with the Christian; for the gospel goes out to the Gentiles (though to the Jew first), and in the church, as in Christ, there is neither Jew nor Greek. The Feast of Trumpets is God’s taking up Israel afresh to awaken them. Undeniably then this feast is after and quite distinct from Passover and Pentecost in which we have our interest; and the first thing disclosed in it is God’s loud summons to a people who once had a place before Him and again come into remembrance for mercy, not judgment. It is evident that this could not consistently apply to the gospel that has been going out since Christ’s death and resurrection. We have had our sacrifice and call to practical holiness and the gift of the Spirit long ago. But when God has done with our blessing, the chapter reveals that in the seventh month dead Israel is to be raised from the grave by God’s trumpet, as Ezekiel predicted long after (chap. 37). As this is clearly a new work, let us trace what light other scriptures throw upon it. Let me take you to the Psalms. There you will find how truly they and the prophets agree with this figure in the law. See Psalm-81. There is a plain enough testimony as to its force: " Sing aloud unto God our strength; make a joyful noise unto the God of Jacob. Take a psalm: and bring hither the timbre], the pleasant harp with the psaltery. Blow up the trumpet in the new moon, in the time appointed, on our solemn feast day." If men were not prejudiced, none would deny the application to Israel. The moon, that luminary which wanes and loses her brightness, once more renews her light. How strikingly is this to be verified in the Jew! You could not say it of the church or Christendom. The apostasy of the Gentile is fatal. Take Babylon; and what does Scripture teach as to this? Babylon never recovers the old light; Babylon is the corrupt woman that assumes the credit of being the bride whilst false to Christ, a mere harlot with the kings of the earth; and her end will be judgment and destruction: no renovation for her; no new moon shining out in fresh strength and brightness. Babylon will never rise again. Destruction is determined, and determined from the Lord God, but by the hand of the revived Roman empire and its satellite kings, avenging those she had corrupted too long. It is quite different with Israel, which never had the. privileges of the church. The Jew was under the law: what did he know of being under grace as we are? By and by Israel will be put under the new covenant, but this cannot take place till the trumpets have blown once more, and the new moon is shining, as we hear in the Psalm, the new moon at the time appointed. The language is suited for Israel, and not for the church. They sing and make a joyful noise to the God of Jacob. Why confound this with the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ? Why deny their hope of mercy? It is a mischievous perversion to apply everything of the sort (the blessing at least, not the curse) to the church. Are we not blessed in heavenly places? We are entitled to take delight in these promises, but then it is not truly to enjoy them if we appropriate them to ourselves. Let us rejoice to know them as yet in store for other people, even Israel, in the latter days. If I know any converted, am I to be jealous of their. blessing? Am I not to rejoice that the grace of God that visited me is thus going out to many others? that it will embrace a larger circle by and by? So here, when we see in the Scriptures that poor guilty Israel is to emerge from the grave, from their long lasting and dense darkness of unbelief, why wish it to be for the church? Indeed it is to lower our character of blessing from -heaven to earth. Let us rather rejoice that at length. God will awaken His people and accomplish all His purpose in them here below. And here let me briefly call your attention to a passage on this subject very poorly rendered in our translation. It is Luke 2:32,. "A light to lighten the Gentiles, and the glory of Thy people Israel." It should be really "A light for revelation of [the] Gentiles." I understand this to mean that Christ is a light for bringing Gentiles into divine view, and that it is accomplishing now, besides His being the glory of Israel by and by. The Gentiles, instead of being in darkness as they once were in the ways of God, have, as privilege and responsibility, the true testimony of God. Not before the millennium will He be the glory of Israel. The Gentiles were once in the dark as the Jew is now; ere long the Lord will come for the glory of His people Israel. Luke’s is the only Gospel where we have the as well as to save, in Christ thus viewed present light for revealing the Gentiles and as future glory for Israel. I conceive this to be the true interpretation of the passage, and, when saying so, I do not mean in a half sort of way. It is important we should seize the intended real bearing of the word of God. We must not be too hasty in assuming it; but when we know that we have got it, let us hold it fast and use it for the Lord: The eighty-first Psalm then speaks of the blowing of trumpets distinctly in connection with Israel. No one doubts there is the figure of a trumpet for ourselves-in general as in 1 Corinthians 14:1-40., or precisely as in 1 Corinthians 15:1-58; but then it is never in our case a memorial of blowing of trumpets. Thus the " last trump " is a blessed and solemn word as to us. What is its connection? It was a figure taken from the military usages of the Romans, then familiar to everybody. We must remember that the Romans were at that time masters of the world, and that people knew too well what their legions were. Few and distant were the places where men did not feel the grinding iron bondage of that imperial power. I think it is Josephus who gives an account of their encampment, and lets us know the various and successive signals given for the different movements of the army. But finally there was the "last trump;" and, the moment this sounded, they all moved off. This may serve to explain the Spirit’s application of the phrase to the final summons of His people for meeting the Lord in the air. It may be well to look at another Scripture, Isaiah 27:12 : "And it shall come to pass on that day, that Jehovah shall beat off from the channel of the river into the stream of Egypt, and ye shall be gathered one by one, 0 ye children of Israel." This is the gathering not of believers to heaven, but of the children of Israel to their land. " And it shall come to pass in that day, that the great trumpet shall be blown; and they shall come which were ready to perish in the land of Assyria and the outcasts in the land of. Egypt, and shall worship Jehovah in the holy mount at Jerusalem." Is not the application evident and sure? "Ready to perish" would not apply to the gathering of the church to heaven. We will be glorified in that day-a very different thing from their being ready to perish. It is clear that, just before God interferes, the people are to be in the last extremity of trial, being set upon by all their enemies. As long as Israel is unnoticed or chastised by God, the Gentiles can be peaceable; but directly there is any movement for good going on, and God is working to make Israel the head and not the tail, the old enmity will soon follow. In that day, then, they shall be gathered by God to Jerusalem. It is not-Jerusalem above, where our portion is by grace; but Jerusalem on earth, where Jehovah in due time shall reign according to His goodness and promises many. This awakening of Israel then is clearly what answers to the feast of Trumpets. It is written in Matthew 24:29, " Immediately after the tribulation of these days"-this may illustrate their being ready to perish-" shall the sun be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light, and the stars shall fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens shall be shaken; and then shall appear the sign of the Son of man in heaven. And then shall all the tribes of the earth mourn, and they shall see the Son of Man coming in the clouds of heaven with power and great glory. And He shall send His angels with a great sound of a trumpet, and they shall gather together His elect from the four winds, from one end of the earth to the other." The context proves that His elect here are of Israel, not elect Christians. This remark may not satisfy some, who, whenever they see any good. thing held out in Scripture, instantly assume that it must be for the church. But we can afford to rejoice in the future gathering of Israel. Have our brethren learned the " parable of the fig tree"? What means the fig tree? Not more surely is the rose the emblem of one part of our land and the thistle of another I could name, than the fig tree was similarly used of Israel. " When its branch is yet tender and putteth forth leaves, ye know that summer is nigh." They have had their long winter, and now the Sun of righteousness is rising with healing on His wings. TM’s’ may suffice to confirm the meaning of the Feast of Trumpets. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 58: VOL 01 - THE FEAST OF UNLEAVENED BREAD: THE FEASTS OF JEHOVAH ======================================================================== The Feast of Unleavened Bread: The Feasts of Jehovah But there is another feature to be noticed. The Passover was followed immediately by the feast of unleavened bread. There was not a single day that intervened. Now, as an ordinary rule, there was a space between these different feasts; but here is an exception to the rule. And let me ask you, who could, save by God’s power, have appreciated the force of this beforehand? Now that it is revealed, we may follow. Like Moses from the cleft of the rock, one can see Him as He passes before us; but who can go before Him? The Passover was followed immediately by the feast of unleavened bread. There was not the lapse of a day between them-one being on the fourteenth, the other on the fifteenth, day of the same month. Indeed, as the feast of unleavened bread in the New Testament is treated as beginning with the killing of the paschal lamb, the immediate response of the Christian to Christ’s blood is to walk in holiness. God will not have him to take a single day to himself. At once he is called by the grace of God to own himself responsible to put away all leaven. We know from 1 Corinthians 5:1-13 that leaven is symbolic of corruption. Ver. 7: " For even Christ, our Passover, is sacrificed for us; therefore let us keep the feast." What feast? The Passover? No; the feast of unleavened bread. This feast, again, we see, is not like the Passover; for one day was to be kept in the latter case, seven days in the former. I may assume that all here who have read their Bibles know the force of "seven days." It was a complete cycle of time, and also doubtless in connection with God’s people on the earth. "Day" might be used of heavenly or eternal things, not "seven days." We may get important instruction in God’s ways from all this. There are in Scripture several applications of leaven. The Lord speaks of the leaven of the Pharisees, of the Sadducees, and of Herod. The Holy Ghost uses the expression " a little leaven" twice in the Epistles of Paul; but from this we do not well to allow the thought that they are parallel passages. Each has its own force, though there is of course a common character. But I feel very strongly, as to all such passages apt to be loosely huddled together and called parallel, that we should seek to discriminate. True wisdom is not manifested, as the sages say, in trying to see resemblances in things which differ, but in discerning the real difference among those which resemble one another. What you need to cultivate is a sound judgment, and you will never get it by hunting up so-called parallel passages. The habit is, on the contrary, destructive to intelligence in the word of God. Hence I believe it would be far better if such references were left out of our Bible, and the readers had to learn it thoroughly for themselves. I do not mean you should not have a concordance or kindred help; but the Bible should be printed alone, and is incomparably richer without than with these additions, which habitually mislead by confounding the distinctions which lie under phrases more or less verbally similar. The headings of the chapters and at the top of the columns are often worse than useless, conveying at best the mere views of men, and encumbering the page which should give Only what is divine. It is written then that " a little leaven leaveneth the whole lump." Hence to many, as the same words appear in two different passages, the too rapid inference is that they point to just the same thing. So far is this from being true that the application is wholly different. What then is the bearing of each? Let me call your attention to the general principle, that, if you wish to understand any verse of Scripture, you must always interpret it by its context.. In 1 Corinthians 5:1-13 leaven represents what is unclean and corrupting, and manifestly immoral. They were not to allow "the wicked person " in their midst, for evil spreads, and ever so little leaven, if allowed, sours and taints the whole lump. In Galatia evil was taking what we may call a religious or legal form (Galatians 5:9). The Christians were observing days, months, times, and years. ’They were crying up circumcision as a desirable supplement to faith. This was the Pharisaic leaven, as the other was the Sadducees. The leaven of the Sadducees was the evil of free thought and licentious action. The leaven of the Pharisees was that of rigorous legalism and human tradition. Keeping the feast of " unleavened bread " typifies the maintenance of personal holiness. So Scripture insists: Romans 6:12-13.; 1 Corinthians 5:6.; Galatians 5:6.; Ephesians 4:5.; 1 Thessalonians 4:1-8; Hebrews 12:14, etc. If we do lift up our hands to the Lord, let it be piously, without wrath or doubting; let the walk and ways be under the sense of responsibility, as separate to the Lord; let love be without dissimulation and with incorruptness. But is the person all? Not so. Leaven was to be banished from the house as well as from the individual. You will often find people careful and jealous as to personal walk, and to the last degree lax as to ecclesiastical impurity. The Lord calls on us here to beware of the allowance of leaven anywhere. Corporate purity is worthless without due regard to personal holiness. Some bring their horror of clericalism or of the sects into shame and contempt by their carelessness about their spirit and ordinary walk. We are bound to eschew all evil, whether collective or individual. In short, what God has at heart is this-that we should please Him in every relation, in what is collective as well as individual walk. The feast of " unleavened bread" takes in the entire pilgrimage, our whole course public as well as private. Thus we may see that if the feast was to begin on the first day after the Passover, the greatest care is taken to show that it was to be continued throughout our entire life here below. To keep this feast is ever our calling while on earth. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 59: VOL 01 - THE FEASTS OF THE FUTURE: THE FEASTS OF JEHOVAH ======================================================================== The Feasts of the Future: The Feasts of Jehovah ======================================================================== CHAPTER 60: VOL 01 - THE FIRST JEWISH MISSION ======================================================================== The First Jewish Mission It is plain that the Lord, in this chapter, sends the twelve upon a mission specifically Jewish. " Go not into the way of the Gentiles, and into any city of the Samaritans enter ye not: but go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel " (Matthew 10:1-42) Afterward, in apprising them of the persecutions and treachery they were to expect, he bids them flee from one city to another: "For verily I say unto you, ye shall not have gone over (or finished) the cities of Israel till the Son of man be come." That is, their mission should be broken off, before it was complete, by the coming of their Master. Doubtless, another commission, expressly to the Gentiles, appears at the close of this Gospel, and the development of God’s counsels, the mystery of Christ and the church, came out still latex’, chiefly through the ministry and writings of the Apostle Paul. Thus the original Jewish mission was interrupted, and what has been aptly styled "the Gentile parenthesis" came in: this over, the Lord will, I doubt not, raise, at a yet future day, servants destined to take up the word and work now left in abeyance, and, ere they will have finished their proclamation of the approaching kingdom throughout all the cities of Israel, the Son of man will come. That work (wherever else the gospel has been carried) was not finished in the Apostolic era, nor will it be, when once more resumed in the latter day, before the Lord’s return to establish the kingdom over the earth in power and glory. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 61: VOL 01 - THE FIRST-BORN OF EVERY CREATURE ======================================================================== The First-Born of Every Creature WHAT is the exact meaning of " first-born of every creature,"πρωτὀτχος πάσης χτίσεως, Colossians 1:15? In a new translation it is said, "it is not each individual as such, but of everything called χτίσις in its nature (compare Hebrews 9:11). Creature’ individually is χτίσμα." This settles it as against the querist if that passage had been in his mind. But Meyer says [on πρωτότοχος πάσης χτίσεως] after the relation of Christ to God, now follows His relation to what is created, in an apologetic interest of opposition to the Gnostic false teachers.. The false teachers denied to Christ the supreme unique rank in the order of spirits. But He is first-born of every creature, that is, born before every creature-having come to personal existence, entered upon subsistent being, ere yet anything created was extant (Romans 1:25; Romans 8:39; Hebrews 4:13). Analogous, but not equivalent, is Proverbs 8:22, f. In a note as against Hoffmann he says that this expression "posits the origin of Christ (as λόγος προφοριχός) in His temporal relation to the creature; and this point is the more purely to be adhered to, seeing that Christ Himself does not belong to the category of the χτίσις.” Then, in the text, he proceeds-" It is to be observed that this predicate [first-born] also belongs to the entire Christ, inasmuch as by. His exaltation His entire person is raised to that state in which He, as to His divine nature, had already existed before the creation of the world," etc. "The mode in which he (Paul) conceived of the personal pre-existence of Christ before the world, as regards (timeless) origin, is not defined by the figurative προτότοχος more precisely than as procession from the Divine nature, whereby the pre-mundane Christ became subsistent, ἐν μορφῆ Θεῷ (Php 2:6). The genitive πάσης χτισεώς, moreover, is not the partitive genitive (although De Wette still, with Usteri, Reuss, and Baur, holds this to be indubitable), because the anarthrous πᾶσα χτίσις does not mean the whole creation, or everything which is created (Hoffmann), and consequently cannot affirm the category or collective whole to which Christ belongs as its first-born individual (it means every creature: compare on, πᾶσα οὶχοδομή,Ephesians 2:21); but it is the genitive of comparison, corresponding to the superlative expression, "the first-born in comparison with every creature," that is, born earlier than every creature. In a note he says against Hoffmann-" The interpretation of H. is incorrect, because there would thereby be necessarily affirmed a homogeneous relation of origin for Christ and all the χτἱσις."H. opines that πάσης χτίσεως is simply genitive of, of the definition of relation ’ (e.g.,’ in relation to all that is created, Christ occupies the position which a first-born has towards the household of his father ’)." " But this" (continues Meyer) " explains nothing, because the question remains, What relation is meant to be defined by the genitive? The προτότοχος is not at all to be got over so easily as it is by Hoffmann, namely, with a grammatically erroneous explanation of the anarthrous πᾶσα χτίσις, and with appeal to Psalms 89:27 (where in fact, προτότοχος stands without genitive, and בְּבו֗ר in the sense of the first rank." " The genitive here is to be taken quite as the comparative genitive with πρῶτος (see on John 1:15, etc.) The element of comparison is the relation of time (πρὸ τοῦ χόσμον,John 17:5), and that in respect of origin. But because the latter in the case of every χτίσις is different from what it is in the case of Christ.... the term πρωτότοχος is chosen, which, in comparison as to the time of origin, points to the peculiar nature of the origination in the case of Christ, namely, that He was not created by God like the other beings in whom this is implied in the designation χτἰσις, but born, having come forth homogeneous from the nature of God. " And by this is expressed, not a relation homogeneous with the χτίσις (Holtzmann), a relation kindred to the world, but that which is absolutely exalted above the world, and unique.... "At variance, therefore, with the words is the Arian interpretation that Christ is designated as the first creature. With this view the sequel also conflicts, which describes Christ as the accomplisher and aim of creation; hence in His case a mode of origin higher and different from the being created must be pre-supposed, which is, in fact, characteristically indicated in the purposely-chosen word πρωτοτοχος.... If the creation of all things took place in Christ, it is evident that He must stand before the series of created things, and be πρωτότοχος πάσης χτίσεως." So far Meyer, the best of all the German critics of the Greek text. What say you to it? Do you think εἴχων and πρωτότοχος refer to Christ in His divine nature, or in incarnation? See also Dr. J. B. LIGIFITOOT’S " Colossians," pp. 210-216, for an historical sketch of the interpretation. Augustine and Pelagius, he says, held both to be expressions of the Incarnate Christ. The " Fathers " did so generally to meet the Arians. And Marcellus went into error, making it all the moral creation, and applying the term to the whole context. Dr. LIGHTFOOT’S notes are copious, and his discussion contains much valuable information; but he does not very distinctly tell us what he thinks, though I gather that he regards both expressions of Christ’s divine nature. OLSHAUSEN says: " In verses 15-17 Christ is delineated without reference to His incarnation." Again: " He (the Son of God) must have been born of the substance of the Father before all the creation, for all things are created in Him." Be. ELLICOTT will have it everything that is created, not the whole creation, " begotten, and that antecedently to everything that was created." " He disdains not to institute a temporal comparison between His own generation from eternity and their creation in time." He admits in a very secondary and inferential sense priority in dignity, "the genitive of the point of view." ALFORD suggests that the safe method is to combine the two ideas of priority and dignity-" that Christ was not only firstborn of His mother in the world, but first-begotten of His Father before the worlds, and that He holds the rank, as compared with every created thing, of first-born in dignity. FOR, etc., 5: 16, where this assertion is justified." THEODORET: " Not as having creation for a sister, but as begotten before all creation." CHRYSOSTOM: " Not significant of glory and honor, but only of time." BRAUNE: "Since πάσης denotes every kind of creature, angels and men, Christ existed before all. He does not begin the series of a category as first-begotten of the dead’ (Revelation 1:5) among many brethren’ (Romans 8:29), but He is antecedent, conditioning the creation." This is the reply which the sending of the foregoing has elicited from a friend:- "I believe that Meyer errs in making πρωτότοχος expressive of priority in time, and is inconsistent in applying it to the Lord before He became a man. His language that He came to personal existence before creation, what does it mean? Put it back as far as you like, His becoming a person is to me a strange proof of Meyer’s own soundness in the faith; but it proves the false interpretation. The man he most opposes, Hoffmann, seems nearer the truth in this matter. John 1:1-51 is perfectly clear that the Word was God, and had a personal existence as the. Word with God before time began, that is, from all eternity. In time He became man; in time He was to be (as I understand it) both first-born of all creation (1:e. of everything to be designated creature), and first-born from the dead, but the former as incarnate, and the latter as risen. " Hoffmann is right in designating the genitive as expressive of relation or in an objective point of view. It is, indeed, still more common than either of its special applications to ablation or partition; so that no objection can be valid on that score. It is notoriously comprehensive, so as to take in that which expresses comparison, value, etc., and is the objective rather than the subjective genitive. The Lord then is shown to be, not only the image of the invisible God, but first-born of all creation, meaning not priority of time, which would then be contrary to fact, but pre-eminence of dignity, no matter when He was born in time; and this because He created all. I, too, do not deny that it is a genitive of comparison; only it is supremacy, and not merely earliest in time, which is not true, and, if applied to His divine existence, would simply deny and destroy its reality. Did He become a Divine person, no matter how early in time? It is a very narrow partition, if any, which divides this idea from Arianism. Psalms 89:1-52 explains very clearly the case. For Solomon, though in fact late as being David’s tenth son, became by God’s will and sovereign choice first-born, that is, chief; so with Christ as man, though on the infinitely deeper ground of His own divine glory and right as Creator of all. " Hence, we must of course reject such forced efforts as that founded on the very different phrases in John 1:15 or inn John 17:5. Origin is not the point, but relation of comparison. Begotten ’ or born,’ in relation to the Son in the Godhead cannot be allowed to mean a point of time, or subsequence, as I understand Meyer to mean, but simply the nearest relationship, or community of nature, between the Son and the Father. Was He or was He not Son from all eternity, as the Father was Father from all eternity or are we to reason from manhood, and infer that, because a father precedes his son, so it is in the Godhead? This I believe to be Arianism, and as baseless in Scripture as in sound reasoning, if we reason from the revealed nature of Godhead. " In words, no doubt, Meyer avoids bald Arianism; but what does he mean if not the same thing in substance? Applied to Christ as man and in time, all is plain and certainly true; and His divine glory is left untouched; whereas these speculations do sully and lower and deny it in effect. For, as I understand the opening paragraph, it is taught by Meyer that Christ is first-born of every creature, as born before all, as having come to personal existence, or entered on subsistent being before creation, citing Romans 1:25; Romans 8:39, and Hebrews 4:13, not one of which touches the question, and saying that Proverbs 8:22 is analogous, though not equivalent. Is it the old Alexandrian idea of the λόγος ἐνδιάθετος becoming, προφοριχός Is this sound doctrine? In Scripture I see the Word God, and with God eternally, not the Word coming to personal existence; I see the Son in the bosom of the Father, not entering on subsistent being, be the point ever so early so as to create all that is created. " But, further, where is the consistency of teaching that, if τ.ρ. π. χτ. means such priority as this, Christ’s temporal relation to the creature, it also belongs to the entire Christ. Certainly the entire Christ was late in the history of human kind. When the fullness of time was come, God sent forth His Son. Now, once in the end or consummation of the ages has He been manifested for putting away of sin by His sacrifice. Nay, stress is laid on the language of the apostle, that it is what Christ is, not what He was, that is on His exaltation as risen to heaven. How then, if it be so, are we to put this interpretation of πρ. π. χτ.into harmony with what we have already heard? How can this predicate, first-born of every creature, belong to the entire Christ, and Christ exalted after the assumption of humanity and His work on earth, in the sense of born ere yet anything created was extant? If I do not mistake, the idea is that He who became personally pre-existent before the world, became also man, and in due time risen from the dead and exalted in heaven; but that Christ is πρ. π. χτ. in both senses seems to be Meyer’s notion. It appears to me that the Lord is πρ. π. χτ. in neither sense, and that it is as incarnate He is so designated. For in becoming man His glory might have been obscured and forgotten. Taking part in blood and flesh, as the apostle says elsewhere, He might have been viewed in a way derogatory to His person and His higher nature. Therefore, He is carefully shown to be first-born of all creation,’ and this because in the power of His person all the universe was created, invisible no less than visible; and this in strong contradistinction from His being first-born from among the dead,’ which He is as exalted to heaven and head of the church. Alone, and always, and perfectly representing the invisible God, as His image, He had the headship of all creation when incarnate, the headship of the church when risen from the dead. "And how absurd the mysticism of the Germans, who limit iv to a local sphere, as I understand, and will have it to mean that the creation of all things took place in Christ’ I What a dreamland is all this pretension to superior accuracy, which is really but the pseudo-literalism of a schoolboy tacked on to the balloon of some wild philosophy! Had it been πρῶτος or πρὸ π. χ., there might have been some grammatical reason, though poor and feeble doctrinally; whereas it is a great truth that, born when He might be, the Creator, if He deigned so to be, was necessarily, when He ἐγένετο σάρξ, πρωτότοχος πάσης χτίσεως. Of course ἐν here means ’in virtue’ or ’in the power of,’ as distinguished from διά,`through’ or by means of,’ as an instrument. For the universe to be created in Him seems to me sheer nonsense. " In the others I see little or nothing but what is wrong. If saints are not often scholars, scholars prove themselves almost always poor saints. If they do not speak ill of Christ, they do not hold fast or confess aright His glory, through their desire to please men." ======================================================================== CHAPTER 62: VOL 01 - THE GENERAL DESIGN OF THE GOSPELS ======================================================================== The General Design of the Gospels It admits of the clearest possible internal proof-of course of an accumulative kind-that the Spirit of God employed Matthew to present the Lord Jesus as " the Son of David, the Son of Abraham," 1:e. in descent from the two leading points of Jewish glory and promise. Mark is occupied with the " beginning of the Gospel of Jesus Christ, the Son of God," and thus naturally detail’s the ministry, in all its varied circumstances, of one who was the ready, patient, and withal powerful servant of all the need that surrounded Him-of one whose dignity as the Son of God " could not be hid" in his least work here below. Next, the genealogy of Luke traces Jesus up to Adam, that is, as connected with the whole race, Gentiles no less than Jews, as Son of man and not merely the Messiah. These observations help to explain the comparatively large use of the Jewish prophets by the first of the Evangelists, while Luke, with equal propriety, depicts " that holy thing," born of the Virgin, who increased in wisdom and stature, and in favor with God and man; and Mark, just as admirably, omits all notice of Christ’s parentage, His birth, His childhood, etc., and commences at once with the ministry of His forerunner and of Himself. Last of all, John gives a portrait of the Lord, in a point of view higher than the others, as the Word made flesh, who in the beginning was with God and was God, the true light, full of grace and truth. For this reason, as well as because the Jews are here regarded as merged in the universal darkness and death, no genealogy is given: His person and Divine relationship, not His human one, is the subject. It is not that the same truths are not recognized everywhere; for Jesus is owned as Son of God in Matthew, and as Son of David in John. Enough is afforded by every Evangelist to show an unbiassed soul, that He, whom they all described, was God manifested in the flesh. Nevertheless it remains true, that each has his own proper and peculiar line; that what has been already stated is the grand characteristic testimony of those inspired writers; and that in this lies the real key, not only to the differences of language in what are called parallel passages, but also, as I believe, to whatever is inserted or omitted in the several Gospels. The Holy Ghost may allude to other glories of the Lord, in a biography which is specially devoted to trace Him in one very prominent character; and with perfect wisdom He has thereby cut off the objection -that the writers differed in their comparative estimate of the Lord. Not one of the Gospels, for instance, fails to notice His inflexible obedience, whatever the office sustained, whatever the light in which He was regarded. He could not but shine in this moral perfectness; yet even here the attentive reader may perceive that it is pre-eminently Luke, whose business it was to illustrate His real and untainted humanity, as the obedient " Second Man," the Lord from heaven, in contrast with the first man, rebellious Adam: in a word, as the woman’s Seed, rather than, as in Matthew, the true Messiah and rejected Emmanuel. It is familiarly known that Matthew and Luke furnish two. distinct pedigrees from David, the latter Nathan’s line, the former Solomon’s, which was the elder, and of course, Jewishly, the more important branch. As was usual in legal genealogies, the line of the husband is given by Matthew, who for the same reason records the supernatural dreams of Joseph; whereas in Luke Mary is everywhere the more prominent personage of the two, and accordingly, as showing the source of His human nature, the genealogy here given is that of His mother. Hence, it is said by Luke, ὤν υἱός, ως ἐνομἰζετο, τοῦ Ἰωσήφ, χ. Τ. λ., that is, reputedly, or in the eye of the law, He was son of Joseph, but in fact, Mary’s, as had been carefully shown in the preceding chapters. Thus, it is plain that there is nothing contradictory in these various accounts; nay, that each is as and where it ought to be, and is found in that Gospel whose character demands it, and there only. The Messianic descent of Matthew would be out of place in Luke, as the last Adam genealogy of Luke would not suit the historian who speaks emphatically of the Messiah, His relation to the Jews, His rejection, and consequently the transition to a new dispensation, which was to go on in mystery and patience, before the Son of man returns to establish it in manifestation and power; of which last phase the prophets had treated. Luke, on the other hand, was inspired to develope the great principles of God’s grace towards man, and the broader moral grounds which they assume; and this is so true that, in the body of his Gospel, events are grouped in their moral connections, not in their Chronological sequence, save where this is required for the truth of the narrative. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 63: VOL 01 - THE GIFT OF GOD THAT IS IN THEE ======================================================================== The Gift of God That Is in Thee 2 Timothy 1:6.-I apprehend that the common division of " gifts " (χαρίσματα) into ordinary and extraordinary is unscriptural, and calculated to mislead; for in one sense, and that a very real one, all the gifts are the affects of χάρις, " freely given of God," and not attained by man’s labor. Scripture recognizes these things as quite distinct; first, the natural ability with its providential training, as the vessel; secondly, the gift of grace, which is received in due time by the chosen vessel; and thirdly, the use of means (as prayer, the word, meditation, hearing, etc.), that the gift be stirred up, and profiting appear. No doubt, the gifts which were signs have disappeared; but all needed for perpetuating, nourishing, and ruling the church abide " till we all come," etc. I do not think that there is any difficulty in the apostolic communication of a \χάρισμα, when the Lord was so pleased. There was an express prophecy so directing it. in Timothy’s case. In general the New Testament shows that such a channel was not necessary nor often employed, though it was sometimes in the wisdom of God. The same remark applies not merely to the χαρισματα, but to the δωρεά of the Holy Ghost (1:e. the Holy Ghost Himself given to believers in general). Occasionally this was associated with the imposition of apostolic hands, as in the case of Peter and John (Acts 8:1-40), and in Paul’s case (Acts 19:1-41) But Acts 2:10 :, etc., are decisive that it would be an error to suppose anything of the sort to be the invariable rule. Hence, while God by times attached either the one or the other to the apostles, He maintained His own sovereignty all the while; and certainly He has not failed either in giving the Holy Ghost or in distributing such gifts as He sees fit to continue, and this directly, now that apostles are no longer found on earth. Romans 1:11 does not necessarily mean a ministerial gift. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 64: VOL 01 - THE HEAVENLY CALLING ======================================================================== The Heavenly Calling Hebrews 3:1-19 -It is of no small moment to bear in mind that, while the "heavenly calling," as a developed system, depends on the ascension of the Lord Jesus Christ into heaven, the faith of Old Testament believers was far in advance of their calling and circumstances. Thus, the Lord called Abram from his country and kindred and father’s house to a land that He would show him; and it was certainly by faith that he obeyed and went out, not knowing whither he went. But Hebrews 11:9 shows us the further action of faith; for when he got to the land he sojourned in it as in a strange country, because a ray of the distant heavenly glory had dawned on his soul. " He looked for a city which hath foundations," etc. Thus he and the other patriarchs died, as they lived, in faith, not in actual possession. Nevertheless, such strangership as this neither amounts to nor implies the "heavenly calling." Doubtless, the " heavenly calling" now produces and enjoins strangership also; but this in no way proves that itself was published and enjoyed of old. For the " heavenly calling," brought before us in Hebrews, grew out of the position of the Lord as having appeared, and when He had by Himself purged our sins, as having sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on high. Hence the earthly tabernacle and the rest in the land, and the Levitical priesthood and sacrifices entirely disappear, for the partakers of the heavenly calling who are addressed in the epistle. This state of things was not true either of the fathers or the children of Israel. Their hope was intimately bound up with the land (no doubt, under the Messiah and a glorified condition, but still their land and people as the medium of blessing for all others); but the " heavenly calling" was not revealed, nor could be till He came whose rejection led to it, and whose redemption and consequent glorification in heaven became its basis. Hence Abram had his earthly altar. Hence he sacrificed, as did his descendants, in due season, of the flock, or the herd, or the appointed clean birds. Then comes the worldly sanctuary and its most instructive furniture and rites, that spoke of better things looming in the future. Nobody that I know disputes that individual saints saw beyond these shadows, dimly perhaps but really, to a coming Savior and a heavenly country. Still the land to which the patriarchs were called was an earthly land, and the entire polity of Israel was that of a nation governed under the eye of a God who displayed Himself on earth in their midst-in contrast with "the heavenly calling," of which not the less it furnished striking types, mutatis mutandis. Accordingly, in Hebrews 11:1-40, after having traced the precious individual traits of the Spirit in the Old Testament saints, not only from Abraham but from Abel downwards, we are guarded against the error that would merge all in one lump, by the incidental statement of the last verse. (See also chap. 12: 23.) The elders have not received the promise; they are waiting till the resurrection for that. Meanwhile God has provided unforeseen some better thing for us. He has given us not promise only but accomplishment in Christ. He has made us worshippers once purged, having no more conscience of sins. He calls us boldly to enter into the holiest by a new and living way consecrated for us. None of these things could be so predicated of them, and yet these things are but a part of the heavenly calling. Truly, then, has God provided some better thing for us, even if we only look at what is now made known through the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven. It is also true that they without us shall not be made perfect. They and we shall enter on our respective portion in resurrection glory at the coming of Christ. Meanwhile we have no earthly calling, nothing but an heavenly one. So far is it from being true that the early ecclesiastical writers erred by distinguishing too sharply between the dispensations, that their main characteristic is Judaizing the church by denying the real differences. Jerome did this no less than others, even to the confounding of Christ’s ministry with Jewish priesthood. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 65: VOL 01 - THE HOPE SET BEFORE US ======================================================================== The Hope Set Before Us Hebrews 6:18.-" The hope set before us" is the expectation of heavenly glory as secured and displayed in Christ exalted on high. Of course, the " hope " implies something yet to be done or manifested; though, being of God in Christ, it has not the smallest shade of uncertainity. This hope has present effects too " by the which we draw nigh to God." (Compare Hebrews 10:23, which ought to be " hope " rather than "faith," as in the authorized version), as it ought to fill us with joy (Hebrews 3:6). It is clearly in the future alone that all will be realized, and therefore it is justly called "hope:" still the work being finished, and Christ having entered within the veil, our hope is said to penetrate there too. That is, besides being sure for us and steadfast in itself, it is heavenly as entering into the immediate presence of God on the basis of the precious blood of Christ. It counts upon God fulfilling all He has promised, according to the faithfulness which has raised up Christ from the dead (like Isaac in the type), and set Him in the atmosphere of unchangeable blessing inside the veil. As Abraham had his son given back as it were, and the promise confirmed by an oath, so have we our hopes confirmed in a yet more precious way in Christ glorified above, though still having "need of patience." ======================================================================== CHAPTER 66: VOL 01 - THE HOPE OF RIGHTEOUSNESS ======================================================================== The Hope of Righteousness Galatians 5:5.-We through the Spirit wait for the hope of righteousness by faith. Not the hope of being justified; for by Christ all that believe are justified from all things. We are not waiting for righteousness, for we are made the righteousness of God in Christ; but we wait for the hope which is suited to such a righteousness, for a glorious resurrection or change, which is the only adequate complement of what we have already in Christ. Ephesians 1:10.-The " dispensation of the fullness of times" is often applied to God’s present work in gathering the church, and connected with Galatians 4:4. But the bearing of the two texts is totally different. Galatians 4:4 refers to Christ sent here below; Ephesians 1:10 to the administration which will be in His hands during the Millennium; the one a past fact, the other future, and both entirely distinct from the gathering of Jews and Gentiles, who believe in one body, which is now going on between these two points. 1: 23.-" The fullness of Him which filleth all in all;" not of God the Father, which the church is not nor can be, but the fullness or complement of Christ, viewed as the glorified heavenly man, whose body we area 2: 20.-Not Old Testament " prophets" and New Testament " apostles," but " apostles and prophets" of the New Testament, as is put beyond all doubt in chap. 3: 5, " as it is now revealed unto His holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit." It is a new work built on a new foundation, Jew and Gentile being now builded together for a habitation of God through the Spirit, which was not the case in Old Testament times. 3:15.-Not the whole family, as in the English Bible, but every family in heaven and earth, πᾶσα πατρία, χ.τ.λ., including, I suppose, all the varieties of intelligent creation in heaven and earth. 4: 3.-" The unity of the Spirit," meaning of the Holy Ghost, and not merely of our spirit. 5: 14.-The Scriptures alluded to seem to be Isaiah 52:1-15; Isaiah 60:1-22., but the application here is clearly to believers slumbering among dead men or things, from which they are called to arise, that Christ may give them light, not life, which would be their first need as unbelievers. Let me add, that in the parenthetical ver. 9 the true idea and word is " the fruit of light is in all goodness," etc. 4: 2, 3.-St. Paul is not of course neutralizing the grand truth that we are not under law, but under grace. He is simply showing how specially God owned obedience to parents among those commandments which were addressed to the Jews, and which held forth earthly blessing as their reward. 1 Corinthians 9:27.-Often used to show that no believer ought to be or can be sure of ultimate salvation: hence, as is alleged, St. Paul was not. But it is clear that the question here is not of life, righteousness, or salvation, but of services in the Gospel and its rewards. Paul did not make himself servant unto all, under law to the Jew, without law to the Gentile, to save himself, but to save them. It was for the Gospel’s sake, not for his own; and to this end serve the figures of a prize and a crown. The word άδόχιμος, here translated a " castaway," and elsewhere "reprobate," "rejected," is I think limited by the subject-matter. A servant might by carelessness lose a reward, who nevertheless as a believer had everlasting life. See 1 Corinthians 3:10-15; 1 Corinthians 11:28; 2 Corinthians 13:5.-These texts are sometimes quoted to show that a Christian ought not to be sure, or, as men say, too sure of his acceptance with God. But it is evident that the first was intended to lead the Corinthians to probe their hearts, when disposed to deal lightly with the supper of the Lord. No such thought occurs as an exhortation to doubt God’s grace, or their own security thereby. To eat the bread or drink the cup lightly without consideration of what that solemn feast sets forth was to deal unworthily: if one discerned not the body, it was to eat and drink judgment to oneself, as was shown in many cases of judicial sickness and death among them. For if Christians discerned themselves, 1:e. the hidden springs of their hearts and ways, they should not be thus judged; yet even where they were, it was the Lord’s chastening, that they should not be condemned with the world. Even where thus negligent and chastened, neither does the Lord confound the Christian, nor ought the Christian to confound himself, with the world. If he does, the true power of self-judgment is gone. Still more explicit is 2 Corinthians 13:5, however familiarly used in the school of doubt. For let the context be read, and it will be plain that Paul is proving his apostolate to the Corinthians, who were seeking a proof of Christ speaking in him. Why, says he, examine yourselves: your own selves are the best proof. If you are in the faith, I must be an apostle-at least to you. (Cf. 1 Corinthians 9:2-3.) The very last thing which these high-minded questioners meant to do was to distrust their own Christianity. Well, but, argues St. Paul, if you want a proof about me, know ye not your own selves, how that Jesus Christ is in you, except ye be reprobates? Paul had no wish to prove them reprobates; but his argument leaves them no escape. If they were in the faith, which neither they nor he doubted, they proved his apostleship: if they were not, who were they to examine him? If verse 4 be taken parenthetically, the sense is clearer. 2 Corinthians 6:14.-Be ye not unequally yoked together with unbelievers-often applied to marriage with unbelievers. But this is an error, though it is true that marriage ought to be " only in the Lord," as is exhorted in 1 Corinthians 7:1-40 The subject is the ministry or service of Christ. In service and worship, fellowship is forbidden with unbelievers, or unfaithful men. If I, a servant of Christ, am among such, I am to come out. What confirms it is-1st, That a yoke is a scriptural badge of service, not of marriage. 2d, That the believing wife is not to be separate from her unbelieving husband (1 Corinthians 7:10-16). On the other hand, the true inference from 2 Corinthians 6:1-18 is that all communion between the Christian and the world, in the service and worship of God, is interdicted in every form and measure. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 67: VOL 01 - THE INTERCESSION OF JESUS ON THE CROSS ======================================================================== The Intercession of Jesus on the Cross Luke 23:34.-I am persuaded that it is perfectly true that Christ is here presented as interceding for the guilty people who took, and by wicked hands crucified and slew Him. The grand design in this part of Luke is to bring out the iniquity of Israel and the grace of Christ in spite of all. I say nothing of "Pontius Pilate," who, indeed, would have released Him but for fearing the Jews and Cæsar; but it is evident to me that the Holy Ghost by Peter expressly refers, in Acts 3:17, to this intercession of Jesus, and proves that the people of the Jews and their rulers were intended. Further, the intercession did prevail partially as to sphere then, as it will by and by triumph, when "all Israel shall be saved." To lower the Lord’s intercession to the mere pattern of various eminent persons forgiving their executioner, ought to be, in my opinion, repulsive to a spiritual mind. It needs little argument to refute the notion. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 68: VOL 01 - THE KING IN DANIEL ======================================================================== The King in Daniel Daniel.-1. " The king," in Daniel 11:36, is, without doubt to my mind, the political side of the same person whom St. John designates religiously or irreligiously as "the Antichrist." It is clear from Daniel that his seat of power is "the Holy Land," the object of attacks at the close from the powers of the South and of the North (1:e. Egypt, and Syria or Turkey, of our days). However, his destruction is reserved for the Lord Himself, appearing from heaven (2 Thessalonians 2:8; Revelation 19:20). It is of the Syrian power (whoever then may hold it that the last verses of Daniel 11:1-45 speak. He also falls by Divine judgment (see Daniel 8:25; Daniel 11:45). 2. The relation of Daniel to the Revelation is a wide subject; but this I may briefly say, that, as Daniel reveals the results of the failure of the earthly people Israel, so Revelation presents the consequences of the failure of the heavenly testimony throughout Christendom and the world at large. This remark may help to show the analogy and the difference between the two prophecies. What the former was to the Jew, the latter is to the church. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 69: VOL 01 - THE LAND SHADOWING WITH WINGS ======================================================================== The Land Shadowing With Wings Isaiah 18:1-7. "The land shadowing with wings, which (is) beyond the rivers of Cush," means, I think, a country outside the limits of those nations which up to the prophet’s time had menaced Israel; a country beyond Assyria and Babylon, which were contiguous to one of these rivers and beyond Egypt, which lay along the other. For Scripture connects Cush with these two districts, if not with more: an Asiatic as well as an African Ethiopia. The meaning is, then, a land which should essay to protect the long-oppressed Jew, and that land beyond those rivers which characterized the great powers which hitherto were best known to and had most interfered with Israel. It was not only a distant but a maritime power (" sending ambassadors by the sea "). " Vessels of bulrushes " looks more like Egypt than anything else in the chapter, but it cannot outweigh the other evidence. Perhaps others may throw light on the phrase. The burden of Egypt follows, and is expressly named in the succeeding chapter. Here the name is withheld. It is distinguished in the plainest way from the nation in whose behalf it employs its vessels and swift messengers. I cannot therefore but think those commentators far astray who interpret the land in verse 1, and the people to whom the message is sent in verse 2, of Egypt and the Egyptians. Happily here the question depends not on mere verbal criticisms, but on the general bearing of the context, which the English reader is quite capable of judging. There is no doubt on either side that the same people to whom the messengers are sent are described in the latter part of verse 2, as well as in verse 7. The words which characterize them are certainly open, in their force and translation, to a good deal of dispute. Few, however, will be disposed to accept the notion that מְמֻשׇׁךְ= " harnessed in leather," which has not the least support from elsewhere. It is used in Proverbs 13:12, of hope prolonged or deferred. Other forms of the same word occur frequently in the Bible, and mean to draw (literally or figuratively), stretch out, continue. Gesenius gives it here the sense of duraturus, robustus, which seems to me not to harmonize with the conjoined word. The English translators may have given the Gesenius gives it here the sense kal participle (poel) means "him that soweth" (marg. draweth forth) seed in Amos 9:13. I rather think the term alludes to the long trials and painful suspense of the Jews, and this seems confirmed by וּמו֗רׇמ, "and peeled" or made bare, rather than " shaven;" for, in such an application, the word is used only of cases where the hair was fallen off (Leviticus 13:40-41), or forcibly plucked off (Ezra 9:3; Nehem. 13: 25; Isaiah 1:6). The sense of "peeling" the shoulder occurs in Ezekiel 29:19, which would yield the same figurative sense, the latter being taken from the skin as the former from the hair. "Furbished" or polished is the general sense when spoken of the sword, metals, etc., and Gesenius thence derives the tropical meaning which he assigns to the word here, "populus acer h. e. celer, vehemens;" a highly improbable turn in my opinion. The general bearing of the next clause remains undisturbed. What follows is literally "a nation of a line, a line," which Dathe connected, I presume, with Isaiah 28:10, and our translators with chap. 25: 17; 34:11, 17; and Lamentations 2:8. Either of these, and the last particularly, I consider preferable to the far-fetched allusion to land-measuring, which, it will be observed, causes some to change "nation " into the " country ’ meted out;" which is the more surprising and inconsistent, because in the sentence before it was justly remarked that it was the people, not the country. The same term נּו֗י is used in both cases. I have no doubt whatever that וּמְבוּםׇהקַויקׇו describes not their vast strength, trampling down all before it (as Gesenius will have it), but rather their obnoxiousness to every form of hostile appropriation and indignity. (Compare Isaiah 22:5; Isaiah 28:4.) This is confirmed and determined by the last words of the verse, whether we adopt the textual rendering or the margin of the English. Bible, or even Gesenius’s theory of "cleaving," which he finds, though to my mind with slight show of evidence, in the word. Still any of these seem to me incomparably better than a fancied allusion to "inundation," which has really nothing to favor it, any more than the fancy that the previous words refer to the practice of sending pigs or goats to tread down the seed under their feet. I hope to be pardoned for considering them both an unlawful importation into this text. All these mistakes flow out of the first great error of treating the people under debate as the Egyptians. To this I may add that מֵעֵבֶר. ("beyond") is made to mean "on this side," quite untenably, though at first sight there might seem more reason for it, especially in the English Bible. However, there is no space here to trace in what circumstances the word is susceptible of that force. I can only say that "beyond," as it is the natural, so here seems to me the true meaning. It is only in very special cases that we can give the other rendering, and the reason must be shown before it can be assumed. 5. As regards the intervening verses, 3-6, all are summoned to see and hear what befalls the people of the Lord, Israel. He, as it were, retires, and watches. Man is active. The Jews, brought back by human intervention, seem to flourish; but suddenly, " afore the harvest," all is arrested, and disappointment comes. The nations turn once more against the Jews. "They shall be left together unto the fowls of the mountains, and to the beasts of the earth." Compare the chapter before, especially verses 9-14. 6. "In that time shall the present be brought unto the Lord of Hosts of a people scattered and peeled, and from a people terrible from their beginning hitherto; a nation meted out and trodden under foot, whose land the rivers have spoiled, to the place of the name of the Lord of Hosts, the Mount Zion," -Here, waiving the question of. the terms repeated from verse 2, and already discussed, I think the English version is more accurate than most others. For there are in verse 7 not two peoples, but two things taught about Israel; that a present should be made (1) of them, and (2) from them, to Jehovah of Hosts. The Jewish nation should be brought a present, and they should also bring one to the Lord in Mount Zion, after their signal deliverance from the fury of the Gentiles. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 70: VOL 01 - THE LAST DAY ======================================================================== The Last Day John 6:1-71 -It may help some of your readers to bear in mind that "the last day" has a broad moral force, like "the day of the Lord" in 2 Peter 3:1-18, save that it applies yet more extensively, taking in the resurrection of the saints, which "the day of the Lord" is nowhere said to embrace. Between John 6:39-40, and John 12:48, the Millennium (Revelation 20:4-5) intervenes, " the last day" beginning a little before, and ending a little after it. It is a vague, or general expression of the entire closing scene, when man’s day is over and God acts in power, whether in blessing or judgment. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 71: VOL 01 - THE LEAST IN THE KINGDOM OF GOD ======================================================================== The Least in the Kingdom of God I do not think Luke 16:16 and Mark 1:1-4 intimate that John Baptist was " under the gospel dispensation." The kingdom of God might be said to be present in the person and power of Christ (compare Matthew 12:28, and Luke 17:21); but, as far as others were concerned, all that the Lord says on this head, and after John was put in prison, is, "The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is at hand." It was not come for others to enter in till the work of redemption was accomplished, and then it was opened both to Jew and Gentile that believed. "Every man presseth into it," does not imply that any were yet within. It was being preached as nigh both by John and afterward by the disciples; but, whatever the saving mercy of God might have been in past times, and of course then also, it was still an object of search and desire till the cross and resurrection of the Lord. Then it was come, and every believer entered, and the accession of spiritual blessing and privilege was such, that the least in the kingdom was greater than the greatest before, even than John himself, near as he was to it as just at hand. We must bear in mind that, as to John’s testimony in John 1:29-34; John 3:29, et seqq., it may have exceeded, more or less, his own intelligence as was often the case in the utterances of the Old Testament prophets. John Baptist did not know more than they, what it is to be purged worshippers, having no more conscience of sins. But this is only one of the many blessings that attach to all within the kingdom now. I am aware that some, shrinking from the simple meaning because it traverses their preconceived thoughts, have sought to make ó μιχρότερος the least prophet, others (proh, Tudor) Christ himself; but such notions are unwarranted and untenable. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 72: VOL 01 - THE LEPROUS HOUSE ======================================================================== The Leprous House Leviticus 14:1-57 -While unfeignedly believing that all Scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable, I may suggest the need of a careful comparison of the fresh light of the New Testament in lifting the veil of the Old. Thus it seems to me that due consideration of Ephesians 2:1-22 and Hebrews 3:1-19 would suggest the idea that "the house" finds its antitype in the corporate aspect or assembly of believers now, rather than in the millennial condition of the earth. "Ye are builded together," etc.; " whose house are we," etc. Hence all is plain. A plague spot may now show itself in the Christian assembly. There is diligent, painstaking, but patient inquiry. The diseased stones are removed, the application of which is obvious. If the plague still overspread, after all means are used in vain, the house must be given up; for the deliberate sanction and maintenance of evil deprives an assembly of its public Christian character. The mention of Canaan is no difficulty, because, in virtue of union with Christ by the Holy Ghost, we who believe are, even now, seated in heavenly places in Christ. Our πολίτευμα At (citizenship) is in heaven. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 73: VOL 01 - THE LIFE, NOT JUDGMENT, OF THE RIGHTEOUS ======================================================================== The Life, Not Judgment, of the Righteous There would be no point gained in supposing a universal judgment of all at the close; but, on the contrary, great loss in force of truth. In fact, the idea and expression " general resurrection" is itself fallacious: for resurrection is of all things the most separative. Even John 5:1-47 makes out two resurrections, irreconcilably differing in character and issues, as Revelation 20:1-15 shows them to be in time. The resurrection of life is in contrast with the resurrection of judgment (χρίσεως), and evidently, if involved in a common judgment; there would be no room for such a contrast. Matthew 25:34, etc., is essentially a millennial scene, not before nor after that epoch. Nor does it appear that any righteous die during the millennium, Isaiah 65:1-25 speaking only of those judicially accursed. The Son of man’s coming as a thief is nowhere connected with the rapture of the saints; but I say no more now, as this latter would involve discussion. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 74: VOL 01 - THE LOVE OF CHRIST TO THE CHURCH ======================================================================== The Love of Christ to the Church Ephesians 5:26.-To understand this verse it must be taken in connection with what precedes and follows. 1. Christ loved the church, and gave Himself for it. His blessed work of redemption already accomplished. 2. That He might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word. His present work, which the Holy Ghost makes good in the church. Eν ρηματι guards and explains τῳ λουτρῳ, showing that it is the power of the word, and not a mere rite. Compare John 15:1-27 " Now ye are clean through the word which I have spoken to you." 3. The result, yet future, when He shall present to Himself the glorious church, not having spot, etc. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 75: VOL 01 - THE MILLENNIUM ======================================================================== The Millennium 2 Peter 3:12; 2 Peter 3:1. The Millennium does not precede, nor is it subsequent to, but rather included in, "the day of God," as used here by St. Peter. That day means, as I suppose, the entire course of divine intervention, from the appearing of Christ in glory till the new heavens and earth. The millennial reign is a part of that grand scheme, Nor is there any serious difficulty in accounting for the existence of Gog and Magog (Revelation 20:1-15), and of sin and death, up to the close of that reign; because, even supposing none left alive in their natural bodies on earth at its beginning, save the righteous, it does not follow that their children must be. So that one can readily see how, during so long a period of unbroken peace and blessing, there might be hosts of unconverted Gentiles, on whom Satan, when loosed, immediately acts in deceit, mustering them for the last rebellion against God. I must be excused if I. think the solution which Dr. Cumming endorses contrary to Scripture. I see no ingenuity, but painful confusion, in viewing these nations, which are in the four quarters of the earth, as similar to the dead in their graves. Not the devil, but God, raises them, after all rebellion is over. 2. I think some will find that the main root of their difficulty lies in confounding the coming with the day of the Lord. The early Church was taught to expect the coming of Christ as that which might be at any moment; while, on the other hand, events were revealed as antecedent to, the day of the Lord (not the παρουσία merely, but the ἐπιφανείατῆς παρουσίας αύτοῦ), which must necessarily occupy some years at least. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 76: VOL 01 - THE MOUNT OF OLIVES CLEFT ======================================================================== The Mount of Olives Cleft Zechariah 14:5.-It is evident, I think, that Azal is the name of a place, joined, as its origin indicates, or near, to the Mount of Olives. As it never occurs elsewhere in the Bible as a proper name, save of a person, it is not surprising that commentators have differed as to its exact locality, some placing it at the eastern, others, as Henderson, at the western extremity, very close to one of the gates on the east side of Jerusalem. The meaning I believe to be that Jehovah, standing in that day on the mount (which is most precisely described, as if to cut off the idea of mere "beautiful poetical imagery") shall cleave it in twain from west to east, half receding towards the north, and half towards the south; and that, if He fights with the nations which shall be then gathered against Jerusalem to battle, the Jews are to flee to the valley of His mountains (so called because thus wonderfully cloven), for the valley reaches to Azal, whether it be considered as the terminus a quo or ad quem. The earthquake referred to is the same signal one from which Amos dates his prophecy. The Vulgate, it may be observed, takes אׇצַל as an appellative, and gives us "usque ad proximum;" the Septuagint agrees with the authorized and most other versions as to this, but apparently follows the erroneous reading וְנִםְחׇּם (which is actually that of four of De Rossi’s MSS. not to speak of other authorities), instead of וְנַםְחֶּםi.e. the Septuagint gives φραχθήσεται ἡ φάραγξ,χ.τ.λ.(the valley shall be stopped up, etc.) in verse 5, which is evidently contrary to the best readings, and to the plain force of the context. It is scarcely needful to say that this prophecy has never been fulfilled. Even supposing that the Roman army under Titus could be meant, as Dr. Henderson affirms, by " all the nations," it seems extraordinary indeed that so sensible a person could see the rest of verse 2 accomplished there. I should have supposed that the impression kit on the mind by the accounts of Josephus or any one else was rather that the city was taken, and that if half the people went into captivity, the rest were cut off from the city. But if there could be reasonable doubt as to that verse, can it be pretended that at that time (and it is all closely linked in the prophecy) Jehovah fought with those nations, and that His feet stood in that day on Olivet, and that the mount was split in the midst? It is a weak and impotent conclusion that the flight to Pella, long before the city was taken by the Romans, is what is here so sublimely but withal most graphically predicted. When we take the latter part of the chapter into the account, the hypothesis is beyond measure harsh and contrary to facts. It is only needful to add that the sense seems to require us to close one paragraph with "the days of Uzziah, King of Judah," and to begin a new one with "And Jehovah my God shall come [and] all the holy ones with thee." The prophet suddenly addresses the Lord, and then proceeds with that day from a point of view which differs altogether from the preceding section, because it introduces His relationship permanently established with the whole earth, consequent on His vengeance upon the nations. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 77: VOL 01 - THE OLIVE TREE, FIG TREE, AND THE VINE: THE FEASTS OF JEHOVAH ======================================================================== The Olive Tree, Fig Tree, and the Vine: The Feasts of Jehovah THERE are three fruit-bearing trees, much esteemed and cultivated by the inhabitants of Palestine, which are fruitful in instruction for us who possess and peruse the New Testament. They are the OLIVE TREE, the FIG TREE, and the VINE. It was these of which Jothan made mention in his parable to the men of Shechem, which furnish parabolic teaching about Gentiles, Israel, and Christians. Privilege, profession, fruitfulness, such are the topics in illustration of which these trees are severally introduced. 1. The OLIVE TREE furnishes special instruction for Gentiles, as such, in the way of dispensational teaching. We meet with it once in this manner in Romans 11:1-36, where a word of warning is given to those who are not of the race of Israel. Promises belonged to Israel as the children of Abraham (Romans 9:4). To the covenants of promise Gentiles were strangers (Ephesians 2:12). Promises there were, as has been remarked, about Gentiles, but not to them. To Abraham were they made and to his seed (Galatians 3:16). Israel, on the ground of their lineage " after the flesh," looked for the fulfillment and enjoyment of them. John the Baptist had warned them how mistaken they would find themselves, if they trusted in this matter to natural birth without being born of God. God could of the stones around them raise up children to Abraham. The warning was in vain, as far as the nation was concerned. For they rejected the One to whom the promises made to Abraham were confirmed-that One was Christ, the patriarch’s seed. God, therefore, has cast them off nationally for a time, and is dealing now with Gentiles. It is of this dispensational change that Paul writes in Romans 11:1-36, and, to illustrate it in a manner within the comprehension of his readers, makes use of the simile of an olive tree, with which those in Italy would be familiar. From this tree, a good olive tree, some of the branches have been broken off, that is all the nation of Israel, except the remnant according to the election of grace, who remain branches in the olive tree, where they had always been. Into-this same-tree other-branches- have been grafted, taken from a wild olive tree; one which had never been brought under culture. Now these are the Gentiles, with whom God is at present dealing in sovereign goodness, brought thus outwardly into connection with Abraham, the root of promise-the root, to carry out the figure, of the olive tree. Before the cross God was dealing with Israel as the elect nation, but not directly with the Gentiles. ’Privileges belonged to the former in which the latter had no part. The Syrophoenician woman had to acknowledge that. She felt it, and she owned it. After the cross a new feature in God’s dealings with man was displayed. The privileges which had marked Israel as God’s special people on earth they enjoyed no longer, for they continued in unbelief. The aged Simeon had declared that the child he held in his arms would be " a light for revelation of the Gentiles," to bring them out of the obscurity in which they had hitherto been dispensationally, as those with whom God could prominently deal in goodness; and Paul teaches us this took place, when Israel for a time, as a nation, was cast off. Advantages, then, Gentiles now possess such as they never had before the cross. The root of promise has not changed. The olive tree has not been cut down, but some branches have been broken off, and branches from a wild olive tree have been grafted in on the principle of faith. As grafted in they partake of the " root and fatness of the olive tree." Privileges are theirs, as brought into direct association with the root of promise, Abraham, the father of the faithful. What flows from the root, therefore, they share in; " of the root and fatness of the olive tree" they partake, being as Gentiles grafted in by faith into the line of promise on earth. Now this is not salvation, for they might be "cut off." It is not church position, for church position is new both to Jews as well as to Gentiles who enjoy it. But here it is, Gentiles coming in to share the privileges on earth of those who, as faithful among the Jews, had never lost them. We say on earth, for the simile of the tree teaches us, that the position, thus illustrated, is one enjoyed on earth. Would, then, the Gentiles continue in this privileged place? That depended upon them. "If thou continue in goodness." Have they? One must surely admit they have not. Excisions therefore, must take place. And, if the natural branches abide not in unbelief, they ’shall be grafted’ into their own olive tree. The good olive tree is Israel, the root is Abraham; and the advantages Gentiles, as such, now possess, they can lose by unfaithfulness, for they stand in that place only by faith. God is now visiting the Gentiles (Acts 15:14), and the outward result of this is what we term Christendom. Privileges those possess who are part of Christendom, but these privileges entail responsibility. Could the Gentile glory then over the Jew, the branches broken off? He could not. To the Jew his natural place was in the olive tree, it was only from his sin of unbelief that he was broken off. To the Gentile it was of Divine goodness that he was there at all, grafted in on the principle of faith, to be continued there only if he abode in God’s goodness. All those then who are really saved are in the olive tree, but far more than they are numbered amongst its branches. It takes in the faithful remnant of Israel. It includes all Christendom. The Gentiles, if once cut off, will never be restored. The Jews may be, and will, if they abide not in unbelief. How truly will that be felt and. confessed by and by, when that which Zechariah 8:13 says, shall receive its accomplishment’ The FIG TREE suggests teaching of a different order, and was used as an illustration to a different audience. The Lord made use of it when warning Israel, and instructing His disciples (Luke 13:6-9; Matthew 21:19-21; Mark 11:12-14; Mark 11:20-23). Its fruit makes it of such value. If the tree is fruitless, why let it occupy the ground? Now there is one feature in the fig tree which made it so suited to depict the state of Israel. Its flowers are formed before the bursting out of its leaves. Hence the presence of leaves suggests the promise and appearance of fruit. One sees at once, then, how fit an emblem such a tree would be of Israel, who by profession were God’s people, but who, nevertheless, when the Lord came, proved by rejecting Him their unfruitfulness for God. The olive tree, as an evergreen, fitly represents the continuance of the line of promise on earth, which never would end, even in appearance, during all the ages that should precede the establishment of the Kingdom of God in power upon earth. As the olive tree from its character suggests the thought of continuance, the fig tree from its habit is well adapted to illustrate profession, which should be accompanied by the proofs of fruitfulness. And if it lacks such proofs, cutting down surely the tree richly deserves. God’s forbearance then with the nation of Israel till the cross, the parable of the fig tree in Luke 13:1-35 sets forth. The sentence on the barren but leaf- clothed tree on Olivet was the indication of the carrying out of the judgment against Israel, of which the Lord had previously warned the people. A tree cut down ceases to be seen by men. Israel, as an ordered nation, would cease to exist. Profession without fruitfulness will never do for God. Turning to the VINE, we get instruction of a different character. It speaks of, and to, Christians in truth. God had a vine, which He had brought out of Egypt: that vine was Israel (Psalms 80:8-11). A vine which is unfruitful is useless, as Ezekiel (15: 2-4) reminded his countrymen. The Lord then, in John 15:1-27, teaches His disciples that He is the true vine: hence fruitfulness in them could only be produced as they abode in Him. For those who were of the Jewish race this teaching was important: national position, a lineage after the flesh, such would not avail. They must abide in Christ to bear fruit for God:-teaching, too, this for us, useful, ’ needful at all times. " I am the true vine, and my Father is the husbandman. Every branch in me that beareth not fruit he taketh away: and every branch that beareth fruit, he purgeth it, that it may bring -forth more fruit. Nov ye are clean through the word which I have spoken unto you. Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the vine; no more can ye, except ye abide in me. I am the vine, ye are the branches: he that abideth in me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much fruit: for without me ye can do nothing. If a man abide not in me, he is cast forth as a branch, and is withered; and men gather them, and cast them into the fire, and they are burned. If ye abide in me, and my words abide in you, ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you. Herein is my Father glorified, that ye bear much fruit; so shall ye be my disciples " (John 15:1-8). When we come to the Lord’s teaching about the vine, we leave dispensational truth about Gentiles and Jews, and come to that which is vitally important. But, to understand it aright we must ever remember, that the simile of a tree suggests something which is upon earth, not something about heaven. Keeping this in mind, we shall understand the bearing of what He says. He speaks of that which is seen upon earth: a branch, therefore, might be in the vine, and yet be unfruitful. But no one could be in Christ before God without being really a child of God. If we bring in standing before God when we read of the vine, we shall get all wrong. If we remember that a tree is a simile of something existing upon earth, we shall be kept right. A branch; therefore, in the vine is a professing Christian. There might be that without the person being a true believer. At the moment the Lord was speaking there was a marked illustration of it in Judas Iscariot. He was one of the twelve, appeared to be a believer, was a branch in the. vine; but his occupation at that very moment indicated that he had not abode in Christ. Mere profession, then, would not do. The Lord, however, does not stop here. He is not merely impressing on them that there must be reality and life to be fruitful; He is telling them how, and how only, they can be fruitful, viz, by abiding in Him. The curse on the fig tree showed that God would not be satisfied without-fruit. The Lord’s teaching about the vine makes plain how fruitfulness can be ensured. Professors there might be, there have been, there are still. Of such, if that is all they are upon earth, the Lord speaks in verse 6; but let the reader remark He does it in language which, while pointedly showing the dreadful future of such, carefully guards against the idea of any real Christian perishing. Speaking to those who were true, He says, " Ye." Describing the barren professor, He says, "If a man," etc. There is no discouragement to the weakest believer. There is the most solemn warning for the mere professor. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 78: VOL 01 - THE OUT-RESURRECTION IN PHP_3:11 ======================================================================== The Out-Resurrection inPhp 3:11 ======================================================================== CHAPTER 79: VOL 01 - THE PARENTHESIS IN ROM_5:1-21 ======================================================================== The Parenthesis inRomans 5:1-21 Romans 5:12-21.-Though I cannot but dissent from those who consider this a difficult passage, it is plain that it is often misunderstood, as it is certainly momentous in its bearings. First, I am of opinion that the parenthesis is rightly marked so as to help the sense, 13-17 inclusively being one of those full and instructive digressions so characteristic of St. Paul. Next, be it observed, that the apostle traces sin up to its source, beyond the Jew or the law. "By one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin; and so death passed upon all men, for that all sinned." Sin was theirs through one; besides, all sinned too. It was not the law of which the Jews boasted which brought in sin; for it existed anterior to the Sinai covenant. And, though sin was not put to account, or imputed to man in God’s government of the world before the law, still death reigned, the proof and wages of sin, even over those who did not transgress a known commandment like Adam (or like the Jews after the law was given). That is, while in the nature of things there might not be transgression between the two points of Adam and Moses, there was sin,* and God marked His sense of it, for death reigned. (*In 1 John 3:4 the true force beyond a doubt is, " sin is lawlessness," and not "transgression of the law," which is a different phrase and idea. Man was corrupt and violent before the law; under the law he despised and rebelled against the authority of God. Transgression is always sin; but sin embraces much more than transgression, being the genus of which transgression is the species.) Now, if Adam were confessedly typical of the Messiah who was to come, should not the free gift be as the offense? For if by the offense of the one the many (the mass connected with him, who in this case were all mankind) died, much more did the grace of God, and the gift by grace, which is by one man Jesus Christ, abound unto the many. And shall not, as by one that sinned, be the gift? For the judgment was of one [thing] to condemnation, but the free gift is of many offenses to justification. For if by the offense of the one, death reigned by the one; much more shall those who receive abundance of grace and of the gift of righteousness, reign in life by the one, Jesus Christ. This closes the parenthesis, nor could reasoning be more compressed in itself, or more conclusive to a Jew. For he, of all men, could not deny the sorrowful facts of Genesis, or the universal ruin entailed by Adam’s sin. The principle then is conceded. From the beginning God had recognized something more than mere individualism. If the first and earthy man had sent down to all his family sin and death, why should not the second man, the Lord from heaven, transmit to His family righteousness and life? Verse 15 compares the persons or heads; verse 16 contrasts the things, or the judgment grounded on a single act with the state of accomplished righteousness (διχαίωμα) in spite of many offenses; and verse 17 presents the crowning result, the evident propriety that, if by the offense of one death reigned, how much rather should the last Adam’s family reign in life through their glorious head. Then, we have the general thread resumed with light and force derived from the parenthesis, and this in the most abstract way possible. "Therefore, then (in allusion to the intervening verses, but in direct reference to verse 12), as [it was] by one offense unto all men to condemnation; so also [is it] by one accomplished righteousness unto all to justification of life. For as by the disobedience’ of the one man the many were constituted sinners, so also by the obedience of the one shall the many be constituted righteous." That is, verse 18 gives us the pure and simple tendency of Adam’s offense on the one hand, and of Christ’s righteousness on the other. The direction of the one, as of the other, was towards all men. But verse 19 adds the very important information that, whatever might be the scope of action in either case, the actual and definitive effect was a different matter. All men were not left in their ruin, nor were all, in result, delivered through Christ. Hence the change from πάντες, to οἱ τολλοί, for it is mere ignorance to take them as equipollent. In certain circumstances they may mean the same persons, but the terms are invariably distinct in themselves. Thus, in verse 18, where "all" occurs, we have the universal aspect of the act, whether of Adam or of Christ; but in verse 19, where the positive application is treated of, we get " the many " who are in fact affected thereby. But law did come: why it entered, and, as it were by the way, the apostle answers in verse 20. It was that (not sin, but) "the offense might abound." God forbid that anything God gave should be said to create evil! Sin being already there, the law came to bring out its real character as directly violating God’s command when He gives one. "But where sin abounded, grace superabounded, in order that, as sin reigned in death, so also might grace reign, through righteousness, to eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord." May I just say in closing, that the authorized version is clearly wrong in twice rendering εἰς πάντας ἀνθρώπους "upon all men "? In such a sentence it ought to be, " unto or towards all men." The distinction of εἰς and ἐπί strikingly appears in Romans 3:22; where we have, first, the universal tendency of God’s righteousness, by faith of Jesus Christ, and then, the actual application of it to all those who believe. This is accurately given in our Bible, "unto all," the first and general presentation, putting all under responsibility; and then, " upon all them that believe," the special portion of all such as believe; but the distinction is lost in the same version of chap. 5. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 80: VOL 01 - THE PASSOVER: THE FEASTS OF JEHOVAH ======================================================================== The Passover: The Feasts of Jehovah But now we come to another thing: God laying the foundation of it all; and mark first, He does not effect it hastily. There are many who think it would have been exceedingly good if God had at the beginning given His Son to die for sinners. Instead of this He waited for 4000 years. Why so? In the word we get the key to the difficulty. " When the fullness of the time was come, God sent forth His Son," etc. It was not on the first day of the first month that the Passover was instituted, that great standing type of Christ slain for sinners, but on the fourteenth day. Was not God in this delay signifying the fullness of time? First, He leaves man to his own way; and then, lest man should complain that he had gone astray because abandoned to himself, God took him in hand and tried him under law. So Israel, as the center of mankind, was placed under His government. What was the result? After all possible pains the bad tree bore more bad fruit. Israel at the close was worse than at the beginning. The end of man was the Cross of Christ. They hated the Son and the Father. Therefore do we hear of, Christ’s death at the consummation of the ages. It is not a chronological expression; but God had tried man in various ways, which ended in nothing but wickedness and ruin. What does God do then? He displaces man’s religion and his failure by the infinite work of redemption; and this is what we have in the Passover. Verse 5, "In the fourteenth day of the first month, at even, is Jehovah’s passover." What was the great principle of this feast? God had come down to deliver His people from the house of bondage. It was not because of any good in them, for the children of Israel at that time were worshipping false gods, and were utterly indifferent to the glory of the True. But next, if God delivers them, He must deliver them righteously. Pay particular attention to this. It is not simply a question of mercy in forgiving those who are wicked, but He will have them before Him on a foundation of right. He is a just God and a Savior. Hence on that night He sent through the land a destroying angel to avenge sin. It was judgment of evil, and the first thing done. He came down by that angel to deal with whatever was offensive to His character. And there was but one thing which stayed the hand of the destroying angel. What was it? The blood of the slain lamb. Wherever it was not on the doorposts or upper lintel, death reigned. Not that God was yet judging all mankind. It was a sample, which testified what sin deserved, and what alone could screen from God’s judgment. God declared, in that blood on the sprinkled doorposts of the children of Israel, that death only could stay judgment. It was in the last degree solemn-the lamb judged for sin. But what wondrous grace! Judgment falling on the lamb; not on the guilty, but on their substitute! It was the judgment of God because of our sins which Christ had to endure, the spotless Lamb of God. What was it made the Lord Jesus sweat, as it were, great drops of blood? Was it the mere act of dying? This would lower the Lord below yourself if you are a believer. Why, a Christian rejoices in the thought of departing to be with Christ, who alone suffered and died for our sins. What was the meaning of that cry, "My God, my God, why hast Thou forsaken me?" It was the judgment of sin which then fell on Christ. It was not what the Jews did, nor Pontius Pilate, nor Herod, nor man in general laid on Him. I know the popular hymn says, "I lay my sins on Jesus." But the truth is far better than that: God laid them there. If it had been you or I that must bring our sins for expiation, we might have forgotten many; but Jehovah laid our burden on Him. And hence the Lord suffered on the Cross as never did before either any other or Himself. For if He had been bearing sins all His life, as some say, either He must have been forsaken of God all His life, or God must have acted as if sin was tolerable till then. Is either thought true? Neither; indeed, without even an appearance of truth. Christ suffered once for sins. This judgment of God falling on the Lamb alone explains what sin is and deserves; and the sprinkling of the blood on the doors answers to the believer’s application of Christ’s’ blood by faith to his own case. In this and this alone was seen that which has made it a righteous thing to put away sin. God’s judgment fell on His Son, because He is His Lamb, who was able to bear it. The blood of the Lamb is the witness of the judgment, but in richest fullest grace because it was on His Son it fell. This was God’s view of it; and you must remember that in these types we are considering not what Moses or others understood, but what God said and faith receives in and through our Lord Jesus. Do you ask my authority for all this? Turn to 1 Corinthians 5:7, "For even Christ, our Passover, is sacrificed for us." Is not this ample authority? And God says this to those who had been Gentiles and now were His church; for He was looking far beyond the Jew on to another day, and this is the day in which we find ourselves. Christ’s death is the groundwork of all our blessing, the blood of the slain Lamb, the Lamb of God that beareth away the sin of the world. We may see too, that it was not a question of continuous or repeated offering; as the apostle argues in Hebrews 9:26, "For now once in the end of the world hath He appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself." Further, " He bore," as Peter says, " our sins in His own body on the tree." The consequence of His work is perfect peace to the believer. If it were continually going on, one could, one ought, never to have settled peace. The perfect efficacy goes with the singleness of Christ’s offering, through righteousness as the apostle teaches in Romans 5:1-21 ======================================================================== CHAPTER 81: VOL 01 - THE PERSONAL REIGN ======================================================================== The Personal Reign Without pretending to say what is meant by the expression " human kingdom," most readers will agree that, besides the sense in which Christ shall reign forever, there is a definite kingdom over all people, nations, and languages, a kingdom heavenly in its source, earthly in its sphere (though not earthly only), which is yet future, and to last for 1000 years. It is this which, I presume, the Querist meant by Christ’s " human kingdom," to be ushered in by His personal advent. It has a mediatorial character, and will cease after the judgment of the wicked dead is over. When the eternal state begins (or the new heavens and earth in the fullest and final sense), the human holding of this kingdom is to cease (1 Corinthians 10:5.), that God (Father, Son, and Holy Ghost) may be all in all. Christ, as man, having held this special kingdom for purposes of subjection, and having put down all other authority, gives it up, that the power may be God’s, as such, exclusively. Our reigning in life, reigning forever and ever, is not to be limited to the millennial kingdom. As possessors of eternal life and rejoicing in hope of the glory of God, we shall reign in everlasting blessedness, when the millennial display before this world is past. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 82: VOL 01 - THE PHILANTHROPY OF GOD ======================================================================== The Philanthropy of God WE have received a letter from a friend on the Continent telling us of the intemperate denunciation of all ranks and classes in the country whence it comes by a temperance lecturer from another land, who had written to the newspapers in his own country that the laud " was a land of drunkards; our Bible a drunkard’s Bible in order to serve the liquor traffic, our clergymen drunkards, and our archbishop a swearing drunkard." " This unhappy and bad letter has now been translated and republished in the most of our newspapers and periodicals, and the result is that very many people have become enemies to the temperance works and movements in our land." Our correspondent then relates the special denunciation with which he had been favored by this man, though he is, as we know, the most prominent promoter of the cause of temperance in his native land, because he did not come up to the mark of the lecturer. He is an earnest and a reforming philanthropist, and also a Christian worker, who, while (as he thinks) promoting the best interests of his country in Parliament, is also giving temperance lectures and preaching the gospel in cathedrals, churches, and other places. In our reply to him we try to show that though the joining in philanthropic works may do good for this world and time, the right thing for Christians is to confine themselves to work for the Lord in making known the gospel, and seek thus to be in the mind and current of the Holy Ghost by urging God’s philanthropy on sinners; not to join ourselves to them to be worked up into the philanthropic schemes of men for the mere improvement of man in this world. Believing that the principles it contains are divine, scriptural, and of universal application, we now publish that portion of our letter which is of public interest to believers. With better times and the increase of wages there has been much more drinking for some time amongst the working classes than in former years. The result of young people receiving wages that make them independent of their parents, for support; is that the family institution, the source of national strength, has become a wreck, and young men and women, in too many instances, have become lawless. Hence there are habits indulged in by them which strike us as in sad contrast with those of former years. The working men are seen crowding our public-houses after the hours of labor, and tens of thousands of young men and women are to be found promenading our streets on the evenings of the Lord’s day. A few years ago this was not the practice in the city where we write. Along with this we might mention the building of three or four new theaters, at a cost of more than £100,000, as a proof that the people are becoming "lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God." All this too on the back of "an awakening"! It is no wonder that Christian men should feel intensely about these significant signs of social deterioration, and catch at any scheme likely to lessen or remove these clamant. and increasing evils. There is a growing feeling at the present hour among social reformers and politicians that some repressive measure must be employed in order to keep down the rising tide of intemperance that is threatening the moral destruction of our people. Hence there is likely to be a great movement set on foot at once to carry out such installments of social reformation, in opposition to the drink traffic, as may be most easily obtained. Then there will be great pressure put on Christians everywhere to join in this great philanthropic movement for social amelioration, and it will be hard for them to keep out of it if they are not aware_ of their heavenly calling, the heavenly character of Christianity, the separateness of the Christian’s path of life and service from that of the men of the world, and that as promoters of "the philanthropy of God" they cannot join themselves with the ungodly and become the promoters of the philanthropy of men. We hope that our letter may be of some use in helping brethren in Christ who may not have thought much on the subject, and give them scriptural reasons why they should keep themselves aloof from all human confederacies, and work from God’s center alone, and with the gospel of God, as being the exclusive " philanthropy of God " for the blessing of men, and this has induced us to publish it. There are two kinds of Christians: the spiritual and the carnal, as 1 Corinthians 2:1-16. indicate. The carnal will flout what we write as transcendental and chimerical; the spiritual will accept it as scriptural, and act upon it; but we will be happy to endure the contempt of the former if we ensure the profiting of the latter. "I speak as unto wise men; judge ye what I say." But first let us read the only passage of Scripture where the Word PHILANTHROPY occurs in connection with God. " But after that the kindness and love of God our Savior toward man (PHILANTHROPY) appeared, not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to His mercy He saved us, by the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost; which He shed on us abundantly through Jesus Christ our Savior; that being justified by His grace, we. should be made heirs according to the hope of eternal life. This is a faithful saying, and these things I will that thou affirm constantly, that they which have believed in God might be careful to maintain good works. These things are good and profitable unto men" (Titus 3:4-8). "I see you have had a sad time from the visit of the foreign temperance lecturer you refer to. He was here the very day your letter came, and lectured in one of the churches the next day. I was not out of the house, and did not see him, for I was not well; but I did not see any report of his address in the newspapers. "There is no doubt great need to try to repress drinking in your country as well as in ours, and Christians ought only to allow the Scriptural use of it (1 Timothy 5:23). " I was once very fully in the advocacy of the abolition of the liquor traffic; but while I have the same opinion of its banefulness, I have been giving myself to the work of the gospel alone for the last seventeen years: for I now think it is properly and particularly a Christian’s work. A man of property and position, or an extensive employer of labor, feels on being converted that he could, by means of the influence he possesses, secure for his less favored citizens many social benefits. He becomes a member of the local municipality; and he labors for the social and moral good of the community, while he may look beyond to a higher sphere of usefulness as a member of his country’s Parliament. If Christianity were intended for the improvement of man in the flesh, instead of being the standing proof of his moral incorrigibleness and condemnation, then there would be sense enough in his pursuing such a course. He has a first-class education; his social position is superior; his influence is great; he has time, ability, and money; why not devote himself to the moral, social, and political amelioration of his less fortunate fellow-men? The soaking of society in drink he sees to be the bane of his country; why should he not give his help to the removing or restriction of this most baneful traffic? There seems to. be nothing more natural than for one who is uninstructed in the nature and objects of Christianity to reason thus and act accordingly. But when one knows Christianity, he sees that it points out a more excellent way.’ I should like to call your special attention to this, if you would allow me. " Meantime I will send you by post the only copy I have of a book of mine, called the ’ Antichrist of England,’ meaning by that the liquor traffic, that you may see how I used to labor in this cause twenty years ago. I have no doubt you will find in it congenial sentiments to your own; from page 66 to the end I depict the mischief done to the professing church by the liquor traffic. I was comparatively young then, and there are hot-headed expressions and opinions in it which I would now modify or omit-(in fact I would let it alone entirely); but I do not abandon my conviction that it is one of the greatest barriers to the success of the evangelization of the people; and even morality: only I would not now seek its subversion either by political or philanthropic means, but leave that to moral men, while I would give myself, to the Word of God and prayer, as said the apostles of our Lord (Acts 6:1-15) And I would advise you to do likewise.’ I hear my Lord now saying to me-’ Let the dead bury their dead’ (it may be the most pious thing and right and natural to bury one’s father), but ’go thou and preach the kingdom of God’ (Luke 9:60). " Besides, I could not any longer feel it right to be joined with all sorts of people in the total abstinence or temperance society, Infidels, Atheists, Deists, Jews, Mormons, and Mahomedans! for my Lord says- He that is not with me is against me:’ also, ’ Be not unequally yoked together with unbelievers’ (see 2 Corinthians 6:14-18). This is a most important portion of Scripture, and tells Christians that they are not to be ’ diversely yoked with unbelievers,’ because they are the temple of God,’ and holy, dwelt in and walked among by God; and nothing but separation from unbelievers will ensure being acknowledged openly as sons and daughters by the Lord Almighty; ’ Wherefore come out from the midst of them, and be separated, saith the Lord, and touch not what is unclean, and I will receive you; and I will be to you a Father, and ye shall be to me for sons and daughters, saith the Lord Almighty.’ This makes it plain that we cannot as Christians be joined with unbelievers in societies, whether philanthropic and social, or religious and political. Christianity allows us to do good to all men as we have opportunity in our individual capacity; but not to join others in it who are unbelievers, so as to compromise what we owe to Christ Himself. Christianity, practically, is the reproduction of Christ in His members; and, consequently, we dare do nothing on earth which our blessed Lord would not have done; and He worked all His works by the finger of God,’ and not by philanthropic societies or political action, but by the power of the indwelling Holy Spirit; and thus only are His saints to serve God. ’ I have strength for all things, through Him who giveth me power,’ said St. Paul (Php 4:13). ’Be strong in the Lord and in the power of His might’ (Ephesians 6:1-24) " I have thought it right to give you this explanation while I send you a reading of my book, written at the level of the current Christianity of 1857, but below that of the spiritual Christianity of the New Testament, which actuated the holy apostles of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, and has now been widely recovered. But I admit that it was written with a true-hearted desire to promote both the glory of God and the welfare of man. And though I would now seek to accomplish these ends with the same devout earnestness, I would not employ quite the same methods and means of reaching them. I frankly acknowledge your true-heartedness to Christ in your labors for the sobriety of your country, though I wish to show you that it is not the proper work for a Christian to occupy his mind and time with. I would like to keep the book as a milestone with 1857’ on it marking progress, as I have not another copy; so please keep it for me till I see you again in Stockholm-if it please God that we should meet there. " My object in forwarding the book is to let you see that I have once been as enthusiastic as yourself against the liquor traffic; but I am now convinced that the Lord Jesus Christ demands of me occupation with and for His name alone. " As to the other book, I have a conviction that it might be blessed to your people, linking as it does the souls of believers with Christ in the heavens, through the Holy Ghost, and engaging the renewed affections with Himself. I have just received two letters from your country, speaking of much blessing received through the perusal of it. "It is of all-importance that the heavenly character, as well as the church character, of the Christian calling should be known by believers, in order that they may be kept from wasting their precious time in working works for which they were not created in Christ Jesus, and which God had not before prepared that they should walk in them (Ephesians 2:10). Christianity, as a divine system, is a living connection with a risen and glorified Christ in the heavens by the Holy Ghost come down; and practical and experimental Christianity is a realization of the blessedness of being justified from all things from which we could not be justified by the law of Moses, and the knowledge of Christ, and of our place in Christ before God the Father, and our place of witness for Christ before men in this world, the place of Christ’s rejection. Those who have a knowledge of it are like St. Paul in Php 3:1-21; for Christianity is grateful love to Christ, and Supreme attachment to Him and constant occupation with Him, for His own excellency, for what He is Himself, and not only for what He has suffered for us and given us. "It takes much divine forming to fit saints who are naturally benevolent and philanthropic for being true Christians, for Christianity is on its negative side the renunciation of all the principles which would naturally actuate us, were we only men, and expected to walk as men.’ Men were made for this earth: our bodies were formed from it, and this earth was fitted up in its present cosmical condition for man; and there is nothing more natural than for Christians, after knowing the benefits of Christianity themselves, to feel for the miseries of their fellowmen and set to work to use Christianity for the improvement of the world. But this were an entire mistaking of the nature and aim of Christianity; for it would suppose our being in the millennium, when Christ shall be reigning, not rejected as He is now, and when all nations shall be blessed in Him, evil shall be subdued and righteousness become triumphant, instead of being, as we are, in a world of which Satan is said to be the prince’ and ’ the god ’―a world morally ended at the Cross, and now under the doom of heaven, and going on to be dashed in pieces on the rock of eternal judgment and perdition of ungodly men, as the Apocalypse of Jesus Christ clearly reveals. God is not to improve this present world, but to save believers out of it and then to judge it; and He gives Christians intelligence of His doings in the present and of His purposes for the future, in order to keep them in their proper place-the place of men risen with Christ;’ also to keep them at their proper work and from embarking in social and philanthropic works for the amelioration of the world, which He has not set them to do. God has raised up from the dead His Son Jesus, whom men had cast out and killed; set Him at His right hand in the heavens; and sent down the Holy Ghost to unite believers to Him there outside the world. And such are the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus-members of His body and members one of another;’ a risen company, a new creation, a people whose citizenship is in heaven, whose Father, Lord, and home are there, and they momentarily expecting the return of their glorified Master, to take them thither in glorified bodies like His own; a people who by natural birth were men of earth, but by new and spiritual birth have become children of God, and are henceforth linked livingly by the Holy Spirit with the risen Man of glory in the heaven’s. I grant you the Christian’s position is entirely abnormal, for he who was by nature formed for earth is by grace cut out of it, and formed by the Holy Ghost for the fellowship of the Father and the Son in the heavens. " The heart must be formed by means of Christ for Christ in heaven; and the kind of divine truth that helps Christians to the true knowledge of Christ is truth of the greatest sanctifying power. The heavenly side of divine truth, or separation by the Holy Ghost in a new creation to Christ in the heavens, is little known either in Stockholm or in Edinburgh; hence saints of God are found in all sorts of doubtful circumstances and associations. They do not see that they have died out of Adam and are united to Christ, risen and glorified, by the Holy Ghost come down from Him for that purpose: and hence they think they are formed anew merely to be better citizens of this world and to improve the world: and thus their being created in Christ Jesus,’ and having their citizenship in heaven ’ (Philip. 3: 20), are ignored or forgotten; and hence the heavenly life of Christ is not lived by them, but only the better life of a man of the earth! But we are in Christ’ risen, not in Adam fallen and dead in sin: and if any one be in Christ, there is a new creation.’ Christ is the Beginning’ and Head’ of it (Colossians 1:18), as well as of His body the assembly,’ that He might have the first place in all things.’ Being saved people, we have ceased our existence as men in the flesh,’ connected with Adam, fallen and dead in trespasses and sins, and have got a new life in Christ, the last Adam,’ the Second Man’ (1 Corinthians 15:1-58), and our sphere of existence is in the Spirit,’ for ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit,’ if so be Spirit of God dwell in you (Romans 8:9). Our life and walk through the world must therefore be in keeping with our birth, rank, standing, relationship, and world; and the ends of the New Testament epistles go very minutely into divine rules and regulations for this walk in newness of life’ (Romans 6:4). They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world,’ as our Lord said ’(John 17:14). What a responsible thing for believers in Christ to be left here in one body’ to -live Christ; for I no longer live, but Christ liveth in me,’ as St. Paul said (Galatians 2:20), I have gone out of my sin-state by the Cross of Christ and death with Him there, and come into a new life in resurrection in and with Christ: I am crucified with Christ;’ that was an end of me as a son of Adam (Galatians 2:20): And no longer live I’ (said the apostle, say I and all believers), but God who is rich in mercy... hath quickened us together with Christ (by grace are ye saved), and hath raised us up together, and made us sit together in the heavenlies in Christ’ (Ephesians 4:1-32; Ephesians 5:1-33; Ephesians 6:1-24). That is the beginning of my existence as a child of God; for, once dead in sins, I get life in living association with Christ, who is our life,’ and my future in this new creation’ in this world and in heaven is linked with His. " Thus for me to live is Christ’―not philanthropy, social reformation, or even the salvation of souls: no I but for me to live is Christ.’ As the ancient tale goes of a noble Roman, that if after death his heart were examined they would find ‘Rome’ enstamped on it; so might St. Paul have said of Christ―’ For me to live is Christ, and to die is gain; ’ for then he would be ’with Christ,’ which he said is very much better.’ He was a man of one governing idea, and this he thus expresses: ’Christ shall be magnified in my body, whether by life or by death’ (Philip. 1: 20). " The body. is the sphere of Christ’s power, and it is with the body that we give expression to practical Christianity; for it is the Spirit’s vessel and agent wherefore glorify God in your body,’ says St. Paul (1 Corinthians 6:1-20) Where our bodies are, there is our fellowship. Do ye not know that your bodies are members of Christ? ’ Again, Do ye not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, which is in you, which ye have of God; and ye are not your own? for ye have been bought with a price: glorify now then God in your body.’ [There the verse ends in the Greek: it is all about the body.] It is very solemn to be told our bodies are ’members of Christ’ and temples of the Holy Ghost’ who is in us. " This makes Christianity at once eminently spiritual and practical. We have the Holy Spirit in us as our power to reproduce Christ, and our bodies his redeemed or price-bought members to enable us to give expression outwardly to the life of Christ on earth. By the Holy Spirit the life of Christ in heaven is communicated and energized, and through the members of our bodies we may express practically this new and divine life. For old things have passed away, and all things have become new’ (2 Corinthians 5:17), and all things’ in the new creation are of God ’-not anything of the old man’ renovated or renewed and sublimated, but positively new. That which is born of the Spirit is spirit.’ For in Christ Jesus neither is circumcision anything nor uncircumcision; but new creation’ (Galatians 6:16). Not a particle of the old creation goes into the new. It is not old Adam rehabilitated; but new creation; ’ knowing this, that our old man was crucified with Him, that the body of sin might be annulled, that we should no longer serve sin’ (Romans 6:6). Now if we have died with Christ’ (verse 7), (the end of man in this world is by death, so that, by faith, we see an end of ourselves in the death of Christ;) we have died with Christ’ out of the sin-sphere where we were under sin’s dominion, who like a tyrant lorded it over us. Not only has Christ died for my sins-the bad things that have come out of me -but I have died with Christ to sin,’ the nature that produces bad things, and sin is condemned,’ judged, and annulled in the cross, the sinner’s self, the old man,’ gets his doom also in Christ’s death (Romans 8:3); So also reckon yourselves dead to sin; but alive to God in Christ Jesus’ (Romans 6:11). Christ liveth unto God; ’ and we, being alive unto God in Christ Jesus,’ can now also live unto God: Yield yourselves unto God as alive from among the dead, and your members instruments of righteousness unto God. For sin shall not have dominion over you; for ye are not under law, but under grace’ (Romans 6:13; Romans 14:1-23.) Ye also have been made dead to the law by the body of Christ, that ye might be to another, who has been raised up from among the dead in order that ye might bear fruit to God,’ so that we should serve in newness of spirit, and not in the oldness of the letter’ (Romans 7:4-6). Dead to sin and alive unto God, we walk in newness of life, and sin shall not have dominion over us; ’ dead to the law by the body of Christ,’ we ’bring forth, fruit to God’ and serve in newness of spirit.’ " Our life then is life in Christ risen-life to God; and we are to let it go up as an offering and a sacrifice, well pleasing to God for a sweet-smelling savor, as Christ’s offering of Himself unto God was (Ephesians 5:2). ’As is the Heavenly One, such also are the heavenly ones’ Cor. 15: 48). With what power the Spirit’s exhortation comes to us-’ If therefore ye be risen with Christ, seek the things which are above, where the Christ is sitting at the right hand of God. Have your mind on the things above, not on the things that are on the earth; for ye have died, and your life is hid with the Christ in God. When the Christ appears, who is our life, then shall ye also appear with him in glory’ (Colossians 3:1-4.) Having put off the old man with his deeds (in the death of Christ) and having put on the new’ (in Him risen from the dead) the exhortations of the Spirit to express this new man’ through means of the body are very minute and practical (Colossians 3:1-25); but Christ is everything, and in all’ (Colossians 4:11). He is before all as an object; in all’ as a life. Hence all are responsible for living the heavenly risen life of Jesus in their bodies in all the relationships of time and in all the intercourse of their daily life. " I have written a very long letter; but seeing that I mentioned to you that I had seen into the meaning of Christianity so as no longer to be able to go on with the mere improvement of man, as he is in the old creation, I felt it necessary to justify my new position by the word of God: and that has led me to show where we are now, as believers in Christ, and that we are expected to fall in with the philanthropy of our Savior-God,’ as those who are ’alive unto God’ in Christ-`risen with Christ created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God has before prepared that we Should walk in them’ (Ephesians 2:10). The cross of Christ tells its sad tale that the world’ is enmity against God, and unimprovable. It was the judgment of this world the end of the world,’ morally when it rejected and crucified Christ, for it thereby proved itself incorrigible; for not only did it refuse to be reconciled by God in Christ in person bestowing all manner of blessings, but it murdered the Reconciler. Wherefore God is not any longer trying to improve it: but He is calling out men from it by the gospel of His grace, and associating them in a living and divine way with His Son in the heavens; for the whole question is now about the worth and glory of His exalted Son whom the world has cast out. The Spirit has come for this object: He shall glorify me, for He shall take of mine, and show it unto you’ (John 16:1-33) Ye shall be witnesses unto me.’ He is sitting on the Father’s throne now (Revelation 3:21), and He will come in manifested glory soon, and sit upon the throne of His glory (Matthew 25:1-46), and He will subdue all things to Himself, and reign to the glory of God the Father. (1 Corinthians 15:1-58) "This present, evil world will end in a time of judgment among the nations, and terrible tribulation, such as has not been from the foundation of the world. God’s word tells us that the sun of this dispensation will set in blood when the book of Revelation will have its great and awful fulfillment. It is blessed to think that God’s word tells of a happy and holy time beyond the flood of fire and judgment of ungodly men, when earth shall celebrate its Sabbath of holy rest for a thousand years (Revelation 20:1-15) Then the world will be divinely changed: and righteousness shall reign over all its nations, who shall walk by the light of the heavenly city, whose light is the Lamb. The sentence of this world is passed: its doom and punishment are certain, and cannot be far off. God, by the Holy Ghost, is gathering a body and a bride for Christ His Son out of it, and giving such His life, place, relationship, and work, walk, and prospects: and He is not touching the world at all so as to make it better, but He is doing this one work of calling out and preparing a bride for the glory of his Son, our heavenly Bridegroom; and this is the work that should engross all the children of God, whom He has called out of the world in its every shape and form to stand outside of it in the place it gave His well-beloved Son when they rejected and crucified Him. We have God’s mind expressly given in His Word respecting this, that we may not throw away our time, means, and energies, on objects of our own: for it teaches that while human philanthropy relieves man where he is, and leaves him there, GOD’S PHILANTHROPY completely saves him, and brings him to Himself in glory to have Christ as gain’ in the Father’s house, where His glory is fully seen, and His saints are conformed to His image. "What then makes a practical Christian That a man should be completely absorbed, and continually occupied with Christ, so that he seems to the world to be as one beside himself’ for Christ; like as Paul seemed to Festus, when he tells of Christ appearing to him; and Festus says, with a loud voice, Thou art mad, Paul.’ (Acts 26:1-32) But he said, I am not mad, most excellent Festus, but utter words of truth and soberness.’ Again, in Philip. 3. he seems to be beside himself;’ for, having given up all for Christ on earth, he presses on towards the goal to win Christ and have Him in the glory of God in the heavens. For whether we be beside ourselves, it is to God; or are sober, it is for you. For the love of Christ eonstraineth us; having judged this, that if one died for all, then all died; and he died for all, that they who live should no longer live to themselves, but to Him who died for them and rose again’ (2 Corinthians 5:13-14). "If we have the excellency of the knowledge of Christ-if He Himself be our exclusive object, as He was St. Paul’s―we will live such a life of practical separation from the world and devotedness to Christ, and of occupation with his objects, / as to make the world say, These men are either mad, or, they are in possession of a divine secret of which we know nothing." ======================================================================== CHAPTER 83: VOL 01 - THE QUESTION AND THE CRISIS ======================================================================== The Question and the Crisis Halifax, Nova Scotia, April 19th. MY DEAR BROTHER-I send you some details on the statements made in the papers you sent me. Mr. Smith says, Ezra 9:11. proves that Deuteronomy 7:1-26 must be from the prophets; but we have exactly the same statement in Exodus 34:11-17; so that his proof proves nothing, unless Exodus be from the prophets too. But prophet is a mere word for those who spoke the word of God, as Abraham is called a prophet, and Moses. Besides, the argument is an absurdity. It is an absurdity to pretend that Ezra, a ready scribe in the law of Moses, who, it is alleged, compiled it in its last form, should speak as if it was not given by Moses at all, and say it was the prophets, and yet say in the same sentence, Israel was going into the land to possess it when the commandment was given, as he does. Only a rationalist, who can believe anything but the simple truth, but no one of sound sense, could swallow such a fancy as this. If Ezra referred to Deuteronomy (which is very likely, as he speaks of going in to possess the land, which characterizes that book), then he assuredly refers to it as given before the Israelites entered into the land. None but those accustomed to assume, and justify too, forgery in documents which pretend to be divine, could allege that Ezra attributes to prophets of the seventh or eighth century a statement of the law which he was teaching as the law of Moses; and, in the deep grief of his heart about their sins before God, accredit and state the forgery in speaking to God. Upon the face of it, to apply "thy servants the prophets," saying, " the land into which ye go to possess it" to prophets hundreds of years after they possessed it, is a gross absurdity. The defilement of the land is not particularly spoken of in Deuteronomy 7:1-26.; it is much more in other chapters, and more especially in Leviticus 18:1-30 I must add a few words on the prudent, wise speech reported in your Scotch journals as that of Dr. Rainy. I can only take it as it appears, "wary and well considered." Supposing, speaking of course as a mere natural man, that some one had given my mother a box on the ear, instead of knocking him down or thrusting him away, I say, Well, but I must see if the fingers reached to the ear: otherwise this is not a box on the ear; if it only struck the cheek, the accusation is not correct. With what feelings should one view such a son? With profound contempt. Here I must add indignation, because the faith of thousands is in question. The speech would insist that it should not be felt there was a crisis. There is a crisis, and the crisis is this: Whether the Free Church of Scotland in its public profession be, however many may object to its tenets or forms, a body maintaining the faith of Christianity as based on the word of God, or not. It is not Professor Smith who is on trial; it is the Free Church. I have no interest in either save as a Christian ought to be interested in all men and all good; but in the authority of the word of God every one who is loyal to Christ must be. Members of commissions may laugh if it be asked, Are we to have a Bible or no? but this is the question. Germans may hold, still pretending to be Christians, that the allegation of miracles at once renders a book unhistorical; but the proofs by which they convince others that it cannot be are the proofs by which Mr. Smith would prove that the Pentateuch, and especially Deuteronomy, are unhistorical, and these are with heartless indifference, on the ground of legal technicalities, to be allowed to be valid on the plea that Mr. Smith on other grounds holds them trustworthy. And what grounds are these? That, because these Shemitic historians, like Thucydides or Livy giving speeches they invent as spoken by the persons they wrote about, do not think it fraud to put the words in their heroes’ mouths, we must take them as they gave them, and they were received at the time; and, this is divine inspiration! Does he mean, or does the speech mean, that this fabled Shemitic system was held at the time for divine inspiration? That they received what was known to be put into Moses’ mouth by a modern author to polish crude legislation, as the WORD OF GOD by the mouth of Moses, saying, " Jehovah spake unto Moses saying," when they knew and received it as Mr. S. does now, (namely, that it was not so given), though some few portions might be true traditions of what Moses taught? Let us see what the "wary and well-considered " compromise speech in the journal amounts to. Mr. Smith is guarded enough. We have this account of Scripture from him: The written record of the revelation of God’s will which is necessary unto salvation makes use of certain forms of literary presentation which have always been thought legitimate in ordinary composition, but which were not always understood to be used in the Bible. Used by whom? How carefully the inspiration of the writings is avoided! Mr. S. does not call this fraud as Dr. Kuenen honestly does; (" pious fraud "): that is his opinion, but not the question. In classical authors no one is troubled about it; men did the best they could, or what they would, to present matters as they saw them, or would please their readers. Did the Holy Ghost do so? The record uses the fraud of literary compositions which I do not call fraud! But where is God in the matter? How carefully He is left out! What more can an infidel want? What does an extreme infidel as Dr. Kuenen, or a violent-tempered but more sober-minded infidel as Ewald, or one in borrowed plumes as Mr. Newman, desire than to reduce the Scriptures to this level? This is what the system of Mr. S. does. He now tells us that for other reasons (which he withheld in what went out to all the world, and till this was called in question) he believes in the authority of these books; but the proofs he gives to all the world, and which are unrecalled, are proofs, not (mind) of a date, but that the books are not what they pretend to be. Does he believe that the composers and compilers and polishers were ’inspired to say that their work was God speaking by Moses? Nothing can be clearer than that it was so given, and sanctioned by the Lord’s authority as such. Their nature, their authority, their contents, depended on these contents being inspired. They had no other, they have no other; the very circumstances are identified with the truth of their being by Moses and from God, for that is inseparably interwoven with the history they contain. On this I shall speak again in touching on the reported speech. But the Scriptures, even in his defense, are not spoken of by Mr. S. when defined as inspired. When he justifies the statement by quotation of the Confession, they are a record of the revelation of God’s will but formed after the pattern of literary compositions which ascribe to orators or the like speeches invented for them. This is not inspiration of the Scriptures. It may lead us to distrust " Confessions " as no better than a sieve, as a means of securing truth, and saving those who hold the opposite of what their authors held, but that is all. But I turn to the reported speech and the wary defense of Mr. S. The speech saves the credit of the speaker. ’ On reading the article it was with the greatest pos4ible feeling of apprehension and pain. Not only he did not agree, but it would not meet with general approbation; he had a very strong impression that they were fitted in the greatest degree to create bewilderment, anxiety, and misapprehension in the mind of members of the church.’ What about? Was it not as to the authority and inspiration of the Scriptures? Yet such a question, we are told, cannot possibly arise, or might be soon settled. Now, I do ask what was the bewilderment and anxiety about? Mr. S. accepts and gives the proofs of infidels that the Scriptures were the development of crude legislation and national life, large portions professing to be what they were not, nor of the age nor of the person who was stated to have received them from God as God’s law-gives these proofs as general satisfactory proofs that the case was thus, without a hint that he thought otherwise. He propagates infidelity, for everybody knows it is infidelity and the elaborately wrought out theory of infidels; which we are now to understand he does not believe, though he believes all the proofs of it. As to the Canon, one book was really a love-song about the purity of northern Israel contrasted with Solomon, which we should have lost but for a false theory about its being an allegory; but the bewilderment and anxiety was not about the inspiration or Canon of Scripture, nor whether we are to have the whole Bible! But Mr. S. and all agree, we are told, that the Bible is inspired. What then was his article about? The escape from the difficulty is: The question is not about inspiration, but whether certain positions brought in, in connection with the explanation of Professor Smith’s views on the Bible, are really inconsistent with this position. A queer roundabout sentence; but have we no views of Mr. S. on the Bible, or parts of it? Nothing but positions in connection with the explanation of his views? And is what every one knows to be characteristic of modern infidelity in the theological sphere to be spread broadcast by professors of theology, without a hint of anything else? Nay, accepting really as desirable progress, views that are to every honest mind totally destructive of the inspiration of Scripture, and then to be told there is no question about inspiration? And how is it excused in a compromising way? We are not, we are told, to deal with it as if some party were rising up to unsettle and undermine these great doctrines. But a party has arisen up, and, as every one occupied with these subjects knows, unsettling and undermining these great doctrines; and all that Mr. Smith has done is to popularize them in a well-known book of general science, the Encyclopaedia Britannica, wherever the English language is spoken in the two continents. He has reproduced and disseminated for all English readers, and as valid, the well-known modern grounds of infidelity as to these great truths. Scotland and the Free Church have been the source, or, if not the source, the instrument, of spreading over the world modern infidelity as to inspiration and the canon of Scripture as a part of the more accurate knowledge of modern science in a popular publication. That is the broad fact, and no special pleading in church courts and committees in Scotland will alter it; nor, it is to be feared, if the Free Church clear itself, undo it. The speech defends the position of the committee as far as it dares; it does not agree with Mr. S., but defends its " deliverances" on the substantive merits, mark, not on the competency of the committee. "You will not succeed in laying a libel for heresy in connection with this view of Deuteronomy." I should not call it heresy: infidelity is its true character. However, the published speech declares that to hold that a book purporting to be spoken by Moses immediately before Israel’s entrance into the land, and directly from Jehovah as words from His mouth in reference to their conduct as so entering, was not so spoken but written some hundreds of years after, proving this by passages alleged to be in contradiction with what was ordained by Jehovah originally, is not heresy as to the inspiration of the books. Such false statement, it is alleged, was a generally allowed license of literary composition. Were these late modifiers of the old law moved by the Holy Ghost to say that Jehovah spake it all by Moses before Israel’s going in to possess the land? " It is," we are told, " a different case where there is a general disposition in certain quarters, or in any quarter, to move off from these fundamental doctrines." Is there none such? Every one knows that large masses of Protestants, and Protestant teachers, have moved off from these fundamental doctrines both in Germany and in England; that their works are translated into English, and have largely affected the public mind; that this attack on the inspiration of the Scriptures is one of the chief characteristics of modern infidelity; that the "Deuteronomist " is one of their chief points along with the " Great Unnamed," Zechariah, and the Song of Songs as a northern pastoral. Now, I will suppose that as yet this hacking up of Scripture has not penetrated into the Free Church, at least in "any quarter." The speech assures that an attempt to make heresy of these views will not succeed. A man is " not particularly wise who is particularly sure about them;" that is about the usual orthodox view of the inspiration of Deuteronomy, etc. True, "a man is not particularly wise who is particularly ready to raise questions about them." The questions on many points as to authorship, date, and so on, are " awkward questions." " They are really not matters of faith at all." How calculated to relieve "bewilderment, anxiety, and misapprehension, in the minds of members of the church "! Mr. S. had done something to relieve this feeling in his answer to the sub-committee. He tells us of a " persuasion of the divine authority of the book (of Deuteronomy), which rests on the witness of our Lord, the testimonium, Spiritus Sancti. It would be possible to adjust the result thus. But this the speech cuts away from under our feet. As to the Mosaic authorship of the Pentateuch, it "does not believe that Jesus and His apostles ever said anything on that subject." But kirk commissioners will hardly make sober men think that it is declared by inspiration that " Jehovah spake unto Moses, saying," when it was not Moses at all; and that when the Lord says ’ Moses’ writings," " He never said anything on that subject." It is trifling to talk of who wrote down the words; the question is, Is it a divinely given, and therefore perfect, account of what God spake and did by Moses, and was really uttered by Him, interwoven as it is with all the details of the history of God’s people? We know that, save that to the Galatians, Paul wrote none of his epistles. In one case we know who did it for him: " I, Tertius, who wrote this epistle." He signed each, saluting in grace, that it might be authentic. Does any one think because Tertius adds that, sanctioned as it is by the Pauline salutation, we have not Paul’s inspired writings? All this is child’s play, and worse. The speech does " not see how a very conclusive argument could be raised against any one maintaining that the book of Deuteronomy was written after the promised land was occupied, and therefore by some one living in the promised land, though he was directed and enabled to embody in that book the authentic declarations and speeches of Moses." This will tacitly, seemingly at least, screen the infidel system which insists on its being written afterward in the land and not by Moses. But save in one fatal word it does not touch the question. It is perfectly immaterial when and where it was written, as in Tertius’s writing the Epistle to the Romans, provided I have a divinely given and therefore divinely authentic word and reproduction of what Moses said before Israel entered into the land, as the book professes to be. We have no statement that Moses textually wrote anything but the song in 32. and the law put beside the ark of the covenant, but there is no " embodying " what Moses said in some other record. It professes to give what Moses said by God’s command and with God’s authority to the people before their entry into the land, stating where it was spoken; and all through the book it is almost chapter by chapter repeated, "the land which ye go in to possess." Now who wrote it is no more important than Tertius in Romans; but if it be not Moses who spoke the things before Israel’s crossing the Jordan, and really the directions for Israel in the land when actually going in to possess it, the book is a false book, not an inspired one-an imposition of some later hand, not a revelation of God. And this is what the system in fact alleges. It does not "embody " what Moses spoke. It gives, and states that it gives, what he spake and where. And if this be not true, the book is not true. But the statement of the speech, while screening the statement of Mr. S., does not touch it. That statement, as of all the infidel school who hold this, is that the Deuteronomist put Moses’ name in as a license of literary composition; that it was written centuries afterward-some Mosaic revelations and modifications and adaptations of later development thrown into the form of a declaration and testimony by Moses. A crude legislation-such is the theory-.was developed and perfected by the priests and the national life of the people. Let any one read Deuteronomy and see what it professes to be, and say if such be its character;-whether it " embodies " sayings of Moses, or whether it be not, save the last chapter which has nothing to do with the question, the directions of God by Moses to Israel before going into the land. I deny the alleged additions and contradictions. That there are provisions for a state of things which did not exist in the wilderness is quite true, a considerable part consists of civil enactments adapted to their condition in the land when the kingly government did not exist. There are two probable interpolations, like " there it is unto this day" (2: 10-12, 20-23), and possibly one other passage besides (3: 9), which may or may not be; that is, one or two small parentheses evidently such, which do not affect the substance of the book, nor have anything to do with a later date. And let it be here remarked, the question is not about dates or writers where Scripture does not state who speaks or writes, but about inspiration. People may discuss who wrote the Hebrews as no author is named; it may be wise or unwise; but that the Spirit of God dictated it, that it is inspired, is another question. I hold the tradition as to Luke and Mark wholly irrelevant. The question is, Are they inspired accounts of the Lord’s life? Learning from Peter is nothing to the purpose if they. are not inspired; from Paul as an eye-witness Luke could not: indeed his own statement leaves no ground for it. The question is this: When Deuteronomy says, These are the words which Moses spake, are they really such? or something concocted, centuries after, out of a crude legislation given under Moses through the development of national life, by priests or prophets who contended against them? Though, indeed, we are called on to believe that the law which was the priest’s work, at least the Deuteronomic or more advanced form of it, was concocted by a prophet, one of the class opposed to the priests; for we are to believe anything provided it be not inspiration and the truth of God. I have nothing to do with Mr. S. or commissions of the Free Church. The question is far wider than that; it is of the propagation of an infidel view of Scripture all over the English-speaking world in a popular book of science. The Free Church is indeed on its trial as to faithfulness, but the evil has to be combated on its own merits. It may be sorrowful to see every professing body of Christians more or less giving up the truth; but the question is there, and we cannot avoid it. The word of God, the Scriptures, are what we are taught to rely on, and those who are taught of God will rely on them. The enemies’ attacks are especially directed against them. Cavils and special pleading will not do in this conflict; it must be the faith of God’s elect, or spiritual "traditores" on whom no reliance can be placed in the conflict. I have had some doubt as to sending you this, because I believe, as I have said above, the question must be treated on its merits, and this is (save the first paragraph, as to Ezra) on the kirk commission, and what is reported as Dr. Rainy’s speech, to me far more painful than Mr. S.’s article. It is a question of the Free Church about inspiration as well as about inspiration itself. It is only a bye-battle, and it ought to be treated for God on its own merits. But if you think it may be useful for souls, you may use it. But the question is raised, and will have to be discussed, not as a local but as a fundamental question. As I have told you before, it has long pressed upon me as an impending conflict. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 84: VOL 01 - THE RANSOM MONEY ======================================================================== The Ransom Money Boston, U.S., January 1877. My DEAR BROTHER-I have read the Lösepenningen of Dr. Waldenström. I had previously read his Latin thesis on the Lutheran symbolical books. There he was all right in combating the common error that Christ’s work changed God’s mind, and that God was then but a Judge, and practically that love was in Christ, and only judgment in God, as if the work of Christ procured His love. I have very often insisted on the truth as to this. You have both sides in John 3:14-15. But he drops out " the Son of MAN must," and holds only that " God gave His Son." And thus it is a very wrong production. Still the error that is in it arises from having got hold of the love, and so getting onesided. The interpretation of the passage is all wrong, but that is not so material; but he confounds purchasing and redemption. If what he says means anything, all sins of all men are put away. Dr. W. is also careless in his use of Scripture. He contradicts himself; for though sins are blotted out the curse abides on sinners continually. Wrath and the curse remain for those who are sinners, yet there was no wrath in God! The justified are taken from under the curse; but they had been under it then it appears, and, in their sins, were under the wrath of God and condemnation. He mixes up all this confusion and contradiction with just refutation of errors. And note, What did Christ suffer and be forsaken of God for? It is all well to say God’s love gave Him, and that was the source of all. No doubt. But why did Christ suffer as He did? why had He the stripes? He is a propitiation, an ἱλασμός, He suffered ἱλάσχεσθαι. God had not to be reconciled, but His righteous holy nature required the sin to be put away. Then he uses "we" and "us" in the mouth of believers, as if it was all the world. His doctrine as to not living under law and experience is dangerous. I resist looking to experience as much as he does; but, in citing the lost sheep and the father of the prodigal, he has dropped the return of the prodigal, so carefully brought out in detail by the Lord to make the difference between conversion and salvation clear. I reject utterly self-examination for peace; but a soul will have to know itself-not merely its sins forgiven, but that "in me, that is in my flesh, dwelleth no good thing." He resists reconciling God, in which he is right. But he has neglected one side of Scripture truth; has quoted Scripture without heed; and contradicts himself. It is confusion of redemption and purchase that has made all his doctrine wrong. Christ is an ἀντίλυτρον ὺπὲρ πάντων: but that which is the strongest statement is very different from ἀπολύτρωσις. It is a pity he could not be set straight, for the point of departure of his mind is just: but he has followed it out hastily, not weighing Scripture. He has lost the ἱλασμός side of the work, and this is dangerous. It has not gone to denying that the sins had to be put away, and therefore has thrown all his teaching into confusion. The blood of the goat was presented to God on the mercy-seat, and Christ is entered in not without blood; why if it were not needed to ἱλάσχεσθαι τὰς ἁμαρτἱας τοῦ λαοῦ? Why was it presented to God? Not surely to change His mind or make Him love (a horrid thought), but needed for His righteousness and holy nature. It became Him in bringing many sons to glory. So He says to Israel, When I see the blood, I will pass over. There is wrath and the curse he admits-why? and what met it so that it should not be executed on us? Hence He always confounds God and the Father, making us all His children. "God so loved the world." It is never said " the Father " loved the world. The Father is a name of relationship with His children, not with the world. Dr. W. admits they are not all saved. The question is not, Did Christ undertake a partial restoration? but, Did He undertake the restoration, of all? He died for all, I believe, but that is a very different thing. Here you have purchase and redemption as the same, and their perfect restoration the same as He undertook. All this is confusion and mist. He is wrong even in saying purchase is always spoken of all. In 1 Corinthians 6:20; 1 Corinthians 7:23 it is not so; and 2 Peter 2:1 is quite another thought, and so is Matthew 13:44, where the field is clearly bought to have the treasure. There are two other cases in Rev. where it is distinctly not all, and περιποιοῦμαι, where the same is true. I cannot find one passage where it is all. To state that it is so always is not careful. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 85: VOL 01 - THE RESURRECTION OF THE BODY ======================================================================== The Resurrection of the Body The doctrine of the future state was taught in the Pentateuch, as well as in later parts of the Old Testament. It is absurd to pretend that Psalms 16:9-10; Psalms 17:14-15; Psalms 49:14-15, were written after the Captivity; or to deny that they reveal or imply the resurrection. There is no sort of difficulty in supposing that Zoroaster borrowed what he knew of this truth from Holy Writ, which was certainly more or less known to him. I am not at all disposed to give up Job 19:26-27; for I think it a decisive testimony to this precious truth, and the more striking as proving it to be held by saints outside the fathers, or the children of Israel: so that this again would readily account for traces of its traditional existence in the East long before the Captivity. In spite of all the assaults of critics, I am satisfied that, in all that is needed for bringing out a true bodily revival wherein the patriarch expected to see the Redeemer stand on the earth, the English Bible gives the substantial truth. So does the Septuagint, in spite of inaccuracies-οἶδα γὰρ ὅτι ἀένναός ἐστιν ὁ ἐχλύειν με μελλων ἐπι γῆς ἀναστῆσαι τὸ δέρμα μου τό ἀναντλοῦν ταῦτα. So Jerome, in his interlinear exposition of the book, gives a version which is identical with his Vulgate save in the addition of one word, though I allow that his Latin is far more distant from the sense of the Hebrew than our authorized English. His comment is plain enough:- Ego, inquam, jam corruptus ulceribus, in has came mortali incorruptus, per resurrectionem futuram glorificatus videbo Deum. Certus atque incommutabilis in hoc fundamento fidei ista loquebatur. De Wette, it is true, gives a very different turn, adopting a sense of the last clause of ver. 26, suggested in our margin; but I unequivocally prefer the authorized text, for though ip often occurs in the sense "out of," "without," "from," the meaning is not that he should see God apart from the flesh, or having no body, but that from out of the flesh he should see Him, or substantially "in his flesh." This is confirmed by the next verse, " Whom I shall see for myself, and mine eyes shall behold, and not another: " a real resurrection of the body, and nothing else. I believe that Isaiah 26:19, like Daniel 12:2, refers to the national resuscitation of Israel, converted and restored by the power of God. The terms are of course borrowed from, and presuppose the known truth of, a bodily resurrection. See also Ezekiel 37:1-28 and Hosea 6:2; Hosea 13:14, which, in my opinion, entirely relieve this interpretation from the charge of halting. The omission of the words inserted by our translators may help to make the meaning of Isaiah plainer. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 86: VOL 01 - THE SABBATH, THE PASSOVER, AND THE UNLEAVENED BREAD: THE FEASTS OF JEHOVAH ======================================================================== The Sabbath, the Passover, and the Unleavened Bread: The Feasts of Jehovah ======================================================================== CHAPTER 87: VOL 01 - THE SABBATH: THE FEASTS OF JEHOVAH ======================================================================== The Sabbath: The Feasts of Jehovah The first thing I would draw your attention to is this, that the Sabbath is introduced in an altogether peculiar manner. This is no mere idea of mine, nor of any one else. It is marked very clearly in the opening of the chapter before us. "And Jehovah spice unto Moses, saying, Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them, concerning the feasts of Jehovah, which ye shall proclaim to be holy convocations, even these are My feasts. Six days shall work be done; but the seventh day is the Sabbath of rest, an holy convocation; ye shall do no work therein; it is the Sabbath. of Jehovah in all your dwellings." Thus the feasts open; but let us notice that the fourth verse begins again, "These are the feasts of Jehovah." Hence we see that in the beginning of the chapter, where the feasts are introduced generally, the Sabbath is named in particular; next, in verse fourth, there is a fresh beginning, which excludes the Sabbath. Now there is nothing in vain in Scripture; not a word from Genesis to Revelation which God wrote could be changed but for the worse. I know certain minds find this difficult to believe; and the reason is because they judge of God by themselves. If you or I had written it, there would have been many a word to change for the better; and we are apt to attribute our infirmities to God’s word. No man can rightly reason on God’s word from himself; nor is it sound to reason from nature up to nature’s God. We must begin with God, and reason from Him, or His word, down to His works. If we begin with what we find in reason or things here below, we begin with what is frail, feeble, inconstant; and how can we reason soundly when we start from that which breaks at the touch? When we begin with God and His word, we are guided by that which judges all around. But the tendency of men is to take on them to judge the word of God: did they believe that the word of God judges them, it would be safer and more becoming. Now if God has given a revelation of His mind, that revelation must be worthy of Himself; and He has taken particular pains to call it His word. Undoubtedly He wrought by various means; but He never calls it the word of Moses, or David, or John, or Paul, but the word of God. Let us never forget this. It may be said that there is here a difficulty, and what appears even to be an irregularity. The Sabbath is introduced first as the beginning of the feasts; and then, secondly, we begin again, when the Sabbath is left out. Why? Because the Sabbath has a character altogether peculiar to itself. Evidently as a matter of fact, and merely looking at it from a literal point of view, all the other feasts were celebrated but once a year, the Sabbath every week. There is therefore a distinct line of demarcation; and so the second beginning is justified. But still the Sabbath has the character of a feast, and with a most important aim, if in a way that marks no other; for that feast, and that alone, was to be continually repeated, as the end of the week came round. And here let us not fail to notice the difference between this and what Scripture calls " the Lord’s day." Those who would and do confound the two understand neither. The Sabbath day was historically and originally at the end of the week, when man had accomplished his ordinary round of toil. The end he gave to God. He had labored Himself for six days, on the seventh He rested. According to God’s law, it was not merely a seventh, but the seventh day. No other day of the week would have done so well, or at all, if one looked at it as truly fearing God. From an utilitarian point of view, one day was as good as another; and that is man’s way of dealing with things. But God knows that man is prone to forget Him even in creation, and above all to forget the gracious purposes of God pledged in the Sabbath. What is it that God means to bring in? A rest for His own, a rest worthy of Himself, and a rest which He will share with His people. When will this be? Not till the end of all things. I am far from meaning that every man will enjoy that rest. No one can think or say so who believes what sin is, or that God will judge the world by the Man risen from the dead and ordained for it. But while acknowledging that God must show His deep resentment against evil, we believe also that He has brought in a Deliverer and a deliverance for us; in due time a full and a perfect deliverance for creation. This is precisely what God will make good in the day of Christ’s coming; and His rest it will be. Let me refer here to the great New Testament Scripture on the rest of God. In Hebrews 3:1-19; Hebrews 4:1-16. you find the Spirit of God (after pointing to Christ on high, Son of God, and Son of man, who had died atoningly), introducing this rest. What gave occasion to it was the evident danger for the Hebrew believers of taking their ease now, and thus forgetting they were only passing through the wilderness. They were so accustomed to connect with the coming of Messiah a present rest, that they could hardly understand that they were ushered into a scene of trial answering to His who suffered without the gate, and called to count it their privilege. They were in danger of seeking to make themselves at ease and comfortable here. The first Epistle to the Corinthians shows that they were not alone in this. It is a very natural snare to the heart of man, even to those who have found the Savior. After there has been doubt and anxiety, the soul knowing what the judgment of God on sin is, and its own utter guilt and condemnation, when deliverance in the Lord Jesus is once found, there is often danger of reaction. The soul is apt to settle down, thinking that the campaign is over, because the great battle has been fought, and the victory is given through the Lord Jesus Christ. They flatter themselves that there can be no more trouble, because the deep soul-distress is past. It is sufficiently plain that these Hebrews were in some such state, and the apostle not only reminds them how joyfully they took their early spoliation and sufferings, but here instructs them that they are not yet after the pattern of Israel settled in the land, but like Israel passing through the wilderness. Accordingly we find that the whole argument of the epistle supposes not the temple, but the tabernacle, from first to last; and thus hails from the camp, not from the throne or kingdom set up after the conquest of Canaan. Hence he says, "Let us therefore fear, lest a promise being left us of entering into his rest, any of you should seem to come short of it ", (ch. 4: 1). We see at once that the apostle is not speaking of believing in the Lord Jesus for present rest of conscience. Had this been the point before him, he would have boldly assured them there was no need to fear. If we speak of the blood of Christ, and then should exhort to fear, it would be the denial of Christianity. The gospel is the declaration of full remission, yea, of more than this, of justification, of reconciliation with God through the Lord Jesus. If forgiveness through Christ’s blood was the question, he would rather call on them to vanquish every fear; for, as the apostle John says, in discussing that point, "Perfect love casteth out fear," not "perfect love " on our part the law asked for that, and never could get it); but the perfect love of God, which is only revealed in and through the Lord Jesus Christ. What are we to be afraid of then? Not of the blood of Christ failing, not of losing the remission ’of sins through any change of mind or at any moment from grace in God. But be afraid of settling down this world, and coming short of the true outlook of pilgrims and strangers on the way to a better land. To have rested in the wilderness would have been fatal to an Israelite; and so we have to remember that this is not our home, and that to settle down would be virtually to deny ourselves the rest of heaven. In passing let me remark that this epistle was written by the apostle Paul and no one else. Men may question, as they do everything now-a-days, but there is no real ground of doubting it. For Peter proves it in his second epistle, where he says (chap. 3: 15)-" Even as our beloved brother Paul also, according to the wisdom given unto him, bath written unto you." Now, as we know, he was then addressing believing Jews; so that Paul must have written to them also, and this can be only the epistle to the Hebrews 1:1-14 refer to it now, simply because Satan is trying to undermine everything, and it becomes of growing consequence to meet lesser questions, as well as daring attacks on the word of God. It is high time that every man who is by grace a believer should declare plainly what he is. Does His goodness not claim it at our hands to be confessors if not martyrs? I say then, that in this epistle the Spirit of God brings before us the necessity of going forward to the rest of God; and I press this as the only genuine meaning, because it is often applied to soul rest, which it rather tends to enfeeble or destroy. That it is not within the scope of the passage in the text, we may see from verse 11, where it says, "Let us labor, therefore, to enter into that rest." What sort of a gospel would it be to tell people they must labor for rest of conscience? Evidently it would be to upset the grace of God; for it means no other than salvation by works. On the face of it, all can see that the apostle here is addressing such Jews as professed Christ, and that they then were in danger of slipping into present ease, instead of pressing through the wilderness world on their way to that rest of God, the rest of His glory. Do not suppose that I deny for a moment that there is in Christ a present rest for faith. The Scriptures speak of it plainly:-" Come unto Me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest." This is the rest of grace now, not of glory. Then there is something farther too:-" Take my yoke upon you, and learn of Me; for I am meek and lowly in heart; and ye shall find rest unto your souls." First, He gives rest unconditionally, in pure sovereign favor, to all the weary that come; and then, when walking in the path of submission to Him and obedience, the faithful find rest. For if one is disobedient, one must have (as John says) the heart ill at ease-it condemns one; and, then, how can there be rest? But there remains a third thing: not only rest given by Christ as a present relief to the conscience, and, again, true rest of heart found in the path of obedience and learning of Him; but, thirdly, the rest of God when it is no longer a question of man and sin and self-will and misery, but all the checkered scene of toil and suffering will be over, when God will rest in the satisfaction of His own love and glory, having brought His sons and people into His everlasting rest. Doubtless, as the apostle argues, God gave the Sabbath at the beginning; but this was not His rest, for sin spoiled creation, and He says afterward, "If they shall enter into my rest." " If " implies that they had not entered it, and might fail also. So again, after Joshua (or " Jesus") had put down the Canaanites (he never completely conquered them), after Israel had settled themselves in the land, was that the rest of God? By no means; for the Psalm which speaks of that rest was written long after Adam and Joshua. The conclusion, then, is that "there remaineth therefore a rest (σαββατισιός, a keeping of sabbath) to the people of God." Consequently it has not yet come. The apostle strengthens this from another principle, namely, that one cannot be both working and resting, in the same sense, at the same time. If one has entered into rest, one has done with works, even as is said of God Himself (ver. 10). But the bright day when we shall rest is not yet arrived. So that he is exhorting the saints to labor. Now is the time for work; and every one that has the love of Christ in such a world as this must feel it, for the simple reason that there is sin and wretchedness in the world. Divine love, whether in God or in His people, refuses to rest in the midst of evil. After Christ comes this will not be so. "There remaineth therefore a rest to the people of God." It is not the same principle which we find in the Lord’s day, for this is the intervention of divine power in the resurrection of the Lord Jesus, after He had gone down into death to make propitiation for our sins and reconcile us and all things to God. Consequently the Lord’s day is an excellent day for spiritual toil, for the work of faith and the labor of love; and no one acquainted with Christ would think it wrong, if able, to preach a dozen sermons on that day, nor to take a dozen Sabbath-days’ journeys to preach them. Were it the Sabbath-day, he could not do so lightly. Thus they have a wholly different character. The source, nature, and end of the Lord’s day is marked out by grace in the resurrection of Christ from the dead, as the Sabbath is by creation and the law of God. It seemed good to the Lord then, and it is necessary for man, that there should be first the great truth of the Sabbath set forth before we enter on the ways of God. Before He accomplished the mighty work, He hung out clearly and distinctly this initiatory pledge of rest at the end. I am coming to have my rest, He says, but not to have it alone: you shall share it in glory with Me. The Sabbath is to be fulfilled in a day yet to come; and that both for heaven and earth. But the rest is after all work is done, whether in type or anti-type. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 88: VOL 01 - THE SAVIOR OF ALL MEN ======================================================================== The Savior of All Men The apostle had been showing how little profit there is in bodily exercise, whereas godliness is valuable for all things, having the promise of the life that now is, and of that which is to come. This he pronounces a faithful word, and worthy of all acceptation: the reason appears in our verse. For therefore we both labor and suffer reproach (painful as it may be for the present), because our settled hope is in the living God, who is the preserver of all men, specially of the faithful. The question here is of His preserving care, and not of salvation only; and this the apostle shows to be most true of those who are most tried by reason of their faithfulness. 1 Timothy 4:1-16 ======================================================================== CHAPTER 89: VOL 01 - THE SEPTUAGINT ======================================================================== The Septuagint There can be no doubt of the fact that the Septuagint was generally used by our Lord and the inspired writers of the New Testament. But this fact ought not to be abused to the denial of what is equally certain-that it contains numerous mistranslations throughout, and is in no way to be compared for accuracy with the authorized version. Nevertheless the Holy Ghost condescended to use it freely, adopting its language, where true, even if it differed from the meaning of the Hebrew: just as occasionally He gives a paraphrase which differs from both. It was a most important witness already extant among the Gentiles, and God employed it in grace without in any way guaranteeing the inspiration of the LXX, or of their work. What would be thought of the argument that the works of Menander or Epimenides were inspired because the Holy Ghost cited them in the Epistles of St. Paul? It was not an unnatural thing that the early fathers, Greek and Latin, should attach an exaggerated value to the version chiefly in use among them. Not even Augustine knew the Hebrew original, and of the Latins scarce any save Jerome. It is much to be regretted that the idea should be revived by a respectable scholar of our own day. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 90: VOL 01 - THE SEVEN PARABLES ======================================================================== The Seven Parables Matthew 13:1-58 -The connection between these several parables is asked. It will be observed that they are in all seven, the number of spiritual completeness in good or evil. (See Leviticus and the Revelation passim.) Next, it is manifest that the first differs from the rest, inasmuch as it is not a likeness of the kingdom of heaven, which the following six are. Further, of these six, three were said (beside the " sower") to the multitude outside, as well as the disciples; the last three to the disciples alone, within the house. All this bears upon the true interpretation, not as deciding but confirming it. For the first parable is evidently general, if it do not particularly refer to our Lord’s personal ministry on earth, before the kingdom of heaven was introduced by His ascension. It is not here the heir sent to receive the fruit of the vineyard; Jesus is " a sower;" and His sowing is hindered and opposed by the world, the flesh, and the devil, as we find in the explanation (verses 19-22), though a portion of the seed takes root in good ground. The three public comparisons of the kingdom of heaven follow,-the wheat and tare field, the mustard seed, and the leaven. The sower here is, still the Son of man; but it is His work from heaven (just as in Mark 16:20; Ephesians 2:17). It is the kingdom of Christ when rejected by the Jews; of Christ absent, not present in visible power and glory. It is the kingdom of heaven on earth, entrusted to servants, who, alas! are soon asleep, and the devil sows his wicked children in the midst of the true children of the kingdom. The general teaching then is, that the new dispensation, as far as man’s responsibility was concerned, would see ruin introduced by the enemy, which nothing could remedy but the judgment executed at the end of the age. But this is not all. Christendom would grow from a diminutive beginning into a "tree," emblematic of a towering earthly power, which would even shelter the instruments of Satan (compare verses 4 and 19 with 32). Nor this only: for a system of doctrine, nominally at least Christian, should spread over a certain defined mass, till the whole was leavened. Whether this mixture, this worldly aggrandizement, this propagation of (not life or truth, but) profession, such as it was, were of the Lord or His enemy, must be gathered not merely from hints here, but from Scripture generally. Then; upon the dismission of the multitude, the Lord explains the chief of the first three similitudes of the kingdom, and adds three more, which develope not its external appearances, but its internal aspects to the spiritual man. Treasure hid in the field, the pearl, and the drag-net, comprehend these further instructions. Christ buys the field for the sake of the treasure, His own that He loved in the world. This, nevertheless, did not fully tell out either His love or their beauty in His eyes. Therefore, as it seems to me, the parable of the pearl follows," one pearl of great price," the unity and the peerless charms of that object in the Lord’s eyes, for which He gave up " all that He had," as Messiah, here below; yea, life itself. The net evidently presents the closing circumstances of the kingdom, as to which I would briefly call attention to two facts often confounded, that the fishermen gather the good into vessels, casting the bad away, while the angels at the consummation sever the wicked from among the just. Our part is to take forth the precious from the vile; theirs will be to separate the vile from the precious. Grace in man occupies itself_ with "‘the good." It will be the judicial task of the angels to deal with the wicked, and to leave " the just" as the nucleus for the Lord’s glory in the millennial earth. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 91: VOL 01 - THE SEVENTY WEEKS OF DANIEL ======================================================================== The Seventy Weeks of Daniel Daniel 9:1-27 -I do not think that there need be difficulty in supplying the Scripture authority, which has been sought in vain, for the break between the last week and its predecessors. In fact, the prophecy itself distinctly furnishes the proof. For after the details relative to the periods of seven and of sixty-two weeks, in verses 25, 26, and the plain statement, that after these times were completed the. Messiah should be cut off and have nothing (1:e. of His proper kingdom and rights, as far as the nations were concerned), the prophet goes on to describe the retributive days of vengeance which fell upon the city and the sanctuary through the Roman people (or "the people of the prince that shall come"). Now, it is clear, that here we have events which took place about forty years after the crucifixion, and yet entirely apart from the seventy weeks, save that they necessarily occurred after sixty-nine had run their course. But if they form no part of the previous chain, as shown by the prophecy, with equal certainty are they outside from and before the last or seventieth week, which presupposes the Jewish polity re-established in some sort, and the sanctuary pot only rebuilt but in actual use once more, though doomed again to see greater abominations than before. I am confident, therefore, that the Scripture authority of Daniel 9:1-27 is, beyond reasonable doubt, against those who make the seventieth week to be in immediate sequence with the preceding sixty-nine, and that the passage itself, without going further, requires us to leave room for (not merely the past Roman destruction of Jerusalem, but) a prolonged series of wars and desolations of indefinite duration, which has been thus far too truly accomplished; subsequently to this, in verse 27, we have the brief but vivid picture of the last week ushered in by a compact or covenant made between the last Roman prince (" the prince that shall come ") and the mass of the Jews; then, in the midst of the week, a stop put to their sacrificial worship, idols protected, and a desolator inflicted upon them, and this till the consummation and the decreed sentence be poured upon the desolate. Thenceforward should the tide turn, through the presence and power of their Deliverer, once rejected but now returning in glory, not only to destroy this antagonist Roman sovereign with all his instruments and followers, Jewish or Gentile, but to apply to Israel, as such, all the predicted blessings of the new covenant. For such was the intimation of verse 24: " Seventy weeks are determined upon thy (Daniel’s) people and upon thy holy city (the question being about the Jews, and not the church), to finish the transgression, and to make an end of sins," etc. Accordingly, I think it demonstrable that all which God has been doing for and in His heavenly people since the cross is here entirely and advisedly passed by; and this is, no doubt, what is meant by "the parenthetical dispensation of the church." It may be added that this view of a detached seventieth week, reserved for the horrors of the future antichristian crisis, can in no way be objected to on the score of novelty, save by the ignorant: it is really the oldest interpretation that I know on record among the early Christian writers. Thus writes St. Hippolytus in the third century: Τῶω γὰρ ἑξήχοντα δύο ἑβδομάδων πληρωθειςῶν χαὶ Χριστοῦ παραγενομένου, χαὶ τοῦ εὐαγγελίου ἐν πάντι τόπῳ χηρυχθέντος ἐχχενωθέντων τῶν χαιρῶν, μία ἑβδομὰς περιλειφθήσεται ἡ ἐν ἦ παρέσται Ἠλἰας,χαὶ ‘Ενώχ, χαὶ ἐν τψ ἡμίσει αὐτῆς ἀναφανήεσται τὸ βδεέλυγμα τῆς ἐρημώσεως, ἕως ὁ Αντίχριστος ἐρήμωσιν τῷ χόσμῳ χαταγγέλλων, χ. τ. λ." For when the sixty-two weeks have been fulfilled, and Christ has come, and the gospel has been everywhere preached, the times having been consummated, there shall be left one week-the last--in which Elias shall be present, and Enoch; and in the half of it shall appear the abomination of desolation, etc. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 92: VOL 01 - THE SPIRIT AND THE BRIDE SAY, COME ======================================================================== The Spirit and the Bride Say, Come Revelation 22:17. - I do not wonder that there are difficulties felt in accepting the interpretation of those who apply this verse exclusively to the Lord or to sinners. The truth is that the former portion refers to the one, and the latter to the other. Nothing can be sweeter nor clearer when seen. Jesus had just announced Himself as not merely the root and the offspring of David, but the bright and morning star. Immediately the church, with the bridal affections, says, Come. It is the Bridegroom that thus awakens her desires that He should come. He is the first object of the heart, and lest it should be thought to be a mere human, unsanctioned longing, it is added, "The Spirit and the bride say, Come." But there are many who have heard His voice and been washed in His blood who yet feebly know their privileges in Him; they little if at all appreciate what He is as the Bridegroom, what they are as His bride. Are these to be silent? Nay, " let him that heareth say, Come." They may know his love but imperfectly: still let them not fear to say, Come. But does not such a hope, such a waiting of the heart, hinder one’s yearning after poor souls? Enemies have said so, mistaken friends may have thought so; but God links the two most blessedly together. If the bride, if the individual saint, owe the first love of the heart to Him who is coming to meet us in the air, so much the more can we turn round to the needy world and invite him that is athirst to come (not to say, Come, which to him, indeed, were but judgment). Nay, even if I meet a soul who perhaps has not yet known real soul-thirst, yet is willing, I can bid him freely welcome: "whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely." It is a perfectly beautiful scene, which the Lord grant us better to know and enjoy by the Holy Ghost! Zechariah 12:1-14 One asks: 1. What will determine, even approximately, the date of this prophecy? It is evident that the date assigned in some Bibles (B. C. 587) is a mistake; probably B. C. 517 was meant, which would better accord with the previous dates 520518 B. C. The Edinburgh Bible of Blair and Bruce, like that of the London Tract Society, gives the date according to your correspondent. On the other hand, the Oxford Bible (4to, 1845) gives a century nearer Christ, 1: e. 487, both of which seem to me highly improbable; while Bagster’s Bible, after dating several of the preceding chapters B. C. 518, suddenly fixes chap. 14. at B. C. 587; and Collins’s Bible (1855) is equally strange, putting B. C. 587 to the preceding chapters, and B. C. 517 to chap. 14.! For myself, I see no reason to doubt that Zechariah 9:1-17; Zechariah 10:1-12; Zechariah 11:1-17; Zechariah 12:1-14; Zechariah 13:1-9; Zechariah 14:1-21 form a part of the great prophecy which commences with chap. 12.; and I conceive that they may have been given in or not long after the fourth year of Darius Hystaspes. (Compare Ezra 5:1-17) To put this prophecy as far back as the reign of Nebuchadnezzar is, in my opinion, of all hypotheses the least reasonable. 2. The " idol shepherd" is Antichrist, whom retributive judgment is to raise up in the land of Judea in the last times. " If another shall come in his own name, him ye will receive." He shall in the end suffer the sternest vengeance of God. This is no modern opinion. Pastor stultus, et imperitus (says Jerome, Comment. in Zech. lib. 3. cap. 11.), hand dubium quia Antichristus sit, qui in consummatione mundi dicitur ease venturus et qualis venturus sit, indicator Iste pastor ideo resurgat in Israel, quia verus pastor dixerat: Jam non pascam vos. Qui alio nomine et in Daniele propheta (cap. 9.) et in Evangelio (Marc. 13.) et in epistola Pauli ad Thessalonienses (2 Thessalonians 2:1-17), abominatio desolationis, sessurus in templo Domini, et se facturus ut Deum, qui et per Isaaiam magnus census dicitur (Isai, 32.) ’ Tarn sceleratus est pastor, ut non idolorum cultor, sed ipse idolum nominetur, dum se appellat Deum, et vult ab omnibus adorari. 3. There is no reason that I see for identifying the stone in Zechariah 12:3 with that in Matthew 21:44. The former evidently means Jerusalem itself, the latter the Lord Himself in two positions, answering to the two advents. First in His humiliation, He is a stone as it were in the ground, and "whosoever shall fall on it shall be broken," verified in all unbelievers, but especially in the Jews; next," He is exalted to heaven, and coming again in power and great glory, He will execute destructive judgment-" on whomsoever it shall fall, it will grind him to powder." (Cf. Daniel 2:7.; Revelation 19:1-21) "A burdensome stone " is another idea, and will be true of Jerusalem in the latter day, when the Assyrian heads a grand Gentile confederacy after the Antichrist is disposed of, which is the subject of Zechariah 12:2-6; Zechariah 14:1-3 : also Isaiah, Micah, Daniel, and other prophets, treat of this closing king of the North. 4. There is no intermingling of the church or Christian body with the subjects of this prophecy. There may have been some partial application in the past, as there will assuredly be a complete fulfillment in the future; but it is Judah and Jerusalem that are in question, whatever profit the church or Christian may and ought to draw from this as from all Scripture. The double reference of John 19:36, and Revelation 1:7, shall fall, it will grind him to powder into the prophecy, which mainly bears on the second, but presupposes the first. " They shall look upon Me whom they have pierced." But Revelation 1:7 is so far from intimating a general conversion of mankind previous to the return of the Lord, that it plainly enough insinuates their then unbelief, for "all kindreds of the earth shall wail because of him." He will be unwelcome to them. The mourning of godly awakened consciences, when Jehovah-Jesus is seen, to the final deliverance of Jerusalem and the total overthrow of all their Gentile foes, is most strikingly described in verses 10-14, but it is in terms which exclude the revival in Ezra’s time, save as being a feeble earnest. Each felt alone with the Lord; and those families are specially named who represent prominent classes in Israel from the beginning, and throughout their history. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 93: VOL 01 - THE STRAIT GATE ======================================================================== The Strait Gate Luke 13:24.-Strive to enter in at the strait gate: for many, I say unto you, will seek to enter in, and shall not be able. The true solution I believe to lie not in the difference of striving and seeking, on which some have rested unduly, and others so mistakenly as in effect to make men their own saviors, but rather in this, that, while many will seek to enter in, it is not at the strait gate but by some method of human device. The natural heart dislikes God and God’s way, and it easily deceives itself into a vague reliance on mercy without righteousness, which is an infidel thought, or into a vain confidence in religious ordinances, which is a superstitious one: in either way, man is lost. People might like to enter the kingdom, but not by regeneration through faith in Christ. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 94: VOL 01 - THE SUITABILITY OF THE EVANGELISTS ======================================================================== The Suitability of the Evangelists As a preliminary to any detailed observations on the Gospels, allow me briefly to notice the wisdom of the Spirit in the choice of each workman for his work. " Matthew, the publican," was not one whom man would have selected as the apostle and biographer of the Messiah. At first sight he might seem the least eligible for presenting the Lord to the Jews, for, as a class, none were in such disrepute as those Jews who consented to gather the taxes which the Romans imposed on their nation. But, regarded more closely, nothing could have been in more admirable keeping with the line of things which the Holy Ghost traces in his Gospel, for Jesus there is not the Messiah only, but the rejected Messiah. His rejection, with its grave and fruitful results, is just as much the theme as His intrinsic claims, with, all God’s external attestations. And who so fit a witness or the grace which would seek the least worthy, if those " that were bidden" would not come, as he who was called from the odious receipt of customs? In the second Gospel the Spirit is evidently developing the perfectness of the Lord’s ministry in word and deed. Now John, whose surname was Mark," was just the right person for such a task, always bearing in mind that none was fit unless immediately inspired to write. But, among those who were so empowered of God, John Mark was precisely the one fitted by personal experience to appreciate, when the Spirit gave him to indite that Divine account of the gospel-service of Jesus; for he had bitterly known what it was to put his hand to the plow and look back, with its painful consequences on all sides (Acts 13:1-52; Acts 14:1-28; Acts 15:1-41) But he had also learned, to his joy, and the blessing of others, that the Lord can restore and strengthen, giving us, through His grace, to overcome wherein we have most broken down. This very Mark subsequently became a fellow-worker of St. Paul, and a comfort to him, as much as earlier he had been a sorrow (Colossians 4:1-18) " Take Mark," says he, in his last letter to Timothy, " and bring him with thee; for he is profitable to me for the ministry." For the writing of the third Gospel, again, Luke was manifestly the most appropriate instrument. From Colossians 4:1-18 it would seem that he was a Gentile, and by profession a physician, both which particulars, as well as its dedication to Theophilus, wonderfully harmonize with the way in which our Lord is there depicted; not so much the Messiah, nor the Servant, but "the Man, Christ Jesus," the Son of God born of the Virgin, in His largest human relations, in His obedience and prayerfulness, in His social sympathies, in miracles of healing and cleansing, in parables of special tenderness towards the lost. It is this prominence of our Lord’s manhood, as brought out in Luke, which to me accounts for the emphatic statements of grace to Gentiles, as it falls in with the special form of his preface, which has been so frightfully abused by rationalists in general, English or foreign. He lets us know his motives, and seeks to draw Theophilus by the cords of a man; but if there be thus a human side of the picture, there is another as divine as in the other Gospels, where the thoughts and feelings of the heart are not so laid bare. The notion that such an opening, touchingly suited as it is to the way in which our Lord is throughout presented in this Gospel, should induce us to regard the writer as a mere faithful and honest compiler, without supernatural guidance in the arrangement of his subject-matter, etc., is worthy only of an infidel. And it is only to cheat oneself or others with vain words to affirm that the occurrence of demonstrable mistakes in the Gospels does not in any way affect the inspiration of the Evangelists. The profanity of these statements scarcely exceeds their folly, nor should 1 have taken this opportunity to denounce them if they were not at this moment finding extensive acceptance, especially among young students, not, alas! without the sanction of those who ought to know better. Lastly, that St. John was eminently the right instrument for his task is most apparent. Who could so fitly, if so it pleased the Holy Ghost, set before us " the only begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father," as he who leaned on Jesus’ bosom, -the disciple whom Jesus loved? ======================================================================== CHAPTER 95: VOL 01 - THE TRANSITION PERIOD ======================================================================== The Transition Period Revelation 5:9-10.-It is one of the special objects of the Revelation, as I judge, to disclose the position and intelligent worship of the heavenly saints, after they have been gathered to the Lord in the air, and previous to His epiphany, and this in connection with the intervening judgments set forth under the seals, trumpets, and vials. Another design is to show that even in those terrible days, "the end of the age," after the church has been caught up to meet the Lord, God will not leave Himself without a witness, but will, by His word and Spirit, commence a new work, suited to the times of special antichristian delusion. Daniel also (ch. 7.-12.) makes known to us saints involved in these same trials, but they are, I think, Jewish saints exclusively. St. John was the appropriate instrument to reveal a larger company of holy sufferers, and that from the Gentiles, " out of every kindred," etc. The countless multitude seen in Revelation 7:9et seqq. is out of all nations, but, as to time, restricted to "the great tribulation." This transition period, after the rapture of the church, and before the millennium, is one of great moment, and very little understood. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 96: VOL 01 - THE TWO MINISTRIES ======================================================================== The Two Ministries Exodus 34:7.-The Gospel plan of salvation is not in the text, it is really the proclamation of the name of Jehovah in His government of Israel. Indeed it is rather a part of that which is contrasted in 2 Corinthians 3:1-18 with the ministration of the Spirit now. There was a precious manifestation of God’s goodness and long suffering, no doubt; but it was in connection with His people still under the law. Hence, in spite of all the mercy displayed, it could only be in result a ministration of condemnation and death. Whereas the essence of the Gospel is, that it comes to the sinner on the very ground that he is lost, and most expressly justifies the ungodly: it is a ministration of righteousness already accomplished on earth and accepted on high. So that, if the Holy Ghost reveal to any soul Christ in glory, that soul is entitled to look up and say, "There is my life and my righteousness." He is accepted in the Beloved. " If that which was done away was glorious, much more that which remaineth is glorious." The two things are so distinct that to harmonize is to spoil them both. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 97: VOL 01 - THE VINE AND THE TRUE VINE ======================================================================== The Vine and the True Vine John 15:4.-I do not think that living union with Christ is here spoken of, because verse 2 speaks of branches in Him not bearing fruit, which cannot be where Christ is the life. Compare also verse 6, which, if living union were in question, would contradict the everlasting life which the believer has. There is some analogy thus far with Romans 11:1-36, the olive-tree of testimony on earth, as the vine is of profession. Of course, in both cases, the saints are living branches; but there are other branches which are broken off. Oneness with Christ, as members of His body, depends on the baptism of the Spirit, which was unknown before Pentecost. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 98: VOL 01 - THE VINE OF THE EARTH ======================================================================== The Vine of the Earth Revelation 14:19.-" The vine of the earth " is the symbol of earthly religion in its last apostate state. Christ, the Lord from heaven, is the true vine; this is the false vine, the scene of whose judgment appears to be Jerusalem (cf. verse 20). Where Christ suffered, where the church of God first saw the light, it would seem that Satan will at the close completely triumph. It is important to note that it is a distinct and subsequent scene to the fall of Babylon, given already in the same chapter. If Rome’ be, as I believe, the center of one picture, Jerusalem is, I think, of the other, the metropolis respectively of Gentilism and Judaism in their antagonism to God at the end of the age. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 99: VOL 01 - THE WAVE-LOAVES, OR FEAST OF WEEKS: THE FEASTS OF JEHOVAH ======================================================================== The Wave-Loaves, or Feast of Weeks: The Feasts of Jehovah Next let us turn to the feast of verses 15 et seqq.: " And ye shall count unto you from the morrow after the sabbath, from the day that ye brought the sheaf of the wave offering, seven sabbaths shall be complete." There is the peculiar expression of fullness here, such as we hear of nowhere else. This feast only is marked out by seven sabbaths intervening. It is the feast of weeks, but among the Hellenists, or Greek-speaking Jews, the number fifty, as is well known, has given the name to this feast, which is therefore called " Pentecost." What then was fulfilled when the day of Pentecost was fully come? The Father made good His promise, that incomparable promise of which the Lord Himself had said, " It is expedient for you that I go away." What could outweigh the blessedness of His presence with His disciples On earth? The gift of the Comforter, not merely gifts but Himself baptizing them, no longer in hope but accomplished in fact. Therefore they were told on that day to offer a new meat- offering. I daresay you are all familiar with the repugnance that many, believers even, have to looking at the Church as a new thing. They ’like to think of it as that which has always been and which shall always go on till eternity. Yet it is remarkable that not only does Paul give it the name of the "one new man," but Moses here calls it a "new meat-offering?" There was a meat-offering before, unambiguously shadowing Christ, as here a man devoted to God’s service. Here was something "new" on the day of Pentecost. What did " the new meat-offering" mean? I leave it to yourselves, to your own conscience and intelligence: the answer is so certain that one need not say more about it. At that day began here below a thing so new that it was entirely without precedent. Again, in verse 17, we hear of " two wave-loaves." Mark. the association with Christ. He was the wave-sheaf, and He alone: these were wave-loaves, and there were to be two. Do you ask if it be not said that the Church was a mystery hid for ages and generations? How then can it be thus typified here? My answer is, God took care, though giving this type, not to reveal the mystery. He did show some important truths that meet in the mystery, but never disclosed itself. For instance, if He had meant to reveal it in this type, He would (as it appears to me, if I may reverently so speak), have spoken of " one loaf." Certainly, when the mystery was revealed, it was marked as "one new man," " one body," etc.; and in the sign of the Lord’s Supper we have, not two loaves, but one bread or one loaf as one body The time then had not come to reveal the mystery, for Christ had not been rejected nor redemption as yet wrought. Consequently the Spirit of God has only given us here the witness of our association with Him what may be called a shadow, not the very image. The symbol was plain in the one loaf when the Church began. I am aware that some excellent men have supposed the two loaves to be the Jew and the Gentile; but it seems to me incorrect. Νo doubt ecclesiastical history will tell you as much; but I do not believe men but God. Ecclesiastical history may assure us that Peter and Paul founded two churches at Rome; but we know that the church at Rome was founded by neither apostle, and indeed by no apostle. It is perfectly certain from Scripture that the saints in Rome were gathered long before an apostle went there; and it is very hard to learn on what ground they ever went there, except as prisoners of the Lord. Peter may have been crucified there; Paul may have gone to prison and to death there; but as to founding the Roman Church, they never did, and no claim is put in for any other apostle. Further, in the Book of the Acts, so called, we have the fullest evidence of the care then taken to avoid having two churches anywhere. When Philip went down to Samaria, though people were converted and baptized, there was no church formed till the apostles Peter and John went down. Thus the link was kept up with the church in Jerusalem in the most careful manner. Of laying on of hands we hear not in Jerusalem, there being no necessity for it that day: in Samaria there was, or there might have been ground taken for an independent church, of which there is no trace in Scripture. Geographically there may be ever so many churches, but there is only one church of God, only one communion recognized on earth. I know there are persons exceedingly sore as to that point: it is usual when people feel their weakness. What they need to see is that it is no question of opinion or will, but of submission to God and His word. I say then, the two wave-loaves do not mean two churches, a Jewish and a Gentile: the very worst notion possible, one may add, as it would have kept up the old distinction; while the very essence of the Gospel, as well as of the one body, is to break all this down forever, as well as to save, in Christ. When God gives a witness, His regular way is by at least " two." So we read " that in the mouth of two or three witnesses every word may be established." When there was to be a full witness, and not a barely valid or sufficient testimony, there were three. So the Lord was three days in the grave; there was the fullest witness to His death. Two witnesses were necessary. And so it will be by and by, when things come to a serious pass for the Lord in Jerusalem. There will be " His two witnesses:" not that I understand this to be said numerically, but according to the figure of adequacy. Here Christ was risen-the wave-sheaf. What witness was given next of the power of His resurrection? Ourselves, as the two wave- loaves. The Christian company are witnesses, not to the law of God like Israel, but to His grace in Christ risen from the dead. Such is the contrast that Paul brings out in 2 Corinthians 3:1-18, where he speaks of our having Christ written on us. He takes particular pains to show that it is not on tables of stone. He leaves this to the Jew, who, without doubt, was called to be a witness to the law of God, as the Christian is to a dead and risen Christ in the power of the Spirit. The wave-loaves, we see, were to be of fine flour baken with leaven. Here are two constituents in the types, so opposed to each other that one who knew their use elsewhere might wonder what to think of them here. Fine flour!--why, that is like Christ, pure, without sin; and leaven!-that is like ourselves, naturally corrupt and corrupting; and is not this just what Scripture teaches? Yet there is where so many find a difficulty about the two. natures; but really I am unable to find an excuse for their want of light as to both Scripture and themselves. I do not think that Christians ever so young in truth should find it hard to believe that they have two natures within them, one craving after what is evil and old habits of self, the other delighting in the will of God and loving what is of Christ. We do not need to go to Epistles, like those to the Romans, Corinthians, or Galatians: here we have the type wrought out that the wayfarer may not err. I know that a short time ago some zealous folk came over from America to preach up that the Christian might be a perfect being without any sin. Moses refutes it all. Here we have two seemingly contradictory things mingled in what typifies Christians-fine flour and leaven. Experience tallies with it. Not that there is the least excuse for sin; but sin is there, set out by leaven, not at work but baked in the bread. Thus we see how truth all hangs together, and from first to last God only speaks perfect truth; and man, without Him, can only find out and utter what is not true in spiritual things. Our part in the things of God is not to theorize, but to believe. But the Spirit is as necessary to the understanding of the word, as the word is the necessary material for the Spirit to use. Yet I am sure that one safely finds the truth not as a student, but as a believer. God is dealing with the heart and conscience. You cannot separate real growth in the truth from the moral state of the soul: if we essay it, we may appear to get on very fast in learning the Bible, but it is to be feared that the next step will be a fall. Again, in verse 18, we read, " And ye shall offer with the bread seven iambs, without blemish, of the first year; and one young bullock, and two rams: they shall be for a burnt-offering unto Jehovah." The Christian should have the sense of complete acceptance before our God and Father; and even this is not all. In verse 19, " Then ye shall sacrifice one kid of the goats for a sin-offering, and two lambs of the first year for a sacrifice of peace-offerings." In the case of the wave-sheaf, as we saw, there was enjoined a burnt-offering and a meat-offering. It is just the same here: the church by grace has the same acceptance as Christ had in Himself. The object of redemption was that we might be even now as completely free from charge of sin before God as the blessed Savior; but He in His own perfection, we in virtue of His work for us. Nothing can be plainer than the type, unless it be the divine explanation in the New Testament. Consequently we have the same figures and similar language used; but now we come to a different thing, for there is a most striking difference. With the wave-loaf there was to be a peace-offering and also a sin-offering; there was none in the case of Christ. In Him was no sin. It is not merely that Christ never sinned, but in Him was no sin; and I particularly press this. He never had a sinful nature, else He must have required a sin-offering for Himself. But it was absolutely needful that an offering for sin should be essentially sinless. And again, when it was a question of Him or of His person, peace-offerings have no place. The peace-offering was when communion was restored, or in communion; but it followed the sin-offering of course. The application is to us and not to Christ. On another word of the Spirit I must be brief. It is verse 22: "And when ye reap the harvest of your land, thou shalt not make clean riddance of the corners of thy field." What is the meaning of this? Does it not seem rather singular that, after the two wave-loaves have disappeared from the scene, good corn should be found still in "thy field?" The wave-loaves, we all agree, mean the Christian body. Some may go farther back than others, but none deny that they are Christians at any rate. How comes it, when these are gone, that we hear of grain left in the corners of the field? Can the wave-loaves typify all saints? Do you not see that such an instance as this proves that there will be true believers on the earth after the church has disappeared? There will be here below good corn. Of course they are not members of the one body; but God has other purposes, and purposes both for the Jew and Gentile; as here some corn was to be left for the poor and the stranger. The Apocalyptic saints may illustrate this-saints during the last week of Daniel’s Seventy, after we see the elders in heaven. To-morrow, if the Lord will, I hope to enter on the revelation of what is entirely future. We have had the past, and the present too, before us. This last verse touches on the cut-off week in the future, but it does not develope the great and distinct plans which God has unrolled that we may learn in the closing feasts. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 100: VOL 01 - THE WAVE-SHEAF AND THE WAVE-LOAVES: THE FEASTS OF JEHOVAH ======================================================================== The Wave-Sheaf and the Wave-Loaves: The Feasts of Jehovah ======================================================================== CHAPTER 101: VOL 01 - THE WAVE-SHEAF: THE FEASTS OF JEHOVAH ======================================================================== The Wave-Sheaf: The Feasts of Jehovah But now we come to another principle. It was not merely that God was at the cross as the Judge of sin. What was shown at Christ’s resurrection? We all know, as it is written, that God, the very One who smote Jesus, raised Him from the dead. Sin was condemned, not for every one, but for those who believed. For those who do not believe there will only be the greater condemnation, for their sins are aggravated by the fact that, in the face of God, they have despised and rejected the Son of God; and, more than that, the Son of God dying as a propitiation for sins. Thus the divine judgment of sin on the cross makes the case of the unbeliever incomparably graver; for he is not only’ a sinner, but refuses the grace of God that would save him. Here we come to a new section, and indeed a new utterance of Jehovah to Moses, not precisely a new feast, but at any rate introductory to a new feast and indeed the whole pivot on which it turns. " Speak unto the children of Israel, and say unto them, When ye be come into the land which I give unto you, and shall reap the harvest thereof, then ye shall bring a sheaf of the first-fruits of your harvest unto the priest" (5: 10). What is the bearing of this? I am addressing those who, it may be taken for granted, believe that every word of God has a meaning, and a most important meaning. You do not require to be reminded that God’s word before Christ is just as truly inspired as the New Testament. The wave-sheaf then is introduced as quite separate from the passover and accompanying feast of unleavened bread. But in point of fact the wave-sheaf was waved on the first day of the week that followed the passover. So the Lord was crucified on Friday, lay in the grave on the Sabbath or last day of the week, and rose on the first day or Sunday as the Gentiles called it. He was raised from the dead on the very day the wave-sheaf was waved before Jehovah. Little did the priest who waved it conceive the power and character of the truth ’set forth in the first-fruits he was thus presenting before the God of Israel. But the Risen One and Raiser of the dead had left the grave and broken its power for the believer, whether they knew it or not; and if the Jew refused to listen, the Gentiles. by grace would hear. Indeed there is no apter figure of resurrection in the Bible than that of the grain falling into the ground and dying, and then springing up. It is the Lord’s own illustration in John 12:24 : "Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone; but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit." Of whom was it spoken? Of His own death and resurrection, with its mighty consequences. If He is not raised, vain is apostolic preaching, and vain the Christian’s faith. But Christ is raised from among the dead, first-fruits of those fallen asleep. So here it is said, "And he shall wave the sheaf before Jehovah, to be accepted for you" (5: 11). Nor is salvation ever known without it though souls may be born again. For it is the light of His resurrection which chases away all gloom and dries every tear of anxious sorrow. It is the resurrection of the Lord which brings out the acceptance of the believer without question before God. In His death our evil was dealt with atoningly, the sole righteous basis for the forgiveness of sinful man; but Christ’s resurrection declares that the sins are forever gone for those who believe. " He was delivered for our offenses, and raised for our justification." " On the morrow after the sabbath the priest shall wave it." The type is fully confirmed by the striking coincidence of the facts. This then is what we have prefigured in the wave-sheaf: Christ raised by God’s power and the Father’s glory; by His power entering the grave of the Lord Jesus, after all that He felt and could do against sin was exhausted in the cross. Therein was God glorified so, that it was His right to raise up Jesus from the dead, never ceasing till He set Him at His own right hand in heaven, and gave Him a name which is above every name. As man He died; as man He is raised up and exalted. As a divine person, the Son has everything; but He became a man, and humbled Himself, yea, to death of the cross; and now, in resurrection, He is taken up as man by the power of God, who raised Him from the dead and gave Him glory, that our faith and hope might be in God. With the wave-sheaf there was to be no offering for sin. This is a remarkable exception. If Israel or the Christian had been meant, there must have been a sin or trespass offering. Here it is Christ, and as fittingly there was no sin-offering. When it was a question of bringing Israel out of Egypt, blood was put on every door-post. The passover was thus a striking type of blood shed and sprinkled to stay divine judgment, with holiness following. Here is a fresh thing in the wave-sheaf. For there are two great principles: one displayed in the death of Christ; the other in His resurrection; and they are so distinct that God. employs two different types to show them forth in our chapter. It is certain that this typifies Christ’s resurrection, and none but His; for we see there was no offering for sin connected with it. He was the only man since the world began who could be presented to God without blood. An offering for sin was needed, even for the high priest, " as for the people, so also for himself;" but not so for Christ, who died for our sins. Ver. 12: " And ye shall offer that day when ye wave the sheaf an he-lamb, without blemish, of the first year, for a burnt-offering unto Jehovah: and the meat-offering thereof shall be two tenth-deals of fine flour, mingled with oil; an offering made by fire unto Jehovah for a sweet savor." It is clearly then a question of Christ only. For here we have the two great offerings of sweet savor: the burnt-offering and the meat-offering, both speaking of accept- arm personally in His perfection; and of a double perfection- perfection of life lived. in the meat-offering, and perfection of life given up, or death, in the burnt-offering. As usual, there was of course the accompanying drink-offering, but not a trace of anything inconsistent with the savor of rest that God found in Christ; for it is of Him, and of Him alone, that the Spirit here speaks prophetically. I would direct your attention for a little to the next verse, and for this reason:-It helps to explain an expression in Luke 6:1, about which I dare say some here present have found difficulty, as certainly most people elsewhere. "And it came to pass on the se( and sabbath after the first that He went through the corn-fields; and His disciples plucked the ears of corn and did eat, rubbing them in their hands." What is the force of " the second sabbath after the first "? For this I fear it is of little use to send you to the commentators, for they are all at sea about it as about most real difficulties for which you want their help. Some have had recourse to a very harsh way of getting out of the difficulty, and that is cutting out the word (for in Greek it is only a single word) δευτεροπρώτω: a very dangerous principle where the Bible is concerned. One celebrated critic thus guilty repented, virtually confessing the fault by replacing it. But it is no bad moral lesson for us to have to say, " I do not know." This at least is true and lowly; and if one looks up for light, it is well, for then God can give what is lacking. Without saying more at this time about the critics, let us look at verse 14, for it is important, and helps to clear up a phrase otherwise dark. Now it is a vital claim of piety all through Scripture that God must have His portion first, before the believer can becomingly take and enjoy his. One feels how right it is that God should be considered in the first place; it is due to Him, and true in everything; and if we do not render it, we must suffer the bitter consequence. So distinctly was this impressed on the statutes and ways of Israel, that no godly person there would have attempted to touch his corn before the first sheaf had been waved before Jehovah. How blessedly this applies to Christ, we all feel! Once Christ is the waved first- fruits, what may not follow? For remember that Christ is a man (not only the eternal Son of God), but One who having become a man has accomplished redemption. To His resurrection the wave-sheaf pointed in type, and this for our acceptance. As man risen from the dead He goes up to heaven. He was not taken up in a merely exceptional way, as an individual like Enoch or Elijah; He was head of the new family whose sins He had borne, going up into the glory of God, accepted for man, that is, for those who believe. By man, when He was here below, we know how He was rejected and crucified; but God raised Him up from the dead, and gave Him glory, that our faith and hope might be in God. And now the disciples were going with their Master through the corn-fields; and, being hungry, on that Sabbath according to the gracious permission of Jehovah they plucked and ate the ears of corn. Now it is said here that this particular Sabbath was " the second after the first," or second-first. How striking that this should be the first Sabbath on which it was allowable! It was of no use to show this to unbelieving Pharisees. For what did they care for the truth? Their only wish was through the disciples to damage the Lord, being blind instruments in the hand of Satan. But the Lord vindicates amply His guiltless followers. On this I need not enter, but will just explain the force of the term in question. The first Sabbath of the paschal feast was emphatically said to be a high or great day (John 19:31). And no wonder when we take in what God foresaw. But so it was also in Jewish estimate. Alas for man! It was the very day in which Christ lay in the grave, the only day, Sabbath as it was, marked by that awful crime throughout its entire evening and morning. It was only a part of the other two days, out of the three, which was reckoned day and night. On that first Sabbath, immediately before the wave-sheaf as it was, no Jew would have partaken of the corn. The day after it was the first day of the week, when the wave-sheaf was offered. The following Sabbath was "the second-first "immediately after the wave-sheaf. The one was the first, the next the second-first; because associated with it. But why do I mention all this? Just to show how precious is Scripture to explain Scripture. Nothing else, as a general rule, can: but we need the Holy Spirit to give us it aright. The word " second-first " occurs nowhere but in this verse of Luke. We see the value of the Old Testament to understand the New, not only the New to understand the Old. Holy Scripture is inspired and profitable; yet it is a fact, as singular as it is sure, that we only begin to appreciate intelligently the Old when we are at home in the New They both go together for faith and blessing, as they ought; and the key to both is found in Christ the Savior alone, but Christ, King of Israel as well as Head of the Church and of all nations too, for we must not limit or confound His glories. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 102: VOL 01 - THE WORD AIONIOS ======================================================================== The Word Aionios Before treating of the force and usage of this adjective, it is well to examine briefly into αἰών, from which it is formed. The earliest application of the substantive in Greek writers (as Homer, Hesiod, Pindar, the tragic poets, and Herodotus) is in the sense of a man’s life, or lifetime. In the later history of the language (not to speak of its medical application to "the spinal marrow ") it denoted a long period of time (Aeschin. Axioch. 17), while the philosophers employed it in contradistinction to χρόνος to express the duration, χρόνος of eternal and unchangeable objects, χρόνος of such as are transient and corporeal. Hence αἰών was used in the ancient philosophy as = the infinite and immutable eternity of God, and by an obvious metonymy = God himself, and subordinate spiritual beings who were supposed to proceed from Him, the term of duration being also extended to those invisible agents or entities themselves. Thus Philo Judaeus says, ἐν αἰῶνι δὲ οὔτε παρελήλυθεν οὐδὲν οὔτε μέλλει ἀλλὰ μόνον ὐφέστηχε. This is important, as showing that in Hellenistic Greek authors of the same age as those of the New Testament the word was used properly and specifically to set forth eternity. " In eternity nothing is past or future, but only subsists." Equally plain is its application to the invisible beings or aeons of Oriental philosophy, as may be seen from the following extract, cited by Mosheim, from Arrian:-οὐ γὰρ εἰμὶ Λἰὼν ἀλλ’ἄνθρωπος, μέρος τῶν πάντων ὡς ὤρα ἡμέρας, ἐνστῆναι με δεῖ ὡς τὴν ὤραν χαὶ παρελθεῖν ὡς ὤραν. Excluding the imaginary- personal force, nothing can be clearer than its use in the time and language of the New Testament inspired writers to represent what is immutable and eternal. Aristotle, I may add, derives it from αἰὲν ὤν(De Coelo,1: 11). Besides, when qualified by words which modify its sense, it is used in Scripture for the continuous course of a given system ruled by certain principles, as in. Matthew 12:32; Matthew 13:39-40; Matthew 24:3; Matthew 28:20; or, again, in a moral rather than in a dispensational sense, as in Galatians 1:4; Ephes. 2: 2. I conclude, then, that while αἰών may be so used as to express the continuous existence of a thing which from its nature does not last forever (as human life, an unbroken age or dispensation, or the general course of this world), its proper sense, taken by itself, is to express eternity. And the same thing is true of αἰώνιος. It is used in certain special connections, as in Romans 16:25; 2 Timothy 1:9; and Titus 1:2, where χρόνοι modifies its force, and gives a relative rather than an absolute sense; but its natural meaning, unless positively restricted, is eternal in contrast with temporary. It occurs seventy-one- times in the received text of the New Testament, the examination of which need leave no doubt on the believer’s mind. Donnegan gives Philem. 1:15 as exceptional; but he is, in my opinion, mistaken. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 103: VOL 01 - THE WORK OF THE SPIRIT ======================================================================== The Work of the Spirit The injunctions in Ephesians 4:30, and Thess. 5: 19, do not apply to all men, but are addressed to believers only. The former warns those who are sealed by the Holy Ghost unto the day of redemption not to grieve Him; the latter exhorts the brethren to " quench not the Spirit;" to " despise not prophesyings." It is clear that the one regards the saint individually as to his own walk with God; the other guards him against hindering the action of the Holy Ghost in those whom He makes His mouthpiece. The striving of God’s Spirit in Genesis 6:1-22 evidently refers to the testimony given to the antediluvians, and especially Noah’s preaching for 120 years. Resisting the Holy Ghost is said of the Jews: "as your fathers did, so do ye." It was shown in their persecution and slaughter of the prophets, and crowned by their treachery against and murder of the Just One. With all their boast about the law, the land, and the temple, they had rejected in every age God’s testimony: "Ye do always resist the Holy Ghost." What man had done before the" deluge, was the dreary history of Israel, till they stumbled upon their own Messiah, refused Stephen’s declaration of His heavenly glory as peremptorily as they had scorned his own personal humiliation, and thus turned that which ought to have been a foundation into a stone of stumbling and rock of offense. But it was not the Jew only who was guilty. "He was in the world, and the world knew Him not." "Now is the judgment of this world: now shall the prince of this world be cast out." The personal coming of the Holy Ghost testifies of this. His very presence in the church on earth convicts the world of sin, etc. For He came down, as sent by Him whom the world had rejected instead of believing in. Of other sins no doubt the world was guilty, but this was the great sin in God’s sight. He had sent His Son, and the world hated His Son. They had now no cloak for their sin. Christ, rejected by man, glorified by God, sends down the Comforter to be in His own, and thus convicts all outside of sin; because if they believed in Him, they too would have the Holy Ghost. The passage does not speak of what the Spirit produces in the heart of every one who comes to a saving knowledge of God and His Son. It is rather the truth that the presence of the Holy Ghost in the church proves all without to be under sin and judgment, because of the rejection of Jesus, whom God proclaims to be the Righteous One, by receiving Him to His own right hand. May I recommend " a well-digested and full reply on this subject," in a little book entitled " Operations of the Spirit of God"? More details still may be found in " Lectures on the New Testament Doctrine of the Holy Spirit." ======================================================================== CHAPTER 104: VOL 01 - THEY DID EAT AND DRINK ======================================================================== They Did Eat and Drink Exodus 24:11.-Does this mean, as some make it, that they enjoyed a feast with Jehovah? " Also they saw God, and did eat and drink," means nothing more than this,-they lived; they were not struck down dead, It was expected that no one could see God and not die. " Manoah said unto his wife, We shall surely die, because we have seen God" (Judges 13:22). What was the origin of this thought? The conviction that Man, as he is, is so unfit for God’s presence, that to see God must be death to man. The death and resurrection. of Him who became man and died for us is meant to deliver the believer from such a feeling. He is indeed dead and risen with Him. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 105: VOL 01 - THEY SHALL RECEIVE YOU ======================================================================== They Shall Receive You Luke 16:9.-Dean Alford’s note is most objectionable in point of doctrine, as betraying no little ignorance of the true grace of God, whilst it displays also lamentable lack of acquaintance with the style of St. Luke. If one examine Luke 6:38; Luke 6:44; Luke 12:20; Luke 14:35, etc., he will perceive that Dean A.’s oversight of the usus loquendi has opened the door for the wild notion that poor and needy friends, who have been helped here, are to receive us into the, or their, everlasting tabernacles with joy. It is clear that the difficulty is no greater as to "they shall receive," in Luke 16:9, than in " they require" (ἀπαιτοῦσιν), in chap. 12: 20. The meaning is simply " ye shall be received," "thy soul is required: " if more be meant, it is God, not man, who receives and requires. The grand point is the sacrifice of the present, in view of what is future and eternal. The question is not the means or title to enter the everlasting habitations, but the character of those who shall be received there. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 106: VOL 01 - THIS GENERATION ======================================================================== This Generation Matthew 16:28.-I am of opinion that the application of these words to the destruction of Jerusalem is entirely unfounded, and that their true connection is with the scene of the transfiguration. They are consecutive in all three of the first evangelists; and 2 Peter 1:1-21 treats that scene, it appears to me, as a manifestation of Christ’s power and coming,-a sample of His future glory. James and Peter did taste of death, the one long, and the other shortly before Jerusalem was destroyed. Dean Alford is not correct in making ἠ γενεὰ αὕτη = " this race," because the race of Israel is not to pass away when all these things are fulfilled; but, on the contrary, Israel is then to reach its full blessing and glory as a people here below. The true force is, " this" (Christ-rejecting, unbelieving) " generation of Israel," not the mere existing generation, but such as bore the same moral fruits as those who then refused the Messiah. So they have continued, and will, till after the last delusions and judgment of Antichrist, when " there shall come out of Sion the deliverer, and shall turn away ungodliness from Jacob." " So all Israel shall be saved," when every threat of God has been accomplished, and grace has converted a new generation" the generation to come." The moral bearing Of the phrase, permit me to add, simply and satisfactorily accounts for God’s righteous judgment, in consequence of the blood shed from Abel downwards. Dean A.’s remark is sound against the application of it to the mere existing generation; but it almost equally disproves his own sense. Those who stood in the place of witness for God, as did Israel, not only suffered the consequences of despising His last testimony to them in Christ, but had required of them all the righteous blood shed from the beginning downwards. The same principle applies to Babylon in the Revelation: " In her was found the blood of prophets, and of saints, and of all that were slain upon the earth." In consequence of the position assumed, God will hold her responsible even for evil done before her existence. It is the principle of God’s corporate judgments. Individually, each bears his own judgment. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 107: VOL 01 - UNION IN INCARNATION, THE ROOT ERROR OF MODERN THEOLOGY ======================================================================== Union in Incarnation, the Root Error of Modern Theology THE subject on which I would engage the attention of your readers is one which affects the whole character and nature of Christianity, branching out into what is really infidelity on one side, and abominable heresies on the other; but held in its root principles by persons who would utterly reject both. It is found in the most highly esteemed ministers of the Free Church of Scotland and widely spread in it, in the Baptist Colleges, and taught by eminent Baptist ministers in the United States; elaborately developed in the revived energy of evangelicalism in Germany, whence it has passed in a gross Puseyite shape to the Dutch Reformed Church in the States. Its full doctrinal results were developed in Irvingism. The worst kind of infidelity is based on it, to which the German doctors approach wonderfully near. The question is this: Was Christ in incarnation united to humanity to renew it? or is the life of believers a wholly new life, in every case, and in the case of the church, believers united by the Holy Ghost to Him glorified? Those orthodox in the main take up only the renewal of the first man; the full-blown doctrine is Christ’s union with fallen man. It is a capital question; because one makes fallen man, the first Adam, that which is taken up of God for blessing as such, to which the Word therefore united Himself, and that (however sinless they may hold Christ to have been personally) in its sinful state, before redemption; the other looks upon man in the flesh as utterly rejected and lost; that Christ stood alone, though a true and very man, till He had accomplished redemption, and then, when He had accomplished it, a redemption available in justification and life to faith, before as after the cross, that a wholly new nature was given, in which man enters into the benefit of it, there being also in the case of the church actual union with Him glorified by the Holy Ghost, members of His body. The Wesleyans have not, that I know of, the doctrine of such union of Christ with fallen humanity, but they take up in practice its effect, with the assertion of some good in fallen man, and that what is wrought in salvation. is the setting right the first Adam, not the communication of a totally new life. The German doctors agree with them in this. Without it, they say, there is no " Anknupfungspunkt," no point to which grace can attach itself. Now God does act on man’s knowledge of good and evil, or conscience, but a new life is given. Christ, the last Adam becoming our life in contrast with the first, needs no " Anknupfungspunkt." Irving held that Christ, while sinless in word or deed, had a sinful human nature; lust, where the will did not consent, not being sin, as is held by Roman Catholics, Wesleyans, and a very great many others, as for example our modern perfectionists - a horrible error. The apostle Paul expressly makes sin the source of lust in Romans 7:1-25 It is an error which makes void the tenth commandment, as he there uses it. Christ, according to Irving, by the Holy Ghost kept sin in the flesh down, and so kept all His ways holy, and was perfect, and obtained thus the Holy Ghost for us, that we may do the same. The substitution of Christ as bearing our sins, and therefore dying for us, he expressly denied (and the truth of the atonement, viewed as substitution, is involved in the question), holding that He died because of what He was as a mortal man, not because of our sins. I need not go farther into his doctrine. Dr. Moody Stuart, late moderator of the General Assembly of the Free Church of Scotland says: "We are renewed in the whole man after the image of God," a most false presentation of what is said in Scripture, where the new man only is spoken of in Ephesians 4:24, as a new creation, in Colossians 3:10 as renewed in knowledge; but in both, the new man, in contrast with the old, he continues, " in mind, in will, in heart, and sin, bath not dominion over us, because we are under grace," carefully omitting "because we are not under law." Mr. M`Leod, Presbyterian minister in Canada, says: " They" (those whom he calls by a name of reproach) "falsely teach that in regeneration the old nature remains the same, the new is introduced. They speak of it as if it were the introduction of a new power into the soul, not as if it were the regeneration of the soul itself, as if the Holy Ghost created a new being, and inserted it into us; while the Bible teaches, not that any new power is added to the soul, but life from God is breathed into the Soul, as it were, or in the language of scripture, the soul is born again, passes out of its former state of unbelief and darkness, and enters into a new state of faith and holiness. All the powers of the soul are so affected as to be renewed, and to bring forth fruit unto God; " and, confounding Christ’s taking true humanity with union with humanity as a race, objects to saying, "between humanity as seen in our Lord and humanity as seen in us there could be no union." He says if so He could not stand in our stead, again confounding union and substitution whereas it was because He was alone in sinless humanity that He could stand in our stead. Dr. Bonar openly ridicules the idea of two natures, or anything equivalent to it, in the Christian. He indeed puts Christ in our sinful place, though sinless, all through His life. I will give an extract, from the discourse of a president of a Baptist College, of a sermon preached with applause at a convention and conference of Baptists, which will show the doctrine in its fullness and true root plainly stated, not saying that all have received every part of it, but as here presented in a full formal way. It is borrowed, sometimes almost verbally, from a German theologian, and has been reproduced in the same terms by one whom perhaps I might call the leading evangelical minister in Switzerland, at any rate in his own canton. It is current in a modified shape everywhere, even where its full bearing is not understood. It has been carried to its extreme results by Menken, in Germany, of whom I know little, and by Irving in England, of whom I know a great deal. Its effects, diluting Christianity and subverting the truth, prevail where, as I have already said, sometimes its true root is unknown and its just consequences utterly rejected; but their Christianity is mutilated and spoiled by it The sermon itself is a dream of Christ’s life, founded on the doctrine, of which there is not a word in Scripture, reproducing the German or Swiss I have alluded to. " Connected in every fiber of His nature with the common nature of mankind, He saw that He must suffer, the Just for the unjust. It could not be that human nature should fail of enduring the settled and necessary penalty of its sin, *and He not on]y had a human nature, but in Him human nature was organically united, as it never had been before, except in Adam; if the members suffer, should not also the Head? When He was but twelve years of age, the consciousness of this divine commission had dawned upon Him. (* Here we see how atonement is involved in it.) Sitting as an humble questioner before the doctors of the Law, the conviction had become overmastering; I am He, the teacher and prophet promised long ago.... I am He, the sent of God, the Son of God. And the eighteen years that followed had made this conviction part and parcel of His very being; growing with His growth, and strengthening with His strength, it had taken up into itself all the energies of His soul, conscious or unconscious, until His life and His work were identical, and He could say, Lo, I come to do Thy will, 0 God.’ " I will not pursue the wretched picture, created by an unscriptural imagination, which is given of Christ’s conflicts, through realizing what was before Him. Suffice it to say that it resulted in His consecrating Himself, and that as devoted to death, in His baptism by John. But as to this the preacher then takes up a third point, founded on Christ’s baptism by John..It is " a proof of Jesus’ connection with humanity, with its sin, and its desert of death, Jesus’ connection with human sin, and His consecration to death for the sins of the world; how clearly that stands out in the baptism!" " Jesus personally," he tells us, " and in every act and thought of His life, was sinless.... and here we come to the greatest mystery of God’s grace-4he person of Jesus Christ, and His assumption of the common nature of us all. If Jesus had no connection with a sinful and lost humanity, or if that connection with a sinful, and lost humanity had been merely a factitious and forensic one, then it would have been the greatest breach of justice, the sheerest insult to purity, the most extravagant of absurdities, that the Lord Jesus should have submitted to an ordinance which was in some sense a confession of sin, and a declaration that this sin deserved nothing less than death. My friends, we can never explain the baptism of our Lord, unless we remember that Jesus was ’made sin for us, *taking our nature upon Him, with all its exposures and liabilities, that. He might redeem it, and unite it to God;" not sinners, mind, but " it." " But this one mighty fact, the taking upon Him of our nature, does explain it. (* Note here the monstrous interpretation which I had heretofore supposed it impossible for any to hold, that "Him who knew no sin" means Jesus in His divinity; and " made sin" the incarnation, " that holy thing," not the cross and atonement then.) As one with humanity, He was about. to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself." I might go on with much more, but it is hardly needed. In all he says of John’s baptism there is not a word of truth. Actual sins, not sin in humanity at all, were confessed. Did Jesus confess such? In Him it was fulfilling righteousness entering in by the door. Jesus went, not with sinful Jews, but with God’s remnant, in their first step in the path God’s word had led them into, as the door of the kingdom. So far was John’s baptism from being to death, that not one who had been baptized of him would ever have put Christ to death. If all had received it, they would- have received a living Christ, Messiah; and He would not, as far as that went, have been put to death at all. But this is not my business now. Dr. Strong uses it as a proof of His doctrine. My business is with the doctrine itself, which is here pretty fully brought out, not by an adversary, but by an advocate of it; and that, not an openly heretical teacher, but one who speaks truth when he, conies to the application of it-a fair sample, in its best forms, of the system. "I also," he says, " must die to sin, by having Jesus’ death reproduced in me. I must rise to a new life, by having Jesus’ resurrection reproduced in me." I do not accept the form of this statement: still it connects itself with vital truth. But then comes the ground. " The putting away of the sin and guilt of humanity, which was the essential feature of Christ’s work, must take -place in me, and this I must do by having my life incorporated with His life." This really denies the atonement What is the guilt of humanity? But on its own ground this is quite unscriptural. Not I, says Paul, but Christ liveth in me (Galatians 2:20); but I do not now enter farther on this. The foundation is thus laid; "It was humanity that bore the curse in His death, and all the true life of humanity rose from the dead in His resurrection." He then puts our death and resurrection as a result of corresponding death to sin and resurrection to holiness. This is an unscriptural way of putting it, based upon the error I combat-the denial of our evil nature, always the same but reckoned dead already by faith and kept down through the Spirit by a totally new life. But I cannot pursue it here. It is a common way of putting it, and connected with reforming the old man, the root of all being now exposed in this doctrine; and cropping out all over the world; largely taught in the Free Church of Scotland, in various shades and degrees, sometimes not knowing what, it means, sometimes in its mere practical results; but likely to be widely spread by last year’s Cunningham Lectures on the χένωσις, or self-emptying of Christ, which are a developed index or "catalog raisonnee " of German speculations and heresy; where their effect too is already seen in the way the blessed Lord is spoken of, even by the author. How different, how contrasted with all this, is the calm and beautiful simplicity of the Scriptural account of Christ’s life. Let us see how Scripture states the incarnation. After stating (John 1:1-51) what Christ was (Οεὸς ἦν λόγος), John tells us (verse 14) what He became; the word was made flesh (σὰρξ ἐγἐνετο), and dwelt amongst us. So in Hebrews 2:14 : "As the children were partakers (χεχοινώηχεν) of flesh and blood, He also Himself in like manner took part (μετέσχεν) of the same, that through death He might destroy him that had the power of death." He became a man, was made a little lower than the angels, that He might die (Hell 2: 9). But His being born in flesh was by the power of the Holy Ghost, so as to be holy as so born (Luke 1:35). " The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the Highest shall overshadow thee; therefore that holy thing (τὸ ἅγιον) which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God." He was as to the flesh born of God, holy, Son of ’God; what was born of Mary was a holy thing. He was, by divine power and the operation of the Holy Ghost on that blessed and obedient handmaid of the Lord, born a holy thing, as man. This was not sinful flesh. He was (Galatians 4:4-5) γενόμενος ἐχ Γυναιχός, γένομενος ὑπὸ νόμον, that He might redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons. But this, in us, is thus the fruit of redemption. To as many as believed (John 1:12) on Him He gave authority to take this place, to none others. But to proceed. We have here no union with sinful humanity; but, what was wholly Unique, a sinless. man, born holy in a miraculous way. The place of sons for others belongs only to those who received Does Hebrews 2:1-18 lead to any other thought? "Behold I, and the children which God has given me;" only these are spoken of. These children were in flesh and blood; so He took part in it. But the objects of His doing So are carefully distinguished from the race. I am not questioning that Christ died for all; I -believe it. But His drawing all men was by His death, not by incarnation, but by what wrought redemption when man had despised and rejected Him, and the world was judged, and the whole of it lay in wickedness (1 John 5:19). He had to draw those (John 12:32) not united, but far from Him. But I have said the objects are carefully distinguished from union with the race. They are (Hebrews 2:1-18) the children God had given Him. He took up (took up their cause) not angels-what an occasion to speak of His connection with the race!-but He took up the seed of Abraham. As they were in flesh He took it, but not a word of union with humanity. But more than this, we have the positive statement of who those are who had part in this oneness. He who sanctifieth, and they who are sanctified, are all of one (ἐξ ἑνός),* and they are so as so sanctified. Death He tasted for every man; but union with man is unknown to Scripture. They speak of His being bone of our bone, flesh of our flesh; Scripture never. If the words in the New Testament (Ephesians 5:30) be genuine, we are of His flesh and of His bones when He is glorified. And in the Old Testament Eve was such of Adam, not Adam of Eve. In every form the theory is as false as it is mischievous. (* It is confined to those who are sanctified. They are εξ ὲνος.) The other quotation in Hebrews 2:1-18 confirms the same truth: "I will declare thy name unto my brethren," which was accomplished after His resurrection, as the 22d Psalm plainly intimates, and is so beautifully unfolded in its accomplishment in the 20th of John’s Gospel. The words which follow fully establish the point: " In the midst of the church will I sing praise unto Thee." The truth is, there is no such thought in Scripture as Christ being united to men or humanity. He was a true man, but there was no union with other men in their sins. Nor is union with humanity a Scriptural thought at all. The only connection with men, which can in any way ’be alleged or pretended, is in 1 Corinthians 11:1-34 " The-head of every man is Christ," but there it is power, not union, which is spoken of, relative position of dignity. The setting union previous to redemption work falsifies Christianity and the state of men.. The passage has been quoted, that we were " crucified with Him." This is indeed faith’s apprehension, and God’s apprehension of us as looked at as in Christ, inasmuch as He died- for us. But it only confirms the great truth I seek to establish. Who are the " we " or the " I "’ crucified with Christ? The believer, and the believer only! Were all the ungodly sinners who die in their sins, and never heard of Christ, crucified with Christ? That He was a propitiation for the whole world I read in 1 John 2:1-29, but there He was alone for others. It was done towards God, and the blood on the mercy seat opens the door of the gospel to all sinners. But this has nothing to do with union with the race. It was done for, not with them. When the title of Son of man is shown to belong to the Lord, how does He take it up? Through His death! The Father took care that, if men despised and rejected Him, the testimony to who He was should be there. The resurrection of Lazarus demonstrated Him Son of God; the riding in on the ass bore witness to the glory of the Son of David; then the Greeks come up, and the Lord says (John 12:23): " The hour is come that the Son of man should he glorified." Here the race is in question. " Verily, verily, I say unto you, except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone; but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit." Son of God and King of Israel He was, according to Psalms 2:1-12; but to take His place as Son of man, according to Psalms 8:1-9, in the glory that belonged to Him according to that title, He must die. His Spirit then enters anticipatively into that scene, and He warns His followers they must follow Him in that path, but bows in perfect submission to His Father’s will, seeking only His glory; and this, as it ever did, opens out to Him the vista of His glory which flowed from it; " I, if I-be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me." For in truth they were far away. So far was it from union, that it was as wholly rejected from the earth, lifted up and away from it, that He would draw men. When man had rejected Him utterly, and the world was judged in consequence (John 12:31), lifted up out of it; He, the crucified Jesus, through death, and by it, became the attractive point to all men in grace. The sin of man, in total alienation from God and the love of God, in redeeming power for such, must both be made manifest, and meet in the death of the Lamb of God, before there could be any bond between them. Redemption is the sole basis of blessing. A living Savior was, as in the world, Son of God, Messiah, entitled to be King of Israel. A Son of man who has died and risen again can alone take the world, and take it as a Redeemer and Savior. He who descended into the lower parts of the earth is the same that is ascended far above all heavens, that He might fill all things (Ephesians 4:10); and He, and in that character, takes the place and power in grace and glory which belongs to Him. So when His hour was really come (see verse 51 in Luke 9:1-62), and the disciples own Him as the Christ of God, "He straitly charged them to tell no man that thing, saying, The Son of man must suffer many things, and be rejected of the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be slain, and be raised the third day" (Luke 9:20; Luke 9:22); and then shows them His glory. No doubt as Son He quickens whom He will, and has, from Adam on; but He is not for us the life and the resurrection, but the resurrection and the life (John 11:1-57) Hence in John 6:1-71, where He is the bread οf life, He so insists on resurrection at the last day. It was on totally new ground, founded on His death, man could have blessing (verses 39, 40, 44, 53). He gives His flesh for the life of the world; and unless men eat the flesh and drink the blood of the Son of man, they have no life in them. Whoso eats that has eternal life. Union with men, and sinful men, without giving life or redemption, is a Socinian fable; unwittingly often I freely admit; but it is so. " Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground, and die, it abideth alone He took flesh and blood, but stood alone, quickening indeed, as Son of God, whom He would, but as man in the flesh, alone in the place He stood in, until by death He could righteously bring in others, and redemption (without which-save of course Himself-none could have to say to God) was accomplished. A Son of man, alive in the days of His flesh, in union with men, without giving life, and without justification or redemption, is unknown to Scripture; but a union with sinful man, giving life and redemption, or justification, before His death, is alike unknown to it. " I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all men unto me." A union of Christ with sinful man is wholly unknown to Scripture. What then was God doing with men before? Quickening souls assuredly from Adam. on; but in His dispensations with ’men testing their state for their own instruction; in the former world setting them in innocence in the Garden of Eden, where they fell, and then on to the flood without any special institution, though not without testimony. That world became so bad, that it was destroyed by the flood. Then came government in Noah in the new world; promise to Abraham called out from the midst of universal idolatry; the law, testing men and bringing in transgression; the prophets, to recall to the law and testify of Christ. Then God said, I have yet one Son: it may be they will reverence My Son. And when they saw Him they said, Come let us kill Him, and the inheritance shall be ours. Not only was man lawless without law, and a transgressor under law, but when grace came in the person of the blessed Son of God, they would none of it. The presence of a Divine person drew out the enmity of the heart of man against God: "Now they have both seen and hated both Me and My Father." So far from there being a link with humanity, or man as a race, it was the final test of their state: God come in grace, as a man in their midst. The result was: Now is the judgment of this world. Hence, in speaking of Christ’s death (Hebrews 9:26), it is said, "Now once in the end of the world (the consummation of ages) He hath appeared." Morally it was the end of man’s history; not the communication of life, hypothetically even, to a race, nor the taking it up into union organically; but the deliberate and entire rejection by that race of Him in whom was life. And so it is stated (John 1:4-5), " In Him was life, and the life was the light of man,"-emphatically such; " but the light shineth in darkness, and the darkness comprehended it not." "He was in the world, and the world was made by Him, and the world knew Him not. He came to His own, and His own received Him not." To as many as received Him, He gave title to be children; but they were born not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God (ver. 13). It had nothing to do with the first Adam and his nature; if He was received, it was in being born of God. Light had come into the world; and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil. That light was life, but with the testimony of John the Baptist, of Christ’s work, of the Father, of the Scriptures, whence they thought they had eternal life, they would not come to Him, that they might have life. There was no mixing the last and first Adam, no renewing the latter by the former, but the utter rejection of the former by the latter, and the judgment of a world convicted of sin by His rejection. Union in incarnation is a mystical and mystifying fable. Man must be born again. This leads me to the second point-the form this error takes when union with sinful man in incarnation is not so distinctly held as by the Germans and their scholars among Presbyterians and Baptists-namely, that nothing new is given to man; that the old and new man are not contrasted in the renewed man.; but that, there is simply a renewal of man as he is, in his affections, thoughts, and whole soul. Such is the Wesleyan doctrine. Such is the basis of perfectionism; such is the current doctrine amidst crowds of Christians and their teachers, exalting the first man to the losing of the full and blessed truth of grace in the Second. Amidst a large class, such as the Wesleyans, it has taken this form: man, body, soul, and spirit, was in a good state before the fall, in a bad state after it; then, by the operation of the Spirit, in a good state again. And thus, they consistently hold, a man may be born again ten times a week, and also be perfect; but it is the perfection of the first man, not of a Christ in glory, conformity to whom is alone spoken of as our goal in Scripture. With all classes who have these views, varying in details, lust is not sin, unless the will consents -a horrible, unholy doctrine; and denying that sin in the flesh is condemned, and the whole truth of the fallen state of man. But my part is to see and state what Scripture says as to this, not now to go into details as to the false doctrine itself. Possibly at the close, if there be any profit in it, I may state, from the respective writings of those who hold them, the views into which this evil root of doctrine has branched out. Scripture states distinctly that divine life is a wholly new thing given of God, always in absolute contrast with the flesh, for which death is the only remedy. I have been somewhat surprised at this truth being contested. Certainly some years ago the conflict of flesh and Spirit was generally owned amongst real Christians, if we must not except the Wesleyans. But our business is with the Word of God. First, I quote the well-known passage (John 3:1-36), "Except a man be born again" (ἅνωθεν), again In its origin and source, for ἅνωθεν means from the very beginning or starting-point, as in Luke 1:3, " from the very first." And this was in reply to Nicodemus, who thought he could be taught, and led right by teaching. Further, in insisting on it and answering Nicodemus, who did. not see how so totally a new life could be possible and puts the case of a natural new birth, the Lord declares that that which is born of the flesh is fleshy is of that nature, as every animal even is of the nature of that which is born; and that which is born of the Spirit is spirit-has its nature. Now the mind of the flesh (Romans 8:1-39) (not the carnal mind, as a condition of soul, but τὸ φξόνημα τῆς σαξχός) is enmity against God, is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can bi; so then they that are in the flesh cannot please God. They that are after the flesh mind the things of the flesh; but ye are not in the flesh, but in the Spirit, if so be that the Spirit of God dwell in you. Is not that a new thing altogether? And if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, he is none of His. So that all have not this new thing. And if Christ be in you, the body is dead, because of sin; and the Spirit is life, because of righteousness. Is not the Spirit being life, Christ being in us, a new thing? But again (1 John 5:11-12): " This is the record that God bath given to us eternal life, and this life is in His Son. He that hath the Son hath life, and he that bath not the Son of God. hath not life." Is not having the Son a new thing to the sinner? Not merely changing his affections and thoughts, but having the Son, we have life; not having Him, we have not life. Hence Christ says, " Because I live, ye shall live also" (John 14:19). He gives His sheep eternal life (John 10:1-42) He is that eternal life (1 John 1:2) which. was with the Father and was manifested to us. The last Adam is a life-giving Spirit (1 Corinthians 15:1-58) " When Christ, who is our life," says the apostle (Colossians 3:4); and again in Galatians 2:20, "Nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me." It is life which is given us, life in Christ in the power of the Spirit; the law "-that is, its nature and uniform character-" of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus." We are alive unto God in-not Adam, but-Jesus Christ our Lord (Romans 6:11). It is a well of water (John 4:1-54), God’s gift in Christ, springing up unto everlasting life, in its highest state of eternal glory. When the full Christian place is understood and enjoyed, there is a life of which God is the source. We are born of God through the Spirit, and the Spirit dwells in us, giving power and liberty in this life with God, and from sin, through the-redemption that is-in Christ Jesus. -But into this, blessed- as the subject is, I cannot enter here. Being by the word (James 1:18), that which is heavenly and divine, yet suited to, and, when in Christ, belonging to man, is. communicated for the sanctifying of the affections and thoughts, a nature having been communicated, when born of God, capable of enjoying what is thus revealed. " Of His own will begat He us, by the word of truth, that we might be a kind of firstfruits of His creatures." " We are born again of incorruptible seed by the word of God, which liveth and abideth forever" (1 Peter 1:23). Hence we are children of God by faith in Christ Jesus (Galatians 3:26). The things revealed by the Spirit (1 Corinthians 2:1-16) are communicated in words which the Holy Ghost has taught. And so far as man lives rightly, he lives by every word. that proceeds out of the mouth of God (Matthew 4:4). This quickening and forming of the Christian’s affections, by the word revealing things above, is fully acknowledged and, I trust, cherished by my readers, as by myself. But the examination of Scripture will show that the flesh, or old man, is an evil thing, gauged and rejected of God and of faith, accounted dead by reason of Christ’s death, but never renewed, never changed. Its history in Scripture shows it to be -hopelessly bad; lawless when left to itself, transgressing the law when placed under it; when Christ came in grace, hating and rejecting Him; when the Spirit dwells in a man, lusting against it, and, if he be taken up to the third heaven, seeking, if it had been permitted, to puff him up about it. We are not simply sinners, but sinners dealt with in long patience by God-a patience that has brought out the full evil of our heart; we are by nature the children of wrath. First, that which is born of the flesh is flesh (John 3:1-36), a positive specific nature, which has its own lusts and delights, such as they are. Its works are manifest-may be seen (Galatians 5:19-21). The mind of the flesh is enmity against God. The renewed mind knows that in me, that is in my flesh, dwells no good thing (Romans 7:1-25) The fruit of the Spirit is in formal contrast with -its works; not only so, but it lusts against the Spirit, and the Spirit against it, and these are contrary the one to the other (Galatians 5:17). They that are after the flesh mind the things of the flesh; but if we live after the flesh, we shall die. If through the Spirit we mortify its deeds-for it is a nature which has its deeds-we shall live (Romans 8:1-39) Is there any forgiveness, any amelioration, any remedy applicable to it? None! All sins, with one exception, can be forgiven; but there is no forgiveness of an evil nature. God, sending His own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh and for sin, has condemned sin in the flesh (Romans 8:3). It is the nature and standing of the first Adam, and, when we are in this, we are said to be in the flesh. What then is the remedy? Is there none? One only, if remedy it is to be called,-death. It was condemned in Christ’s death, as we have seen in Romans 8:3. (not that He had any of course, but as made sin for us); but that, if it was its condemnation, was also death. He that has died is justified from sin. (Romans 6:1-23). I am crucified with Christ,. nevertheless I live; but not I, but Christ liveth in me (Galatians 2:1-21.) They that are Christ’s have crucified the flesh, with its affections and lusts (Galatians 5:24). Knowing that our old man is crucified with Him (Romans 6:6). If ye be dead with Christ (Romans 6:8). Ye are dead, and your life hid with Christ in God (Colossians 3:3). Hence the very place of faith is to reckon ourselves dead to sin (Romans 6:1-23 A.1), and, as the flesh is still in us which lusts against the Spirit, to bear about in our body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life of Jesus may be manifested in our body (2 Corinthians 4:10). Christ having died, it is, for faith and the life of Christ in us, as if we had died, and we reckon ourselves dead, crucified with Him; dead to sin, dead to the law, crucified to the world, and the world to us, Christ lives in us, alive to God-not in Adam, for our old man is crucified with Christ, but-in Jesus Christ our Lord. Scripture is as uniform and as clear as it possibly can be. There is the-flesh which--lusts against the Spirit, things contrary the one to the other; but we are entitled and bound to reckon ourselves dead, inasmuch as in us, that is in the flesh, there is no good thing. But Christ being in us, the body is dead because of sin (its only fruit, if we are alive in the flesh), and the Spirit life because of righteousness. Hence we say we have put off the old man, which is corrupt according to the deceitful lusts, and put on the new, after God created in righteousness and true holiness, renewed in knowledge after the image of Him that created us. And note, it is not merely the deeds, but the old man with his deeds; the truth as it is in Jesus is the having done so and having put on the new man. The first part of the Epistle to the Romans treats of guilt and forgiveness, through Christ having died for our sins; the second, our having died with Him, so that by Him we might live to God. Scripture is clear in the contrast of flesh and Spirit, the old man and the new; but we are entitled to hold the first for dead, and our life to be Christ and not the flesh. Also before God, we are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if so be the Spirit of God dwell in us (Romans 8:9). To deny that a new life is communicated to us, and that the old man, the flesh, is always contrary to the Spirit, is to deny the plainest testimonies of Scripture; while our privilege and duty, if indeed the Holy Ghost dwells in us, is to know that we are in Christ, not in the flesh, and to reckon ourselves dead, the old man crucified with Christ, seeing His death is available to us for that also. The perfect result will be our being like Christ in glory, as was shown to the disciples in the transfiguration. Nor is there any other perfection for the Christian than this: only we are to realize it here, Christ in us the hope of glory; and if Christ be in us, as our life, is not this something wholly new, and contrary to all that the flesh is? We are in Him for acceptance, He in us for life and walk. If my reader would see this life fully developed, let him read Colossians 3:5-17. Let him note that in 2: 20 our death with Christ is laid-as the basis where our being alive in the world, in the religious aspect, is not allowed; and in 3: 1 our being risen with Christ. We are associated in life with Him risen, now that He is glorified, our life hid with Him in God. No thought of sustaining the old Adam-life, nor taking it up into Him, or infusing His into ours by a kind of incorporating power; but, on the contrary, we are dead and gone as to this, and Christ is our life, and so belong to heaven, where He is, though not yet there. This only remains to refer to, the positive testimony that our union is as believers with Christ in glory. We have seen it already, when speaking of the alleged union of Christ with us in incarnation (Hebrews 2:1-18), that only they that were sanctified were of one with Him. But there remains some positive evidence to notice. In John 14:1-31 the promise of the Comforter is given, expressly upon the ground of Christ’s being gone on high,-as in John 7:1-53, the Holy Ghost was not yet [given] because Jesus was not yet glorified. When He was come, as we read in John 14:1-31, " In that day ye shall know that I am in my Father, and ye in me, and I in you." Who? Humanity? No, the disciples only. The Comforter was not for the world,-" whom the world cannot receive, because it seeth Him not, neither knoweth Him; but ye know Him; for He dwelleth with you, and shall be in you " (John 14:17). And this is the more definite, because in the early part of the chapter the Lord speaks of the Father being in Him, and He in the Father, but not of the disciples being in Him, or He in them. This belongs to the present time, when Jesus is glorified, and the Holy Ghost come. The same great truth is brought out in Romans 8:1-39 There is no condemnation for them who are in Christ Jesus; but this is through the presence of the Holy Ghost, the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus, consequent on the death of Christ. " Ye are not in the flesh but in the Spirit, if so be the Spirit of God dwell in you. Now if any man have not the Spirit of Christ, He is none of His;-and if Christ be in you-," etc. Here is union, and through the Spirit; Christ being glorified, we in Him and He in us. So in 1 Corinthians 6:17, " He that is joined to the Lord. is one spirit." " Now He which stablisheth us with you in Christ, and hath anointed us, is God, who bath also sealed us and given the earnest of the Spirit in our hearts" (2 Corinthians 1:21-22). So "if any man be in Christ, it is a new creation; old things are passed away, all things are become new; and all things are of God, who hath reconciled us to Himself by Jesus Christ " (2 Corinthians 5:17-18). So in a more special character of this union, the being members of His body, it is to Christ as raised from the dead by God’s power and set at His right hand, and we by the same power quickened with Him, and raised together, and made to sit together in heavenly places in Him. Thus God has given Him to be head over all things to the church, which is His body, the fullness of Him who filleth all in all. So -indeed in Ephesians 2:12-18. So in the fifth chapter, connected. with the comparison with the husband and wife, and Eve’s union with Adam. So it is largely developed in 1 Corinthians 12:1-31 as a system established here on earth, that it is by one Spirit we are all baptized into one body, to which Christ, and those united to Him by the Spirit, are compared. The whole groundwork of the New Testament, and the truth taught in it, is that Christ, though a true man,. was alone until He had accomplished redemption; and that then, when He was glorified, we are in Him, united to Him, by the Holy Ghost, He the head, and we the members.. John gives us our being in Him. individually; Paul also our corporate union with Him, the Head, as living members of His body (He, the Head, being glorified on high). Christ’s union with sinful humanity is an anti-scriptural fable. The life the Christian receives is a wholly new one; he is born again. That which is born of the flesh being flesh, that which is barn of the Spirit being spirit. He that hath the Son hath life; he that hath not the Son of God hath not life. God sent His only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through Him. There is no renewing or ameliorating of the flesh; it is enmity against God and cannot be subject to His law. Our union is with Christ glorified, in a new life in Him, through the indwelling of the Holy Ghost, of whom our bodies are the temple, and against whom the flesh always lusts. Let me add that God, in His history of man, has shown what flesh is, and even the creature left to himself. The first thing man has always done is to spoil what God has set up good. Man himself-the first thing we read of him is eating the forbidden fruit. The first Noah did, after offering thanksgiving for his deliverance, was to get drunk. Israel made the golden calf, before Moses came down from the mountain. Nadab and Abihu offered strange fire the first day after being consecrated, and Aaron never went into the holy of holies in his garments of glory and beauty. The son of David, Solomon, loved many strange women, and the kingdom was divided. The Gentile head of gold persecuted the godly, and became a beast, characterizing the empires that followed him for the seven times. What shall we say of the church? How soon did all seek their own, not the things of Jesus Christ, and forsake the devoted and faithful apostle! John could say, "There are many antichrists, whereby we know that it is the last time." But God has worked on in grace, in spite of this, to show what He is, His longsuffering and goodness and patience. So all those things-man, the law, the priesthood, royalty in the Son of David, He that rises to reign over the Gentiles, His being glorified in His saints-all is made good in its place in the Second Man, the last Adam. May His name be eternally praised! As is the earthy, such are they also that are earthy. As is the heavenly, such are they also that are heavenly. And as we have borne the image of the earthy, so also we shall bear the image of the heavenly. And in the ages to come God will show the exceeding riches of His grace in His kindness towards us in Christ Jesus. I speak of man’s evil, not surely to delight in it, but that we may so know it, and that in conscience, that we may take, through grace, Christ instead of ourselves, and be occupied with Him. I cannot but recall to the reader what this system involves -that " Christ, who knew no sin, was made sin for us," means that Christ, having been sinless in His eternal divinity, was made sin in being made man. By. whom? Not when He offered Himself without spot to God, but He was made a bad sinful being by God, when coming into existence in this world! ======================================================================== CHAPTER 108: VOL 01 - WESTMINSTER CONFESSION OF FAITH ======================================================================== Westminster Confession of Faith April 10, 1877. I MIGHT as well have replied to your last letter at once, and said that I had no desire to wade through the " Westminster Confession of Faith," or whatever else it may be called, with any purpose of writing about the book itself, in detail. Personally there was nothing in it which could have profited me, either for "communion in the truth" with Christ, or in service for Him, as gathering souls to Him where He now is! Controversially, it presented a temptation, but this I refused; so that the whole matter has been authoritatively ordered (as they say elsewhere) " to lie on the table." It caught my eye this morning, and upon looking it through again, I am more confirmed in the futility, and one might add the fatality, of creeds from Scripture; and of confessions of faith from creeds; as well as of catechisms (large or small) from confessions; were it only for the simple but obvious reason that God in His wisdom and grace has given us exactly the revelation of Himself and of His Son that most suits His own glory and our blessing, both now and hereafter; and this is contained in what we rightly call " the word of God." There is, however, another reason, and of great importance, as. regards " this book," which comprises " the Westminster Confession of Faith "-that, even supposing it drawn from the whole word of God by "the assembly of divines," however learned and godly they may have been, yet it could only in result be the minimum of what would satisfy them to agree upon (that is, if they were expected to be unanimous); and this came out at last, as the fruit of their labors, in " a creed published and proclaimed by authority." The word of God was in this way set aside, and conscience as well as faith interfered with, in their distinct and direct exercise before God, upon the revelation He has made of Himself to us as a whole. A. very serious question arises out of this, viz. that if the truth of God’s own word is reduced to the minimum of what will satisfy an " assembly of divines and others," what becomes of the maximum upon which they could not agree together? Evidently this maximum is in the word of God itself, and the minimum, both in quality and quantity, is only what suited the spiritual perceptions or the moral mind of the assembly. Nor is this " assembly of divines " fair to itself and its own reputation, for the few (upon this graduated scale of theological investigation) who would rise higher than the many, must necessarily compromise their own convictions, and yield their judgment to the lowest, if unanimity is demanded. Or, if a majority is allowed to be decisive, still the question remains, decisive of what? It is a very solemn alternative, in all such assemblies thus convened, that the maximum (which is God’s) is the precious thing sacrificed; or, if not yielded up, who gets it? Certainly none of the churches represented by this convocation in England, Scotland, or Ireland, for they accept the Confession of Faith, and "the minimum" of what the divines could agree upon. My question is again repeated on behalf of the truth and of God and His word-Where is "the maximum" gone? and who is he that has craftily got it away from the members of Convocation, and cunningly substituted "the shields of brass" for the golden shields of Parvaim which adorned the temple in the days of Solomon, when "the glory of God " dwelt therein? It will be melancholy to pursue this subject farther, and to speak to you of " the covenants-the national and solemn league -the engagement of duties-directories for public worship-form of church government-with the Acts of Assembly and Parliament relative to and approbative of the same," which all lead men back into the wrong world, upon the fatal principle of reducing a thing by its lowest term to its lowest quantity! In continuance, let me ask you, or any Christian who knows the maximum, and maintains it by separation from these convocations (with all else who by grace will), What are the terms " agreed upon by this assembly of divines at Westminster, with the assistance of commissioners from the Church of Scotland "? One of their title-pages expresses these terms, " as a part of the covenanted uniformity in religion betwixt the churches of Christ, in the kingdoms of Scotland, England, and Ireland; " and, moreover, "ratified and established by Acts of Parliament," etc. Upon this showing, and according to this rule, these churches cannot be " the body of Christ;" it is openly a worldly system, and for man as a citizen of the earth. God’s maximum is lost. That is to say, a believer in Christ, in union with " the Last Adam" in, life and righteousness, as Head of the new creation of God, is dropped out; so also is the Lord in heaven, as " Head over all things to the church, which is His body, the fullness of Him which filleth all in all;" as likewise the abiding presence of the Holy Ghost, come down from the glorified Christ at Pentecost, to dwell in and baptize the members into this unity upon earth. Endeavoring to keep " the unity of the Spirit" in the bond of peace is not even in their minimum, to say nothing of "the bride," and "the marriage of the Lamb." As for the blessed hope of the Lord’s coming, and "the taking-up of the saints to meet Him in the air," it is outside this vaunted Confession of Faith and its catechisms, as well as "the sum of saving knowledge," etc. In vain do you look for the coming of " the Son of man in glory," when He shall take to Himself His great power and reign over this world, and order it in righteousness and universal blessing for every creature; till finally " He will deliver up the kingdom to God, even the Father, that God may be all in all." Indeed, most of what concerns the purposes and counsels of "the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ,’’ both as to the heavens and the earth, whether now or hereafter, are left behind in the maximum of divine revelation. We may well say to each other, How could such disclosures come out, under "an ordinance of the Lords and Commons assembled in Parliament, for the calling of an assembly of learned and godly divines and others for the settling" of the government and liturgy of these national churches of England and Scotland; as also "to establish, ratify, and confirm the Presbyterian Church government and discipline by kirk sessions, presbyteries, provincial synods, and general assemblies"? The order of God for the earth in the millennium, by the restoration and conversion of Israel under the rule and reign of the Lord the Messiah, as well as the future blessing of the Gentiles through them, when gathered to " Jerusalem, the city of the great King," and the deliverance of creation from its groaning into "the glorious liberty of the sons of God," might also be adduced in proof that what most concerns the manifested glory of God and of Christ, in the midst of His earthly people on this earth (and the binding of Satan, and casting him into the bottomless pit), have no place in this compendium " done at Westminster and in Edinburgh." It is lamentable to see that in this conclave "of divines and commissioners assembled in the chapel called King Henry the VII:s Chapel, aided by committees deputed by both the Houses of Parliament," the new order of manhood set up in the risen and glorified" Second Man," at the right hand of God in heaven, as the beginning and Head of a new race of men, "whose bodies are the temples of the Holy Ghost" on earth, has been entirely overlooked. The new order of God in a heavenly sphere and by a new system, of which the ascended Son of man is become now the center and Lord, passes into the same oblivion, as a matter of course, or rather as a necessary consequence of the former. All that is set apart and called out by God in grace to form and distinguish this new order of creation, in heaven above and the earth beneath, presently with Christ in manifested glory and blessing, is in eclipse. The necessities which required our being "born again" as men, to see what the natural eye had not seen, or to understand what the heart had never conceived, in this new order of things " which God has prepared for them that love Him" for present enjoyment and communion with Christ, are, alas! overlooked, because the objects themselves are out of mind, and catechetical examinations substituted. How could it be otherwise? They follow as naturally as cause and effect; nor is this all the mischief, for " the anointing and unction of the Holy Ghost," whereby a saint is competent "to understand the things that are freely given to us of God," slips away with the new birth. Earth takes the place of heaven, and the first man becomes the object of interest, instead of the Second Man "in the glory of God" on high. As a consequence, Christ is reduced to these sacraments and ordinances, or else connected with forms of worship and ceremonial observances authorized by divines, and established by houses of Parliament, for the populations of England and Scotland and Ireland, and for "man in the flesh" coming from anywhere else. Thus "the fine gold is become" not merely " dim," but turned into dross and corrupted, and Christianity proper is dragged down to the very level of Judaism, as regards God and man, upon the footing of the Decalogue; as though this standing remained an unsolved problem, and Christ had not accomplished redemption from under its curse, and its very principle, hundreds of years ago. I need secarcely remind you that a Christian’s charter runs thus: " Sin shall not have dominion over you, for ye are not under law but under grace." In fact, these churches recognize man as under the law and covenant; and yet put his offspring into sacramental grace by baptism. It is true the minister only declares this rite " to be the admission of the party baptized ". into outward privileges, against which I have nothing to say. But he then affirms "it to be a sign* and seal of the covenant of grace; of his in-grafting into Christ; of regeneration; of remission of sins," etc. He thus openly takes the blessings, which belong only to a Christian by faith in Jesus Christ, as born of the Spirit; and confers them upon one who is as yet merely in the flesh. Surely this is not in our " confession of faith," but a sorry departure from the "grace and truth" of the gospel. (*See " The Confession of Faith," chapter 28.) Thus, all that God has done to redeem man by blood, and lift him up to His own glory with " the Son of His love," who is already there as the forerunner, has been so obscured by this combination of human wisdom and legislative authority as to lie " a maximum" wrapt up in the word of God, for those who make it their confession of faith and hope. Practically I repeat that this " covenanted uniformity " finds its starting point and gets its motive power from the little babe, an infant of days, born of the flesh; with its parents, and godfathers and godmothers, its sponsors, etc., on the one side; and on the other, there stands the Ecclesiastic to declare "the remission of sins, and an ingrafting into Christ," by the assumed efficacy of sacerdotal and sacramental grace, as administered to a sucking child! Only stop the nurse and the infant at the church door, and the minister’s hands are empty; yea, all this imposing machinery would be at a stand-still.* (*Our correspondent is not what is called a Baptist, though writing thus.) If there were no infants brought to be baptized, there would be no proper boys and girls for "the Shorter Catechism," nor recognized adults for " the Larger." In vain would they into Christ," by the assumed efficacy, religously educated, to bring under the obligations and covenants suited to riper years " and greater capacity." But enough I have merely sought to show that what was " approved by the General Assembly, and ratified and established by Acts of Parliament, as the publick and avowed confession of the Church of Scotland, with the proofs from the Scripture " (see the title-page to the Confession of Faith), does not recognize a believer as " a citizen of heaven " now, and one with the Son of man in glory-" not of this world, even as Christ was not of the world." On the contrary, this book and its contents, from cover to cover, recognizes " man in the flesh," from his very infancy, and makes provision for his advancement by the means and appliances we have examined: and by giving him " the law as a rule of life" (which life?) he is encouraged and stimulated by vows, covenants, and solemn leagues, to prove the strength of this life in the flesh, and what the man is worth who goes through it to despair, and the cry " 0 wretched man that I am I" It is the opposite of the Christian who begins as a dead man in this world-alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord -and one with the risen Lord in heaven the Second Man; having his citizenship and his affections where Christ sits. There are two classes or companies now, as there were when Paul wrote to the Colossians. To the one he said, " Ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God.... Mortify therefore your members which are upon the earth," etc.; and this is surely Christian position and unearthly practice still. To the other Paul says, " If ye be dead with Christ from the rudiments of this world, why, as though living in the world, are ye subject to ordinances (touch not, taste not, handle not, which all are to perish with the using) after the commandments and doctrines of men?" and this is as surely " ritualism." The heavenly system of God’s new order, with the Second Adam at its head on high, and the old earthly system, " with its worldly sanctuary" and man in the flesh alive upon the earth, mistaking death and life too, as known in Christ, and therefore subject to ordinances, are the two subjects brought before us by all these considerations. May the Lord open the eyes and ears of His beloved ones, that they may take their places with the departed Lord and find their present position where He has found His, in the Father’s love; and live out " the life of Christ" on earth, the little while we wait for Him. The Holy Ghost came down from heaven at Pentecost to bear witness to the glorified Son of man on high; and to gather out and quicken the members of Christ into life and union with the Last Adam, the head and beginning of God’s new order of manhood, and of another creation in the heavens. " Outside the camp to Jesus, bearing His reproach," is our present opportunity, and the refusal of this "covenanted uniformity in religion" affords a fine occasion to any exercised conscience for getting out of forms, into the truth of the Church. Any one who, by faith and communion with Christ through the truth, sees what the nature and calling by the Holy Ghost of the "church of the living God" really is, upon this earth, has got the light by which to contrast this " covenanted uniformity in religion " with our real unity in Christ by divine revelation from the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, and to put himself right. What a mercy when one discovers this difference, and gets out of the old order. of God for the earth into His new order in Christ for the heavens I One step, and a bold one, clears the distance by simple obedience to His revealed’ mind and will. Uniformity in religion for Scotland or England must needs be accompanied by a Public Confession of belief; sustained by its appointed ordinances, and an ordained clergy in ministry, on behalf of the people. Moreover, such a religion requires to have its " worldly sanctuary, as by law established," for the performance of all its offices and functions; and goes upon the arithmetical principle of church-extension, to meet the requirements of an increasing population! But where, in all this, is "the faith once delivered to the saints "? And, what is become of "the faith of God’s elect, and the truth which is after godliness "? Yea, who are " God’s elect," and where may they be found? What in these last days is " the faith " for which we are to contend? are questions for grave and individual consideration before the Lord! ======================================================================== CHAPTER 109: VOL 01 - WHAT THE CHURCH CONSISTS OF ======================================================================== What the Church Consists Of If certain views as to what " the church’.’ consists of are asked to be clearly stated, I cannot better fulfill this request than by giving the following extracts from a writer deeply versed in these subjects:- The Word of God presents to us a church formed on earth by the power of the Holy Ghost come down from heaven when the Son of God sat down there in glory, having accomplished the work of redemption. This church is one With its Head; it is the body whereof Christ, ascended on high and seated on the right hand of God, is the Head. (Ephesians 1:20-23; Ephesians 2:14-22; Ephesians 3:5-6; Ephesians 4:4-16; 1 Corinthians 12:12-13; John 12:32; John 11:52.) The same Spirit, who, by the means of those whom God chose, had called sinners and communicated life to them, has also united them in one body, whose Head is the glorified Christ, and of which the Spirit Himself is the bond with Christ, and in which He serves as the bond between the members one with another The church, then, is a body subsisting in unity here below, formed by the power of God, who gathers His children in union with Christ its Head; a body which derives its existence and unity from the work and presence of the Holy Ghost come down from heaven as the consequence of the ascension of Jesus. What is described in Ephesian, and defined as the church, is a state of things impossible to exist before the death and resurrection of Christ as its basis, and the presence of the Holy Ghost as its formative and maintaining power. Any definition we could give of it, according to Ephesians, supposes these two things. The Spirit of God, there, treats Jews and Gentiles as alike children of wrath, speaks of the middle wall of partition broken down by the cross of Jesus, the actual exaltation of Jesus above all principality and power, and us raised and exalted with Him; and both Jew and Gentile reconciled in’ one new man, in one body by the cross, and builded together for an habitation of God through the Spirit; so that there is one body and one. Spirit. It is declared, consequently, that " now unto principalities and powers in heavenly places is made known by the Church the manifold wisdom of God." There are two great truths dependent on this doctrine: the church united to Christ in glory accomplished hereafter; and meanwhile, as far as existing or developed on earth, the habitation of God through the Spirit. This is its calling, of which it is to walk worthy; a calling clearly impossible from its very nature, till the descent of the Holy Ghost made it such an habitation. That the saints will all be gathered into everlasting blessedness as partaking of Christ as their life, and redeemed by His blood, according to the counsels of God, and conformed to the image of His Son, is owned. They are all redeemed by blood, and all quickened by divine life. But the doctrine insisted on is this: that, Christ having broken down the middle wall of partition by His death, and ascended up on high, and sat clown on the right hand of God, and thus presented the full efficacy of His work in the presence of God, the Holy Ghost has come down and united believers in one body, thus united to Christ as one body; which body is in Scripture designated the Church, or assembly of God, and is His habitation through the Spirit. In this, as founded on the risen and exalted Savior, and united to Him, as seen on high, by the Holy Ghost, there is neither, Jew nor Greek. Christ, as exalted, is entirely above these distinctions; Jew or Greek are alike brought nigh, as having been children of wrath, by the blood of that cross by which the middle wall of partition has been broken down. Hitherto God had saved souls. At Pentecost He gathered His children into the assembly on earth; He added daily to the Church such as should be saved. It is no longer salvation merely, nor even the kingdom. God begins to form His Church here below (Acts 2:1-47). To make the Church a company of believing Jews, with Gentiles added to them, and Abraham’s seed their proper definition, entirely shuts out this divine teaching, because the position given to the Church in Ephesians entirely precludes their being, looked at as Jews; and the character of "Abraham’s seed" comes in merely to show they are true heirs of promise, because they are Christ’s, who is the seed of Abraham and Heir of the promises. But, most clearly, this is altogether the lower ground on which to speak of Christ, in comparison with His glorious exaltation at the right hand of, God, on which the Church as such is founded..... No one can read the Ephesians attentively without seeing that the Church, as one body existing on earth, though heavenly in privilege and character, takes its place consequent on the work of the cross, the exaltation of Jesus to the right hand of God, and the coming down of the Holy Ghost. Hence to give any definition of the Church which implies its existence (other than in the counsels of God), which speaks of its existence on earth (e.g. during the life of. Christ on earth, or previous to His exaltation and the descent of the Holy Ghost), denies its nature, and sets aside its character Those who compose the Church have other relationships besides. They are children of Abraham. But these latter characters do not weaken what has been stated, much less do they annul it..... 1 Corinthians 12:1-31 describes the Church.... as one body on earth. So Ephesians 1:4.; Colossians 1:1-29.... While then one would sympathize with the godly dread some may feel at anything which seems to affect the salvation of a11 saints from the beginning, and the electing love of God in respect of them, it is well, on the other hand, to call things by their right, 1:e. scriptural, names. The Spirit of God is infinitely wiser than man, and our business is to see, follow, and admire His wisdom, as in other matters, so here. He has restricted the title "Church of God," in a New Testament sense, to those who are baptized with the Holy Ghost. Such is a brief exposition of the views in question, which, to my mind, carry scriptural proof along with them. But what I contend is, that the view which makes the church of God embrace believers in all dispensations is wholly devoid of such proof. It is in vain to reason, against the plainest and fullest testimony of God’s word, that "all saints are equally and similarly justified by faith.... alike called saints.... the names of all written in one book, the Book of Life." These similarities, which are not denied, are by no means inconsistent with the place of the church as the body and bride of Christ. But when it is pronounced that " the new Covenant Church " (a term not found in Scripture) "has no higher place assigned it than participating in the blessings of faithful Abraham," the entire teaching of Scripture, above referred to (in Eph., Col., etc.) is set aside. It really then becomes a question of spiritual intelligence, if not worse. This objection is ignorance of or opposition to Scripture. As to Hebrews 12:22-23, we must adopt not only with some of the best critics, but with the most ancient versions, as the Syriac, Vulgate, etc., the punctuation χαὶ μυρίασιν, ἀγγέλων πανμγρει, χαὶ ἐχχλησίᾳ, πρ. χ. τ. λ. It is confessedly required by the structure of the whole portion of which every paragraph is commenced by χαί. So that the attempt to make this passage show "the general assembly " and " the church " as identical is a failure. No doubt we read of " the church in the wilderness." But ἐχχλησία simply means an " assembly" or " congregation.", In Acts 19:32; Acts 19:39; Acts 19:41, the confused meeting of the Ephesians cannot mean the church of God, yet it is called ἡ ἐχχληςἰα. So "the church in the wilderness" ought rather to have been " the assembly" there. It means, unquestionably, not the church of God, but the congregation of Israel, almost all of whose carcases fell in the wilderness, and to whom God sware that they should not enter into . His rest. It is said again: " Besides, He was slain from the foundation of the world." A comparison of this passage (Revelation 13:8) with Revelation 17:8, where the same persons and circumstances are referred to, makes it evident that " from the foundation of the world" should be connected, not with " the Lamb slain," but with " the names written in the book of life." It is thus plain that the arguments, whether of one adversary or of another, have no weight when examined. And yet they are among the principal ones against the view which, in my opinion, Scripture so plainly sets forth, viz. that the body of believers, gathered from the day of Pentecost until the time when Christ shall come to take. His heavenly people to Himself, has, while sharing many fundamental blessings with all the redeemed, a distinct calling and privileges of its own, and alone has the title assigned to it of." the church of God" or Christ’s body. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 110: VOL 01 - WHO ARE "THESE KINGS?" ======================================================================== Who Are "These Kings?" ======================================================================== CHAPTER 111: VOL 01 - WHO SHALL CONFIRM COVENANT? ======================================================================== Who Shall Confirm Covenant? Daniel 9:27.-I believe that it is impossible legitimately to connect the death of the Messiah with the covenant confirmed with the mass, or many, for one week (1:e: 7 years) in this passage, and that for several reasons:- First, The Messiah was already regarded as " cut off" at the close of a previous division of the weeks, viz. after the first 7 + 62 = 69 weeks, or 483 years. Secondly, The disastrous end of the city and the sanctuary is supposed to have come before the seventieth week begins. (Compare the conclusion of verse 26.) After the Messiah was cut off and before the last week, it will be noticed by the careful reader that there is an interval of indefinite length, filled up by the destruction of Jerusalem and the temple, and a course of war and desolation which is not yet terminated. Thirdly, After all this comes the last, or seventieth week, which has to do with "the beast" as clearly as the first 69 weeks bring us down to Christ’s death, the interruption of the chain being left room for, and supplied, in the latter part of verse 26. Fourthly, It is clear that when the Messiah has been cut off, another personage is spoken of " as the prince that shall come," whom it is absurd to confound with the Messiah, because it is his people who ravage the Jewish city and sanctuary; that is, it is a Roman prince, and not the promised Head of Israel. Fifthly, As this future prince of the Romans is the last person spoken of, it is most natural, unless adequate reasons appear to the contrary, to consider that verse 27 refers to him, and not to the slain Messiah: " and he shall confirm covenant" (not "the" covenant, as the margin shows). Sixthly, This is remarkably strengthened by the time for which the covenant is made, namely, for seven years, which has, in my opinion, no sense if applied to anything founded on the Lord’s death, but exactly coincides with the two periods of the earlier, and the later half-weeks, during which the Roman beast acts variously in the Apocalypse. Seventhly, It is yet more fortified by the additional fact, that when half the time of this covenant expires, " He shall cause the sacrifice and oblation to cease," just as might be gathered from Revelation 11:1-19 and other Scriptures. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 112: VOL 02 - 1CO_9:1-27; 1CO_10:1-33 ======================================================================== 1 Corinthians 9:1-27;1 Corinthians 10:1-33 There is no doubt that ἀδόχιμος has its simple force of " reprobate" or "good-for-nothing." I never could find out the difficulty people have found in it. There is no difficulty in being a preacher and oneself rejected, and that is all he says. I only add that when the wilderness comes in, as he goes on. to introduce it here in Chapter 10, it must be crossed, and the ifs come in. I have not a shadow of doubt that God will keep His own to the end: 1 Corinthians 1:1-31, John 10:1-42, and other passages are far too clear, thank God, to leave a doubt. But we have to be kept, The wilderness forms no part of the counsels of God, but of His ways. No transit is found in Exodus 3:1-22; Exodus 6:1-30, or 15. His purposes will be infallibly accomplished; but more-Christ could take the thief to Paradise from off his cross perfected by His one sacrifice, and we can say " Giving thanks to the Father who hath made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light." We are in Christ and Christ in us. There is no " if " there, and no condemnation. But as a general rule God makes us pass through the wilderness. There (Deuteronomy 8:1-20) He humbles us and proves us to know what is in our heart, only learning what is in His, that He withdraweth not His eyes from the righteous. He does not suffer our foot to swell, nor our clothes to wax old. What we learn then is not salvation: that is the Passover, the Red Sea, and Jordan. But we learn dependence as our part; we learn to know ourselves and be humble, and we learn the sure watchful faithfulness of God-"kept by the power of God through faith;" but we have to be kept, and, if His, surely will be. But why kept if we had not need of it? No one can pluck us out of Christ’s hand; but why say this if there was not real danger, and keeping of us in it? The wolf catcheth (same word as plucks) the sheep and scattereth them, but cannot catch them out of Christ’s hand; and here our responsibility comes in, our dependence on Him, our leaving ourselves to His infallible care; and one is as precious as the other is necessary. Hence, wherever the journey is spoken of, " ifs " are found: when righteousness and our place in Christ, never. In verse 10 he goes on to put this to the Corinthians. Many were delivered out of Egypt and fell in the wilderness; but he does not say many were true believers, and fell in the wilderness. When I can talk of beginning and end, I find if Where one is in Christ, that is not the case; nor if righteousness and justification are spoken of. " By one offering he hath perfected forever." Let me add to this note a remark, wherever falling is spoken of in Hebrews, it is always fatal and hopeless, drawing back to perdition. It is never a fall, but " falling away." Christ’s priesthood in heaven is not for sins; but that we may not sin. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 113: VOL 02 - 2PE_1:19-20 ======================================================================== 2 Peter 1:19-20 Prophecy is a lamp in a dark place, this world, and refers to events happening in this world and the judgments of God. It is therefore well to take heed to it. When the day is come, it will be Christ revealed in judgment on the world, and resulting blessing (compare Malachi 4:1-6). But there is a better hope for those who watch, and in contrast with judgment: the dawn, and the morning star, not seen by these who are only blessed when the sun is risen, but by such as look for Christ in peace and longing desire before He appears, who are therefore not merely warned and detached from earth, but associated with Christ in heaven. The sense has been sought to be helped by two suggestions. First, one well known proposed to read part of verse 19 as a parenthesis, thus--" We have also the prophetic word more confirmed [1:e., by the transfiguration], whereunto ye do well that ye take heed (as unto a light that shineth in a dark place until the day dawn and the daystar arise) in your hearts," thus connecting " in your hearts " with " take heed." A similar parenthesis, it was argued, is found in 1 Peter 3:21. But one has only to read the latter text to see that no such parenthesis is found there, nor, as far as I am aware, anywhere else in St. Peter’s Epistles. But if it were the fact elsewhere, it is inadmissible here, where it simply destroys the true thread of truth, and connects what stands really in contrast. For the prophetic word, confirmed by the transfiguration, is but as a lamp in this dark scene, to which the saints do well to attend, until daylight (such as the gospel sheds in Christ, heavenly light) dawn and the daystar (Christ, the morning star of Christian hope) arise in their hearts. Though believers, it did not follow that these brethren of "the circumcision," used to Old Testament prophecy, had got real hold of the heavenly hope, and Christ the center of it. The apostle taught them to heed the prophetic word as a useful lamp, till they got that better light from above in their hearts. For it is a question, both here and in 1 Peter 3:21, of the affections now, and not of the actual accomplishment in power at the coming of the Lord. No doubt this lamentable mistake was acted on in Bagster’s reprint of what professed to be Scholz’s text, in the English Hexapla, and the Critical Greek and English New Testament. But this was the unauthorized, and, I think, rather improper doing of the suggester. Another conjecture was offered by the late Mr. H. Craik, which equally severs "your hearts" from that which precedes; but it connects the words with what follows, " in your hearts knowing this first," etc. Now not only does this take away " in your hearts " from the words bound up with the phrase most appropriately and to spiritual profit, but it gives a connection which is unmeaning and unsuitable; and not in harmony with 2 Peter 3:3, where a similar formula stands without any such addition, as it should be here, and is in the authorized version, and in all correct translations ancient and modern. The error of both suggestions is that they would make prophecy not merely a lamp for the path but a matter for the heart, whereas this is due only to the heavenly hope and Christ Himself. And the and logy of Peter’s style in 1 Peter 3:1-22 and in 2 Peter 3:1-18, fairly considered, refutes each respectively. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 114: VOL 02 - ATONEMENT AS SET FORTH IN THE OLD TESTAMENT ======================================================================== Atonement as Set Forth in the Old Testament SACRIFICES were instituted at a very early date after the fall. " By faith," we read, "Abel offered unto God a more excellent sacrifice than Cain " (Hebrews 11:4). The knowledge acquired, and the practice of offering sacrifices survived the flood, and Gentiles as well as Abraham’s descendants had their altars, on which they were offered. By and by they will again take place, and God’s altar at Jerusalem will be sprinkled daily and annually with blood, though for centuries no sacrificial victim has been offered on any altar of divine appointment. From the first, it would appear, that the burnt offering character of sacrifice was known and adopted, the whole animal being presented to God, and consumed on the altar, though it is not till after the flood that the: character of the offering is described. Noah, we learn, on the occasion of his leaving the ark after the flood, offered on the altar which he erected burnt offerings of every clean beast, and of every clean fowl (Genesis 8:20). We can understand, therefore, how this character of offering came to be generally known, before the special regulations about sacrifices were communicated by Moses to Israel. And, as around the altar erected by the patriarch, there were assembled with him all the members of the human race which had survived the flood, to acknowledge with thankful hearts their preservation from the judgment that had overtaken kinsfolk, friends, acquaintances, and the rest of Adam’s descendants who had seen the commencement of the deluge, it is clear how the knowledge of sacrifices could have been carried abroad over the earth. Abraham and Isaac were familiar with them (Genesis 22:7-8). Job in the land of Uz resorted to them (Job 1:5). Balak, king of Moab, and Balaam of Mesopotamia, were cognizant of them (Numbers 23:1-30) The Phοenician worship of Baal demanded them (Jerem. 19: 5). And Chemosh, the god of Moab, it was thought, accepted them (2 Kings 3:27). And for various reasons were they offered. Job had recourse to them, when he feared his sons had sinned against God. His three friends were commanded to bring them, because they had not spoken rightly of the Almighty (Job 1: 42.) And Balak, when seeking to obtain his desire that Israel should be cursed, offered a bullock and a ram on each of the seven altars, which by the prophet’s command. he had built on the high places of Baal. After a time sacrifices of a different character were introduced in addition. Thus Jethro took a burnt offering and sacrifices for God, when he visited Moses and Israel in the wilderness, and heard from the lips of his son-in-law all that the Lord had done to the Egyptians on behalf of His chosen, and now ransomed people (Exodus 18:12). And Moses, on the occasion of the ratification of the covenant, sent young men to offer burnt offerings, and to sacrifice peace offerings unto the Lord (Exodus 24:5). Clearly then there was already a recognized distinction between burnt offerings,צֺלוֺח, and sacrifices, וְבׇחִים; and peace offerings too, שְלֵמִי, had been introduced. These last, however, are only mentioned in connection with Israel. What had been the patriarchal custom,-whether, like Jethro, they sacrificed other offerings in addition to, or distinct from the burnt offering-is not made known to us. Jacob indeed offered sacrifices, זְבׇחִים, at Beersheba on his way down to Egypt (Genesis 46:1). But it is. not till we reach the book of Exodus that we have the two plainly distinguished. And as we peruse its pages, another feature of sacrificial ritual, very prominent in the law, and highly instructive to us, is presented to our notice. Throughout Genesis we have mention of altars and sacrifices, but never of blood in connection with the victims. Blood in this connection is first noticed in Exodus, and is dwelt on at length in Leviticus. Redemption by blood, and atonement by blood, are subjects of divine revelation communicated by God’s servant Moses. For redemption as treated of in the Old Testament has to do with the nation, whereas in the New Testament it is set forth as concerning individuals. The nation had therefore to be in existence before redemption could be known and enjoyed. Atonement by blood requires a priest to effect it. Priesthood had therefore to be instituted before it could be made. To the Old Testament teaching on atonement let us then now address ourselves. (*For though the verb is not so translated in the Bible, it seems to bear the sense of covering in Arabic. Once met with in Kal (Genesis 6:14), wherever atonement is expressed by the verb, it is always in either the Piel, Pual, Hithpael, or,, as some would add, Nithpael voice.) But what are we to understand by atonement? In Hebrew there is one word used to express it, the primary meaning of which is said to be to cover.* All then, that was requisite to cover the people’s sins before God is included in the idea of atonement. Until after the giving of the law the verb is not met with in this strict doctrinal meaning, though the noun derived from it, and translated "ransom,"is used by Elihu in Job 33:24. With the verb the patriarchs were well acquainted, for Jacob gave utterance to it when he said of Esau his brother, " I will appease him," אְַכַפְּרׇהפׇכׇיו (lit. I will cover his face), " with a present." The flocks and herds destined for Esau were so to cover his face that he should no longer view Jacob in the light of a supplanter, and wreak his vengeance upon him. That was Jacob’s thought, who as a man acted thus towards his fellow-man. We can understand this as between man and man. The offender may know how to appease, and turn aside the wrath of the one against whom he has sinned. But who shall determine what can make atonement for sins committed against God? God only can do that. And in Scripture God alone declares it. This is at once fitting and gracious. It becomes Him to do it. He is gracious in doing it. He has compassion on His sinful creatures, and provides an atonement for their sins. To palliate, or to be indifferent to them, would not be like God. To provide an atonement, whereby He would be righteous in dealing with sinners in grace, and in casting all their sins into the depths of the sea,-this is worthy of God. But, till God spoke of it, what could make atonement for sins committed against Him, was unknown, and by consequence unprovided for. Substitution in some measure was understood, as the history of Job, already referred to, sets forth (1: 42.) The sacrifice offered up for those who had sinned, it was known, would preserve them from being dealt with according to their folly. But atonement in the Old Testament is more than this, though involving it. Propitiation is included in it, as Levit. 16. makes plain God then must teach men about atonement, if their sins against Him are to be rightly dealt with, and they are not to suffer the just consequences of them in eternity. God too must provide the sacrifice to make atonement, if any is to be effected on behalf of His erring creatures. This Elihu in the book of Job teaches in connection with God’s ways in government. " Deliver him," he represents God as saying, " from going down to the pit. I have found a ransom " (33: 24). But the book of Job will not teach us, what God afterward made known by Moses, that atonement by blood can alone deal with the question of our sins before Him. Who would have understood this, had not the Lord revealed it? And the occasion and channel for revealing this God reserved to Himself to determine. So the first, who used the verb ID3 in its doctrinal sense of making atonement, was the Lord God Himself. From His lips (Exodus 29:36) that word in this sense first fell. "God commendeth His love towards us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us," is the statement of Romans 5:8. In perfect keeping with this we find, that God was the first to speak of atonement by blood. Thenceforward in the Law, in the Prophets, and occasionally in the Psalms, we meet with the verb frequently translated "to make atonement." Asaph, making mention of God’s dealings with Israel in grace, recalls to mind how many a time He, being full of compassion, forgave יְבַפֵר(lit. covered) their sins (Psalms 78:38). The godly remnant of the future, desiring restoration to their land and to divine favor, will find provided by the Spirit of prophecy suited language for them to take up before God (Psalms 65:3; Psalms 79:9). They will look to God to purge away their sins. As a sinful people they will confess that God alone can do it; for though typically under the law atonement was made once a year, the real atonement was a thing of the future. And nothing less is in store for the faithful remnant of Israel than the results of the atoning work of Christ on the cross being applied to them both nationally and individually. As a nation they will want it (John 11:51); as individuals they will enjoy it (Isaiah 53:6). For nothing short of atonement by blood can give a sinful people a standing, and the conscious enjoyment of it, before the throne of God. By that alone, according to Old Testament teaching, can the sins of God’s people be covered. And now, keeping in mind during the progress of our inquiry that the original meaning of the verb, כׇּפַר is to cover, the reader should understand that it has been translated at times, to reconcile (Leviticus 6:30; Leviticus 8:15; Leviticus 16:20; Ezekiel 45:15; Ezekiel 45:17; Daniel 9:24); to purge (Psalms 65:3; Psalms 79:9; Ezekiel 43:26); to forgive (Deuteronomy 21:8; Psalms 78:38; Jeremiah 18:23); to be merciful (Deuteronomy 21:8); to cleanse (Numbers 35:33); to pardon (2 Chronicles 30:18); as well as to make atonement. Sin is a grievous thing, and the consequences to men who commit it, whether governmental or final, are terrible, unless God provides a means whereby atonement can be made for the offense. The sinner is therefore entirely in the hands of Him against whom he has sinned. If God appoints that which can make atonement, well and good. If He does not, the iniquity of the offender can never be purged. Thus the iniquity of Eli’s house was not to be purged (יחְכֵּפֵּר) with sacrifice nor offering forever (1 Samuel 3:14). Isaiah speaks of those whose iniquity would not be purged till they died (22: 14). And Jeremiah asked God not to forgive the sins of his persecutors (18: 23). What a solemn thought this is! In what a position does the sinner stand with God! No thoughts of man, no suggestions of his own heart, will here avail. God’s thoughts are the thoughts he really wants to be made acquainted with, to learn whether an atonement can avail on his behalf. Now there are cases in which Scripture pronounces, with a clearness which none can gainsay, that no atonement will be accepted for those to whom they refer (Mark 3:29-30; John 3:36; 2 Thessalonians 1:9). Thank God the sinner’s case is not irremediable if he hearkens to God, for the instances referred to are of those who reject the divine testimony. But the remedy must be prescribed by God, and submitted to by the offender. "By one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin." Man therefore has forfeited all claim to continuance of life on earth, because he has sinned against God. In the garden of Eden God warned Adam of this, and in that same garden. He pronounced on man his doom, as far as this world is concerned: "Dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return." But life here is not everything. As an immortal creature man exists, and must exist, forever. Therefore, as a sinner by nature, another question arises, viz, the condition of his everlasting existence. Can he have everlasting life, or must he forever and ever have his part in the second death? Can he, though he have sinned, have a standing in God’s presence by means of atonement, or can he not? These questions it is in the province of God’s word to answer. It does answer them satisfactorily, and exhaustively. God has provided the needed atonement; but it is atonement by blood. Now, atonement in the Old Testament is viewed in two distinct lights; the one in connection with God’s ways in government upon earth, the other in connection with the standing both of individuals, and of the people of Israel before Him. Pursuing our inquiry in this order into the Old Testament teaching on the question in hand, we learn that, in connection with God’s governmental ways, it divides- itself into two parts. The one treats of atonement made to prevent governmental dealing; the other shows us how atonement was made to arrest the progress of it, after it had begun. Instances of the former are furnished, as in Exodus 30:15-16; Numbers 8:19; Numbers 31:50; Numbers 35:33; Deuteronomy 21:8. Examples of the latter are found in Numbers 25:13; Numbers 16:46-47; 2 Samuel 21:3. When the Israelites were numbered from twenty years old and upwards, the age at which they were able to go out to war, and were regarded as having grown up to man’s estate, and fit for the service of life (Numbers 1:3; Numbers 14:29; Leviticus 27:3; 1 Chronicles 23:24; 1 Chronicles 27:23), they were commanded to bring every man a bekah, or half shekel, to make atonement for his soul, that "there be no plague among them" (Exodus 30:12). God thus provided to ward off His hand in government, if they would acknowledge His goodness and mercy to them by the bringing of the stipulated sum. Judgment is His strange work, in which He does not delight, but to which, if His people are disobedient, He must have recourse. But how gracious to make known the terms on which He would withhold it! How calculated this was to remind them to whom they belonged! Would they glory in their strength and ability to act as they chose, reckoning on their strength from their numbers? They were to acknowledge to whom all their strength of manhood and numbers were due, else a plague might break out to emasculate, and decimate the people. How often this command was obeyed, and God’s gracious purpose towards His people carried out, we have no means of ascertaining. Far on, however, in the history of the kings of Judah, we have a notice of it, which shows that it had not wholly fallen into abeyance; for Jehoash assigned the produce of this tax, called " the money of every one that passeth the account," along with others enumerated by the historian (2 Kings 12:4), to swell the fund to be collected for the repair of the house of the Lord* (*Compare Exodus 30:13, צל־הַפְּקֻרִיםהׇצֺבֵרכׇּל,with 2 Kings 12:4 (5 in Heb.), אִ٠שׁצוֺבֵרכֶּםֶף. See also Exodus 38:26.) In another way God provided for His people to shield them from governmental dealing. He took the Levites in the place of the first-born of Israel, on whom He had a special claim (Numbers 8:16-19), " to do the service of the children of Israel in the tabernacle of the congregation, and to make an atonement for the children of Israel, that there be no plague among the children of Israel, when the children of Israel come nigh unto the sanctuary.". What care on God’s part did this evince for the welfare and immunity from judgment of His ransomed, but stiffnecked, people! All the people were redeemed, and the first-born were God’s in a special manner; but He chose the Levites, and gave them to Aaron and to his sons to do the service of the children of Israel in the sanctuary, that governmental dealing should not be called into exercise by reason of any of the children of Israel coming nigh the tabernacle of the congregation (Numbers 1:53; Numbers 18:22-23). So on no plea, or pretext, were any of Israel, apart from the tribe of Levi, to come near to the tabernacle. Now this injunction was not issued after the attempt had been made, and had ended in a terrible disaster. It was issued by God, and Moses announced it, as the provision made by the Lord, to avoid the occurrence of that which must otherwise have taken place. On another occasion God accepted an offering, voluntarily presented to Him, to make atonement for the warriors of Israel. They had gone out to war with Midian by God’s direction. They had prospered by God’s help. They returned without a gap in their ranks, a striking proof of God’s special goodness. Wherefore, of their own accord, after numbering the people, and ascertaining the mercy bestowed on them, the officers presented an offering from the spoil of 16,750 shekels in weight of gold, to make an atonement for their souls before the Lord (Numbers 31:50). They desired to acknowledge that their lives were in God’s hand, and to His care they owed their preservation from injury and slaughter. Had they shared in this signal favor without acknowledging it, they might justly have feared the divine displeasure. By their offering, which God accepted, all fear of judicial dealing was removed. As men, they were no better than the Midianites whom they had slain. By this action they owned it, but by it made atonement for their souls. Prevention, however, would not always have met the case. They were a rebellious people, so governmental dealing had to take place, and they had to learn, by bitter experience, what it was to sin against God. But when divine wrath was deserved, who could avert it? When it was outpoured, who could arrest it? If it was righteous in God to visit on the offenders their sins, how could His hand in government be rightly withdrawn till all the guilty had perished? As regards the sinners, their condition was helpless, and their only resource was in God, for Him to act in mercy, if He could consistently with His righteousness, and stay the plague when it had already commenced. Scripture history records that He could, and He did. In the plains of Moab this was seen, as well as in the desert of the wanderings. At Shittim Israel had joined themselves to Baalpeor, and committed whoredom with the daughters of Moab. A plague in consequence had broken out amongst the people, and 24,000 died from it. The action of Phineas, however, stayed it, when he slew Zimri, a prince of Simeon, with Cozbi, a daughter of Midian, and thus made atonement for Israel (Numbers 25:1-18; Numbers 13:1-33). A man had been found to vindicate God, by taking part against offenders in Israel. With that the Lord graciously arrested the judgment, which was doing its direful work in the camps of the people. Because of judgment executed on an offender the congregation were spared that day. But there were circumstances into which Israel had brought themselves at another moment of their history, when action of a different character had to take place for God to stay His arm, then lifted up in wrath. After the rebellion of Korah, Nathan, and Abiram had been dealt with, the congregation murmured against Moses and against Aaron, and accused them of killing the people of the Lord. In a moment, without any warning, the plague began. And nothing could stem the tide of judgment, and shield the survivors from the death which threatened them, but the intervention of the high priest with a censer full of burning incense, lighted from the fire of the altar. At the suggestion of Moses Aaron ran, for the matter was urgent, and thus atonement was made for the congregation (Numbers 16:46-47). The arrest of the plague at Shittim took place when a man was found to take God’s side against that of his own people. The plague was stayed in the wilderness, when Aaron with his lighted censer stood between the dead and the living. Those who had died were beyond recovery, for them no atonement was possible. For the living only could Phineas or Aaron interpose, for governmental dealing was all that these two were concerned with. Zeal- for God was seen in the one, and the merits of Christ set before God were displayed in type by the other. Thus the congregation were preserved from reaping the fruits of their ways. Again, in the reign of David there was a famine in the land three years, year after year. God was dealing with them for some sin,-that was clear; so what it was, and how to turn aside God’s hand from them, were questions of the deepest importance. For if God restrained the fruitfulness of the earth, man could only wait till He was pleased to bless its increase. On this occasion then, as on the others, God was their only resource. But it was sufficient.; for on David inquiring of the Lord he learned the reason of the famine, and speedily discovered the way to stop it. The execution of children and grandchildren of Saul by the Gibeonites atoned for that king’s breaking faith, and slaughtering the Hivites, and God was entreated for the land (2 Samuel 21:1-22). This was a special case, though in perfect keeping with that provision in the law for cleansing the land from blood where the murderer was known. Under such circumstances there could be no atonement for the land, except by the blood of him that shed it (Numbers 35:33). But there is more than governmental dealing to which men are liable. There is another, and a deeper question to be settled, than the continuance, or not, upon earth of those who have sinned against their Maker. There is an existence which survives death, and which temporal death cannot touch. " It is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment " (Hebrews 9:27). A question then of all importance is raised for each individual who has failed in obedience to God (and who is there, who could Say he had not?): What shall be his condition of existence in eternity? One alone can give the answer to that, and He has given it. At the threshold, then, of an inquiry of this nature we must cast behind us all men’s thoughts on the subject, and as learners hearken to what the Holy One has to say about it. A position this is, which man in his pride kicks against, but which he who is really wise accepts. A new feature now presents itself, for our attention is directed by God to the positive need of atonement by blood, since " it is the blood," we read, " that maketh an atonement for the soul " (Leviticus 17:11). Hithereto, in the instances of atonement to which we have turned, we have not met with the mention of blood. Atonement in connection with governmental dealing might be effected without blood. Atonement in connection with the sinner’s real position before God, whether in type or not, is only accomplished by blood. " For the life of the flesh is in the blood; and I have given it to you upon the altar, to make an atonement for your souls." Let us mark the grace here indicated-" I have given it to you." God, against whom we have sinned, provides that by which atonement for our sins can be made. He provides it, and He reveals it. Now this was something quite new; for accompanying this revelation there was a special enactment, made for Israel and the stranger who dwelt among them, against the eating of blood. Not that this was the first occasion on which God had forbidden it For just after the flood He forbade Noah and his sons, and through them the whole, human race, to eat blood: assigning as a reason, that the life of the flesh is in the blood (Genesis 9:4). But no penalty was then annexed to any infraction of the command. In Leviticus 17:1-16 it was different. The reason for not eating blood, given by God to Noah, was not forgotten, for Moses in Leviticus 17:1-16 mentions it; but another reason against it was appended, and a penalty was attached to non-compliance with the precept. Thenceforward atonement by blood was regarded as a cardinal doctrine, and the people were never to forget it. For this God made provision, and in the first year that Israel existed as an enfranchised people on earth they heard about it (Exodus 29:36). As long too as they shall continue to be God’s earthly people, throughout the millennium, they will remember it (Ezekiel 45:18-20). At the new moons, throughout the paschal feast, at the feast of weeks, and again during that of tabernacles, atonement was to be made for the congregation, as well as at the feast of trumpets, and on that solemn day in their ecclesiastical calendar, the day of atonement. Thus, they never could present themselves at their annual festivals before the Lord without being reminded as a people of their need of it. On the eighth day of Aaron’s consecration it was first made for all Israel (Leviticus 9:1-24) When the sons of Zadoc shall resume their ministrations at the altar, they will afresh be reminded of atonement. During the week of the consecration of Aaron and his sons atonement was made for the altar of burnt offering (Exodus 29:36-37). In the temple, as described by Ezekiel, the same thing will again take place (Ezekiel 43:20-26); for they will purge it, rump. Annually too on the tenth day of the seventh month the high priest made atonement for the golden altar, and for the tabernacle which was among them, " because of the uncleanness of the children of Israel, and because of their transgressions in all their sins" (Leviticus 16:16). Thus of the defiling nature of sin Israel were continually being warned. But not only were the congregation taught about it, the individuals in Israel were made frequently to feel their need of it. God brought it home to the consciousness of every one amongst them. Had it been only a national want, individuals might never have felt their responsibility and personal condition; but when any one had sinned, or trespassed in a way which admitted of an offering for his sin being brought to the altar, he was made to feel that he personally had need of atonement, even if no one else was in a similar position. The man, the Israelite, had to acknowledge, that he was thrown wholly upon the mercy and gracious provision of his God. Now all would understand that in certain cases this was but right. They had, however, to learn that for the congregation, or any individual who sinned unwittingly, atonement was needed (Numbers 15:25; Numbers 15:28), as well as for a trespass committed against the Lord (Numbers 5:8). Sins of ignorance called for atonement as well as sins done wittingly, if indeed for such the law had made any provision. For few were those, out of the catalog of what men would generally call sins, for which any offering could be brought by the offending Israelite. For presumptuous sin nothing was awarded the one guilty of it but death. David felt that when he uttered to God those words, "Thou desirest no sacrifice, else would I give it Thee; Thou delightest not in burnt offering" (Psalms 51:16); and Nathan acknowledged it, when he said to the king, " Thou shalt not die" (2 Samuel 12:13). This, which perhaps is little understood, deserves to be well considered, if we would estimate aright the relief of being not under law, but under grace. But, further, the leper on the day of his cleansing confessed publicly his need of atonement (Leviticus 14:10-20), as the priest presented him with his offerings before the Lord at the door of the tabernacle of the congregation; and the Nazarite, who had sinned by the dead, had also to acknowledge that he stood in need of it (Numbers 6:10-11). Cases these were very different to outward eyes, yet for each of them atonement was required. The leper on the eighth day of his cleansing, and the defiled Nazarite on the eighth day of his cleansing, stood in ’need of atonement by blood. In the case of the leper, it was his leprosy which had made him unclean,-the working out of what was within him; in the case of the Nazarite, he was defiled by a man dying suddenly near him. This was defilement from without, and defilement against which, very probably, he might not have been able to guard himself; but no plea, which he could urge, would have availed to release him from the obligation of approaching the altar of burnt offering with his pair of turtle doves, or two young pigeons-the one for a sin offering, the other for a burnt offering-to make atonement for him, " for that he sinned by the dead." Was a man or a woman afflicted with an issue in the flesh? For such, too, a sacrifice for atonement was demanded on the eighth day after its cessation (Leviticus 15:1-33) In each of these cases we have mention made of the seventh day, and of the eighth day. The seventh day marked that a full period had elapsed since the defilement had taken place, or the uncleanness had ceased. The eighth day, as the one on which each was to bring his offerings for atonement, marked the commencement of a new period of time, from which each was to live to God. A mother, too, each time she became one, had likewise to present herself before the Lord with an offering which confessed her need of atonement (Leviticus 12:7). Now, what was there in common in these cases, that in each of them it was required? Why were the Nazarite and the mother, for this purpose, put on common ground with the leper and the one who had been afflicted with an issue? None of the children of men would surely thus have classed them. And, indeed, we may go further, and say that in none of these cases would men, unless taught of God, have understood that there was any need for atonement. In God’s eyes, however, they all required it, yet none could effect it on his own behalf. Each had to confess the need of it by bringing the sacrifice appointed, but, when brought, the priest had to deal with the blood. On the ministrations of God’s priest they were all dependent; atonement by blood they all required; for in these cases it was the outflow from man’s nature, which in God’s eyes is uncleanness, that necessitated the bringing of the offering. This the leper, the one with an issue, and the mother, had all to acknowledge. Besides this, as death is connected with sin, it is in itself an unclean thing; so the Nazarite, who by his consecration had been set apart for God, found himself defiled if a man died suddenly near him. Again, as the priests at their consecration brought a bullock for a sin offering, so the Levites came with a bullock for a similar purpose, to make atonement for their souls, when they were set apart as wholly given to God from among the children of Israel (Numbers 8:12). God could not take up the one class or the other without this acknowledgment of their condition, and this confession of their need. And if any one among the children of Israel was moved in his heart to bring a burnt offering to God, he, too, was reminded ’that, if filled with gratitude for favors received, it was not for his personal worthiness God had thus dealt with him, for the animal he offered was accepted for him to make atonement for him (Leviticus 1:4). How varied, then, were the occasions on which atonement was made. In seasons of rejoicing as well as in seasons of personal affliction it had to be effected. The happy mother was reminded of it, the rejoicing Israelite could not forget it. The one on whom God had laid His hand required it, as well as the Nazarite defiled by the visitation of God coming suddenly on one by his side. And the priest, and the Levite, when set apart for God’s service, confessed their need of it, as did the man who had sinned, or had committed a trespass against the Lord, or against his neighbor. But, if God was thus teaching His people their need, He never left them in doubt as to the sacrifice they were to bring. Here again we have to remark His goodness, and thoughtfulness. None had to ask himself with what should he appear before the Lord. The divine word had prescribed it all beforehand, that, as soon as the individual was aware of his need, he might offer that, which, he well knew, the Lord would accept at his hand. Now by three kinds of offerings could atonement be made, viz. by burnt offerings, by sin offerings, by trespass offerings, but not by meat offerings, or peace offerings, though in the case of the burnt offering there was offered its accompanying meat offering (Leviticus 14:20; Numbers 15:1-11). This, however, was quite distinct from the meat offering proper as set forth in Leviticus 2:1-16, as the reader should bear in mind; for after the entrance of Israel into their land no burnt offering was complete without its accompanying meat offering, God thus directing that in that sacrifice the life, as well as the death, of His well-beloved Son should be delineated in type before Him. The specific offering in each case God, we have said, prescribed. If it was a burnt offering, there was liberty to bring any animal which could be offered in sacrifice, with this one proviso, that, when it was of the flock, or of the herd, the victim in each case was to be a male. In the case of a sin offering, or trespass offering, special provision was made; and He, who judges righteously, took note in the sin offering at times of the responsibility, and at times of the ability of the offerer. Thus, if a sin was committed through ignorance against any of the commandments of the Lord which ought not to be done, a bullock was to be brought, a kid of the goats, a male, or a female lamb, or kid, according as it was the anointed priest, the congregation, a ruler, or a common person, who was guilty. From this rule there was no appeal; the offering varied only with the class in Israel in which the delinquent was found. God thus took note of their responsibility, measuring it by a just measure, but He could pass over in none a sin even of ignorance. Hence, if the anointed priest, or the whole congregation had sinned in this way, the largest offering was to be brought on their behalf, whereas for a common person the Lord appointed the one of least value to be offered. In Leviticus 5:1-13, certain other sins are specified for which an offering was required. Here the ability of the offerer was taken into consideration. The man’s position in life under these circumstances made no difference. Each one had to bring the same sacrifice, unless his temporal circumstances precluded him from procuring a female lamb, or kid. In that case he might bring two turtle doves or two young pigeons-the one for a sin offering, the other for a burnt offering. But were he too poor even for that, then he might bring for a sin offering the tenth part of an ephah of fine flour, which was an omer, equal in measure to about five pints. In a country where corn was plentiful, and the land was divided amongst those inhabiting it, this would doubtless have been within the compass of the poorest of the people. And to such an one God gave the comforting assurance, " It shall be forgiven him." How gracious was this. No one, therefore, not even the poorest in Israel, had to leave God’s altar after bringing his appointed sin offering, without the word of God, as it were, ringing in his ear, "It shall be forgiven him." Purging by blood was the normal rule, and in the case of the true Sacrifice we know how that has been carried out; for in Him "we have redemption through His blood, even the forgiveness of sins." God, however, met the poor sinner in Israel by prescribing that he should offer an offering according to his ability, though nothing short of the death of the Lord Jesus Christ could really atone for that poor man’s sin before God. For a trespass offering a ram was required, whether the trespass was committed through ignorance or not (Leviticus 5:15; Leviticus 6:6; Leviticus 19:22; Numbers 5:8). At the great festivals the sin offering was a goat, offered up for all the congregation of Israel; so it was on the eighth day of Aaron’s consecration, when first a sin offering was sacrificed for the people. For the Nazarite, or the one afflicted with an issue, the smallest offering in which blood was shed was appointed, even two turtle doves, or two young pigeons, because the defilement God could not overlook, it must be atoned for. In the case of the leper, and of the woman after child-birth, God considered their circumstances. For the woman a lamb was the normal sacrifice, but, if she was too poor to procure it, the two birds already noticed were to be taken in its stead. It was of this gracious provision that Mary the Virgin availed herself-a declaration on the one hand of her poverty on earth, and on the other of her condition before God. For though she was well aware of the manner of her conception, and had been informed of the holy nature of her child, she could not assert for herself, what others have since done, her own immaculate conception; for the sacrifices she brought told a very different tale, as she offered the burnt offering, and the sin offering to cleanse her from the issue of her blood, and to make atonement for her that she should be clean (Leviticus 12:1-8) Thus over and over again God reminded Israel that without shedding of blood is no remission (Hebrews 9:22); for on one occasion only could an omer of fine flour be accepted as a sin offering in lieu of an animal, and the sprinkling of its blood. But even then there was represented in type the judgment of God against sin, borne really by Him who was the true sin offering, for a handful of the flour was burnt by the priest for a memorial upon the altar. Little probably did the offerer understand; as he availed himself of God’s gracious provision on his behalf, and brought what he was able to get, that by the true sin offering nothing short of the full judgment of God against sin must be borne. In that case no alleviation could be permitted, for the question then settled was not simply what concerned the sinner, but what was due to the majesty and nature of God. This was taken up fully in type only on the great day of atonement. In all the cases hitherto noticed, the relief of the individual from his guilt, or the making him acquainted with his need, are clearly set forth; but the making propitiation was scarcely shadowed out. Identification between the offerer and the offering was taught, as the hands of the offerer were laid on the head of the animal previous to its being killed, intimating, in the burnt offering, that the individual was identified with the sweet savor of that offering; but teaching in the sin, or trespass offering, that to the victim brought as a substitute, the guilt of the offerer was transferred. After this the sacrificial victim was slain, and the blood was duly dealt with. In the burnt offering it was sprinkled round about upon the brazen altar, if the sacrifice was of the flock, or of the herd; or wrung out beside the altar, on the east part of it, if it was a bird. In the same manner was it dealt with if a delinquent brought the ram appointed for the trespass offering. In the case of the sin offering, however, the blood was treated differently, and that varied with the person or persons on whose behalf it was shed. For the anointed priest, or the whole congregation, three different actions with the blood were prescribed. It was sprinkled seven times before the vail before the Lord. In this action we have the nearest approach to a shadowing forth of propitiation, yet it did not fully express it. For, sprinkled seven times before the Lord before the vail, it was rather the assuring those on whose behalf it was presented of their standing before Him, than the simple meeting of the requirements of His holiness, answering more to the sevenfold sprinkling before the mercy seat than to the one sprinkling upon it. After sprinkling it before the vail, the blood was next put upon the horns of the golden altar, as meeting the responsibility of the offenders at the ordinary place of their standing. Then the rest of it was poured out at the bottom of the altar of burnt offering, the life of the victim being thereby seen to have been given up for that of the sinners. In the case of an individual in Israel, whether a ruler, or a common person, the blood was not taken within the sanctuary. It was not therefore sprinkled before the Lord, but part was put on the horns of the brazen altar, as meeting the individual sinner’s responsibility at the recognized place of his standing, for further in than that he never could get, and the rest was poured out at the bottom of the altar. The dealing with the blood in the sin offering then teaches us a great deal. God had to be considered as well as the sinner. This, however, was only fully done on the day of atonement. To, a consideration of that let us now turn. On the tenth day of the seventh month that special service took place. God fixed the day, and appointed the service (Levit. 23: 27). At the time of its institution, the reason why the seventh month was selected might not have been apparent, nor can we determine how far the godly in Israel entered intelligently into the mind of God about it. Suffice it for us if we can see the reason of its appointment in the seventh month, instead of in any other. Now, the ecclesiastical year of Israel being really an outline of their history from the exodus to the millennium, it commenced naturally with the Passover, and ended, as far as the great feasts were concerned, with that of Tabernacles. Beyond this there was nothing for Israel. Beyond what that feast really speaks of; there will be nothing, for it runs on in type to the commencement of the eternal state; having, what was common to no other festival, an eighth day, the beginning of a new period, of which there was no word of the end. So, though the ecclesiastical year began with the Passover, with which was connected the Feast of Weeks-the time for the observance of the latter being fixed in connection with the former (Levit. 23: 15),- Israel did not observe the day of atonement till the tenth day of the seventh month came round, after the feast of blowing of trumpets. To us all this is clear. Pentecost, which is now, as it were, going on, being fulfilled in God calling out the church, must take place before Israel are brought to own their sins, and to share consciously in that redemption by the blood of Christ, which was shadowed out by the Passover (Romans 11:25). And since they are at present cast out by God, disowned as His people, and exiled from their land, He must take them up again as His own ere they will learn what it is to have their sins put away. So, what the feast of blowing of trumpets typifies, the re- gathering together of the people, must precede the true day of atonement for the children of Israel. The Jews, gathered out of the countries whither they have been scattered, will look on Him whom they have pierced, and mourn (Zechariah 12:10), after which all Israel will keep the true feast of tabernacles, enjoying millennial rest under the reign of the Lord Jesus Christ. Had the day of atonement been fixed for any other time of the year, the annual national purging of sins and uncleannesses would equally have taken place; but the prophetic history, sketched out in the order in which the several feasts were to be observed, would have been thrown into confusion. Now that history in the days of Moses was foreknown only by God. The people could never have divined it by intuition, analogy, or any process of mental exercise. None but He, who sees the end from the beginning, could have foreseen Israel’s temporary rejection, the calling out of the church, and the restoration afresh of the nation to its place as God’s earthly people. The sacred calendar therefore of Leviticus 23:1-44 bears on the face of it the impress of the divine mind; and, when God gave it to Moses, He had evidently before His eyes the whole history of the people from the exodus to the millennium. Nothing that they have done has taken God by surprise. Their whole moral history was before Him, when He gave that law to Moses, just as their political history lay unrolled before His eye, when Jacob on his deathbed, in blessing his sons, sketched that out by the spirit of prophecy (Genesis 49:1-33). But, not only did God look onward down the whole line of Israel’s moral history, when He arranged their sacred calendar, for He looked onward to the atoning work of His Son, on which all their future and final blessings will be found to rest. And this work, in its propitiatory and substitutionary character, was especially typified in the rites of the day of atonement. On that day the people were to rest not only from servile work, as in all their great feasts, but from all work of whatsoever kind, just as they did on the Sabbath (Leviticus 16:29; Leviticus 23:28-32; Numbers 29:7). On the Sabbath they rested in remembrance of God’s rest after His six days’ work in making the heavens and the earth. On the tenth day of Tisri they rested, because a work was being done for them in which they could take no active part, yet in which they had special and pressing interests. Resting from all work, they were not, however, to sit at home listless and unconcerned, whilst the High Priest was within the sanctuary. They were to afflict their souls. Atonement was God’s gracious provision for His people who had sinned. The people were not therefore to think lightly of it. If the High Priest was actively engaged on their behalf, it was because they had sinned. Hence afflicting of their souls was enjoined upon them. If any refused to do that, cutting off from his people was the penalty to which he exposed himself. If any one did any work on that day, destruction from among his people would be the due reward of his deeds (Leviticus 23:29-30). Two things they were to learn,-nor they only. First, that though atonement for their sins was effected by another on their behalf, they were not to think lightly of sins, which required, as we now know, the death and the shedding of the blood of the holy Lamb of God; and, secondly, that God will have the sinner to own his inability to have a hand in that work. Thus, on the one hand, all lightness of thought about sin in the presence of God’s abounding grace was to be checked, and all mistaken thoughts of the sinner doing anything for himself, when the work of atonement was required, were to be corrected. Their need of atonement the people were fully to own, what their sins were was to be deeply impressed on them, and their indebtedness to the ministry of the High Priest to make it, they were equally to acknowledge. "For on that day shall the priest make atonement for you to cleanse you, that ye may be clean from all your sins," is the reason assigned for this enforced afflicting of themselves, and for the perfect rest which was enjoined upon them. All on this day depended upon the High Priest. If he was faithful in his work, atonement would be made for all Israel; if not, of course it could not. And since on no other day in the whole year could it have been made, if the High Priest had failed to do it on that day, it must have remained unaccomplished till the tenth day of the seventh month again came round. And further, since the question to be taken up had especial reference to the claims of God’s holiness, and the grounds on which He could righteously act in grace towards a people who had sinned against Him, there could be no room for man’s thoughts to come in as to what would be a suited service, nor for man’s suggestions as to that which should be done. God must prescribe everything, for God alone knew what would enable Him to act in grace consistently with all that He is. This is manifest on a moment’s reflection. All then that was requisite the Lord prescribed, leaving to Aaron only to carry out what He had enjoined. Peculiar was the service appointed; special too were the garments in which the High Priest was to be arrayed. Clean and spotless is the Great High Priest, of whom Aaron was but a type; but to be a type even, he had first to wash his flesh in water, and then to put on the holy linen garments, which were exchanged for his ordinary pontifical attire, when he subsequently offered up the burnt offering upon the altar (Leviticus 16:4; Leviticus 16:23-24). Washed and clothed, Aaron next proceeded to the specific work of the day, for which sin offerings and burnt offerings were appointed, in both of which, as we have already seen, the thought of atonement enters. As, however, on this occasion the dealing with the question of sins was the prominent matter, the sin offering took precedence of the burnt offering in the making of atonement; whereas at the great festivals the order was just the reverse. And now a work had to be done for Aaron and his house, and a work as well for the congregation; and these are distinguished by the animals selected for the sin offerings. For Aaron and for his house it was one bullock, for Israel two he- goats; the one was offered up as the Lord’s, but the other was to be the scapegoat,* after Aaron had cast lots upon them. Thus even in the selection of the goat for the sacrifice Aaron had no discretion. (*לצְַזׇאזֵל for the scapegoat Azazel. This word occurs nowhere but in Leviticus 16:1-34, in which it is met with four times, vers. 8, 10, 26. After all that has been written about it, the simplest, and probably true, explanation of the term is to take it as compounded of two words, צזִ a goat, and אׇזַל to go away, meaning goat of departure, or scare-goat.) It was chosen by lot, and if the lot is cast into the lap, the -whole disposing is of the Lord (Proverbs 16:33). The burnt offering was the same in each case, a ram, in token of the consecration of the Lord Jesus to do the will of God. Everything thus prepared, and Aaron having killed the bullock for himself and for his house, he took a censer of burning coals of fire from off the altar before the Lord, and with his hands full of sweet incense beaten small, brought it within the vail, so that the cloud of the incense, ignited by the burning coals, might cover the mercy seat, that he should not die. The sweet incense typified the sweet savor of the merits of Christ. It was compounded of four ingredients chosen by God (Exodus 30:34-36), three of which are mentioned nowhere else, for there was that, we must all acknowledge, in the Lord Jesus Christ which was acceptable to God that was peculiar to Him. With the cloud of incense between Aaron and the mercy seat he could stand before it. The glory of God shining on the mercy seat ("For I will appear in the cloud on the mercy seat," was the Lord’s announcement to Moses), Aaron could behold through the medium of the cloud of incense, and God viewed Aaron, the representative of his house and of his nation, through the same medium. He of whom Aaron was the type needed of course no cloud of incense through which to be seen by God. He is in the presence of God according to the excellency of his person, and He abides there, thus teaching us of the perfectness of his work. But none of the children of men can stand before God apart from the merits of Christ. For if the representative of the redeemed people could not enter the divine presence with the blood of the sin offering, unless the cloud of incense was rising up before the mercy seat, what folly for any unredeemed soul to think it could be in God’s presence without judgment overtaking it. None of Adam’s descendants can be there except as they own the atoning death of the Lord Jesus, and are received by God, as it were, through the medium of the merits of Christ. But who discovered this? Conscience can make a man feel his unfitness for the presence of God, but revelation alone can tell him on what conditions he, personally by nature unfit, can enter there in confidence and in peace. Who prescribed the cloud of incense for Aaron that he should not die? It was God. And thus He testified of His desire for the work to be rightly done on behalf of His earthly people, and has taught us His wish to have sinners righteously at home before Him. With the incense thus burning Aaron did his work, first with the blood of the bullock, and then with the blood of the selected goat. Two victims were required, though both types of the Lord Jesus, who died but once; so the blood of both was dealt with in the same way, being sprinkled once on the mercy seat, and seven times before it. Here too the order is not without significance. The mercy seat was the place of God’s throne upon earth, so the blood was first sprinkled thereon. The claims of God’s throne were to be first considered, since on that day the making propitiation was to take precedence of all thought of the sinner’s standing. Sprinkled once on the mercy seat, it was sprinkled seven times before it. For God once was enough. All that the blood could speak of to Him He well knew. To assure the sinner, however, of a perfect standing before the throne, it was sprinkled seven times in front of it; for, whilst caring for His own glory, God thought of the sinner, because of whose sins the atoning death of His Son was required. After this Aaron withdrew from the immediate presence of the Holy One of Israel. He could enter the holiest, but he could not stay there. He entered to shadow forth the way atonement could be made by the blood of the sin offering. He did not, however, remain there, because the real atonement was not then made. But now, since the Lord Jesus has entered in by His own blood, He has remained there, having found eternal redemption. Aaron’s annual entrance into the holiest pointed to what would be effected at a time then future. The Lord Jesus remaining in the heavenly sanctuary, speaks of what has been accomplished by His blood. "For by one offering He bath perfected for a continuance (ἐις τὸ διηνιχὲς) them that are sanctified" (Hebrews 10:14). Aaron’s entrance gave ground for hope. The Lord’s continuance there gives grounds for confidence and certainty. But all those on whose behalf atonement was made upon the cross have not yet understood about it, or rested upon it. The nation of Israel are still strangers to it, and will not understand about it, till they see the Lord, as Isaiah (53.) and Zechariah (12.) set forth. Now the order prescribed by God for the special service of that day portrayed this in the distinction between the sin offering for Aaron and for his house, and the sin offering for the people of Israel. The former was killed, and the blood of it taken within the vail (Leviticus 16:14-15), before the goat for the Lord’s lot was even slain. The Lord really died but once, and never will die again (Hebrews 9:28); but His death was on this day typified twits. Very probably none of the people in the wilderness could have explained the reason of this. To us, however, it is clear, and we see how the foreknowledge of God was here also displayed in a victim being taken for Aaron and for his house, and another being chosen for the nation of Israel. For as all those now saved are priests to God, and that in a double character, their place in this typical service was really with Aaron and his house. They are a holy priesthood, and they are a royal priesthood (1 Peter 2:5; 1 Peter 2:9). The former character of priesthood was in Israel confined to Aaron and his house, and will again be true only of the sons of Zadok when the Lord returns to reign (Ezekiel 44:15). A holy priesthood Israel never was, and never will be. A royal priesthood God offered to them on conditions, to which, however, they failed to conform (Exodus 19:6). By and by they will share in this, but never can they as a nation have part in the holy priesthood (Isaiah 61:6). The sons of Zadoc will, on the contrary, in that day be the latter, and share with the rest of the people in the former. Hence we who believe are in this respect on common ground with Aaron and his house, so in type are represented with them. And since we share in the atoning work of Christ before Israel as a nation come to know about it, we see clearly how accurate was the delineation of things, when Aaron offered for himself and his house distinct from, and before he offered the sin offering on behalf of, the people of Israel. But the ways of God with which we are familiar, His work in grace whilst Israel is viewed as Loammi (Hosea 1:9), was not then made plain, though it was all perfectly known to, and arranged for by Him. By Aaron’s work within the holiest propitiation was effected, for the blood was sprinkled on the mercy seat. Thus the claims of God’s holiness were met. The action of the throne in judgment, with which the cherubims were associated, was stayed, and their faces being towards the mercy seat, they gazed, as it were, on the blood, which never, that we read of, was wiped off, or washed away. Provision, as we see, was duly made for the blood to be sprinkled thereon, but nothing was said or provided for obliterating all trace of it afterward. There it remained, and because it had been put there propitiation was made, and God was seen to be righteous in dealing in grace with sinners; for the action of propitiation is Godward, the making good the ground on which God can righteously deal in mercy and favor with those who have sinned against Him; but that being made, it is evident, that, as far as God’s. character and nature are concerned, He can righteously deal in grace with all sinners, if He can righteously deal in grace with one. Whether all will submit now to God’s righteousness is another matter. Propitiation, however, having been once truly made by the blood of Christ, it can avail for the whole world, as John the apostle teaches us (1 John 2:2). From the holiest Aaron retraced his steps to do his allotted work in the outer chamber of the Tabernacle, commonly called the holy place. Into the holiest none but the High Priest could ever enter. There, then, he must always have been alone. To the outer chamber, however, all the priests had equal access, but on that day their ingress was prohibited whilst Aaron was engaged in making atonement in the holy place. Aaron alone was typically to do that which really was done by the great ’High Priest, to whom all the glory of it must ever be given. Thank God, in the results of it all who believe on the Lord Jesus share, and share forever, though in the doing of it they had, and could have had no part. How carefully did God, on the one hand, care for the glory of His Son, and on the other again "inculcate, in the plainest manner, the impossibility of those on whose behalf it was done taking any part in the work. " There shall be no, man in the tabernacle of the congregation when he goeth in to make atonement in the holy place, until lie come out, and have made an atonement for himself, and for his household, and for all the congregation of Israel" (Leviticus 16:17). In the camp the people were resting from all work, though afflicting their souls. From the tabernacle all the priests were excluded whilst Aaron was performing the appointed service in the holy place. What more, then, was wanted than the carrying in of the blood to God? That indeed laid the ground for God to act in grace, and made good the standing of sinners before the throne. That, too, was the first and the most important work of the day. But more was requisite; for, as acting on behalf of the earthly people, the blood had to be put on the horns of the golden altar, the altar that is before the Lord, mentioned in 5: 18, the ordinary place of their standing; and the tabernacle and its vessels were to be sprinkled with blood, to make atonement because of the uncleanness of the children of Israel, and because of their transgressions in all their sins (5: 16). We stand before God’s throne, on ground sprinkled, as it were, with the blood of Jesus, for we have boldness to enter the holiest by that blood. To the earthly people such an entrance was unknown, so, where they nationally stood before God, the blood was put on their behalf, to make. atonement for the altar, to cleanse it, and to hallow it from all the uncleanness of the children of Israel (vv. 18, 19). But, further, they were taught that, where in person they never got, their uncleanness was found. Into the sanctuary they never, on any pretext entered, yet their uncleanness was regarded as reaching into it-a reminder that the effects of sin reach far beyond the person who commits it, and a guide to us as to the meaning of those words in Hebrews 9:23, " It was therefore necessary that the patterns of things in the heavens should be purified with these; but the heavenly things themselves with better sacrifices than these." All having been done as prescribed in the sanctuary, Aaron reappeared to public view, a token to all Israel of God’s acceptance of their representative, and of the accomplishment of his work within the tabernacle. Aaron within the sanctuary answers in type to the Lord as High Priest in the true tabernacle, from which by and by He will in person come out, and the remnant of Israel will then learn what that day of atonement really shadowed forth, and who is the High Priest chosen by God to represent that people before Him. When then we read of Aaron coming out, we pass from what has been fulfilled-the dealing by the Lord with His blood in the heavenly sanctuary -to what is still future-the open declaration of the remission of the sins of the people, typified in the sending away of the scapegoat into the wilderness. Now this goat was for Israel, as distinct from Aaron and his sons, though, of course, the latter could learn about the teaching of it; just as what it speaks of for Israel we understand for our joy, viz. the putting away of sins, never to rise up against those who have committed them. But since this will only be known by Israel when the Lord Jesus comes out of heaven, though we know it for ourselves now by the teaching of the Holy Ghost, the accuracy of the type is fully manifested. For Israel there was the scapegoat; for Aaron and his sons there was none. On that animal Aaron laid his hands, and confessed over him all the iniquities of the children of Israel, and all their transgressions in all their sins, putting them on the head of the scapegoat, and sending him away by the hand of a fit man into the wilderness (5: 21). Charged with all the guilt of Israel, that goat went away. If then their sins rested on the goat, they rested no longer on the people. They could not be upon both. The goat was to bear them away (5: 22). Here we see portrayed in type substitution, as we have already seen portrayed propitiation. Both are necessary for atonement. Propitiation being made, God can act in grace. Substitution being effected, the sins are transferred to, and borne by another. The man selected for the work let go the goat in the wilderness, and God provided that it should not reappear upon the scene: " The goat shall bear upon him all their iniquities unto a land not inhabited" (5: 22). Who directed the steps of the scapegoat after the man in charge had let him go? Who was concerned in making known the full and everlasting putting away of sins, never to be remembered against the sinner? The High and the Holy One was concerned in this, and He provided for it: " The goat shall bear upon him all their iniquities unto a land not inhabited," was God’s gracious announcement in anticipation of what He would do. For who ever heard of that goat coming back? God took the matter in hand. The goat sent away was never to return. How gracious of God was this! Doubt or uncertainty as to the effectiveness of the work of atonement never came from Him. He provided that Israel should be satisfied that all was done, and rightly done, which concerned the question of sins. Providing, however, for that by a work in which Israel had no hand, He made all see what sin was before Him, since Aaron, the man who took away the scapegoat, and the one who burned the sin offerings, had each to wash his flesh in water. When Aaron had done that and had changed his dress, he re-appeared in his ordinary pontifical attire to offer the burnt offerings, to make atonement for himself, his house, and the people; and then burnt the fat of the sin offerings on the brazen altar. The order here is instructive. The burnt offerings were first offered, then the fat of the sin offering. By both atonement was made, but the whole surrender of the Lord Jesus Christ to do God’s will, typified by the burnt offering, was the basis on which the fat of the sin offering rested. The Lord’s surrender of Himself to death is most precious to God, and had a prominent place in that day’s ceremonial at the altar; for service at the altar recommenced after Aaron had sent away the scapegoat. Till then, from the time the sin offerings were killed, nothing went on at the altar in the court. There could be no service carried on there whilst Aaron was within the tabernacle. Now this cuts at the root of all ritualistic principles, in carrying on a service now at the altar whilst the great High Priest is in the true tabernacle. It would have been just as improper for Eleazar or Ithamar to have been ministering at the altar whilst Aaron was hidden from view, as it is for Christians now to profess to do it, whilst the Lord is in heaven for us. With the burning of the fat of the sin offerings on the altar Aaron’s special work in making atonement ended, though other sacrifices as well were appointed by the Lord for that day. Before, however, noticing them, let us review the character of what we have been considering, to gather from it what are essential conditions for, and elements of, atonement. First, as to the high priest. He must be holy and clean. Who has ever answered to that but Him who is holy, harmless, undefiled? (Hebrews 7:26). Next, the sacrifice must be that of God’s appointment, and none can be with the high priest when engaged in this work. He must do it all alone. God has provided the Lamb. To Him John the Baptist pointed; of Him as a lamb Peter wrote (1 Peter 1:19). Having learned, then, about the person in whom alone all the requirements are found, we may next inquire, What are essential elements of atonement? Death, dealing with the blood, transferring the sins from the offenders to the victim to bear them away, and the enduring divine wrath, these are component parts of what we sum up in one word- atonement. Both the burnt offering and sin offering character of sacrifice have to do with it. The life of the victim must be given up on behalf of the sinner, and that life must be surrendered voluntarily to do the divine will. Propitiation, too, must be made, and that by blood. The blood shed had to be sprinkled on the mercy-seat as well as before it, The character of God must be considered, as well as the standing of the sinner be made good, and the blood also has to be sprinkled wherever the uncleanness of the sinner has reached. The sins, too, must be transferred to, and borne by another, and borne away, never to come back to sight or remembrance. For as the sin offerings and burnt offerings were to make atonement, so was the scapegoat (5: 10) likewise. In its dismissal, and the burning of the bodies of the sin offerings without the camp, the putting away of the sins was clearly set forth. Besides this, the wrath of God had to be endured, which was typified in the burning on the altar of the two rams for the burnt offerings, and the fat from the bullock and the goat of the sin offerings. For the fire on that altar had come from heaven, and so was a marked emblem of divine judgment. Five living creatures, then, were required to shadow forth atonement, One only in the universe could be found really to accomplish it. Creatures of earth could typify it; a person from heaven alone could make it. But other sacrifices bad to be offered as well. Of these we read in Numbers 29:7-11. A burnt offering of one young bullock, one ram, and seven lambs of the first year, with their accompanying meat offerings and drink offerings, and one kid of the goats for a sin offering. The one bullock appointed for part of the burnt offering seems to intimate that the tenth day of the seventh month concerned Israel in an especial manner. At the great feasts, in the fulfillment of which others beside Israel share, two bullocks were appointed to form part of the burnt offerings selected by God (Numbers 28:29.) At the feast of blowing of trumpets, and on the day of atonement, one bullock, not two, was to be offered. For as the feast of blowing of trumpets concerns Israel exclusively, so the day of atonement in the seventh month has special reference to their history, as has been already pointed out. After all these sacrifices had been duly offered, the evening burnt offering, and the kindling of the incense on the golden altar, with the lighting of the lamps within the sanctuary, brought to a close a day of the greatest importance, which taught Israel their need of that atonement which they will never be allowed to forget. Once, however, in every fifty years, something else had to take place, viz. the proclaiming the year of jubilee, which commenced on the evening of this day, and was announced by the blowing of the trumpet. Welcome must the sound of the trumpet have been to the impoverished Israelite, and to the poor one who had been sold to his neighbor for a servant. Possessions returned to their owners, fields were reoccupied by those to whom they had belonged, and the family circle might be cheered by the filling up of gaps, which had been made when one or more of their number had been sold into servitude. At the sound, too, of that trumpet the Levite could return to his house, if it had been sold, as the Israelite to the fields of his possession. For of freedom, restoration, and joy, that jubilee trumpet was the signal. Very gracious was it of God to institute the jubilee, in which, doubtless, many rejoiced when they shared in the provision thus made for them-the proof of divine forethought for the impoverished amongst God’s people, in whose eyes earthly prosperity was a token of divine favor. Yet the people never experienced the fullness of grace, of which their jubilees were but the earnest. By and by the real jubilee, the year of the Lord’s redeemed, will come, and Israel shall return to their own land, and the captives and the exiles will rejoice in a freedom which no oppressor will ever curtail, and in a security which no enemy will be allowed to disturb. But, as the year of jubilee only commenced on the evening of the day of atonement, Israel’s deliverance will only be known when they have learned what their sins required, and how by the Lord’s death their need has been met. When, however, the day of atonement was drawing to a close, the jubilee trumpet sounded, for God did not let the priest put that off till the morning. The trumpet blast was heard before night closed on the scene; so when the nation shall know of the finished work of Christ, and own it, they will enjoy deliverance, and the possession of their land once more. When the Lord comes out of heaven, the remnant will see Him. They shall look on Me, says Zechariah, and mourn (12.) On Jehovah they will look, and learn then of His humiliation to death for them. Well may they mourn, as the sense of divine grace and love dawns on them, who deserve only to have divine wrath for their portion forever. How they will be affected when they see the Lord, Zechariah describes; what will be the language of their hearts, and it may be of their lips, Isaiah 53:1-12 sets forth. They will own His atoning death as the one wounded for their transgressions, bruised for their iniquities, by whose stripes they are healed. His death, too, they will make mention of, and the transference of their guilt to Him as the true scapegoat, who; appearing in glory, will make it evident that He has borne their sins away. The Lord, they will learn, has laid them on Him (Isaiah 53:6), and has cast them all into the depths of the sea’ (Micah 7:19) so that, if sought for, they shall not be found (Jer. 1: 20). At that day, then, they will learn and confess that Aaron’s typical work has received its full accomplishment, and the tenth day of the seventh month will be set apart no longer for that special service. Atonement, however, they will never as the earthly people forget, for in the first month, on the first day of the month, the sanctuary will be annually cleansed with blood; and on the seventh day of that same month the blood of the sin offering shall be dealt with for every one that earth, and for him that is simple; so shall they reconcile or make atonement for the house (Ezekiel 45:18-20). Will it then be discovered that the work of the Lord on the cross was defective, or that something will be needed in addition? Thank God, that will never be found to be the case. The perfectness of His work will never he questioned in that day, as those passages from Jeremiah and Micah show; The earthly people, however, will offer sacrifices on the altar at Jerusalem, for that always has been, and throughout the millennium will be, ’the normal character’ of worship for people whose portion is on earth, Sacrifices of this character have ceased for a time, because God is calling out, a heavenly people, who worship Him now as ’they will also by and by, bringing the sacrifice of’ praise, the fruit of their lips. For in heaven there are no sacrificial victims to offer to God. On earth it will be different, Hence, in this way they will celebrate and recall to remembrance that one perfect sacrifice which avails for us, and will be seen to avail for them. In. token, too, of the work of Christ being per, feet, and their standing being established on what has been accomplished on’ the cross, their ecclesiastical year will commence with the remembrance, in God’s appointed way, of an atonement already effected. Of old they commenced their ecclesiastical year with atonement in prospect, to be effected ere they reached the close of it. By and by they will commence their annual festivals with the remembrance of atonement effected. All then will start from the atonement accomplished, known, and enjoyed by God’s redeemed people. Ezekiel writes of this in respect of Israel, who annually will be reminded of God’s provision on their behalf (Ezekiel 45:15; Ezekiel 45:17; Ezekiel 45:20). They will then know of atonement accomplished, as their fathers knew that the national redemption of Israel was accomplished. All the world, however, will not partake in the everlasting benefits which flow from the atoning death of the Lord Jesus Christ. Those who remain of the nations that shall fight against Jerusalem in the last invasion of the northern army, prior to the establishment of the kingdom in power, will be required to assemble annually at Jerusalem to keep the feast of tabernacles, in token, it would seem, of the favor enjoyed of living under the peaceful sway of the King, the Lord of Hosts (Zechariah 14:16-19); but we read’ not that all on earth will be required to keep the paschal feast. That will be incumbent on the redeemed people of Israel, and any with them who are joined to the Lord. None but those who are redeemed are required by God to commemorate redemption. All the saints in heaven will be rejoicing in atonement made by the blood of Christ. All God’s people on earth will have their part in the results of it. Here the sketch of the Old Testament teaching on atonement naturally ends. We have traced it from God’s first mention of it at Sinai to Israel’s future acknowledgment of it and enjoyment of its fruits in the millennium. One feature is conspicuous throughout, viz. God’s desire that His people should learn about it, and understand what the provision is which He has made on their behalf. We never should have known the depth of our need, had He not declared it. We never should have discovered what alone could meet it, had He not revealed it. We never could have provided what was requisite, the offering to make atonement. For the impossibility of a sinner atoning for his sins is now fully demonstrated, since we have learned who it was who died to effect it-the Lamb of God, who is the only begotten Son of God. We should never have understood what sin is in God’s sight, and how far the uncleanness of our sins has reached, had not God taught us. For intelligence, then, and for teaching about atonement, we are wholly dependent on God. But who in heaven or earth surmised what was all along the purpose of His heart, to send " His only begotten Son into the world, that we might live through Him 2 Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us, and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins" (1 John 4:10). ======================================================================== CHAPTER 115: VOL 02 - BAPTISM NOT THE COMMUNICATION OF LIFE ======================================================================== Baptism Not the Communication of Life Dear Mr. R.-Baptism is not communication of life. Resurrection may (though all critics do not) be attributed to it, according to Colossians 2:1-23; it depends on the construction of ED and it is in a certain aspect more than life, because it is being transported from alienation from God, into the place of blessing which He has constituted on earth; it is figuratively washing away sins. Resurrection is not the communication of life. They are formally distinguished in Ephesians 2:1-22 and when Christ is mentioned alone in Ephesians 1:1-23, resurrection is spoken of, not quickening. Communicating life to Christ is a dangerous expression. Resurrection involves the reunion of soul and body, not the communication of life. If resurrection be connected with baptism, it is coming up out of the water. The baptism proper is death or burial, but it is at any rate connected with faith in the operation of God, which does not refer to death in the act of baptizing. Resurrection unto life, in John 5:1-47, is not communicating life, but refers to those to whom life had been given, and explicitly to their coming up out of their graves. Resurrection may be the quickening of the mortal body, but never the communication of life to the soul; and in its full power it involves a vast deal more. The saint is raised in glory, because of the Spirit dwelling in him; the sinner to judgment. I deny entirely what is called " sacramental grace." That we are blessed in communion with Christ, in partaking in the faith of the Lord’s supper, I gladly recognize. He is present with two or three, gathered together in His name, in that special and blessed remembrance of His death, according to His grace; in which He, in sovereign goodness, cares that we should remember Him; the soul enjoys fellowship with Him, and in the most excellent way. But it is not grace in the elements. I do not believe there is any grace in the bread or the wine. It is a mere mischievous superstition. There is in Scripture no consecration of elements, though they are appropriated with thanksgiving; since they are to represent Christ’s body and blood, and hence to be reverently used in doing so, "discerning the Lord’s body." But what we break is bread, and nothing else. The history even of the progress to Romanist views is easily traced, though of no importance. We must have " what was from the beginning," or else not abide in the Son and in the Father. I suppose the chapters alluded to are John 3:1-36; John 6:1-71. Now the latter chapter proves conclusively that it does not refer to the Lord’s supper, for it affirms that every one is surely and finally saved who so eats of Christ. Christ Himself is the bread of life, and he that eats of it lives forever (verse 51). The " sacrament" is nothing more; but more particularly, " he that eats My flesh and drinks My blood hath everlasting life, and I will raise him up at the last day,"-that is, he has present and final salvation. We have, too, ἔφαγον, as well as τρώγω-original faith as well as present exercise of it. In chap. 3. we have only entering into the kingdom, nothing even attributed to water, whatever it means; and then life distinctively attributed to the Spirit, only as communicating a nature, " is spirit"-is water, would be simple nonsense. I have no doubt that it is the word as in Ephesians 5:1-33 and John 15:1-27, and the necessary sense of chapter 6: confirms it; but in any case it has nothing to do with the communication of life, and verse 6 shows it; and a reference to Ezekiel 36:1-38, to which it so very plainly alludes, leaves no doubt, I think, of its force,--hence verse 10, and the expression, earthly things, in verse 12. I may refer to another chapter, perhaps, as none is mentioned: communion of the blood and body of Christ (1 Corinthians 10:1-33), but as it is the same word as partakers and fellowship in what follows, as in verse 18 (not 17), there is no kind of difficulty or uncertainty. It is moral identification with what is set forth there; see verse 20. As to union with an exalted Christ, what Acts 2:33-36 has to say to it, it would be hard to tell. It shows that the writer has nothing serious to object, and no more. I have no doubt that the exalted Christ authorized Peter, and gave to Peter, by the Holy Ghost, to say," Repent and be baptized." Why that makes baptism union would be very hard to tell, and so much the more that it is distinguished from the receiving of the Holy Ghost, which is a consequence of it. Repent and God would give. This is hardly serious. I say’ that a man must be born again before he receives the Holy Ghost. "Ye are the children [sons] of God by faith in Christ Jesus, and because ye are sons God hath sent forth the Spirit of His Son into your hearts: in whom, after that ye believed, ye were sealed with that Holy Spirit of promise." " He that stablishes us with you in Christ, and has anointed us, is God." I might multiply passages. It is so according to the writer’s theory, for they, he says, are born by baptism; and Peter says it was consequent thereupon-they would receive the. Holy Ghost. And the point is important. By one I get a life and a nature; by the other my body is the temple of the Holy Ghost, and I am sealed for the day of redemption. One is a nature derived from God; the other, God dwelling in me. In- deed, as to the practical state of the church, I know of no truth more important-the Christian state hangs upon it. It is through the presence of the Comforter I know I am in Christ (John 14:1-31). By it we were baptized into one body on the day of Pentecost; by it we are sealed for the day of redemption. Confounding finally the mission of the Twelve in Matthew 28:1-20 with receiving Peter’s as well as Paul’s teaching, is a mere blunder of mind. For the believer, Peter’s and Paul’s writings are the word of God, and received as such. The commission of the Twelve was from a risen, not an ascended, Christ, and only to Gentiles; Luke’s from an ascending, and embraced the Jews. The point which makes it of any importance to us is, that we learn, in Galatians 2:1-21, that the three great apostles gave up the mission to the Gentiles, and agreed that Paul should undertake that; and none mentions the church but Paul. What he calls "the mystery" was committed to him, and he was a minister of the church as well, as of the gospel, declaring he was not sent to baptize-which would be incredible if such received life by it. As to Matthew 16:1-28, all the false system of the Papists and Ritualists flows to this point, from their confounding Christ’s building and man’s. I will build, says Christ, against that the gates of hell cannot prevail. That building is not finished yet. In 1 Peter 2:1-25 the living stones come, but we hear of no human builder. In Ephesians 2:1-22, all is fitly framed together, and groweth into an holy temple; but no builder is named. In I. Cor. 3., we have a wise master-builder, Paul, and wood and hay and stubble-the contemplated fruit of man’s responsibility, and warning against it- not Christ’s being the builder - and corrupters: reward of labor lost, and the person saved, the person purged, in these cases. Now, these men* attribute the title and privileges of Christ’s progressive building to the wood and hay and stubble of foolish and bad workers among men; yea, many to the corrupters and corruptions themselves. In all this they are not taught of God at all. He tells us where there is the form of piety, denying the power, to turn away. (*This was written in reply more especially to a letter we had from one of the leading Ritualists seven years ago. -Ed.) To say that the wood and hay and stubble built in by bad workmen, or positive corruption, is the body of Christ, is a very monstrous thing; nor is the house the same thing as the body: There is no recognition of a finished salvation, and that I am in Christ, and forever, and united to Him by the Holy Ghost. The failure of the outward professing -church is a positive declaration of Scripture, and that perilous times would ’come in the last days. And we are referred to Scripture as the only sure guide in those days (2 Timothy 3:1-17) I believe I have touched on most points you have mentioned. I can in a letter only touch on them, but I think I have met them all. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 116: VOL 02 - BEARING SINS ======================================================================== Bearing Sins I have elsewhere fully shown that to apply ἀνἠνεγχε to anything but what was done on the cross is simple ignorance of the use of the word.* I add a confirmatory remark here that the three preceding words are in the imperfect, giving them a continuous character, ἀνήνεγχε, the aorist showing one special act. (*Bible Witness and _Review, vol. 1: p. 251.) ======================================================================== CHAPTER 117: VOL 02 - BIBLICAL ANNOTATIONS* ======================================================================== Biblical Annotations* IS THE SUFFERING OF CHRIST A PAYMENT TO GOD FOR OUR DEBT OF SIN? An answer, the answer to the above, is furnished us by the Master Himself, who taught His disciples to say, " Our Father,... forgive us our debts, as we forgive our debtors" (Matthew 6:12). (*The Editor thinks it just to the truth, the writers, and the readers of this periodical, and to himself, to say that, while he would not put in anything which he believed affected injuriously "the faith " or " morals," and must reserve to himself the right of accepting any paper, or not, as he may think it profitable or otherwise, yet he is not to be held responsible for all the opinions or interpretations which he may permit to be published. He would not think of changing or adding anything to any one’s paper-no independent mind would stand this; and, moreover, it would be an assumption on his part of being wiser than all who sent him papers; and, besides, by making his own attainment the measure of the truth, it would binder fullness, variety, and advancement. Every writer is on his own responsibility, and allowed the most absolute freedom; but, when this is so, he must not feel disconcerted if " the others judge," and also take the liberty in due time of expressing their judgment. "Let all things be done unto edifying," is the divine injunction which all of us should most carefully obey. If anything should escape the Editor that affects the faith, so that it is injured, he will be thankful if it he pointed out. These remarks, while they apply especially to "Biblical Annotations " and " Epistolary Communications," must also be regarded as having reference to the entire contents of the Magazine. We have thought it right to preface this department with this note (indeed it was an omission in our first issue), that liberty for all may be preserved, and every one may be on his own responsibility as the Lord’s servant, that the truth may have free course and be glorified.) If a debt is paid, it is not forgiven: if forgiven, it assuredly is not paid. Unvarying obedience to God we all ought to have rendered. Having failed in that we are defaulters, debtors who have not discharged what was incumbent on them. Debts τὰ ὀφειλῄματα are unpaid, which we cannot discharge; for no amount of obedience in the future could make up for failure in the past. Nor can any amount of suffering borne by ourselves or another, pay the debt. Obedience only could have done that; hence there is a confusion of thought in the question. We were debtors to God, that is clear. Christ has suffered, that is certain. But His sufferings have not paid our debts, though by them, to use the language of man, He has paid for His people the penalty. The question then confounds the debts and the penalty. Further, the Lord teaches us by parables that the debts are not paid, but forgiven. The disciples were told to pray for forgiveness: the parables assure us they could receive it. The parable of the servant who owed 10,000 talents (Matthew 18:23-35), is clear upon the point. The parable of the two debtors, uttered in the house of Simon the Pharisee (Luke 7:41-43), leaves no room for doubt on the question. Had the king’s servant’s debt been paid, the king could not have exercised his prerogative of mercy in forgiving it. The king’s heart, too, would never have been known, nor would the character of the relentless debtor have been manifested. For had the debt been paid, the former debtor might righteously have demanded payment of the three hundred pence due to him from his fellow-servant. Righteousness would have reigned, but grace on the part of the creditor would have been unknown. How, too, would the king have looked for his debtor to act in mercy, and forgive the debt that was owing to him, if the king had not been satisfied himself without payment of his debt by some one, whether the actual debtor or another? The teaching, too, for which that parable is introduced must fall to the ground, if the hypothesis be correct, that Christ has paid our. debts to God. For the parable was spoken to enforce the full forgiveness by each one of his brother’s sins, as often as there might be occasion for it. We are to forgive as God in Christ has forgiven us (Ephesians 4:32, Colossians 3:13). God has acted in grace towards us; we ought to act in grade towards each other. But another consideration conies in. If any one professedly takes Christian ground as forgiven by God, and yet persistently refuses to act in similar grace towards his brother, the Father will ultimately deal with that person as a debtor to him of that which has never been paid (Matthew 18:35, see also 6: 15). For the absence of grace in the heart will evidence that the person so lacking has never really been a subject of divine grace. Again, had the debt been paid by another, gratitude to the one who paid it might have filled the debtor’s heart. But why should love to him, to whom the debt was due, be called out by the debtor being freed from his creditor? What was it, however, that filled the poor woman’s heart in the house of Simon the Pharisee? She loved much, said the Lord; and why? Because she was forgiven much. The strength of her love was the evidence of the great grace shown to her. "Her sins, which are many, are forgiven; for she loved much." Her love flowed from forgiveness enjoyed. Forgiveness was not the consequence of her love. On another occasion the Lord by His teaching inculcated the same truth: "Or those eighteen, upon whom the tower in Siloam fell and slew them, think ye that they were sinners (literally debtors, ὀφειλέται) above all men that dwelt in Jerusalem? I tell you, nay; but except ye repent ye shall all likewise perish " (Luke 13:4-5). No thought have we here of His paying the debt, but of repentance, which is closely connected with forgiveness. The Lord Jesus, then, never hints at the payment of our debts to God by His sufferings. What a loss, too, it would have been, if that had been the case! Exemption for the debtor from punishment would of course have been secured; gratitude, too, to Him who paid the debts might have filled our hearts; but no man could ever have known in his heart what it is to respond in the feeblest way to the love and grace of God. God, as He is, would never have been known to us. Was He then indifferent to our defaulting condition? By no means. Did He think lightly of the sinner’s failure in not rendering Him full, perfect, unvarying obedience? No; for, unless Christ had died and made atonement, no sinner could have been forgiven, and we should have all been, to use the language of the parable, on the way to being delivered to the tormentors, till we should pay all that was due; and this never could be done; because no amount of obedience in the future, from one who ought always to have obeyed in everything, could ever make up for failure in the past. What, then, has the Lord Jesus done for us by His sufferings and death? He has done things of inestimable value. By His precious blood having been shed, God is manifested to be righteous in forgiving, and justifying the ungodly (Romans 3:25). He too, has borne our sins in His own body on the tree (1 Peter 2:24); our judgment He has borne that we should not bear it, and by His life given for us we are ransomed (Matthew 20:28), and shall be saved from wrath through Him (Romans 5:9). Thus we are delivered from that condition in which we were as sinners before God. Propitiation, substitution, redemption, all have been accomplished by His death for us. We have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins (Ephesians 1:7); God is righteous, not in receiving us because another has paid our debts, but in forgiving us, because His Son has died on the cross to glorify Him and to save sinners. Thus God is manifested in a full way. He is light; so He could not think lightly of the debts. He is love; so He sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins (1 John 4:10). Christ too, is manifested as the obedient One, even to death, who could in infinite love give Himself for His people, and by His death lay the ground for the character of God to be displayed, and His grace to be made known, and enjoyed. [Much speaking to no purpose on this subject might have been saved by those who took part in the "Discussion Meeting," at Stockholm, in August 1876, if they had had the scriptural distinction in their mind between debt and penalty, as given in this paper.-En.] The doctrine of the Reformation put forth the view that Christ died to reconcile His Father to us-a statement every way erroneous, confounding the name of relationship in blessing with God in His nature; and teaching, what Scripture does not, that Christ’s work was to reconcile God to us, to change His mind But others have used this to deny real propitiation and atonement. " God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son." He did not need to have His mind changed. But a righteous and holy God could not pass over sin as nothing, and if God so loved, the Son of man must be lifted up. God was not (as a heathen god) one who had to be propitiated that he might not be against us; but He did require that righteousness and holiness should be maintained in the universe. I think you will find that the New Testament never says God was propitiated, but you will find Christ was an ἱλασμός for our sins (1 John). And that Christ was a priest ἱλάοχεσθαι τὰς ἁμαρτίας. It is not, as in Homer, αἶθρον ίλάσχεσθαι. We have the imperative in Luke 18:1-43ἱλάσθητι " Be gracious." We have never God for the object of ἱλάσχομαι in the New Testament; but we have sins; and it seems to me to set the point on very clear ground. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 118: VOL 02 - BRIEF REPLIES TO A FEW QUERIES ======================================================================== Brief Replies to a Few Queries 1. What is the difference between Purpose and Counsels? - "Purpose" is a fixed will. " Counsels " are the wisdom and wise plans according to, and to which this will is directed. 2. Did the believing priests inActs 6:7remain still as priests, offering sacrifices in the temple? No doubt they did. The Jewish Christians broke bread apart (χατ’οἷχον), but they all frequented the temple. They believed Jesus to be the Christ, but still He was the Messiah connected with the Jews, who, but for God’s interference, would not have let in the Gentiles. See Acts 10:11; Acts 20:20-21. 3. What would you say ofHebrews 2:1-18? The habitable earth to come is the present object of my attention and faith. The passage is "the habitable earth to come, whereof we speak," and so in Acts 17:1-34 He has given assurance to all men. I have no objection to say "every man," in Hebrews 2:9; the word that would dispose me to it is " by the grace of God:" though it does not convince me. He does it by grace, not through sin. The " sons " you would refer it to come after, and πάντος cannot refer to them. I query if it would not be πάντων if it referred to men. And things are spoken of before. These words are not men but things (Ephesians 1:22, and Colossians 1:16; Colossians 1:20). There τὰ πάντα. 4. What is the difference between " Mercy" and " Mercies?" It is a mistake to connect Romans 12:1-21 with 9.-11. It connects with the end of ch. 8.; and all that precedes 9.-11. is an annex, to show how to reconcile "no difference " with the positive promises of God. Law was clear; they had broken it; but they had forfeited the promises in rejecting Christ, in whom they were; yet God would fulfill them as faithful; only, then, in His wisdom, it would be from mercy. Ἕλεος is more showing mercy; οἰχτιρμὀς compassion, which though touching are different things. " Mercy " is more active dealing, or way of dealing; " compassion," more subjective feeling. 5. What is the Worship of the Epistle to the Hebrews? In Hebrews God is approached in His nature as God; we go into the holiest. It is not the relationship of the Father with his child, nor is it union with Christ and the church, the entirely new thing; but "first began to be spoken by the Lord;" had " by the prophets;" and in " the last " of their days. It connects Christianity with the old thing, only substituting the heavenly reality for the forms or patterns of things in the heavens. We are pilgrims on earth, and Christ in heaven for us. Hence, though it is for partakers of the heavenly calling as we are (not union in the church), it reaches out like Joseph’s boughs over the wall to the persecuted remnant in the last days, who, though not having a heavenly calling, will have a heavenly portion; though Christ has to do with it when we go to God, in that we have a High Priest over the house of God. We go to the "throne of grace," our great High Priest being there (never to the Priest), though as Lord we do. But while we go in Christ’s name, and so only can, there is no priest with the Father. Deuteronomy 25:1-19. does not go beyond the Jewish order developed in Hebrews, and is very beautiful in that aspect. The defect of a tract on worship I saw in old times was that it was only Hebrew s’ worship, not the worship of the Father. The priest in Deuteronomy 26:1-19. was the necessary administrator of such things in Israel, and we are all priests; but it was the offerer said all directly. Anything offered to God must have been by the priest then. Still we have a High Priest over God’s house, who is at the right hand of God, in the presence of God for us; but this is not as coming to the Father. 6. What would you say of the Sleep of the Soul which some talk of? As regards the sleep of the soul, it is a miserable doctrine that comes simply from Satan acting on man’s reason. It is generally connected with annihilation, but not always in this country; but it is a heartless doctrine. The Lord tells the thief he shall not wait till the kingdom, but that he should that day be with Him in paradise. Was he to be fast asleep, knowing nothing of Him, or anything else? It is monstrous! We are " absent from the body, and present with the Lord;" but if that means being fast asleep, we might as well be at the other end of the universe! "To depart and be with Christ is far better.;" that is, being fast asleep and unconscious is better than serving Christ and ministering to His glory! The apostle did not know which to choose, to live which was Christ, or be fast asleep! It was gain, that is to be unconscious, compared with serving Christ faithfully here! But not only do these passages show the moral absurdity of this notion to every spiritually-intelligent Christian, but there is no such thought in Scripture as the soul’s sleeping. It is a beautiful expression, signifying that death was only falling asleep to awake again, but it is the man always that falls asleep, never the soul. Thus in the case of Lazarus. Then said He plainly, Lazarus is dead (or has died). That is, falling asleep means, plainly expressed, dying. So when Stephen was killed, he fell asleep. Stephen did, not his soul; so "some are fallen asleep." It is in contrast with, "some remain unto this present." " All live to Him." Were the souls of the rich man or Lazarus fallen asleep? They tell me it is a Jewish figure. I agree with them: but it is not a figure of the soul being asleep. The falling asleep is always attributed to the man, never to the soul, and always means the Christian’s dying; and is a beautiful expression for his not being, as we say, " dead and gone." Another thing to remark is, that it is never said of the wicked that they will not be raised, or that their souls are asleep, for they will be raised; but it shows the true and lovely force of the expression as to the saints; they are " in Christ; " and it is no dark and gloomy uncertainty; they have fallen asleep to the day they lived in, but that is all. But there is no such statement in Scripture as the soul sleeping; nor is there such a thought any more than such a statement. It is the living saint who falls asleep, and according to Scripture it means dying. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 119: VOL 02 - CALVARY ======================================================================== Calvary There is no such word as Calvary in the S. Scriptures. It is a translation into English of the word Calvaria, in the Latin translation called the Vulgate. "Mount Calvary" is therefore not a scriptural expression. Indeed the conjecture that the place of the crucifixion was a mount is not borne out by express Scripture; although there is reason to infer that it was an elevated place either by nature or art from the word Golgotha in the Hebrew, or Kranion in the Greek (both signifying a skull), because skull-like in its form-not because there were skulls there. If you have ever seen the ruins of a feudal castle of the olden time, you may have noticed that, right in front of its windows, and about a mile away, there was a mound, generally an artificial one, on which, in these times, the gallows tree was erected for the execution of criminals; and, from Pilate’s house, along the via dolorosa, the Lord was led to Golgotha where that way terminated at the place of execution about a mile off, outside the city of Jerusalem. Our Lord, "that He might sanctify the people with His own blood suffered without the gate." ======================================================================== CHAPTER 120: VOL 02 - CONQUERORS ======================================================================== Conquerors When we look a little at the different agents of evil and of delusions exhibited in the book of Revelation, we wonder how any soul will escape. And then, when we remember that though these agents have not yet been manifested, yet that the energies which are to animate and use them are already abroad and in action, and all working now in mystery if not in revealed forms, we stand amazed at the sight we thus get of the conflict in which we are engaged. There will be "the dragon" and his "great wrath "-the " beast " and his " false prophet "-the " frogs "-" Babylon "" the kings of the earth "-and " the whole world wondering after the beast." What tremendous agents in the work of delusion, darkness, and blood 1 What strong temptations and what appalling difficulties will then beset the path of the wayfaring saints! Who will stand? Who will find safe conduct through this array of hindrances? Who will discover the path of life and light amid all this thickening and overwhelming darkness? And yet with each feature of this terrible scene, with each member of this great system of subtlety and strength, in the mystery or spirit of it, we have now to do; though, of course, some part of it may be more in real activity than others. But it is our duty still, and always, to recognize the dragon and his wrath, the beast and the frogs, Babylon, the kings of the earth, and the world deluded into infidel or idolatrous wonder and worship-to recognize each and all of these in the mystery, or in the hidden energy, of their working.* (*The "lawless one " is to be revealed, but it is "the mystery of lawlessness " that is now working (see 2 Thessalonians 2:1-17, Greek).) The field of conflict thus spread out is serious indeed. But, as this same book unfolds to us, we have at the same time to recognize the better region, that is, the heavenly, where we get other objects altogether, and all, I may say, for us. The prophet of God in Patmos passes, in vision, with great ease and rapidity from earth to heaven, and from heaven to earth. The two regions are alternately before him, and he sees the action in each. But the passage is made with ease and with speed.* (*He was "in the Spirit " (chap. 1: 10). And we know that the Spirit was as a chariot to convey the prophets of old, either really or in vision, hither and thither. (See 1 Kings 18:12; Ezekiel 3:12; Acts 8:29.)) In chapters 4. 5. he is in sight of heaven. So, at the opening of the Seals in chapter 6., passing however at once to see the results of those opened seals on earth: so again in chapter 8., we find him in vision of both the regions; and, in like manner, I may say throughout. He hears the music and the conferences in heaven, the rapture and the hopes there; and then again he is amid the infidel pride, the confusion, and all the workings of apostate principles, which are giving character to the scene on earth. He passes from the exulting marriage feast in heaven to the terrible judgment of the Rider on the white horse on all the confederated iniquity of the earth. We see something of this in the opening of Job. There we are, in vision, both in heaven and on earth, as in the twinkling of an eye.* (*So at the time of Stephen’s martyrdom. How near to each other are the two regions (that of sight and that of faith, or of earth and of heaven) though so different, presented to us! (Acts 7:1-60)) Is it not the business of the soul thus to act still? There are two regions-that of faith and that of sight: and the soul should pass rapidly and frequently into the region of faith. Had Job thus visited heaven, and heard and seen the action there, he would have been ready for the trials and sorrows which awaited him on earth. Little one knows of it indeed, but the soul covets the power to follow John in the Revelation, passing, as we see, easily and speedily from earth to heaven and back again, and always prepared, I may say, without amazement, for the shifting. scenery. But beside this, for the encouragement of our hearts,- I observe two victories achieved in the progress of this book-one over the accuser (chap. 12: 11), and another over the beast (chap. 15: 2). The accuser was defeated by a certain army of martyrs, and the weapons of their victorious struggle are hung up before us; for we are told they conquered by " the blood of the Lamb," by " the word of their testimony," and by " their not loving their lives to the death." These had been their armor in conflict with the accuser. If he went up, as in Job’s case, to the presence of God with charges against them, they met him there with " the blood of the Lamb." They pleaded the sacrifice of God’s own Lamb according to God’s own testimony respecting it. And to the charge that "skin for skin, all that a man has will he give for his life," they rendered up their lives to death in answer.* (*They surpassed Job’s measure. He pleaded "the blood of the Lamb (see Job 19:24), but he failed in the devotedness of a martyr, and was not prepared for the place of death. [I doubt that "Redeemer" in Job means what the author infers; though the power in which He will act in favor of the saints cannot be separated from His atonement, as we know.-En.]) Here was their victory, and such and such the weapons which accomplished it. Heaven could employ itself in celebrating this victory. -Was Jesus standing when Stephen was martyred? Easy then for heaven to be engaged in rehearsing with joy these conquests of this martyr-band. But again, we have another victory celebrated in chapter 15: It had been obtained over the beast, as the other had been gained over the accuser. The conquerors here are like Israel on the Red Sea in Exodus 15:1-27 And just as in that song of Israel, so here in this song of triumph, we learn the character of the previous truth, and how it was the conquerors conquered. Moses and, the congregation rehearse the fact that a victory had been won. But more than that, they rehearse how it had been won. They sing of the horse and his rider being thrown into the sea, of Jehovah, as a man of war, casting His enemies into the mighty waters, of the depths covering the foe. And they let it be known that Israel themselves had not fought, but that Jehovah had made the battle all His own. Thus the style of the victory, its instrument and strength, is published in this song, as well as the fact of victory. And I judge in like manner so does the song in Revelation 15:1-8 All the world had wondered after the beast, and their wonder led to worship-or it was itself worship (chap. 13:) His power appeared to be so great, his history so marvelous, that all the world wondered and worshipped, except (as I may say) this conquering band who paid their lives as the price of their faith in God and fidelity to Jesus.* (*I doubt not that " the great exhibitions " of the day are designed of Satan to practice the world in this idolatrous admiration of man, so that they may be the more prepared for the beast when he appears in all his fascination. The saint should retire from it to Jesus.) But the song, as I have said, utters, as I judge, the weapons they had used in that day of battle. And they were these. These martyrs were admiring and worshipping "the Lord God Almighty," while the world around them were admiring and worshipping the beast. The world was wondering at the greatness of the beast and the marvelousness of his history; but they were standing in the holy adoring admiration of the Lord and the marvelousness of His works. (See Revelation 15:3.) And while all beside were fearing the beast who could and would kill their bodies, they lived in the fear of God only, giving heed to the angel’s voice which had spoken of His coming judgment (see chap. 14: 7; 15: 4). Thus this fine but short song tells of the manner of the victory, or the weapons which had accomplished it, as that song of Israel at the Red Sea had done, before.* (*I might notice a difference in the battles, though the songs are the same. That on the Red Sea was fought alone by Jehovah for Israel, this with the beast was fought by the Lord in His saints.) But further. I might extend this thought as to victories in the book of Revelation, and say, generally, that from beginning to end it is the book of victories. It contemplates corruption or apostasy-evil in the church and in the larger scene outside; or first among the candlesticks, and then in the earth or world. But corruption or apostasy occasions struggle or conflict on the part of saints; and accordingly, the saints in this book are addressed or contemplated as conquerors; such as have been in conflict because of corruption and have come off in victory. They are formally regarded in this character in this book. Thus it is as conquerors they are addressed by the Spirit in each of the letters to the churches. "He that overcometh" is the language in each of them; because in each church there is contemplated a struggle or conflict, by reason either of corruption’ within or danger and enmity without (chap. 2. 3.) And I suggest that the crowns of chapter 15. are more formally the crowns of victors than of kings (see chap. 3: 11), as though we saw the " overcomers " of the previous chapter enthroned in chapter 4* (*We may say that, in divine reckoning, there is scarcely a difference; for the kingdom is taken by those who have been in the conflict before (see Luke 22:28-29; Matthew 20:28; 1 Corinthians 9:25; 2 Timothy 2:12). The Lord had gained a succession of victories in the days of His flesh over Satan (Matthew 4:1-25), over the world (John 16:33), over.sin and its judgment (Matthew 27:51), over death and the grave (John 20:6-7). This earth has been the scene of these victories, the gospel publishes them, faith accepts them.) So in the very next scene (chap. 5:) the Lord Jesus is recognized as a conqueror. In that character He takes the book. The word " prevailed " is the common word for " overcome," " the Lion hath overcome." Then, in the progress of the book, we see two victories celebrated in heaven, one obtained over the accuser (chap 12.), and another over the beast (chap. 15.), as I have before noticed. Then, on the earth, we see victory achieved, victory over the closing concentrated enmity and apostate strength and pride of the whole world (chap. 17: 14, or 19: 11-21). And further still, for I ask, Is not the first resurrection contemplated as a resurrection of conquerors? Is it not a reign of conquerors which we see in chapter 20: 4? And so forever for the inheritance of all things, after this is in the hands of conquerors (chap. 21: 7). Can I ask my own soul what measure or character of victory marks my course? Can I inquire of myself, Do I know what conflict is because of corruption, and what the victory of separation from it? The more we are conquerors, the more are we morally fit to be readers of the book of Revelation. John, I may say, was a conqueror in the first chapter, for he was a martyr or confessor in the Isle of Patmos, " a brother and a companion in the kingdom and patience of Jesus Christ," and in that character he gets the revelation communicated to him. And I suggest again that it comes to him from a conqueror, because it comes to him from " Jesus Christ" in the character (among others) of the " faithful Witness," the character in which He overcame the world (see 1 Timothy 6:13; see also John 16:33; Revelation 3:21). Indeed the four leading ideas in the book seem to be corruption, conflict, victory, and kingdom, the judgment of God being in exercise throughout. The book assumes, so to speak, that those who have tasted the grace of the Savior should stand in the rejection of the Savior. This may give a character to the book which will be somewhat strong for our timid hearts; but it is fitting that the volume of God should close with such a chapter, if I may so call it. Because the blessing of the creature was not the only business in creation, neither is it in redemption. His own glory was proposed as well as His creatures’ good. And it is His glory to judge a reprobate unrepentant world; and His people glorify Him by taking part with Him in that judgment; and they judge it now in weakness by gainsaying the course of it even at the hazard of goods, liberties, and lives, as they will by and by judge it in power, when seated on their thrones in the regeneration. The volume then closes as it began, for His own glory, of course in a different way (1:e. in the judgment of all the apostate principles of the world in their ripened condition). And the saints are rightly expected to be on His side in that action. This is their place and character in this book. The present is an age of easy profession, and the martyr strength and devotedness which are found in this book is not the common element. 0 for faith and love to reach it!-to be on the side of a rejected Jesus against the world! But more than this: the book contemplates the saints as heirs as well as conquerors. The expectation and the desire of getting the earth into possession and under dominion occupy the mind of Christ and of the saints throughout.* (*Properly or necessarily so, because the sealed book is the book of the inheritance, and that book rules the action from thence onward to the end; and I ask, Is not the attitude of the saints quite different now from what it is in the Apocalypse? They are now " waiting for the Son from heaven " (1 Thessalonians 1:1-10); in the Apocalypse they are waiting to reign on the earth (1:e. now they- are on earth, but then they are in heaven). In the opening of the prophetic part in chapter 4: we see the rainbow, the sign of the earth’s security, round the throne in heaven. And the One who sits on the throne is clothed in His glory as Creator, for whose pleasure all things were created. We are, thus, in spirit, in Genesis 1:1-31 In chapter 5. the book of the inheritance of the earth passes into the hand of the Lamb, and all rejoice. We are, thus, in spirit in Genesis 2:1-25, where the Lord God Himself, and all the creatures owned the dominion of Adam, the Lord God by conferring it, the creatures by submitting to it. Judgments under the seals and under the trumpets, the necessary precursors of the kingdom, then take their course; and in chapter 10. the Lord Jesus, as the mighty angel, triumphs in the now approaching moment of inheritance and dominion over earth and sea; and, in chapter 11., the saints in heaven do the same. The voice heard in heaven in chapter 12:, and the song of the victor-harpers in chapter 15., alike utter joy over the prospect of the kingdom. " Now is come the kingdom of our God and the power of His Christ," says the voice in heaven. " All nations shall come and worship before Thee," the harpers sing. Then in chapter 19. the joy in heaven is this, that she that corrupted the earth has been judged; and the voice there (as of many waters and mighty thunderings) utters, "Alleluia! for the Lord God omnipotent reigneth." And the action which makes the earth the Lord’s property takes place. In chapter 20. the first resurrection is spoken of as being for the very purpose of bringing in or manifesting the kingdom. Speaking of the risen ones, the prophet says, " They lived and reigned with Christ a thousand years." And how does the book close? Not with a description of the church in the hidden places of heaven, as the Father’s house, but with a sight of the church in the manifested heavens, the place of power or government, up to the light of which the kings will bring their glory and honor, and forth from which will go the waters of the river and the leaves of the tree for the healing of the nations. And this is such a view of the heavenly places as suits the earth in the days of the kingdom; and of the servants of God and of the Lamb, who are there, it is said at the close, "and they shall reign forever and ever."* (*It is the book of the kingdom rather than of the church. The church’s heavenly destiny is assured, as in chapter 4., but the kingdom at the close is reach through judgments.) ======================================================================== CHAPTER 121: VOL 02 - DID OUR LORD DRINK OF THE PASCHAL CUP? ======================================================================== Did Our Lord Drink of the Paschal Cup? There does not seem to be any ground for affirming that our Lord did not drink of the paschal cup, any more than that He did not eat of the paschal bread. Some have founded on His receiving the cup and saying as He gave it to the disciples, " Take this, and divide it among yourselves," that He must have passed it to them without drinking of it Himself. But they forget that two or three Passover cups had been drunk before this, and the words even in Luke, " I will not drink until "... show that He had drunk then. The expression I will not drink corresponds to "I will not any more eat " of verse 16. We might as well argue that He did not eat as that He did not drink. A considerable number of MSS. have ἀπὸ τοῦ νῦν-from the present time. Matthew 26:29says-"ἀπ ἄρτι, from henceforth I will not at all (gewisslich nicht) drink, which plainly indicates that He drank of it then, "until that day when"... He had intimated that this was His last Passover; and as the cup had become the most prominent thing in the Passover, there being four or five of them during the feast, it was to be expected that it should be that which He would speak of when intimating the break and the resumption; as He has done. The Lord accepted the Passover as He found it: for He never would have blessed or given thanks for the cup, and given it to His disciples, if He had not accepted it as part of the Passover-feast which He desired to eat with them before He suffered. There could have been no eating of the Passover without drinking of the wine; for thus then, and thus only, was it eaten. And it was of God’s permission that the wine was on the table that the Lord’s supper might be instituted. And as none can partake of the Lord’s supper without drinking of the cup as well as eating of the bread, so none, in our Lord’s day, could partake of the Passover supper without drinking of the wine as well as eating of the bread, and the lamb, etc. So the presumption is that the Lord drank of the cup, as the wording of the Evangelic narrative not obscurely indicates. He could commemorate the joyful deliverance of the nation from bondage with the righteous remnant; though He could not partake of the Lord’s supper, which was only prospective and dependent on His death. I do not see anything against the Lord having drunk the last cup of the Passover after having instituted the Lord’s supper. This fourth cup ended the Paschal supper. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 122: VOL 02 - DR. FARRAR ON EVERLASTING, DAMNATION, AND HELL ======================================================================== Dr. Farrar on Everlasting, Damnation, and Hell Dr. Farrar, with a great deal of pretentious language, appealing to his own perfect knowledge, his own deep sense of responsibility, and speaking in the sight of God (he says) and of the Savior, perhaps of angels-he would hardly be so narrow minded and illiberal as to speak of " elect angels " with Paul- and of what never crossed Paul’s narrow mind, "the spirits of the dead "-declares that not one of the words, "damnation," "hell," or "everlasting," should be found in the English Bible. Now with (I dare say) less knowledge than Canon Farrar, no unusual conscientiousness, still in the fear of God, I beg leave to say that what Canon Farrar says is entirely unfounded, in the essential point wholly untrue. I am not, in a note, going to enter into much Greek or. Hellenistic learning, though both refute what Canon Farrar says as to " everlasting;" nor is there need. One passage suffices to show as to this word that his statement, with all its pretension, is false. " The things which are seen are temporal (πρόςχαιρα); but the things which are not seen are eternal" (αἰώνια) (2 Corinthians 4:18); that is, eternal is the opposite of what is for a time. Need I quote more? Let the reader take a Concordance, and see the passages where " everlasting life " is used (or eternal), and say if everlasting should not be there. And note, " eternal life " in the person of Christ was with the Father (1 John 1:2). Is " eternal Spirit " wrong? (Hebrews 9:14). God has called us to His eternal glory (1 Peter 5:10). God lives forever and ever (Revelation 5:14), the everlasting God (Romans 16:26). I might multiply quotations; but these suffice to prove, or even the first alone, that the statement of Dr. Farrar, with all his boasted knowledge and conscientiousness, is, as to this word, either ignorance or dishonesty. Would Dr. Farrar in the Old Testament change the word " everlasting " in Psalms 90:1-17, "From everlasting to everlasting Thou art God "? Is " eternal power and Godhead" wrong? (Romans 1:20). Is "eternal glory" (2 Timothy 2:10), eternal salvation, eternal redemption, wrong? Is " everlasting God, Jehovah, the Creator of the ends of the earth," wrong? As to " damnation," the English word was used more loosely when the Bible was translated than it is now. In 1 Corinthians 11:29 it is used in contrast with final condemnation. The translators, where one word was used in Greek, took pains to use several in English, and thereby disfigured the sense of many passages, or at least obscured the connection. Thus in John 5:1-47 we have " judgment," " condemnation," " damnation," all used for χρἱσις, where " judgment" is the only true translation; but this does not affect the substance of Canon Farrar’s assertion. He speaks of the word in its ordinary modern acceptation. "Damnation" is used frequently in the English New Testament for judgment, as in Matthew 23:14; Mark 12:40; Luke 20:47; Romans 3:8; Romans 13:2; 1 Timothy 5:12; and this is the sense of 1 Corinthians 11:29, in contrast with condemnation with the world. Now, even if this judgment " be everlasting condemnation, still the word means judgment. But there is another and a stronger word than χριμα used, even in express contrast with it, so as to plainly mean final, absolute condemnation. The word is χατάχριμα. What a man is condemned to must be known by the sentence. We have both words in Romans 5:16, " For the judgment (χρίμα) was by one to (χατάχριμα) condemnation," and in ver. 18. So, "There is therefore now no condemnation to them which are in Christ Jesus " (Romans 8:1). " God justifieth. Who is he that condemneth?" (vers. 33, 34). When we are judged, we are chastened of the Lord, that we should not be condemned with the world" (1 Corinthians 11:32), where partial earthly judgments are contrasted with a final absolute condemnation. It is not therefore the mere word " damnation " for which I contend, nor to which Dr. Farrar objects, as all his sermon proves; for it is used in the English version many times, not in the sense of eternal condemnation; but that eternal condemnation meant by the word in modern times is spoken of in contrast with judgment, and as a distinct thing. Hence the apostle speaks of " eternal judgment " (Hebrews 6:1-20); " eternal punishment " (Matthew 25:1-46); " everlasting destruction from the presence of the Lord; " and (Mark 3:29), " bath never forgiveness, but is in danger of (ἔνοχος, subject to) eternal damnation." And where the wicked have their part in the lake of fire it is said, γέγονε. It is done when ft is written on all things. Now it is not the use of the mere word " damnation," which had not then the definite force it has now which is insisted on or objected to. In Mark 3:29 it is χρίσις, judgment; but it is eternal, conclusive, absolute, and final. The objection made is to what is meant by the modern use of the word, and that is definitely stated in Scripture. The other word is " hell" Now, unfortunately, two words are translated "hell" in the English Bible-Hades and Gehenna; one meaning the temporary state of departed spirits, the unseen world, without saying more, the other used for the fire that never shall be quenched. Its meaning is, etymologically, the valley of Hinnom, where people offered their children to Moloch, and which was defiled by Josiah; and, it seems, a fire kept up to consume what was filthy and unclean out of Jerusalem, and called Tophet. Hence we have in Isaiah, "For Tophet is ordained of old; yea, for the king it is prepared; he bath made it deep and large; and the breath of the LORD, like a stream of brimstone, doth kindle it" (Isaiah 30:33). "And they shall go forth, and look upon the carcases of the men that have transgressed against Me: for their worm shall not die, neither shall their fire be quenched; and they shall be an abhorring unto all flesh " (Isaiah 66:24). This is, on the face of it, a material fact; there was a constant fire enduring continually, to which those bodies were enduringly subjected. Now, Scheol, or Hades, is never confounded with this. It was an actual valley between Zion and what is called the Hill of Evil Counsel, south of Jerusalem, where tradition places the house of Caiaphas, if my memory serve me. This valley, where the unquenched fire consumed what was unclean, which yet, according to Isaiah 66:1-24, should remain in the consuming fire unconsumed, an abhorring unto all flesh, was used for an image of a sorer punishment, and was called Gehenna (Anglice, " hell"); that is, literally, the valley of Hinnom. Now this word is found in Matthew 5:22; Matthew 5:29-30; Matthew 10:28; Matthew 18:9; Matthew 23:15; Matthew 23:33; Mark 9:43; Mark 9:45; Mark 9:47; Luke 12:5; James 3:6. In Matthew 5:1-48 the statement is general: danger of hell fire -thy whole body cast into hell; referring to sacrificing one member rather than sin; clearly not the valley of Hinnom. " Fear Him which is able to destroy both body and soul in hell." (Chapter 10:28.) It is not the valley of Hinnom They do not put souls there. It is metaphorically used for the place of final judgment and punishment, 28: 9 is as in 5.; 23: 15, a child of hell-one who is the natural heir, belongs to this place. That it is the place of condemnation in judgment Matthew 23:33 shows: " Ye serpents, ye generation of vipers, how can ye escape the judgment (χρίσεως) of hell?" (Mark 9:43; Mark 9:48.) We have solemnly repeated the call to sacrifice the dearest thing that is a snare to us, under penalty of being cast into hell, into the fire that never shall be quenched, where their worm dieth not, and the fire is not quenched. It is a judgment, a judicial punishment, for which there is no relief, of which there is no cessation. In Luke 12:1-59 it is used as a known thing, a place, the effect of divine judgment. James 3:6 is only of importance as showing that it is connected with pure unmitigated evil; where nothing else is. Now a person who reads all this cannot doubt that that which the word "hell" is used for in English is fully contemplated. The desirableness of not confounding it with Hades, the vaguest possible word for the unseen world, no reflecting mind would deny. It is a place into which God’s judgment casts the unrepentant and rebellious wicked, where their worm does not die, and the fire is not quenched. That human figures of fire and worms are used may be; but the force of it is plain enough-it is the everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels, where God casts in judgment those that are righteously rejected, where there is no remission-when God says γέγονε: it is done, and without are whoremongers, and all who love and make a lie. Hades is not Gehenna, and Gehenna in the New Testament is never used as the Valley of Hinnom. The proper English word is "hell;" that is, the place where pure evil, if such a phrase may be used, meets its final doom, after restoring means (even to God’s giving His own Son, and beseeching men to be reconciled) are exhausted, and where the effect of judgment remains unquenched. Canon Farrar is wrong in saying everlasting should not he used: no other word but that, or an equivalent one, would give the sense of what is not πρὸς χαιρὸν for a time, or temporal. He is wrong in saying " damnation" should disappear, though it is used with uncertainty of meaning in the English version; nor is the mere word what is really in question, but what it is now used for: full and final condemnation; and this is used and contrasted with partial judgment. Finally, "hell " is the only true English word, as usually employed, which answers to the word Gehenna in the New Testament. With great and boasting pretension to knowledge, and a conscientiousness which the spirits of the dead are to be witnesses of " perhaps," I find (in the report given in a weekly journal,* which is all I can speak of) ignorance as to the use of language in the New Testament, or, if it be not that, a want of conscience in the solemn things of God. (* [Canon Farrar has now published his five sermons delivered in Westminster Abbey in a six shilling volume, called Eternal Hope, which (such is the Laodicean indifference of our times) is being sold everywhere by pious booksellers as well as others; and thus his unscriptural sentiments are spread abroad, and the people are, generally, so void of spiritual discernment, or so regardless of the voice of God speaking in the Holy Scriptures, that they are ready to receive them as true. And yet his book, and all such, tell but a mere dream of the human imagination, which a single text from the word of God, such as 2 Corinthians 4:18, serves at once to dissipate. The Lord is "against the prophets that prophesy out of their own hearts." Let Ezekiel 13:1-23 :, be read and pondered. Such prophets deluded and ruined Israel; and such seem to be almost as completely successful in deluding and ruining the Christian profession of our day. Are we on the verge of the awful time referred to in 2 Thessalonians 2:9-11?-ED.]) ======================================================================== CHAPTER 123: VOL 02 - EPISTOLARY COMMUNICATIONS: THE CASTAWAY ======================================================================== Epistolary Communications: The Castaway ======================================================================== CHAPTER 124: VOL 02 - EXAMINATION OF MILL'S LOGIC ======================================================================== Examination of Mill’s Logic THE question is a grave one, how far, when no general idea or quality is predicated of an object, but it is only said "is," two objects are before the mind. But Mr. Mill is, as usual, all wrong and inaccurate.. When I say " the sun," I already suppose such a thing and its existence, or I can have no object before my mind at all. "A round square" gives no object or idea to be affirmed about. What he does not see, for he is very shallow, is that what is affirmed in saying "the sun exists" involves unexpressed that it exists now. Time present is affirmed; but whether I say "was," "is," or "will be," I have an object of which the existence is before my mind, or there is no object before it. He shirks the word idea, because an idea in the mind supposes an object With which it is occupied. It may be only a poetical possibility, but its existence is assumed poetically. If I say "is," or " exists," I affirm that it is a fact now. It may go farther, for the present supposes in its nature all times or none; it affirms a fact, and leaves past and future wholly out. If I say, " I am," I cannot say " I " without a conscious object; " am " adds little to any idea of it. There is no other object. " I " carries " am " with it; and the only danger is that " am " makes it too absolute by excluding beginning, "was " and " will be." " I" involves my existence as spoken of. " I thought;" that is passed. "I will give;" that supposes an "I," an existing object I have in my mind. Yet I may not exist to do it; but the object is an object in the mind, and existing there as an object thought, whatever is affirmed about it. The verb substantive affirms that it is not only an ideal object, but an actually existing one," God is." If I say " God," I have a thought object, an object before my mind; if there be no such thing thinkable (as " a round square "), I am talking nonsense. It is an assumed object, and I cannot think it without thinking of it as an existence. I do not say "existing," for that says now, but an existence. When I say "is," I affirm actual existence now, and past and future are not in my mind. It is an existing fact; and, as every present puts me in a present time (that is, has no time at all), it is an affirmation, taken by itself, of eternal existence. (*A System of Logic, by John Stuart Mill, 8th edition.) It is totally false that no belief can be afforded. If I say "my father," my hearer believes, if he receives what I say, that I have had or have one, and disbelieves what I say if he does not think so. Thus, if I say "Adam’s father," I disbelieve the whole account in Genesis. If I say " Cain’s father," and another does not reject what is said, it is believing he had one, at least agreeing in it. If I say a "round square," he has no object before his mind to affirm about. When it is said "affirmed of something," something is affirmed before anything is affirmed about it. The sun exists, or my father exists, goes on to say it or he which is exists now. And the present involves no time,-i.e., contemplates no duration for a time, and hence is either the simple fact of now, which has no duration, or involves eternity,-a now that never ceases to be new,* for now is unity, not duration,-a true unabgeschlossenes Aorist. (*Hence, when I say " God is," " God. " necessarily represents to the mind an eternal, self-existing, or untreated Being. No beginning and no ending is in the thought; and it can be said absolutely of such only. " Is" affirms being. It may be used for " exists," and then it has not its absolute sense. Seyn and daseyn are not the same thing. Man exists; the world. around us exists; but I could not say "is.") " I dine every day:" what time is that? When I say, "God is," I affirm no time, but existence; and, if I add nothing, eternal existence. Existence only is affirmed of Him, and, if true, always true. If I say to any one " God," I call his attention to an object, which I cannot do if there be no such object. I do not say in existence now, but as an object to be thought of as existing (I do not say when). But I think of His seyn, though not necessarily as seiend. If " the sun " suggests a meaning, what meaning? That there is such a thing as sun as an object of thought; not "is," as presently existing, but as an existence. If I say " round square," I have no object of thought at all; it is not an existence even for thought; it has no meaning. The importance of this in "I. am," " God is," is evident. And this is evident when other words are used predicatively. " God created the world." If " God " does not convey the thought of an existing object, the proposition has no sense at all. That is, without affirming at all that God exists or did. exist then, naming Him affirms, not as an inference but in the word itself, an existence, a Being which did that. So if I say "the sun heats," " sun " gives me the thought of an existing thing. I say something about it, but I speak of something about which I affirm. And one could pertinently say, There is no such thing as a sun to heat. That is, he does not believe, not the proposition about heating or the sun’s heating, but what is contained in the word "sun." If I say "the moon heats," one might say No, it does not. That is, he disbelieves what I say about the moon, he denies the proposition; but, in denying the proposition, he accepts the affirmation that there is a moon to heat or not to beat, and knows it is affirmed, and believes it. In what I have said of the sun, he disbelieves it. Thus if one speak of say "a round square," I say there is no such thing, I disbelieve what is said. And this Mill really admits in § 3 when he says, " When we affirm or deny two names of one another, must depend on what they are names of; since it is with reference to that, and not to the mere, names themselves, that we make the affirmation or denial." Just so; but then there is a " that" which we affirm or deny about. This is " what we do, what passes in our mind "-i.e., mind takes cognizance of the reality of the object as an existence, believes it, or can have no proposition about it. Again, names; § 1. " Names are not intended only to make the hearer conceive what we conceive, but to inform him what we believe. Now, when I use a name for the purpose of expressing a belief, it is a belief concerning the thing itself, not concerning my idea of it." If then a name expresses my belief in the thing, he, if he goes in with what I affirm about it, acquiesces in the thing as an existence, a thing; just what I insist on. It is a complete contradiction in terms of what he had said: "There is as yet nothing to believe." If I express a belief concerning the thing, so can he, or (as I said) tacitly acquiesce in the belief l express, to go on to something else about it. Mill is the most inconsistent " reasoner " I ever met with. Names are the names of things. And when I say "Franklin," or " sun," or, what is infinitely more important, " God," I am naming a thing and " expressing my belief " in that thing, and the hearer too, if he acquiesces, whatever else I may affirm about it. But I cannot talk of Franklin if there be no Franklin to talk about; nor about the sun if there be none. All propositions assume then the subject and predicate as things or existences. Hence it is evident that reasoning, inference, logic, supposes existence, an object, 1:e. it is always preceded by belief. I cannot reason about nothing, I cannot infer from nothing. I do not say, therefore, logic has nothing to do with belief; but that it is based on belief. To put it in a more palpable way, suppose I say "Drumdrum is white." If you think I am serious, you will say, What is " Drumdrum "? If I answer, There is no such thing, you will at once say, Then you cannot say it " is white:" that is a proposition, it supposes the subject to be a real thing, 1:e. believes it. " Is " goes farther when it is a copula-i.e. affirms a quality of the subject. It affirms present existence. If I say "gold is yellow," I speak of it not only as a thing, but as an existing thing. If I say " Fuimus Troes," " fuit Ilion," I speak of a thing, but as no longer existing. That is, belief is necessarily antecedent to all reasoning, first, of the affirmation in the premises; secondly, further, that the thing affirmed about is a thing, the word therefore conveying an objective idea to my mind. But more, the conclusion is never an object of belief, though in practical life it becomes so. It is a conclusion, a necessary consequence if the premises are true, involved really in them, and so a means of belief practically. But all that is affirmed is, not that the conclusion is true, but that it is involved in the premises, and no more. What I believe or deny is what is in the premises. I say, "then so and so follows." What I say is, " must be "-" gold is yellow." Then, I believe there is a thing called gold, and that it is yellow. I add, all yellow things are ugly. I believe that of yellow things; but gold is a yellow thing; consequently, if these two propositions are believed, gold must be ugly too. But I infer the thing, because I have no direct evidence of the fact, or I should want no inference. I quite admit that practically it induces the belief if gold still exists, but I must believe this to turn the inference to a fact I believe. I believe by experience or testimony, and by that only; I conclude from the nature of language and thought, which never goes into fact, because it is only the nature of thought, but supposes it, because I cannot have thought without an object thought of, a thing. When my knowledge arises from testimony, reasoning may help me as to the credibility of testimony from experience of the world and men and the like, from which I reason to the credibility; but what I believe is still the experience or the testimony. I believe that there is an innate consciousness of God-not an idea of God. Such as I have may be true or false as to many things I affirm about Him. I believe that He can make Himself known. This is experience. I believe that He has made himself known in an external way, 1:e. by a revelation. But this is not a matter of inference, nor can it be, but of experience or testimony, supposing capacity to receive it. I may reason to banish the folly of false reasoning; but that appeals to facts, as all reasoning must. A conclusion must rest on premises, 1:e. on facts; but they are known by experience or testimony. And so even Scripture speaks. " He that believeth on the Son of God hath the witness in himself; and he that believeth not hath made God a liar." That is experience and testimony. In conclusion, then, belief precedes logic always. If I say " gold is yellow," I affirm two things-i.e. believe them or present them for belief,-that gold is, and is of a certain color; but I have drawn no conclusion at all. There is no reasoning as yet whatever, no logic. It is what is stated as believed by experience or testimony. Mill’s statement is wholly and essentially wrong, and is the basis of his infidelity. And a very poor one it is, and only shows how very inaccurate and illogical a mind he has. The extreme looseness and carelessness of Mill are surprising. There is a kind of impudence in its character. " Truths are known to us in two ways: some directly and of themselves; some through the medium of other truths. The former are the subject of intuition or consciousness," in the note he tells us others make a difference between the two: intuition of objects external to our minds; consciousness to our mental phenomena, but he uses them indiscriminately; and then he admits that something is known antecedent to all reasoning, but, if known, believed; then gives being vexed yesterday as consciousness, whereas this is memory; by inference only, about what took place when we were absent, the events recorded in history, or the theorems of mathematics. The two former we infer from the testimony adduced; but this is not an inference at all, it is belief of the testimony, right or wrong, without any inference at all; or traces of what has happened. This may be called inference; but to put knowing what has happened by testimony, or theorems of mathematics, on the same ground of inference, is nonsense or impudence, or rather both. It is to get rid of knowledge by testimony, which he states thus: Whatever we are capable of knowing must belong to the one class or to the other, must be in the number of the primitive data, or of the conclusions which can be drawn from them. Now, I know it is cold at the poles, and that Constantinople is a city in Turkey. But it is not primitive data, nor a conclusion drawn from any such. People have told me so, which is neither one nor the other. This is not honest, that is the fact; and so to state it is impudence. It is convenient for infidelity. I deny that logic judges anything but the justness of an inference; nor does it determine whether evidence has been found. It settles whether, the premises being given, the conclusion is just, and no more. Whether the premises are true is a question with which it has nothing to do, save as they may be a conclusion from prior reasoning. It only says, granting the premises, such a conclusion necessarily follows; that is all. It may use subsidiary helps, as definitions, divisions, etc.; but inference from is all it judges of-of truth, never. Hence the scholastic rule, Contra negantem principia non disputandum est (p. 9). In page 3 Mill says, Every author has a right to give whatever provisional definition he pleases of his own subject; but if the definition be false, he deceives from one end to the other, as all the reasoning depends on it. Thus in Milner’s End of Controversy, the author says, A rule of faith, or means of communicating Christ’s religion, and hence proves the Protestant rule of faith unfit to be such. It sounds all fair, the Bible being used to communicate religious knowledge; but a rule and a means of communicating are not the same thing, and his whole book is a fallacy, unanswerable in great part if the definition be let pass. A mother may communicate Christ’s religion, but she is no rule of faith. People have no right to deceive and mislead by a fraudulent or false definition, and this Mill does.* (*He also professes to take "cause" as meaning merely an antecedent, without entering into effectual causes, and so to define it; but, when the statement is lost sight of, he takes it as a certain and proved point.) Thus when Mill says testimony to a fact happening when we are absent, or a theorem of mathematics, are alike inference, he is deceiving his reader if he has not his eyes open to what he is about. So, when he says-for thus he uses his false division" Whether God and duty are realities, the existence of which (p. 8) is manifest to us a priori by the constitution of our rational faculty, or whether our ideas of them are acquired notions," etc., not of consciousness or intuition, but of evidence and of reasoning, it does not follow it is rational faculty or acquired notions. It is not necessarily nor really one or the other; nor are our ideas of them the same thing as their being realities; all is grossly loose. Nor is it the same either to say, not of consciousness or intuition, but of evidence and reasoning. For a priori rational faculty is not intuition or consciousness; and, so far from admitting the greater portion of our knowledge to be matter of inference, I deny that inference gives any true knowledge at all. It may be a help or a short end to get at what is sufficiently near it to act on, but it is never knowledge (p. 43). I agree with Bain, that to say such a smell or sound is not white is nonsense; color does not apply to either. It is astonishing what an inaccurate mind Mill has. In p. 7, "The science, therefore, which expounds the operations of the human understanding," etc. What science is that? We have had none such spoken of. Here he speaks of it to exclude metaphysical inquiries from logic. Be it so, though it be difficult save as a mere examination of the laws of inference, at any rate from its subsidiary parts as definitions. But then logic is a science (p. 2). " Logic is a science-an analysis of the mental process which takes place whenever we reason; and a right understanding of the mental process itself, of the conditions it depends on, and of the steps of which it consists." Now, these two statements are contradictory to one another, only so vague, so indeterminate, that though one affirms and the other denies as to logic, a certain part of a general science not elsewhere named, it is impossible to say they do or do not so contradict one another. Still " a right understanding of the mental process itself" is pretty much the same as expounds the operation of the human understanding, and so far he plainly contradicts himself. Again, the whole book depends on the difference of intuition and logical inference, yet no one could tell from it what intuition is. Nay, it is carefully obscured by the statements in p. 5:-" The object of logic is to know how we come by that portion of our knowledge which is not intuitive " (whatever that is). Yet logic neither observes, nor invents, nor discovers, but judges. But judging is not coming to any part of knowledge, but ascertaining the accuracy of what is before my mind, eliminating what is not accurate. If logic discovers nothing, it is no way of coming to any knowledge. It is not practically true that it discovers nothing; it does not in fact or directly, but it does to my mind. I would dissuade a man from ascending Mont Blanc. Constant white is bad for the eyes, but snow is constant white; snow is bad for the eyes. This is very simple; the conclusion is, as often argued, involved in the premises, but it is not in my mind before, and in this sense I discover it. It is the means of putting two things together in my mind by means of a middle thing, which were not together there before. Everything is not so simple. Every man is an animal; all animals die; man dies. This is not exact knowledge; it involves man being a mere animal, and the second premise assumes that, ani may be false if the first be absolutely true. It affirms that an animal necessarily and universally, in the sense in which it is used in the first premise, is subject to death, for that is what "die" means here; and in the absolute sense I may combat both premises. This makes the statement of two names for one thing, as Hobbes, evidently false. Man may be an animal as to qualities which make anything such; but if all other animals die, he may be exempt from it. It states that man and death are colimitaneous, of which we have no proof; though a matter of general observation, which is in general sufficient for conduct, but it is never truth in itself. This could be met by denying the minor, that all animals die. Death is not a quality necessary to constitute anything an animal. If it were nothing else, it assumes that what has happened constantly always must happen, which is not necessarily true. There may be impeding causes. Man may have to act on it in the world in which he does observe, but it is never truth. As regards " relative " and " relationship" (p.45), Mill’s adopted statement is poverty and superficiality itself. It has nothing to do with a series of events. They may be the fundamentum relationis, but cannot be the relation itself. Relative or relation is merely that a thing is before the mind in relation or reference to something else, not simply in itself, and in what it is related. Where this is an important and constant reference, there is very commonly a word expressing it, as subject, son, father. And even the verb is so used. I say, relatively to Asia, India is a small tract of land, but relatively to England a very large one, and so on. That dissertation relates to political, not physical, geography. Hence more widely he related to me his history. (This may be from another etymological sense of the word.) At any rate relative is when, in thinking of anything or speaking of anything, my mind or even the word refers to something besides that of which I think or speak, and states, where it is a relative word, the nature of the reference: what I said related to such an one, 1:e. referred it to him. Hence a relative word is one which expresses this reference, as "son" makes me think of "father," " subject" of " king" or other ruling authority, "citizen" of "state." But the thought as to the two is not the same as Mr. Mill asserts. The fact is not the same, not even in father and son. One is the attribute of paternity, the other of fileity. Begetting is only the way it is formed; father is not a series of events, but present reference to what he is towards a son. Begetting, in man’s case at any rate, is the cause of that, but not it, for it is continuous and begetting is not. Begetting is not the relationship at all. It is over before the relationship begins. So in king and subject. Subjection is thought of when I say subject, and in the subject; authority in the king, when I say king. And here by what events he got it has nothing to do with the matter. It may be birth, conquest, election: the relation is in all cases consequent on an event if referring to it. It is a character in one which refers to another, and is a link or tie in thought to them. Mill’s account is degrading and false too, for the series of events must be finished before the relationship begins. But it gives him the opportunity of denying all moral character to it; whereas relationship in living beings gives duties and affections according to the nature of the being. There is no relationship of this kind between an apple-tree sprung from a pippin with the tree the pippin came from. The kind, if according to nature; may be the same. So that if I say apple, I suppose an apple-tree, but there is no subsisting tie or link formed by God. In mere animals this is merely animal as long as the necessities of animal nature require it, but that is all. Where there is a moral nature, there is a moral relationship according to it. Husband and wife are that. It means a relationship in which the formed tie is to be maintained according to its nature. I quite admit that this is outside logic; but then all duties and right affections, all thoughts and ideas connected with the relationship, are outside logic; that is, everything that man is as a moral being. Hence no rationalist has ever found a basis of morality. Conscience, happily, is often better than logic; but one time it is general utility, another following nature, and other things. It is wholly and only living up to the relationships we are placed in. Yet Mill says (p. 8) nearly the whole of human conduct is amenable to the authority of logic. Logic has nothing good or bad to do with it. Nor is it, as he says, the science of evidence. Logic has nothing to do with it. There is no science of evidence. There is observation of human nature, and the motives which govern it, which help to ascertain whether evidence is reliable. But he carefully obscures this word as he does others. I must say, to seek to defeat truth. Evidence or testimony has on the face of it nothing to do with proof by inference (see note, p. 5), but he obscures this point too. There testimony is spoken of, and as to this it is said (p. 9), logic does not find evidences. Then we have the evidence of consciousness. But is the testimony of another evidence, supposing it proved credible, or thought so? Find it out from Mr. Mill if you can. It would open a door to faith on adequate testimony, without reasoning or inference, and that would be intolerable. From what I have said of constancy of link or tie, another distinction arises as to relative words and relation. There are many relative words where there is no relation. Thus, robber is a relative word, but you cannot speak of a relationship between them, nor have you a word for him who is thought of in the relative word. I say lessor, that is a subsisting relation, and I have lessee. I rather think, at any rate it is so in many cases, the relative word, where there is only one, exists where the character abides in that one, specially in the active and passive, er, or, and ee. At any rate, where the relative character subsists, there is a relation in common language. Where not, there may be a relative word. Where the relative word expresses a relation, it is never an event or series of events. The assertion is merely an effort to put a pig and. a man on the same level, and deny subsisting relationship and duty ’(see p. 8, § 4). All active words are relative, but there is generally no relationship. As regards p. 49, the only thing logical proof does is to show that the conclusion, which I have not yet admitted, is contained in the premises, which I have, though of course in reasoning I may deny them. All that is believed is what is stated in the premises, upon whatever ground it may be, consciousness, sight, experience, or previous proof even. The statement implies and means to say that formal proof, as afforded by logic, is that which produces belief, or makes it tantamount.* (*But this is wholly false, and at any rate applies only to discourse (λογος). I see a man; I believe it -without any proposition. If I say such a one is there or here, there or here is asserted about him; but when I see him I know or believe it without any logical inference at all. Existence, we have seen, asserts nothing save in mentally adding now.) I believe what I am conscious of, have by intuition, which he admits is no part of logic. I would add experience of what goes on outside us, and, I add, testimony to facts which are not properly propositions, though as to some of course they may be so stated, but are believed, not by logical proof. So that, if a proposition or assertion be made of it, there is no logical proof, it is believed by sight or testimony. All this is radically false. Nor can existence as a fact be said to be two things, one predicated about another, like qualities. When I say "the sun exists," as we have seen, unless the thought " now " be introduced, it is not affirming a second thing about a first, but that the first " is " which is involved in saying the sun. For if no sun’s existence is before the mind, I cannot say "the sun" as we have seen. Introducing the idea of time " was " or " now is is another thing affirmed about it. But I affirm no quality, I predicate nothing about it, when I recognize it as a thing, 1:e. mentally its existence. Even if I say "the sun was," I say nothing about it; there is no attribute attached to it. If I say such a man is a good man, it is a proposition, but the facts of his life show it. My testimony may be believed. I may make a conclusion of it, as he who does so and so is a good man, but he does so and so; he is a good man, then. That he does so and so is believed; there is no logical inference, if I say he does so and so as the proof; it is merely defining goodness if I put it in a proposition to infer from it. That is what I mean by goodness; the acts experienced prove the heart of the man, not logic. If I say, he who does so and so is a good man; A does so and so; he is a good man; I turn it into a logical form; but what I know and believe is that A does so and so, from experience or testimony, and that is the proof of his goodness; the first premise is merely what I mean by goodness, or at least the testimony of what I mean by goodness experimentally to my mind. His doing so and so proves goodness, not logic; the facts do, if what I mean by goodness is proved by them; but a definition is not an inference. When I say good, I mean something without any inference at all; the facts that show it are no inference, but I believe the goodness because, of them. But all this is a vital principle. The, statement is tacit infidelity, as all that went before is. Belief is not by logical proof, never even. The things believed are/in the premises, as I have said; and besides, consciousness and intuition, and, I add, testimony, are grounds of belief. The two first, he admits, are no part of logic; the latter he shirks. Mill’s inaccuracy of mind certainly unfits him to write on logic. In his Categories, p. 55, feeling is a state of consciousness. This is false really, and according to the next sentence. There it is said, " Everything is a feeling of which the mind is conscious;" but then I am conscious of the feeling, and the two things are distinct, which they are. Feeling is an effect produced in me by some external cause. I am conscious of this. In consciousness there is a reflex activity of "I" as to what I feel. I take cognizance of it. When I say " I am," I introduce an activity of " I" about something. "The mind is conscious," 1:e. the mind (or "I" mentally) is in operation about something; that something is the feeling. Let it be color supposed in the object, or the effect of it on my mind if I am so to take it, is an object of which I take notice. But if it be " of which," it is not the state of consciousness I am in about it. If the language of philosophy is no more accurate than this, it had better not set about to teach. The division, too, lower down, is false; for thought is as large as feeling if it embraces everything we are conscious of, only here he has proved what I have said above. We think and so have the consciousness, and the red color is something we think of. The whole statement is the utmost confusion and inaccuracy of statement. I doubt too the accuracy of distinguishing imaginary objects from the thoughts of them, because they exist only in the mind, and what exists there, and only there, is a thought, and only a thought. I may so connect it with other things as to give it a thought reality, as with yesterday and eating the loaf, or the plant and the bud; but the thing itself is only a thought. There is no object in the mind save the thought itself. Existence may be added to the thought by circumstances, but the thought is all there is. His distinction of sound and color as being, or not, a name of the sensation, is all groundless. I think of the sound in a trumpet as well as in my ear, and the color in the object as well as in my eye. There is no name of sensation distinct from what produces it. It is merely the nature of sight connecting it more sensibly with the object. A trumpet and sound are two things, because the sound is produced, not in the trumpet. Whereas in a white box I conceive the white as always in it, not being produced in it as sound. What is in p. 57 is the same confusion we have spoken of, confounding consciousness with the feeling we are conscious of. If I am hurt in my body and feel it, say pain in my hand,, my mind is not pained. That is quite a different thing. My. mind is conscious of the pain, but that is not the pain itself. How it comes by nerves is another question. But I may be conscious of a mental sensation or a bodily one, and these are not the same. As to the perception of an external object, no doubt what I am conscious of is the sensation produced in me. But I judge it comes from a given body, for where the action of that is intercepted, the sensation is not there. But this is judgment. But we have certainty of the relative existence of material objects, because they make the action of my will impossible. I cannot walk through a wall. It is not feeling or touch, but my purpose is hindered. But this is only relative, as some other being may be able-I believe can. Page 59 is all inaccurate. Some do and some do not. Sovereign and subject do not. "Physician" does not, it is hardly a relative term. Some are a single act, as mortgagor and mortgagee, and with others suppose a title, as sovereign, and no acts. All is utterly inaccurate, but mortgagor and mortgagee connote nothing about a court of justice. It is puerile, the want of accuracy of his mind. Indeed, superficiality marks Mill particularly. As to substances, I admit that what the mind takes notice of passes in it. Yet, as I have said, material resistance of matter, where my will works, proves the existence relatively to me of matter. It is not a sensation; it is a fact. Thus, when Mill on relation speaks of the judge’s dealing with a debtor as only a sensation, supposing he had the debtor put in prison, it is not merely a sensation. Prison means being shut up, so that, sensation or no sensation, you cannot get out. You are a prisoner. Your body is shut in. But further, if white be only a sensation, it may exist without saying "of." I can think of whiteness without an object, and have the sensation, though more dimly perhaps; in a dream quite as vividly, which, however complex, is only sensation. Next, if I say " it produces," I affirm a quality; let it be intuition, or habits of thought and language formed experimentally. When I say snow is white, I have as much the thought of snow as of whiteness. It is defined unexceptionably, he tells us; the external cause to which we ascribe our sensations. Well then (be it that I am so constituted, as the way of explaining it, to which I do not at all except), I have the thought in my mind of an external cause, as well as of that which is the particular sensation or attribute. The sensation in my mind gives me the thought of an external cause, as well as of whiteness or any other attribute. I can say red snow;" but, red or white, my thought of snow is distinct therefore from my thought of red or white. And I have this thought. So if I say snow is white and paper is white; objects are in my mind, call them bodies, external cause, or what you like, as well as whiteness. When I say external cause, I speak of something, but of what is other than the effect it produces. Cause and effect are not the same. Nor is it the same thing really to say opium puts me to sleep, and to say it has soporific virtues. One affirms the fact as true; the other positively asserts, rightly or wrongly, a quality existing in opium as a universal fact about opium. Nor is it true that a man having no child, I do not call him father merely; he is not a father.. This is false, and the whole comment on it is beating about the bush. I do not talk scholastically of substance and attributes. It is a mere ideal abstraction. But an external cause of a sensation and a sensation are not the same thing. And I judge rightly that, if an object always produces a sensation, and in its absence it is not produced, but by an effort of mind having been received, there is what men call an external cause. I may know that it is a mere effect of the reflection of light from a given body, but there is an external cause, be that cause scientifically what it may. I knock my shin against a stone, I have the sensation of pain; pain is not a stone. You will tell me it comes from muscles. Well, pain is not muscles, but a sensation through an effect produced by the stone on the muscles conveyed by the nerves. But whatever the cause, it is not the sensation caused. Further, I doubt the justness of the statement; "to the senses nothing is apparent but the sensation." This is not correct. They produce the sensation, or rather it is produced in them, and the mind takes cognizance of it. The external cause acts on the senses, and, by these, causes, produces the sensation, which, I readily admit, the consciousness of my mind notices (63). If I know only my sensations, I cannot conceive an object but by them, nor, consequently, their non-existence. I may conceive the others without one of them supplanted by a different one, but I cannot conceive no conception. Hence he whole argument has no ground at all, and for sensation there could be no residuum when the absence of the sensations is supposed. It proves nothing but that there is no sensation when there is none. I have already noticed sensations apparent to senses as a fallacy. The proof of the existence of matter is elsewhere, and untouched, excluding other matter, and obstructing my will; 1:e. it exists relatively to me. If there is an external cause, no matter what you call it. But here also is a mistake. The materiality is not the cause of the sensations. There are external causes commonly called qualities or attributes. Of these I can only say there is a cause of something which produces the sensation. The substratum is not, as such, the cause of them, unless it be touch, which in one aspect is the perception of matter. Nature of the thing (65) is too vague to have any value in reasoning. "Nature of" generally means qualities. The existence of matter for me is known; its nature is to hinder progress of other matter, as my body. Beyond this nature conveys no idea at all. I can only know what affects " I." So that the word has no meaning; I can only know it by I, 1:e. my power of knowledge. I is necessarily the limit of I’s knowledge by the power of I. Only I may be acted on by a power above or beyond I. But Cousin is wrong.; for if there was no "sujet sentient, on ne peut pas dire ils agiraient encore." There would be nothing affected, and I can suppose them physically inert. To conceive them existing, moreover, there is a conceiving power, and, if by acting I mean in a being conscious of it, it involves the consciousness also, and it must be mine, or I know nothing about it. I cannot think of a consciousness I have not got; if I realize it, I have it. Hence all Cousin’s argument falls through. I cannot say " agiraient autrement," for I cannot conceive autrement than I conceive. All this really means the powers I have cannot go beyond themselves, which is the meaning of the word "power;" but that I am made so as to be acted on, and in this I go no farther than I am acted on. I am conscious of it. That is not the being acted on, feeling, but my perceptions of it. Of course that ends in itself, save that when acted on, something acts on me, for it is not constant. Of this I am conscious, but only in that in which it acts on me. I am in a relative state, and it exists in that in which it acts on me, relatively to me. The result is really this: I am in relationship with a scene around me, and outwardly part of it, formed to act on certain sensibilities I have, with a mind which takes notice of the sensation produced--is conscious of it by taking notice of it. But this does not go farther than the attributes or qualities which then by long habit and constitution we attribute to the object which so acts. This is not a logical conclusion, nor merely long experience. A child tries to take hold of an object which it sees; it may measure wrong, but seeks the object; so even does a dog when attracted to it. Matter is not perceived abstractedly, but something known sensitively by its attributes or qualities; but matter is proved by its resistance to other matter and my will; for I, having a material body, as well as senses and mind, am in relation to matter as disabling my will from doing what it seeks. Matter is obstructive. But all this is only my relationship with a world, of which, in this respect, I form a part. But then, note, this only recognizes a material sensible world, subject to me in thought, if not in fact. I discover it and its qualities, and its materiality, but no more. It is pure materialism in the limits of thought. If I go no farther, all action on me other than on my senses, or material obstruction to my will, is ignored or denied. There can in the nature of things be no morality, no influence even of a stronger mind on mine. As to the knowledge of God, or any idea of Him (though idea is an incorrect word), it is impossible, because He is not the object of sense or physical obstruction of will. But this is false upon the face of it, because men have an idea of God, not an object of senses or material. I do not go so far as to say this is a proof that He exists, though this may be strongly urged, and has been, for I think the true knowledge of God is mainly at any rate from another source or inlet; but I say that it proves all this and other metaphysics wrong, because men have, not exactly an idea, for it is not from sense or physically obstructed will, but an apprehension of God for which this system gives no place. I do not say how they got it, but they have it, and that these systems fail to account for moral qualities, goodness, love to a parent, authority, right and wrong, which are in our minds, but do not enter into this account of names or things at all. Mill is so grossly inaccurate and careless, correcting others only by inaccuracy of mind that, save for this he is hardly worth reading. He says thus (p. 88), we affirm that something is not, which is absurd on the face of it, for if I can say something, I cannot say it is not. I can take a supposed being; there is a griffin, or a dodo; and deny the proposition. There is not, etc. A particular quality may be denied of something. We say it familiarly. The true word is, there is not anything, or no such thing. If it be merely a predicated quality, then it is a positive affirmation about the subject. " Maoris are not black." This affirms something about Maoris. What? not black. But the secret of this is, he has settled that a copula " is " is, another word than " is " exists. But though modified by the predicated quality, it is still the identically same "is." It means not that the subject is simply (1:e. exists), but that the quality exists, or does not exist in that subject. But it is always affirmation, or supposition, of existence of something. Where not is placed, I am quite indifferent. Again he says we know mortality by one death as by any number. This is an utter blunder. I know death as well, but not mortality, which means that men are liable to death. For men mortality is an inference to universality from multiplied experience; whereas one man’s death does not prove that at all. I have already said his division of feeling is wholly false, for either thought is a mere sensation (and he confounds consciousness, and what we are conscious of), or it is an active exercise of mind, and not a feeling. Volition is not a feeling, unless I confound consciousness, and what I am conscious of. Matter gives us no sensations (unless the pain of a blow be so called, save obstructing the will, of which he does not speak); attributes or qualities do. So that the unknown body is not the cause of our sensations; for, were it so, it would be known by them. I know white and black. The substratum is assumed to exist as sustaining these so-called inherent qualities, but it produces no sensations. As to mind, I am conscious of knowing, not merely receiving as a sensation, but of activity about them. So far I know it. Saying "unknown recipient" means nothing, or supposes it to be an object sensible so as to form an idea, really assuming objective materialism in it (which denies its nature, which is thinking). To say recipient is equally false, as leaving out the principal distinctive part of it. Mind is known in its own consciousness. It knows itself not objectively, but consciously, and recipiency is not its principal character. I am so. constituted as to receive impressions of objects, but this is not properly mind, which begins when I begin to judge of the impression, or go on farther. Mind (and other capacities) may be acted on by higher mind, but this is another point. As to attributes, there are no other states of consciousness, which is the knowledge of attributes, but sensations. They may produce pleasure, but that is not knowledge of an attribute. Relation I have already spoken of. He is all wrong. "Father" has nothing to do with any fact or phenomenon. You can only say we are so constituted as to have a sense of the relationship. Of my being generated I know nothing, and I am a child only after all that is over. I did not exist till it was. It was a relationship with one by whom I was begotten. As to present facts, the accomplishment of them all would not make a man a father, nor produce the sense of the relationship. Filiality, as in the mind, is a part of our nature, and even of animal nature, as far as it goes. We are so made. In a large class of relations the acting of a cause produces a relationship, but it is not the relationship itself. This is a state in which one is towards another, not what caused that state. Those not such are quantity. I have spoken of propositions. A word on their nature (p. 94). I do not admit that man is mortal is the same thing as every man is mortal. The last is a fact as to every individual, the former an assertion as to his’ nature, which is a quite different proposition. So as to wine or food, it has nothing to do with quantity; it affirms something of the nature or quality. Food is necessary, or metal is requisite, is a thing characterized by that word. It is food, it is metal, that thing. Assent is merely that I make the proposition mine, and affirm it. " Mahomet is the apostle of God." My assent is merely that my mind too says so. If I say " No, he is not," I reject it, I disaffirm it. If I do not know, it is left as no proposition in my mind about it. The looseness of Mill is inconceivable. In p. 93 "general name" is Used without a word of what that means. In 97 we have " these theories" without any distinct theories having been mentioned. Again, a golden mountain is no proposition at all. I do not see any difficulty in seeing what the mind does in believing. I affirm the proposition. I say "gold is yellow." Propositions are not assertions about two things, and this contradicts his whole previous system that attributes are never anything but our conceptions; substance or body an external thing that causes them. When I say gold is yellow, I affirm that gold is the external cause of the sensation of yellow in my mind. When I say Mahomet is or is not the apostle of God, I affirm or deny what apostle of God represents in my mind of the person Ma- hornet. The predicate is always a conception of the mind, not a thing, the subject a real or supposed object. If I say a centaur is a fiction of the poets, fiction of the poets is what I conceive as characteristic of it; but centaur is a real thing; not an animal, but I speak of a real thing, a description in the poets. And of that which does exist in that description, I. affirm that it is a fiction; what I think of is not an animal, but a description, which I affirm to be a fiction. Further, my belief has not reference to things as he states. The impression made by that outward thing upon the human organs has not, save as a simple sensation in the mind, anything to do with the matter. He denies his previous teaching. And if a sensation, it is his conception of gold. I add, in p. 68 there is the usual looseness. Myself cannot be my mind, because my mind supposes myself distinct from mind, and mind to be something I possess. The whole of this, p. 97, denies what is previously taught. He does not believe a fact in saying yellow, but a conception in Ms mind; for nothing else, he has told us, is meant by yellow. Besides, what does he believe?--a fact relating to the outward thing gold, or to the impression made by it? Two distinct things, the former of which he has stoutly denied before. (See pp. 67, 69, and 70.) We assert simply that we have a particular sensation (p. 98). Digging is not a proposition; so that is all nonsense. When I say "fire causes heat," I do say that the thing called fire causes a sensation in me. Yet I admit that logic is not concerned in belief, but in showing that the conclusion is contained in what is believed already, namely, the two premises. But then he is wrong altogether. I inquire neither into what believing is nor into the thing believed, but into the conclusions being rightly contained in the premises. If I take the simple proposition, the only question is, Do I affirm it in my mind? Does my mind say " gold is yellow?" Of this, evidence alone is the ground, and this has nothing to do with logic. The question is, Does or does not gold produce in men’s minds the sensation called yellow? That is a question of fact, the effect of something in the mind; and I cannot begin arguing till that is settled. This may be a conclusion drawn to start afresh with as true; but it always starts from what is believed on evidence, and when it is a fact that is believed logic has nothing to do with it-cannot in its nature. He confounds assent or belief with the evidence of truth. Hobbes is wrong, because the quality is not the name of the thing which has it. Man, if six feet high, is not called by the name six feet high; one is not capable of being called by the other. Logically, it would make the predicate of an affirmative proposition universal, which it is not. White is not connotative. It attributes the quality whiteness to any given object, and connotes nothing. If I think of white without an object, I can only think of whiteness, and white is the form of word which attributes this to any object. (See § 104, p.4.) Snow is white. I think only of snow, and the sensation it gives me. Hobbes’ mistake is in calling wise a name of Socrates, as if they embraced the same extent. It is a quality of Socrates, but may be affirmed of a thousand other things, or else we could say wise is Socrates (102). But the explanation of connotation is extremely confused (31). So in p. 102, it is not the attributes connoted by man which are mortal at all; they are not necessarily accompanied by the attribute mortal. It is the man in whom they are who is mortal. Man may have all the attributes of a man, except, mortality, or many of the same attributes be found in one who is not a man. Hence, he speaks of objects possessing the attributes, which falsifies all his statements. When man suggests or connotes a number of attributes which make up the idea, mortality is another attribute I add to these, but not another name for the united attributes which go to make up the name man. It is not a name of man, but of one of his attributes. The predicate is one attribute of the subject, but, if it have become the name of a class, the class is formed of all that have that attribute. Plato is a philosopher, only says, Plato has the quality so predicated of him; but if men have agreed to make a class of all possessing that quality, the word puts him in that class: If I say a potato is a solanum, deadly night-shade is a solanum. It merely in each case attributes a quality or qualities; but men have agreed, rightly or wrongly, to classify a set of plants by having that quality or qualities. It is not the name which makes them a class, but the common possession of the quality expressed by the name. If I call a monopetalous flower, possessing certain other phenomena of form, a solanum, whatever has these forms is a solanum the name only states it has. If I say a dog barks, does not mew, barking is not a class, because barking, as a fact, does not make a class, because the thing does not characterize sufficiently other individuals to bring them together in my mind. See further on this point more clearly and fully discussed. I affirm (p. 105) that the object did already belong to the class, though I did not know of it. A "single sensible attribute does not make a class, and some classes are in nature, indeed, all really; but many may be formed for scientific convenience which are not obvious classes, as pig, ox, horse are, metal even. If the diamond is combustible, it always was combustible; all the difference was the ignorance of men. Combustible means what can be burnt; and that was always true of diamond, though man, through his ignorance, could not say so. The more I read on these points, the clearer it is to me that we are created in a system of which, corporeally and in our natural faculties, we form a part; consequently all our competency of perception and conception is within the limits, and necessarily so, of the system of which we form part. We may be mentally a more reflective, and so superior part. I do not speak here of what connects us with the Divinity, but of our natural faculties. We may have superior powers of reflection as to what we perceive, but our perceptions are all of it and necessarily according to it, for we are part of it. And if I can say, as a matter of proof, that what is material exists, I can for that reason, as already said, only know it relatively. My reflective powers create a difficulty, because I know it is an image on the retina I perceive, not the object directly. The dog sees by an object on his retina, and has no difficulty, but seizes a man or a piece of beef, and he is right; and if nothing hinders, he succeeds, and defends his master from a robber; or satisfies his hunger. So does man; but he is not quite sure it is a man or a piece of beef he sees, rather sure it is not, because he is wise. But the whole truth is, that all is relatively true, most of the accounting for it is nonsense; but we belong to a system, and can only think in it. For after all I do not see an image on the retina any more than the object which produces it. It is only an object, and the conception formed in my mind is only that I am created, or, if that offends, constituted, so to perceive; and objects in the same creation or world around me are constituted to produce the impression with which mind occupies itself, no more to be accounted for than the impression produced. We are so constituted (that is the whole matter), and confined to the constituted system we belong to, only perhaps to rule it. Hence language cannot yet out of it, for we think and so speak according to this constitution. And these wiseacres cannot get out of it. Substance is something that causes a sensation. Is it then something or not? You only know the sensation, a point further as to your reflective powers of analysis and reasoning. But you must say " something." Try and do without it. Just so of attributes, only another kind of something. You have got sensations; you are so constituted. Something produces it. The system you are in is so constituted. But you have a will as well as sensations. And with the best will in the world a man in a secure dungeon cannot get out. He has no doubt the sensation of the door and the walls. But he has more-a will wholly arrested, because he.is as to his body of the same system as the wall, and, thief or philosopher, he cannot get out. The dog is in the same plight; as to this he is part of the same system. Only the philosopher, seeing we know only sensations, tells me I have no knowledge that a wall is there, or conceals his ignorance on the same ground by saying substance is " something" which produces a sensation. But I will follow yet some details. All seems to me confusion and inaccuracy in p. 98. Heat, we have been told, is only known as a sensation in me. NOW it is not my idea of heat, but heat itself. If heat is in the fire, the fire does not cause it; if in other objects, the whole sentence is obscure. But, to turn to the import of propositions in p. 112, I deny that in a noumenon they affirm causation. If I say Socrates, I think of a person existing, but not of his causing anything. If I say John Brown lives in Brentford, I am not thinking of a cause of anything. The definition is false. If I say a stone, as believing the existence of matter as a noumenon, I do not think of its causing anything. If I go on and add its attributes-hardness, compactness, weight, form, -whatever else-these are phenomena known by sensation, not as noumena at all. Sameness is not resemblance. Resemblance supposes a difference in something, but certain phenomena in the objects alike. Two perfectly white things have the same color, they resemble each other in that, but that supposes other phenomena in which they do not. There may be perfect likeness, if the object itself be known to be different, as a portrait, or two brothers. But in some way the objects are known to be different. Next, all is confusion as to what he says of a class. A class is where many objects, different in a number of qualities, have some characteristic ones the same, and in this sense essential ones, so that a common name is given to them. To call snow, as he does, a class, is just nonsense. It is one thing, though a general name for repeated cases of that one thing existing. But when I say man is mortal, I do not speak of a class at all, though the word may imply it if such a class be known. I affirm of man the. quality which makes him a member of the class designated by it, if such a class be known. Some predicates are merely a quality, as mortal; others are a class already formed, as animal. But there is another thing to be noted here. Very often, in predicating a quality which may form a class, I predicate only as regards the subject partially, if the subject be a compound idea. I speak only according to the phenomena. Thus, man is a corporeal being does not mean wholly so for one who believes he has a soul distinct from his body. Corporeal means he has a body, which is true, but, not that the body is the whole of man, or a different name for the same thing. It only affirms that man has that quality. So man is mortal, 1:e. he naturally dies. Only that quality is affirmed of him What else there may be of him, or may not be, nothing is said about. The class, is merely by having a body, or dying as a being here; and, so far as regards that quality, he belongs to the class distinguished by it, but no more. If I say man is a corporeal being, but man is one person, composed of body and soul, but all corporeal beings are divisible, therefore souls are divisible as well as bodies, it is sophistry; and here logical forms are justly used to detect it, because corporeal applies simply to the fact of having a body. Here the sophistry is evident, it identifies soul and body, which I have therefore expressly added, which possession of a body, though it classifies man, does not. It is not using the class, but affirming the quality of man, which, if there be such a class, puts him in it, as to the point expressed in the quality. Now snow is not a class, because it is not a quality predicable of different objects which can be so qualified; snow is an object, and is snow. But then, though Mill has partly stated what I have insisted on above, by want of distinguishing, in fact, he has misapprehended the matter. White is a primary sensation, and indeed hardly makes a class; but the great mass of class words are not so, they are experimentally formed, and the quality experimental, not sensational, or at least scientific discovery of like qualities known by sensation so as to form classes. Hence, though the proposition only affirms the possession of a quality, the quality is as used a general one formed by experiment. Thus, diamond is combustible; come bustible means simply can be burned by heat, a word invented on discoveries of what could be consumed by heat. When I say snow is white, white is a simple sensation, though it can in certain cases classify where sensations of colors are in question; but combustible, though a mere quality, is not a primarily sensible one, but a class word. That a diamond is so was not yet discovered, but combustibility was, and by discovery a diamond to be such. So mortal is properly still more a class. When applied to a class, man or all men, it is only a conclusion drawn from all we know dying, affirming that men are naturally all subjected to it, as animals also are. They cease to be in this state of existence; and what is quasi-universal is felt to be necessary. It is strictly a class experimentally formed. A man might die, and I could not say man is mortal. It might be only criminals, or only good people, or only man in some circumstances died, till I found the contrary. Thus some classes are formed, and the only inquiry is, if the individual belongs to it. It can hardly be strictly said so of mere sensible qualities; but belonging to a class even in this case is very often the only important point where the sensible quality connotes some other which constitutes the minor. Snow is white, but white dazzles the eye--snow dazzles the eye. But I cannot say, as he alleges, gold is a metal, if there are no others, unless certain various qualities combined are agreed to be called metal; but words are not so formed but by the experiment of several having certain qualities, coherence, weight, ductility, etc. It may so happen, as: Christians are men, and men from singular qualities being alone; but then it is not a class, but observed unity in these qualities. It is a word representing a definition only. But when I say such a thing is white (116), it is not resemblance. When the name was first given, however this was, it meant that sensation; and when I say a thing is white, I merely say it produces that sensation, it connotes nothing nor any resemblance. My mind may go on to this. (117.) I doubt the possibility of the co-existence of two states of consciousness. As I always find in a thing attributes which cause certain sensations, and pass instantaneously from one to another, I conclude their simultaneous co-inherence. It is not, therefore, simultaneity in time, but a conclusion to co-existence in what produces the different sensations; hence that they are all constantly there. In p. 119, " thoughtlessness is dangerous," is not the same as thoughtless actions; one is a state of mind or character, the other the effect of these. The latter may be actually fatal. Thoughtlessness is dangerous because it tends to these; when the act is there, it is over, and the danger passed in ruin, mischief, or escape. Nor are any of his propositions in this page the same. " Prudence is a virtue," states what prudence is. Prudent persons, etc., affirms something of persons, and may be taken as a conclusion drawn from the other. The attachment of the virtue to a person is different from something being a virtue; and this indeed he goes on to show. Nor can I say in so far as they are prudent, for, as he says, prudence in a wicked man is no benefit to society at all. But then all his reasoning about it and equivalents is confusion. Prudent persons or acts are noway the same thing as. prudence. Prudence is a good thing always in itself; when you pass into persons or acts, the whole matter is changed. A prudent act or person may be pure mischief, and more mischief by being prudent, because acts or persons introduce other things besides prudence into the thought, and what is good per se may lose its goodness when connected with something else mixed with it or using it. I use it now merely to show that such are not equivalent propositions. Even whiteness as a color is not the same as the sensation of white; for whiteness is the supposed producer of the sensation, and not the sensation itself. If I say whiteness is not to be attained or produced, it is not the same as to say the sensation of white is not. I return to p. 104. What he says of ὕστεροω πρῶτον is all wrong, because when I say snow is white, I assume the known class white already gathered up from various objects. The conception of white does not follow the judgments, but, white being known, I know by the conception various objects are so. Now white is a class for me, and so I use it in the proposition, because white connotes other things which I want to affirm of snow, which forms my minor. Thus, snow is white, but white dazzles the eye-snow dazzles the eye. Classes are made by attributing certain qualities to various objects common to them all, and not to other objects, as I say metal. And the objects with the line drawn round them by this word "metal" belong to the class, and, materially speaking, form it. I cannot say, till I have made a class by the conceptions contained in it, gold is metal; I say gold is heavy, malleable, ductile, etc.; when I say so is platinum, silver, etc., I then have a name including these or other qualities, and call those having them " metals" as a class. It may be one attribute, as white, but one attribute hardly forms a class from its being only a single conception, and it is simply a repetition of the same conception, not a class of objects which has received a distinct common name so as to form them into a class, as metal. If I say white is pleasant, it is really whiteness, and not a class, but a single conception. If I say white flowers are beautiful, I classify them, because I have a selection of objects combined into one set by themselves, and so a class. For a class is a class of some things distinguished from others which might by certain common qualities be confounded with them, but are distinguished by others peculiar to a certain number of them. He is wrong in saying (p. 115), it does not retain the same meaning. It does, but another individual is brought into the class because it has the qualities which form the meaning of that class word. It did belong to that class, but we did not know it. This is grossly stupid; and the framers of language did and do what he says is so absurd, as when they said metal. If other metals have been discovered, 1:e. things having the qualities embraced in the name, that alters nothing. We may, of course, from fuller knowledge of qualities, change or improve classification. Common distinguishing qualities make a class. A mere single conception of sense, to say the least, is a bad class word, because it does not combine by adequate resemblance in what is peculiar what distinguishes things from others generally like them so as to be confounded. Connected with other analogous things it may; nor can it be said it cannot form a class. Classification is " an arrangement and grouping of definite and known individuals." Pp. 108-9 are also false, because when I say all men are mortal, it is true that I speak of men as known by the attributes expressed by the word. But this is only the phenomena presented to sense or matter of evidence. Hence I can only say that the connotation is of men as phenomenal here. Hence, really the subject of the proposition is taken strictly in its extension, not in all it does or may connote,-all men who are the subject of my observation of men in general down here; and hence it is absolutely necessary to bring in extension strictly, for so only it is true. It is thought of only through the " intension " or attributes, but this only includes ordinary phenomenal man, and can only apply to those whom I know or see; 1:e. the proposition is TRUE ONLY as taken in extension. Add here, the proposition is only a conclusion from a particular to a universal, for the only phenomena I have is death, not mortality. The extent of the class, therefore, is " apprehended and indicated directly"; for if I say man from phenomena or attributes, I take in only what is phenomenal. All the cases of ordinary phenomenal man we have seen have died; therefore phenomenal man is subject to death; the phenomenon has accompanied the other phenomena, but this strictly brings in extension. Phenomenal men are all that we speak of, and speak of all of them as such. As to his minuter analysis (p. 119) of " prudence is a virtue," all is as usual vague and unsatisfactory. It gives definitions of virtue which are no equivalents at all; a virtue is not equivalent to a mental quality, etc. Just now prudence was equivalent to prudent persons or actions; they are not a mental quality. Nor is virtue a mental quality. Virtue gives a whole class and order and principle of conduct in spite of difficulties, and when he says a mental] quality because prudence is one, he confounds the subject and predicate, because the definition must give the whole of what is defined; and if I say a mental quality, virtue is only one mental quality, and if prudence is that, there is no other. His statement is that a mental quality is equivalent to or a definition of virtue, can take its place. But, further, it is not a cause of God’s approval but the object of it, whatever causes Him so to approve it; nor, though it is not so thoroughly false, is a quality beneficial. Still beneficial refers to what the beneficial thing causes; approval is a state of mind in another caused by the motives which govern it. What he states of the ground or foundation of the prudence is the prudence itself. If these things are in a man I say he is prudent, because they are prudence. But if no conduct follows, nothing is beneficial. What he calls facts or phenomena which are the ground of the attribute are no facts or phenomena, save as prudence itself is one. The whole statement is in the highest degree unsatisfactory. When I say " prudence is a virtue," I give a character to prudence, without any facts, phenomena, sequence, co-existence, causation, or resemblance whatever. He admits it does not involve any conduct; consequently there is nothing caused by it. When I say beneficial, I suppose some activity towards others, or deliberate abstinence from it in which others are concerned. Whereas prudence is merely an abstract quality, and I declare it a good one without any facts or phenomena. But there is a use of logic flowing from classification which I must notice. Locke takes all the properties. Of this farther on. It is important to note that some predicates express only an attribute, as mortal, though a class may be made out of them; others are a class, as animal. But there is a use of logic flowing from classification which I must notice. A main distinctive feature is taken to form an under-class or species, 1:e. the underclass is made by it of a wider class (or genus), and by this feature the class is denoted, as rational animal; and the subject comes under it, the predicate expressing the species and genus containing it, the class word forming the species expressing only a given important attribute of the class. But it is important to designate, another attribute as belonging to the subject, one unknown to or unnoticed by the person reasoned with. That this other attribute exists in the predicate is affirmed in the minor, and so is affirmed of the subject. Thus, all men are mortal, 1:e. subject to death, but all mortal beings are so by living by blood (or by blood being their life); therefore all men live by blood, Now mortal, though forming a class, only speaks of liability to death; that is the meaning of the word and no more, and I say no more. I affirm a second truth in the minor-namely, how or. why beings die or are subject to death, in no way comprised in the word mortal, but giving a reason for all mortality. The syllogism merely gives a secure method of affirming the facts so that the conclusion follows. The word mortal means something and only that, liability to death; but if man be in this class, mortal, and I show that something else does belong always to this class, though not in thought contained in the word it is named by, I have added something to the knowledge contained in the major.* (* All this in Mill on classification is wrong.) In verbal or essential propositions classes are of different kinds, some natural and obvious, some from experimental observation, some more arbitrary. A man is a real thing or being. It is not merely that a class of two-legged mammals without reason is not reputed a man. I care not about the word; but here the word does not make the class, but the class the word: call it homo, or ἄνθρωπος,or mensch, is all alike. Universal intelligence has distinguished that kind of being; the class existed or the nature which constitutes it, before it got a name. I believe (and important principles are contained in that) God gave it as Adam did to the animals; but whether this were so or not, the thing was there before it got a name. It was not a horse nor an ox, nor a biped mammal with no more reason than these. A man was there to be called and have a name, and a distinguishing name, as horses or oxen were, and the difference known. In other cases the class was the result of experience, as metal, where weight, ductility, and other distinguishing qualities existed, and men made a class for convenience; but the qualities on which the class was founded were not words but things. I am not now reasoning how or when the knowledge was acquired, whether by sensations produced or not. I accept that in general; but language is formed in the relative sphere of existence in which we are and in which we know, and the language is formed according to the system and accepts the things as real; and if men are to speak, for whom the sphere around them exists relatively, the language which expresses their thoughts must express the existence of things, which, relatively to them and their thoughts, do so exist. They may grow in this knowledge, form, where experiment has been their ground, more satisfactory classes; but, though in different ways, the difference which makes a class is not verbal but real, and the word only the expression of it. Hence saying a biped mammal without reason is not a man means merely not reputed a man, is false. He is not reputed a man because he is not one. Such a thing may exist, but it is not that thing to which the name man has been given, and which is in fact a totally different thing from what the irrational biped is. You may call the irrational biped mammal man if you like, and the rational one fear or crut, if you like to be foolish, but the two things are as distinct as they were before. The fear is a fear, and the man is man. Mill’s statement is childish trifling. Nor is it the whole of the attributes, which assumes all classes to have no existence but in words, as the nominalists, confounding different kinds of classes. If a man was born with one leg, or six fingers, he is a man still, though some of the regular physical attributes are wanting or in excess. You will say this is only accidental difference. That is, you fall into the distinction of essential and accidental. Besides, attributes as a whole differ. There are black or Negro races, Turanian and Caucasian races. Supposing for a moment I say all descendants of Adam are Caucasian. But the Negro is not a Caucasian; therefore he is not a descendant of Adam. Suppose the Negro has the general physical constitution of man, the power of progress, the faculties, language, the consciousness of responsibility, conscience, reference to the idea of God, abiding relative affections of wife and children, has, to say, to God and men, as subject and fellows, an immortal soul, for we are only supposing, should I say he is not a man? I do not believe a word of the theory of distinct races, and the want of truth in the idea makes the conclusion difficult to me; because known relationship to God is shut out by it, which I believe to be of the essence of man’s nature; but if all this were true that God had created two races of men, " A man’s a man for a’ that." I utterly reject the idea, but the difference of black and white, prognathism, and even woolly hair, would not hinder, if God had created him apart, his being a man. It would set aside one great and important origin of a class, namely, common origin. The only question would be, Is that essential to being a man? I believe it is fully, but on Mr. Mill’s ground it would not. They have not the same attributes, but in his sense they would be men, they have the attributes which constitute a man. His reasoning is false. I believe the theory to be wholly false, because it denies what is, as revealed, essential to man. Actually in relationship to God I do not believe such men could be; but if there were, they would be men, though the whole of their phenomenal attributes were not the same, and they had not the same ancestor. If you take in all men as one race, as I do, there may be several attributes different; but while their moral nature, and even physical, essentially is the same, they are men, Adam’s children. If there be no essential attributes (that is, what makes a man a man), and accidental ones, a yellow-haired German of old time is not a man if I am. This may seem long on such a point, but it is vital, because it makes phenomenal attributes everything, and the real classification of things-the fact that things are what they are besides mere phenomena-is wholly denied. Men may make classes for convenience, and give a name to represent it; but even here there is no real ground for a class but in actual things which distinguish some from others; and there are classes of being which God has made, and one wherein man stands alone, though in certain essential aspects not connoting all that is in him, or in the name of the class, he may be classified in these aspects, with others. As I may say, created intelligent beings are responsible. Angels are created intelligent beings, and so is man, or the like. To have classes true, we must have the qualities in common which they have by God’s creation, or at least His providential ordering. I have nothing to do with any scholastic speculations on essences to explain essential differences. I have already shown that, to say giving an attribute, as " rational," to man teaches nothing is a fallacy. It is the direct path to knowledge where the predicate involves a quality not affirmed in it about man. Man is a rational being. I only affirm about man that he is a rational being. And it unfolds as to that, what man is, one particular quality; but supposing that quality involves in man or anywhere else consequences not expressed in it, as every rational being is responsible to God, this will be as true of an angel, say. It is not merely what is in man as an equivalent; it leads me by another larger proposition, applicable to man and other beings, and not known to be true of man till the knowledge of the second proposition is acquired. It is not a phenomenal attribute of man like rationality. It is true of rationality wherever it is, from the relationship in which all rational beings stand. I am not speaking of man, but of rationality; but he, being so, comes under my new proposition as belonging to that class. And this is a most important element of error in these logical and metaphysical systems, that they can only take up what is phenomenal, and all the greater and more important part of what man is and truth is-relationship--is left out. They can discuss his relationship with mere phenomena by sense or consciousness, but this last only mentally or in the reason, and that is all. All that is true and abides, naturally or spiritually, is outside this. Death, or the dissolution of things, closes the phenomenal, and, as to mere mind, now possessed state. Hence it is said in Job as to wisdom, "Death and destruction have heard the fame thereof with their ears;" they know the end of what man has now; of what is beyond, of positive knowledge, of what abides, they can tell nothing. All logical knowledge is phenomenal with its consequences. The mind, as such, cannot see beyond the system with Which it is in relation as such. Only it should not deny anything beyond it, but own its own limits which indeed it cannot help, only honestly. But as Mill returns to his classes, a few words to clear up. He is, as usual, all wrong. Some predicates are class words formed by man, some a particular attribute. Thus, man is an animal: that is a class word, a class formed by man as to language, but from nature and by a difference existing in it. So really gold is a metal. That is a word formed to designate, by a collection of attributes, several objects which possess them, and are characterized by them, and distinguish them thus from others which do not. When I say man is mortal, it is one attribute, not a class in itself. I merely affirm one thing about man. Now, if I use a class word which only takes up one or some attributes to make a class, and leave others unnoticed, and affirm of the subject all that may be said of my class predicate absolutely, I may contradict something in the subject which does not come in question in the predicate. There may be some quality in the subject which does not hinder the class word being predicated of it, but may make untrue that which is true of others in the class. Thus all animals at some period cease to exist This is phenomenally true. Man is an animal. Man ceases to exist. I conclude from what happens phenomenally to all animals, and even to man as such phenomenally, what may not be true of him for some other reason. If I assume, as I believe, he has an immortal soul, which does not come into the list of attributes included in the class word " animal," he does not really perish, though phenomenally as an animal externally he does. And so Ecclesiastes takes him up. It is what is under the sun, the days of the life of his vanity. This comes from assuming phenomena to be all, which, with consciousness, is all man’s reason can do. But he cannot say, man cannot have an immortal soul. And the possibility proves the reasoning defective and false. And this is the whole question with metaphysicians and logicians; for experimental reasoning is their all, and it must be incompetent to pronounce beyond its own power, limited by the sphere to which it belongs, while it cannot say there is nothing beyond it, for it does not see beyond it. When I merely predicate one attribute, it is not quite so much so because I confine myself to the phenomenon predicated, as man is mortal. Only I may pursue it farther, and so run into it; but it is then not speaking from the known qualities of a class, but a positive new affirmation going beyond the predicated phenomenon. If I merely say "man is mortal," I merely affirm the phenomenon that we see men die as a rule, which is true, phenomenally true, though it be not beyond the reach of preventive power if God so will, but for man’s sphere it is true. If I say all that is mortal ceases to exist, I go beyond the phenomenon and introduce a new proposition. It ascribes a new sense, or attribute, to mortal. Taken as a phenomenal class animals do, and man too as animals in this world. It is as a class true; it is not true that the attribute mortality contains in it ceases to exist. The statement goes beyond the phenomenon, for as to that they do cease to exist. But a word more on classes. The notion that general or essences of classes are only the meaning of the name, that the whole of the attributes means the essence, and the taking all classes to be the same, makes all the reasoning of Locke and Mill to be false. Some classes man has made for convenience of arrangement, some more from the nature of things, as a metal; but some general terms are not classes. Thus when I say man, it is a being I know, not a class made by man from attributes or phenomena. I am conscious of a personal living existence. I know others through intercourse or through facts. They are a race, not a class. I know what a man is, for I am one, and find others of the same race, born as I am, and like me. I am not a dog, nor a horse, nor a pig, nor an ox, nor if there were Houyhnhnms who had reason would they be men. Man is a known race. Reason is essential to man. Yet if there be an idiot born of a human father and mother, he is a man, an exceptional idiotic man; whereas if there were a race physically just what men are without reason, I should not call them men; they are not of the same race. Races are real things. Essential differences are negative. Not having them excludes from the class, as want of reason the supposed race; possession of them may make a class, but does not make a race, as the supposed Houyhnhnms. Hybrids, which some insist on, only prove this. They are called mules, distinguished from the races their progenitors belonged to. According to creation races may approximate in their extremes so as to make it difficult to classify them, but this proves nothing, however interesting, as to God’s way of acting. You may show that the nucleus of a cell is the inorganic seat of life, and write a long book about protoplasm, but this does not prove a man is a pig, or a pig a man. I may have to learn the attributes of this race, or many of them, after I know it. The word man is not a collection of attributes, but a general term for that race, and I then learn what the attributes of that race are. He is a living being, with reason and power of abstraction, hence capable of progress. He has an immortal soul. But all this I learn about man after I know him de facto as a race. If true, they were always true of man, at least as now known to me, but they formed no part of my idea of man. I know the race, and then learn about the race. When the word speaks of a class distinguished experimentally, as metal, then, though often vague, still in principle it involves in it the whole of the attributes which constitute the force of the word. So of all races as well as men. What is a pig? It is an animal born of a boar and a sow I learn that it is carnivorous and herbivorus, but I knew what a pig was before I knew that. Of course there may be varieties and species, and we may turn pig into a class name. What Bain says, note 112, is utterly false, indeed absurd. Supposing there was a report that the dodo existed, and search is made say all over the world, Mauritius and all, and I say the dodo does not exist, in fact it really never had, what has that to do with its disappearing and becoming extinct? (My family had a large life-size good picture of a dodo, now in the Ashmolean Museum at Oxford.) When I say dodo, I mean a supposed bird thus imaged and thought of, and I say it is a supposition, it does not exist. Such reasoning is child’s play. I exist, and am conscious of it; what is that in contrast with? I admit relativity in phenomena, and insist on it. But that is not all I could not use the word "is," or "exists," without its giving the idea of existence to my mind.; and, if used with any word by itself, affirms that idea of it-predicates the fact that there is really such a thing. I doubt its being a category. All the rest, at any rate, assume existence. I have spoken of classes. White is not a class really, because it does not really give an attribute which adequately distinguishes other like things from one white set, unless I speak of colors, then it does. For class means attribute or attributes, by which certain things are distinguished from other like ones, and so clubbed together. Mill accepts most of what I have said, but by denying races makes all false. I have said that many classes are the act of men, but founded on natural qualities, as metal. That is, man invents a word to combine many distinct things in community of certain characteristic qualities which distinguish them; and the word is invented to give a common name to things which have the qualities, not to express the qualities themselves, so as that, if there were only one, it could be used. It is the result of the experimental knowledge of several having them. But if we call races classes, then it is not the act of man which has formed the class in any sense. I do not think that class is a good word for this. If I say a man and a pig, it is no act of man’s mind which makes any class. He calls an animal of that race a pig, and knows it is not a man. But there is no mental combination to’ form the class, if class it is to be called. A pig is a pig by creation, and now by birth. Nay, so far from it being the whole of the attributes that make a class or verbal general name equivalent to one where the whole of the attributes are included in the idea, there is no class at all; for if all the individuals have them, they are the same, there is no distinction. A class is only, when there are some qualities common to a certain number of objects otherwise distinct, that I classify them by a word expressing their possession of them in common, as metal, including gold, iron, copper, etc.; but if each individual object had all the qualities of gold there would be no class, all would be gold. Thus man is not a class, animal is, because there may be and are man and brutes connected in particular qualities. But he is wholly wrong in taking the general name as being the expression of qualities, so as to make it indifferent if one object or many, and a class or not, as being the meaning of the name and a class word, indifferently or not. There are class words. Animal is, metal is, founded on qualities no doubt, but qualifying objects by their common possession of them. If I have only a word embracing all the qualities of a being, it is not and cannot be a class; if only some, it may. Thus, God is a general term, he says, to the Christian or polytheist. But the Christian or Jew, when he says God, takes in in principle all His attributes. He is one, almighty, eternal, omniscient; He is, and He only, absolutely. " God" takes in, at any rate, such attributes as absolutely preclude His being a class. There is no quality in common with the polytheist’s God, for he has many, which excludes the qualities of the one. Even if I say mermaid or ghost, as in thought I take in all that they are, it cannot be a class, for all who are such are the same wholly; mermaid is a mermaid. Where all the attributes are not taken in, it may become the name of a class, though where there is a race, and not man’s combination, they will be only, as woolly-haired men, accidental differences. In fanciful names it is merely a question whether the fancy has formed a class or not. There may be many dragons having certain fanciful qualities in common, others not, and so be under a common name of class. Here, of course, all is man’s creation, and he may invent as he likes. His statement that every name, the signification of which is constituted by attributes, is potentially name of an indefinite number of objects, need not be of any, may be of only one, is false. Suppose unity and omnipotence, or even the last, be one of the attributes, there can be only one. But if constituted by attributes, and I take in all, it is not a class; it may be a race. If only of one, it is no general term at all. We do not create a class by general names. All this theory is wrong. If I say man, it is a general name; but if I take the whole of his attributes, it is a race of the same beings, not a class. Classes are made by men, by selecting qualities, and combining and distinguishing by them. The whole of this is wrong, and wrong in the most important way. Races are popularly called classes, but then they do not rest on the meaning of words, nor are formed by men mentally (pp. 132139). Pp. 139-141 are all obscurity and confusion. The question is not whether one or infinite qualities are in question. The essential difference is negative; it does not make the class, but the class is not the class without it. One quality, as, white, or Christian, or mathematician, does not make a class (unless in respect of things constituted by color or sciences or religions), because a man is just as much a man whether a Christian or a mathematician or not. These ideas do not enter into the conception of man; reason does. A being formed as man, as a general term (a race so qualified), without reason is not a man; but, if reason be in an angel or a dog, he is not therefore a man. A man represents a being not with the knowledge of all his attributes, but of such as constitute a man. (This is a question of the possession of language as expressing thoughts which normally is inseparable from human reason, 1:e. man is so constituted.) If one of these be not there, he is not a man. Thus, if Negroes and Turanians were created apart, still if they had these qualities they would be phenomenally men; that is what man means. They might then be considered subclasses, and man would be a class word, because there would be qualities in the Negro or Turanian inseparable from their being such, not in the others which enter into the class. If I say pictures very white in their coloring are not pleasing, are too glaring, paintings are things formed by colors, hence one color or another is part of their constituted existence, and so as to paintings form species, though white or green be a single sensation. So in various earthly substances. Some have a set of qualities which make them metals; here, though natural differences, they are of sufficient importance to man by these qualities to make them a class; they melt, etc.; if they will not, they are not metals. Other things may melt, as sugar; that does not make it a metal, but what will not melt is not a metal. It may be one or many qualities which distinguish, but what makes a class is what distinguishes a certain number of objects from others similar in other respects, when the difference is such that where, if what makes it is absent, it would not be of those things to which the name is attached. But when Mill says men have made classes, " a sense artificially given to the word for technical purposes," in the case of races, as man, ox, it is not so; it is merely observation of real differences. The word is expressive of the object as an object. When used as a class, it is not artificial but real, as observed. If a true class, the name is given because of real differences observed. That man gives a name to those that have is merely saying language belongs to him; but he cannot make a class without adequate distinctions belonging to beings of the same general sort, combining many of them together, apart from others of the same sort. To lose this by scholastic mistakes of essences is only blinding oneself. Names for classes may be made by men; but if rightly made, the class is not made but discovered or known intuitively, which is only a way of discovering. I know a man is not an ox. Man and ox express this, they do not make the distinction. I may have then to ascertain by thought what makes the difference. They both live as animals live; have flesh, bones, blood, die as to existence here (for that is all I can say phenomenally)-that is, in many very important things they have qualities in common. What makes the difference? It is not artificially given for the purposes of science; the form is different, the race is different. In the genus animal I distinguish two classes; the name is quite immaterial. Man has given that (the ox cannot), but I have to discover what is the real point, the quality or qualities without which a man is not a man normally, is not of that class in the genus animal. It is not a question of some or inexhaustible differences, but adequately distinctive qualities which combine a certain set of things contained in a larger class formed by having common properties. I have ascertained these distinctions combining many individuals of a larger division, without which they are not so combined or divided, as contrasted with a quality which leaves the differences which constitute the class where they were, so that, with or without it, the class subsists just the same, as red hair in a man. I thus possess the class. I may discover afterward differences more or less important, which confirm the justice of the classification, or inform me as to the qualities; but if already adequate, I have my class. Thus language with man, cooking if you please, a sign it may be of the reflective use of materials as contrasted with instinct, but which is useless, as it may be merely the expression of reason, a thing by which reason may be discovered, however poor a one. It is quite immaterial what caused them to have the essential difference. I believe it was God; but for logic or man’s mind it is merely phenomenal. And, save the notion of substantial essences, the Schoolmen were right, and Mill wrong. If the Schoolmen seized on what the name connoted, so as adequately to distinguish, by means of certain properties, those things which had them from those which had not, they did right. It is what makes a class, and that only, though others may be discovered. Thus if I discover, by whatever means, that man has an immortal soul, I have a quality which, as well as reason, constitutes man what he is, as contrasted with other animals, and a more important difference; but, with reason, the class is right, because there is in man what there is in no other animal. And when I have arrived at what makes man to be man, all the rest which do not unmake his being man form no species. I have an infima species. Suppose there were men with reason, and not with immortal souls, I have two classes of men, if I still call them men; at any rate I have two kinds, which I can separate into classes. I do not believe this possible, because I have no idea of existence in moral things but as God made them; and thus the thought is necessarily inaccurate. But infima species is right-that is, a class adequately distinguished by qualities which make it what it is, which consequently cannot be subdivided, so that one division should not possess what makes them both the same thing essentially as man, though you may add qualities which leave it what it is, as woolly-haired, black-skinned, etc., Caucasian, Turanian, but all possess what makes them men. For the ethnologist they may conveniently be made species of. A man without a soul or reason is not a man as God made him. A red-haired or black-haired man is alike a man; but if the qualities which constitute the class remain, it is of that. That is the infima species. Whether classes be rightly formed is another question; but it is a question whether we have rightly followed facts, and here races come largely into question, because the distinguishing qualities follow them, and they are more readily perceived than others, and they are classes which God has made, and from which man with all his wisdom cannot get out. If God has approximated classes in given cases as He has, man may make hybrids, but he only proves his impotency by doing so. The distinction therefore between differentia and accidens is in the nature of things, and the foolish instance of cooking proves it. It is merely an expression of man’s having reflective reason to use materials. It is not accidental, but what proves, however poorly, the essential difference. What he states as making the difference of genus and species is only true phenomenally, or in the measure of man’s mind as acting, not as acted on or even conscious. In sec. 6 (144) he merely puts forward what I have noticed in the case of color, that if we take a word for a genus from any real fact, and use the species without adding any quality to make one, confining the difference to what is true only within the genus, then we may form classes, but we add no quality. When I say man is a rational animal, I add a quality to animal. It is not merely what is not connoted in the word, but I falsify the use of the word itself as expressing the class if I add it, for thus an ox is not an animal, only man is. But when I say man is an animal, with four incisors, one canine (leaving out erect, for man only is, it is an added quality to animal). With four or two incisors, or no canines, an animal is as much an animal as before. It does not add any quality. These facts do not come into the circle of connotation of animal, and he is as much what is called animal as before, and only animal. When I say rational, it admits animality, but adds what is not in the notion of animality when I say four incisors, he is no more than an animal, after all, nothing besides being an animal-nothing is added. I have already said the possession of an essential difference does not make a thing to be of the same class (strange to say, Mill takes the two examples I took), the want of it puts him out of it (save the question of normal state of a race); but if a dog had reason, it would not make him a man, but we should have two classes of rational animals. But God has not formed things so. He has made classes; and so man must take them, for his reason is relative, and within the sphere so made, and we cannot really go beyond it. It may (for reasons beyond, sometimes perhaps within, our ken), be morally impossible. We do not know in everything, we may in some, how things are adapted in creation to one another. Comparative anatomy has shown it within nature. Without it the reasons may be weightier and deeper. Thus os homini sublime dedit, not to go farther than outside, and feet and hands, instead of only hands or feet, may be so adapted to reason, or more, that we cannot suppose, say, that a dog should have reason, with any just thought at all. I have sometimes supposed things which are not, to meet their reasoning; but I deeply feel man as having reason is within the sphere where he is placed -the highest in it no doubt, but in it. I have no doubt there is a relation to God also, but his reason is phenomenal in its source. I deny that it knows God at all. We may prove there must be a cause; but, as said elsewhere, if we can, it proves we cannot know it. But in this part (pp. 144-147) Mill is again all wrong in virtue of his principle, for Linnean or other classes do not add an idea to animal; they are as much a mere animal as before (very convenient for science no doubt, but that is all); not a species, though possibly necessarily, as I have said, suited to it, because it adds nothing to the contents of the word animal -with four or all incisors he is an animal just the same. When I say rational, it adds an idea to animal which makes it really another thing from a mere animal. Man has not really two meanings, because it is not merely an artificial designation, but the name of a being we know, of which we give the true character by the difference or class term, as an animal by what is purely animal. Cooking is really a proprium, and proprium is merely what is caused by the essential difference. Demonstration is not another kind, but merely proving it is so, caused by or necessarily connected with the essential quality, as, save organic defects, language belongs to reason (or rather to thought) in man. It may be convenient to distinguish, but it goes with what makes the species. Only some may be more obvious than others-some essential differences involve more consequences than others,-but the propria are really more identified with, es dif. than with accident. The accident we have practically spoken of; it is what leaves the individual or individuals in the universality of the class they belong to. It adds nothing to what the class name connotes; a yellow-haired race of men leaves what is meant by man where it was. A rational animal does not leave what is so, where animal merely puts him. But if there be reality in classes, and there is when justly made, a definition by genus and specific difference gives more knowledge than the sum of all the attributes. In the first place, the latter is impossible and false, because there are many which contradict each other, and have nothing to do with the real explanation of the word, as woolly-haired, red-haired, prognathous, brachiocephalous, and dolikocephalous. I cannot introduce all these and their contraries as describing man. They do not make the difference of man and other things, but only of men amongst themselves; You cannot enumerate all the attributes, and if you do, you have lost what makes him man. But this makes differentia and accidens clearly distinct in meaning; one a quality, without which a thing is not the thing named, a difference from other things; accidens, a difference in individuals, which still are the thing named. Proprium also is a constant difference caused by essential difference. I do not dwell on giving a definition of one’s own meaning of a word; it is arrogant. Words may be ambiguous, or their meaning changed by time, then of course we may explain; but it is at best the extreme of nominalism that there can be no definition of a thing. If so, there can be no mathematics, for though words must be used, they are part of human nature, and we are men; but be it circle, kreise, circolo, or what it may, and variety of language proves it, I am defining, if I can, a thing. And if the thing does not exist, you cannot define it, as Mr. Mill’s " round square." Some definitions are poor ones, as the shortest line between two points. That is a fact about a straight line. I say a line described by a point always moving to the same fixed point; a curve, one described by a point which never does, but always turns farther from it. This by the by. (P. 152.) Provided the attributes are what make the difference of man (phenomenal man), and that involves adequacy and reality of difference from things not man. But if I use a class word embracing them, with the essential difference or differences, it is much more informing, because I connect it thereby with a large class in very important elements as such already formed in my mind, as a rational animal formed so and so, as given by Mill You cannot define a simple sensation as white, because it is that, and that only; has no qualities but whiteness. What he says of eloquence is all false; he defines it by its effects, which may fail by the state of those addressed, and yet the eloquence be sublime. It is perfectly intelligible to say, all his eloquence, however elevated, produced no effect whatever, they were stern and unmoved. Eloquent is not the name of one attribute only. It is the power of presenting facts or thoughts in a way adapted to stir up the feelings or thoughts emotionally natural to man, or desired by the speaker or writer. A white object is quite another thing than white (155). (§ 3, 155.) I do not admit what declares the whole of the facts to be the only adequate definition, but do not enlarge on it; because the difference is often more important, as rational animal denies rationality of other animals than man. This may be inadequate too if there is more than one essential difference, but generally or often these are only propria. But what I have already noted is all important, all this is only phenomenal. The Houyhnhnms, which I supposed before, not being realities, do not really come in question, because it cannot be said that it is possible. The form of man may be a necessary proprium. At any rate, classes are derived from observedfacts, and cannot go beyond them. I deny that we can make classes which will be really such. And as Mill admits they are taken from nature, he must admit it. But of this I have spoken, only I should speak more strongly of it now. It is true that this judgment of definition by genus and difference or differences only applies to the created world. Such only is phenomenal, so that we can in any ordinary way classify it; it is all that is subjected to our language, at any rate classify adequately. When I come to Creator, it is evident that class can have no sense; but then I cannot define Him either. He cannot be measured by an. inferior mind, and if it be not inferior, He is not really God; there is no God. And there is no summum genus at all really, for the highest carries me up to One who cannot be a genus, or He is not what He is. My summum genus must be creature, not being, unless I deny creation and am an atheist, which though he may strive to be I do not believe man can be, though he may forget God for the creature, or corrupt the thought of. Being is not exact, because though I may take it in a general way as a thing existing de facto, yet if I drop out creation, I falsify the idea of being when not being per se. Because, if I say I or a man exists, it is true; but I cannot say I. a man without having the idea of having begun to be. And being, when applied to God, means one who did not begin to be, or some one was supremely before Him who caused Him to begin to be; and of one who never began to be I can form no idea, for I am finite; it is out of the sphere in which I exist, out of the power of mind. Human thought always and necessarily ascribes beginning as an idea. Negatively I can speak of it. I say infinite, etc., but I cannot conceive it positively in thought, because I am finite, I exist as to my status of thought in time. I may drop the idea of time, and only think of present being, I, and put together ἀε. and ὤν. But when I think of that really, I must think of Creator and created. I can conceive what is always going on, because it is. But. I cannot think of a living thing nor a formed thing, and man knows no other, without a beginning in its very nature. We talk of matter, but it is scholastic mysticism, of substance which gives no idea at all. We know nothing but what is formed, whatever formed it. There is no abstract idea of matter. For convenience we may make an abstraction. But there is no idea or conception, all our knowledge is phenomenal. As to p. 157, it is all well as phenomenal, but only in that way. And I suspect that all definitions are just solely in the relationship in which they are used, at any rate so far as forming classes. Thus a rational animal, or take all the essential attributes and enumerate them. It is what man is in this visible creation of which he forms a part, corporeally in distinctive form, reason as compared with other animals. It is man in this created sphere. All well in its way, in what is subject to mind. But if it be in relationship with God, that has nothing to do with it. I must take in an immortal soul, conscience, responsibility, subjection, lusts, passions, love morally to God and man, consequent guilt, and so on. Hence, as I have said, metaphysicians have no ’ground of morality or obligation of relationship. The very definition becomes different, though the other remains true in its own sphere, but convertible in the sphere it professes to define, only in the, sphere and relationship in which it is spoken of; in another it has nothing to do with it, or is false. Mind deals with what is subject to it; subjecta veritas quasi materia; but this excludes God and all moral thought, all I am subject to, or any action on me. This confining of. definition to particular relationships, a really material point, is proved by Cuvier’s definition cited (p. 158): Man is a mammiferous animal, having two hands. I have no objection to this. It refers to his classification as an animal. That is a particular relationship in which he stands, leaving out therefore, as to reason, what essentially distinguishes him from other animals. It is just in the ’relationship he is viewed’in, but leaves out, and properly, what belongs to another aspect and relationship. So of the alleged adequate enumeration of attributes. It may be true and adequate in the relationship it refers to, totally false if another relationship be in question. If I say he is only that, it cannot be said. He is that in a given relationship, and that is all the justness and adequacy definition can be said to have. They belong to such a sphere, and are true in it. I admit man’s knowledge is phenomenal, or some inference from it as existing in the sphere he does; but the question remains, Is there no other? Clavier says what man is qua corporeal animality, metaphysicians what he is mentally; and we may add, in connection with the world subject to him, and that is all he can mentally, 1:e. by the power of intellect. But is that all the relationship he is in? I wholly deny it. It will be said, Prove there is another, or how can we know it? Not by intellect, as is evident, for professedly it is outside it. But intellect never loves; is that nothing in man? ἀγάπη did not, it is true, exist in Greek. But to go down-parent, child, husband, wife; I take natural relationships on purpose. Intellect cannot deal with them at all. Have not men hated Christ, the thought of Christ? What has intellect to do with that? Do not they dislike to think of God and responsibility? What has that to do with intellect? Intellect does not hate. Why is a child to obey its parents?-will intellect tell him? While on the topic of definitions, I would notice as a signal instance (p. 153) of utter mental incapacity and incorrectness, I believe through moral blindness and absence of sense of responsibility falsifying every mental apprehension (for man is a moral being, and must think morally to think rightly)-at any rate, as an instance of incapacity to define,-" Fault may be defined a quality productive of evil or inconvenience." Unless I introduce character-a fault in his character, which is loose and inaccurate and only fit to be used when it is failure in responsibility,-it is his fault, otherwise defect is the word; but unless in this special way fault is not a quality at all. It is an actual failure. All the confusion in pp. 160, 161, is from not seeing that his whole system of definition and classifying is false. Man as such is popularly known, as he says. The enumeration of all the attributes never enters into men’s minds, nor even a definition, till men begin to think and analyze their thoughts. Thus adequate definition is one thing, complete knowledge another that is, such attributes as suffice to determine and define it in the midst of and from other objects, as a rational animal of such a form. The thing is known in itself. I can see and hear a man. This defines it in the midst of others only in the relationship in which it is defined. The full knowledge of what man is must tell me all his attributes, and, if really full, in all his necessary relationships, 1:e. the relationships in which he exists as man. As to scientific definitions, they are not arbitrary, but pass from the obvious qualities to more exact distribution by the progress of knowledge, and though drawn from nature, are, as a class, made for convenience. Thus acid meant sour, and does, but a man must be a chemist to know what the word has come to mean in chemistry. But, in what is ordinary phenomenal, not scientific, discovery, thought and language cannot be separated; we think in language, and a great deal of the dissertation on "verbal and real" consequently is beating the air. Horse is a mere word, but I think of a thing if I say horse. A horse leaps; it is not a word leaps. No doubt forms of propositions are the same, as I may say a centaur leaps; but if I do say it, I am thinking of a thing real or fictitious, half man and half horse, believed true experimentally, I suppose, from the Thessalians being horsemen; so that he is all wrong here. When you come to facts, you can only take in centaur that which is thought, what attaches to the word; in triangle too; only centaur, being taken from imagination, cannot go beyond it, whereas triangle being taken from a mathematical shape, I can pass from the thought thing to the examination of the actual thing. What is implied has nothing to do with the matter, it is what is expressed is in question in any proposition. Again (p. 165) we arrive at no truth by reasoning, but only at conclusions; if the premises are just, then the conclusion is necessary. The name denotes the thing, and in reasoning by means of the name, I reason about the thing, man being so constituted as to think of things by words. He cannot invent a thought; I believe he may put them together, as a centaur or a griffin, but he thinks a thing in doing so. He seems to me always to forget that human knowledge and definition is drawn from phenomena. Thus a circle is not learned by " may exist," but from what I observe and know, even if not physically described, but thought of according to certain known qualities. The whole of the statement in pp. 165-7 is absurd. " Through the point B draw a line returning into itself, or which every point shall be at an equal distance from the point A," is a definition of what you are doing, as circle is a word for what you have done. A circle is a figure every point of whose, boundary-line is at at an equal distance from a given point (A) within it. You may call it bosh if you like, but such a figure Englishmen are accustomed to call circle; and the thing is what I think of when I say a circle, and so does Mr. Mill, for without ceremony he says, the circle being now described. Hence B C D being a circle, 1:e. such a figure agreed to be called circle, two certain lines are by supposition equal. All that is a settled fact, when I have got my circle and my radii; but by drawing the secant of the arc within the two radii I have an isosceles triangle, and can go on farther in my mathematics. I do not reason about the word circle, but about a thing to which having certain qualities that name in English is given. When he says B A is equal to C A, not because B C D is a circle, but because B C D is a figure with the radii equal, it is about as much sense that man is not a quadruped, not because he is a biped, but because he has two legs or feet. All I see nearly " self-evident" is that he is talking arrant nonsense. The question of dragons or serpents is decided by the very important principle that the conclusion of a syllogism never states a truth, but a conclusion; that, if the premises are true, the conclusion follows. It is a mere consequence of the premises. It does follow justly that there are such serpents, if dragons are such things, etc. The question of truth lies in the premises. A dragon is is not a dragon means; this is another statement. Hence the conclusion always is " therefore." The whole of this, too, is nonsense. A definition does in one sense refer to the meaning of words; but the word represents a reality, and, as we think in language, the word represents the thing thought of as the basis of further reasoning, the attributes of the thing represented by the word being taken as far as known for granted. Thus, if I say there can be no quadrature of the circle, it is not of the word circle there can be no quadrature, but of the figure represented in my mind by that word.. All this is folly; so of p. 168. Suppose I say the figure called circle is a figure having a boundary-line of which every point is equidistant from one given point in it; or a circle is a figure which, etc., one is a definition as much as another. Adding "idea of" merely puts it in the mind, and defines it there as such. It is just as much a definition of that idea, only dragon having no reality, it makes it untrue de facto; but the two are definitions one as much as another. A dragon being a thing, etc., the idea of the dragon is the idea of the thing, etc.; one is exactly as much definition as the other, one taking it as an assumed fact, really an idea, the other as an idea. It is true that a circle has such an attribute, also true that what has not is not a circle. What man can make is not the question. A straight line is as clear an idea as possible, and justly reasoned about as such.; very likely a man could not make one. Points and lines are all ideal; but the great point here is that there is no demonstrative truth, but merely demonstrative conclusions, truth being assumed. The therefore is a plain proof of it. The absence of all moral feeling and basis for it in the author’s mind is shown in the remarks on " just," as well as the loose character of his thinking. " Just" is what is due to a person in the relation in which we stand towards him. The want of reality and all being words in his mind makes even his logic poor. I add a syllogism is really this, If so and so is such, and if such be so and so, then, etc. There is such a total absence of the power of abstraction and analysis in Mill, that it is wearisome to deal with his statements. He has no idea of just, or noble, or mean, but by a comparison of objects so called to find a common principle. The moral instinct of man seizes the force of words so employed without always asking why it so estimates them; but the moral nature estimates morally. Of this, of course, he has no idea. It may be a useful exercise of mind to analyze its thought, but that is all; the apprehension is there without it. Moral sense, though not of course infallible, determines it. A few words as to mathematical terms. All here, too, is superficial. He never can distinguish between objects with qualities and the quality itself. Of length he says, that is, of long objects; but the two things are quite different. In common use we are occupied with objects, but we are here defining. Now we exist in space as in time; it is our mode of existence, and both are measured and partitive. A point is nothing; it is where a thing begins, or, more strictly, a division of space or time begins; it is where a given thing begins, and its absence ceases by the existence of the thing; it is that in which the division of space begins, or of anything existing in space. Length is the distance, when the same direction is followed from a given point to a given point, the part of space in distance between the beginning and end. It is not the thing, but the part of space in which, from the first point of the thing to the last point, the thing exists. Now, we do think of things in space and of space as occupied by them, the object being wholly immaterial; divisible space is our necessary way of thinking: so far from not thinking it we cannot think otherwise. Length is the quantity of space in one direction; breadth is exactly the same thing, only for convenience, as occupied with objects, we take the same thought of one object in another direction, strictly at right angles perhaps; but the direction only is different, not the idea. A point is merely where the distance in space or division of space begins, and can have no existence consequently in it; a line is merely a metaphorical use of a physical thing used to measure distance; length is merely the direct distance between the two points where the division of space contemplated begins and ends. If I postulate, I must think of an object, but space is not an object; it is the manner of existence of objects for us, or of our finite mode of thinking. Everybody knows what space means. No one can define it, because it is the mode of existence and thought for us, in which exists everything we can think of, in the sphere we exist in as thinkers. Nor is the inquiry what is just or virtuous, justice and virtue, the definition of a name merely; because if I define the word, it is by stating what the thing is (if it denote really anything) which the name speaks of. If I say virtue is the moral energy which does what is right and just in spite of the difficulties or temptations which stand in our way, and there be such qualities or character, I state the real qualities or character of which the word stands as the sign in the remarkable instrument of thought and communication bestowed on man called language. An infidel may think there is no such thing really as virtue, but there is; and when, if needed, I explain the word, I explain or define it by what the thing is. I can hardly conceive a lower moral state, without question of religion, than that of which this part of Mill gives evidence. A circle seems to me a line described by a point moving round another given fixed one, always at exactly the same distance; it then necessarily, if carried all the way round, enters into and ends at the point started from. There is no postulate to describe it. " Always at the same," or " not always at the same," is as easy one as another; and to say it postulates something is to say that we must postulate describing any figure at all, to deny which is to deny the existence of mathematics. Circle is merely a word which, for the convenience of language, represents such a figure. Take a fixed pivot and move a steel line attached to it round, and you have it as to the means of objective thought; and, so far from it being a postulate that such a line or a circle can be drawn or may exist, I do not believe it can be drawn, and so Mr. Mill states. Whether it may exist I know nothing of; but in both cases I know what I want to draw, and do it as nearly as I can, assuming its perfection, which is in its definition and nowhere else, and from that I reason. Though, of course, there are equivalent propositions which prove nothing, many are not so. And I reject, as I have done, the sum of attributes being a definition. Objects are really known, as a man, and then defined by what distinguishes them to the mind, and the words stand for the object known, and the distinctive quality may be discovered to involve truths not present to the mind in the object, and so further knowledge be acquired. I reject also, if it is what follows its being a truth, as he says (180). It is not a truth as so following but a proved consequence -if the premises are true, and no more. Logic has nothing to do with truth. Truth rests on testimony. As an instance of the looseness and inaccuracy of Mill’s mind, I notice (181) "incapable of reason," which is nonsense, -of reasoning perhaps. Nor do I accept his list of predicables. The making the definition of a word the sum of its attributes falsifies the effect of the syllogism, as does his inaccuracy. I have already stated that what makes a being a man to me is not the sum of his attributes. I am ignorant of the half of them, but he is a man to me, and to a savage, and rightly so (yea, even to an animal); hence if the minor applies a quality from the admitted predicate of the major, not in my idea of man, I increase my knowledge. Supposing I know nothing of life being in the blood, and it is discovered as to animals, and I admit man is an animal, I have to conclude he so dies. I have already said truth and, belief are only in the premises. Of course all that is true was always true in the system I am of; but nay growth in knowledge is by discovery, and I may by general terms of acquired knowledge learn particular things by just conclusions as to what is included in the general term. But, further, death is not mortality. There is an inference that because so many have died, all do; but this has nothing to do with the syllogism, save as the believed premise. The kind of syllogism is not a fair test, because the subject of the minor is only an individual of that of the major; whereas, as said above, a class word justly predicated may contain or involve an attribute not included in the mental idea of the subject of the major; whereas, by the rule de ontni et nullo, in the instance given, it is on the face of it not true when it is an individual of the class. But no observation has made me know even here that the Duke of Wellington dies. It is a direct and mere inference from the premises that all men do, however I had learned that. Unless I had heard of God’s sentence I could not have told it, that I know of, for Adam’s lifetime. It might have been a puzzle for centuries. The syllogism never proves the fact but the consequence. All men are mortal is not the cause that the Duke of Wellington dies. It assumes it, if he be a man; but it proves it to me because I cannot deny either of the premises. Logic has nothing to do with facts but with mental consequences. It is this (as often said) that makes all the reasoning false. It proves he must die, not a fact but a consequence. For here the fact is not so. The Duke of Wellington is not dead; but, as men are mortal, and he a man, he must die-at least is mortal. Testimony is the only proof of truth or fact, save personal experience. Nor was mortality known because death was, identified here with Mill’s usual inaccuracy. But the whole idea of Mill as to syllogistic reasoning is wrong. It is only reasoning, and this to prove the justness of a conclusion, not heretofore admitted, from what I do admit; and he admits "it is indispensable to throw our reasoning into this form when there is any doubt of its validity." This is all it is meant for. It may thus convince of facts as to a given subject which form no part of my idea of the subject, which having been otherwise discovered and admitted is predicated in the major, and then, the subject of the major being in the class predicated, this asserted in the minor brings the subject of the major into the condition so asserted. But, as I have already stated, the only thing believed is what is in the two premises (which of course may be contested but’ is assumed by the syllogism); but if the form be right, no doubt remains as to conclusion so far as phenomena go. A syllogism is only, "If so and so, then; " and this it does perfectly in the sphere of man’s knowledge, what is subject to sense and experience; but the statement that the inference is in the premises, as I have said, has nothing to do with the matter. They are assumed truths, and the syllogism has nothing to do with how acquired; they may be by observation, or consciousness; they may be, if I believe it, by revelation, or by any other way. The syllogism assuming their truth says that excessive brightness dazzles the eye; I say to one who has never seen snow, But snow in sunshine is excessively bright (which he believes on my testimony); therefore, snow in sunshine dazzles the eye. The syllogistic conclusion is just, there is no difference at all in the premises He knows by experience what dazzling the eye means, by testimony what snow is. The conclusion is certain,-he knows what snow does, which he did not know before. But all Mill’s ground is false. In reasoning from particulars to particulars, the fact may be true, but it is false reasoning, and not what thoughtful men do. His instance only shows his inaccuracy. "A burnt child dreads the fire" is not reasoning, it is instinctive fear; and if a thing looks like fire, it is equally afraid of it,-an instinct mercifully put in animal life even, but not reasoning; its reasoning value is found in another proverb. " The scalded cat fears cold water." The man must have had an extraordinary opinion of himself, with such a mind, to undertake to write on logic, pace Sir J. Herschel, Archbishop Whately, and Mr. Bailey. But it is also all false that, if John and Thomas die, etc., the Duke of Wellington will die. I suppose before Adam died, Enoch went up to heaven; should I rightly say Adam will? If ten had done so, not more truly. When Cain killed Abel, I had seen death. Man was capable then of being put to death. But would he die if let alone? I had seen him live 600 or 700 years,. and nobody died; then I should have concluded he could not, he was not in se mortal.. But when I have seen or known every-body die for thousands of years, I conclude that man (this being, this race) is mortal-i.e. dies as left to the natural phenomenal course of his race. It is not that particular men have died. Man is mortal, or even all men are mortal, is quite a different proposition. There has been an induction as to the nature of the race, Enoch and Elijah being excepted, as happening by the intervention of extrinsic power. Consequently I say the Duke of Wellington certainly (if no such power intervenes) will die, for he is a man, and such is the fate of his race. I can say, as a conclusion phenomenally considered, the Duke of Wellington must die, etc. It is a perfectly correct conclusion, supposing I believe in revelation, and, spite of all the Mills and Voltaire’s, there are those who, by grace at least, have sense enough to do it; but this is not my question. Supposing I believe that the sentence of death lies on man, I say man is mortal (save intervention of extrinsic power). Some may suppose that great men or wise men do not, are taken to heaven like Hasisadra, or deified like Hercules or Nimrod; I say, No, he is a man, and he is mortal. The conclusion is as perfect and as certain. And that is what the syllogism is and does; it draws a conclusion from assumed truths. How they are discovered has nothing to do with the syllogism, which is just as sound as a conclusion if the premises were false as if they were true. The premises being true has nothing to do with the justness of the conclusion, nor has the way the truth of them has been discovered. It is not necessarily by inference at all. The discovery, be it of Sir W. H., Mills, or Berkeley, is a mare’s nest (209-240). The form merely assures accuracy in drawing the conclusion. I repeat here (232), saying that man is mortal is not the same as that A B C, etc. etc., died. The difference is as real as it is grave. It may be, if universal, a just induction; but dying as a fact, and subjection to death, are distinct things. I might have seen the whole world destroyed by the flood, and not justly conclude that men must die of themselves naturally, as we say, and therefore I could not have said the Duke of Wellington will or must die. Put the syllogism and try. So many millions of men died, perished in the flood, therefore the Duke of Wellington will die (without it). Is there any just conclusion there? As to conclusions to particulars, and general formula being the same, it is the same; it is every way false; the induction in either case is false as reasoning. It may contain motives as the structure of the particular case as involving the result; but then it is a general formula, in its nature applying to that structure, and the proposition is only true because it is general -i.e. true in the nature of the thing, so that it is false from particular to particular, and always is so as reasoning. But Mill is all wrong (as is Whately) when he says that the major is an affirmation of the sufficiency of the evidence on which the conclusion rests. It states the proposition, but says nothing of the evidence one way or another, nor of the induction on which it is founded, nor is it necessarily founded on an induction. It is the basis of assumed fact on which the syllogistic reasoning is founded. In the common disputations they denied the major or the minor as facts (or distinguished), or the conclusion, which last alone referred to the syllogistic process. (235.) All his reasoning here shows nothing but the grossest mental incapacity. No one doubts we infer from particulars very often, as that Tenterden steeple was the cause of Goodwin Sands; but it is never sound as reasoning, save as above when it involves a general proposition which sagacity often instinctively sees. So that Mill is wholly wrong, does not see how it becomes a general proposition, which alone makes the conclusion just. Some men die, therefore others do, is never just as reasoning; all men do, therefore such and such will, is; though I may call in question the truth of the general proposition. And though all men include the one, the reasoning is just because it does. The question is, if Thomas will die? I say all men do, and he is one of the all, therefore he will,-not that he dies because of it, but that I know he will because he is. He dies because he is mortal. The conclusion is not general necessarily, but to the truth as to some from what is true as to all; and the conclusion as to some from other some is no just conclusion at all, never is. Why should I die because Socrates does? But if I have justly arrived at the subjection to death of all, with which induction the syllogism has nothing to do, but assumes it, it is. true of Socrates or any one else. That is, the general proposition is essential to the conclusion; if not, the dying of all other men would prove nothing as to all. Man is mortal, such as he is; it is his nature. Man is mortal, 1:e. the general proposition, which is. everything; the " conditions of legitimate induction" (236) cannot be realized as to the Duke of Wellington at all without the general proposition, however arrived at. Mill does not even see what he is reasoning about. I admit that "the general conclusion is never legitimate unless the particular one would be so too," that is as to the fact; if it were not, the general one would not be true. But that is exactly the conclusion of the syllogism. The question is, Can we arrive at the conclusion as to the particular one without the general one being true first? That is, can we justly say A B C died, therefore the Duke of Wellington is mortal? That is " Mill’s logic." His statement is quite true, but is the principle of syllogism, and refutes, if it were needed, his whole system. That we take the trouble of stating the general proposition always has nothing to do with the matter; but it is an indispensable condition of the validity of the inference. Thus if I say A B will die, for he is a man, this truth assumes that all men do. For clear inference the latter is stated as the major premise. If all men do not die, I cannot say the Duke of Wellington will; he may be of those who do not. I have, singularly enough, anticipated in my notes every question nearly Mill has raised. Here (224) he confutes him-self completely. " There is no contradiction in supposing that all these persons have died, and that the Duke of Wellington may notwithstanding live forever.". Just so; that is, you cannot argue syllogistically or really from particulars to particulars, which is what he says you can. If 900 millions and 900 thousand had died, and 100 thousand not, there is no proof at all that A B will die; it may be 9999 to one he will, but there is no proof of anything. You must have a general proposition for proof. The way, as I have said, I acquire the general proposition has nothing at all to do with the proof in the syllogism which assumes and starts from the general one (liable, of course, to be contested by the adverse disputant). If I had lived in Adam’s time, and no one had shown mortality (not death merely), and I believed Scripture, I should have said all men are mortal. Adam and all his children will die, for they are men (save prevention by power). If observation was my ground, I could not say any one would die. The general proposition may be rightly or wrongly accepted, but that is another question. But, as he says, there would be a contradiction if the general principle be assumed, not if only particular cases; that is, a syllogism is sound reasoning because it lays the basis in a general proposition, and Mill talks nonsense in his reasoning about it. But I repeat, with the reasoning of the syllogism the actual truth of the premises has nothing to do. It is a contradiction not to admit the conclusion, assuming the premises. That the premises may be obvious or require proof is evident, and may be partially true, as I have said as to animals: animals cease to exist; man is an animal therefore man ceases to exist. As existing here in time, qua animal he does, but it is only partially true, because animal and man are not equivalent terms,-man is more comprehensive. Water dissolves lime; if I put this lime into this water, it will dissolve it; but the water is already saturated. We have thus to distinguish the accuracy of propositions. Water will dissolve some lime is alone true; and this water is water and its full complement of lime. What a weariness to turn to this from the truth, from the word of God! But I pursue, the rather as here (240-247) the cloven foot comes out, though it is really only going over again the same false ground; and he clearly proves, in seeking to do the contrary, that general propositions are the only way of real conclusions. Thus as to arsenic (242). I have no need to go to other inductions from qualities. What produces a black spot under such circumstances, etc., poisons. No matter whether metallic, volatile, or what else, if everything that does so poisons. The induction is as to the nature of the thing which does produce blackness, that is, to a general proposition: All that does so poisons. Supposing all that does so does not poison, I can draw no conclusion from such a spot. That is, a general proposition which states the nature of what does is absolutely necessary to the argument. If only some articles, like in this, do, I may add, A spot-producing article if also metallic, volatile, etc., does: these qualities are necessary to make it universal, 1:e. determine its nature as poisonous; but I have my general proposition. Everything that produces such spot, being also metallic, volatile, etc., poisons, has that nature destructive of physical life in man. I learn it in every known instance, and when I have (any exception being from an extraneous cause), I say " every," I have a general proposition as to its nature, and hence only applied to every case because it is its nature, and so always such. The justness of the induction has, of course, to be settled. That is, my major premise may be contested, but with the conclusion this has nothing to do-that is based on its being true, and if true, the conclusion simply certain. And this he admits in the government case. No government: that general proposition is the foundation of all,-" a generalization from history." The similarity is not the question-another false principle of his. It is in this the same, it desires the good of its subjects; the nature and principle which governs the point is ascertained. This government acts in the same way. It certainly is not likely to be overthrown (for likeliness is the point to be proved here). Then comes question as to the fact. Now this is not a question of inference at all, but of testimony. Is it a fact that I believe the testimony, or not? If I do, I say with certainty. Supposing twenty instances of disinterested intelligent witnesses had occurred. This may or may not be true, and may or may not be believed to be true. To draw my conclusion, the government must be the same in this; if I believe the testimony, I say it is the same, as no government, etc.; this is not likely to be overthrown. This is an inference justly drawn, and the inference certain according to the premises, but " may be believed to be true " gives no inference as to fact at all as to this government. The witness of intelligent disinterested witnesses affords no ground of inference. It may be all necessary and right for common human life, but has nothing to do with logical inference. I may be a bad judge of the witnesses, or ill informed as to them, and other witnesses being true does not prove them to be so. Moral probabilities are very important, but they have nothing to do with logical inference. I can say, if these say true, this government is not likely, a certain inference on a hypothetical truth, and so far logical; but what depends on the moral estimate of my mind as to the personal qualities of witnesses has nothing to do with logical inference. It only proves incapacity to judge of reasoning to say it does. The resembling other cases is no part of what I believe on testimony at all even, but the fact of that in which they are the same. Nor is it reasoning from particulars. His starting point was no government, and supposing this true only of some, the possibility of overthrow even, if so, not its unlikeliness, would be proved. The whole argument is trash, save as it clearly proves he is all wrong. Being asserted to do so by intelligent, etc.; was no mark that it did so in its nature or qualities, but merely a question, Do these de facto speak truth as to its qualities ’? of which their testimony is no mark at all as an attribute in the government. But all this is to get rid of evidence, and subject the matter to logical inference that nothing might be believed, and always rest in this " may be believed to be true," and nothing be believed at all. Now, reasoning or syllogistic conclusion is certain if the premises be true, and evidence may be morally or absolutely certain too. This makes all uncertain in logic and in testimony. I do not a moment admit that every step in the deduction is still an induction. The deduction does not begin till the general proposition or nature of the subject expressed in the predicate is, through induction or other means, assumed, to be true. In the deduction there is no induction at all. All he says as to mathematics is most stupid materialism; as if, because his fingers and compass could not be absolutely true, his mental apprehension of it could not. His head is no wiser than his fingers. The certainty is no illusion. He supposes that mere materialism is all we have. But we exist in space. and time, and space is divisible. What is material phenomenally exists in space, and the matter is not the subject of thought but that mode of existence, and this gives form and measure, and of this mathematics are cognizant and demonstrate the equality. of dissimilar forms, etc. But his idea of a point, etc., is not only false, but wholly inapprehensive of the whole truth. A line is that at which divided space begins and ends, the limits of any such division, or of two which meet. And if I enter on existing matter, or the space it is in, I am not at the limit at all. Hence a line properly is a non-existent thing, as the limit of a thing, or of two spaces which meet, must be; but I necessarily so think from my nature. A point is the starting-point or end of the line, or any point where the mind divides it. A straight line is that whose direction is invariably to a fixed point. So surface is that where matter ceases or begins. If I pass into an existing thing, I am not on its surface. When we make lines physically, they are sufficient to represent them to the eye for the mind, but this is all. If I take what is physically marked, I have lost the idea of line. And we, as finite, living according to space and time, necessarily think in it. If the radii are not equal, it is that the circle is not a true one, not that equal radii are not true of any circle; if not, it is not a circle at all. And so far from a right angle never being true, it is necessarily true, and I cannot help thinking of an exact one if I think of it. Supposing a line so conceived as above, and for practical use auy line drawn. Let one cross another at any angle. Let one move round in the direction to enlarge the smaller of the two angles. I necessarily pass through all angles till the lines are identical, and at a given point a right angle; I must do it. The physical exactitude is a’ mere question of physical skill. In the case of a line one cannot form a mental picture of a line, for its essence is not to be a material existence at all, but the mode of existence of that of which I can form such a picture, that is, existence in divisible space; and it is his reducing all thought to mere objects, so as to apply the phenomenal facts as to that to all thought in the mind, which makes all his system false. Geometers just define it for practical use; but Mill never thinks nor gets beyond what he picks up to comment on. All human reasoning is built on hypothesis necessarily. The only difference of geometry is that, occupied with what actually exists in nature, the hypothesis is incontrovertible. Mere definition or axiomatic assertion may be well or ill founded, but the relations of space, quantity, in- ’equality, exist in the necessity of our thought; and geometry has only to discover what they are, and, as in all true deductive reasoning, the conclusion is necessary. Some mathematical definitions are very stupid. "A straight line is the shortest line between two points." This may be true, and doubtless is, but is no definition, not what a straight line is, but a quality of it. " Straight" is whatever never swerves from one direction towards a point fixed as regards the point from which it starts. Every basis of deduction is an assumed truth-and as to the nature of what is spoken of. Only mathematics dealing with the forms and measures of space deal with that which exists as true in the nature we belong to. Man is mortal, or man is a rational animal, may give rise to a thousand important questions other than such as belong immutably to the nature of space, the sphere in which we exist. His change as to equal magnitudes (264) makes the whole thing false. There are equal magnitudes which cannot be so applied to one another as to coincide, though ’those which do are upon the face of it equal. I suppose "magnitudes equal to the same" to be a delusion in terms even if convenient for practice. The magnitudes here are the same. I think the proposition that two straight lines cannot enclose a space may be demonstrated, for let them start from two separate points and these are not united by them. Let them start from the same point-either they are identical (only one line really) or perpetually diverge. The true definition of a straight line, one which never diverges from direction to one fixed point, makes all this simple. I dare say geometry may be more convenient as we have it, but what we want in it logically is to give right force to terms, and so to definitions. What we have said of straight lines is not (266) an induction from the evidence of our senses (rather nonsense, by the by), but is necessarily demonstrated from the meaning of " straight." And this introduces another fallacy of Mill’s, founded on his assertion of general propositions and ignorance of their nature. Of course they may be contested, but in all deductive reasoning are assumed. I3ut as reasoning from particulars (Mill’s theory) is clearly false on the face of it, and no reasoning at all-i.e. no legitimate inference of any kind-so the universality of a general proposition is not all. All men are mortal is a fact. They have been so in all known cases; but the induction goes farther, and involves, perhaps is even tacitly based on, another: Man is mortal, which affirms something of the nature of man which is other and more than the fact that all are involved in it. And this is the meaning of what is universal is necessary-i.e. certainly must always happen according to the nature. " Straight" is a line of a particular nature, one which never deviates in its direction; if it does, it is not straight. So a circle; it means a boundary line enclosing space whose distance from a point within is always equal. Now Mr. Mill’s reasoning that it comes from observation is false upon the face of it, for he says there never was a perfect circle nor line seen, nor can there be, he declares. Hence it cannot be observation which has given me the idea, of a perfect line or circle, for there is no such thing to be observed. It will be said, I correct its aberrations in my mind. Correct it by what? By the idea I have of it; that is, I have an idea to correct it by, not an idea in the sense of a mental image. I know what equal means. This I may have learned experimentally, but knowing what equal means, I know what circle means without seeing it or, forming any image of it in my mind. Saying, too, I cannot reason about non-entities is false; for modes of existence, as time, space, are not entities, and I can, though with perhaps more difficulty, reason about them. And here the part which language takes is forgotten. I may have learned what " equal" is by observation (not by inference and inferring nothing from it); but I exist in space, and divisible space and time, and I know what number is, and I think in this order, and equal becomes an abstraction from the things I may have learned it by. I apply it to entities, but it is not an entity at all, yet it is a perfectly intelligible word. I have no mental image before me when I say equal or unequal, though modes of existence suppose for us that things exist; but they are not existing things imaged in the mind. This materialism has rendered all Mill’s reasoning false. I have an idea of straight and circle, lines or forms, with certain qualities which exclude from them all lines and forms which have them not. And if nature or art does not, as Mill says, furnish such, then I say a true circle does not exist in nature, and art cannot make one, though what it makes is meant for it, and answers practically for deductive reasoning, because it is meant for it, and supposed to be it. I do not take Euclid’s axioms; because they are taken as sufficient for mathematical purposes, not meant to have the precision necessary for logical discussion. Let us bear in mind that all syllogistic reasoning is on the assumption of the truth of premises-i.e. hypothetical; and if true, the conclusion is always " must be," never really "is;" never truth affirmed in itself, but a conclusion, though always a necessary one. That two lines cannot include space is demonstrable, and no real axiom, but a necessary consequence of their nature, the meaning of "straight" being assumed, of which, whether I have ever seen an exactly straight thing or not, I have a perfectly clear thought. As to the burden of proof (267), it is a feeble defense, but Mill has proved it; for he tells us that no one has ever seen a true straight line or true circle. I have already said that the only difference of mathematics is that the truths we start with-space, divisible space, form, etc.-are in the certain nature of things, 1:e. our own mode of existence. Hence unless I know God and what " I am " means, in which there is no space or time, all thoughts, or rather attempts at thought, of what is eternal outside them are negative, and cannot be otherwise- infinite, immense, and so on. I exist in what is divisible space and time, and with human powers I cannot go beyond it. When I say I am, the thought has no past, no future-i.e. is negative of finite time. It is the nearest to eternity I can come, and by a tacit negation. It is ἀεί, ὤν, always now.* Hence, when used absolutely, it negatives time absolutely; when said of myself, it says, I exist now. (*Everlasting only supposes continuous existence from now, ex parte post, so called, or ex parte ante. What Mr. Bain says is clearly false (272), for we have no really straight objects to compare, and I cannot say " bent or crooked" without understanding what "straight" means, to which another object may be an approximation. That the knowledge which makes it understood suffices to verify it, is true; but for a very different reason. Straight means what does not deviate; but from what? All his reasoning in 274-5 is founded on different meanings of inconceivable. Whewell uses it as tantamount to impossible, Mill as what the mind may or cannot apprehend, lie having nothing but observation and experience to judge by; but the impossibility is in the nature of the things. Two are not three in the same sense, nor bent and straight. It is not simply that I cannot conceive two straight lines enclosing a space, but they cannot enclose it. It has nothing to do with the information of my mind or its habits, which is all Mill can speak of. The thing, according to our mode of existence and thought, cannot be. It is not merely that in my condition of mind it cannot de facto be thought: in my state of existence it is not thinkable. All his reasoning is not worth a straw. One is the effect of prejudice or education; the other in the nature of the things. My having ascertained it or not is the state of my mind; the other is the state of two straight lines. And it is quite possible that while my ascertaining the fact is a matter of scientific progress, I may learn, too, that, things being what they are (and so only can I think logically and as to nature), it could not be otherwise. Thus it took great progress to learn the uniform and universal laws of gravitation; but, once learned, the sun being an enormously greater mass, that principle being true, the earth, once set in motion, must go round the sun. So with combinations in the reasoning of both these gentlemen. If things were not definitely combined (though experimentally learned) we could not have a χόσμος, an ordered universe. There might have been another combination possible (but not according to that in which we live, hence not conceivable by us); but to have order and distinct bodies, there being diverse elements, they must be definitely combined to have these distinct bodies. Uniformity and order cannot exist without it. Whewell, on the main point, defends himself needlessly and to no purpose (283). The question is not, save for myself, if I conceived distinctly or not, nor do I trouble myself with actual axioms more or less correct; but is there such a thing as a straight line conceivable which is not a crooked one, and a circle which is itself not an ellipse nor a square? Necessary conclusions are there rightly drawn from admitted premises; necessary truths are those which follow necessarily from the facts certain in nature. They are.also facts. I learn them perhaps by reasoning. Geometry proves the equal quantities of distinct forms. I join by a straight line two radii of a circle. I have an isosceles triangle, whatever may be deduced from that rightly necessarily follows, and may involve important discoveries. The uncultivated mind has no clear idea of what makes it impossible for him, therefore it is not so of course. And though I cannot conceive a world with different chemical combinations, as I belong to this and am not a creator, I can conceive there may be; just as I may conceive there are a thousand chemical combinations yet undiscovered. But chaos man cannot conceive. It is combination in a definite way which comes into his mind, if any; but any particular combination must be for an ordered χόσμος. True axioms, then, are relationships which are in nature and for our existence always and necessarily true. When I define a thing in mathematics I take a fact in the relations of space or number, not an existing object, but a relationship mentally conceived, one which is important for further reasoning, though there may be a thousand others; not, as Mr. Mill says, denying other attributes, but selecting that which makes it important. What I take necessarily and absolutely exists, not a physical object, an object of sense, but a relationship in the nature of things, say a right angle. Now all angles exist infinite in number. I take one where, two lines crossing each other, all the angles are equal. There must be such, for all angles exist (they are the mere relation or difference of direction of two lines from one point),* therefore this does: only I take it, for further use. (*Angles are mere quantitative angular space, part of the whole circle of space round a point. A right angle is one of four equal ones which take in the whole space.) So there are infinite forms circumscribed by a continuous line, never straight, but returning to the same identical point. There is, therefore, one of which the circumscribing line is always equidistant from a point within, that is, all whose radii are equal. I take this one, because from this quality (there may be twenty others) all the system of trigonometry-its sines, cosines, versed sines, etc.-flows. But the existence of these relationships is in the nature of things, not objects (though if true they may become such), but as to which it is impossible that they should not be. I learn many consequences, as I do from the ellipse or other forms which in astronomy become of the greatest importance; consequences that are also true as relationships-say as Kepler’s laws-much more certain and certainly accurate in mathematics than by observation. If facts, they may be observable of course, but their certainty is mathematical, 1:e. in their nature not experimental. I repeat all deductive reasoning is hypothetical, 1:e. it assumes the truth of the premises. (290, 293.) I come to numbers. Mr. Mill tells us that 1= 1 is not certain, because a pound troy is not equal to a pound avoirdupois. This is a sample of Mill’s logic. He says we must think of ten bodies, ten sounds, etc., but I do not think of bodies or sounds at all, not even if such are before me, only of their relation in number. I think of ten. I can say ten is not nine, and think of no body or thing at all. Two and one is no definition of three at all; it merely states that, if I add one to two, it makes what I call three; but two and two making four, 3+ 1 making four, and so on, show this has nothing to do with definitions. We cannot define numbers, because they enter as a primary idea into my condition of existence in the divisibility of quantity or the unity of an undivided object, as three parts, one sun. You cannot define colors for an analogous reason, nor sounds. They are primary sensations in the latter cases, the mode of my existence in the former. The word is merely the sign of it; but I am one, another person speaking to me is one, and we are two. When I say two, it shows that it is not the object of sense, for the two are different, but unity or numerical quantity that I think of. The word four, as applicable to all objects, represents none. It represents four, the number, a mode of separate existence. The objects are not the subject of thought, but the number of them, and therefore I can compute without referring to any object; the relations developed are relations of number, and nothing else. Nobody denies that objects are numbered, but thinking of number is not thinking of the objects. They exist in space, in time; but space and time are not the objects- of sense that exist in them. To confound reasoning of " one " and " one pound," as if it were the same thing, shows an incapacity of mind which may not be impossible, but it is certainly "inconceivable" in one pretending to teach reasoning or logic; the difference is in the pounds, not in the one. But mathematical arguments as to quantity are just as certain. What have quantities, as man has combined them in commerce, to do with abstract relations of quantity? This is all child’s play in logic. I need not enter at any length into the question between Mr. Mill and Mr. Spencer. Both base their reasoning on exact experience, and both are all wrong. If, as Mr. Spencer says, I feel I am cold, and cannot conceive I am not, this is not past experience. Nor is it necessary to talk of the opposite being inconceivable. A present positive feeling is for him who has it certain. Mr. Mill’s answer is, as usual, nonsense. He says, I can conceive not being cold; but Mr. S. evidently means there. when I feel cold I cannot conceive being not cold then. But they are, in order to make experience the sole test of truth, making my conception of a thing the only question, not the thing itself. If I have a toothache the pain is something, though, of course, I conceive it; and in the cases we have been considering--circles, numbers, etc.-my conceiving it has nothing to do with it The thing has the qualities, the form or number is what it is. There are numbers which convey no idea to the mind, but I can calculate them with as much certainty as if it was two or three; the certainty is in the numerical relation, not in any conception; and, be the circle big or little, the relations of sines, cosines, etc, are just the same. Conceiving depends on the conceiving power, not on the truth of the thing. " That what is inconceivable cannot be true," is as false as can possibly be; for conceivable depends on the capacity of the conceiver, not on truth or not. Besides, a man may be certain in his conception, and deceived-think himself made of glass, or Louis XVI.; he is mad no doubt, but just as certain. It is inconceivable for him that it should be otherwise. Mr. Mill distinguishes between inconceivable and impossible. I may use the former for the latter; but if the difference is made and it is just, I had already made it. The whole argument is not worth a rush. What is impossible cannot have been a matter of experience, and rests on the nature of the thing, not on conception or experience at all. And a thing may be impossible and yet supposed, or so far conceived, as that the square of the hypothenuse is not equal to the squares of the two sides. This is impossible to be true from the relation of the quantities. I may have to discover it, but it is in the nature of the thing always so. As to contradiction or an excluded middle, I must add used in the same sense. Thus, snow is white; snow is not white. If snow is white, what is not white is not snow. What is red snow? It is in all its essential qualities what makes it snow, but it has been colored in some way; and contradiction is simply such negatives, 1:e. says the affirmation is not true, consequently the negative cannot be true if it is. But this supposes the term used in the same sense. A man is one single I, but there are body, soul, and spirit, which may be separated. But what Mill says is, as usual, wrong (321); for an unmeaning proposition is none at all-is not true nor false, not as a proposition, but because it is not one at all. He is wrong, too, as to matter. What is infinitely divisible cannot be said to be not infinitely divisible. Whether matter exists or not has nothing to do with the question. The existence of matter is another proposition, the truth of which is assumed in the one we are treating of, as is always the case mentally. The incapacity of the man is really astounding. Nor has sight or touch anything to do with it. Thus, if chemistry has shown, as alleged in the atomic theory,* that divisibility cannot be carried farther, then the up to that divisible thing is not infinitely divisible. Infinite divisibility may be applied to space without matter in thought. If I get space, I get extension; and if I do, I can conceive part of it. (*But this merely physically. Mentally space is always divisible, because it has extension, or is not space.) In the quotations from Spencer we get the usual reference of everything to experience. Now as to phenomena I should insist on it. But reasoning has nothing to do with it. I know, without any phenomenon, that when I say a thing is not, I do not mean that it is, but to contradict it, that I am saying that the proposition is not true; if it is true, it is not true to say it is not. I have nothing to do here with the experience of objects, beyond which these men cannot get. I say, Whales are mammals; it is said that whales are not mammals. If I use the word in the same sense both cannot be true, because one says the other is not, and it cannot be true and not true in the same sense. Yet I have no experience of whales-never saw one-only I know that in the usual common sense of the term it is a great fish; but I have no experience of the matter; only I know what a proposition is, and what not means. I deny altogether that all our knowledge comes from induction, or that induction gives us any truth at all. Induction gives us what we have to act on as men, in a multitude of cases; for Mill carefully leaves out belief in testimony. But induction only gives us a high degree of probability. Induction does not give us truth; testimony alone gives us truth. But he admits that what induction does is to discover and prove general propositions. He insists on ascertaining individual facts, but all this is sophistry.* (*Indeed. in p.331, " In strictness, indeed, the result of the problem is a general proposition." To be sure it is, and must be-here in the case of mathematics.) Because I do not infer from some observed cases to one, unless it be the observation of all; for if not, you can draw no inference; it concludes from constant recurrence in all cases without other cause; it is true in all cases, hence in any given one; otherwise in none, unless that it is uncertain, for some are and some are not alike, or at least only probability. It never gives truth as such. " Observation of known cases " means of all known cases, or is quite false; but from all known cases universality is concluded. But this is the general proposition. The inference is to a whole class, because it is true of the whole class in all observed cases. "It does not hold at all, or it holds in all cases." Just so; but my induction is from its having been so in all observed: if it has not, I cannot infer that it will; and of cases not yet observed I only infer it of one, because I infer it of all. Only, as I have said, it tacitly but really affirms the nature of the thing. "All men are mortal" is really a conclusion as to man’s nature from having known all to die as to human knowledge. All diameters of a circle are equal is the nature of a circle having all its radii equal But here again the cloven foot comes out, that the inquiry into a scientific principle or an individual fact is just the same induction. Now, a principle or the nature of things is a matter of induction from many or all observed facts, but an individual fact (save as identical with a scientific principle) is never a matter of induction, but of testimony. I know he reasons about it to show, I believe, by an induction as to credibility; but this, however much it has its place, does not in itself give any induction in believing the fact. I believe the testimony that the fact is, and infer nothing about anything. I may show it is folly not to believe the testimony, and infer I ought; but that is reasoning or inferring as to the testimony, if I do this (not always the ground or belief, nor even of divine faith), not as to the fact. I believe on testimony, which is no induction at all; and this in the next pages he does not deny. (329.) The senses or testimony must decide on the individual fact. Inductions may, of course, then be made; but what he says about the syllogism is all false, as before. It is always and only deduction,: and not induction. Even in practical affairs the inference to a particular case would not be just, unless true of all such cases, for if not, this one may be a similar exception; and so he admits in the first sentence in the next chapter. It is really wearisome to pursue such absence of all exactness of mind. This definition of induction (333) says all I have insisted on, as to the whole class or general proposition being its true character. But syllogism is not induction, but deduction. It does not give probability, however high, which is all induction can do, and therefore nothing certain, but a necessary and certain conclusion if the premises be true. The case Mr. Mill puts is induction, and of it syllogism says: Argumentum a particulari ad universalem nil valet, and for a deduction certain in its nature, that must be; it is an induction from given cases to a class which may or may not be well founded. It is an induction; there is a conclusion, namely that every A is B; whether it be fairly conclusive depends on circumstances. If this and that A are sufficiently numerous and none contradictory are known, then it is a fair induction, such as men have to act on. But it is not a syllogism must be if the premises are. Of the use of syllogism I have spoken; it connects with certainty, by means of a middle term, ideas or an idea not connected or contained in the subject as announced, and which is called in question. Every man is an animal; every animal lives (as such) by blood; therefore man lives by blood. The middle term animal connects life by blood with man, which is supposed to be in dispute. He is wrong in saying ascertained as to every individual in it. That is not it.. It is ascertained as to every individual that has come under observation, and so I conclude as to one which has not. That is induction, the nature being really always introduced, though the process be not analyzed in our minds. And this view of induction he admits to be true in 334, 335. But syllogism is wholly distinct in its nature, and gives on admitted premises a certain conclusion from them. The induction, if it be sufficient to prove the nature, is practically sufficient so far as phenomena go; but never in se certainty. But this point of the nature of things is of great importance, though it simplifies things much. I need not follow the mass of useless verbiage in the controversy between Mill and Dr. Whewell. Mill sums it up in one sentence as to Kepler, but showing himself wrong therein; for, as is evident, Kepler’s law was an induction, only one ready-made for him in the necessary rules of an ellipse. Having found a certain number of places and movements of Mars, he inferred all the rest: only the inference was ready-made for him. But as to the question of nature itself, what is in Mill (ground of induction) and Whately is vague and unsatisfactory, though there is a general presentiment of truth in it. Nature and its uniformity come up in three distinct ways. First, uniformity of relative existence, 1:e. of what is always true in nature as it subsists, as space and form, mathematical induction, which is really merely discovery of what is constantly so. Secondly, the effects of power in nature, which may or may not operate constantly, as gravitation or certain chemical affinities or effects. Thirdly, subjection to some law or power which operates universally. The second is probably the law of nature. I do not conclude because John and Peter have died that all will. Abel’s death by violence, and all men’s, save eight, by the flood, could not have proved it, because it was not the course of nature that all would have died by nature; but I conclude that John and Peter will die because all have. My reason is that the universality of it, without other external cause, makes it a law of man’s nature; but as it is not in the subject itself apparently, but subjection to a law of necessity, I must show its universality in the natural course of things, which practically proves its necessity in every case. Yet it is not proof, 1:e. certainty, though quasi-certainty. He who believes Scripture knows we shall not all die. It is what in a person or being in his normal state is contrary to his nature, for he lives. He is subjected to it, he maybe even violently. Hence I can only conclude while that subjection continues. But in chemical affinities or gravitation it is in its normal state that it so acts; it is its nature. Seeing this, namely that it is its nature, the law of it if you please, I reckon on its doing so in all cases, because it is its nature. This may be both learned and confirmed by observation, and, no doubt, possibly the generalization induced; but from one clear adequate instance or many I have its nature. In geometrical induction it is, as I said, discovery of the nature or essential qualities of one form; and these never vary, they are the qualities of that form. What he says of only proving that that circle is only so and so is a mistake. It is what a circle, any circle, is. Colors do not give just ground for induction. They are not what the thing is,-its nature. Black swans, however, were known-rara avis in terris, nigrogue simillima cygno. What he says of abstraction is wrong. It abstracts a quality from all it may be found in, as whiteness; or a thing as a nature abstractedly from all in which the nature is found, as a man, or man; a circle, etc. It is not connecting known facts by common characters, but taking the characters apart from the facts. Man is so and so, whiteness dazzles. It is the quality of being in its nature apart from the objects in which a quality is, or individual instances of a being or an act; as " Reading much tries the mind:" "Living by warm blood is the property of all beings who breathe through lungs." It is really that the nature of the thing has been discovered. In all cases it is, so far as one instance shows, the nature of the thing that the induction is sure (for mathematics is a discovered fact of relation of quantity). When it is only from all known instances (though adequately for human conclusions) and the nature of the thing not shown, it is not, properly speaking, certain; as mortality is not the nature of man-i.e. a living being; but subjection to something which produces it. But there is another kind of inference, not from cases or all cases to the one not observed, but to the cause of the case itself. This may be from other similar cases, but not necessarily. Thus if, having gone round part of an island, I find in a strait I have not surveyed the tide setting in strong through it, I conclude it is open at the other end, for the current could not so set through it under given circumstances if it were not. This is a legitimate induction to the cause of the phenomenon, and then to the state of things which allows the cause to operate and is its formal occasion. But I deny wholly that belief in oracles, or Whately’s popular superstition, is induction from experience. They may try and justify their opinion by experience. It is evidently the power of unseen things on the human mind. Its cause is not experience. What invented it? What set it up? I do not admit any proof in induction. (352.) When one man has died, the conception of being mortal is not arrived at at all. Nor is it properly a conception. I conceive death. Mortality is a moral judgment as to the condition of the living where that conception has no place. Nor is abstraction description. But I do not dwell on these points. But if generalization from experience be induction, it cannot be proof. In material facts of the course of nature it may, but that is not really an induction from instances, but the discovery of the uniform law of the course of nature in which we exist. It does not assume the uniformity of the laws of nature, but discovers, and in that sense proves, it in the cases where it is so. I do not (from some cases of bodies falling, since nature is uniform) infer that other bodies will fall, but learn weight or gravity as a law of nature from all bodies (not hindered) falling. What I have discovered is the law (or uniformity) from all known cases, not some from an abstract idea of uniformity. I have no contest with uniformity of laws of material nature; my question is about the inductive process. I admit habitual experience gives a general feeling of a uniform law in the order of nature. But even in this it is only present phenomena. The sun rises and sets, and I expect it to do so. But the most accurate science says this order must have begun, and it must end. I shall be told this is a mere general law; be it so (though it makes phenomenal induction a poor and foolish thing). But it proves that proof by induction from observed instances to others, on the assumption of uniformity in the course of nature, is no solid ground of reasoning. For this reason: the earth had a beginning; that is, as Mill admits, there was a change. That is, uniformity which means no change is not true. If one boldly says beginning to exist is from a law (not to say that it is nonsense), where is the proof of it as a law? from what other cases is the induction made? What was the antecedent of which its existence is the sequence (called cause)? If I am told it was the effect of cast-off portions of a revolving sun and cooling mass, what was the antecedent of that? Whatever cooling of the sun may be affirmed, if matter be inert and has been set going, some force has set it going which is not in the inert matter. So, if the uniformity of the principle of weight is there, what put it there? This regards change and beginning, and motion is change. Where there is none, the case is even plainer. " Fire burns," he tells us, does not relate to time. Of course not, but "fire burns" is a statement of its nature, and what it is as such, what consequently it always as such does. There is no inference at all from cases known to cases unknown; it is known already and always that fire burns. He tells us (254) that this uniformity of the course of nature, or government by general laws, " is an assumption involved in every case of induction." In 255 again: " That the course of nature is uniform is the fundamental principle or general axiom of induction. It would yet be a great error to offer this large generalization as any explanation of the inductive process. On the contrary, I hold it to be itself an instance of induction Far from being the first induction we make, it is one of the last." This is singular. It is an assumption involved in every case of induction, the fundamental principle or general axiom of induction; but then it is a late instance of induction-i.e. it is not an assumption at all, but an instance of induction, which of course must have been made without it, for it is one of the last inductions made-i.e. it cannot have been assumed before. It is known by induction, the fruit of it; but the induction was made always by assuming it. It is always taken for granted to have proof by induction, but the induction must be made or it is not known; it is itself induction, in which it takes itself for granted. His only answer to this is, for he admits it, that it is no more than the major of a syllogism. But this is no answer at all, for he admits that the major is necessary to prove the conclusion, though no part of the proof. What is necessary thus to prove all inductions is itself a matter of induction, when it is not there though necessary! But the answer is in itself unfounded. The major is part of the proof,-ground I have already gone over. Thus man lives by blood, therefore man is mortal. Here is no proof whatever of anything. I say, Why so? I answer, Which is the major, because everything that lives by blood is mortal? My minor only brought it into this class, the major proved it was mortal. He would say, Your major had to be proved. Of course it had. But that has nothing to do with the proof of the syllogism. In fact, moreover, universal laws of nature are not assumed. A universal law of gravity is discovered by observation, generalizes withal by finding that it explains all the phenomena of movement in the universe, though gravity is only a name for the fact. But nothing of a universal law is assumed here. It is, as he admits, an induction, and an induction which could not yet be made. I find by experiment that water presses equally in every direction, another general law, but no assumption of universality. But when I find in every case that comes before me there are fixed principles of nature, and that it is in a general way necessary for the order which constitutes the χόσμος I accept it as a general principle of that χόσμς-i.e. in the physical order of things. It is a result of induction. But this proves the inaccuracy of Mill in saying that it is the basis in every induction; for it is not in any of these, by which it is ascertained. That is, his principle is wholly false. Nor does it go beyond material elements or physical nature; but we cannot expect Mill to get beyond materialism. But then to assume it is a universal basis of induction because it is in material things is wholly unfounded. He may amuse himself with chemistry from Bain and Sir John Herschel, but this is superficial work, and shows a will. He says (329): The validity of argument, when constructed, depends on principles, and must be tried by tests which are the same for all descriptions of inquiries. Now an inquiry whether alkalies neutralize acids is not tried by the same test as whether man is morally responsible to God, and what God is, what morality is. And Mill has shown elsewhere the effect of this materialism in declaring his belief of an impotent God, partially good and unable to do better with the materials ready to his hand, whencesoever they came. Doubtless he had felt physical evil personally, and knew, as evidently he did not, nothing else, nothing of the truths involved in conscience. His theory is,-we are to perfect what has been made imperfectly. The induction by simple enumeration is true where it is the expression of nature, for that reason; one instance well ascertained to be attributable to a chemical agent is so for the same reason. When I cannot say it is nature, it is the highest probability where no other cause is, as ordinary mortality. Violence, disease, or not, men equally die as to animal life; phenomenally animals the same. I then say it is the present order of nature. When I say alkalies neutralize acids, or hydrogen and oxygen in given proportions make water, I get, as far as man can ascertain, their nature as to that. And I do not, however, draw an induction properly in this case. It is the nature of alkalies, and these gases so united make water. I do not predict, save to the ignorant. They do not resemble, as Mill would say; they are the same, not in corporate unity, which has nothing to do with the matter, but in action. Alkalies do that; not "have done" nor " will," though each be true; they do it. When I conclude from instances to instances, it may be more or less likely, because, if tolerably many, there is probably a common cause; but it is no proof of anything: but if I ascertain the nature of the thing, that is an induction, and so far practical proof. But this only applies to material nature, not to a law binding everything with a phenomenal χόσμος. Consequences prove antecedents, but only where it is the nature of the thing; sequence in itself has nothing to do with it. He admits the fact; but if it does not in one instance, it is no proof in any. Day follows night, 1:e. light darkness; but it is not of the nature of darkness to give light, or to cause it, and the sequence has nothing to do with causation, laws of nature, or induction. That is propter quia post. Where a thing produces anything, then I pronounce on its nature, and it is always itself when not hindered. His chemical instances may be all very well as trivial illustrations of means to discover producing causes, though he never travels beyond materialism; very pretty experiments borrowed from’ others, which not only are confined to material things, but do not analyze the true principles even of them. They are mere means of scientific discovery, beyond which his mind cannot go. He does not see the difference I have noted. The black or white swan, or gray crow, says nothing as to nature; it is a mere fact, and swan or crow is merely a class made ill or well; and all the white swans in the world would not prove there was not a black one,-has nothing to do with it. The only important principle evolved here is that he is obliged to rest all on testimony, as in all questions of fact we must. Most of the laws of nature are simply facts, and there is no induction whatever, but adequate ascertainment of a fact; as that hydrogen and oxygen make water: only in the details we must see that other causes do not come in to produce or have hindered. As to cleverness in experiment, his cases may be all very well, but have nothing to do with the logic of causes. I cannot see any induction in ascertaining the laws of nature, though clever induction may shorten the work in guessing or probability (not proper invention). The fact is there, and the fact is learned. A clever mind may think of means to ascertain whether the fact is such; a well-informed mind knows what may eliminate, what would confuse. But if hydrogen and oxygen always make water, there is no induction. If a third element be there which hinders it, I have to ascertain where the true law or uniform fact is; but all this is mere ascertainment of facts by observation. As to the result, that is the fact. You have nothing to do with following them. I quite admit cleverness and knowledge in the use of facts. When Leverrier or Adams discovered that Urania’s motions could not be accounted for, all the difference was that they could not see what caused it. The law of gravity was known: it was an instance of it. The irregular movement proved the presence of the object, just the same as sight would. The cause and result were identified. The reason why testimony that there were black swans could be received was that color does not alter the nature at all. -Wearing heads under arms clearly ran counter to the natural structure of a man. You cannot say there can be none such, but it is too contrary to nature, and so to probability, to receive it. Experience would not help us with the swans. If color had to do with nature, as the black spot from arsenic, it would at once affect our judgment. As to his case of abuse of power there is generalization, but his conclusion is, as usual, a Tenterden steeple one. How does he know that education will ever elevate character, or destroy the love of power or its abuse? The only conclusion to be drawn is that no forms hinder the love and abuse of power found in man, and no system of education yet invented has corrected his nature. (354-372.)-He had before told us (258) that mathematics were not certain: now their laws are rigorously universal. If truth is investigated by evidence, neither induction nor logic is such at all. He naturally avoids all efficient causes, looking only to physical ones; in which, too, all is false, because he has confounded cause and sequence, and things apparently necessary with cause. It is the merest fallacy to call it causation where it is simply sequence. Be it that I learn what is a cause from it by eliminating other concomitants, but then it is a producing cause. Whether there be a constant sustaining will is another question: I believe it, but I may consider the ordered sequences apart as ordered. In that sense he is superficial and unanalytical still; Events, as we know them in the χόσμος, have had not necessarily antecedents; this is not so, but causes. Gravity is not an antecedent of centripetal motion, nor impulse even of rectilinear. They act in the motion. What we call gravity is only the force so displayed. But the real cause is not all the antecedents where there are such. Poison kills one man, not another, the former being unhealthy, but the latter is not the cause. The poison destroyed the tissues, or corrupted the blood, etc., that killed the man; in the other case there was adequate force to resist, which there was not in the first. (378-9.) Language may be used carelessly, and occasion used for cause, and Mill’s mind not get beyond this. We do so when, without the occasion, the result would not have happened; but this is only language. The man falling from the ladder broke his neck-suppose this was the cause of his death; but I say, slipping from the ladder, because otherwise he would not thus have broken his neck, and his weight would not have done it at all. A stone falling, to the bottom is caused by gravity simply, partially hindered by the medium. It is immaterial what might hinder. It is evident that it cannot come into the cause of what it is not hindered in. He is wrong as to-the surprise. The absence of the sentinel did cause the surprise, not the attack; but it was the cause why that attack was a surprise on the others; and that is what causing a surprise means, not causing the fact, but causing that fact to be a surprise. Absence may be a cause. Absence or non-existence of light (darkness) makes me lose my way. There must be a way, and a man purposing to go it; but this has nothing to do with the cause of his losing it. I may say, in common parlance, Faust died (383), because he was a man; Mephistopheles not, because he was a spirit. But this does not say what was the cause of Faust’s death. Poison killed Faust, his being a man did not. But the operation of the poison did not exist as to spirit. There was no cause at all at work. In comparing and saying why there was not, it is all well to say because, etc., but this has nothing to do with the cause. His whole system as to causation is wrong. To say that the existence of tissues is the cause of their destruction, because there must be tissues to destroy, is trifling nonsense, and that it is not alleged as a cause only, because taken for granted. The existence of tissues is no cause at all of their being destroyed. In 383 he says this, in 380 he says it is vicious tautology. The movement of a projectile is the effect of the combination of two forces. More than one cause may be in operation, but the collection of all conditions being causes is unfounded. And he takes states of objects as causes, but this is all the grossest delusion. If a stone attracts the earth, that is not what makes it fall; were it big enough the earth would go to it. So colors are states of an object. There being causes of sensation in me is a wholly different matter. He has really a most incompetent mind. The thing caused in my mind has nothing to do with the color being a patient, but my senses. The action and passion refer to different objects in which the result is produced. If I give a blow and produce pain, I am in no way the patient. The whole of this in 388 is utterly false, because the object is not agent in that in which it is patient, nor vice vεrsα. The case of the scholar and teacher is sophistical in this, that mind is brought in in both. But even here, qua recipient from the teacher, the scholar is not active. It may set his mind working. He is all confusion too here. In 62 a substance or body is the external cause of our sensation. Hence if I paint the wall white, the cause of my seeing whiteness is there. It is a simple direct cause, not an induction, at least if 62 be just. Painting the wall is merely putting on that place what does so, the wall has nothing to do with it. Nor do I see that what he says of cause, or of conditions to define cause, is just. Cause means what produces an effect. Be it that Hume will have that we only know what is constantly antecedent. This is not true, as Reid’s case of night and day shows. Mill adds unconditionally. But this is not true. His elaborate proof to show that there is the condition that the sun must rise and set is absurd; for I have his experimentum crucis of the sun making daylight the cause of daylight-i.e. the cause known by the effect. And if I say, accounting for the sequence, it is the rotation of the earth which causes the sequence, as it is. There is the condition of the sun or light being there, and even here, as much as before, the earth may cease to rotate, or the sun to give light. But the rotation is none the less de facto the cause of the sequence-I cannot say it will be forever, but will be, nature being what it is: a necessary condition in every case.-The man whose side was shot away led to experiments on the power of the gastric juice in digestion, the proportional ease of digestion of different edibles; but when they put the gastric juice into a vial it was found that it did not digest save at the heat of the stomach. Here it was clear there was a condition, a certain degree of heat. But gastric juice digested the substance. If not, what did? Gastric juice in its normal condition, not else.-Hydrogen and oxygen produce water by being mixed, but if mixed with a certain force the hottest fire; here is a condition, the absence of a certain degree of force in mixing them. It is not unconditionally that the mixture produces water, but the mixture of hydrogen and oxygen for all that is the cause of water.-And, according to his own statement, in the case of the surprise of the army, non-existence cannot be a cause of anything. The absence of force is not existence; so that cannot be a cause. But even there he was wrong, because the army reckoned on the sentinel, and therefore it did not watch. And now, let me ask, what sequence of antecedents and consequences, conditioned or unconditioned, makes me find the light of the sun by day an experimentum crucis that it is the cause of day? But further, this is merely an effort to insist on laws and nature’s order.-Supposing I make a lamp, what sequence, conditioned or unconditioned, is the cause of its existence? Every fact which has a beginning, he tells us (376), has a cause. All right. And the invariable antecedent is termed the cause (377). The lamp had a beginning, consequently it had a cause. That is an invariable antecedent, and we learn farther on that it is always followed by the same consequent; whereas there is no invariable consequence in the lamp. The lamp is certainly an existing phenomenon. Between the phenomena which exist at any instant, and the phenomena which exist at any succeeding instant, there is an invariable order of succession. Now if his explanations and definitions apply only to one class of objects, and are untrue of all the rest, they are false as such. Thus every fact which has a beginning has a cause; that is, according to his definition, an invariable antecedent. Both these are clearly not true. I admit, every one, admits, that as a general principle the course of nature proceeds according to established laws. It would not be a course of nature if it did not. This does not preclude the possibility of interference, but it is there to be interfered with if it be. But Mr. Mill’s theory of causation is wholly false and wrong. But further, every fact which has a beginning has a cause. Now in the course of nature there is no beginning phenomenally, or it would not be a course. Particular effects may begin, as the precession of the equinoxes returning on their course; but this is really a continuous effect, a regular thing. Thus there is no beginning of anything, consequently no cause of anything at all, save petty details man can make by his activities. Nothing ever began, and nothing ever was caused. A thunderstorm begins, but it is the regular course really of the operation of electricity and heat. It is as regular a course of nature really as the sunrise. But what made electricity have this course? In truth Mr. Mill merely states a phenomenal course, but cause is no real word for it; hence, to slip out of the difficulty, he confines himself to course of nature where general laws are admitted, and avowedly confines himself to phenomena, by which he means merely the visible or discovered course of nature around us, where nothing phenomenal had a beginning, 1:e. now apparent as apparent, or it would not be an established law; for if established now (or any time), something established it, and there is an efficient, not a mere phenomenal, cause. If constantly in operation, it has not a beginning. The whole theory is utterly shallow. If we are to believe Thompson, the earth must have had a beginning; so that there was a cause when it was not. But that is another question of fact. Phenomenal laws do not begin, and there is no beginning at all, or, in Mr. Mill’s definition, a cause before the beginning of phenomenal laws. An established law now going on is not a beginning, but a going on; and he shirks the whole real question, falsifying all the principles he lays down himself. So he says (397):The beginning of a phenomenon is what implies a cause, and causation is the law of succession of phenomena. This is a contradiction in terms, or reduces phenomena to the subjective perception by me. The light of the sun causes day-his own example-but that is merely my seeing it, for it is always light; day is merely that I see it. As the moon always reflects the light, the waxing and waning and lunar months, etc., are merely a question of my seeing it. The moment I have a law, I have what always is, 1:e. no beginning and no cause on his showing of what " cause " is. But this involves most important principles. A course of nature phenomenally is clearly not ’So beginning. It is not a law nor known phenomenally as a law till it acts, and has acted regularly, as such. If learned by experience, it is going on (though if the nature of the cause be ascertained, I may conclude to its being so from one instance). That is, the fact of beginning, implying a cause, and a law of nature or regular sequences (cause meaning no more), as ascertained by experience, are contradictory to one another. Hence of two things one: either the course of nature began, and then I have a cause, that is, an efficient cause, outside and before that course; or it went on eternally without any cause at all. Not merely matter existed (we do not know matter unformed and whose state is uncaused, and no part of the χόσμος), but the whole perfectly ordered system, with the force that governs it in its movements, regular as no man could devise it-scarce discover, and multiform as no man can think, is perfectly uncaused and invented itself before it existed-for invented somehow it is. Matter, we are told, is inert; but it moves with a speed thought cannot realize, yet nothing has made it do so! It is here we may say Credat Judoeus Apella. Mill says he is not obliged to treat this question. But all his theory is false without it, because regular phenomena going on by established laws are not beginning. Day begins, no doubt, that is, I see the sun at a given time; but nothing is really beginning; the rotation of the earth is, as a law of nature, perpetual. If he says it is no law of nature, as it may naturally terminate, so begin, what gave the impulse? He cannot avoid efficient causes, for there are no other real ones. The attempt to reduce phenomenal causes to efficient ones was the intuitive sense that there must be such; the discovery of regular laws gradually did not falsify this, but merely the place they sought them in. Discovery of gravity, a few general laws in chemistry-as the law of general proportions, etc.-proved it was not in essences of things efficient cause was to be sought (though there is more truth in it than in the denial of it). His changing conditions into causes is false as to causation. But the necessity of a cause somewhere is evident, and Mr. Mill admits it elsewhere, only an impotent one that could not make things better than they are, and we are to perfect the poor result! And the fact of general laws leads us up to a general or single cause which caused the course of nature to begin, and consequently was not of it (in the beginning was, ην, and by Him all things ἐγένετο, began, or took place. Das Wort war, and durch ihn alles ward). But this, then, was by a will; hence they can only continue by a will, the same that formed and gave the impulse. If the impulse was necessary to move originally, that only could cause the movement, and that will only can cause it to be now. By Him all things consist. This is the only possible conclusion. Descartes may have gone wrong so far as not allowing secondary wills, as man’s, which in their allowed spheres may be causes. All Sir W. Hamilton’s reasoning (417) is just nil. Is the steam not the cause of propulsion because there are cranks and condensers, etc.? The intermediate instrumentality has nothing to do with the cause or efficient power which produces the effect. All Mill’s statement refers, with his usual want of sagacity, not to the point itself, but to the means of ascertaining it. Supposing I learn it by experience,-a dog, without learning anything, or using any reflex action of mind at all, moves his foot as much and as well as, or better than, I do. The cause of his action or moving is the same as mine. Foolish man may reason as to matter not acting on matter, or mind not acting on matter, but I and the dog do will, and do move our legs because we do will it. The case of paralysis proves nothing. It only shows that the machinery is out of order which communicates to a certain-say, as they do- distant lump of matter. Does it show that steam is not a motive power if the crank be broken? The ascription of life by savages to sun and moon, because they had motion marking a plan, was a mistake as to the fact; but supposing it caused, as Mill and Reid say, which is only partially true, it was at the utmost a wrong deduction from too widely generalizing a true fact; and this is their account of the matter, that is, they had always experienced that will in themselves gave rise to motion when so willed. Mill (410) says volition is a physical cause, 1:e.an antecedent invariably producing a given consequent, which is absurd on the face of it, for thus it is not will. I may say, In three minutes I will strike the table, there is no consequent at all when this will exists. In three minutes I strike it when the will is positively active. Will cannot be physical, even if thought may be. Motives may produce will, conscience restrain it; but will is not subjective feeling, though this may tend to produce it; as, if a man irritates me, I should like to strike not his talk but him. It is not a consciousness of effort, but a consciousness of intention. Effort brings in the machinery; intention not. If they say, and it is all they say, "I don’t know how will sets the machinery in motion," I agree entirely, I insist on it. I have an intention and a will, and by nerves and muscles and a pen I write these lines, each word being what my intention makes it, if I am careful and wide awake. Can they tell how? Of course not. Is that a reason for saying, if I intend so to write, that I then have an active will to do it which puts these means in motion and produces the effect? The instruments have nothing to do with it. I must have a pen and ink. What then? They are as necessary conditions as nerves, and, say, electricity, if so it be. I speak to my friend: he understands and receives the deepest truths, say the nature of God. All I do is to modify the movement of the air by my lungs and throat and lips. Other spiritual power may be necessary; but this would only additionally prove that the animal economy through which the action passes has nothing to do with the cause. " Conscious of power " may be incorrect, because that may include the instruments of a body so wonderfully constructed to follow will, but conscious of will as that which somehow when in practice acting (for it may be there when it is not) causes the effect to follow. Paralysis has nothing to do with this. It refers to the machinery the motive power sets in activity: how, none can say..He can carry up the machinery to the nearest point where it receives the impulse, but that link no human mind can find; in no case can he. But however it acts, or however we learn it, active will, when the machinery is in order, does produce effects. Nothing can be without it, and no human mind can tell us the links between matter and mind and will. Mill has no idea of anything but theories of others and natural laws (419); the truth that lies behind he avowedly avoids; and when he touches it collaterally, he goes all wrong by the help of others (411, 413). In 393-426 I only find shirking the truth, feebleness of mind, and want of sagacity. The chapter on the composition of causes is all ’to no purpose. There is no analogy between the cases. The composition of forces is one and the same case, motive power (or attraction) acting on a distinct object. Chemical composition is one thing acting on another, or rather two things acting on each other, so as to produce a result within themselves, combining elements which, when together, form a third thing. One is mere force on an inert mass, the other the combination of elements within themselves. The total absence of all moral sense and responsibility, and the degrading character of his philosophy, is shown in the way he speaks (432) of the laws of life. The way gastric juice produces chyle, or gastric juice is formed, perhaps that is within his sphere of vision, and no one doubts there is a chemical action in the development of animal life; but beyond that his thought cannot reach. What a son is to a father, a man to God, that never crosses his path. I shall be told it is no part of logic. In a direct way I fully admit it; but neither is chemistry, which is his constant hobby; and life has nothing really to do with chemistry save in its external causes and sustainment. It is proved now that there is no production of life from matter of itself, and that life precedes organization and produces it. That much is hid from man, nay, all these things, I fully admit. But all his laws of life are only the form of operation when life is there. Matter does act on mind, as a knock on the head or a bad cold makes me senseless, mad, or stupid; and mind acts on matter, for I move, in spite of all the Cartesians (though in substance I agree with him and Leibnitz) in the world: how I cannot say. Muscles, nerves, perhaps magnetism, only bring me to more subtle matter, and the question is untouched. Of this I have spoken. The effect of progressive heat (434) may be merely increased power of separating the particles. But this is no matter. It is fatiguing, his never getting beyond the merest materialism; and we must ever remember that laws leave the question of real cause wholly untouched, as I have said.-To say that social and political phenomena are the effects of the laws of mind, is simple nonsense. It is the effect of passions, prejudices, unknown impulses, with which mind has nothing to do. Motives-and men have to be governed by motives-are not mind; and, whatever Utopia he may conceive, he cannot get rid of them or govern others, nor has he by any possibility a standard of result or principle which can form society. He may easily say " the good of all;" but what is that good? If reason governs each individual, is each individual competent to discern the best good of all, and to act upon it without caring for self? Love governing where it is I understand. But reason and laws of mind never made a world happy, nor have anything to do with it. Cold never thawed the hard earth, nor reason selfishness in man. As to induction (444), I deny that its object is to ascertain what causes are connected with what effects. It is to ascertain what things are. No doubt it may be used for the other; but every major premise of a syllogism, when believed by induction, is not the statement of the effect of a cause. Every man is an animal is fact derived from observation, and has nothing to do with cause and effect. This is merely the blinding effect of being engrossed by laws of nature, and incapacity to get out of the material rut in which his very narrow mind moves. And this, as the end of inductive philosophy, is the low fallacy of his whole book. That his principles are incapable of anything beyond it I fully admit. But he assumes that chemistry, life, social and political questions, are all problems of the same nature; he leaves out not only the whole higher sphere of thought, admitting that induction has made nothing even of most of these, and drawing all his instructions from chemistry and mere physical nature. But this false view of induction destroys the basis of his reasoning. And it is every way and wholly false and illogical; for laws are not really causes, and physical laws are not everything-at any rate cannot be assumed to be such; so that his whole system is false from beginning to end. The introduction of another element besides physical uniform sequence makes, or may make, all untrue; and it is wholly unfounded. He is obliged to make human will a mere physical cause or law, having never proved it is so, which makes evidently the whole system foundationless, a rehearsal of chemistry and the way of discovering facts in it, which is not logic (see p. 410), but which betrays the system, and shows the flimsiness of the whole of it. His statements as to methods of agreement are not correct.. The effect of it is not necessarily A; because it is possible, and indeed common, that A without B produces nothing at all. But it is not material, as it is merely means of discovery. The same objection applies to Canon 4, as indeed he admits. On his own showing they are not shown to be unconditioned, therefore not shown to be a cause. The principle (466) is a false principle. Gastric juice (cold) and heat produce, neither of them, any effect on. a piece of meat; join them, and they digest it. In moral things the contrary is constantly true: a woman has nothing to do with me, and no effect on my position. She marries my father, and I am turned out of the house. Nor is it evident in the case of the stars, though it may be true. The conjunction of two suns might alter every condition of man’s life, in many respects morally, or burn him up; one changes nothing as originally adapted to his nature, though the last instance is less strictly exact, as one (though, as adapted unfelt) does act on him. Physical "phenomena" only (470) come under these rules, right or wrong. Organic life consists, he says, in a continual state of decomposition and recomposition of the different organs and tissues (473), and yet more strongly, " the chemical actions which constitute life." Now this is alike folly and impudence. In life in the body these changes take place: but who says that is life? In the first place, it is proved that life precedes and produces organization (the inorganic nucleus in the cell); but at any rate the body, being subject to these changes by vital power, in no way says that they are life or constitute life. They are a corporeal process where life is, but more cannot be said. Of course he cannot get beyond it, and note here that he pretends to go beyond phenomena or physical causes. He may say these are the regular phenomenal causes; but when he says this constitutes life he touches the efficient cause, so as to settle there is none else but the phenomenal. The dispute between him and Whewell I leave. I think some of his cases inconsequent; but all this is merely verifying inductions on chemistry and the like, interesting in their way, but which concern me little. All is material.-On the composition of forces I do not think his conclusions just; the distance gone is not the same, nor is time the same; nor can rest be estimated as the same as twice the distance in opposite directions. Its consequent effects are clearly totally different. If the force were attractive, not impinging, it would not be so. Some of the difficulties he escapes by tendency and pressure. For the mere history of science in its deductions I have no remark to make. His making induction a part of deduction is clearly false, as already noted. It is merely ascertaining the general premise for the deduction, and so he says, p. 534. Nor is his statement in 536 true in proper deduction, when the nature or law is adequately ascertained. If deduction be just, I say "must be." In mere material phenomena verification may be all well, because it is a question of material facts, which may be mistaken. But this is a question of the truth of the premise, not of the deduction which assumes it, and we are where we were, subject to particular observation of cases, unless the law or nature of the thing be ascertained; then the conclusion is certain. Verification may be all well, but it is testing the justness of the induction which establishes the major premise. As logic, all his statements are very poor indeed. That he has interested himself in physical science may be all very true; but though it may seem harsh, the whole tone evinces, I judge, a bad vitiated mind. I am led to say this by the way he speaks so lightly and flippantly (534) of constructing an organic body, and trying whether it would live. The tissues at the instant of death are the same. An organized body constructed is not a living body, nor an organ’s inactivity of themselves, or movable by will, the same as a constructed organism. He is no Prometheus. He admits he is quite ignorant, only flippantly taking occasion by his ignorance practically to deny life or a soul distinct from body. If a man believed there were, he could not talk of trying whether it would live. And this is flippant on what is solemn, if it be only to be or not to be; and flippancy on solemn subjects is the proof of a vitiated mind. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 125: VOL 02 - EXAMINATION OF MILL'S LOGIC 2 ======================================================================== Examination of Mill’s Logic 2 Why must there be ultimate laws? All may be summed up in one, and that one a constant acting of force in One who can originate force. His limiting it to sensations is limiting it by effects on us, beyond which I suppose his mind cannot go. Colors, for instance, are the result of degrees of refraction, and red is contained in white. A colored object is from some special power of reflecting that ray. He affects to speak only of phenomenal sequences, and not of efficient causes; but if the reader be attentive, he will soon find he speaks of them as efficient. Causa causata perhaps; but this he will not have, because it leads to a causa causans, which no human mind can escape or conceive. Bain’s statement (7) is merely that we cannot now give an ultimate cause, or one nearer to it, to two phenomena. Sameness is constantly treated as similarity or resemblance, which is a misleading blunder, failing in abstraction. (P. 11.) Induction has nothing to do with deduction, nor has verification, which is merely a means of testing its justness. It is clear that I cannot verify till the deduction is completely made, and verification also is in particular cases, and the conclusion might be true in them, yet the deduction unsound as a general one. All is superficial here, and a mere recital of material means of scientific research. Hypothesis is the short cut of genius versed in general relations and power of memory as to them, merely concluding it must be so. If proved that other circular forms did not produce equal spaces, then the proof was complete, practically it was that, supposing no cause did. As to causes being causes, see 15, second paragraph. I have not much to remark in this part of the book: only notice the careless fallacies of Mill (57.) The effect might not be produced if A were alone. In the calculation of chances he changes probable into " probable to us." But this changes the whole idea, and makes the probability depend, not on the calculation of the chances based on the fact, but on my knowledge, different it may be in all, so that there is no calculation of chance. He does not believe in the Jesuit’s middle knowledge. What means certain here? Some event does happen, we can say, in result. But events are not certain 2 priori. It was the sense of this made him add to Laplace. The two events must be of equally frequent occurrence. To get out of this he turns probable into " probable to us," unless all this is confusion. Evidently it is more probable that a man in the last stage of a consumption will die within a year than that a man in good health, coeteris Paribus, will. Our ignorance of it does not affect its probability, though it may our estimate of it. The logical ground (66) is not our knowledge, though we may have to act on it. Pp. 67, 68, are all nonsense. The fact of credibility of witnesses is clear judgment of the individual, no average question at all. In 69 we have a very important false principle, arising from his rejection of testimony, and resting all on inference and averages. The probability of a fact rests on our knowledge of the proportion of cases in which it occurs. Now, supposing it occurred but once, and never before, the real question is of adequate testimony, not of probability at all. Say the deluge: I have a positive testimony, confirmed in every way, supposing the earth to bear evident marks of its having taken place. I have no question of probability, but of adequate testimony; and this false and evil dependence on inference confounds past facts with possible future ones, putting them on the same ground. Testimony has nothing to do with probability, but he seems to have no idea of such a thing as truth. Besides, here and throughout we have it assumed that there can be no power in operation at any time other than phenomenal sequences. Not merely that he will only consider these; which, if there be others, must put him on false ground, and which are no causes at all (from which yet he cannot escape); but he denies all others: they are not supposable to him. It is only causes in operation which tend to produce, admitting, in spite of himself, efficient or productive causes, but limiting all active power to existing phenomena. As to past fact, probability is nonsense, or a denial of all possibility of adequate or certain evidence. In reasoning (82) on the sun rising he tells us: If it do not, it will be because some cause has existed, the effects of which, though during five thousand years they have not amounted to a perceptible quantity, will in one day become overwhelming. He then goes on to assume that only some long existing cause, or one arriving suddenly from a distance to be the cause, can be supposed. But this assumes there can be no agent or power beyond known phenomena. I believe in constant agency of divine power, and that this is the ultimate law; but he has no right to assume that there can be no intervention of power beyond observed phenomena. We know that it is the infidelity of the last days; but it is an arbitrary and ignorant assumption. (95.) It does not prove A to be the cause, but only a necessary condition. Thus the universality of causation as a general proposition is not what is believed; but when I find a formed thing, I believe there was a former; so, if anything occurs, I believe something has made it occur. The return of day, save religiously, is not a question of general causation at all. The peasant expects the sun to rise, because it always has, by simple enumeration; but when he sees his cart, he believes somebody made it, without any generalization, and would think you mad, or perhaps a philosopher, if you doubted it. But the mental principle in these cases is quite different. But in neither case is there belief of universality of causation. Nor is universality of causation the truth we cannot help believing, 1:e. an abstract proposition; but having an effect, we cannot but think there is a cause. Nor is he right in saying belief is nowhere without proof to reason. I believe my own existence, I am conscious of it, without any proof at all. Nor is it the truth of a fact in external nature which I believe here. The cart is the fact, and with it conies the belief that it was made. Man does believe that effects, as the word intimates, have a cause. Reason never believes anything. It may test the credibility of evidence; but it is not its function to believe, but to reason. Nor does it follow that, if I cannot help believing that there is a cause for an effect (1:e. that it is of necessity I do so), my belief may be of what is not true; for if there be such an instinct, it may be, and is, a truthful instinct. It is not that any particular thing is the cause, but that there is one. This assertion of Mill is from the primary fallacy that there is no ground of truth but reason, which I wholly deny. And what he says, p. 99, shows the fallacy he labors under. Man cannot conceive chaos, because he is part of an order or system; nor events in it without a cause, because he belongs to a caused system; and there can be events in chaos only by action on it. If I have a notion of events in chaos, I have the notion of cause and effect; and effects are still the proof of a cause. The belief in human will does not affect in the least the general principle of fixed laws. It is bound by them in its activity: cause and effect remain in nature where they were. Arbitrary intervention, even where there is almighty power, leaves them where they were as a fixed rule, and supposes them. What was not known was the universality, which is an abstraction quite distinct from the facts on which it is founded. And all his reasoning fails; because, if his discovery of the law uncontradicted is only simple argument and simple enumeration, all subsequent reasoning is no stronger than the basis, and this is founded on each particular case. It is merely a measure of probability; and the allegation that the major is no part of the proof, because it may have been previously proved by induction, is a fallacy already exposed. All men are mortal is a proof that Lord P. is mortal, if he be a man; and all he can make is a material improvement in a fallible process (101); but the ground was not rigorous induction (102). All this is very lame. The belief in a cause has nothing to do with uniform sequence. This is the effect of labored investigation, and gives that persistence of causes in their effects which makes an ordered system and fixed laws, and applies only to the sphere in which they are observed. Whereas the belief that what occurs has a cause is instinctive part of my nature, and hence, as far as my capacity goes, applies to all that occurs anywhere. Be it true or false, it is a wholly different thing; for we must not think that the law of causation is the same thing as the fact of an event or effect flowing from a cause. The former is simply the uniformity of sequence (108) in phenomena. Consequence connects the two ideas; but an effect flowing from a cause is really its producing it. In spite of himself, saying he will not speak of efficient causes, Mill speaks of one thing producing another. He says not efficient; but says "effects of different causes," in his other books cons0 nay; thus pp. 246, 247; 203, so 160, "the effects of causes," "the effects which these causes produce." All this is mental dishonesty. What is an effect of a cause not efficient? I have no objection to recognize the operation of supernatural power in some miracles as a case of the law of universal causation-i.e. the existence of a cause. But it clearly is not a case of invariable sequence, for the cause is set in motion by special intervention; yet invariable sequence is all he owns as causes from observation of nature. This is quite clear, however he may muddle it together. He admits, moreover, the instinctive action of mind by a law of our nature (110); but on this I need not comment. His answer in 111 to M`Cosh is null, for the law of causation is " the uniformity of the course of nature." The uniformity of the course of nature has not any exceptions that I know of, nor do events succeed one another without fixed laws. But it does not thence follow that there are events which do not depend on causes: but if there are such which are not according to fixed laws of nature, there are causes which are not the fixed laws of nature. His tacit denial of God, and of all efficient causes in order to that, plunges him in incessant illogical statements. So ultimate coexistences force him up (113) to eat his words by admitting either things without a cause, or a cause found by ascending " to the origin of all things." And he cannot deny the fact. He is obliged to come, where all open honest minds conic, to a causa causans for the ultimate coexisting properties from which uniform effects follow. There is no uniform sequence, or they are not ultimate. When he says, " if the properties do not depend on causes, but are ultimate properties," could there be a stronger evidence of will to deny a first cause? For an ultimate property is not an invariable sequence; and how did it come to exist? (See 115, at the end.) The rest of that chapter is all talk to little purpose about kinds. Note his only idea of moral inquiry (130), the chance of human actions so as to predict them. All his reasoning as to existence is false; because, when he says the Emperor of China exists, means that I should see him at Pekin if there, he confounds cause and effect, He has defined qualities to be something which produces a sensation. The existence of the something, then, is necessary to the sensation. Existence is note its being perceived (143), it is that which is the occasion of the sensation. I may have the sensation even without the existence of the thing; I can dream or remember. But the object of what follows is to deny the force of testimony; it is an inductive law of succession or coexistence. It is neither. When I am told by a credible witness, by one I believe, the Emperor of China exists, there is no proof of its connection by succession or coexistence with any other thing. When the outermost planet was discovered by its disturbing Uranus in its orbit, it was no conviction that with more power it might be seen. That followed, of course; but a certain power of gravity was there, as the course of Uranus showed. As to resemblance, all is a mistake. When mathematical quantities are alike, they do not resemble one another, they are the same. Figures resemble each other, because in that they are the same. Two things equal to the same are equal to one another-convenient for Euclid-means nothing; it is one and the same quantity in all three. As I have said, mathematics are identity of quantity in different forms. If I have a foot-rule, it is only that, as to quantity, all three are one and the same. When it is said two straight lines which have once intersected one another continue to diverge, it is no matter of induction or observation. A straight line is one which always follows the same direction, hence diverging in starting by supposition, for once intersecting one another means that, they always diverge, or they are not straight at all, 1:e. do not follow the same direction. Other facts are matters of observation empirically, or may be traced to causes. We must not forget that confessedly constant sequence in itself proves nothing, not even a phenomenal cause, as day is the cause of night. He, we may be reminded, says unconditioned sequence, as if the sun was always up, it would be always day-always light, not day. Many things which are causes are conditioned, as heat with gastric juice, a certain proximity for the attraction of cohesion. All this confusion arises from real causes not being owned. Hydrogen and oxygen make water, but under the condition of the power which unites them atomically according to certain laws. The whole of the chapter on grounds of disbelief is founded on an entire fallacy, 1:e. assumption that that is true of which no proof whatever is given; just what I said at the beginning as to using a word with his own definition of it as if it was the truth. He assumes that experience of natural laws is the only foundation of knowledge. Evidence can only be a proximate generalization. Possibly so on his ground, that belief of testimony is only matter of inference. But this is simply a petitio principii. It can only be a question of superior generalization, because that is the only ground of evidence. But that is just the question. It assumes that God, nor man, cannot reveal himself so as to enforce belief, which is not true, certainly cannot be assumed, specially when it is the point in question. I know I am. What generalization is that? I know Mill elsewhere tells us that even this is known by his kind of knowledge. But this is making a farce of reason. So he asserts, if an alleged fact be contradictory of a rigorous induction from a completed generalization, it must be disbelieved. Now his complete generalization, agreement and difference and all, is merely inference from observed phenomena, but this assumes that any power beyond observed phenomena is impossible. But this he cannot assume, and if he does, it is merely a petitio principii, and is contrary to truth, and to what he is forced to admit, that ultimate properties must have had a cause, for we have then ascended to the origin of all things; but this must have been antecedent to the laws these properties act by. One could not have a more complete proof of the fallacy of his system than this chapter. So his defense of Hume is simply the same fallacy. Whatever is contrary to a complete induction is incredible: induction from what? This merely says there can be no cause but what we see of fixed laws, which even Mill admits there must be. Nor is it merely (166) that B did not follow A. This assumes only the negative of existing causes or laws. But supposing X comes in, which was not there? He does not even consider the possibility of another power which may act from itself so as that no observed action of A has anything to say to it. It is not to be credited but on evidence which would overturn the law. It has nothing to do with the law, may confirm it. Thus resurrection supposes the law of death, is an action of power not in the sphere of observed sequences. And note here, our question here is not if it be true, but if it be impossible, for which the only ground is the positive assumption that there is no power possible outside observed sequences, which he alleges are no efficient causes at all. If what a human being can see is no more than a set of appearances, either there is no ground of believing anything, and complete induction is a fable, or I may have as good or better evidence of what power extrinsic to observed phenomena and sequences has done. So when he says (167) he cannot admit a proposition as a law of nature, and yet believe a fact in real contradiction to it. Now law of nature is merely existing phenomena, and this is the absurd idea that the ascertained phenomena of nature are the only possible thing that can be, and not a conclusion within nature, but the denial of all action outside it, and that as possible, which is simply nonsense as reasoning, and the more so as he is obliged to admit such action at "the origin of all things." Because such a thing is, as far as we know it, there can be nothing else. There can be no other ground for this but the positive denial without proof that God can act, and affirmation that there is nothing possible but what we have observed; yet the ultimate properties and their cause he confessedly has not accounted for. Nor within the limits of fixed laws, quite another question, is all so certain, though enough for all human purposes in the sphere man is in. Because if ABC produces abc, and BC only be, this does not prove A is the cause of a; it may be a necessary condition of B being the cause. I must have ABC produce abc always, BC not produce a, and A by itself produce a; a concatenation of proof hardly ever to be found. And this supposes I know all possible causes which could produce a, and all to be absent (see 168). The question of miracles is not (167) of any cause defeated, but generally of positive power producing an effect of its own, as health restored, the dead raised, sight given - natural laws remaining just what they were. There are the cases of frustrating the action of poisons, but there is the power of evil defeated, and all power in good operative; the moral character is as strong a part of the evidence as the power, and there is even power to communicate power. I deny that belief of a supernatural being is necessary first in order to believe miracles, because the exercise of a power wholly above nature is the proof of supernatural power; it is, on the face of it, that power. If the dead be raised, that is not a sequence of nature. As to believing oneself capable of judging what the Supreme God ought to do, it is above all things presumptuous in one who has no foundation of morality at all, though Christ’s miracles are the supremacy of all good in power where evil was, of others sometimes judgment in its place. Supreme power and perfect goodness used to lead men to trust God, as leading to a yet higher good when they were in misery, is not unworthy of God. A word giving sight, the lame from birth walking, the dead raised, goodness in power meeting every case in sight of hundreds, is not possibly the case of natural causes. They do not operate so, there is no experience of it, the wish is father to the thought and he admits the facts may be proved. The whole of this argument mocks at reason. And his other ground is the character of duty as they conceive it, in which the conceiver may be judged rather than God. One who can see no beauty in the uniform patient exercise of power in goodness to lead man’s heart to trust it, may find others will know his state more than he is aware of. No one desires to deny that " on the whole " the government of the universe is carried on by general laws. But this is no presumption at all against miracles, 1:e. the intervention of divine power when man is in misery to recall him to God, and give the ground of confidence in goodness in power. With a weak, scarcely benevolent God doing the best He could, and that very bad as Mr. Mill holds, there is no need to believe anything about it. Man, he thinks, is to do better if he can. (It is a disgrace to Oxford to allow such a book.) But he contradicts himself here; practically he admits such acts of power may be satisfactorily certified (168). Now, supposing resurrection from the dead is (and I repeat it is not a question of a counteracting cause defeating an effect, but of power acting when the effect is produced, acting by its own energy), it may set ordinary laws in motion again, as in many cases it did; but did its own work independent of them. There was no counteracting anything generally, and, if the fact be certified, it is no question of probability or improbability. Supposing one rising really from the dead who stank after four days in the grave, what probable sequence of nature is there in that? There is no mental honesty here. And that there is deliverance from death and misery by goodness and power is worthy of God, but not to take man out of his present place of responsibility till full accomplishment be come. He tells us (171) that the law of causation, number, and extension are the only cases of absolute incredibility of any exception; but what does extension apply to but to matter? Consequently there is no such thing as spirit at all. As to number, eternity, I am, is an exception. It is the stupidest limiting of everything to observed matter. The whole class of moral motives in man even, number and extension cannot apply to. What is the number and extension of a mother’s love, a child’s attachment? It is brutish, his system, and if there be a cause for everything-which I believe there is for this creation, and that cause is God-belief in a fact (not exactly contrary to, but) independent of some recognized law of nature, has nothing to do with shaking conviction of the truth of the law (175), as I have said. Resurrection does not make me doubt of death as a law of nature in us now; quite the contrary. As to his throws of dice, I leave them to him and D’Alembert. We have now to come to the great question of motive, human will, and fixed laws. Whatever reasoning may make of it, the responsibility of man remains untouched, because he does act by motives which determine him. But all in Mill is so loose and unanalyzed that it is difficult to deal with. Thus a motive, what is it? Is it a motive when it does not move the will at all? If it has determined the will, then it is mere tautology to say he is governed by motives, for it is only a motive when it does determine or govern it. Yet is there a will when nothing is willed at all? If I will a thing, the determination is made, morally the act is complete. Free to will is quite true as far as compulsion goes, for if it be compelled it is not willed, it is another’s will. Now, in all the flimsy language in which he speaks of antecedents, the difference is plainly this: In fixed laws of nature it is compulsion. Gravity acts, the earth, the moon, follow fixed laws, cannot do anything else. It is compulsion; the movement, centripetal or centrifugal, is imposed. The action itself is a necessary one as far as observed nature goes; it is strictly compulsion both as to the act and as to the acting thing, it having no thought or will or consciousness in the matter. So in all cases of fixed laws. They mean this: but there is another point. In the case of man’s will the motive produces no action. Man’s will or mind is the thing acted on. It is a state of mind, determination by motive. It does no more than be a motive; consequently a man may act or be hindered acting, or defer to act when the will is there, and only when he acts comes the analogy with physical effects. With the previous part, the production of the will, there is no analogy at all. Till the will is determined there is no motive in the mind; there may be reflection of the mind on it, but it has not become a motive to me, has not produced any effect in me. When the man acts, his will is the antecedent cause, by whatever bodily machinery it is carried out. But another point comes in here: an object may attract the desire without determining the will, which may utterly refuse it. It is not an actual motive to the man as to his conduct. All this, which is of the essence of the question of will, is, to say nothing of the conscience controlling it when otherwise the will would be determined, is left out by the superficiality of Mill. Of course he has not in view Divine objects, which take the mind clean out of the whole sphere he moves in, and by grace determine the will. But on his own ground the phenomenal antecedent to effect in man’s conduct is his will; motive produces no act; but, where operative, produces a state of will and no more, or rather is one, which is not a phenomenal effect at all. It is not true that the action of masses is merely individual will. Motives vary from individual to individual, and in any individual from moment to moment may. This is lost in masses which follow a general impulse, or there could not be a mass. But he admits that the causes are so endless and unknown that we cannot predict action, at most tendencies. But this is not invariable sequence or a fixed law at all. Now a general course of corrupt human nature I do not deny; but if I take up individual man, the whole idea is absurd. A man’s recollection of his mother stops him in evil. The Scriptures, a sermon, a thousand things impossible to count on, come in and arrest or form the determination of the mind called will. All he can pretend to is to see the tendency of corrupt human nature without God, which, for my part, I should not deny. If he say this is an antecedent cause, no doubt, only he cannot know of its existence, nor if it exist of its effect; that is, it is no matter of invariable sequence nor of fixed law at all But even here his statements prove only that he cannot do what he pretends to do. He is obliged to do what he condemns in Bacon, only pretending to get up to the principles of human nature and bring in deduction, but forced to admit we have no sure elements to reason from. This brings in another difficulty, that all depends, not on the discovery of a necessary fixed law of force (as gravity or chemical action), which cannot act otherwise, but on my sagacity in estimating motive, which involves my moral state as well as the state of those I reason about. How clearly Christianity is above and outside all this, by a revelation of God, a new nature, and objects wholly outside the world Mill has a feeble and partially benevolent creator who did the best he could out of the materials he had to hand, and we are to mend his work. But then what of necessary effects of causes? This he feels and seeks to shrink from. Now man has got philosophers (not for the first time, however) and " the highest thinkers," we may expect something of this poorly- constructed world. It has been a long while coming to find it out; nor would they, without Christianity, have had even the thought they had. Plato not only did not know God, but taught the most brutish communism, which Aristotle disapproved because, base as trade might be, selfishness was a stronger motive. The world by wisdom knew not God. It pleased God, by the foolishness of preaching, to save them that believe. But these have gone farther: when they knew God as revealed in Christ, they did not like to retain Him in their knowledge. But I will take up a few details. All the statements of Mill are vague, as we have seen; lusts, will, conscience, are all huddled up together. Motives present to an individual’s mind and character, but is it yet really motive till the will is determined by it? then it is inducements which act upon him, and so we could foretell his conduct with as much certainty as we could any physical event. He admits fully afterward we cannot, but only tendencies. In physical nature the physical event may be hindered, but the cause remains absolutely invariable, and this is utterly false as to the influence of motives on a man. You must know not only the man’s character, but the circumstances at the moment, for a moment may wholly change what acts on him. (See 433, 466 § 2, 452, 450, 1, 2, 480, 492, 513, end of 4, 515, 540, 541, etc.) If I knew what acted on a man as an inducement-if it be merely a thought, desire, powerful pressure on his inclinations-I do not yet know how he will act.. I quite understand that Mill would hold that the hindrance to his acting on this is one of the antecedents, but this is not merely character. I may have motives which determine wholly above character, and which subdue my nature. If these be taken in so that the purpose is determined by them, then it is merely saying if I know what has determined the will, I know what has determined the will, as I have said. Now masses, as already said, are masses in virtue of not controlling impulses, but acting on the passions or perhaps wants, pushed to an extreme, so that passions broke out; and here, but really in each case only when all is known, the general result may be better judged of. Conscience is always individual. But this independence of individual character and principle is lost in the infidel and liberal system, as indeed Lecky admits in his history. I deny that the knowledge of circumstances and character would enable us to tell how people would act (422); for motives outside both, and governing a man in spite of both, not counteracting the will but determining it, may be in operation. Of this, of course, Mill has no idea. In physical causes there is nothing to form. Counteraction is another thing, the motive power remains the same. But the slovenly mental habits of Mill are again found here. Our volitions and actions are invariable consequents of our antecedent states of mind. The volition is the state of mind, and may be produced by a motive which is no antecedent state of mind at all, nor even my natural character. It may control it, and never have been in me before; yea, set me free from it. Nor is any foreknowledge the same as divine foreknowledge. God knows what will be and absolutely, and does not reason on tendencies and effects of character and its probable results. When I speak of will, I speak of actual determination of purpose, not of a religious or metaphysical faculty. " There is nothing (423) in causation but invariable, certain, and unconditional sequence." " There are few to whom mere constancy of succession appears a sufficiently stringent bond of union for so peculiar a relation as that of cause and effect." Even if reason repudiates, the imagination retains the feeling of some constraint exercised * by the antecedent over the consequent. (*Given certain institutions and customs, wages, etc., will be determined by certain causes.... but this class of political economists argue that these causes must by an inherent necessity.... determine the shares. (Autob. 244.) Is no constraint exercised here in either view of the case 3 The first is Mill’s.) Now, first he had said he would not consider efficient causes, but only physical or phenomenal causes; here he does consider them, to deny them absolutely. But uniform consequence has nothing to do with cause. It may be a cause with no uniformity, uniformity with no cause (while fully admitting regular order in creation). Day and night we have seen, but so of all seasons, summer, winter, etc., so of the moon’s phases, but of even more important things death uniformly follows life. Is life the cause of death? We must turn Buddhists and seek Nirwana. Sequence deceives; it is merely that a thing comes after in point of time, which in itself proves nothing even if constant. A cause is the why it follows. Now there is force in existence. That is admitted, and force produces effect, movement, etc.; it becomes heat, etc. It is an efficient cause, an agent, uniform or not. It turns to heat where it cannot move, to movement from heat, etc., not uniform, but a power. Electricity knocks a thing down, sets fire to something, melts, kills, or takes away consciousness. If the same as magnetism turns iron north or south, it operates with power not uniformly, strips a strip of bark from a tree from top to bottom, leaving the tree as it was; twists another into small fibers in all its growth. Here I have force in this shape; power operating gives light, makes a clock go. This is not mere uniform sequence, but operative force an efficient cause. But, as I have said, ascending to ultimate properties and " the origin of all things," you have clearly and avowedly no sequence, uniform or other, but operative power a cause. If I only take present order, I may stop at a constant law without seeking the cause, and this is what he professed to do, but does not do, but denies any such; it is not mysterious compulsion as if there was a will, but ordained effect, an effect produced, as he is forced, unconscious of self-contradiction, to say. And necessity it is in this sense, as to matter, that according to its ordered nature it cannot be otherwise. It is compelled by the original orderer so to be. It is its nature without a will. Gravity is always the same, so that I can predict, not a tendency, but a fact. It may be hindered, but not changed while the χόσμος subsists. And if we are to believe Mr. Mill (433), " it needs scarcely be stated that nothing approaching to this can be done" (in the case of mind) (See 424-5 also.) If I can change or conquer my character, can he do this as regards the ordering of the spheres by gravity? His discussion on pleasure, pain, and habit, is empty. " We still continue to desire the action;" but I do not go further into it. In 434 he admits motives in large masses which cannot be so accounted in individuals, again contradicting himself. And I admit, taking the run of masses of men, if sufficiently sagacious, we can judge of the motives which will govern them, though after all very inadequately, from a thousand causes. Still there may be a general estimate of the working of motives in uncontrolled man. Only most do not believe how bad he is when uncontrolled. They are, however, " the lowest kind of empirical laws," and they must "be connected deductively with the laws of nature from which they result." This, then, requires a sure knowledge of the nature of man. And here is a field of inquiry and moral judgment. One believes he is good, another that no good thing dwells in him in the flesh. What is to be done here? Mill, that the world is such a miserable world that an impotent half-benevolent God must have made it out of the materials he had to hand. Only man, being, I suppose, better than he, is to try and perfect it. What are the universal laws of human nature? (435). How ascertained but by the empirical laws observation affords " of the lowest kind," unless we believe in Revelation? Of the mind’s own nature (436) he will keep clear; the laws of mind are for him mental phenomena, but this is empirical. Nature has another meaning than in human nature, which is disposition and motive, here nature properly. Mind, if it means anything, he tells us (436) means that which feels, does not reason or think. Pages 436. and 437 directly contradict each other as to what laws of mind are. In 437 one kind are called laws of body, in contrast with mind; but it is no matter, save to show the slovenly superficiality of Mill. What he calls confusion in 436 he lays down in 437. Nor is sensation really a state of mind. It is the point of mysterious union between mind and body of which the mind takes or may take notice, reflecting. But note further, though body and other states of mind may produce a state of mind, he excludes absolutely all action on the mind by mind or power extrinsic to itself, which is as important as it is absurdly false. It is to make its law like matter, the laws according to which one mental state succeeds another. But suppose a state of mind began by an influence extrinsic to it-the commonest thing possible-for this he has no place, so that all his statement is false as a system. In 441 he is all wrong. When white is there there are no various colors, they have ceased, they are not white; but white is before my eye. The rest I deny and leave. Belief may come from habit of the idea in the mind, but there are other sources as testimony of that, as to which I have no habit. To make moral reprobation consist in association with a disgusting idea is worthy of Mill and disgust. It is curious to see how carefully he excludes testimony; one thing is recognized by the mind as evidence of another thing. (449.) The statement as to old and young has very little or no foundation. The formation of character has of course certain truth in it, but it is not by the laws which form it that the whole of the phenomena are produced. As to the action of circumstances on man, I must know what character is actually formed to judge of that. All this is in the air, besides all special action on man being ignored. So all on to 456 is nothing but his fancies, and groundless too; denying not only higher principles, but natural characteristic differences of race, as of sex too. It is not true (458) that bodily strength tends to make men courageous. It may make men bullies over weakness if not courageous, but all this is excessively superficial and worthless. I admit (459) we must know, as I have stated, the nature of a thing to have a real general proposition. But he cannot deny that all his mental laws are from empirical laws only, for even character is that. See 454, 455, as the result. If they are laws of formation of character, this is clearly empirical. It supposes a character must be formed to judge; but then laws of human nature abstractedly have no place, because a formed character is what I have to discover. The whole system is superficial and arbitrary (see 451, first par.) So 450, "impossibility of establishing any but approximate empirical laws of effects." Laws of matter in their nature we have as gravity; it cannot be otherwise. But when I come to character and circumstances this is not the case, though there may be empirical laws making conduct probable. But this is what he admits is not science at all, and such formation of character must be, 1:e. is no science at all, besides leaving out other deeper principles. Indeed he contradicts himself, for if psychology, 1:e. the nature of man, be the science, then formation of character is not. Yet here psychology is the science studied (461). This formation of character follows, which is by circumstances, and then conies the action in circumstances. As far as this is mere knowledge of human nature or mankind no one would deny it. It excludes all but circumstances and human tendencies as they exist, no action on the soul being admitted. All moral considerations are of course excluded, all basis of moral obligation. " Congenital predispositions " are not, so far (462), to seek, and will never be found when man’s being evil is rejected as a starting-point. It is not a law of man’s nature to lie, but what makes him lie? Selfishness. Hence " lying is nearly universal when certain external circumstances exist universally" (449). But I do not dwell on all this part. The statement (469) that "the actions and passions (of masses) are obedient to the laws of individual human nature " is utterly false. 466 is not true. He always forgets the power of an objective end of action. The law of the individual as to this is selfishness or his own interests; of a society it is the supposed interests of the society, and more or less the individual is sacrificed to it. Nothing can be more utterly futile and empty than all this part of the book. He takes up the principle already laid down, that having empirical general laws, he hypothetically puts great general principles of the nature of mind, laws of mind, thence deduces consequences as to forming character in given circumstances, and so how men will act, only admitting that we can only have tendencies, and never conclude to facts. And what are these few and simplest laws of mind; few but not simple, and running into one another? (489). Memory, imagination, association of ideas. Now I suppose nobody denies these three things; but can anything be more absurd? Where are the passions and objects of man, his affections, and the positive influences exercised upon him? He admits that we must know what they are before a child can speak, the circumstances of ancestors, and what not. He admits our mental states and capacities are modified for a time, or permanently, by everything that happens to us in life; but this is experimental (451); the generalizations which result will be considered as scientific propositions by no one at all familiar with scientific investigation (452). Are the laws of the formation of character susceptible of a satisfactory investigation by the method of experimentation? Evidently not (452). These laws are to be obtained by deducing them from the general laws of mind by supposing any given set of circumstances, and then considering their influence in forming character (457); these laws, or the principal ones, being memory, imagination, and association of ideas-the result to be verified by observation. It being impossible to obtain really accurate propositions respecting the formation of character from observation and experiment alone (456), and so, knowing memory, etc., we possess psychology, the laws of mind, and draw corollaries from them, which is the new science of ethology not yet created. Yet, after all (458), psychology is altogether, or principally, a science of observation and experiment, by which we have read it is impossible to obtain any accurate propositions, consequently we must have the generalization of laws of mind; but they are hypothetical, only in result affirming tendencies. Now remark here, that in true science we have nothing to do with tendencies, but with facts The forces of gravity and laws of motion do not give tendencies, they produce certain resulting facts. They may be counteracted, and that even by the operation of the same laws; but they have nothing to do with tendencies. Hypothesis may come in to get at the law, verified by the ascertained result in facts, and it then ceases to be an hypothesis. It is a principle or law demonstrated by facts. The whole argument is trifling nonsense. Yet the constituent elements of human nature are sufficiently understood to create a science of ethology. Yet the laws are modified by everything in our life, that is as to our mental states and capacities are no laws at all, are matter of observation and experiment, or principally so, that is empirical; and all the science flows from knowing there is memory, imagination, and association of ideas forming character by circumstances we do not know, and then middle principles of how to form being obtained, we, by education, form the character to be desired. And what is that? We perfect the bungling of creation, while we must know what the nurse has done with the baby and act as a despot alone could, and not even he, for he could not manage the nurse, the passions and governing objects being wholly left out of both sciences. Now that there are these three principles in human nature every one knows; that education tends to form character is not denied; that the observation of human nature helps to know how the general mass will act, at least tendencies hypothetically, no one denies; but such a mare’s nest of hypothetical science I never met with. It is again curious to see the effort to set aside belief on testimony by attributing to it associating ideas. Such practical impotency in judging of "the laws of human nature," leaving out passions, objects, selfishness, is hard to conceive any one capable of; but there it is, and a science made of it-one created by Mr. Mill. No doubt it is. If you want to see uncertainty and folly, read 466. Happily there is an impassable limit to the possibility of calculating (the facts or results) beforehand (467); the data being uncertain and varying, only the laws are not. Now that certain principles govern human society as a general rule no one can doubt; but the discovery of the result depends on data so complex we cannot calculate on it. Just so; we are left where we were after the exact science of psychology, ethology, and all-only the last science has not been created yet. Is that the case with the results of the law of gravity? I do not admit that the sequences and coexistences result from the law of the separate elements. So that the effect amounts precisely to the sum of the effects of the circumstances taken singly (488). Men acting in a mass are quite different from the individuals taken singly. Confederacies of men are in a moral state and have a sense of power which takes them out of what controls individuals, and even conscience is necessarily individual. Logical deduction has not to be verified, an hypothetical generalization which is not deduction has (490). It results at best (491) in what is useful for guidance, but insufficient for prediction, and that is an "exact science." But even with respect to tendencies, " it would be an error to suppose we could arrive at any great number of propositions which will be true in all societies without exception." No doubt. "All the propositions are in the strictest sense hypothetical" (493), and cannot be verified of course till it is too late, because there is no constancy or uniformity of data as there is in exact science. Our conclusions are soon deprived of all value by accumulating error (494). So much so that " the more the science of ethology is cultivated, and the better the diversities of individual and national character are understood, the smaller, probably, will the number of propositions become which it will be considered safe to build on as universal principles of human nature." That is encouraging (see again 503). The confessed fact is that, while there are assuredly principles which actuate human nature, the path as to the masses of mankind is so modified by circumstances that we must know the effect of circumstances on human nature, and the practical effect on men, and this is always changing; the " properties are changeable." That is, however. controlled the inquiry may be by the general laws of human nature, yet we have to know, if we can, its circumstantial condition, and how one state of society produces another, and that itself in given circumstances, for violence may come in, and one state not be a simple sequence of another; and of these we cannot judge even empirically: of a few tendencies we may, perhaps, if nothing intervenes,-as increase of wealth, commerce, etc. But one thing is wholly left out here even in the inquiry what is the end society tends to: what is the good and goal to be sought? It will be flippantly said the good of the whole. What is that? Who is the judge of it? I do not attach importance to his discussion on society; but though it is difficult, from his want of precision, to compare what he says, yet I make a few remarks. " The succession of states of the human mind and of human society cannot have a law of its own; it must depend on the psychological and ethological laws, etc. It is conceivable that these might be such as to determine the successive transformation of man and society (512). But I do not think any one will contend that it could have been possible setting out from the principle of human nature to determine a priori the order in which human development would take place " (513). There is an end of hypothesis and deduction from psychological laws. "What we now are and do is in a very small degree the result of the universal circumstances of the human race, or even of our own circumstances acting through the original qualities of our species," there is an end to psychological science, " but mainly of the qualities produced in us by the whole previous history of humanity." This series of action and reaction of man and circumstances could not possibly be computed. All is therefore uncertain and empirical. There is no science from psychological generalization, " while it is an imperative rule never to introduce any generalization from history into the social science unless sufficient grounds can be pointed out for it in human nature." Then he goes on to say what I have quoted, that the result is in a very small degree that of the original qualities of our species. As to progress, which he yet admits may not be improvement (511), it is all a fable. Not that there may not be progress in civilization (not morally); yet is there progress in the Copts, in Assyria, Persia, Turkey, in the barbarian inroads? In mere physical arts and sciences there is in modern Europe, but not even there in fine arts. What is the progressiveness of the human race which is the foundation of philosophizing? Christianity has elevated the standard of conscience, bringing in withal the knowledge and reference to one true God. But outside its influence where is the progress? But in this progress "often... we cannot even show that what did take place was probable a priori, but only that it was possible," and this from psychological laws! And this is an exact science, like the invariable effects of gravity! " Nothing is more probable than that a wrong empirical law will emerge instead of a right one (515); see 523, 524. Here we must know the laws according to which social states generate one another; but (512) the succession of the states of the human mind and of human society cannot have an independent law of its own. It must depend on the psychological and ethological laws. Here little progress can be made in establishing the filiation directly from laws of human nature without having first ascertained the immediate or derivative laws according to which social states generate one another." Only, unhappily, they have no independent ones at all-cannot. The vapid infidelity of 527 I leave. " We have to take into consideration the whole of past time from the first recorded condition of the human race." Recorded where? What was that condition, and in what place? History, moreover, is too broken and interrupted to have a course of progress, whatever " the superior minds" may think of themselves. No doubt they are the men, and wisdom will die with them. See the self-complacency of 530. The intellectual element is the predominant circumstance in determining their progress. Progress in what? I only note it here to recognize the principle. Philosophy and religion are abundantly amenable to general causes (539). But if there had been no Christ, no St. Paul, there would have been no Christianity. His perfect ignorance of the person of Christ objectively, being the all of Christianity, with what it involves, has necessarily made him talk nonsense here. Circumstances may have been prepared for it, but his total ignorance of what Christianity is (or even Judaism) necessarily makes him grossly superficial. As to the general principle of progress, it is (540) only precarious approximate generalizations confined to a small portion of mankind, and there is need of great flexibility in our generalizations. And " who can tell?" etc. See, too, 541, how much" remains inaccessible to us." Unhappily the art of life (523), to which all other arts are subordinated, has still to be created. Rules of conduct (549) are only provisional. Right and wrong he has not an idea of. Morality, prudence, and aesthetics, all has to be created; but (554) the ends to be aimed at must be known, or laws of phenomena are useless. Most true. Some general principle or standard must still be sought (555). The end, however, is conduciveness to the happiness of mankind, or rather of all sentient beings. Has man no higher or better? What is that happiness? On this he is silent, save that present happiness may give way to ideal nobleness; but this in result will be mere happiness existing in the world. Of happiness, divine or heavenly, of course he has no idea. It is, at best, what is under the sun, the days of the life of our vanity. Life now is almost universally puerile and insignificant; it is happiness such as human beings With highly developed faculties can care to have. Moral, spiritual, divine happiness, grace in the heart towards others, is simply absent from his mind. it is a blank. I see nothing in the book but an overweening estimate of himself and his own mind, and the grossest absence of every moral feeling,-a blank, an incapacity for anything higher than reasoning on current facts, which he does superficially; not mare that there is anything beyond, which he does not possess, with only that which always accompanies it: the secret (so not honest) pervading effort to undermine the grounds on which the assurance of it is built in others. It is a petty, superficial, pretentious work, without one tinge of any moral or elevated feeling, but the contrary; a miserable attempt to spin out of a world he holds to be badly created by a feeble God (the only one known) by a creature badly created or grown up by evolution, a system that is to be objectless as causeless, that this creature is to perfect as well as he can without knowing what good is. Impossible to conceive anything more "effoeta The fact is, it is simply positivism borrowed from Comte which knows nothing but what is presented to the senses, with perhaps some inferences, and leaves every moral and divine idea wholly out, and covers absurdities and rejection of what is intuitively known by what is illogical and contradictory too. It is merely the absurdity of positivism; conscience and morality all gone, as is the possibility of a higher power acting influentially on me. I am to seek the good of all. Why so? What motive have I for doing so? What is the good? Am I the judge of it, or are they? And who are they? It is as empty as it is bad. His affinity with another man’s wife he calls his first marriage to her (one of mind and affection, I dare say); and then he married her after her husband’s death, who was a convenient sort of man that let things go on. There was immense moral and mental weakness in the man; he was in a state of despairing melancholy for a long while. Now his logic does not bring out all the results, but it sows the seed in denying causation, and in teaching positivism, on which, with some intellectual principles borrowed from Kant, it is wholly based. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 126: VOL 02 - EXAMINATION OF THE BOOK ENTITLED THE RESTITUTION OF ALL THINGS* ======================================================================== Examination of the Book Entitled the Restitution of All Things* THIS book denies all true sense of what sin is; that men must be born again; and the cross, as Christ bearing our sins. We die as He died; and that is all. And, I judge, there is more\ behind which he says, aping Paul, he cannot utter (p. 75). (*The Second Death and the Restitution of all Things. By Andrew Juices. London: Longmans, Green, and Co. Third Edition.) I should add that guilt is never thought of or recognized, nor Christ’s work as meeting it in any way. The book is written in the form of a letter to a friend. On page 2 he says, "Your difficulty is, How are we, as believers in Scripture, to reconcile its prophetic declarations as to the final restitution of all things with those other statements of the same Scripture which are so often quoted to prove eternal punishment?" There are no such prophetic declarations as to the restitution of all things absolutely. He leaves out, as all such do, the words " which God hath spoken by the mouth of all His holy prophets since the world began" (Acts 3:21), "Repent ye therefore, and be converted, that your sins may be blotted out, so that the times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord, and He shall send Jesus Christ, who before was preached unto you: whom the heavens must receive until the times of the restitution of all things which God hath spoken by the mouth of all His holy prophets since the world began " (Acts 3:20-21). The all things refers solely to those things of which the prophets have spoken. The reading of the passage dissipates the notion based on it by leaving out the end. Again, "Scripture, you say, affirms that our God (whose?) is a Savior full of pity towards the lost, seeking their restoration; so loving that He has given for man His Only Begotten Son, in and by whom the curse shall be overcome, and all the kindreds of the earth be blessed; and yet that some shall go away into everlasting punishment, where their worm dieth not and their fire is not quenched. How is it possible, you ask, to reconcile all this? Are not the statements directly inconsistent?" No. There is nothing to reconcile, no opposition whatever. Suppose He has been rejected-found none to answer? "He that believeth not the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God abideth on him " (John 3:36). Those in hell are not kindreds of the earth. Nature and Providence are said to veil as much as they reveal. " We must confess to some veil or riddle here. It is precisely the same riddle which we find in every other revelation.... Providence surely is a revelation of God; and yet is it not, like Nature, a veil quite as much as a revelation?" Why so? All this is confusion and error. Nature and Providence are under the effects of the fall, and the fruits of sin are there. If these last are in the word, I must cull out what is and what is not. But the word is perfect as Christ was. It is want of intelligence in me-unbelief in me-that hinders my understanding it, not the effect of sin in it. It is quite wrong then to say that " Scripture, as it appears to sense, makes out God to be just as far from what He really is as Nature and Providence seem to make Him." Again, " Even so it is with those other two revelations which, much as they have been gainsaid, the church has received and yet believes in, I mean the flesh of Christ and Holy Scripture." "The church:" what church? He quite treats it all through as some known adequate authority. What he concludes regarding Nature, Providence, and Scripture at page 14 is all false as we have just shown; and the esoteric referred to has been discovered by him! That God was willing, in revealing Himself, to seem inconsistent by giving the law is utter nonsense and confusion. There was no seeming inconsistency, for the law was the just measure of what the child of Adam ought to be, so as to convict him of sin; not the revelation of what God was at all; " If men are in the flesh, God comes to them in flesh," etc: All are in the flesh (not disembodied) when God comes to them. All this section (pages 14, 15) is a denial of the truth where it is not pretty nonsense. "Why have men always heard God first speaking in law before a gospel dawned on them? Why must it be so, or at least why does He allow it? Is it a mistake of His which we must avoid when we attempt to make Him known, etc.?" We may use law to convict of sin; but all up to Christ was a testing of man, not a revealing of God, save promise and prophecy. Then, in the fullness of time, God was revealed in Christ; light shining in darkness, and no man received Him because men were darkness. Then grace wrought to lead to it. The concluding sentence of this paragraph is totally false; for God never revealed Himself till Christ came. "It was needful that He should show Himself under the forms and limitations of that creature in and to whom He sought to reveal Himself, that is, by shadows before light, by law before gospel, by a letter before a quickening spirit-in a word, by the humiliation of His eternal Word stooping to come out of man’s heart and in a human orm." Where? Nowhere in ’Scripture. When he says this " could not be done without Truth " stooping " to come in human form, out of the heart of man, even as Christ came forth from Mary," we ask, Is man’s heart the birthplace of truth, as Mary’s womb of Christ? Man’s heart indeed! And yet he says "this Word is no stranger to me!" Also " knowing that it has many things to say which we cannot bear at first." Who? The disciples before. Pentecost (John 16:12), or the little children whose sins are forgiven, who know the Father, and have an unction from the Holy One and know all things (1 John? At page 19 he begins to consider the question, " What then does Scripture say on this subject? Its testimony appears at first sight contradictory... there are direct statements as to the results of these [law and gospel] which at first sight are apparently irreconcilable." He first states the results as to law and condemnation, and at the close says: " Words could not well be stronger. The difficulty is that all this is but one side of Scripture, which in other places seems to teach a very different doctrine. For instance there are, first, the words of God Himself, repeated again and again by those same apostles whom I have just quoted, that in Abram’s seed all the kindreds of the earth shall be blessed (Genesis 12:3; Genesis 22:18; Acts 3:25; Galatians 3:8); words which St. Peter expounds to mean that there shall be a restitution of all things;’ adding, that God bath spoken of this by the mouth of all his holy prophets since the world began ’" (Acts 3:21). This is utterly false, and a deliberate misquotation of Scripture. It is ἄχρι χρόνων ἀποχαστάσεως πάντων ὡν ἐλαλησεν ὁ Θεός. Then our author quotes more passages, but Paul in Colossians 1:16 leaves out τὰ χαταχθόνια, the "things under the earth" They are neither re-headed, reconciled, nor delivered. This is introduced in Php 2:10, where bowing to Jesus’ name is spoken of. The whole created scene is to be restored, but what is cast out of it is left out. But the deliverance of a groaning creation in Romans 8:1-39 is at the revelation of the sons of God. The liberty of glory the creature will have part in, not the liberty of grace (Romans 8:21). And when he quotes, " through death to destroy him that had the power of death, that is, the devil," it is all right, but not to restore him. When he quotes, " God was in Christ reconciling the world unto Himself," mark was; but the world, instead of being reconciled, hated both Him and His Father, and showed their incorrigible enmity by crucifying Christ. The passage from Romans 5:15, (" If by the offense of one [the] many be dead, much more the grace of God and the gift by grace which is by one man, Jesus Christ, bath abounded unto [the] many,") when quoted as now given, proves the contrary of Mr. Jukes’s doctrine. It is the many connected with the one respectively. "The many" connected with Adam are all his race; " the many" connected with Christ all His race-that is, all believers. The English translation of verse 18, as he gives it, is wholly false. It should be: " So then as (it was) by one offense towards all men for condemnation; so by one righteousness towards all men for justification of life." He says: "To another church he states the same doctrine, that ’ as in Adam all die, even so in Christ shall all be made alive.’" I do not accept the use made of the words. I have no doubt it is all in Adam, and all in Christ, at any rate " the same doctrine." It speaks of the resurrection of the body. The reading of the passage will dissipate his view of 1 Corinthians 15:24-26 : "The last enemy that shall be destroyed is death;" and this is at the resurrection of the wicked, so that no enemy is destroyed after it. He quotes further Ephesians 1:9-10, " That.... He might gather together in one all things in Christ, both which are in heaven and which are in earth, even in Him." But in Php 2:10 there is a third class. And this gathering together is in the millennium, " the fullness of times," when confessedly the wicked are not restored. "That at (or in) the name of Jesus (that is, Savior) every knee should bow," etc. The gloss, " that is, Savior," is wholly unwarranted in the passage noted. Again he quotes, " Who is the Savior of all men" (1 Timothy 4:10). But mark two things: 1st, " Is the Savior;" and, 2d, it is providentially Savior, as the passage plainly proves. Again, "will have all men to be saved." No doubt θέλει, but that is now in the day of salvation (1 Timothy 2:1-15). It is all wholly a present thing. That Christ was a ransom for all, I believe. As to Romans 11:1-36, "that He might have mercy upon all," is, as he quotes it, the merest abuse of words. The Jews are come under mere mercy as Gentiles by rejecting Messiah and the promises. " That the world through Him might be saved " it is too bad in the author to quote for his purpose, for that passage distinguishes believers as alone profiting, and the rest judged. " He is the propitiation.... for the whole world." So He is. "The Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world." So He will. " That He might destroy the works of the devil" So He will; but all this proves nothing at all as to the rejection of rejectors. Destroying the works of the devil rather implies the devil stays where he was, and that as a result " there shall be no more death," etc.; and then without are " the fearful and unbelieving, and the abominable, and murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars," etc., who " shall have their part in the lake that burneth with fire and brimstone: which is the second death" (Revelation 21:8). His quotation for universal salvation of John 6:37-39; John 12:32, is too bad. The first passage spoken of carefully teaches that only those will be saved whom the Father has given Him. Look at verse 36, and indeed the whole chapter. The other passage-" draw all men unto me "-is the present effect of the cross in contrast with a Messiah to the Jews. After giving several sets of passages, with the confusion indicated in the few we have remarked upon, he asks:-" Now is not this apparent contradiction, few finding the way of life, and yet in Christ all made alive? God’s elect a little flock, and yet all the kindreds of the earth blessed in Abraham’s seed? mercy upon all, and yet eternal punishment? the restitution of all things, and yet eternal destruction? the wrath of God forever, and yet all things* reconciled to Him? eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels, and yet the destruction through death, not of the works of the devil only, but of him** that has the power of death-that is, the devil? the second death and the lake which burneth with fire, and yet no more death. or curse, but all things subdued by Christ,*** and God all in all? (*Only all things in heaven and earth, not the things under the earth. - (Php 2:1-30)) (**καταργήσῃ, which is not destruction but annulling his power. The word used as to the works is an entirely different one: λύσῃ.) (***But then all things are not restored.) What can this contradiction mean? Is there any key, and if so, what is it, to this mystery?" The conclusive answer is, There is no " contradiction," no " mystery." The above references are all falsely cited apart from their context. This makes the apparent contradiction. Then he mentions the common answer, "That some are saved and some are lost forever;" that therefore the words, " in Christ shall all be made alive,"* only mean that all who are here in Christ shall be made alive; that the Lamb of God, though willing to be, is not really, the Savior of the world, but only of those who are not of the world, but chosen out of it; that, instead of taking away the sin of the world, He only takes away the sin of those who here believe in Him;** that all things therefore shall not be reconciled to God;*** and that "the restitution of all things," whatever it may mean, does not mean the reconciliation to God of all men. (*"All in Christ" is the real force; and, at any rate, it refers to resurrection.) (**All these passages have only to be read in their connection.) (***We have already seen it is the state of things in creation, while those under the earth (infernal, καταχθνια), mentioned in Philippians, are omitted; and, further, the reconciliation of believers is spoken of as a distinct thing.) This (he says) is the approved teaching of Christendom; this is the orthodox solution of the mystery; the simple objection to which is, that in asserting one side of Scripture it is obliged not only to ignore and deny the other side, but to represent God in a character absolutely opposed to that in which the gospel exhibits Him (pp. 26, 27). The Lamb of God is "the taker-away of the sin" (not sins, a very different thing), true in the new heavens and the new earth. "All things " here are the thing’s spoken of by God through the prophets--hence things on the earth. Mr. Jukes then affirms that " the truth which solves the riddle is to be found in those same Scriptures which seem to raise the difficulty, and lies in the mystery of the will of our ever-blessed God as to the process and stages of redemption. " First, His will by some to bless and save others; by a firstborn seed, the firstborn from the dead’ (Colossians 1:18), to save and bless the later born." This is pure invention. Christ alone and the church are spoken of, in contrast with general restitution of the state of things. His will therefore to work out the redemption of the lost by successive ages or dispensations, or to use the language of St. Paul, ’according to the purpose of the ages "’ (Ephesians 3:11). This, too, is mere imagination. We have only to read the passage to see that there is not one word about it. Nor has the " therefore " any ground, for he is concluding from his own fancy, and not from Scripture. Ephesians 3:11 is speaking solely of the church now. Lastly, His will (thus meeting the nature of our fall) to make death, judgment, and destruction the way to life, acquittal, and salvation; in other words, through death to destroy him that has the power of death, that is, the devil, and to deliver them who through fear of death were all their life-time subject to bondage’ " (Hebrews 2:14). But this is through Christ’s death, and as to sin, ours with Him. All is confusion. We have only to read the passage to see it. The power annulled is not that which dies. The author’s simplicity is rare. He adds: " These truths throw a flood of light on Scripture, and enable us at once to see order and agreement where without this light there seems perplexing inconsistency." " Truths!" They are no truths at all, but false " therefores " from falsely-used passages. His questions a little farther on-"What was the object of the incarnation?.. What was intended to be accomplished by the first and second death? " etc., are all presumptuous folly, not revelation. When he writes, " inquire " what is the breadth and length, and depth and height " of their heavenly Father’s purpose." It is not of this. Of what it is, is not said in Scripture; but it is very certain it is not " the restitution of all things," as Mr. Jukes interprets that phrase. Again, we have a misuse of 1 Timothy 4:10, when he says: " By this light we see more fully God’s purpose in Christ, and how He is the Savior of all men, specially of those that believe;" for it is obvious that it means nothing about the future at all, but that Paul labors and suffers reproach because, as a present thing, God is providentially caring for all, but specially for " those that believe; " as says the Word, " The eyes of the Lord are over the righteous, and His ears are open to their prayers" (1 Peter 3:12). But our author is caught with the mere sound of a passage, regardless of the sense; or uses a mere change of sleight of hand to effect his purpose, as when he says: " While others not partakers of the first resurrection are only brought to God by the resurrection of judgment; that is, by the judgment of the coming age of ages." "That is," etc., is a mere gloss of his; entirely outside of all Scripture. It is very tedious to " look in order at each of these three points," when one has proved they are mere fancies. But it will only show his false use of Scripture. "(1.)First, the purpose of God by the first-fruits or first-born to save the later-born. This, which is in fact the substance of the Gospel, like all God’s secrets, comes out by degrees; scarcely to be discerned in the first promise of the woman’s seed; then in thy seed shall all the kindreds of the earth be blessed;’ for the seed in which all the kindreds of the earth are blessed must be distinct from, and blessed prior to, those nations to whom, according to God’s purpose, in due time it becomes a blessing." All clearly false; unless it be Christ, and then the whole argument fails. As a Scripture the contrary is here-the elder serves the younger; the Gentiles come in before the Jews. But the " seed " is declared to be Christ (Galatians 3:16), not "some " as he has said, " His will by some to bless and save others" (p. 27). The reference to Romans 11:16 will show what is spoken of and what is done. Again, " Christ, says the apostle, is the promised seed (Galatians 3:16) and the first-born (Colossians 1:18), and in and through Him endless blessing shall flow down to the later-born." But this says nothing to his purpose. Believers are the seed in Him: not unbelievers (Galatians 3:1-29) When he says " Christ, as Paul shows, is first-born in a double sense: first-born from above, first out of life," etc., it is all false. Nor is Christ ever called " first-fruits of the creature." When he says, "All things are of God; but it is no less true that all things are by man, as it is written, Since by man Came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead;’ therefore, as by one first-born death came into the world, so by another first-born shall it be forever overthrown," it is not true that all things are by man. Where is it so said? What he says is not " written." The resurrection came by man; it is nowhere said by a firstborn. When he says of Christ, " who by a birth in the flesh has come into our lot," it looks like positive error. When he speaks of its being "ever the first-born from the grave that the law speaks of ’ (where?) and that it is the woman’s, not the man’s first-born, the whole thing is a rhapsody of nonsense. But the only proof he alleges is false; Christ is not called " first-fruits of the creature." All things are not by man; He who makes all becomes a man. Again, "According to the law the first-born had the right, though it might be lost, of being priest and king; that is, of interceding for, and rifling over, their younger brethren." Quite false. They might be offered to God and redeemed, but had no rights as such. It is totally false about being priests. Aaron and his family alone had the right of being priests. In the passages quoted or referred to-Exodus 13:2; Exodus 24:5; Numbers 3:12-13; Numbers 8:16; 1 Chronicles 5:1-2 -there is not a word about the matter! It is all a rhapsody in pages 32-33, spun out of the writer’s own mind, even when quoting Scripture. When he says " God’s purpose is by the first-born from the dead to save and bless the later-born," Scripture says they are quickened by Him. " But the truth goes farther still; for there are others beside. the Lord who are both `first-born’ and Abraham’s seed,’ who must, therefore [why.2] in their measure share this honor with and under Christ, and in whom as joint-heirs with Him’ [God’s heirs?] the promise must be fulfilled that in them* shall all the kindreds of the earth be blessed. (*Paul carefully insists it is only in one, Christ.) As if Christ and his body only should be saved, instead of rejoicing that they are also the appointed means of ’saving others." Saving others! What does that mean? He applies the promise in. Christ to us. It is folly, or it would be blasphemy. Ministers of blessing we may be; but does he mean to say that we, quickened and redeemed, when in glory shall shed our blood for them? Was ever such stuff? Again, the references he relies on and gives on p. 33 are all false; that is, there is nothing about a first-born in them. " Even of the elect few see they are elect to the birthright, not to be blessed only but to be a blessing; as first-born with Christ to share the glory Of kingship and priesthood with Him, not only to rule and intercede for their younger and later-born brethren, but to avenge their blood, to raise up seed to the dead, and in and through Christ, their life and head, to redeem their lost inheritance." It is all utter stuff. "Later-born:" how born? How " avenge their blood?" "Redeem!" What is raising up seed to the dead " to redeem their lost inheritance? " Nobody did this, or had to give it up in the jubilee. Mr. Jukes dwells on "first-fruits," and affirms that the sheaf at Passover, and the other at Pentecost in the form of cakes, were both called first-fruits. "Both in the law are distinctly called first-fruits,’ though they are distinguished by a separate name, the ears at Passover being called Reeshith, the leavened cakes at Pentecost Bicourim." This is inexact; both are called Reeshith, both Bicourim, but Reeshith Bicourim is applied to the sheaf only. Reeshith is put first. But the words give no ground for the alleged analogy. The church or assembly of the first-born calls us simply "first-born." Christ only is called " the first-fruits of them that slept." It applies solely to the resurrection, and only Christ’s are spoken of. " They that are Christ’s." The wicked will be raised; but the passage has to do with resurrection only, and has nothing to do with any general restitution-not even with wicked men. It is " the resurrection of the just." The parties are Christ, the first-fruits of them that slept, and they that are Christ’s at His coming; none else. "The offering of the first-fruits to God being accepted as the sanctification and consecration of the whole coming harvest." What "harvest?" At the " harvest" our Lord refers to (Matthew 13:40) the tares are cast into the fire. Scripture knows of no " harvest" in Mr. Jukes’s sense, or general restoration. " Who share the honor with and under him of being the Pentecost first-fruits." "With" is not said, but " they that are Christ’s." " Who with Christ are through Christ Abraham’s seed? " Galatians 3:1-29 says believers baptized to Christ; those sealed with the Holy Ghost. Nothing he says of Scripture can be trusted; not even when he says in a note-" Saul, whose name means death or hell." It is not so; t and i are not the same. Saul means "demanded." He goes on to say that the conversion of the nations will be accomplished by Israel, " who at their conversion, converted, like Paul, who is their type, not by the knowledge of Christ in humiliation, but by the revelation of His heavenly glory, shall, like Paul, become apostles to the Gentiles, priests to the Lord and ministers to our God’ to all the earth."* This is a mistake. (*The footnote about the seventy Hebrews that went down into Egypt, the seventy heads of nations, and the sending out of the seventy by Christ, is all wrong.) The testimony goes out before to both, and the remnant then own Christ coming in glory. Paul in his conversion is a type of the Jewish remnant, but there is no ground for the exclusion of others; he was one of the pre-trusters. When he says (p. 38), " The church is also Abraham’s seed," it is not so. We are, as Christ’s; not in our church character. He adds: " To the church, therefore, belongs the same promise as first-fruits with Christ." The church is not " first-fruits with Christ." In the first-fruits of the day of Pentecost there was leaven. When he speaks of the church with Christ being a blessing in its own heavenly and spiritual sphere, the statement is without foundation. The leaves of the tree, of which we eat the fruit, are for blessing down here. Full of his own thoughts, he mistakes when he says the church will act as priests; for a priest is for those out of the way to minister to those who are out of the way; for a priest did not minister to any but for accepted blood-washed ones.* (*Hebrews 5:2 does not apply at all, nor does Revelation 1:6 or 5: 10. In Hebrews we are not kings; in Revelation we are not for those out of the way.) "This is the church’s calling... with Him to be both prophet, priest, and king; and this not here only, in these bodies of humiliation, but when changed in His presence to bear His image, and do His works with Him." But we are never said to be prophets then. Priests and kings we are. But Christ Himself must give up the mediatorial kingdom. We reign over the earth, and, as priests, offer up the prayers of the saints (Revelation 5:1-14) At the end the wicked are " without." It is a fable, as it is nowhere written in Scripture, that believers’ "death and resurrection shall only introduce them to fuller and wider service to lost ones, over which the Lord shall set them as His priests and kings, until all things are restored and reconciled to Him." There is not a hint of such a thing in Scripture; it is a stupid romance. " To whom, I ask, shall the church after death be priests?," We answer, In resurrection to those on earth. Not to those " who have departed hence in ignorance," nor "to spirits in prison’ such as those to whom after His death Christ Himself once preached." It is said in Revelation 5:1-14 as kings we reign over the earth; as priests we present the prayers of the saints. We are not to be prophets then. All the rest is yarn-spinning. When Mr. Jukes says, " The words distinctly assert that our Lord went and preached unto the spirits in prison, who once had been disobedient in the days of Noah," we affirm that they certainly do not; that is, it is not said He preached in prison.’ Not only so, but God declares, in Genesis 5:1-32, His Spirit should yet strive but those 120 years. And yet they would tell us that with these only He strove afterward. He speaks as if we comfort the lost where they are, in Gehenna! How they pass the " great gulf fixed " he does not say! (Luke 16:1-31) " I may add here, that this same truth that the first-blessed must save* others is set forth, though in a slightly different form, in the kindred law of redemption touching the firstlings of beasts, whether clean or unclean. (* How?) The lamb redeems the ass. SO it must be." No such thing! the owner redeemed it with a lamb It is well that English is ambiguous. First- blessed may be plural or singular. To say that we are going to save others, because we are joint-heirs, is too monstrous to listen to. It is really awful to read of our joy " to be like Christ-that is, to be channels of blessing to viler, weaker souls-for all higher and elder beings serve the lower and younger. The first-born, therefore, must serve and save others..•. like Christ; channels of blessing and life to thousands of later-born." Is Christ no more than a channel, or do we bless as redeemer? Yet he dares say so. When he speaks of the two leavened cakes being offered up together in " that great coming Pentecost," we ask, Which is that? and surely in glory they will not be leavened cakes’ at all. When he says, " Oh glorious day, when our Lord and Head shall give of His treasure to His First-born, that they may with Him redeem all lands and all brethren!" we say, It is infamous to link them and the Lord in redeeming. " Then shall the laver be multiplied into ten lavers,’ till the water of life become a sea of crystal’ large enough for even Babylon the Great to sink into it, and be found no more at all forever." This is senseless sentiment dissipated into mere air, when we ask, Who were cleansed in the lavers? Only actual priests, already consecrated; being washed! So when we ask, Where is such a sea as he describes into which Babylon could sink? There is no such sea. The " sea of glass" was solid, and there was no sinking into it, and no purifying (Rev. 4: 15, 21.) Were it so, this is the kingdom given up, while " without " are the wicked? Then we have quotation from the Apocrypha, which has nothing to say to the matter either; "Then shall the elect run to and fro as sparks among the stubble." And when he romances about " Christ’s members judging the world with Him, and consuming the evil with that same fire which Christ came to cast into the earth, and with which He is yet pledged to baptize all nations," we ask, Where is He so pledged? The Spirit is not for the world. No doubt the fire is, but it is " everlasting fire!" It is mere assertion that the first-born, though first delivered from the curse, have a relation to the whole creation, which shall be saved in the appointed times by Christ and His body, for there is no Scripture; and to end the sentence with bring about " the restitution of all things," is false quotation, as is also what follows; for Ephesians 1:3-10 has not a word about it, nor has Ephesians 2:4-7. Ephesians 1:3 is falsely connected with verse 10, and this is given up too. " The church, like Christ its Head, is itself a great sacrament," etc. This is all romance and nonsense! So when he says the blessing of the elect is " but the means and pledge, as the apostle says, of wider blessing," it is not true, and the apostle does not say it! The reading of 1 Corinthians 1:27-28 will show that he misuses it for the future when it means the present. And so is it to utterly confound the day of salvation and the day of judgment to say that when He comes in judgment on persons, it is " a priestly work of judgment and purification by fire which must be accomplished that all may be subdued’ and reconciled.’ " All this is before the " fire" save as " the perdition of ungodly men." Then it is clearly not purification. What he says of Moloch is blasphemy, and as applied to us monstrous! " But Scripture never says that these only shall be saved, but rather that in this `seed’ whose portion as the first-born is double, all the kindreds of the earth shall be blessed.’ " This is a shameful abuse of Scripture. Christ is the " Seed," and specifically one, and the blessing is of " the kindreds of the earth; " not of the lost in Gehenna. His reference to the church ordaining " All-Souls’ Day" as well as "All-Saints’ Day," and thus "may have been teaching more than some of her sons may yet have learned from her," and that " she believed that, like her Lord, she is truly linked to all, and with Him is ordained at last to gather all," we ask, Where did she learn it? and to keep days? (Galatians 4:10-11). And to deduce such a conclusion from the unscriptural action of the church can only impose on those who are willing to be deceived by gratuitous assertion. But it were positive wickedness, if it were not absolute nonsense, to say " only by the Cross * can the change be wrought in us which conforms us to Christ and His image-which makes us, like Him, lambs for the slaughter, and as such fitted to bless and serve others." His misapplication of Scripture is very painful. He says, "And, indeed, so narrow is the way and so strait is the gate that leadeth to the life and glory of the first-born, who follow the Lamb whithersoever He goeth," etc., a misapplication of what is wholly unconnected. (*What cross?) (2.) "I pass on to show that God’s purpose by the first-born from the dead to bless the later-born-as it is written, so in Christ shall all be made alive,’ is fulfilled in successive worlds or ages; or, to use the language of St. Paul, according to the purpose of the ages,’ so that the dead are raised not all together, but every man in his own order. Christ the first-fruits, afterward they that are Christ’s at his coming; ’ which latter resurrection, though after Christ’s, is yet called the resurrection from among the dead,’ or the first resurrection." All this about God’s purpose is false. Scripture states no such purpose. If " so in Christ shall all be made alive," be the true translation, which I do not think, it is resurrection. But what does "raised" mean, as applied by Mr. Jukes to " the dead"? Does it not mean restoration in his sense of all? But mark the eras of resurrection as given by St. Paul in 1 Corinthians 15:1-58 (1) Christ the first- fruits; (2) Afterward they that are Christ’s at His coming; (3) Then cometh the end,γέγονε,* when there is a within and a " without " as Revelation 21:8; Revelation 21:27; Revelation 22:14-15, clearly teach. At the " end " the wicked are " without." The dead are not " raised" but to, "judgment; " the result of which is not blessing, saving, and restoration, but to " be cast into the lake of fire" (Revelation 20:11-15). This is the express testimony of Scripture. (*Or as Lach. γεγοναν.) It is vain to reason that, because Christ was raised before the members of His body-also called first fruits-" who will not be all gathered till the (fancied) great Pentecost," that it is plain the purpose of God is wrought not all at once but through successive ages, and that this fact gives us a hint of further mysteries, and some key to " the ages of ages." First- fruits, and the morrow of the Passover Sabbath, or Christ’s resurrection (Leviticus 23:9-22), is all one period. Moreover, it is not said that the saints share Christ’s glory as heirs of God, in subduing all things unto Him. This is nowhere said; nor that " all have been made alive in Him by His resurrection," but only all in Christ, all believers, and Christ gives up the kingdom when the wicked are "without," as we have already pointed out. And there is no Scripture for their being " subdued." It is also false to affirm that there is " nothing in the gospel the figure of which is not in the law, nor anything in the law the substance of which is not found in the gospel," for there was only a shadow, not the image (Hebrews 9:1-28); and the church was " hid in God " (Ephesians 3:9). As to Pentecost and Tabernacles (p. 50) we say, no doubt; but it is now or the age to come. Where is it said that the " mystic periods are all different times for cleansing and blessing men; sevens and seven times seven; the former of which are figures of the ages, the last of the ages of ages in the New Testament?" We ask for proof of this, or where it is so said, and why so? It is mere imagination. When he says of those who could not go free as some did at the sabbatic year, that they might at the year of jubilee " regain what had been lost, and find full deliverance," he ignores, what makes it wholly fallacious, that they were already the rightful heirs, are restored to their own inheritance. What he says of the jubilee is totally false (see Leviticus 25:16), so that the proof is exactly of the contrary. "Not of persons only," it was not of persons at all. To what is Acts 1:7 applied? To what is quite different from that to which our Lord applied it. The Scriptures are everywhere pressed out of their express and obvious meaning in order to have some show of Scripture for the creation of his own fancy. Besides, one grows sick of exposing nonsense like the following: "For the woman is our nature, which if it receive seed- that is, the word of truth-may bring forth a son, that is, the new man.’" Our nature brings forth the new man! "In which case nature, or the mother which brings it forth, is only unclean during the seven days of this first creation." Here again all is false. The old man must die. " And then in the blood of purifying till the end of the forty days, which always figure this dispensation." Always? Genesis 7:1-24 is not the figure of it: Moses in the mount is not: Ezekiel 4:1-17 is not. It is all imagination. "But if, instead of bearing this new man,’ our nature only bear its like, a female child," etc. Bears it through the quickening word! Miserable trifling! "To those too who believe that the church was divinely guided in the order and appointment of the Christian year," etc., the apostle’s word is, "I stand in doubt of you" (Galatians 4:8-20). The statements as to the incarnation are, to say the least, extremely hazarded, and bear the stamp of some of the worst current errors, and the fact is quite false. The new man does not spring out of the weak nature into which the eternal Word is come; if, indeed, there is any sense in the passage. At the end of this purification of women he adds: " There is like teaching in every time and season of the law, and its days and years figure the ages ’ of the New Testament; " but he gives no proof, but expects, I suppose, " that there is some teaching here, though he cannot understand it!" When he refers to such nations as Moab and Ammon being ejected in an earlier age and saved in a later, it is true of them no doubt, but what proof is there that it is a figure of others? And when he adds: "For them also must there be hope in the new creation according to the promise, Behold I make all things new; ’ for Christ, who, being put to death in the flesh, but quickened in Spirit, went in Spirit and preached to the spirits in prison, which sometime were disobedient, when once the long-suffering of God waited in the days of Noah,"* is " Jesus Christ (that is, Anointed Savior)2 the same yesterday, to-day, and forever; " we must remind our readers that it is at the time when He makes all things new,-this part of his statement is not honest - that Scripture tells us that the wicked " shall have their part in the lake of fire " (Revelation 21:8). His allusion to Christ passing over the sea and healing the man possessed with devils fails utterly; for they would not have Him It is a picture of the world’s rejection of Christ when some were healed. It gives no countenance to his notion that Chris " casts out devils also on the other side of the deep waters.** (*The spirit spoken of was in Noah, (see 1 Peter 1:11) " a preacher of righteousness," who " prepared an ark to the saving of his house; by which he condemned the world." God had said: " My Spirit shall not always strive with man; for that he also is flesh; yet his days shall be an hundred and twenty years," (Genesis 6:3). Christ by His Spirit in Noah then preached to the spirits now in prison; and note that the only persons spoken of are those of whom it was said, "My Spirit shall not always strive with man. His days shall be an hundred and twenty years." With these only he is said to strive again.) (**It is not.) " Such is the light which the law and prophets give us as to God’s purpose of salvation through successive ages! " Creation and regeneration are next referred to, and said to " tell no less clearly, though more secretly, the same mystery." " In creation each day has its work to bring back some part of the creature, and one part before another, from emptiness and confusion, to light, and form, and order." This is utterly false; for so it was not creation, but bringing back something; reconciliation rather than creation. When he continues: " These first works act on the rest, for of God’s will this heaven’ is a fellow-worker with God’s Word in all the change which follows, till the whole is very good; we ask, Where is that? His note from Parkhurst, in which he says that "heavens " means the " arrangers," because the heavens have been the great agents in disposing all material things, shows us that Parkhurst had about as much childish fancy as Mr. Jukes. He was a strong Hutchisonian, and held this interpretation. It is all stuff. It is equally false to say, as he does, that the quickening of the body will be in any way effected by our quickened souls. Scripture says (Romans 8:11), ωοποιήσει χαὶ τὰ θνητὰ σώματα ὑμῶν, διὰ τὸ ἐνοιχοῦν αὐτοῦ Πνεῦμα ἐν ὑμῖν. "For our spirit is to our body what the spiritual are to this world " is distinctly false- and the conclusion false. " So surely shall the quickening and manifestation of the sons of God end in saving those earthly souls who are not here quickened." This is not only imagination, but deadly false doctrine. But he is as unhappy in pressing "forever" and "forever and ever," into his service, and telling us that the word is literally " for the age," or " for the ages of ages." ’εις τὸν αἰῶνα does not mean "for the age," nor is αἰώνιος not eternal. 2 Corinthians 4:1-18 What is seen is πρὸς χαιρὸν, what is not seen is αἱῶνιος. It is definitely what is opposed to for a time in its absolute proper sense. "Ages" no one denies. But, when he says that " God’s wisdom was ordained before the ages to our glory," means God’s bringing glory to the fallen creatures, accomplished through successive ages, we reply, Nothing of the kind. It was the mystery Paul preached ordained for our glory, and which he states to be what is now-not in the future (Ephesians 3:10-11). Then he says " We are told distinctly of the ’ purpose of the ages,’ showing that the work of renewal would only be accomplished through successive ages; " it shows nothing of the kind. Paul writes the wisdom of God in the church χατὰ πρόθεσιν τῶν αἰώνων. "By the Son, God made the ages" (Hebrews 1:2) is quite false, even as to translation; and the reason given is also invented and false- that each age was made by what the Word gave of God’s mind. It is " worlds," not " ages," also in Hebrews 11:3. It means in both places the universe. When he quotes "the end of the ages," and that on us " the ends of the ages are met," it does appear strange to say " words which... seem to imply that other ages are approaching their consummation." How so, if it is σνντελεια τῶν αἰώνῳν the "end of the ages "? It is positively the contrary: we are in the συντελεία (the end), though the things are not fulfilled till Christ comes. And when he speaks of God’s showing His grace in the " ages to come," there is no restoration spoken of-but solely and expressly His kindness " towards us." "Now, what is this `purpose of the ages’ which St. Paul speaks of," etc? St. Paul states it expressly to be the church (Ephesians 3:10-11). Our author answers: " The ages are the fulfillment or substance of the `times and seasons’ of the sabbatic year and jubilee under the old law." And we have seen that the Gentiles remained slaves forever (Leviticus 25:46). Again: "They are those times of refreshment from the presence of the Lord, when he shall send Jesus Christ." But that brings in the end. It is strange to read that then cleansing and rest will be gained by those who now are without their rightful inheritance. What made it their rightful inheritance? Is God bound to save the lost? When he affirms that in " the ages," and in no other mystery of the gospel do we find those good things to come, of which the legal times and seasons were the " shadow; " we must say that it is quite differently applied in Hebrews. One has to come as to fulfillment: for this (the church) is not one (p. 59). When he identifies those ages to come with " times and seasons which the Father hath put in his own power," we ask our readers to turn to Acts 1:7, and read the passage. It speaks of restoring the kingdom to Israel, and not of saving those who died impenitent. What he says of the book of Revelation is entirely false. It does not speak of these " ages of ages," but the contrary. It goes through judgment; then says " It is done." There is no opening out of the processes and stages of the great redemption. But when the end comes, all is done (γέγονε); and sinners (as has been already noted) are "without" There is no redemption of those who are judged. Mr. Jukes’s quotations or references are not to be trusted. He says the book of Revelation, more than any other, speaks of the ages, and he refers us to Revelation 1:6; Revelation 1:18; Revelation 4:9-10; Revelation 5:13-14; Revelation 7:12; Revelation 10:6; Revelation 11:15; Revelation 14:11; Revelation 15:7; Revelation 19:3; Revelation 20:10; Revelation 22:5. Look at them; never believe a quotation or reference till you do. Paul does no such thing as speak of " the ends " of some; but absolutely "the ends of the ages," τὰ τέλη τῶν αἰών. When he says Christ’s mediatorial kingdom, which is for ages of ages, is one delivered up, he refers to a passage which only upsets his argument as to ages. The kingdom of the world, of our Lord and Savior,* is come" (Revelation 11:1-19). (*Or, according to the now more received reading, "of our Lord and of His Christ.",) It is one state or dispensation showing the vague general use of ages (p. 61): He says the inspired writers, " when they had in view a greater or more comprehensive age wrote εὶς αἰῶνα αἰῶνων, that is, " to the age of ages." We ask, Where but in Ephesians 3:1-21? " When they intended the longer age’ alone, without regard to its constituent parts, they wrote εἰς αἰῶνα ἀιῶνος= to an aeonial age; ’ this form of expression being a Hebraism exactly equivalent to εἰς αἰῶνα αἰώνων, like liberty of glory’ for glorious liberty’ (Romans 8:21) and body of our vileness’ for our vile body’ (Php 3:21). When they intended the several comprehensive ages’ collectively, they wrote εἰς τοὺς αἰῶνας τῶν αἰὠνων, that is, to the ages of ‘ages.’ Each varying form is used with a distinct purpose and meaning." This is all wrong: αἰῶα αἰὠνων would be only one age so characterized. " Glorious liberty " does not give the sense; it is liberty of glory in contrast with liberty of grace, of which the mere creatures, not even our body, could not partake; and it is "body of humiliation," not "humble body." God lives, εἰς τ. α. τ. α. Does this mean "ages" collectively? The whole scheme of precision is a delusion. Εἰς τὸν αἰῶνα by itself is " forever," " eternal." There is an object in the change, but very often just borrowed, as Hebrews 1:8, from the LXX. le olden vead. His quotations are incorrect, leaving out the articlə which is most commonly inserted. The only place where εἰς τὸν αἱῶνα τοῦ αἰῶνος, is I believe in Hebrews 1:8, and he quotes without the article to make it " an age," which is quoting it falsely in words and sense. εἰς τοὺς αιῶνας τῶν αιῶνων is said of God (Revelation 4:10, and elsewhere), "’who liveth," ε.τ.α.τ.α Does God only live for the comprehensive ages? Is that what the passage means? The saints reign ε.τ.α.τ.α. In Daniel we have (7: 10) εἰς αἰωνα τῶν αιῶνων.In Kaldee, " unto [the] age, and age of ages. What does that mean? There is, according to Mr. Jukes, glory to Christ in the church for certain collective ages viewed as one, but that is all. He compares 1 Corinthians 15:1-58 -Christ giving up the kingdom-and Revelation 11:15. But he forgets that the last enemy which shall be destroyed is death, and Satan is cast into the lake of fire with the beast and false prophet, and they are tormented for ages and ages; but the next thing to the resurrection of the saints is (εἶτα τὸ τέλος) the end. So the rest of the dead lived not again till the thousand years were finished. Then the wicked dead are raised, and Christ gives up the kingdom- the saints having lived and reigned with Christ a thousand years; and when the dead are raised and cast into the lake of fire it is the end, it is γεγονε So that his confounding the ages of ages and the giving up of the kingdom denies plain Scripture. There is one thing singular that Mr. J. never alludes to the commonest and simplest form of expression εἰς τὸυ αἰςνα an expression which, according to him, must mean the age. Now, with " this," it may mean age; but when used abstractedly, it constantly means simply " forever." The fancy that Alpha and Omega seems to imply an end of the peculiar manifestation of Christ as King and Priest, under which special offices revelation shows Him, because there will be an end of lost ones to be saved, is all a delusion (comp. Isaiah 44:6). He thinks it would have been more respectful to the word of God if our translators had been content to give the exact meaning of the words they render " forever," or " forever and ever," but which are simply "for the age," or "for the ages of ages." But I deny it to be the exact sense. (See Revelation 4:10, and other places; and the passage 2 Corinthians 4:1-18) Does Peter (2 Peter 3:1) wish Christ glory " for an age?” It is important to hold them fast on these proofs, that their statements as to it are false. The note on p. 62, as to 2 Peter 3:18, is quite false. Εἰς ἡμέσαν αἰῶνος is not an exact literal translation of the words in Micah 5:2, עולםםיםי, and which in our authorized version are translated "from everlasting." n is not εἰς, not "to," but "from," and "days," not " day." But if they were, what do they mean? The passage is, on the contrary, a proof of the use of aim) for eternity, in contrast with time. "The ages’ therefore, are periods in which God works." "Therefore:" why? His conclusion is drawn without any solid reasoning, as has been shown. The end is next after the first resurrection, as Rev, proves (p. 63). It is totally false to say that " Christ, by whom all things are wrought in the ages, goes back to the glory which He had before the age-times,’ that God may be all in all,’ for the Son Himself is then subject " (1 Corinthians 15:28). Nor does " Jesus Christ" mean Anointed Savior, but Jehovah the Savior, the Anointed, or Christ. To apply Hebrews 13:8 to prove salvation through the ages, translating " forever" for the ages, is very bad. And the Scripture gives another reason for the name, which exactly sets aside this, " for He shall save His people from their sins." Thus Mark 11:14, or Matthew 21:19; John 4:14; John 6:51-58; John 8:35; John 8:51-52; John 10:23; John 11:26. So εἰς τοὺς αἰῶας-Romans 1:25; Romans 9:5; Romans 11:36; Romans 16:27. Now these, and many others, it is absurd to say means ".ages," as if God was to be glorified only for certain ages. So Php 4:20; 2 Timothy 4:18. The same may be said of " It will, I think, too, be found that the adjective founded on this word, whether applied to life,’ punishment," redemption," covenant," times,’ or even God Himself, is always connected with remedial labor, and with the idea of ’ ages ’ as periods in which God is working to meet and correct some awful fall " (64). Romans 16:1-27 shows, with other passages, exactly the contrary. There were aeonial times" in which God was testing man till he rejected Christ. " Now," says the Lord, " is the judgment of this world," and the συνελεία τῶν αἰώνων is come on us. But all is not fulfilled Christ came in the end of the world to offer Himself, and then the things are reported by the gospel preached with the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven, and we wait for them to be brought when Christ is revealed (1 Peter 1:12-13). Of that the prophets spoke. When He gives up that kingdom "it is done." And it is false to say that eternal life is aeonial life: " but the end everlasting life:" "this is life eternal:" and as to God Himself " who liveth forever and ever." There is nothing about the " ages; " and his assertion, "ages during which Jesus Christ is the same, that is, a Savior," is a mistake. The word is unto,είς,* not during: Yesterday, to-day, and forever, εἰς τὀν αἰῶνα. Mr. Jukes’s statement is wholly unfounded. (*In note to page 64, what he affirms is incorrect. In Genesis 21:23 it refers to Abraham’s confidence in the promises. Isaiah 26:4 has nothing to do with the matter. He is the Rock of Ages -abiding ground of confidence. Nor, in- deed, has Isaiah 40:23. "In Exodus 3:15 we read of God’s ’όνομα αἰώνων, that is His name as connected with deliverance." It is nothing of the kind: it is His constant name with Israel. His comment on 2 (or 4: 17, p. 67) is puerilely false. The connection of the word βαρος with αιωνιον shows it plainly. Again, the use of αχαταλυτος with punishment would have no sense, if I should say indestructible judgment or punishment.) Forever does not mean aeonial (65): " The aeonial God," - the God who works through these " ages." Instead of this, it is in contrast with temporal or repeated workings. And so of the rest, "redemption," " Spirit," " fire," or " inheritance," all which in certain texts are called " aeonial." All false! So again: " As the context of Romans 16:1-27 shows God as working through aeonial times." How? There is not the smallest allusion to it. Redemption was by a work done once in the end of the world (σθντελεἰα τῶν αὶώνων), or He must often have suffered (Hebrews 9:1-28) It was the Father our Lord addressed when He said, " This is eternal life, that they might know Thee the only true God." The rest is not there-that this marks the renewed life peculiar to the ages. It astonishes by its rashness to read " ئonial or eternal life therefore is not, as so many think, the living on and on forever and ever," when we read in Scripture that Christ "is the true God and eternal life-that eternal Life which was with the Father. He that hath the Son bath life: he that hath not the Son of God hath not life." When he gives as the Lord’s explanation of the word eternal, a life that has to do with a Savior, and is part of a remedial scheme, we ask where? "2Eonial is simply of the ages" (p. 66). That is the question. "And the ages,’ like the days of creation, as being periods in which God works, witness not only that there is some fall to be remedied, but that God through these days or ages is working to remedy it." Creation proved nothing of the kind: I wholly deny it as a universal proposition. " The adjective aeonial or age-long cannot carry a force or express a duration greater than that of the ages or aeons which it speaks of." If it means it! But the positive use of it in Scripture confutes all this. It is not even said they are partakers of Christ’s endless life: their life is only and always carom, and if, for whatever reason this means endless, then αἰωνια does mean endless duration, for that is the word always used for this life, as it is exactly in the same position for punishment. " By death, and by death only, that He destroys," etc. Whose death? His citation and use of John 12:24 is the grossest misapplication. It is fruit in others, the saving of souls by the death of Christ, as He who gave His life a. ransom for many. He could have had twelve legions of angels. " Advance " of what, and of what character, was it in Christ? (69). Christ has shown us the way, we are told. He has shown us we must take up the cross and follow Him, though to do it till He had dried up the swollen waters of Jordan was impossible. But is that the meaning of Christ’s death bearing fruit? that we have to tread the same path. The elect yield themselves to the same great law of progress; and this he calls salvation, the way they are saved. This a fatal denial of the truth of God and Christ’s glory. As to the passages quoted page 69, "goes from strength to strength" and "from glory to glory," neither of them applies to death or any like change. " Christ has shown us all the way down from" the lowest parts of the earth, "from the virgin’s womb," etc. This is all donner la change saw la parole! "The elect yield themselves to the same great law of progress through death." Then Christ did not go through death for them; they do the same! " Others may think they will be saved in another way than that Christ trod:" to save whom did He die if all save themselves by going through the path Christ trod! All this contains abominable false doctrine, and denial of real Christianity. "Nature and sin must be judged and die." Judged in whom? Scripture says it was condemned when Christ was [a sacrifice] for sin. Mr. Jukes complains of some "seeming to think that Christ died that we should not die, and that their calling is to be delivered from death, instead of by it and out of it; because the meaning of Christ’s cross is not understood but rather perverted, and therefore death is shrunk from instead of being welcomed as the appointed means by which alone we can be delivered from him that has the power of death, who more or less rules us till we are dead, for sin reigns unto death, and only he that is dead is freed from sin; because this, which is indeed the gospel, is not received, or if received in word is not really understood. Even Christians misunderstand what is said of that destruction and judgment which is the only way for delivering fallen creatures from their bondage, and bringing them back in God’s life to His kingdom." First, Christ’s death for us, as guilty, is ignored. Next, that sin in the flesh was condemned in Christ’s death. Next, sin must reign, more or less, till we actually die, and our own dying is the Gospel, not Christ’s dying for us. That we reckon ourselves to be dead in the power of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus, and so are delivered as crucified with Christ; and Christ living in us, is equally ignored. We are delivered by our own death, and sin reigns till we die. Christ has not made the Jordan dry for us, destruction and judgment delivering us by our going through them ourselves. I may add freed, though we are made free then, 8: 2, 3, is not the true word in the passage cited, it is justified. This is very bad. Whose "destruction and judgment"? That we reckon ourselves dead to sin because Christ died is true. But if we examine Scripture and compare the contexts, we shall find the whole scheme, giving the clue to all the judgments of Him who killeth and maketh alive, Mr. Jukes’s fancy, and confuted by the connecting of the passages with the Lord’s coming and reign, and " Then cometh the end." But it is a doctrine worse than mere fancy. He adds: " As this is a point of all-importance, lying at the very root of the cross of Christ and of His members, and giving a clue to all the judgments of Him who killeth and maketh alive,’ I would. show, not the fact and truth only, that for fallen creatures the way of life is and must be through death, but also the reason for it," not that Christ died for our sins and to sin on the Cross, and we reckon ourselves dead to sin as well as justified, but the cross of Christ and ours. Now, if we weigh this linking " the cross of Christ and of His members," he shows that he has no thought of the atonement-guilt is ignored; but as He died thus, they die and so live. This he says is "the root of the cross of Christ." He then goes on to say why this is. The cross is not a fact only, but power-God’s power and God’s wisdom, to set heart and mind free! Scripture says He was crucified in weakness, but liveth by the power of God; and it is not said that the cross is God’s wisdom and power, but that Christ is. He ascribes peace, propitiation, forgiveness, to the cross, of which Mr. J. says nothing. What Mr. J. says it does not. Finally, we do not actually die. We have not to die to sin, but to reckon ourselves dead, then to mortify, and carry about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus. Death is ours, and gain. The whole system is unscriptural and false. "For both to head and heart life is a terrible riddle, which neither Greek nor Jew, the head and heart of old humanity, could ever fully solve.... To both God’s answer was the cross of Christ, which gave to each, to head and heart, what each was longing for: power to the one to escape from that which had tied and bound it, for by death with Christ we are freed from the bondage of corruption, and from all that hinders the heart’s best aspirations; wisdom to the other to see why we must die, or what is the reason of all present suffering." Is this all that the cross is? Is there no thought of guilt which is met by it? No craving of the conscience of convicted sinners? The very reading of such a quotation will deliver the simple that know what the cross is. The way to life is not for fallen man through judgment, or he is condemned (page 72). His teaching of the cross is only dying with Christ, of which Scripture always says as to believers they have died, not that as He died so we die-as the same path of life. There is no dying for us in his perfect cross. Here are his texts-Matthew 16:25; Galatians 2:20; Romans 6:3-4; 2 Timothy 2:11-12; Romans 8:12-13. This is significant; atonement there is none. " Why is the way of life for us through the cross?" Whose? He says that the way man got away from God must be retraced, if by grace we come back to Him. But Scripture says No: it is " by a new and living way " (p. 73). He says "... poisoned and destroyed the divine life in man’s soul." What divine life? Equal nonsense is talked about Eden being the paradise called by Paul the third heaven. Did Paul go back to Eden? " It was by death to God we fell out of God’s world" (p. 74). We did not fall out of God’s world. Man was a guilty transgressor and driven out by God. Though we reckon ourselves dead to sin by Christ’s death (Romans 6:1-23.), all our author says is hollow. What " spiritual world " are our souls living in? All is vague and loose. " Christ died this double death for us, not only to sin,’ but also to the elements of the world’ And to be free we also must die with Him to both." I repeat Scripture says we have died; and was He in nature and in the world of darkness? On p. 75 all is nonsense about. quickening God’s life again in man. " As the life of hell was quickened by a lie, so the life of God is quickened by the truth." What is that? " Even by the Word of God, who came where man was to raise up God’s life in man, in and by which, through a death to sin and to this world, man might be freed perfectly." " In Christ the work has been accomplished." What work? He adds-" In Him by God’s word and Spirit God’s life has been again raised up in man," etc. God’s life was not in man at all. There is the life, a new one, when man has received Christ, and he reckons himself dead as crucified with Christ; but for all that, all that Mr. Jukes says is false, as " God’s life " and living in the heavenly paradise are spoken of as to Adam. The note to p. 75 is also a mistake. He says, " Not without a deep and wondrous reason is בשר both goodness and flesh in Hebrew." It is nothing of the kind. Besorah is good news, from Basar, to bring good news. Basar is flesh. If he applies it to Christ, as it would seem he does, it is yet worse. What does he mean by " again raised up in man in Christ "? In Him was life. He was eternal life come down. There are things concealed here which, as he says, " it is not lawful for a man to utter ": he is concealing thoughts he dares not state. "Come basic out of darkness." Is that of Christ? What work " in Christ " does he mean on p. 76? " Die to that which keeps him far from God." Was that so of Christ? There is the most absurd misapplication of passages of Scripture, using them in a sense they do not bear: " Kills to make alive," " turneth man to destruction, that He may say, Return, ye children of men." This is God’s judgment to bring about the death to that which keeps man far from God! Satan’s double lie was that God grudges and is untrue, and that by self-will man may be as God, and God’s two methods, law and gospel, meet this state of things. " By the one God’s life is quickened in man;" What is that again? It is not a new one then, ἄνωθεν;by the other, through present or future judgment, " the hellish and earthly life is slain and overcome." I ask: What judgment? for if saints were crucified with Christ, and no longer live, they have not to die, but to reckon themselves dead. " Is man as God? The law settles this." It does not; it settles that he is not as man ought to be. " The law "... " to be abolished": this he quotes as if Scripture, but Scripture does not say "to be " but " is abolished" (Hebrews 10:9; 2 Corinthians 3:13). "He taketh away the first." His use of Scripture is not to be trusted; his whole book is built up out of a misuse of it. His reference to promise to Abraham not being disannulled by the intervention of law to prove that, though men are judged, condemned, and sent to hell for their sins, the judgment thus endured " cannot disannul the previous covenant," is a specimen of this absurdity (p. 78). And law is not judgment but death and condemnation (2 Corinthians 3:1-18). " But this killing is to make alive." There is no such thought or expression in Scripture. Where is it so written? His theory requires such a passage, and there is none, and yet this for him is the whole point; for he is going to make damnation do it. " Judgment therefore (?) must end in blessing." Why? " God our Father judges to save." Scripture tells us (the Lord Himself says), " The Father judgeth no man." It is a name of grace and relationship; and Christ the Son, to whom judgment is committed, does not judge to save. The Father judges in chastising His children here (1 Peter 1:17). Christ died to save. Mr. J. says: " He only saves by judging what is evil." Is that true, as fully judging it in the persons guilty, and if by that means, what did Christ do for them? " The evil must be over’ thrown; and through death God destroys him that had the power of death." Whose death? The devil’s? For in Mr. J.’s system it is the death of him in whom the power of the evil is. This is utter perversion. " A new creation, which is only brought in through death, is God’s remedy for that which through a fall is held in death and bondage" (p. 79). This is totally false, confounding two distinct truths; Ephesians and Romans. A new creation is not brought in through death, or it is not a new creation. When we were dead in sins, says Ephesians. Romans teaches us to reckon ourselves dead to sin because Christ has died. When he says we die more quickly to sin through the burdens and infirmities of " this vile body," than those will who reject God’s judgment here, and meet it in a more awful form in the resurrection of judgment, it is all totally false, both as affirmed of us and them; for Scripture nowhere teaches that believers die to sin, in their own proper persons: Christ died to sin because He had none. " Such is the reason for salvation by the cross." Is it that Christ had to be saved through dying? Or whose death or cross does he speak of? If we are dead to sin by Christ’s cross, all his system denies the truth. Whose is he speaking of? And note how guilt and bearing sins are left out. " But the great illustration, here as elsewhere, is to be found in the law, that appointed shadow of good things,’ which in all its varied forms of sacrifices asserts the same great truth, that only by the fire of God and through death can the earthly creature be changed, and so ascend to God" (p. 80). But these sacrifices were the substituted death of a victim for others. How can this apply to those who have rejected salvation, and for whom the Scriptures tell us there is no more sacrifice for sins? Hence for Mr. J. it is personally dying to sin, which Scripture never speaks of, -save as to Christ; carefully the contrary. As to the sacrifices showing that the creature cannot be changed through death, were they not types of Christ, and therefore spotless? Had He to be changed? What he says of the sacrifices is all wrong as to fact. Only very rare ones were burned; most were eaten. The fat only of some was burnt: as a whole the sacrifice did not " perish in its first form to rise in another as pillars of smoke before God. "If then all this was the pattern of things in the heavens,’ we have another witness that a transformation wrought by fire is yet being carried on in the true heavens, that is, the spiritual world." There is no such witness. They prefigured Christ, and no one else. There is no question of " our nature not being spared any more than the animal was not spared by the priest." Mr. J. tells us that " no divine change can be wrought even on God’s elect, save by passing through the waters and through the fires." They are born with a wholly new life. He says:-The Lord "fulfilled the types of suffering, so will He fulfill the same in the bodies of those who are His members." How so? we ask. Are they to do that same work which Christ did? Or what was He doing in dying? anything as to Himself? All he says on p. 81 of the uniting power of fire and of fires for the elect is idle and false. And his use of Scripture, as of casting fire into the earth, and salting with fire being the baptism of the Holy Ghost, and fire which Christ desired to be kindled, mingles the most opposite thoughts together, so as to make falsehood and error of all. What is united?; Bathing with fire is not baptizing with the Holy Ghost and with fire. The baptism with the Holy Ghost took place on the day of Pentecost. Fire is always judgment. Christ does not say He desired the fire to be kindled. His theory is salvation by chastening; and a denial of divine life given, and atonement for sin. But chastening is another matter. There must be life and relationship for that. And reconciliation is not transmutation of our nature "by the fire of God into partakers of Christ’s flesh and blood." And what is "partakers of Christ’s flesh and blood?" Is there no new life? " In and through Christ we have received this transmutation; and through His Spirit, which is fire, is this same change accomplished in us." Same change with what? Says Scripture, " Through whom now we have received the reconciliation," and χαταλλαγὴ (Romans 5:11) is not " transmutation," but an entirely different thought and thing. And the footnote to page 82 completes the absurdity, where, founding his remark on a false reading of the Hebrew,* he affirms-" His purpose to the creature is through destruction to perfect it, and by fire to make it a bride to the Lord." (*p. 82. His note about Hebrew words is not true. The reason why the first two mean also perfection is because it is complete or finish. What he says of אִשׇה is not true. אֵשֺה is fire, once Keth Jeremiah 6:29אֶשׇהאִשׇׁה. is from אשׁ.) How unlike His purpose as expressed in God’s word Ephesians 5:1-33! " The Christ has loved the church, and delivered Himself up for it, in order that He might sanctify it, purifying it by the washing of water [not fire] by the word, that He might present it to Himself a glorious church, having no spot or wrinkle or any such thing; but that it might be holy and blameless." "And as with, the first-fruits, so with the harvest." (" This same change!") Was Christ really changed? " The world to be saved must some day know the same baptism." Will it be saved? For " the Lord," Mr. Jukes adds, " will come by fire," and " by fire and by His sword will He plead with all flesh, and the slain of the Lord shall be many." It is also mere trifling with words to affirm, as he does, " The promised baptism of the Spirit must be judgment, for the Spirit cannot be poured on men without consuming his flesh to quicken a better life." But the Spirit is given only when we believe. As to " consuming his flesh to quicken a better life," whence is the life thus quickened, and what is quickening a life? Is it a life already there in embryo? Besides, Christ says, the world " cannot receive " the Holy Ghost. Where in Scripture do we read that God’s " warfare and wrath... works both righteousness and life?" On page 84, while he rejects the Annihilationist doctrine, " that those who abuse their day of grace will be utterly annihilated," he asserts that God’s plan is, with regard to man, " out of, and through the fall, to raise him to higher and more secure blessedness, as it is written, As in Adam all die, so in Christ shall all be made alive;’ not all at once, but through successive ages, and according to an appointed order, in which the last, even as the first, shall be restored by the elect," etc. Read the passage " as in Adam," etc., and see of what and of whom it speaks. There is not a word of all this in Scripture, but the contrary (as we have shown already). It is the same blasphemous nonsense I have already spoken of in which he makes us save others as Christ did. As to 1 Corinthians 15:1-58, it is altogether about the righteous dead. Page. 85, the answer Mr. Jukes gives to What is conversion? is all false. It is not at all, as he says, " a change involving a death unto sin," etc. He has purposely made it vague or false. Where do the condemned get their new life, and when? " There is but one way to bring seed out of the earth... Nothing is done without the waters and the fires." But the life is already in the seed, to be quickened and eventually ripened. " Conversion is only wrought through condemnation." All is fundamentally false here. Instead of conversion being through condemnation, condemnation of self is through conversion. "The law condemns and slays us, not to annihilate, but to bring forth a better life." How? Law did not, and could not, give or bring forth a better life. To confound (page 86) my spiritual judgment of sin and self with God’s judgment of guilty sinners, is stupid and senseless. The way in which Christ’s passing through death, which he calls the baptism which awaits Him, and a baptism of the same kind for us, so that we may say, too, " How am I straitened till it be accomplished," is as unscriptural as it is shocking, and disgraceful trifling with Scripture. We are baptized to His death, and we have only to read Acts 2:1-47 to see that his appropriation of baptism for the remission of sins is the grossest abuse of words to suit his purpose. Christians are baptized to Christ’s death, have died and have received the Holy Ghost. " And that therefore, and to the same end, those not so baptized here must know the last judgment." Who says this is to be to " the same end"? It is the folly of confounding dying to sin and God’s final judgment. " Judgment which is to meet the greater hardness and impenitence of the reprobate." Miserable I Not an idea of Christ and of a new life, nor of peace through grace! " It is, therefore, simply because God is what He is, that He is, through love, and because He is love, the curse and destruction of the impenitent" (page 87). Was it love, we ask, that Christ experienced on the cross when He was made a curse for us? He was made sin for us that we might be the righteousness of God in Him All this and bearing sins is wholly left out; and also wrath revealed from heaven. Christ went by the cross, and so got the blessing, and so must we; and so must the wicked for themselves! No, one denies chastisement, but we are chastened that we should not be condemned with the world. Paul does not tell the church to deliver to Satan. " Souls are taught not to blaspheme by being delivered to Satan;" why withhold "for the destruction of the flesh"? " What does this not teach us as to God’s purpose towards those whom He also delivers to Satan and disciplines by evil, since they will not learn by good." He does no such thing. Satan is there then himself! In page 88, " for man’s form bears God’s image " is never said in Scripture. 1 Corinthians 11:7 is man contrasted with woman. The rest is utter nonsense. In the judgment of the great white throne, Revelation 20:1-15, there is not the smallest intimation of salvation or recovery. The judged go into the lake of fire, the second death. And in quoting Revelation 21:5-8, why does he leave out γέγονε-is done? The becoming is over. "What does He say here but that all things shall be made new?" It is contrast with the former state of things, and all is finished, γέγονε, and the wicked, in contrast with overcomers, are in the lake of fire. But He does not say so, but " I make." He says their " part " is there. The accomplishment of the earthly promise to Abraham is past, and the promise does not refer to that time when γέγονε by his own showing is there (p. 90)* (*A. L. Newton.-She never thought a right thought on this subject. The curse did not involve the blessing. The Second Man, not the first, was to overcome.) As to Paul’s two passages, "wished himself accursed for them," and have " hope," not fear, " that there should be a resurrection of the dead," etc. The first has no connection with the subject. He had loved them as Moses, who had said, " Blot me, I pray thee, out of the book which Thou hast written." Then he also says that the saints are said to have died to sin, " that is, the dark spirit world;" we ask, Where is this said? * As to the second, he expresses his convictions and hope of resurrection, adding, as part of it, this important fact, "both of the just and of the unjust." The rest are within the limits of that dark and fiery world, the life of which, p. 91, is the life of their spirit-a strange idea, whose value is to show that he feeds on German notions, which can identify clairvoyance and animal magnetism with the life of Christ in man as man, owning withal his fall.** (*It is borrowed from the Germans, I think from Lange, who is as wild as he is full of error.) (**See Lange’s Life of Christ.) They get out of the dark world by the second death! " Even if we have not light to see this, ought not the present to teach us something as to God’s future ways; for is He not the same yesterday, to-day, and forever "? Why " forever" here, when elsewhere only "for the ages"? " We know that in inflicting present death His purpose is through death [whose?] to destroy him that has the power of death, that is, the devil." Not at all. Christ became a man to do it. This is totally false, and it confounds, as elsewhere, Christ’s dying for us and the person’s getting free through his own death. Our reckoning ourselves dead to sin with Christ is, for him, the same thing as the judgment of sinners by God in wrath! " How can we conclude from this that in inflicting the second death’ the unchanging God will act on a principle entirely different from that which now actuates Him?" On whom would the second death in order to save be inflicted? On Christ? It must be so to have any show of truth, for that it was in the first case. Or shall the greater foe (the second death) still triumph, while the less, the first death, is surely overcome "? Satan, the great foe, does not, but is judged and in the lake of fire. Being judged is not " triumph." The resurrection of the wicked is the destruction of death, " the last enemy." Who has taught us to limit the meaning of the words, " Death is swallowed up in victory?" Scripture: Then shall come to pass that which is written. It is at the resurrection of the just (1 Corinthians 15:1-58) " Is God’s will to save all men?" (1 Timothy 2:4). The word used for " will " in Greek does not mean purpose. " His appointed means for our deliverance" is not our death, as he speaks of it, but Christ’s. The last sentence of page 92 is filled with dishonest quotations, for the passages which he cannot but know refer to the Lord’s coming are dishonestly applied to another time. Why not add, " of which the prophets have spoken " to " the restitution of all things," and thus honestly declare that it refers to this earth? " He shall save His people" is the scriptural application of the name of Jesus, his last reference. As to freeing bondsmen and debtors, as a type it proves the contrary. Only Israelites were set free (p. 93); as to the heathen the bondage was forever. It is therefore the contrary to what Mr. J. says, " Fallen still are his children." They are not. Scripture says, we are the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus (Galatians 3:1-29) Where there is no faith, there the person is not a child of God. " A larger mercy from our Father in heaven." Whose Father? All this on p. 94 denies sin and guilt, judgment and righteousness. And judging sin is not being overcome of evil. And the whole of his closing remarks are without one word of sins, guilt, responsibility, or righteous judgment! His whole system is a mere dream of his own imagination, outside of Scripture and against its plainest teaching. His view of Job, too, is wholly wrong; but I do not pursue the question here. His " testimony of Scripture " we have now examined, and next come to his examination of " popular objections." " POPULAR OBJECTIONS."-It is said that this doctrine is opposed to the voice of the church, to reason, and above all to holy Scripture. " For the rest, if the church speak with God, woe to those who disobey her." What is the church? Who set her to teach? And where is her teaching? " Where then, I ask, and when, has the Catholic church ever authoritatively condemned this view of restitution?" Who set her to do it? What council had any warrant? The church teaches, not. " It (the doctrine of endless torments) can never be classed under Quod serape; quod ubique, quod ab omnibus." Nor can anything else. All that he says of the Fathers east or west I leave. What matters it who held it or who did not? Is it in Scripture? is the question. Mr. Jukes appeals to this, and asks, " What does this prove if the doctrine is really taught in Scripture?" Nothing, assuredly. If it was from the beginning, it would. But what he says immediately after is unfounded. " Many things have been hid in Scripture for ages. Paul speaks of the revelation of the mystery which had been hid from ages and generations, some part at least of which, though hidden, had been spoken by the mouth of all God’s holy prophets since the world began." Utterly unfounded, or Paul was all wrong. This is ignorance, but I fear I must say willful ignorance. " But when have God’s people as a body ever seen or received any truth beyond their dispensation?" Only Mr. Jukes, then, we are to believe. The ways of Israel are not examples to us. The things happened to them for ensamples (p. 98). The doctrine of the union in one body is never spoken of The call of the Gentiles is expressly spoken of in the Scripture, which Paul uses. It is a false suggestion of Scripture’s silence where it speaks plainly. That is, Scripture spoke plainly, and Paul used it. It was absolutely silent on another point, and it required a positive revelation to declare it. Both were the word of God. God’s unerring word is final. " But when I see the church’s blindness," etc. (p. 99). Where is the church’s teaching now? " For if the flesh that bore Christ was not ours, His incarnation does not profit us." I thought there was something at bottom as to this. I quite think " that the church’s judgment cannot decide a point like this, if that judgment be in opposition to the word of God." But the church is a mere deception - where is it? For Mr. Jukes, the papal system "is its widest branch." And who gave her authority to teach? God teaches finally as to doctrine in the holy Scriptures. The church has nothing whatever tο do with even the teaching of the truth. It is not hers to teach, but to be taught. What is truth is all in the Scriptures. But it is natural, with what he makes of the church, to flatter it (p. 100). " Transubstantiation is a mistake built on Christ’s very words, and the doctrine of endless torments is a like misunderstanding." Poor work is this! Did He wish His disciples to believe that lie held Himself in His hands when He took the bread, as indeed Augustine says we must, in a manner, believe, and when He was not crucified? But the words were used when He was alive in the body, so that the disciples could not have mistaken Him. So much the more when we think of His saying " My blood," and even, " This cup is the new covenant." They could not have misunderstood Him then; no more could any now who were not willfully ignorant. The words which declare everlasting punishment are, if possible, plainer still. Then, on pp. 101-2, he takes up the objection that " this doctrine militates against the atonement, for if men shall at length be saved, God became man to redeem from that which is equally remedied without it." But how " saved?" According to Mr. Jukes they are saved by their own suffering and death. Atonement in its Scripture sense is everywhere left out; and guilt too. Salvation is only the change of a nature by dying. His teaching as to the fall and its consequences is not scriptural. God drove out the man. Guilt and judgment are ignored. Here, too, we have this German semi-infidelity: " In this fall God pitied man and sent His Son, in whom is life, to be a man in the place where man was shut up, there to raise up again God’s life in man, to bear man’s curse, and then through death [whose?] to bring man back in God’s life to God’s right hand," etc. Was He in the distance, away from God, dead in sins, raising up God’s life in man in His own person? Or did He go into man’s place and suffer death as made sin, bruised for our iniquities? " Obtain the life by which these shall rise." Not so. They do not rise by that life. They are raised. Of what was Christ the first-fruits? Of those that are Christ’s. "But how does it follow hence (from this doctrine) that those who are not first- fruits, if saved at all, are saved without Christ’s redemption?" God’s word could quicken and deliver us out of the horrible pit, that we might be first-fruits of His creatures; why should we say He cannot bring back others out of death though they miss the glory of being first-fruits?" Redemption by bearing sins in death and forgiveness are wholly ignored 1 Mr. Jukes uses the Bible terms in another sense than they mean in Scripture: even hell is used in another sense (p. 103). " The other part of the objection that none believe in redemption who do not believe in hell, is true:" but this is donner la change. Hell is used in another sense from the objector’s. So going to hell is not delivery to Satan-he is in it himself. It was prepared for him. The second objection, "It is further argued that, if grace does not, judgment cannot, save man. How can damnation perfect those whom salvation has not helped? Can hell do more for us than heaven? The answer to this lies simply in what has been said above as to the reason why the way of life for us must be through judgment... judgment therefore to show us that what we are is as needful as grace," etc. Then we must all go to hell, and that by judgment. But life- giving and judgment are contrasted, and those who have life do not come into judgment (zpian). "If we want further examples, Nebuchadnezzar shows us how judgment does for man what goodness cannot. The remedy is to make him a beast." This begs the whole question, in making the chastening of the living the same as the final judgment of the adversaries of God. Besides chastening itself does not change the heart unless grace work. " Let the nature of the fall be seen, and the reason why we are only saved through judgment is at once manifest." This is utterly false to say "only," and the whole question remains, by whose stripes we are healed, how peace was made. So the statement, "The first-fruits from Christ to us are proofs that by death, and this alone, our salvation is perfected," raises the question-By whose death, Christ’s in atonement, or our’s in judgment? That this is his meaning appears from his saying, " unbelievers who will not die with Christ are lost because they are not judged here." But suppose that " by the ministry of death and condemnation in another world the work of judgment to salvation were accomplished," what puts away their sins? For unbelievers die in them, and there is no more sacrifice. He has perfected that work, and He came to do it once. The 9th and 10th of Hebrews are urgent on this point. It was in the end of the world He appeared, once, to put away sin. He dies no more. Mr. Jukes makes our death and condemnation here what saves us, and so of the lost afterward. (3.) "But it is further objected that this doctrine gives up God’s justice; for if all are saved there will be no difference between St. Peter and Nero, virgins and harlots, saints and sinners." The objection, if so made, and the answer ignore Christ’s atoning death. His error is not that he saves the condemned without redemption; he denies all redemption as Scripture states it, though the word atonement may be thrown in to blind people. Christ’s own case he is afraid to utter (see p. 75). It is absurd, he alleges, to say, " God’s justice is given up because He saves by judgment." But do we get what our sins deserve from justice? We do not come into judgment. He says " the elect being first quickened by the word, and then judging themselves in this world, or being judged by a death to sin are freed from Satan." Even death to sin was Christ’s (Romans 6:1-23) We reckon ourselves dead, and if all are freed by our own dying, what, then, did Christ ’do for them? But Mr. Jukes goes farther. " What Scripture teaches is that man is saved through death... that others not so dying (as the elect) to sin remain in the life and therefore under the curse and power of the dark world, and are therefore delivered to Satan* to be punished, to know, since they will not believe, their fall and their need of God’s salvation. (*This, as we have seen, is a gross perversion of the words of Scripture.) But all this simply asserts the justice of God."... This is dreadfully bad, and sets aside Christ’s work altogether, save as the first dier! It is, in fact, a purgatory which does the whole work. As to " no distinction," he asks, " Is there no distinction between reigning with Christ, and being cast out and shut up in hell with Satan"? But then that is all; and in the long run one is saved as much as another, only in another world, having rejected Christ. Receiving a wholly new life and guilt are both ignored in Mr. Jukes’s notions. He falsely uses and indeed translates the 9: of Romans. And it is merely slurring over the real question to talk of an outwardly pure and blameless life needing the blood of the cross. (4) The fourth objection he answers is from analogy-that, as many creatures in this world fail to attain their proper end and perfection, so thousands of our race may miss their true end, and be forever cast away. This is mere reasoning with which I do not meddle. Assertion may be met by counter-assertion; but where Scripture is claimed for anything, it needs to be examined. But when he says:-" Why not go further, and argue that death, and not life, must be the final ruler of the universe?" It is so through sin of this present world. Nor does he deny it, but declares apparent death is only a change of form, the change being a witness of present imperfection but not of eternal bondage in that form, nor of destruction or annihilation when that form perishes. He insists on change, and that analogy shows that what appears worthless or destroyed may contain what is precious. But all this remains the same nature. But Christianity depends essentially on our receiving a new life, ἄνὠθεν, not a mere change, which in mere nature may take place (pp. 108-9). We know there is nothing precious. " I know that in me, that is in my flesh, dwelleth no good thing." And " he that believeth not the Son shall not see life." (5)"The greatest difficulty of all is that which meets us from the existence of present evil." " Was He not infinitely wise, and holy, and powerful, when the earth was without form and void? Why, then, should this state ever have been changed by Him till all was very good?" Here creation is ignored, and whatever judgment brought it into the ruined state. No recognition of sin bringing in the misery and evil of the present state. Then, on p. 3 he speaks of the " Day of Judgment, and the promised Times of Restitution." Judgment is not restoration, and there are no promised times of restitution of the wicked, as he makes it. It is positively false, and not in Scripture; and it is equally false, as he means it, that the Father will go on working till all things are made new, and everything is very good. When God makes all things new, He leaves the wicked " without," and " everything very good " is never said but at creation. As to Romans 8:20-21, he has quoted it falsely in saying " through Him." It is on account of him who has subjected [it] διὰ τόν. It was not the creature’s own will, but on account of another; and Adam, not God, is the " him" referred to. And " the creature unto the liberty of glory of God’s children," has nothing to do with restoring the wicked spiritually, for which Mr. J. falsely uses it; and the deliverance of the creature is when the children are glorified and judgment is on their adversaries. Evil subserving some good purpose, otherwise God would never have permitted it, or, say, " I form peace, and I create evil," just shows the false use he makes of Scripture. He does not create moral evil: it is temporal evil as contrasted with peace-not with good. Again, " Prophecy announces a day when there shall be no more curse or death, but all things made new. In this witness we may rest, spite of the fact and mystery of present evil." This is before the final judgment; a settled fallacy that runs through the book. "No curse" is the millennial state (Revelation 22:3); " all things new" after it, and then the wicked are without, outside the scene where there is no more crying, pain, or death (Revelation 21:1-8). " Curse" is not spoken of as no longer the question. In Revelation 21:1-4 are new heavens and new earth, and in 5-8. These passages prove just the contrary of what Mr. Jukes affirms. (6.) He says truly, " What saith the Scripture?" is the only question on this subject. Mr. J. speaks of sin creating an antagonistic world. Sin creates nothing. It is always enmity. It is judged; this is not equal power. " Willed" is falsely used; and will in this passage is not purpose. " And all this (antagonistic world) in opposition to the word of God, which says that God’s Son ’ was manifested that He might destroy the works of the devil,’ who, if the so-called orthodox views be right, will succeed in destroying some of the works of the Son of God forever." So the Son of God does. He destroys the works of the devil. The judgment of Satan is not Satan’s work, nor that of wicked men. He has morally destroyed them already. On p. 115 he tells what his reason concludes, as to those being punished for their sins with everlasting punishment. He gives no Scripture for it, but exculpates the sinner as much as possible, speaks of weakness, the tempter, strong passions, conscience not helping him, failing to avail himself of mercy. The Lord says " They have both seen and hated both Me and My Father; " and Paul, of the least enlightened, "that they are without excuse." There is no true sense of sin; no power of the word of God in the conscience. " I cannot say my reason would conclude on his ground," and this is the root of all these reasonings. " Once God’s child," he says. Only in nature and at the outset, as His created offspring, and that is exactly what makes it eternal misery. " Even nature teaches... to act more generously." That is " nature " is to judge God, instead of having a sense of sin deserving judgment! As one said, " God condemned men for eating an apple." The truth is, man gave up God for an apple, believing Satan, not God! Mr. Jukes represents man only as unfortunate, like a child who has hurt itself, and God as indulgent. But God is a holy and righteous judge, which is all left out (p. 116), for death and hell are only to save-not judgment of sin or exclusion of evil; his statements are a mere expression of natural human kindness, as it may be found in an animal, and a totally false representation of both God and man; nature’s reasoning, but not the Holy Ghost’s. A child falling or hurting itself is all his thought of man’s sin, and human pity for man’s misery is all his idea of God. All this is nothing but the absence of the just sense of guilt. Have we deserved to be forsaken of God? or why was Christ? He thanks God we have revelation. Thank God we have, but he adds, " That word declares man’s final restitution." Not so; it does the contrary-. It says, " Hath never forgiveness," and Revelation 21:1-27, as already quoted. God seeks the lost till He find them is the grace of the present time; and the elder brother did not go in, and did not get in. (3.) " But it is said," he says, "certain texts of Holy Scripture are directly opposed to the doctrine of universal restitution. We have already seen that, taken in the letter, text clashes with text on this subject." I do not admit it. To say that all those texts which speak of " destruction " and " judgment " have been explained by what has been said by him above as to the way of our salvation, is simply lying against the truth. What he says (p. 117) of Romans 2:12 -that it is the state of all by nature -is utterly false. It is expressly said, in the day when God shall judge the secrets of men’s hearts. It is very bad thus to pervert God’s word. Again, 2 Corinthians 4:3 refers to those who are being lost in contrast to being saved-,ἀπολλύμενοι-σωξοένοι those to whom the gospel is hid when preached, not their mere common natural state. In all the quoted texts, it is so. In Luke 15:1-32; Luke 19:1-48. it is ἀπολωλὸς. Or ὡς. There is actual state, so that the force of the passages against his argument is very strong. " For the Good Shepherd must go after that which is lost until He find it." Where is this said? It is according to him God’s duty, and the point of the parable is that it is His sheep. Page 118, " By faith Isaac," etc., is a temporal prophecy. When he affirms (p. 119) that " there is scarcely a doctrine of our faith which, at first sight, does not seem to clash more or less with some other plain Scripture," we reply, only when man’s mind is at work. After much more human reasoning, he speaks of a superior intelligence overruling all, according to a scheme of perfect love; a statement never made in Scripture, which tells of judgment of sin, not of overruling in result. But when perfect love was manifested, for His love Christ had hatred: " They have both seen and hated both Me and My Father." The texts chiefly relied on as teaching the doctrine of everlasting punishment are then looked at by Mr. Jukes. The first is what is said of the blasphemy against the Holy Ghost: " shall not be forgiven neither in this world nor in that which is to come" (Matthew 12:32; Mark 2: 29; Luke 12:10). Of these he says that, so far from teaching that sin not never be forgiven, can never be forgiven, they teach the opposite: " first, all sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven unto men; secondly, that some sins can be forgiven as against the Son of man in this age; and thirdly, that other sins against the Holy Ghost cannot be forgiven either here or in the coming age, which last words imply that some sins, not here forgiven, may be forgiven in the corning age, the sin or blasphemy against the Holy Ghost not being of this number. This is what the text asserts." As to what he says in the note (p. 120), the words, two ages being specified, prove that the passage could have only an absolute sense. But the whole statement is all a blunder. This age is before Messiah, " the coming one " when He is revealed; but two only are admitted in the passage. It is Olam, ha ze and Olam ha vo. Certainly in Messiah’s age there was forgiveness larger than under the law. What does he mean by saying, " Man cannot reject or speak against the Spirit until the Spirit comes to act upon him?" There is no question of rejecting the Spirit. They blasphemed in saying Christ cast out devils by Beelzebub. The Spirit did not act on them but by Christ. In Stephen’s case (Acts 7:1-60) it did act on the Jews; the conscience reached with the will unchanged led to his stoning by them. "To reject this last (the Spirit) cuts man off from the light and life of the coming world." His whole statement as to the Spirit convincing the heart, and then being rejected, is false. "This sin, therefore, is not forgiven, neither in this age nor in the coming one. But the text says nothing of those ages to come, elsewhere revealed to us; much less does it assert that the punishment of sin not here forgiven is never-ending." It says it is not forgiven under the Messiah-hath never forgiveness, οὑχ ἕχει ἄφεσιω εὶς τὸω αὶῶναshall not be forgiven unto men absolutely. This age and the coming being mentioned, the words show the absolute force of εἰς τὸν With two ages specified, it could have no sense but as absolute. As to the ages to come, all is unfounded and hypothetical, In Ephesians 3:1-21, it is expressly " His kindness towards us "-not others, that we read of. It is all fancy and false on p. 122 about the mystic seventy weeks. One is amazed at the utter absurdity. Daniel’s prophecy of "the seventy weeks" is quite clear, and so is what it refers to, ending with the Lord’s coming, and applying to Jerusalem. There is nothing about a jubilee. "I believe in the forgiveness of sins even to the end, as long as God is a Savior." And when He is a judge? Are to be sentenced and to be forgiven the same thing? (2.) A second text, " The wrath of God abideth on him." His plea is that it says that " Man, so long as he is in unbelief, cannot see life," "but an unbeliever, though while he is such God’s wrath abides upon him, may pass by faith out of the wrath to life and blessedness." It is not a question of nature, but that, when in the state of sin and ruin by nature, and. Christ presented to them in grace, they rejected Him and grace; then they should not see life. Christ does not say cannot, but " shall not see life," etc. Nor does it say so long as he is in unbelief. It is a broad statement that he who does not believe "shall not see life," and the Son is referred to as having all in His hands. The wrath of God (for there is wrath) abides on him (John 3:36). " If it were not so, all would be lost," he says. This is a proof that all is false. It is totally untrue that, if this text bears the meaning we affirm it does, an unbeliever could not have any hope of life or deliverance, for it puts the turning-point on faith, and he that does not believe shall not see life (compare 1 John 5:12). The text is as plain as possible. Some do believe; some do not. If not, they shall not see life, but the wrath of God abideth on them. Another text: " Where their worm dieth not, and the fire is not quenched" (Mark 9:42-50). "For every one shall be salted with fire," etc. That is, all shall be judged-the saints, that they may not be condemned with the world-the rest by final judgment; but salt, separation from evil, belonged to sacrifices thus given to God. "And every sacrifice must be salted with salt." Those who were consecrated to God, whose life was an offering to Him, should not lack the power of holy grace which binds the soul to God, and inwardly preserves it from evil. Mr. Jukes’ explanation of it from the law really shows nothing but a total want of spiritual understanding. Making the meat-offering duty to one’s neighbor, when it was a sacrifice by fire to God, and Christ’s leavenless person shows a mind away from all truth.* (*The footnote about the sacrifices is incorrect; the fat was consumed on the altar; and only when the blood went into the sanctuary, was the body burned without the camp, otherwise it was eaten by the priest.) Page 126 is all wrong from beginning to end in every point. The bodies of the sin-offering were not burnt as unclean; nor, generally, were they burnt at all. Only very particular ones referring to the people or the high priest were. Those parts which were not burnt were eaten. What does he mean by " worm," alluding to the consumption of those parts? They were eaten. On p. 127 we have a continuance of the same absurdity. It would seem the altar was hell; and yet he says the sin-offerings were burnt outside! It is all conflicting nonsense. The fire never being quenched* " typifying the preservation of that spiritual fire, which it is Christ’s work as priest to kindle and keep alive." (*It is no more " quenched " than "go out," save in one place, perhaps "let go out " would be the truest. But " not go out ". is quite right.) That is in hell! The passages he quotes just state that nothing should intervene to stop or arrest, the judgment; the fire would not be put out. The words "the fire never shall be quenched" have the same sense in Mark as in all the rest-that nothing shall avert or suspend the judgment of God. It was not chastening but final judgment. In Isaiah it refers to the valley of the son of Hinnom, hence Gehenna, where the fire was kept up continually to consume the filth of Jerusalem, and the carcases of the rebellious remained a constant spectacle. Was the burning of the sin-offering without the camp a fire never quenched? (p. 128). Was ever greater nonsense? (4.)All that he says about everlasting, as not being never- ending in Matthew 25:46, proves that he has nothing to say. Nor does the word translated "punishment" ever mean in the New Testament a corrective discipline, as he alleges. It is only twice used; and the verb twice (p. 129). If the bliss of the righteous be eternal, so must the punishment of the wicked. If Scripture be examined, there remains no question as to the word χόλασις, that it is judicial torment, or torment, where the verb is used-never correcting. The other place where the word is used is 1 John 4:18 -the verb in Acts 4:21; 2 Peter 2:9, in neither of which is there any other thought than "punishment." (5.)Another text: " Good were it for that man if he had not been born." As to what was said to our first parents, it was only what came on earth. If Judas’ fall end in the restoration of the fallen one to more secure blessedness, then it would have been good for him to have been born-the highest witness of grace. What he says, " It is surely significant that one and the same awful prophecy is by the inspired writers of the New Testament applied to Judas and Israel," is not the case. Psalms 69:1-36 and Psalms 109:1-31 are both quoted in Acts 1:16, but the part of the prophecy used in Romans is not that quoted in Acts. That Israel came under the same judgment as Judas in this world is quite true; but this has nothing whatever to do with what the Lord says of him. This is a mere come off. The words, "Let his habitation be desolate," are founded on Psalms 69:1-36, and Israel never will be restored as they stood on the old covenant. They are cursed as the fig-tree was, never to bear any fruit. What is said of Judas is absolute-good not to have been born. And to say that Luke 19:42 is in substance the old man and the new is tampering with the Lord’s words. Is that what the Lord means? Page 134 is too gross perversion of the Lord’s words. Good * not to have been born, means better through this very wickedness! (*Footnote, p. 134.-He says it is καλὸν, not ἀγαθὸν, that the καλὸν may be missed, while the’ αγαθὸν may be by grace obtainable. Αγαθὸν would have no sense.) " For all that rose in Adam falls in Christ, even as all that fell in Adam rose again in Christ." Where is this in Scripture? The quotation of Psalms 37:35-36, is an absurd use of it. " I sought him, but he could not be found." That is, he rose again, and was blessed 1 His interpretation of the Rich man and Lazarus is all wrong. It shows a change of dispensation, and the introduction of eternal and unseen things, as to which Christ withdraws the veil, in contrast with earthly things; and to say that the gulf was impassable for man, but that Christ might pass, is trifling with the word of God. Abraham says, " they that wish cannot pass," but this only means they can pass in another way not named. Dives did not so understand it; that is, the Lord who makes him say, " I pray thee," etc. " It is no use," says Abraham; "if the word will not do it, a man going from the dead won’t." Yet we are to believe it can be done after all, and saying that because man cannot make himself good, it does not follow God cannot. He does not change the flesh, but gives a new life, and the unbeliever shall not see life. He next takes up the objection (p. 140) that it is opposed to the obvious sense of Scripture, and Scripture being written for simple and unlettered men, the simplest sense must be the true one. There is no such testimony in Scripture as that all death shall be done away; it is never said of the second death, which is the whole point. On this point Scripture contains no " apparent contradictions." He quotes Romans 5:14-21, and then asks what is the obvious meaning of these words: " Can a partial salvation exhaust the fullness of the blessing which St. Paul declares so unequivocally?" Certainly. It is carefully stated to be " the many" connected with the obedient One. " Why, then, not receive the teaching in its plain and obvious sense?" This is just what we have to do; only one verse in our English version is utterly mistranslated: " Therefore, as by one offense toward all men to condemnation, even so by one righteousness toward all men to justification of life" (Romans 5:18). This is what has happened for justification of life, and so reigning in life which he admits they lose. " The many," not " all," are constituted righteous. This passage, instead of teaching Mr. Jukes’ doctrine, carefully teaches the opposite. All connected with Adam have sin, condemnation, and death, and are lost; all connected with Christ have righteousness, justification, and life, and are saved. Surely we need the Spirit to understand the revelation; but it is not Scripture, that the death we see, and this only, is the way to fuller blessed life: we shall not all die. He takes up this objection next: "If you indulge the hope of the final restoration of all men, why not lost spirits also? Why should not the judgment of angels be their restoration?" "Why," he asks, " if He died for all, that by His death He might destroy that evil nature, and deliver them?" Through all this he drops atonement, and only looks for change, for which he absurdly quotes Hebrews 1:11-12. I answer, the thought sets aside Christ’s work. He did not take up angels at all; He did not take up their cause. The flesh is never changed. Mr. Jukes says, after giving more than two pages to it, " I confess I cannot see that God would be dishonored by such a conclusion of the great mystery." And on his principles the restoration of devils is necessary; and then we have this rhapsody: " When I see that man contains all worlds, and is indeed the hieroglyphic of the universe,... but hell and heaven, and the life of each in him!"* (*This is pretty exactly Swedenborgianism.) How is the life of heaven in him? "Ye are of your father, the devil," said our Lord. " Lucifer and Adam, the two first great offenders, the one in his male, the other in his female property 1" Simple truth is worth a good deal of this kind of trash. That "the hellish life can be transformed," he says. It never is. All these interpretations and answers to objections only show that scriptural proof is against him, and his answers are the best proof that he is wrong. As to the case of Jonah, p. 148, grace individually, without promise, has nothing to do with natural judgments. 4. " CONCLUDING REMARKS."-" Then cometh the end" settles the question as to receiving truth beyond our dispensation; it is error we reject-not truth. " It is humbling to proud spirits that all their pride and rebellion must be overthrown." Are they saved, not being born again? "For teachers to learn is to unlearn!" No doubt ye are the men 1 " We are saved by hope," not by fear (p. 150), is an entire abuse of the words of Scripture perverted by what he adds. We are saved ἐν ἕλπίδι, not we are saved διὰ. "I rather believe that, if the exactness of final retribution were understood, if men saw that so long as they continue in sin they must be under judgment, and that only by death to sin are they delivered, they could not pervert the gospel as they now do, nor abuse that preaching of the cross, which is indeed salvation." As to "exactness of final retribution," we ask, exact to what measure? And his statement leaves out the gospel, or rather sets it aside. " God consigns," he says, all but a few to endless misery (p. 150). They are enmity against God, and have rejected His love; both seen and hated both Him and His Father. " Can such a doctrine be true? If it be, let men declare it always, and in every place " (p. 153). So they do, and it is a powerful means of conversion. " If we think Him hard, we become hard." Does he think he deserves to be shut out from God? " The Gospels," he says, " show that God is love," and that as manifested in Christ. But when Jesus came, how was He received? " Wherefore when I came, was there no man?" He came in the fullness of grace, reconciling; but they drove Him out of the world; they killed the Prince of Life, and preferred a murderer! " Because we were in the flesh, He came in the flesh." He expatiates on his grace coming " to bear our burden, break our bonds, and bring us back in and with Himself to God’s right hand forever,"* but never one word of His bearing our sins. (*This is quite unscriptural.) " How He did it, with what pity, truth, patience, tenderness, and care, no eye but God’s yet sees fully." But what effect had all this? Christ’s own testimony is, "Now they have both seen and hated both Me and My Father." Of what he says, p. 156, " Will the coming glory change all this? "-seeks the lost. The reply is,-Christ as a judge is different from Christ as a Savior in what He is to others, in what He is doing in bearing sins, and judging men for them. The grace manifested did not change men, nor does it now without quickening grace. And " Behold, now is the accepted time. Behold, now is the day of salvation." When judgment comes on men, it is not the time of saving them, (See Hebrews 6:1-20; Hebrews 10:1-39). Christ cannot then die for their sins; it is too late. And who says that " with Christ in heaven believers will look upon the torments of the lost in hell?" (p. 157.) It is not true that those who know the love of God are indifferent to the case of the lost. Known love acts as love; but there is no great need if all are to be saved at any rate. But Christ, through an unwearying love when on earth, did not win men to God. For His love He had hatred. All this denies the need of being born again. It is wretchedly false to say, " With their views they can only judge the evil." This is not true-they can serve in grace. " They do not believe it (evil) can be overcome by good." Nor can it. " Salvation through the cross-that is, through dissolution, above all in the face of Jesus Christ,* tells out the great truth that solves the great riddle, and shows why man must suffer while he is in sin, that through such suffering and death he may be brought back in Christ to God, and be remade in His likeness." (*This again is a gross perversion of Scripture. It is the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ then, when He is in glory.) I pray the reader to mark this passage; it shows clearly what Mr. Jukes’ system is, and propounds a gospel wholly different from and subversive of the gospel of God. It is through a man’s suffering while he is in sin he is brought back in Christ to God. Christ’s dying for our sins, His atoning work, is left out, as is our receiving a new life in Him. All that constitutes the gospel and truth of God as our salvation by grace, and God’s gilt of eternal life in Him; and we are saved by our own suffering death while we are in sin. Nothing can be worse. " The cravings abroad," of which Mr. J. speaks, are not "the work of God’s Spirit," but of man’s restless mind, and those which the Spirit of God does produce cannot be met by Mr. Jukes’ speculations, which contradict the word of God. On the page (159) where he says, " I conclude as I began. The question is, What saith the Scripture?" He misuses and misapplies Scripture, as he has done from the beginning. He says " the question is, in fact, whether God is for us or against us; and whether, being for us, He is stronger than our enemies? " This is set aside by asking, Of whom is Paul speaking-believers or unbelievers? All this is heedless of truth. "POSTSCRIPT."-The extract from William Law (pp. 161-168) denies what is said of God in Scripture: " Vengeance is mine, I will recompense, saith the. Lord." There is not one word either in Jukes or Law of guilt,, bearing sins, forgiveness, justification by faith, or of the blessed Lord Jesus’ work for us. A work in us both speak of in the same way. "APPENDIX," Note A," attempts to give the Scripture use of the words " death" and " destruction," in order to combat annihilationism. This deadly and anti-scriptural doctrine, which upsets atonement, repentance, and responsibility, I repel more absolutely than Mr. Jukes; but this is not the place to go into the question. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 127: VOL 02 - EXAMINATION OF THE BOOK ENTITLED THE RESTITUTION OF ALL THINGS*: NOTES ======================================================================== Examination of the Book Entitled the Restitution of All Things*: Notes " NOTE B."-Extracts from the fathers. Where do you find Christianity in them? I never did, and it is denied in some of these extracts. None except Diognetus, and perhaps Irenaeus, were sound on the divinity of Christ. The believer can receive only what was from the beginning, that is, what is in the Word of God. "He that is of God heareth us." The abuse of Scripture in Mr. Jukes’s book is flagrant. The remarks from page to page in what precedes will show this. NOTE.-The preceding examination of Mr. Jukes’s book consists simply of marginal notes made on the pages of it in course of reading it. The writer had no thought of publishing them in doing so. But as it was thought that the publication of them might show what is palmed now on the public mind for enlightened religious teaching, and received by unsuspecting readers and hearers, not accustomed to search into the trustworthiness or adequate ground for what they read or hear, they have been linked together and published. Canon Farrar’s Sermons in Westminster Abbey and Mr. Samuel Cox’s Salvator /1fundi-both evidently, the latter admittedly, inspired by Mr. Jukes’s book-show that such an exposure of the book was needed. Popular religious leaders must in this day be unsound in the faith, the rush towards religious infidelity has become so rapid. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 128: VOL 02 - FIRST BORN OF EVERY CREATURE ======================================================================== First Born of Every Creature The πρωτότοχος clearly holds a special place in the revelation of God’s counsels. He takes it as man, He takes it as Son, but he takes it as having created all. All things have been created ἐν αὐτῷ as a fact. It is His creation, but also διὰ looked at as the actual instrument of God’s counsels; the object also, all is Εἰς αὐτόν. But there is sovereign grace, He is also πρωτίτοχος amongst many brethren. So the πρςτίτοχος is introduced into the world, and the angels worship Him. But then all the fullness of the Godhead dwells in Him, and we are complete πεπλήρωμενοι in Him, and now continually all things subsist in Him. Hebrews 1:1-14, though the same general truth; is more a personal Messiah, and so manifestation. God has spoken ἐν υἱῷ. He is the express image of His substance. Indeed in Colossians we have the εὶχών of the invisible God in the πρωτότοχος. And all this is in a man. It is a wonderful thing; and the place among men holds the first place, as in Proverbs 8:1-36 The church as the body is another line of thought though closely connected. In John it is more the Son in and with the Father, and we in Him, more personal, and relationship though it is " in," with the Father it is ἐξ1 Corinthians 8:6. So Romans 11:36ἐξ,διὰ,εἰς. Hebrews 1:10, δἰ ὁν, and δἰ ου. But this is another thought. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 129: VOL 02 - GOD MANIFEST IN THE FLESH ======================================================================== God Manifest in the Flesh Throughout St. John’s Gospel we may perceive that a sense of the glory of His person is ever present to the mind of Christ. Whether we follow Him from scene to scene of His public ministry (chap. 1.-12.), through His parting words with His elect (chap. 13.-17.), in the path of His closing sorrows - (chap. 18.- 19.), or in resurrection (chap. 20.- 21.), this is so. This full personal glory that belongs to Him is declared at the very beginning of this Gospel (chap. 1:1), and there recognized by the church, conscious, as she is, that she had discerned it (chap. 1: 14). But, as I have just said, it is always present to His own mind. He is in the place where covenant arrangements put Him, and He is doing those services which care for the manifestation of the Father’s glory laid on Him; but still He takes knowledge of Himself in the fullness of the Godhead glory that belonged to Him, essentially and intrinsically His. (See 2: 21; 3: 13; 4: 14; 5: 23; 6: 46, 62; 7: 37; 8: 58; 9: 38; 10: 30,38; 11: 11, 25; 12: 45; 14: 15; 16: 15; 18: 6; 19: 30; 20: 22.) The Spirit in the saint, after this manner, glorifies Him still. The saint may recognize Him in the place of covenant subjection, or think of Him in His sorrows and sufferings, but (like Himself in the days of His flesh) never loses the sense of that personal glory which is essentially and intrinsically His. Christ’s own way when He was here, and the saint’s present experience, are thus in perfect concord. And when we look a little at the epistles, we shall find something still in harmony-I mean in this particular. The Spirit in the apostles does not meet an injurious treatment of the person of Christ in the same style that He does a wrong, dealing with the truth of the gospel. And this difference in style is very significant. For instance, in the Epistle to the Galatians, where the simplicity of the gospel is vindicated, there is a pleading and a yearning in the midst of earnest and urgent reasonings. So there are measures and methods recommended (such as charging, rebuking, stopping the mouth, 1 Timothy 1:1-20 and Titus 1:1-16), and not a summary process and outlawry at once, when Judaizing corruptions are dealt with. But when the person of the Son of God is the thing in hand, when His glory is to be asserted, there is nothing of all this. The style is different. All is peremptory. " They went from us, because they were not of us." " Receive him not into your house." " Whosoever transgresseth and abideth not in the doctrine of Christ hath not God."* (*The eating of herbs only, and the observing of days, if fully interpreted, are customs which depreciate the gospel, or affect the full beauty of the truth. But such things are to be borne with (Romans 14:1-23) But our souls have the full sense of this, that depreciation of the person of the Son would not receive a decree in its favor after this manner.) The Spirit, as I may say, holds the decree most sacred, and guards it as with instinctive jealousy, " that all should honor the Son, even as they honor the Father." (John 5:23.) All this about His full divine glory is precious in the thoughts of His people. We are, however, led to look at man in Him also, and through a succession of conditions we see in Him man presented to God with infinite though varied delight and satisfaction. I have, long since, traced Him in the following way, as man in all perfectness:- Born.-The material, so to speak, moral and physical, is presented in Jesus as the born one. He was a taintless sheaf of the human harvest. Man in Him was perfect as a creature. (Luke 1:35.) Circumcised.-Jesus, in this respect, was under the law, and He kept it, as of course, to all perfection. Man in Him was thus perfect as under law. (Luke 2:27.) Baptized.-In this character Jesus is seen bowing to the authority of God, owning Him in His dispensations, and man in Him is perfect in all righteousness, as well as under law. (Luke 3:21.) .Anointed.-As anointed, Jesus was sent forth to service and testimony. In this respect man is seen in Him perfect as a servant. (Luke 3:22.) Devoted.-Jesus surrendered Himself to God, left Himself in His hand to do to His utmost will and pleasure. In Him man was therefore perfect as a sacrifice. (Luke 22:19-20.) Risen.-This begins a series of new conditions in which man is found. This is the first stage of the new estate. John 12:31-32 intimates a new course in man, as here said. The corn of wheat, having fallen into the ground and died, is now capacitated to be fruitful. Man in the risen Jesus is in indefeasible life. Glorified.-The risen Man, or man in indefeasible life, wears a heavenly image. The new man has a new or glorious body. Reigning.-The risen and glorified Man receives, in due season, authority to execute judgment. Dominion is His. The lost sovereignty of man is regained Scripture leads us through this series of contemplations on the Son of man. And though I speak here of the Man, as before I did of the divine glory, yet I divide not the person. Throughout all, it is " God manifest in the flesh " we have before us. We need to walk softly over such ground, and not to multiply words. On so high a theme, precious to the loving worshipping heart, we may remember what is written, " In the multitude of words there wanteth not sin." ======================================================================== CHAPTER 130: VOL 02 - IMPUTATION ======================================================================== Imputation The meritorious ground of our justification is the blood of Christ (Romans 5:9). But had He, who was "made of a woman, made under the law," failed in any one point in keeping it, He would not have been the holy Lamb of God, who could have atoned by His death for our sins. Now it is clear that we were not justified by His keeping the law for us, for " if righteousness come by law, then Christ is dead in vain" (Galatians 2:21). We should have been justified before He died in that case. This shows the mistake of such thoughts. On the teaching of God imputing righteousness, Scripture is clear. Faith, not the obedience of Christ, is imputed to us for righteousness (Romans 4:5; Galatians 3:6; James 2:23); that God reckons the man righteous, who believes His testimony, whatever it may be. In Abraham’s case it was God’s testimony as to his seed: in ours it is His testimony about the work of His Son (Romans 4:19-25), " Obedience " (ὑπαχοή) may, of course, often be used with reference to continued obedience, but in Romans 5:19, it refers to only one act, as the preceding verse distinctly states, "Therefore as by one offense, unto all to condemnation: so by one righteousness (διχαίωμα), unto all men unto justification of life." ======================================================================== CHAPTER 131: VOL 02 - IN WHOM OR WHEREIN? ======================================================================== In Whom or Wherein? At first sight it might seem to refer to the same as ὲν ῷ in vet 11, and those who punctuate by a comma after Χρίστοῦ in ver.. 11, and a colon after βαπτισματι in 5: 12, would make it that. But I have felt that A. V., J. N. D., W. K., Green, Ellicott, Alford; were justified by the sense of the passage in rendering it "in which." We are συνταφέντες αὐτῷ ἐν τῷ βαπτίσματι, buried with Him, not in Him. We are raised up in baptism with Him. The ‘en ῷ of ver. 12 seems to me necessarily to refer to baptism. Buried with Him in it, we are raised up with Him in it. Baptism can never be obliterated; but, though buried, we are not always, as it were, under the water; we have to walk, act, and serve here. Hence resurrection comes in as a necessary consequence "buried with Him," " raised with Him." Verse 11 gives the condition we have been brought into by the death of Christ, the putting off the body of the flesh; ver.12 is the position on earth, buried and raised with Him; ver. 13 the standing, once dead, but quickened with Him. All they wanted they had, then, in and with Christ. If you punctuate with a colon after βαπτίσματι, as Scrivener does in his G. T., as well as Griesbach and Scholz, you make the first clause of ver. 12 simply explanatory of ver. 11, and thereby, it seems to me, lose an important point-viz. that position, as well as condition, and standing, they had with Christ. I have taken the circumcision of Christ to be His death; for that alone deals with a nature, "the body of the flesh." ======================================================================== CHAPTER 132: VOL 02 - IS THE BELIEVER FULLY SATISFIED ON EARTH? ======================================================================== Is the Believer Fully Satisfied on Earth? We have surely much cause to thank God and rejoice in Christ Jesus, but nothing really to satisfy. We must still be looking onward to the future blessings in Christ. Never till He appears will the full desires of our hearts be given us; never till we " awake in His likeness" shall we be really " satisfied." Nothing less will suffice, because the Spirit of Christ is in us- constant dissatisfaction, and constant thanksgiving meanwhile; for if we know Jesus risen, nothing short of the full power of His resurrection can content--God’s thoughts run on to God’s ultimate purpose of complete blessing. This, we think, is scriptural teaching. Analogies of other truths of Scripture will help us here: e.g. (1) we are saved; (2) the saving goes on; (3) and we hope to be saved. So (1) we have been satisfied; (2) we are being satisfied; (3) and we hope to be satisfied. That is the teaching of the Spirit; and you never can get God’s people to walk rightly by looking at their feet, but by looking on, like St. Paul, to the glorified Jesus at the goal in glory. It is vain to quote one text against another, e.g. "Whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never thirst; but the water that I shall give him shall be in him a well of water springing up into everlasting life." This means that the indwelling Spirit makes you independent of earth’s most refreshing things, it may be (like water) things not evil in themselves; but so satisfying is the Spirit’s well that it supplants the need of earth’s waters. This does not say that a saint will never thirst more for the things of the Spirit: nor that a saint is satisfied with what he has in faith, and in the Holy Ghost. The most spiritual, we believe, are at once the most contented, and the most dissatisfied: for the Holy Ghost being the earnest as well as the seal must create a constant longing for the yet unexperienced and the unpossessed. Only when we are in the enjoyment of complete blessing will we have full satisfaction-i.e. in glory. The teaching then which would inculcate that the saints have no thirst for more than they possess, or no discontentedness even with the blest blessings of the highest spiritual kind here, in comparison with seeing the Savior having the travail of His soul and being satisfied, is contrary to the God’s word. To teach that the saints of God could be satisfied here even with their knowledge and attainment as to Christ Himself would be teaching against Scripture, as found in Php 3:1-21, and against all Christian experience. So little satisfied is Paul with his knowledge or experience of Christ, that we find him writing " that I may know Him," " that I may win Christ." His "one thing" was "forgetting those things which are behind, and reaching forth unto those things which are before; and pressing towards the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus," so well satisfied with the Christ he had, as to count all things but loss and dung for Him, but totally dissatisfied with his experience of Him, and longing for full satisfaction by having Him, and being with Him, and completely conformed to Him in glory. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 133: VOL 02 - IS THE BRIDE CHRISTIAN OR JEWISH IN REVELATION? ======================================================================== Is the Bride Christian or Jewish in Revelation? As I read it, the Bride is the city, but that bride is also the Lamb’s wife; and although reigning with Christ, may be common to all saints of all ages; yet being made "kings and priests unto God and His. Father" may be peculiar to the saints of the church period; and when we have this sort of kingship and priesthood introduced, as in chap. 21:, we have the Bride represented as the city, therefore the city must be the Christian bride, not the Jewish wife. When we read, " Unto Him that loved us, and washed us from our sins in His blood (how like to Ephesians 5:1-33), and bath made us kings and’ priests unto God and His Father," is not His Father said because the kingdom on earth (Matthew 13:25 :) is about to be introduced, and to be subdued and administered by His Son the Man of Glory, who had got there because He had been the Lamb of Calvary? (Hebrews 2:1-18) And He is seenin view of having all things put under Him, crowned with glory and honor as the Melchisedec-King and Priest-ruler; and when He is displayed in glory and honor, it is in the city of Revelation 21:1-27, where He has His kings and priests with Him. It is the throne of God and the Lamb that is there displayed, but as associated with the Bride, the Lamb’s wife-the glorified church, as I take it. None other class of saved ones could, with any appropriateness, be termed the Bride, the Lamb’s wife, because of the following considerations:- 1st, Israel is always represented as the married wife; the church as the espoused one-the Bride only the Lamb’s wife, after she is no longer on earth. Israel is the wife under divorce, and put away in the meantime, and to be received back on her repentance; and- 2d, The word Lamb is representative of rejection, and only the church could suffer with Christ and, as His affianced bride, occupy His place as rejected in this world. No other could be Arnion’s (the rejected Lamb’s) wife; for in no other age was there a rejected Lamb to be rejected with. 3d, Also, as a third thing, the false bride-the harlot-is surely the harlot of this Christian period, not a Jewish adulteress; and if she be the Christendom harlot, then the true bride must be the chaste Christian woman, or there would be no contrast; for what is the false fornicating Christendom a travesty of save of the pure church of God that shall come out of the awful defection, as " the Bride, the Lamb’s wife?" Do you see anything in these considerations? ======================================================================== CHAPTER 134: VOL 02 - JESUS CHRIST COME IN THE FLESH ======================================================================== Jesus Christ Come in the Flesh The ark and the camp were, in some sense, necessary to each other during the journey through the wilderness. The ark, seated in the tabernacle on which the cloud rested, had to guide the camp; and the camp, in its order, had to accompany and guard the ark and all connected with it. This was the business of the camp. There was to be subjection to the will of Him who dwelt in the cloud; dependence on Him who led them daily; conscious liberty because of having left Egypt behind them, and hope because of having Canaan before them. Such a mind as this was to be in the camp; but its business was to conduct the mystic house of God onward to its rest, "the possession of the Gentiles." Their journeying through that desert would not have constituted divine pilgrimage. Many a one had traveled that road without being a stranger and pilgrim with God. In order to be such, the ark must be in their company. The mind of the camp, of which I have spoken, might betray its weakness, or forget itself, and this might lead, as we know it did, to chastening again and again. But if its business, of which I have also spoken, were given up, there would be loss of everything. And this did come to pass. The tabernacle of Moloch was taken up, instead of the ark of Jehovah, and the camp, therefore, had its road diverted to Damascus or Babylon, far away from the promised Canaan. (Amos 5:25; Acts 7:1; Acts 7:3.) And thus it is with ourselves. We are to maintain those truths or mysteries which the tabernacle and its furniture represented: and the apostle commits our entrance into Canaan to that. " If ye continue in the faith; " and again, " if ye keep in memory what I have written unto you." Our safety, our rest in the heavenly Canaan, depends on our keeping the truth. This, however, is to be added-that not merely for our own safety’s sake, but for Christ’s honor, is the truth to be kept. This is to be much considered. Supposing, for a moment, that our own safety were not concerned in it, Christ’s honor is, and that is enough. Such a thing is contemplated in 2 John 1:10 : the elect lady was inside the house,-she was in personal safety, but she has a duty to perform to " the doctrine of Christ; " so that if one come to her door, and bring not that doctrine, she must keep him outside, and refuse to have him where she is. Title to entrance is confession to that doctrine, a confession of " Jesus Christ come in the flesh," a confession that involves or secures the glory of His person. A full confession to His work will not do. The one outside may bring with him a sound faith as to the atonement, sovereignty of grace, and like truths; but all this is not a warrant for letting him in. There must be confession to the person also. " Whosoever transgresseth and abideth not in the doctrine of Christ hath not God: he that abideth in the doctrine of Christ, he hath both the Father and the Son. If there come any unto you and bring not this doctrine, receive him not into your house, neither bid him God’s speed: for he that biddeth him God speed is partaker of his evil deeds." Surely this is clear and decided. I believe that this is much to be considered. The truth touching Christ’s person is to be maintained by us, even though our soul’s safety were not involved in it. I grant that our salvation is involved. But that is not all. He who owns not that truth is to be kept outside. It imparts tenderness as well as strength to see that the name of Jesus is thus entrusted to the guardianship of the saints. This is what we owe Him if not ourselves* (*The wall of partition is to be raised by the saints between them and Christ’s dishonor.) Mere journeying from Egypt to Canaan will not do. Let the journey be attended with all the trial of such an arid, unsheltered, and trackless road, still it is not divine pilgrimage. A mere toilsome self-denying life, even though endured with that moral courage which becomes pilgrims, will not do. There must be the carriage of the ark of God, confession to the truth, and maintenance of the name of Jesus. Now, in John’s Epistles, the name "Jesus Christ" expresses or intimates, I believe, the deity of the Son. The Holy Ghost, or the Unction, so filled the mind of that apostle with the truth, that "the Word " which had been " made flesh" was God, that though be speaks of Him by a name which formally expresses the Son in manhood or in office, with John that is no matter. The name is nothing-at least nothing that can interfere with the full power of prevailing assurance, that He is "that which was from the beginning," the Son in the glory of the Godhead. This is seen and felt at the very opening of the First Epistle, and so, I believe, throughout. (See chap. 1: 3, 7; 2: 1; 3: 23; 4: 2; 5: 20; 2 John 1:3-7.) In the thoughts of this Epistle "Jesus Christ" is always this divine One, so to speak, the eternal Life manifested. With St. John "Jesus Christ" is "the true God." Jesus is the " He " and the " Him " in the argument of his First Epistle; and this " He " and " Him " ever keeps before us One who is God, though in assumed relations and covenant dealings. The confession, therefore, which is demanded by them is this-that it was God who was manifested, or who came in the flesh. (See 1 John 4:2; 2 John 1:7.) For in these epistles, as we have now seen, " Jesus Christ " is God. His name as God is Jesus Christ. And it is assumed or concluded that " the true God " is not known, if He who was in the flesh, Jesus Christ, be not understood as such; and all this simply because He is God. Any other received as such is an idol. (1 John 5:20-21.) The soul that abides not in this doctrine " has not God," but he who abides in it " has both the Father and the Son." (2 John 1:9.) This, I judge, is the mind and import of the required confession that " Jesus Christ is come in the flesh." I here speak of God under the name of Jesus Christ, and it is, therefore, the demand of a confession to the great mystery of " God manifested in the flesh." The very adjunct (as another has written to me), " come in the flesh," throws strongly forward the deity of Christ; because if He were a man, or anything short of what He is, it would be no such wonder that He should come in the flesh. And verses 2 and 3 of chapter 1: guide us to John’s thoughts in the use of the name " Jesus Christ." That which was from the beginning, the eternal Life which was with the Father, was the Person he declared to. them. The words " with the Father " are important, making it evident that the Son was the eternal One, the name of this eternal Son being Jesus Christ. And it is interesting to compare the close with the commencement of this Epistle" This is the true God and the [with the article] eternal life.” I desire to bless the Lord for giving my soul fresh assurance, on such simple ground of Scripture, that this duty lies on us of maintaining the honor of the name of Jesus. In the course of our Lord’s journey on earth, we see Him in the following ways:- As the born One-holy, meeting God’s mind in the nature or human material. As the circumcised One-perfect under the law, meeting God’s mind in it. As the baptized One-meeting God’s mind in dispensational order and righteousness. As the anointed One-meeting God’s mind as His image or representative. As the obedient One-doing always those things that pleased the Father, As the devoted One-meeting God’s mind in all things; and in laying down his life.-John 10:17-18. 7. As the risen One-sealed with God’s approval in victory for sinners. Thus does He meet all the mind of God while providing for us. All was magnified in Him and by Him, all made honorable. God’s proposed delight in man, or glory by him, has been richly answered in the blessed Jesus. While in His person He was " God manifest in the flesh," in the succession of His stages through the earth He was accomplishing all the divine purpose, delight, and glory, in man. Nothing unworthy of God was in the man Christ Jesus, His person, experiences, or ways. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 135: VOL 02 - ON THE INSPIRATION OF SCRIPTURE AND THE TENDENCY TO RELIGIOUS INFIDELITY ======================================================================== On the Inspiration of Scripture and the Tendency to Religious Infidelity My Dear Sir-I see you are setting yourself with devout zeal and Christian energy to uphold the inspiration of the Holy Scriptures, and in this I am wholly with you, and send you a volume which will show how fully I can sympathize with you in the present stand you are making to maintain the inspiration and authority of the Bible. But at the same time I fear, judging by what is patent to all, that the plague of rationalism has so pervaded the more prominent of your younger ministers, and has so many promoters in your colleges, that it is hopeless to think to arrest its ravages, or to stamp it out. What hope can there be when (as the division in Professor Smith’s case showed) about one half of your theological professors are either sympathizers with it or screeners of him who holds it? In our student days there was not a breath of religious skepticism. We were stirred in our souls by the thrilling evangelism of the truth-loving and eloquent Chalmers; we listened with eager ears and attentive minds to the profound and ponderous utterances of the great truths of God’s word and the crushing of the arguments of errorists by Dr. Cunningham, and felt sure that no heretical thing could live beneath the sledge-hammer reasoning and stern logic of that great and good man; and if our other professors were not of equal weight, they were all sound in the faith, able men in their several departments, and worthy of all respect as those who were evangelical to the core, and who received the Holy Scriptures as the inspired revelation of God. But what a change has these past thirty years wrought! With some there has been much attention given to the earnest preaching of the gospel, and there has been much mission work done and revival sought; but the steady tendency in theology has been to unsoundness, and in regard to the word to discredit its plenary inspiration, so that in Scotland there is cause to fear for a reign of rationalism, as in the end of last century. The writings of the Broad Church school of England, and the continuous translation and circulation of unsound foreign theological literature, will, ere long, have completely wrecked the orthodoxy of the Scottish churches. And within the last thirty years the Congregationalists of England, as a body, have wellnigh made shipwreck of the faith. They have now discarded " the atonement," "eternal judgment," and other truths. The Baptists, but for Spurgeon, had also gone down. But that they are not a little tainted with infidel views such writings as those of some of their chief men painfully show. There is a terrible declension in general orthodoxy in all denominations, and (what is nearly as painful) a levity and latitudinarianism in those who have the reputation of being sound. The authority of Christ and His word are ignored. The Pan-Presbyterian Council is the most outstanding witness of this lukewarmness as to Christ, when rationalists, sacramentarians, and evangelicals were congregated in one assembly at Edinburgh, in July 1877, to express the substantial unity of Presbyterianism throughout the world! Under the system of some of its leading members, Christianity entirely disappears, and these are specimens of the men united to display the cosmopolite " comprehensive " unity of Presbyterianism! Some of those men that could be named, do not believe in the real inspiration of the Bible, nor have they Scriptural views of the person and work of Christ. The atonement is not held by them; nor is it, perhaps, in the old way, if you inquire, by some of your professors. The young men of mark are tinged with the " progress " views, which are anti-Christian, and will eventually prove infidel. All these things are sorrowful and depressing; for there is, indeed, serious declension from fundamental truth in unlooked-for quarters. But the remedy must be sought for elsewhere than in the action of church courts. We must hold simply by God’s word and Spirit, be entirely on divine ground, and be so fully possessed of God’s system that we can dispense with all human systems before we can be in an impregnable position ourselves, or be able effectually to act for Christ, so as to be a credit to our association with Him, or be of real use to our fellow-believers in a crisis like the present. Your deliverance, my brother, will not consist in getting Dr. Dods* put out, but in getting yourself out; for though you were rid of him, and a score of others, the system you are in being only human, and having no warrant in the word of God, would just produce a fresh crop of free-thinkers, to be dealt with at some future day. (*"Inspiration and Revelation," the first paper in our next volume of Bible Witness and Review, takes up Dr. Dods’ veiws, and shows that his system is a mere echo of the rationalist system of Dr. Ewald.) There are many Christian ministers and Christian people among you, but the system is not of God, and has no claim on any saint of God, and not being based on God’s word, or guided by God’s Spirit, neither your church, nor any other church, can be entrusted with the testimony of our Lord. For this we must be on the divine ground of God for His church on earth-on a Scriptural basis, such that it commands the consciences of all saints-a basis inclusive of all saints, and exclusive of all evil in doctrine and practice, before we can be of real service in a crisis like this through which we are now passing, and also meet the approval of our exalted Lord and Master. I have it in my heart to help in this solemn crisis by directing you to God’s Christ and His word, but this must show that the system you have adopted is not Christianity, that your church is not owned by Christ as His, and that your Church’s system of doctrine, discipline, and polity, as well as ministry, is outside the Holy Scriptures, and that you must abandon all and receive the things of Christ as the Holy Ghost has given them in the Holy Scriptures.. It is all right in you to maintain the inspiration of the Scriptures; but the Bible is our master, not our servant, and we are surely bound to be ruled by it as by the very voice of the Spirit of God speaking to us with divine authority; and if we are so, we will, of necessity, have to stand on the Scripture ground of there being only one church and no denominations, for " There is one body and one Spirit," and that is the divine unity we are to keep (Ephesians 4:1-32), and, in doing so, we will, necessarily, find ourselves outside of all existing churches, Presbyterian and other. The cost of obedience is, no doubt, considerable, as was that of Saul of Tarsus "to the heavenly vision," but that is nothing compared with the happy communion resulting from knowing that your obedience to Christ is well= pleasing to Him, and puts you in the divine current of the action of the Holy Ghost for His glory at this time. There is a testimony being raised up all over the world in this outside place, in great apparent weakness when it is confronted with man’s great human, institutions, but the strength of the Holy Ghost is in it, as it was in the Pentecostal church, in so far as there is full dependence on Christ and no confidence in the flesh. There is an ecclesiastical confederacy of the present day in which the Holy Ghost’s unity and Christ’s person and word are ignored, that they may all be happy with each other; and there is this movement of the Holy Ghost to maintain the truth of Christ’s person and work, the authority of the Holy Scriptures, and the work of the Holy Ghost in gathering saints to Christ on the divine ground of the church of God, and causing them to move outwards from all man’s denominations, to center round Christ alone, the Holy and the True. All these " churches " must grow worse and worse, and land at last in such indifference to Christ that He will spue them out of His mouth’; and, notwithstanding the " woman " may be seen riding in state on the back of the beast, she will end her career in the " fire " of divine judgment (Revelation 17:1-18; Revelation 18:1-24), this testimony upheld by the Holy Ghost will grow brighter and brighter as the infidelity of " the churches " becomes more pronounced; and those who have a place in it, by the grace of God, will have, at least, this said of them-" I have set before thee an open door, and no man can shut it, for thou hast a little strength, and hast kept My word, and hast not denied My name" (Revelation 3:8). It is very important to maintain the plenary and verbal inspiration of the Holy Scriptures, but, in order to be consistent, have weight with others, and enjoy God’s blessing, we must be prepared to obey them (1 Samuel 15:22). ======================================================================== CHAPTER 136: VOL 02 - ON THE PUTTING AWAY OF SIN ======================================================================== On the Putting Away of Sin The question having been raised as to verse 26 of Hebrews 9:1-28 and the putting away of sin, I send you a few lines on this subject. In the first place I have frequently insisted on sin being put away by the sacrifice of Christ, in the sense that the believer stands before God perfectly justified and accepted, the Lord imputing no sin; he is perfectly clear before God. And this, thank God, I believe as I ever did. It is our blessed privilege in Christ. May every quickened soul enjoy it! God forbid that any nicety of expression should enfeeble it. But when expressions, not actually the word of God, are used, and conclusions are drawn from them, as if they were Scriptural statements, we are forced to be more accurate. And this has been the case in the statement that sin has been put away by the sacrifice of Christ. This Scripture does not state. He appeared once, in the consummation of ages, for the putting away of sin (εἰς ἀθέτησιν) by the sacrifice of Himself. I had long ago noticed that the expression, " the Lamb of God which taketh away the sin of the world," would have its perfect completion only in the new heaven and the new earth, though the work on which that state was based was finished by God’s Lamb once for all on the cross; but the force of Hebrews im 26 had not been so especially noted. Yet it is essentially the same truth. Sin, that hated thing, must be put out of that world which God created for His own glory. We must not confound clearing our conscience and redeeming us, and putting away sin out of God’s world as that which is offensive to Him. Verse 28 speaks of Christ’s bearing the sins of many. Thus they are perfectly cleared. But sin remains in the flesh and in the world, and it must be set aside, all things in heaven and earth reconciled to God; and this will take place. The work on which it is based, in virtue of which it will be accomplished by power, the work in which God is morally glorified perfectly and forever, is accomplished, and Christ sits at the right hand of God in virtue of it. But the sins of the many who come under grace have been borne by Him, and the believer has been washed from all. Nor is this all as to him. Not only has Christ borne all his sins, but for faith he has died with Christ, and as dead he is justified from sin: the old man has been crucified with Christ. Sin in the flesh was condemned on the cross, and there is no condemnation for him. It is in this general sense of our standing before God that it has been said that sin was put away, and, thank God, it is so. But the real thought was all guilt and imputation in our standing before God. But the putting sin away has a wider application in Scripture; all things in heaven and earth are to be reconciled to God. Righteousness is to dwell in the new heaven and the new earth, and in a modified sense this will be the case even in the reign of Christ. Then it will be effected by power. But the work by which morally that is done in righteousness and for God’s glory, in which it is really done in the moral sense, is ccomplished, all that God is having been glorified on the cross where Christ was made sin; and faith lays hold on this. Alas! very few Christians even make the difference of sins or guilt, and sin. Our sins are all forgiven, we are perfectly washed from them; and, besides this, as dead with Christ, the old man is for faith put off; its condemnation was in Christ’s death. We are not in the flesh, though actually the flesh is in us. But the putting away of sin goes far wider, the putting it away out of God’s sight in the world. And this, as a result, is not accomplished, though the work be perfectly accomplished on which that result is founded, and that work is in one sense more important than the fact, because God has been perfectly glorified there, in virtue of which it will be accomplished; and faith knows this work is done, and rejoices that there is no condemnation for the believer before God, the conscience being purged from sins, and sin in the flesh being condemned in the cross; so that there is no imputation and no condemnation. But sin exists. The effect of the work, as in God’s purpose, is not as yet made good. Even as to the believer, he cannot say, I have no sin. " He that is dead is justified from sin " (not sins here); but I have this title to reckon myself dead, Christ having died to sin. If I say sin is put away, I weaken the force of "putting away," for sin is still there. It is not the world in which righteousness dwells. The sins of God’s people have been borne, and the blood of propitiation is on the mercy-seat; so that we can go to the world and beseech sinners to come, as though God did beseech by us, in our little measure. That work is all done and accepted which enables me to do it. I can say to the believer that he is all clear, white as snow before God. But the putting away of sin is a wider thing. John 1:1-51 itself shows this -the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world (not has taken away, nor sins). It is the removal of sin in God’s sight in the world, a result not yet accomplished. This passage refers specifically to the result, Hebrews 9:26 to the purpose and means of its being done, as verse 28 does to the other question of our actual guilt. Incorrect expressions I should not make a work about: God graciously bears with them, if the heart is earnest and right. I do not stand in the gate to make a man an offender for a word. Here I inquire merely what is correct when the question is raised. Conclusions from what is not in Scripture I do not allow. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 137: VOL 02 - PASSAGES EXPLAINED ======================================================================== Passages Explained The passages you refer to seem to have no difficulty if you take them as they read. Ecclesiastes 12:7 : the first half of it refers to the body; the second to the soul: Genesis 2:7 explains it. The breathing of God put an immortal and responsible spirit in us, which at death returns to God who gave it, and awaits the judgment throne of Christ, whether it be as in 2 Corinthians 5:10, or in Revelation 20:11. Paul in Acts 17:22-31 throws light on Genesis 2:1-25 and Ecclesiastes 12:1-14Acts 17:25, He gave to all life, etc., verse 29, "We are the offspring of God," etc. Also verse 31 speaks of the coming of this exalted Man as judge. This is the judgment of "the habitable world." But whether it be the saints of this church time; the living nations of Matthew 25:1-46; the men of the millennial world; or the wicked dead at the great white throne- all are regarded as bound morally to be taken account of by God. If God gave the spirit-the spirit returns to God; and when re-united to the body the deeds done in the body will be passed under the moral review of the searching glance of Him whose eyes are as a flame of fire, and who tries the hearts and reins, and will give to every man according to his works. This makes the doings of that period when soul and body are in conjunction here so very solemn and important. Every morning we rise we should say to ourselves, I am to walk to-day as " manifested unto God" in view of that day when " every man shall give account of himself unto God." "For we must all be manifested before the judgment seat of Christ," etc. (2 Corinthians 5:10). I see no difficulty in Luke 16:23 : what is it? That a disembodied spirit should be said to have eyes? But does it not? If not how do the angels who are " spirits " and have no bodily eyes manage to know where to go? Our organs of vision are the mere windows in the body through which the eyes of our spirits look: we take our eyes with us when we die, as this text teaches, for the seeing is in our spirits; for as soon as a person dies, his visual organs are merely curiously wrought clay, and they see nothing: the seeing of the eyes goes with the soul. Hence the thought that the saints do not see any one in their disembodied state is a mistake. The Lord’s words are, " in hell he lifted up his eyes, being in torments, and seeth Abraham afar off." As to Luke 4:25-27, I suppose your difficulty is about the word “save," which means "except," but the expression refers to widowhood in general and not to widows in Israel, 1:e. to none of the many widows in the land of Israel was Elias sent, but to the one widow in the Sidonians’ land. The same applies to verse 27 about the lepers. See "but" in Matthew 12:4 and "save" in Galatians 1:19. The "James " of " Galatians " was not one of the twelve apostles, but an apostle in a wider sense, as Barnabas was. " He gave apostles " (Ephesians 4:1-32); he did not confine them to the number, twelve. So " James " was one of those glory-given ones, as Paul was himself. It seems clear that this " James " was "the Lord’s brother," not the apostle so named and called by Christ an earth. It is more than probable when James the apostle was killed by the sword of Herod (Acts 12:1-25), that James the Lord’s brother filled the gap made in " the Twelve," for he is found among the " pillars " (Galatians 2:1-21) " James and Cephas and John, who were conspicuous as being pillars, gave to me and Barnabas the right hands of fellowship," etc. He appears to take the lead in the council at Jerusalem (Acts 15:1-41), and this he would hardly have done at such an important assembly as was then convened, if he had not had a very high spiritual consciousness that he was acting as an apostle of the Lord-though a sub- resurrection one, and one (so far as we have the record of it is concerned), who had no formal place of authority given him, as bad Matthias (Acts 1:1-26) ======================================================================== CHAPTER 138: VOL 02 - PURCHASE AND REDEMPTION ======================================================================== Purchase and Redemption ======================================================================== CHAPTER 139: VOL 02 - QUERIES AS TO THINGS CONNECTED WITH THE LORD'S COMING ======================================================================== Queries as to Things Connected With the Lord’s Coming Q. Will the saints be caught up before the Lord comes in glory and the tribes of the earth mourn because of Him? Matthew 24:1-51 Here there is no hint of the church’s escaping the great tribulation, except by sudden flight; nor of any other παρουσία except that which we are to expect after that tribulation. (See vers. 23, 27, 29.) Nor of any gathering of His elect unto Him except in verse 31, after the great tribulation. In verses 32, 33 we are directed to " know that it is near, even at the doors, when we shall see all these things," 1:e., those which are described in verses 7-29. 1 Thessalonians 4:1-18 The living will not be changed before the dead in Christ are raised (ver. 15); then (1 Corinthians 15:51) we shall all be changed, in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump. (literally, for the trumpet shall sound)-all, not some only, of those who believe. And the trumpet mentioned in Matthew 24:31, when all the elect are to be gathered together, cannot be subsequent, or the other would not be the last trump. (3.) The caution of 2 Thessalonians 2:1-12 seems to imply that the church must witness the full revelation and ἐνέργεια of the wicked one, and then expect the immediate coming of our Lord. It is true, we are to be continually looking for the coming of our Lord; but is this inconsistent with the expectation of a previous tribulation? A. The Old Testament saints and the church, which is being now formed by the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven, will be caught up to meet the Lord before His coming as Son of man in power and great glory, when all the tribes of the earth (or the land) lament. This necessarily follows from the doctrine laid down in Colossians 3:4, compared with 1 Corinthians 15:23, 1 Thessalonians 4:1-18, 2 Thessalonians 2:1-17, and other Scriptures, and from the prophetic intimation of Revelation 4:5 :, compared with Revelation 17:14; Revelation 19:14. For if Christ and the glorified saints appear together at the selfsame time in glory, it is evident that the saints must have been caught up, changed into His likeness, before that common manifestation of Him and them. Besides, the Revelation indicates their presence above, after their translation there, and before their appearing along with Him, under the symbol of the crowned and enthroned elders, who are seen in heaven when the seven churches disappear (Revelation 2:3.), and before the pre-millennial judgment of chapter 19., and the millennium of chapter 20. This interval is occupied here below by God’s preparation of Jews and Gentiles (separate from the glorified) who will be to His praise on earth, as the Old Testament saints and the church will be in heaven when the administration of the fullness of times is put under Christ, the Head of all things heavenly and earthly. (1.) This helps to render Matthew 24:15-41 perfectly plain. Certainly there is no hint of the church’s escaping the tribulation by sudden flight here; for those spoken of are a remnant of converted Jews who will be found in Jerusalem, in connection with the temple and the sabbath in the latter day. What possible ground is there to predicate this of the church of God, which is neither Jew nor Gentile, and which, save at its first origin, is found everywhere under heaven? What reason to take it away from the last days of this age, when God will again be savingly at work among the Jews in their land, protecting a remnant from the last fiery tribulation which the Antichrist will occasion, and fitting them as a people for the Lord, when He comes for their deliverance in the clouds of heaven, and the mass being apostate will be filled with terror and mourning and shame at His sudden glory which flashes on the world? That the elect of verse 31 cannot possibly mean the church is evident, if it were only from the passage itself; for the sight of the Son of man appalls all the tribes before He sends His angels to gather these elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other. Now if you apply this to the same scene and persons as Colossians 3:4, you set one Scripture against another-the unerring proof of error. Distinguish between the saints already caught up, to be glorified with Him on high, and these elect gathered from all places of their dispersion here below, to be blessed under His reign here below, and the balance of truth is preserved. No doubt, then, the gathering of the elect here is after the great tribulation, but it is also after His appearing. It is therefore not the church which appears with Him when. He appears in glory, and which is promised (in Revelation 3:10) exemption not only from the place and circumstances of the great coming temptation, but also from its hour. The signs are, as usual, for the Jewish saints, who were wont to ask such things as evidence of the approaching accomplishment of their hopes. (2.) 1 Thessalonians 4:1-18 No one contends that the living will be changed before the dead in Christ are raised. It is clear that, the latter being raised, and we who are then alive being changed as they, all together will be caught up to the Lord. The " last trump " of 1 Corinthians 15:1-58 is an allusion to the final signal of the break up of a Roman camp for its march. It has nothing whatever to do with the loud sound of trumpet in Matthew 24:1-51 (with which compare Isaiah 27:13), any more than with the seven trumpets of Revelation 8:1-13; Revelation 9:1-21; Revelation 10:1-11; Revelation 11:1-19 Undoubtedly when the Lord at His coming or presence (παρουσία) gathers the changed saints to Himself in the air, it is all, not some only, of those who up to that time have believed (compare πᾶσιν τοῖς πιστεύσασιν in 2 Thessalonians 1:10). But how does this present a difficulty to such as see from Scripture that others subsequently are to be converted, kept through the tribulation and blessed in the millennial kingdom of the Lord? It is the querist’s system which is at fault, not leaving sufficient room for all the elements, and of course therefore both leading to confusion in the various parts, and presenting a defective result. 1 Corinthians 15:1-58 presents (and so I may add 1 Thessalonians 4:1-18) our last trump, because the question is of the risen saints; Matthew 24:31 presents, if you will, the last trump of the Jewish saints then scattered over the earth. How does this identify the two, even if the trumpet in Matthew 24:1-51 had been styled the last trump, or " His elect " were called " all the elect?" neither of which is the fact. Is it a contradiction if the historian speaks of the last trump sounding for the tenth legion in Gaul, and of the trumpet gathering the twelfth legion in Syria? (3). 2 Thessalonians 2:1-12 cautions us against the error of those who confounded the coming of the Lord to gather His saints on high with His day upon the lawless one. The misleaders of the Thessalonian believers sought to alarm them by the false cry that the day of the Lord was already present (ὡς ὃτι ἐνέστηχεν ἡ ἡμἐρα τοἐρα τοῦ χυρίου). This the apostle dispels, first, by a motive of consolation for the heart, as well as, secondly, by an express prophecy. First, he beseeches them, by the coming of the Lord. and their gathering together to Him, not to be shaken or troubled by this pretense (for which they feigned a revelation and even a letter of the apostle). The first act of the Lord, bound up with His very presence, is the translation of His own beloved ones to Himself. But, secondly, that day (mark, he does not say the Lord’s παρουςἱυ, but His day) should not come till the full development of the evil which His day is to judge. The mystery of lawlessness is now restrained: when he who hinders its outburst is withdrawn, then shall be revealed the lawless one whom the Lord Jesus will destroy by the breath of His mouth and annul by the appearance of His coming. Observe the striking difference between the terms in verses. 1, 8. When it is a question of gathering the saints, the phrase is simply His coming or presence; when it is a question of His day, or dealing in judgment with the lawless one, it is the shining forth of His coming-not παρουσἰα, only, but ἐπιφάνεια τῆς παρουσιας αὐτοῦ The real caution of the chapter would have preserved people now from an error kindred in principle, though not in form, to that which wrought among the Thessalonians. We are then to be continually expecting the Lord, apart from either external signs or the final great tribulation, which Scripture connects with others, not with us, after we have been translated to heaven. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 140: VOL 02 - RECONCILIATION ======================================================================== Reconciliation You confound, first, two things-abhorring " workers of iniquity," and "hating Esau." In the last case the children had done neither good nor evil. The former is moral detestation of ill-doing and ill-doers in God’s moral character and government, which must be the case morally; the other is the sovereign election of faith, and rejection of Esau. But grace reigning through righteousness makes the case plain. It is what makes the cross glorious- God glorified in it. God is love, but He abhors evil-must in His nature. Can love operate in accepting evil and evil-doers in their evil? Then righteousness is denied, not merely ignored, by God in definitive judgment-i.e., if He accepts the sinner in his sins. But propitiation is made-the death of Christ satisfies the claim of righteous judgment (though it does a great deal more), and hence love flows freely according to righteousness. Hence Christ has not only borne our sins, but has glorified God in the cross. Without it there was neither righteousness nor love. Now grace reigns, but it reigns through righteousness to eternal life. Less would have been contradiction. Sin having entered without the cross, at least love would have remained hidden and powerless, for indifference to evil is not divine love. Light and love go together in His nature, and His authority acts in righteousness to maintain right; but by the cross love is not only free in its proclamations to all the world, but divine righteousness is "upon all them that believe." The new nature judges sin morally. "Do not I hate them that hate Thee? yea, I hate them right sore, as though they were mine enemies." But now I see propitiation made, justice and love for me, and in the highest act of love I can carry out the love according to righteousness to God’s glory. He is righteous and just to forgive; and, much more, we are made the righteousness of God in Him. God cannot but hate evil; and, morally speaking, He hates, detests the evildoer. It is not a passion as in us, but His moral judgment, that of His nature, to be made good by judgment in righteousness. The cross has done this, and love acts on the footing of righteousness, but a righteousness not in the object, but for him on the part of God. While producing fruits of it in the quickened soul, it does not reconcile God, but His holy righteous nature requires the propitiation; but when made, and righteousness glorified (and God has given in love, and Christ Himself too, for it), then love is free, and grace reigns through righteousness. Man knows this through faith, and returns in entire confidence, and is reconciled to God, his heart in perfect order as thus brought) according to what God is, for He is glorified in the cross as the ground and means of His reconciliation. The reconciliation of things (Colossians 1:1-29) is that they have been turned away and polluted from their natural relationship to God, and they are restored purified to this. They could not be guilty as we, but they were polluted; so the tabernacle, which represented them in the midst of Israel. The work of Christ is the basis of all. They are to be reconciled. At present the created heavens are the seat of disorder, as well as the earth; but we are reconciled, having believed in the efficacy of that by which He has made peace, and being brought back to God. We were by nature the children of wrath. There is the necessary moral outgoing of God’s nature against evil; but " God, who is rich in mercy, for His great love wherewith He loved us," etc. Here it is the new creation, through redemption, tells how wrath and love go together, God’s moral judgment and sovereign goodness. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 141: VOL 02 - RIGHTEOUSNESS ======================================================================== Righteousness As to Romans 5:17, it is not the same as Romans 8:4. There it is the fact that, in walking in the Spirit, the sum of the requirement of the law (and so only) would be fulfilled, the διχαίωμα. Much more, perhaps; but as the flesh was not subject to it, that διχαίωμα could not be accomplished when in the flesh. But, living in the. Spirit, the Spirit or Christ living in us, the body dead, the sum of the law’s requirements, so walking, was fulfilled. Against the fruits of righteousness there was no law. The Christian has a higher rule-to be an imitator of God, as manifested in man in Christ (Ephesians 5:1-2); but as people were looking for legal righteousness, what is in verses 2, 3,was the way of getting it. Chapter 5:17 is διχαιοσύνης, the abstract thing righteousness given to us, and though taken abstractedly, that thing in its nature and quality; yet as being free gift (δωρεά), and that of God, according to grace, goes much farther than the requirement or διχαίωμα of the law, which, if fulfilled, was no more than man’s -righteousness. Ver. 16 is διχαίωμα. But it is not τὸ διχαίωμα τοῦ νόμου. That was measured by the requirement of the law. Here it is of many offenses to a sum of recognized righteousness. It is a χάρισμα-a gracious gift of a sum of adequate righteousness, judicially estimated and satisfactory. Keeping the law makes that out as a requirement from man. It would be his righteousness as rightly measured by it. But here it is a χάρισμα. χρίμα came upon men to χατάχριμα. It is now a χάρισμα. Χρἰμα dealing with many offenses, and so giving us, according to God, an adequate judicial righteousness, but now, according to God’s free gift, not man’s responsibility; the διχαίωμα of the law and God’s διχαίωμα are different. We have hardly words in English to make these differences, but διχαίωμα is the sum of requirement, διχαιοσνη the thing righteousness; so 1 Corinthians 1:30. Hence, in Romans 4:1-25, it is διχαιοσύνη; διχαιοσύνηisἐλογίσθη. These words in -οσύνη are the quality. Then the persons of the perfect passive, as a rule, give the thing done, the doing, and the doer, χρίμα, χρίσις, χριτής, διχαίωηα, διχαίωοις. We have not διχαἰωτης. It is not an office like χριτής but διχαιῶν (Romans 3:26; Romans 4:5). " The fruits of righteousness," in Philip. 1: 11, must not be taken as if meaning righteousness itself as fruits. As you could not say that " fruit of the Spirit" (Galatians 5:22) was the Spirit as fruit, or "fruit of the light" (Ephesians 5:24) meant the light as fruit, so you cannot say that " the fruits of righteousness " means righteousness as fruits, but the fruits which flow from a righteous moral state. See also James 3:18; Hebrews 12:11; Romans 6:21; Proverbs 11:30. In no instance is the genitive with "fruit " the genitive of apposition, but a righteous moral condition; the moral consequence because the necessary vital expression of a state of justification of life in which a man now brings forth fruit in newness of spirit (Romans 7:6). ======================================================================== CHAPTER 142: VOL 02 - SALT ======================================================================== Salt Salt is of great importance to man. It makes savory what without it would be insipid. It checks the growth of nature in the vegetable kingdom; it preserves, too, from corruption and decay, what belongs to the animal kingdom. Of its savory properties Job speaks (6: 6). To its power in destroying the growth of nature Moses and the Prophets bear witness (Deuteronomy 29:23; Jeremiah 17:6; Ezekiel 47:11); and Abimelech’s action in sowing the city of Shechem with salt (Judges 9:45), shows us that Israel were well acquainted with its influence on vegetation. But not less marked is its action on that which belongs to the animal kingdom, preserving what is subjected to its influence from that corruption to which otherwise it would assuredly turn. Now as salt acts in the realm of nature, so does grace in spiritual matters. It savors; it checks the outflow of nature from man. It is preservative, too, in its action from corruption. Under the law the meat-offering was to be salted, typical of the Lord Jesus in His life on earth, in whom grace acted constantly (Leviticus 2:13). With all their offerings they were to offer salt. Hence a "covenant of salt" was a term Israel well understood (Numbers 18:19; 2 Chronicles 13:5), meaning that such a covenant should never be broken, no element of corruption should enter into it, for it would last forever. Of that character was the provision God made for the support of Aaron and his house. Of that same character was the Lord’s engagement to David and to his sons. In the New Testament the figurative meaning of salt, as illustrative of grace in its savoring and preservative action, is met with more than once. The disciples were the "salt of the earth" (Matthew 5:13). But as the Lord reminded them, salt is useless, if once it has lost its savor. So they would be of no use as salt, unless grace was really in them. What then man in nature has not, what the earth viewed morally does not possess, that the disciples were, and should be careful to continue to be. They were not merely salt for the earth, but the salt of the earth. And having salt in themselves, the working of nature would be checked, and they would have peace one with another (Mark 9:50). Moreover, that preservative and savoring character of grace would be felt, if their speech was always with grace, being seasoned with salt (Colossians 4:6). They would know how to answer every man, and no corrupt communication would proceed out of their mouth, but only that which was good to the use of edifying, that it might minister grace to the hearer (Ephesians 4:29). Moreover, the preservative character of grace would characterize all God’s people, "for every sacrifice shall be salted with salt." But there is another statement of the Lord, preserved only in one Gospel, that of Mark and the statement to which we now draw attention is one most solemn in its character, and universal in its application. " Every one shall be salted with fire: " for as salt preserves things in the animal kingdom, so the fire of judgment will act on men. It will not consume them so as to terminate their existence, but burning up all that is perishable of men and their works (1 Corinthians 3:13-15), will leave that which never can decay. To have one’s works tried by fire is a solemn consideration for God’s saints. To be salted with fire is a dreadful prospect for the wicked. And in connection with these latter, it should be remarked, the Lord brings it in: " Their worm dieth not, and the fire is not quenched; for every one shall be salted with fire " (Mark 9:48-49). Even in things of nature in the animal frame, there is a residuum, which the fire does not consume. But after burning up all that is consumable, the fire dies out. Now it will not be so in the other world; all that can perish will assuredly perish, but the wicked will never die, and the fire will never be extinguished. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 143: VOL 02 - THE ATONEMENT ======================================================================== The Atonement THERE is in John 3:1-36 a twofold aspect of Christ presented to us, as the object of faith, through which we do not perish but have everlasting life. As Son of man, He must be lifted up; as only begotten Son of God, He is given by the infinite love of God. Many souls stop at the first, the Son of man’s meeting the necessity in which men stood as sinners before God, and do not look on to that infinite love of God which gave His only begotten Son-the love which provided the needed lamb, the true source of all this work of grace, which stamps on it its true character and effect, and without which it could not be. Hence such souls have not true peace and liberty with God. Practically for them the love is only in Christ, and God remains a just and unbending judge. They do not really know Him, the God of love, our Savior. Others alas! with more fatal error, false as to their own state and God’s holiness, with no true or adequate sense of sin, reject all true propitiation. The "must be lifted up" has no moral force for them, nothing that the conscience with a true sense of sin needs. The former was one great defect of the Reformation, the other comes of modern infidelity, for such it really is. Alas! that defect of the Reformation, as a system of doctrine, is the habitual state of many sincere souls now. But it is sad. Righteousness may reign for them with hope; but it is not grace reigning through righteousness. I repeat, God is not known in His nature of love, nor indeed the present completeness of redemption. The statement of John 3:1-36 begins with the need of man in view of what God is, as indeed it must; but it gives as the source and result of it for the soul, its measure too in grace, that which was in the heart of God towards a ruined world. As in Hebrews 10:1-39, to give us boldness to enter into the holiest, the origin is "Lo I come to do Thy will; by the which will we are sanctified by the offering of the body of Jesus Christ, once for all." The offering was the means, but He was accomplishing the will of God in grace, and by the exercise of the same grace in which He came to do it; for "hereby know we love, that He laid down His life for us." So in Romans 5:1-21 God commends His love to us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. It is summed up in the full saying: Grace reigns through righteousness unto eternal life, through Jesus Christ our Lord. This point being premised, and it is an important one, I add that we cannot present too simply the value of Christ’s blood, and redemption and forgiveness through it, to the awakened sinner whom that love may have drawn to feel his need; for by need, and because of need, the sinner must come-it is his only just place before God. The love of God, and even His love announced in forgiveness through the work of Christ, may, through the power of the Holy Ghost, awaken the sense of need; still having the forgiveness is another thing. That love, brought home to the soul through grace, produces confidence, not peace; but it does produce confidence. Hence we come into the light. God is light and God is love. Christ in the world was the light of the world, and He was there in divine love. Grace and truth came (iyivoro) by Jesus Christ. When God reveals Himself, He must be both-light and love. The love draws and produces confidence; as with the woman in the city who was a sinner, the prodigal, Peter in the boat. The light shows us our sinfulness. We are before God according to the truth of what He is, and the truth of what we are. But the atonement does more than show this; it meets and is the answer to our case when known. It is the ground, through faith, of forgiveness and peace (see Luke 7:47-50). Christ could anticipate His work, and the child of wisdom go in peace. The law may by grace reach the conscience and make us feel our guilt, but it does not reveal God in love. But that love has done what was needed for our sinful state. Hereby know we love, that He laid down His life for us. He was delivered for our offenses, died for our sins according to the Scriptures, is the propitiation for our sins, set forth as a mercy seat through faith in His blood which cleanses from all sin. With His stripes we are healed. I might multiply passages; I only now cite these, that the simple basis of the gospel in divine love on the one side, and on the other the work that love has wrought to purge our sins and withal our consciences, so that we may be in peace before a holy God, who is of purer eyes than to behold evil and cannot look on iniquity, may be simply and fully before us. We must come as sinners to God, because we are sinners; and we can only come in virtue of that which, while it is the fruit of God’s love, meets according to His holy nature the sins we are guilty of. But then, while it is true that our sins are removed far from us who believe through grace, as they were carried into a land not inhabited by the scapegoat in Israel, yet we have only an imperfect view of the matter in seeing our sins put away. In that great day of atonement the blood was sprinkled on the mercy seat and before it, just as it was sprinkled on the lintel and two door-posts to meet God’s eye. " When I see the blood," He says, " I will pass over." It was in view of the sin of Israel, but presented to God. The goat whose blood was shed was called, on the great day of atonement, "Jehovah’s lot." The blood was carried within; so it was with the bullock, and with the bullock it was exclusively this. The testimony was there, blessed be God, that as dwellers on the earth our sins have been carried off where none shall find them; but what characterized the day was putting the blood on the mercy seat- presenting it to God. On this day only, too, it was done. In the case of the sin of the congregation, or of the high priest, it was sprinkled on the altar outside the veil; but on the great day of atonement alone on the mercy seat within. Now, though the sinner must come as guilty and because of his need, and can come rightly in no other way, as the poor prodigal and so many other actual cases, yet this does not reach to the full character of propitiation or atonement, though in fact involving it. The divine glory and nature are in question. In coming we come by our need and wants; but if we have passed in through the veil, we can contemplate the work of Christ in peace, as viewed in connection with God’s nature, though on our part referring to sin. The sins, then, were carried away on the scapegoat, but what God is was specially in view in the blood carried within the veil. The sins were totally and forever taken off the believers, and never found; but there was much more in that which did it, and much more even for us. God’s character and nature were met in the atonement, and through this we have boldness to enter into the holiest. This distinction appears in the ordinary sacrifices. They were offered on the brazen altar, and the blood sprinkled there. Man’s responsibility was the measure of what was required. His case was met, as to guilt; but if he was to come to God, into His presence, he must be fit for the holiness of that presence. Christ has not only borne our sins but He has perfectly glorified God on the cross, and the veil is rent, and we have boldness to enter into the holiest. The blood, therefore, of the bullock and of the goat, which was Jehovah’s lot, was brought into the holiest. The other goat was the people’s lot, this Jehovah’s: He was dishonored by sin; and Christ the holy One was made sin for us, was before God according to what God was in His holy and righteous nature. Now, says the Lord, is the Son of man glorified, and God is glorified in Him. If God be glorified in Him, God shall also glorify Him in Himself, and shall straightway glorify Him; and man entered into the holiest, into heaven itself. Having glorified God in the very place of sin as made it before God, He enters into that glory on high. Love to God His Father, and absolute obedience at all costs, was perfected where He stood as sin before God. All that God is was glorified here, and here only. His majesty;-it became Him to maintain His glory in the moral universe, and thus in bringing many sons to glory, that He should make the Captain of our salvation perfect through suffering. His truth was made good; perfect, righteous judgment against sin, yet perfect love to the sinner. Had God cut off man for sin; there was no love; had He simply forgiven and passed over all sins, there would have been no. righteousness. People might have sinned on without its being any matter. There would have been no moral government. Mari must have stayed away from God, and misery and allowed’ sin have had their fling; or he must have been admitted into God’s presence in sin, and sin been allowed there; man incapable withal of enjoying God, and, as sensible of good and evil, more miserable than ever. But in the cross perfect righteousness against sin is displayed and exercised, and infinite love to the sinner. God is glorified in His nature, and salvation to the vilest and access to God, according to the holiness of that nature, provided for and made good, and this in the knowledge, in the conscious object of it, of the love that had brought it there; a perfect and cleansing work in which that love was known. This, while the sins were put away, could only be by the cross: God revealed in love, God holy and righteous against sin, while the sins of the sinner were put away, his conscience purged, and, by grace, his heart renewed, in the knowledge of a love beyond all his thoughts; himself reconciled to God, and God glorified in all that He is, as He could not else be; perfect access to God in the holiest, where that blood, the testimony to all this, has been presented to God, and the sins gone forever, according to God’s righteousness; while the sinner has the consciousness of being accepted according to the value of that sacrifice, in which God has been perfectly glorified, so that the glory of God and the sinner’s presence there were identified. Angels would learn, and principalities and powers, what they could learn nowhere else. And this marks the two parts of propitiation-man’s responsibility, and access to God given according to His glory and nature: in the sins borne and put away, the scapegoat, God judging evil according to what man ought to be; and access to God according to what He is. The last specifically characterizes the Christian; but the former was necessary, and accomplished for every one that believes; both by the same work of the cross, but each distinct-judicial dealing according to man’s responsibility, access to God according to His nature and holiness. The law in itself was the measure of the former, the child of Adam’s duty; the nature of God of the latter, so that we have the infinite blessedness of being with God according to His nature and perfection, partaking of the divine nature, so as to be able to enjoy it, holy and without blame before Him in love. Of this Christ as man, and we must add as Son withal, is the measure and perfection; and let it not be said that, if we partake of this nature, we need not this propitiation and substitution. This can only be said or supposed by those who have not got it; because, if we partake of the divine nature, we judge of sin in principle as God does, we have His mind as to it, and, as upright, of ourselves as in it, and so come, as I have said, first in lowliness in our need to the cross, and then purged in conscience, comprehend the glory of God in it. These two points, in their general aspect, are clearly presented in Hebrews 9:26-28 : Christ appeared once in the end of the world to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself; and as it is appointed unto men once to die, and after that the judgment, so Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many. It is carried out in application in chap. 10., where we have no more conscience of sins, and boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus. But this leads us to a still wider bearing of the work of the cross. The whole question of good and evil was brought to an issue there: man in absolute wickedness and hatred against God manifested in goodness and love; Satan’s whole power as prince of this world, and having the power of death; man in perfect goodness in Christ, obedience and love to His Father, and this in the place of sin, as made it, for it was there the need was for God’s glory and eternal redemption; God in perfect righteousness, and majesty, and in perfect love. So that all was perfectly settled morally forever. The fruits will be only complete in the new heavens and new earth, though the value of that work be now known to faith; but what is eternal is settled forever by it, for its value is such and cannot change. Propitiation, then, meets our sins through grace, according to God’s holy nature, to which it is presented, and which has been fully glorified in it. It meets the requirements of that nature. Yet is it perfect love to us; love, indeed, only thus known as wrought between Christ and God alone, the only part we had in it being our sins, and the hatred to God which killed Christ. But it does more, being according to God’s nature, and all that that nature is in every respect. It not only judicially meets what is required by reason of our sins, man’s failure in duty, and his guilt, but it opens access into the presence of God Himself, known in that nature which has been glorified in it. Love, God in love working unsought, has through grace made us love, and we are reconciled to God Himself according to all that He is, our conscience having been purged according to His glory, so that love may be in unhindered confidence. Man sits at the right band of God in virtue of it, and our souls can delight in all that God is, our conscience being made perfect by that which has been wrought. No enfeebling or lowering the holiness of God in His judicial estimate of and dealing with sin; on the contrary, all that He is thus glorified, no pleading goodness to make sin light; but God in the will and love of salvation met in that judgment and holiness, and the soul brought to walk in the light, as He is in the light, and in the love which is His being and nature, without blame before Him, a perfect conscience so as to be free before Him, but a purged one which has judged of sin as He does, but learned what sin is in the putting of it away. ’Without the atonement or propitiation of Christ this is impossible. God is not brought in; it is but human goodness which drops holiness and overlooks sin, or estimates it according to mere natural conscience. Christ has died, the Just for the unjust, that He might bring us to God. It is not innocence, for the knowledge of good and evil is there, not the slighting of God and an unpurged conscience, not even the return to the former state of Adam (not knowing good and evil, innocent), but God fully revealed and known in majesty and light and love, and we brought to Him according to that revelation in perfect peace and joy by a work done for us, which has met and glorified His majesty and light and love in the place of sin, as made it, by Him who knew no sin. The full result will only be in the new heavens and new earth, the eternal state of blessedness, a condition of happiness not dependent on fulfilling the responsibility in which he who enjoyed it was placed and in which he failed, but based on a finished work accomplished to the glory of God in the very place of ruin, the value of which can never in the nature of things change; it is according to the nature and character of God, it is done and is always what it is, and all is eternally stable. Righteousness, not innocence, dwells in the new heavens and the new earth, not feeble man responsible, but God glorified for evermore. The result is not all there yet; but we know that the work is done through the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven, and wait as believers for our portion in the rest when all shall be accomplished, accepted in the Beloved. Judgment is according to man’s responsibility, shut out then judicially into that exclusion from God into which man has cast himself; blessing is according to the thoughts and purpose and nature of God in the exceeding riches of His grace displayed in our salvation through the work of the Lord Jesus Christ come to bring us into His presence as sons. Sin and sins are before God in the cross, and propitiation wrought, There sin and sins met God, but in the work of love according to holiness and righteousness, which brings to God according to His nature those who come to Him by it cleared from them all forever. In commenting on. Dr. Waldenström’s statements * as to the atonement, I would begin by saying that I entirely agree with him (and indeed I have long insisted on this in contrast with the church confessions of the Reformation), that it is man who is reconciled to God, and that Scripture never speaks of God’s being reconciled to man. (*Om försoningcns betydelse of P. Waldenström. Stockholm.) The statement and the thought are wholly unscriptural, and shock rather the scripturally-taught mind. And it alters the whole tone of the gospel and the state of soul as to God, both as to peace and the sanctifying power of the truth, for it is the truth which sanctifies. That God is always the same and immutable is assuredly true. Thank God, it is so.. There is one thing Stable; or what would be,? But while fully acknowledging this, it seems to me that some of Dr. Waldenström’s thoughts come from traditions or from his own mind, not from the word of God; and these I would briefly notice, while my heart would encourage him in his conflict in ’maintaining the truth of which I have just spoken. And here I would add that I look to the Scriptures alone as the foundation and source of truth; on them alone I shall base any doctrine; and if I call in question any statement of Dr. W.’s, it will be because it is not in the word; and I present to him these remarks, first of all, that he may weigh them before the Lord, remembering how important the truth is, and how all blessing and sanctification flow to our souls by it through grace. It is to the Scriptures that the apostle refers us in 2 Timothy 3:1-17 when the perilous times should be come. And are they not there? Dr. Waldenström’s first proposition is "that no change has been effected in the heart of God by the fall." Now as to God’s nature, this is surely true. If He is love, He is always love; if righteous, always righteous; if holy, always holy. But because He changes not, His relationship towards others changes, and His conduct and dealings, because they are changed. God would not, could not, because He did not change, drive man out of paradise when he was innocent. This would have been a change in God if there was none in man. But He did drive him out when he had sinned, because the righteousness (which would have left him to enjoy in innocence the blessings in the midst of which He had placed him while unchanged, and because He Himself did not change) now had to deal with one that was changed, and therefore dealt differently, dealt judicially, with the guilty and alienated, which He had not to do before. Leaving him to enjoy the tree of life, and turning him out and barring the way to it, was an immense difference, an immense change-not in God, but in God’s ways and dealings with man because He did not change. And to say that God does not change in Himself does not meet the question. Even the love was quite different in its ways and character. The love of complacency in what He had made good is very different from the sovereign love of mercy which works to redeem a fallen, defiled, and guilty creature. God rested when all was created, and all was good; but, when Jesus was maliciously accused of violating the Sabbath, His sovereignly beautiful answer was, "My Father worketh hitherto, and I work." How could the love of God, a holy God, rest in sin and misery? It could work in grace, but it could not rest. And there is a revelation of that in God in redemption which had no place in innocence. God commendeth His love to us in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. Love takes the character of grace to what is in enmity, not of complacency in what was His own work. Here let me remark that, if I do not mistake him, Dr. W., with all who rest in theological traditions, reckons Adam to be righteous and holy. He was neither, but innocent. To be righteous or holy requires the knowledge of good and evil, and this Adam had not till he fell; and the difference is immense. We have only to speak of God as innocent, and the believer’s heart at once revolts from it- is offended by it. Righteous and holy He surely is. This difference in Adam is clearly and formally stated in Scripture. It was the promise of Satan (Genesis 3:5), and Jehovah Elohim declares it to be so (verse 22). Tradition has falsified all this, but the word is clear and certain. It does not mean "You shall know evil who before knew only good." Would Satan have proposed such a thing as this to him, or, still more, could it have this sense in God’s mouth? " The man is become as one of us, knowing good and evil." No, he was before innocent now makes inwardly the difference between right and wrong, not merely by an imposed law as tradition teaches, but inwardly as God does, though he may be hardened or misled as God cannot be. We must not confound the rule for conscience with conscience. The law is the perfect rule for the conscience of Adam’s fallen children, Christ’s walk for the Christian, and this the soul taught of God accepts, and with delight. The conscience takes; knowledge of the difference of what, is right and what is wrong. Further, the question is not, as Dr. W. states it, " If the fall was an obstacle in the way of man’s salvation." It was no obstacle to his salvation. Salvation was not needed without the fall; but it was an obstacle, and in itself an absolute one, to man’s acceptance as he was. Christ came to save what was lost, and that, because God was not changed but remained holy and righteous-is "of purer eyes than to behold evil and cannot look on iniquity." I do not speak of God’s wrath against the world being the obstacle; but the unconverted man is under wrath, a Child of wrath. I do not say this was an obstacle to salvation; it was not; because God was sovereign in goodness. But Scripture does not speak of the matter as Dr. W. does. He asks, "How could He be propitiated that loved?" A person who loves deeply and truly may require something in order that he may show favor. The eternal maintenance of the unchangeableness of God’s character, of the nature of good and evil as He sees it, may require it. Not merely man’s being saved is in question, for that is not the result of Christ’s death as to all men, if He did die for all, but the public testimony to the immutability of God’s nature, and to maintain it in the sight of the universe; yea, to lay the foundation of the immutable blessing of the new heavens and the new earth according to what God is, supreme as righteous, holy, and love. A father with the most perfect love to his child may require for the order of his family that satisfaction to his authority, what maintains it before all, and the rules of his house, be done. " It became Him (God) for whom are all things and by whom are all things in bringing many sons unto glory, to make the captain of their salvation perfect through sufferings" (Hebrews 2:10). It became Him. Did. He not love that blessed One? Yet it became Him to do this. So that this statement of Dr. W.’s is alike inadequate and incorrect. There is that which becomes God because of what He is, which is not love, though love be His unchangeable nature. And now see how Scripture actually speaks of the very point. It does not simply say that, where sin abounded, love did much more abound, but grace did much more abound. But more. We were by nature the children of wrath. It was our natural inheritance from God; for whose wrath is spoken of? What belonged to us? "But God who is rich in mercy, for His great love wherewith He loved us." So that wrath against us, as our natural portion from God, is not inconsistent with infinite and sovereign love. So Christ in the synagogue looked upon them with anger, being grieved at the hardness of their hearts. The grief was love, the anger His righteous estimate of their sin. Grace reigns, blessed be God, but it is through righteousness (Romans 5:1-21) Dr. W. seems to say it is in making us practically righteous by removing our sins. But it is " God’s righteousness." Does he question it is God’s wrath? I quote Romans 1:17-18 for both, " I am not ashamed of the gospel, for therein is the righteousness of God revealed." Why? "For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven." And then Paul proceeds to prove all the world guilty before God as the reason of this. It is not true, therefore, that wrath cannot be where there is love. A father full of love may be rightly angry with his child, and when Dr. W. says "wrath in the heart," he is misled altogether, and confounds hatred with judicial anger. There is no hatred in God to man assuredly. Yet God is a righteous judge, and God is angry every day and ought to be so. Farther on Dr. W. admits that there is wrath against sin in God’s mind, and therefore against the sinner while he abides in the sin; but what God does is to take away the criminality by Christ, and so He can love the sinner, and His wrath has no ground as the sin is gone. Now, as thus put, it is merely the personal state of the sinner which removes the wrath in removing the occasion of it. And this is doubly, and in every way false. First, it mars the perfectness of God’s sovereign love. God loved us while we were sinners, and this is characteristic of His love, His saving love; and secondly, it ignores the righteousness of God, and the work by which judicially the sins were put away. I do not mean that he denies that Christ died for our sins as a fact; but it is merely the effect in us which removes the wrath, the state we are in which leaves God free to love us; our criminality is gone, we are cleansed, so there is no object of wrath left because we are clean. He speaks indeed of God’s wrath being His justice, but all his reasoning is that there is no "change in the disposition from anger to kindness." But peace had to be made when there was wrath, and the sovereign love that saves is not the favor which rests on those reconciled (Romans 5:1). God loved us when we were sinners; He loves us without any change when we are cleansed. But we are cleansed, reconciled, we are told. Now I fully recognize, and insist on it, that God loved us when we were sinners, and that we are reconciled. But then, according to Dr. W., the only change is in our state, which leaves God free to love us; whereas He loved us when we were in our sins. The change spoken of is by the operation and work of grace in us. The work of Christ we needed is wholly left out. I do not mean that Dr. W. in terms denies there was an ’atonement; he says, Scripture teaches the necessity of an atonement. But what is this? Is it anything towards God? " The reconciliation must be effected by our recovering the righteousness in which God through His righteousness could again become our eternal life." There are as many errors as thoughts here; but I only notice now that the mediatorial work of atonement is simply a change in our actual state, otherwise "the righteous One is a consuming fire for the unrighteous," and so over and over again. I quote one passage more:-" No: where there is sin, there is wrath; God’s wrath is unchangeably manifest, as sure as God is God." I ask in passing, Is there no sin in us? "His justice can take no other form against sin but that of wrath, and it is impossible that there should be sin without the wrath of God." " But where there is righteousness, there is no wrath to be quenched, for there can be none." " But an individual who is blameless respecting the law is outside its wrath, and instead thereof enjoys its blessings."’ Did God then not love us when we were sinners? If He did, and it is impossible there should be sin without the wrath of God, wrath and love go together. All Dr. W.’s system is false. The truth is, all this confounds divine favor resting on us in Christ, and sovereign love to the sinner. The first part of what the Lord says in John 3:1-36 is thus left out. "As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of man be lifted up." The Son of man, He who represented man, must be lifted up-die on the cross; and where was such a lamb to be found? " God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten Son." The " Son of man " must be lifted up, the " Son of God " was given, the same blessed person; but " Son of man," to die for man’s need, standing for man before God; " Son of God," vessel and proof of God’s sovereign love. He is therefore spoken of as representing man, which Dr. W. denies, and not merely God. Nor did He, properly speaking, represent God in dying, nor in being made sin. His doing so was the effect of God’s infinite love to man, which was His own withal; but in the work thus wrought He suffered as Son of man, made sin. This could not represent God. If the world be reconciled, the relationship is changed, though God be not. But this Scripture never says.* (*The Swedish translation in 2 Corinthians 5:19 says God has reconciled the world, not God was in Christ reconciling. So far, Dr. W. is excusable; but he knows Greek. The translator is inexcusable. I suppose he followed Luther, who also so translates it. But there is no possible pretense for so translating it in the Greek. The Vulgate does not. And so far from being reconciled, the world rejected Him when He came. Hence the ministry of the apostle was beseeching’ them to be reconciled. I shall always treat the passage as it really is.) Christ, Dr. W. tells us, " was struck by the curse of God’s wrath against sin." " He descended," he says, "into our sin," and so was " struck by the curse of God’s wrath." * Whom did He represent then? (*I am told the exact translation is the curse and wrath. But this makes ne difference.) Was Christ, as man made sin for us and struck by the curse, representing God in this place? That His doing so was the effect of infinite divine love is true; but did sin, and wrath, and the curse represent in the infliction of it God’s love or God’s righteous wrath against sin? By the grace of God He tasted death, being mane a little lower than the angels to that end; but was His tasting death, and drinking that dreadful cup, and sweating as it were great drops of blood at only thinking of it, God’s love to Him or apprehended by Him? Did He pray that if it were possible the cup might pass, meaning the cup of God’s love? I am told it was to justify us, to make us righteous. All true; and His not sparing His own Son was the infinite love of God. But what was Christ doing and suffering then in order to that end?, We must not slip away from it by confounding the effect in believers and the work or suffering which wrought that `effect. God does look upon believers with complacency as righteous in Christ, and the result is far greater and more admirable than all that Dr. W. speaks of. He has obtained for us to be partakers of His own glory according to the counsels of God; but the wrath of God, His judicial wrath against the sin, was removed by Christ’s being made sin for us and bearing our sins, not by our state in consequence of it, which is the effect of that. " He was wounded for our transgressions, bruised for our iniquities; the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed." If the chastisement of our peace was upon Him, He was substituted in drinking that dreadful cup for us. He was our (believers’) representative there. God dealt with Him so because of our sins which were laid upon Him, and for that reason peace comes to us; not because we became actually righteous: our peace is the effect of His chastisement. You may quarrel with the word " appease," and confound judicial stripes with " hatred;" but do not let us lose what Dr. W. does not deny, though he argues it away in taking " wrath " for "hatred,". and making the ground of our peace our actual state of righteousness; whereas we are made the righteousness of God in Christ because He has been made sin for us (2 Cot 5: 21). Our peace is the fruit of God’s judicial chastisement falling on Christ. If not, of what is it the fruit? "He was struck when He descended into our sin" (was made sin for us) " by the curse of God’s wrath against sin." The sin then, according to Dr. W., has been dealt with in wrath. Whose sin? If Christ descended into our sin (an expression by no means agreeable to me), and the curse of God’s wrath came upon Him for it, it is not simply God’s loving us. Righteousness dealt with sin in wrath, and thus God’s anger (the curse) was executed, and so peace was made: His anger was turned away from us. When He who knew no sin was made sin for us, the curse fell on Him. Never was Christ so precious to His Father as then. " Therefore cloth my Father love me, because I lay down my life." But this is not the question. Did not "the curse of God’s wrath" which was due to our sins come upon Him? He had no sin: He was delivered for our offenses, and "the curse of wrath" came. If as our representative He bore our sins, and God’s curse and wrath came upon Him, He was our representative so as to have the curse upon Him, for because of those sins He so suffered and drank the cup, and the anger was over, gone, as regards all that believe. The anger against our sins had to be executed, and so ceased; with us it would have been eternal condemnation, but through a mediator’s stepping in and taking the curse He has redeemed us from it. Christ has redeemed us from the curse by being made a curse for us. Infinite love, no doubt; but whom did Christ represent when "the curse" came upon Him for sin? Was it God when He laid on Him our iniquity? That He was God, and else could not have done it, is all blessedly true; but it is not the question. Did He represent God in suffering the curse which God laid upon Him? He glorified God: that is true (" Now is the Son of man glorified, and God is glorified in him"). And glorifying God was the first grand object, and not merely love to us. This was part of the glory, no doubt, but it was not all. It is not simply that God was putting away our sins, but there was a mediator with whom He was dealing about sins. God was making Him sin, and dealing with Him in the way of a curse because of it, when He had " offered himself without spot to God." Curse and wrath have been executed; and thus peace has been made. It is not without God’s dealing with sin, that He has treated us as righteous, nor was our being made righteous "recovering our righteousness " (a wholly unscriptural thought), which made God righteously favorable to us; but He held us to be righteous because of what the mediator had done, and this was not representing God, but "the man Christ Jesus" bearing the curse of wrath from God. According to Dr. W. himself God takes vengeance. He is not unrighteous who taketh vengeance, claims it exclusively to Himself: "Vengeance is mine. I will recompense, saith the Lord." Assuredly this is righteous judgment with Him, not passion or hatred; but it is real. Christ will appear " taking vengeance on them that know not God, and that obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ." But through a mediator there is peace made for us. The Red Sea which destroyed the Egyptians was a safeguard, and the way of deliverance, for Israel. And it is to this work of Christ God looks in sparing and forgiving, not to the state we are in in consequence of it, true as that consequence may be. When Jehovah executed judgment in Egypt, He did not say " When I see them righteous, through the slain lamb of course, I shall not smite them; " nor " I will spare them because they have recovered righteousness." The blood was to be put outside the house to meet God’s eye, and He says-" When I see the blood, I will pass over you" (Exodus 12:13). And if I am justified by faith, faith in what? Not faith in my state of righteousness; but faith in the person and blood-shedding and resurrection of the Lord Jesus. I do know I am forgiven and cleansed through it, but my faith is not in that; for faith in my being righteous cannot be what justifies me, but faith in Christ and His work does justify me. I believe that God has accepted that work. Anger and wrath rested on me; Christ stepped in between and drank the dreadful cup, and there is no, more anger for me. There was wrath outstanding against me; and now there is not: call it " appeasing " or not, that is the truth. It is not that God does not impute my sins, because I am now righteous and there is nothing to impute; but because Christ has borne them. I believe on Him who raised up Christ from the dead, delivered for our offenses, raised again for our justification; and having been justified by faith I have peace with God (Romans 4:24-25; Romans 5:1). My present state of righteousness, though it may be the reason why there is no cause for wrath now, says nothing about my past sins, nor can it be the means of clearing them away; but a real work of suffering for sins, the Just for the unjust. That work may be the means of bringing us into that state, so that God looks on us with complacency. But what did the work? what cleared the sins? Was the cup, and what Dr. W. calls " the curse of wrath," love in itself? Love to us may have caused its being done; but what was it that was done? And here I must make a remark as to Dr. W.’s use of Romans. He only uses the second part which does not treat of our guilt by our sins, but of our state by Adam’s sin. By one man’s disobedience many were made sinners" (Rona. 5: 19). The two parts of the epistle are quite distinct. The division is between the 11th and 12th verses of chapter fifth. The first treats of our sins and guilt, the second of our sin and state before God; and, though the cross be the remedy for both, yet the difference of its use is very marked. " Christ died for our sins " is what avails in the first part. Believers have died with Christ in the second; they are no longer before God in the flesh. They are " in Christ," " in the Spirit." Their status is changed, they pass. (having been "crucified with Christ ") out of Adam into Christ. Now this does refer to their standing or state. The first part of the epistle on the contrary deals ’with the guilt of their own sins, the sins they are guilty of as children of Adam. This first part escapes Dr. W.’s attention altogether, and it is in this that " propitiation" is found (Romans 3:25), not in the second. Christ died for us in the first part; in the second, we are "in Christ," " not in the flesh." He was " delivered for our offenses" in the first part (Romans 4:25); " our old man is crucified with him" in the second. Now I shall have some remarks to make on the use of the second part; but I here notice the first. After having spoken of the guilt of Gentiles and Jews, and that God’s wrath was revealed against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men who hold the truth in unrighteousness, the apostle tells us that God had "set forth Christ for a mercy-seat through faith in his blood to declare his (God’s) righteousness for the remission of sins that are past... to declare at this time his righteousness, so that he is righteous and the justifier of him that believes in Jesus" (Romans 3:25-26). It is not man’s righteousness, but God’s, in justifying a sinner. God’s wrath has been "revealed from heaven." Guilt was there, and consequently wrath was there. Guilt is put away, so that wrath should not and does not reach the believer, though one guilty and deserving it. How so? Christ is presented to man as "a mercy seat," where he could approach God, according to " God’s righteousness." And how so? "By faith in his blood." And to whom was the blood presented on the mercy seat, as on the lintel and the two doorposts? To God. It was not God seeing man’s righteousness, and so having nothing about which to show wrath, but having Christ’s blood presented to Him, which caused the wrath due to man, as guilty, to be passed away, and not to be inflicted. God sets forth Christ in this character to poor sinners in the gospel to reconcile them; but what He presents is that the blood has been presented to Him in the sanctuary, and He justifies not the righteous, because they are, so, but the ungodly, because Christ has died for our sins, and He sees the blood and passes over,. and man can approach through faith in Christ’s blood. All this aspect of the truth is passed over by Dr. W. He turns to the state of those in Christ in contrast with Adam, the second part of the Romans, and speaks of "justification of life" for those who have died with Him, and forgets the justification of "the ’ungodly" through faith in the blood shed for our sins. My faith, in coming to the mercy seat, is in that which has been done for the ungodly, in the blood which has been carried into the holiest, and not in my state as having "recovered righteousness," so that there can be no wrath against me. God justifies the ungodly through faith in Christ’s blood; not the righteous, because there is no ground for wrath. Justifying is even wrongly used. Even in the second part of Romans it is "of many offenses to justification;" not complacency and absence of wrath, because man has righteousness. And wrath is not spoken of there as ceased; but that, if He has reconciled us when enemies, having been reconciled " we shall be saved from wrath through him " in "the day of wrath and revelation of the righteous judgment of God." Nor was it merely forgiving our transgressions that was the effect of Christ’s work. He "suffered for sins, the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God." The great day of atonement tells us the same tale and the same truth: only then it was signified by "the veil" that men could not go into "the holiest;" whereas now the believer can boldly. Dr. W. affirms that there was but one meaning to both goats; but this is contrary both to the institution and to the explanation in the Hebrews. As to the institution, one was called "Jehovah’s lot," the other was for the people: not that the first was not in view of the people’s sins; but there was the double thought-(1) of Jehovah’s glory and nature in the holiest; and (2) the removing the sins of the people according to their responsibility, gone where they never should be found. Nothing can be more distinctly set before us than this double character; it is one that runs through all the sacrifices and estimates of sin. They may be measured by the responsibility of man as God’s creature, and the law is the perfect measure of that, and that is a question of positive guilt; and in general sacrifices at the brazen altar were in view of that, or they may be looked at as fitting me for the presence of God in light. Into this the Jew could not come, whereas we have "boldness to enter into the holiest by the new and living way." The goat whose blood was shed and Hazazel were practically one; but it is evidently a double aspect of Christ’s atoning sacrifice: the slain goat was " Jehovah’s lot," the other not. This surely meant something; all God’s nature and character were connected with it. I say this not as an opinion, but as stated of Christ as the ground of His being in glory as man. "Now " (when Judas went out) "is the Son of mart glorified, and God is glorified in him; if God be glorified in him, God shall also glorify him in Himself, and shall straightway glorify hint" (John 13:31). So in John 17:4," I have glorified thee on the earth; I have finished the work which thou gavest me to do; and now glorify thou me with thine ownself with the glory I had with thee before the world was." God’s glory and the glorifying of Christ are the effects of the cross here, not the putting away of our sins only, which lowers it in its character, blessed as that truth is for us. It was thus "Jehovah’s lot." So He was "God’s lamb to put away the sin (not the sins) of the world?’ " He appeared once in the end of the world to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself " (Hebrews 9:26), a matter clearly distinct in Hebrews 9:1-28 from " bearing the sins of many," verse 28. The blood was presented to God. God had been dishonored by sin, His fair creation all spoiled and come under the bondage of corruption; His race of predilection, man, in whom His purposes were, the slave of sin and Satan. His glory had to be retrieved, and in the very place of sin; thank God that such a thing should be As a man, Christ did so. All that God is was glorified, man perfectly obedient at all cost, the Father perfectly loved, His majesty, truth, righteousness against sin, and love to sinners, all brought out and made good through the blessed One who suffered. We bless God unceasingly, and shall forever that it was in that which was done for us. Still we have the Lord’s words for it that it was "glorifying God," where He makes no allusion to its being for us. Only man is gone into God’s glory through it. Hence the blood was sprinkled on the mercy seat and before it, and also on the altar of incense, and this was the way of approach to God, not merely of putting away guilt, for we have boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus, and the incense altar is our place as priests. Nor, though it was done in respect of the sins of the people, was it the cleansing them or forgiving them. It was what belonged to God, the holy place and the altar of incense, the place where God dwelt, which had to be cleansed, not the people. It was not forgiving them, though the basis of that, but "Jehovah’s lot" cleansing the place of His presence, showing the character of Him who dwelt there who could not bear sin and uncleanness. Then the people’s sins were laid on Hazazel and carried away. But what concerns " Jehovah’s lot" is all left out in Dr. W.’s scheme; it is reduced to what was accomplished in Hazazel. Even as to this Dr. W. in his general thought loses its real force, and makes it a reconciliation of the world, an abstract putting away of sin for all, not the actual real, effectual, putting away of sins; but of this I will speak farther on, when I come to speak of certain passages which he quotes not according to the word of God. My object now is to show that the great effect of the distinction of the two goats, and, I may add, of what was done with the bullock, whose blood was employed as one of them, is lost and set aside by Dr. W., and the bringing us to God in the holiest (not merely clearing the world) dropped-the highest and especial blessing of the saint; and this done, not by forgiving His people, but by presentation of the blood to God, by whom the excellency of this sacrifice in which He has been glorified in respect, yea, through the very means, of sin, is justly estimated. It is far more than forgiveness, it is being brought to God; and by that which is done Godward, in respect of what God is, not manward, though the occasion be what man has done. It is entirely arbitrary to say that Jehovah’s lot and the goat for the people have the same signification, though both refer to the sacrifice of Christ. In one, God was glorified in respect of the sin that had come in, in the other the sins were removed from the people. It is not all that men be forgiven: sin must be removed out of God’s sight; and He has done what accomplishes that blessed purpose. It is what reveals and glorifies God Himself in a wholly new way. Moreover, the just anger which rested on the guilty on God’s part is removed as to the believer by the sacrifice of Christ, call it "appeasing," or what you will. It did not change God, but it changed the relative attitude of God towards the sinner. What He is, and will be in judging, actually towards the sinner, He is not towards the believer, not because of what the believer is become, but because of what has been done for him in the sacrifice of Christ. As when God said when He smelt the sweet savor of Noah’s sacrifice, "I will no more curse; " not because man was become good, for He adds for "the imagination of the thoughts of his heart is evil from his youth." In sum, then, the blood was presented to God for Him to see, on the door, on the mercy seat; and Christ entering in not without blood was the witness that He had suffered, borne the sins, been forsaken of God, drunk the dreadful cup. That was not love, it was death, the curse, what Dr. W. calls "the curse of wrath " (an expression I should not use), and consequently God acted differently towards the believer from what He must have acted, had this not been done; not because He was changed, but because He was not; but acted according to His constantly righteous nature. He did not love us because we had recovered righteousness, but when we were sinners. The system of Dr. W. diminishes the love, and alters its character as much as it does the righteousness. God smelled a sweet savor, a חַנִּיחתַאֶח־ריחַ the odor of rest, and said, I will no more curse, and this is called ἱλασμός,ἱλάσκεσθαι, and the mercy seat ἱλαστήριον in the New Testament. Now, those words refer to God. They involve forgiveness and favor, but favor obtained by the sacrifice of Christ presented to God. I do not say love caused, for it was infinite love gave the Son to be the lamb of propitiation; but that love wrought by a work which maintained the righteousness and holiness of God in forgiving and justifying; and, though the word may be used for the effect, it is applied to God in the New Testament, and its meaning is " propitiation " or " appeasing." " Reconciling," which is applied to believers, is a totally different word καταλλάσσω, καταλλαγή. The ἱλασμός was offered to God, ἱλαστήριον was where His blood was placed on God’s throne, and it was God who was the object of ἱλάσκεσθαι, man of καταλλαγή (1 John 2:2; Romans 3:25; Hebrews 2:17); and as to καταλλάσσω, see Romans 5:10-11; 2 Corinthians 5:18-21; Cot 1: 20, 21. As to the last word Dr. W. is right. It is man, not God, who is reconciled; but he has failed in giving its force to the former. I must now show that connected with this there are a number of statements made by Dr. W. which are from traditional habits of thinking, not from Scripture. The question of sin has wholly lost its judicial character in Dr. W.’s mind He sees only the moral condition of the sinner. " He who continues in sin is struck by God’s wrath against sin, nor is this relationship altered by the death of Christ." " To be carnally minded is death; if ye live after the flesh, ye shall die: whenever there is sin, there is unchangeably God’s wrath, as surely as God is a righteous God, and salvation from this wrath is only to be obtained by justification from sin" (Romans 5:9). Now all this seems fair enough, but it misrepresents the case, because it confounds the ceasing to be carnally minded (that is, my state) with justification from sin, which is wholly and solely by the work of another, though it may be accompanied by a work in me which does change my state. But the whole statement is a mistake as to the gospel, even as to the love shown in it. " God was in Christ reconciling the world to Himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them;" and this was when the blessed Lord was here in the world. It was God’s way of dealing when the trespasses were there. And, as to justification, it is not the morally righteous He justifies, but the ungodly. Romans 4:5. We are " justified freely by His grace, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom God has set forth to be a propitiation (mercy seat) through faith in His blood." Do not let the reader suppose that this implies continuance in sin. That question is met by Romans 6:1-23, but not by weakening what goes before in Romans, and which treats the judicial question, but by adding the truth of a new divine life, and death to sin, in Christ. It remains that by one man’s obedience many are made righteous. The world will always charge this as being an allowance of sin; but the believer who has a new life knows better. A holy nature, Christ become his life, hates the sin; but this is holiness, not righteousness; and one who is convinced of guilt does not reject the forgiveness and justification of the guilty, because he knows he wants it, though he may be kept a long while from peace because he confounds the two. Dr. W. does not deny, it will be said, that Christ was a propitiatory sacrifice.* He does not. (*But then the love that gave Him was love to sinners in their sins and under wrath.) What then does a propitiatory sacrifice mean? Was it offered to God or to man? Whom does it propitiate? It is not that man is versöhnt (reconciled), but sühne (propitiation) presented to God. He accepts the words, but denies the thing, e.g., " If we regard the plain words of Scripture respecting Christ’s redemption, we find them treat solely of man’s reconciliation." " It is not, God laid His wrath on Him" This is quite untrue. I do not use the word wrath, but stripes, chastisement, He was wounded, bruised for our iniquities, is said. Dr. W. will answer, it was that we might be healed. Thank God it was. But what happened that we might be? Dr. W. calls it " the curse of God’s wrath." How can he say God did not lay His wrath upon Him? His mind is running rightly on our being reconciled, and divine love in it; but he contradicts himself when he admits that, when Christ descended into our sin (was made sin for us), the curse of wrath came upon Him. And what he says just afterward is unfounded and contradictory to itself and Scripture. " It is correct to say that God’s justice was satisfied by Christ’s atonement, not any demand of God’s justice for vengeance over the sinner, for God loved him, but the demand of God’s justice for the sinner’s justification as a condition of his salvation." This is the merest sophistry. What did that justice demand for this justification? Was it not, according to Dr. W., " the curse of wrath ". on Christ? Call it " curse of wrath " or just vengeance against sin, is alike. Vengeance is mine I will recompense, saith the Lord-ἐμοὶ ἐκδίκησι, ἐγὼ ἀνταποδώσω, λέγει Κύριος.וְשִלֵםכָקםָ belong to God, and wrath is revealed now from heaven against all ungodliness, not merely temporal judgment, as in the government of the world. What was the " demand of God’s justice for the sinner’s justification? Was it " the curse of wrath " or not? I use in both cases Dr. W.’s words. All this reasoning of Dr. W. avoids the question. The object of the atonement, he tells us, was to remove his (man’s) sins; but this was not all: there was glorifying God; but I only ask now, What in the atonement did remove the sins? Was it "the curse of wrath?" and, if so, whose wrath? But I turn now to expressions in which Dr. W. states his system, for which he has no warrant in Scripture: " I find it everywhere written that God through Christ reconciled the world to Himself." It is nowhere so written.* (*See Note to p. 14.) If it be said, let us have " faithful adherence to the words of Scripture," I read, " God was in Christ reconciling the world." But, so far from its being reconciled, " the world knew Him not," and " His own received Him not." It is the statement of God’s dealing with the world when here, and goes on then, as a distinct thing, to " the ministry of reconciliation " in the apostle; Christ, who knew no sin, having been made sin for us." But in no way or form does it say the world has been reconciled. 2 Corinthians 5:17-18, distinctly shows that it is those who belong to the " new creation " who are reconciled, and what follows shows that it is by the word: and that God in love is beseeching men to be reconciled. God could not beseech the men of the world to be reconciled if they already were. Again, in Colossians 1:20-21, he speaks of the time to come, when the whole order of things in heaven and earth will be reconciled, and then speaks of Christian believers, the holy and faithful brethren at Colosse, " and you that were sometime alienated and enemies in your minds by wicked works, yet now bath He reconciled." So far from saying the world is reconciled, Scripture carefully teaches an exclusive actual present reconciliation of believers. The nearest approach to such a thought does not refer to the efficacy of Christ’s death at all, but to the dispensational dealings of God, in which the casting away of the Jews opened the door of grace to the Gentiles as such, Romans 11:15. In Ephesians 2:1-22 again you have peace being made: it was to make of Jew and Gentile together one new man, reconciling both to God in one body, and to that end goes and preaches peace to the nigh (Jews) and those afar off (Gentiles); but a reconciled world by the cross is unknown to and denied by Scripture. " The whole world is lying in wickedness." That the door of grace and preaching peace to it is opened is true; but believers only are reconciled (" you hath He reconciled," you who are in the faith) according to the positive statement of Scripture; and this affects the whole scheme of Dr. W. Further on, replying to Mr. Welinder, Dr. W. confounds the sovereign love of goodness to a fallen world with love of relationship. Both writers assume the world to be reconciled, and neither sees the difference of special affections and absolute general goodness. I ought to love everybody; but my love to my wife and children is another thing. God loved the world; but believers are His children, and the Church of God Christ’s bride and body. We are " God’s children by faith in Christ Jesus" (Galatians 3:1-29), sons of God, and " Christ loved the church and gave Himself for it" to present it to Himself as God did Eve to Adam. I cannot go further into this here; but it does show that in both these writers theology and tradition have eclipsed the light of Scripture. Dr. W. says:-" The atonement spoken of in Scripture was an atonement by which the sins of the world were removed." No such thought is found in Scripture; that He is an ἰλασμός for the world is said, but that the sins of the world are removed is wholly unscriptural. If so, there could be nothing to judge men for; for they are judged according to their works (Revelation 20:13), and the Lord says:-" If ye believe not that I am He, ye shall die in your sins;" and the Apostle, " Because of these things the wrath of God cometh upon the children of disobedience." It is said of Christ that He is the ὁ αἴρων, not of the sins, but of the sin of the world, and that He baptizes with the Holy Ghost, not that He has taken away our sins. This taking away of sin will be completely fulfilled only in the new heavens and the new earth, and He, as Lamb of God, is this taker away; but that the atonement spoken of in Scripture was one by which the sins of the world were removed is utterly and wholly untrue. Further, there is no statement that God gave His Son that the world might recover the righteousness it had lost in the fall -not even that Adam had righteousness before the fall; nor had the world or Adam any union with God before the fall or after; nor is "union with God" a Scriptural expression or thought at all. "Dwelling in God and God in us" is, but not union. It is utterly unscriptural. Union with the glorified man Christ is Scriptural, and that is by the Holy Ghost. We are " members of His body," but this is the result of redemption (see Ephesians 1:1-23; Ephesians 2:1-22.); and this even Adam unfallen had not at all. In what follows both controversialists again confound His love of divine goodness toward the world and the love of relationship, and that love of goodness towards the world, as such, with individuals personally; and though I doubt not, thank God, that God sought and seeks wandering sinners in their sins, Dr. W. forgets that in the prodigal son it was a returning prodigal come back to his father, to whom a father’s love was displayed, and the best robe put on him, and he received into the house, The two first parables in Luke 15:1-32 give the love that seeks, the last the love that receives; and though all be grace in this chapter, and the father went out and sought the elder brother (the Pharisee), he never got what the father’s love gave to the prodigal-his own fault, doubtless; but, still true, he had neither kiss, nor best robe, nor ring. When Dr. W. says "God’s point of view is solely as follows: God loved the fallen world, and, moved solely by His own love, sent His Son to save and restore us from sin," he states what is quite unscriptural. That God did so love the world is true, but that God’s point of view is solely that is not true. Nor is it said that He might remove its sins. God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish but have everlasting life; but His point of view is not solely this. This phrase, "that whosoever," etc., is carefully repeated, and what Dr. W. states is not even put first. But " as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whosoever "-that is the Scripture carefully states two things, and puts that first which Dr. W. leaves out. I am not objecting, assuredly, to God’s love being the source of it. I sympathize with Dr. W. wholly in this; but his statement is contrary to Scripture on the point in question. It obliterates what was needed that this love might be made good. He will say, " I have stated elsewhere that the atonement, a propitiation, was needed." He has; but he has, through pre-occupation with his side of the question, cast out what he fancies opposes this, and falsified its nature, and here falsely stated that God’s only point of view is, " God so loved; " whereas, in the very place where this is said, another point of view is formally and in the first place stated, and the blessed Lord is revealed in another aspect in which He had to be presented to God, on man’s part, for atonement. " So must the Son of Man be lifted up." Had not God given His Son, there could have been none such; but this is added as the way by which the first was accomplished. But there was need that man, for man, should be presented to God, and that "lifted up "-that is, take "the curse," drink "the cup," suffer, according to Dr. W.’s words, " the curse of wrath." Love provided the Lamb in God’s Son; but the Lamb must be slain, presenting Himself as man, " who through the Eternal Spirit offered himself without spot to God" on man’s behalf, and take " the curse " and drink " the cup "from God’s hand, forsaken of God. This was not in itself love; but it was propitiation. God’s love (though the work was so perfect for His glory that the blessed Lord could say, Therefore doth My Father love me,") did not show itself to Christ then. Dr. W.’s statement as to Ephesians 1:1-23 is also ungrounded. He says, " it means;" but it is not what it says, but quite a different thing; and the meaning Dr. W. gives to it is wholly and utterly below and aside from God’s thoughts in it. Saving us " through" is not choosing us " in." Our being "in Christ," " the last Adam, the second man," is a great Scriptural truth, not yet in Dr. W.’s mind at all. But, for that very reason, I do not go further with it here. As to His justice suffering a violation and so demanding an indemnity, I should not perhaps so express it. But "the Son of Man must be lifted up " is just that. " The chastisement of our peace" being upon Him is just that. "He was wounded for our transgressions, bruised for our iniquities." His being " made sin for us, that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him," and countless other passages, state clearly what Dr. W. denies. Righteousness declared in the remission of past (1:e. Old Testament) sins is declared by. Christ’s shedding His blood, forbearance had been exercised as to them. This was now proved to be righteous. Dr. W. has not at all seen that it is God’s righteousness which is revealed, when things "worthy of death" had been done, and that through Christ’s death, God’s wrath being revealed as well as His love. We are "justified by His blood," and using such words as " indemnity " will not alter the divine and substantial truth that "by stripes" and "chastisement from God" we are justified and healed; that by His bearing our sins and receiving from God what was due to them, the cup He had to drink, being forsaken of God and dying, we are cleared and justified. He offered Himself without spot to God to be a sacrifice, He must be lifted up; He prayed that if it were possible the cup might pass, but it was not if we were to be saved; and so, call it " indemnity " or what you please, we are saved from wrath through Him. His death was an ἀπολύτρωσις, it was a λύτρωσις, without which there is no ἀπολύτρωσις for us. Luke and Hebrews both use the word λύτρωσις, which is just redemption by ransom, lösegeld, or indemnity, loskaufung. These are exactly what Dr. W. says is not in Scripture. He says " we obtained the righteousness which was a necessary condition for our salvation." Where is this in Scripture? And so far as it is scriptural that "we are made the righteousness of God in Him," how is that so? is the question. "He was made sin for us." Dr. W., as I have said, forgets it is God’s righteousness. God’s wrath is the shape or form assumed by God’s justice with reference to sin. I agree. But where was this displayed? Was it not in Christ’s suffering " the just for the unjust," a λύτρωσις, the substitution of Christ as "made sin for us "? And Dr. W.’s argument is all false.. He says quenching wrath is then the same as quenching justice. Supposing another is punished in my stead: as to me the wrath or punishment is quenched, and by justice; and justice is executed. The justice remains; but in my going free, and there being no wrath for me. God’s wrath against the sinner, by reason of the sin and guilt he lay under, is taken away for the believer by the death of Christ; " by His stripes we are healed." The Lord has laid on Him our iniquity. We were children of wrath, a wrath which will be executed against unbelievers, but we are saved from wrath by Him; He is our deliverer from the wrath to come (1 Thessalonians 1:10). And this was by Jehovah laying on Him our iniquity when He made His soul an offering for sin, and His taking the stripes due to us. It is written; the whole fifty-third of Isaiah states it. " Christ bare our sins (1 Peter 2:24) in his own body on the tree," and drank that dreadful cup, the thought of which made Him sweat as it were great drops of blood, "suffered for sins the just for the unjust" (3: 12), "bore the sins of many," and, had He not then fully completed the work, must have suffered often (Hebrews 9:1-28). "He was offered to bear the sins of many." Before whom, and from whom, did He suffer? He is gone in " not without blood." To whom presented? Blood must be shed for remission. Why? Dr. W. tells us it was to cleanse us, to obtain righteousness; but why that in order to such an end? He, will say he cannot tell. Scripture says it was a λύτρωσις, an ἱλασμός, and that it was presented to God. No Christian doubts its cleansing power for faith on which Dr. W. insists. But the present question does not lie there. Dr. W. talks of God loving the world less after than before the fall. But all this is misapprehension. There was no world before the fall. There was a being whom God had formed according to His own mind, in which, as the fruit of His own handiwork, He could take pleasure, and view him with complacency. After the fall there was not. It repented the Lord that He had made man upon the earth and grieved Him at His heart (Genesis 6:6). " The friendship of the world is enmity against God." " If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him." God could not have the love of complacency in a fallen sinful creature as He had in His own perfect handiwork; and the plain proof is, " He drove out the man." What was that? His love, in the sense of sovereign mercy in Himself, was greater after the fall than before. Unfallen Adam did not need it. But all this is lost in the. confusion of Dr. W.’s statement. He confounds God’s nature with His relationships in respect of good and evil, and leaves out His righteous judgment. He insists that the law condemns sin against it as before. Of course it does. But " Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us." The curse does not reach believers because Christ was made a curse for them. It is a poor cavil to say being made a curse was not punishment; it is " chastisement, stripes, wounding, bruising, forsaken of God," according to the word of God; " the curse of wrath," according to Dr. W. I do not at all admit that it is only unbelief that is punished; but God’s wise order is that it is by faith we have forgiveness and justification; and the unbeliever dies in his sins, and is also guilty of refusing the Son of God and despising mercy. His whole theory and all its applications are false, because he holds without a trace of Scripture that the atonement has removed the sins of the world. His confounding the distress of unrepentant David (" while I kept silence ") with Christ’s taking the curse atoningly, shows how far a false theory can lead into darkness; and that is all. His statement that, "where there is sin, God’s wrath is unchangeably manifest as surely as God is God," is deplorable in every way; for what then is love to a sinful world which he rightly holds, and declares incompatible with wrath? (And see Ephesians 2:3-4, and following verses as to activity in grace.) It denies the atonement-Christ "suffering, the just for the unjust," -and it leaves us always under wrath; for " if we say that we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us." This is the effect of theoretical reasoning instead of simply receiving Scripture.. What is said withal in Scripture is that Christ bore our sins in His own body on the tree-bore the sins of many. " Gave us His righteousness " is not found in Scripture. If it be let Dr. W. show it. This is tradition also, not Scripture. He is "made righteousness to us of God" (1 Corinthians 1:30) is said, but " gave us His righteousness " is never said in Scripture. The difference is total; and, I insist, with Dr. W., "I must have Scripture, not theological theories." And let Dr. W. remember, too, that it is Christ suffering (from whom? of whom was He forsaken?), "the just for the unjust," that was to bring us to God. But Dr. W. boldly asks " Where is it written that man is free from wrath because God in His Son punished sins against the law, so that He can no longer be justly angry with us because of these?" Did Dr. W. ever read the fifty-third of Isaiah was " the curse of the law " not the punishment of sins? did He not suffer, "the just for the unjust "? was He not forsaken of God? what was the cup He had to drink? was not the chastisement of our peace upon Him? is it not with His stripes we are healed? was it not for our transgressions He was wounded? was it not for sins Christ suffered, "the just for the unjust"? It is, then, "so written." Did it not please Jehovah to bruise Him? put Him to grief when He was making His soul an offering for sin? To whom? Was He not bearing others’ iniquities there? was He not bruised for their iniquities? was it not for the transgression of Jehovah’s people He was stricken? Was He not bearing the sins of many there? It is written, and written in both Testaments, that " by his stripes we are healed." Stripes from whom? " It pleased Jehovah to bruise him." Oh, it is sorrowful to think that any one, for a theory, can pass over the deep mystery, but revealed truth, that God was dealing with sins, our sins, in the atoning sufferings of the Son of God, " made a little lower than the angels for the suffering of death"! What is hard to conceive is, how Dr. W. could ask where it is written.* (*It is never said that justification is accomplished for the whole world. That "Christ died for all " is written. It is never said in Scripture that He bore the sins of all, but carefully avoided; changing the language to "many," or "our," where needed; but propitiation and substitution are all confounded by Dr. W., and the first part of Born. i to oh. 5: 11 left out, and the second part, which speaks of our being all sinners through Adam’s sin, taken up; where believers reckoning themselves dead, not propitiation for sins, is discussed. But all these points are jumbled together in Dr. W.’s statements. Here I only draw his attention to statements made without any warrant from Scripture.) But we are "justified by faith," and it is wholly unscriptural to apply this to the whole world. Scripture applies it solely to believers. I have already said I entirely agree with Dr. W. that Scripture speaks of our being reconciled to God, not God to us. I would insist on it; still I do not agree with what is said of saints and forgiveness; but I make no remark on it. Only Dr. W. seems to have forgotten that the publican’s supplication was ἱλάσθητι. I admit the expression came to be used in a very general sense; but it would not support Dr. W. in his statements, but the contrary. It is based on the idea of the propitiation; of the offended person being propitiated, and so propitious. Nor does his reasoning on 2 Samuel 21:14 meet the citation. I have no objection to his translating TM to be entreated for the land, as the English translation has it. But why was He thereupon entreated for it? was it not on a reparation done to His judicial authority on the violated engagement made by Joshua and the Princes? (Joshua 9:18-19). The same remark applies to 2 Samuel 24:25. I do not say reconciled; but I ask why, on what ground, was God entreated- that is, heard the entreaty-as to the plague, so that it ceased? Was it not because offerings were offered to Him? His argument as to the ransom money has no force, because the question is, what is the meaning of ransom or atonement through which their lives were spared? That Christ is the only one for eternal salvation no Christian denies. Dr. W. rests on objectionable words in his adversaries’ statements. Thus he alludes to sacrifices inducing a disposition in God. Now I object to these expressions, as does Dr. W. They are drawn from the false idea of reconciling God, producing, so to speak, love in Him; and this is quite wrong, and Dr. W. on this point quite right. But they were not presented to God simply to reconcile or induce a disposition in the sinner. But, if Jehovah was entreated for the land, it is not that men entreated Him but were not heard; but that they were now heard when they entreated. What was the cause of this? The offerings presented to God, or satisfaction made to His outraged justice. When Jehovah smelled a savor of rest and said, "I will no more curse the ground," on, whom was the effect produced by the sacrifice of Noah? The result was the ground was no more cursed, Dr. W. will say. No doubt. So the passage says. But why? Who says that it should not be cursed any more? Who smelled the odor of rest so as not to curse any more? It is too plain and intentionally positive to, admit of any question. Dr. W. is not correct when he says "the enmity" in Eph. is the enmity between Jews and Gentiles, to the exclusion of all else. The passage speaks of reconciling both to God; still God’s enmity is not spoken of. In his statements about the goats Dr. W. seems to me wholly to have missed the mark; but I have spoken of it. I only remark here that one goat secured admission to the presence of God according to His holy nature" boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus," as is expressly and elaborately taught in Hebrews 9:10.,-and the other, the removing of all the sins of God’s people according to their responsibility towards Him; and Dr. W. loses an immense deal if he does not see both; and alas! it is the case with many Christians. It is utterly untrue that nothing else is said of sacrifices than perfecting us. This is not the case, even in the Hebrews, " for then must he often have suffered." What and from whom? Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many. Offered to whom? What was bearing sins? what did it mean as to Christ? Did’ He sweat as it were great drops of blood at the thought of justifying us? The whole work was done, " finished " on the cross, before ray conscience was perfected, or even felt the need of it. He is sitting down because the work is perfect; and God has accepted it in righteousness, has glorified the man Christ at His right hand, because the man Christ had glorified Him when made sin upon the cross. It was, I repeat, wholly done, and Christ, sitting at God’s right band in consequence, before anything was done with my conscience at all-done with God alone -and, if it had not been, my conscience could not have been perfected at all. Christ’s own glory as a Redeemer depended on it. And even as to us that is not all its import; He " obtained eternal redemption " and an " eternal inheritance." If His blood does purge our conscience, it is because " through the eternal Spirit He offered Himself without spot to God." Yea, He fills all things through it, Ephesians 4:9-10, and indeed 1: 23. Besides, it is not said only, " God so loved the world," but " the Son of man must be lifted up." There was an incumbent necessity which He had to bear. So, as we have seen, " Jehovah smelled a sweet savor; and Jehovah said, I will no more curse." It is totally untrue that nothing else is said about it in Scripture than that " God so loved the world." Again, I say, in reply to the assertion " that the world was reconciled to God" in the cross, not God to the world, that it is not the manner in which God’s word expresses the matter. Not a text can be cited that says anything of the sort. It is wholly unscriptural, and one of the grand mistakes of Dr. W. which misleads him as to everything. Nor, above all, when Christ said, all is finished, was it said that the world was reconciled. It was the closing of the scene as regards the world which proved they had both seen and hated both Him and His Father, and, in that character of reconciling the world which He bore in earth, it would see Him no more (John 14:19). I do not accept Dr. ’W.’s criticism as to " reconcile." In the first place, ἱλασμός and χαταλλαγή are quite different; that is, " propitiation " and " reconciliation." And this makes his whole argument utterly worthless. But besides, though בׇּפַר may etymologically mean to cover, it does not follow that the Piel (כִפֵּר) does, which he would, in many cases, find wholly out of place. The word for covering sins, in the ordinary sense, is כׇםֵה as בְּםוּי in Psalms 32:1-11.; and, as far as כִפֵּר is connected with covering, out of whose sight were they put? and how? Were they not before God, in His sight, when Christ bore them? and what was the consequence as to Him 2 Was not this the propitiation? In Daniel 9:24 it is not said, " then shall the transgression be taken away,"* but to take away. (*I take the English translation of Dr. W., not understanding Swedish, though having his article in that language. But the force of the Hebrew is plain.) To cover sin is quite another word, בׇםׇה. To atone for iniquity is לְבַפֵּר Further, in Hebrews 9:1-28, as to " once hath He appeared to put away sin," it is εἰς ἀθέτησιν ἁμαρτιας, "to the removing of sin" (not sins), a wholly different matter, bearing our sins being added as a distinct thing just below. Sin will not be removed, as a result, entirely, till the new heavens and the new earth, though the effectual work which is the ground of it be accomplished. Nor are the weeks of Daniel accomplished yet. Messiah was cut off after the sixty-ninth,לוֺוְאֵין and took nothing of the kingdom and Messiah-glory. But to enter into this would lead me too far, though the not giving heed to it has led to much misinterpretation of Scripture in Dr. W.’s statements. We never find the reconciling of the world to God as an effect of the cross. But if sin were " a wall of separation between God and man," as it was, was not Christ made sin for us, and forsaken of God, according to Psalms 22:1-31, and was not propitiation wrought there when He made His soul an offering for sin, and bore the sins of many? What relation was Christ placed in to God then? Never obedience so fully accomplished, never so fully showing love to His Father, but "made sin for us who knew no sin." It is not, I agree, reconciling God to us; but both Dr. W. and his adversaries take " We are reconciled," for the world, which is wholly unscriptural, the apostle speaks of believers. In 2 Corinthians 5:1-21 he is speaking of those in Christ and the new creation. He was reconciling the world; He bath reconciled us. The passage is quite clear, and the ministry of reconciliation was then committed to them, and that toward the world, Christ having been made sin for us. In Colossians it is distinctly " you," 1:e., the believers at Colosse. The effect of this error runs through every page. " God was in Christ reconciling" is spoken of as if it was the world which was reconciled, a totally different matter. The statement is wholly unscriptural. " Be ye reconciled " was the apostle’s ministry to the world; that is, they were not so yet. The Scriptures are " uniform " in not saying God was reconciled, uniform (it is spoken of twice) in saying believers are, and equally uniform in presenting the world as not so by Christ’s death, but that His death gave the basis of the apostle’s " ministry of reconciliation." Being reconciled does not mean God being appeased. But what was the basis of that ministry? Was it Christ’s taking "the curse of wrath" or not? Was that necessary in order to it, or otherwise the wrath have abode on us? God’s love to us was not free " because we were righteous," but wrought its perfect work while we were sinners: " Hereby know we love that He laid down His life for us." That righteous state was the effect of something else, and faith in that was needed to become righteous. This theory destroys the sovereign freeness and fullness of love, as well as the propitiation by a work wrought when we were far from God and unrighteous. " God justifies the ungodly "-so Scripture says at least-and that " by faith." Faith in whom, and what? Reconciling the " things," which is yet to come, is of the " things," not of God; but Dr. W., in his explanation, does not give any meaning to " having made peace by the blood of His cross," which precedes reconciliation. There are many things I should not accept in Dr. W.’s statements here, but I pass them over as not the main point; but he has not explained the ἱλάσθητι, of the publican in the temple. I am not insisting on reconciling God, for I do not think it scriptural, but the "making peace by the blood of the cross" suffers in the hands of Dr. W. To say that God is not angry with the sinner because He loves him is confusion of mind. I can be angry morally and judicially, I cannot, perhaps be righteously anything else, with those I dearly love. Did Christ not love those whom He looked at "with anger, being grieved at the hardness of their hearts"? Wrath may be come upon a people to the uttermost, and God not cease to be love, and he even who says it-Paul-not have ceased to love them devotedly. The union or meeting of infinite love and " the curse of wrath" is, by Dr. W.’s own admission, the essential character of the cross. Dr. W. must allow me to say that his argument as to the atonement-money or the numbering of the children of Israel is wholly without force. The commandment was not concerning the numbering, but concerning giving a ransom for their souls; lest they should die when they were numbered, being brought, poor sinners that they were, personally and individually under God’s eye when thus numbered. I must repeat, because the fallacy is incessantly repeated by Dr. W., that the effect produced is not that by which it is produced. He insists that the work of Christ was in order to reconcile men, to cleanse them, to justify them. Agreed. And he cites passage after passage to show this. I accept them all fully. But this does not touch the question, What was the work done, or what the sufferings endured, that this effect might be produced? What was presented to God? Christ was made a curse for us, made sin for us, suffered, the Just for the unjust, was forsaken of God, drinking that dreadful cup, which could not pass away if we were to be saved. The effect was the cleansing of believers; but what was the meaning of that which cleanses them through faith, in which Christ was alone with God that they might be so cleansed? Were not men redeemed from the curse by His being made a curse for them? Was that curse God’s love to Him? And so with the goat of atonement. It was cleansing the holy place and altar, etc. No doubt; but what was done that they might be cleansed? Did not death, in figure "suffering, the Just for the unjust," come in that they might be cleansed, by reason of Israel’s sins? As to the two goats, I have spoken of them; but God. does not give one explanation of them, as Dr. W. says. It is not said of the first goat, " He shall bear upon him all their iniquities into a land not inhabited." Aaron having confessed their sins on the head of that goat, not on the other. That both represent one Christ and one cross is true; but in confounding these two aspects of the cross Dr. W. loses a great deal. At any rate, Scripture does not give the same explanation. Is it nothing to have all one’s sins taken away, never to be found again? It is Dr. W. who neglects the meaning Scripture attaches to these figures. In his remarks on Hebrews, Dr. W. omits to notice the real point of the case, the " perfecting " is " as pertaining to the conscience," and by the blood carried in. Through Christ presenting Himself, and then entering in, " not without blood," the conscience was purged. And this alone is ’ the purging spoken of, so that we have "no more conscience of sins;" not consciousness of sin, but conscience of sins, sins on the conscience, because Christ has borne them and gone within, " not without blood." It is not our state, but the state of our conscience before God; we as to this are "perfected forever" (εἰς τὸ διηνεχές), always and perpetually, because Christ is always now (εἰς τὸ διηνεχές) sitting at the right hand of God; not like the Jewish priests standing, renewing a work which was never done. No cleansing of our state is spoken of but of our conscience by Christ’s offering, who is gone in, not without blood. Dr. W. does not state what Scripture states here. It is false that no other import of Christ’s sacrifice for God is spoken of than that it was a consequence of God’s unchanging love. It hides Christ’s forsaking of God, and drinking the dreadful cup, and His standing as Son of Man, who must be lifted up. Dr. W. says " God so loved the fallen world that He gave it the offering to restore it. And as there is nothing else said about it in Scripture," etc. There is something else said about it in Scripture. Christ "offered Himself without spot to God through the eternal Spirit," and "the Son of man must be lifted up." Dr. W. will say, "that whosoever believeth might not perish." No doubt; but why must He be "lifted up " on the cross as " Son of man " that they might not? And this is said, as well as " God so loved;" but this Dr. W. always passes over. It is not true that Scripture says that God never had any anger against him (the sinner). It is expressly said, "indignation and wrath, tribulation and anguish," will be rendered "to every soul of man that doeth evil," and " wrath from heaven is now revealed." " Now is the accepted time, the day of salvation;" but those who despise the grace of it are "treasuring up for themselves wrath against the day of wrath, and revelation of the righteous judgment of God." Wrath from God, therefore, rests on and is executed against men; yet God does not change. Vengeance belongs to Him. " Is God unrighteous who taketh vengeance?" But Dr. W. is all out of the way as to reconciling. I do not return to what I have already insisted on, that Scripture never says the world is reconciled any more than God. Christians are, and Christians only; but there is no foundation for what he says as to the force of the word. 1 is a difficult word, at least with 93, (see Leviticus 16:1-34); but Numbers 25:13 shows Dr. W. cannot make good his statements. But into this I will enter no further, because it is perfectly plain that in the New Testament reconciling does mean reconciling the people, changing their disposition; and we have no need to turn to nice discussions on words, and their use in the LXX. It is somewhat more than changing the disposition, because it includes a relative object as to which that change takes place-one is reconciled to some person or thing. This being by an offering or the like, the meaning of the word is extended; but it is not merely cleansing, or anything of the kind. In Romans 5:1-21 we have, "If, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of His Son, much more," etc. Now this is changing the disposition when one was an enemy, and thus bringing back the mind to God. So Colossians 1:21, "And you that were sometime alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now hath He reconciled." That it is by an offering which cleanses and purges the conscience, is true, and what I should insist on. The heart could not return really, if the conscience were not purged, nor this unless the sins were purged; but this was by Christ’s suffering the agony of the cross, forsaken of God, God’s infinite love to us bringing back the renewed heart to. Him thereby. The end of 2 Corinthians 5:1-21 fully confirms this. Reconciling is bringing into happy relationship with another when we have been out of it, as Matthew 5:24; and to speak of χαταλλαγἠδιαλλάγηθι, as equivalent to ίλασμόν and ἱλάσχεσθαι, is unfounded; as making such words as רׇצֵה, or נתר, or חטֵא, or הִיתְחַטֵא or נֶצֶחַר. and בִפֵר the same, is falsifying the sense of words; so בִפֻרִיםיוֺם; so in Numbers 16:46 (Heb. 17: 11), wrath, קֶצֶױ was gone out from the presence of Jehovah, and Aaron was לְבַפֵּר; nor was it to reconcile the people, but to stay the plague, to stop the wrath that was gone out. And it is an unhappy thing, because the effect of atonement, when wrath would justly come out against us, is to cleanse and reconcile us, to weaken the truth of that righteous wrath, and its being righteously arrested by the precious blood presented to God, and that bearing of sins, which makes it righteous in God to justify the ungodly and forgive their sins. Appeasing God, ἱλάσχομαι, placare, let the word be what it may, is not changing God, but glorifying and satisfying God’s righteous judgment; so that He may say, when " I see the blood, I will pass over." Scripture does know the expression of the anger or " wrath of God." What Dr. W. says of it is not true. " God’s wrath is revealed from heaven," and, if we do not believe, abides upon us (John 3:31). And it is written, " Thou wast angry, but thine anger is turned away" (Isaiah 12:1). And the passages are very numerous too which speak of it. I do not know Swedish; but Dr. W. will know that shnen and versِhnen are different things, though, like the Greek, the meanings run into one another as cause and effect; but they are essentially different: one does apply to God’; the other does not. And " we have the propitiation" is an abuse of the word. Dr. W.’s statements on this are most unequivocally unscriptural. Dr. W. reverts to the statement already often noticed to give it a particular application, saying, " The forgiveness of sins is nothing but an application to the individual sinner of the taking away the sins of the whole world, which took place in Christ." Every part of this statement is unscriptural. It did not take place in Christ. There is no such thought in Scripture; indeed if there were, there could be nothing to judge them for. And further, no such application would be needed, for the sins would be already taken away. The forgiveness of sins and the imputation of righteousness is by faith (Romans 4:1-25) Ephesians 1:7, Colossians 1:14, Hebrews 10:18, cited by Dr. W., do not say one word of what Dr. W. says. But further, redemption from a state is the commonest use in Scripture and in modern speech of the word " redeem." We say "redeemed from captivity," from destruction, death; so that all the discussion about Anselm and the fathers is to no purpose. We are delivered from the wrath and the curse by Christ’s being made a curse for us. From whence did His suffering come? "He hath put him to grief." Debt is used as a figure; but by the Lord. It was not restitution of money; of course it is a mere figure; but it was not to remove the sin of man, that is, from man (which indeed is in every sense an unscriptural way of putting it, and will not be found in Scripture), but by bearing our sins for us; and if Scripture speaks of putting away sin, it is putting it as a state and condition out of God’s sight, and that even of heaven and earth, not of forgiveness. He condemned sin in the flesh. But, as for faith, we died, were crucified with Christ, we are freed from its law. When we are brought in, then it is Christ who knew no sin was made sin for us; that is, it was what was done for us, outside of us, not our state, though that state (righteousness of God, note, not of man, though the believer stands in it) be the purpose of it, yet not an actual righteous state in us, but we made the righteousness of God in Christ. See Romans 8:3; 2 Corinthians 5:21. Dr. W. has evidently not taken into consideration this part of the truth. I turn to the conclusion: " No change was effected by the fall of Adam in God, or in his disposition, but what was effected was that we fell into sin, and by sin into eternal death. In the work of Christ there was no change in God or in His disposition, but we gained righteousness, and thereby eternal life. And behind this work of Christ Scripture only recognizes one thing, God so loved the world." Now though save the last phrases I recognize in general the truth of this,* yet the statement is fundamentally false, because it suppresses a mass of scriptural truth of the most solemn character, and in the last phrase denies it. Is wrath not spoken of in Scripture? (*But Scripture speaks, as we have seen, of God’s repenting that He had man on the earth, and its grieving Him at His heart.) It was no change in God Himself, yet we are not merely fallen into something God drove out the man, and not only so but shut up the way back to the tree of life, previously free to man, and he must get life some other way. It is the gift of God, and, save in the sense of man’s ultimate state in glory, righteousness is not the way of regaining it. Man must be born again when he is a sinner. Dr. W. speaks of wrath against sin elsewhere; but why, in order to systematize, is so immensely an important thing left out here? It is no change in God; it is righteousness dealing justly with evil. Man fell under wrath by sinning, God’s wrath. It is the wrath of God which abides upon him if he does not believe; he is a child of wrath, Jew or Gentile alike; and it is part of the truth which came in by Christianity though not in itself of the grace, that the wrath of God is revealed from heaven. Something does remain "behind," besides "God so loved;" that is, " the wrath of God." Already God’s driving man out of paradise was an execution of judgment, and the flood was righteous judgment. But it was not fully "revealed from heaven," nor judgment pronounced on man till he had rejected Christ, because another question was to be tried in God’s ways: could the first man be restored? He was tried without law, and the flood had to come in; he was tried under the law and broke it (the flesh was not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be; so that they that are in the flesh cannot please God), tried by the patient goodness that sent the prophets till there was no remedy. Then God said, I have yet my Son, my well-beloved, it may be they will reverence my Son. And when they saw Him, they said, This is the heir; come, let us kill Him, and the inheritance shall be ours. Man has both seen and hated both Him and His Father. Then the Lord pronounced the sentence: "Now is the judgment of this world." Except death were gone through, and the curse borne by another, the " corn of wheat " remained alone. The wrath of God was " revealed from heaven," but by the sin that work wrought which cleanses the believer for God according to God’s own perfectness in light, and man took his place in heaven, according to the righteousness of God, in Christ. He came to seek and to save that which was lost-now proved so. No doubt faith rested on promises and prophecies before the Lord came: but now all came out: the mind of the flesh was "enmity against God," but the veil rent, and heaven opened. The answer to the spear, which made sure that the Son of God, come in love, was gotten rid of from the earth, was the blood and water which cleanses and saves every one that believes, that comes to God by Him. Love was revealed; for hereby know we love, that He laid down His life for us; but wrath was "revealed from heaven." And " if God so loved the world that He gave His Son," so was it equally true that "the Son of man must be lifted up," or we should have perished under just wrath. And it is not true that Christ was only God’s representative to take away our sins; He was man’s representative and made sin for us, bearing our sins so that it pleased Jehovah to bruise Him, He put Him to grief when He made His soul an offering for sin, having offered Himself " through the eternal Spirit without spot to God." I have nothing to do with the traditions of theologians and do not notice them, but with what the word of God brings before us. I have spoken of this at the beginning as to principles; but Dr. W. brings it all again forward here, and it is the kernel of the question. I agree with him, reconciling God is not spoken of; but he is one-sided in hiding a mass of truth which Scripture puts clearly forward. All that is said as to God being what He is in His revelation of Himself is delusion. God is love, God is light. But God could not act in wrath to man innocent (for man was neither righteous nor holy, as theologians say),-He would not have been righteous,-and wrath was not revealed nor judgment, but, solely, the consequence of disobedience that man would die. All that Dr. W. takes up, and all that was said when man was judged in paradise. But God did act in wrath when he had sinned, and turned him out of paradise, and shut the way of the tree of life; but it was not revealed before and surely not executed, nor was love revealed as it was in redemption. Christ was God’s representative on earth, the image of the invisible God. But whose representative was He when made sin, and what was the consequence to Him? With the theories Dr. W. opposes I have nothing to do. He joins with his adversaries in holding that God reconciled the world to Himself; and from this common error one draws his theological consequences, which I refuse, as they are not in Scripture, and the other hides other plain scriptural statements and falls into denying them. "Incidit in Scyllam, cupiens vitare Charybdim." Here, in this section X., Dr. W., as I have already said he did, speaks of wrath. But then how can he say, " Nothing remains besides and behind but God so loved the world? " Because the momentous fact of wrath remains. Perhaps he will tell us yes, but the world was reconciled, which is totally unscriptural, and how reconciled so that there is no wrath if the wrath of God abides upon them, as Scripture says and Dr. W. admits, and Christ is our deliverer from the wrath to come? Yea, they are " heaping up unto themselves wrath against the day of wrath, and revelation of the righteous judgment of God." Dr. W. says this reconciliation is " not a change of disposition, but of relative position, placing in another relation to a person;" but how in another relative position when the wrath of God abides on him? That wrath is not executed now (save in chastisement for our good in love, called wrath in Scripture, Job 36:1-33), and that it is the accepted time, the day of salvation, is true: the wrath is " to come;" but " he that believeth not is condemned already, the wrath abideth upon him." Dr. W. tells us God cannot be angry and love at the same time. If so, there is no wrath abiding on the unbeliever, as he admits it is, or he is not loved. All this error flows from one-sided reasoning and the utterly unscriptural notion that the world is reconciled, because it is the time of the exercise of grace founded on Christ’s death;’ as the apostle states. I do not comment on the fallacious arguments of Dr. W.’s opponenth. He and they have both started from a false tradition. I have only to remark, again, that Dr. W. avoids the question; namely, that saying the object of the atonement was to justify the sinner (which all will admit was one object), does not touch the real question: What was done there in order to justify him? What were the stripes with which we are healed? Herein we find again the utterly anti- scriptural doctrine. "The race of Adam was herein justified." We are justified by faith, not without it, though it be through the atonement. The saved are righteous in Christ, but " salvation only for the righteous " is as unscriptural as possibly can be. Christ came to save sinners, "not to call the righteous, but sinners." God justifies " the ungodly." Christ came " to seek and to save that which was lost." This is another fundamental fallacy of Dr. W., that we are justified by being made personally righteous. Dr. W.’s argument as to devils is sadly sophistical. The necessity of appeasing God as alleged was, if people were to be saved. If the devil and evil spirits were to be saved, according to God’s justice an atonement would be needed; but Christ did not die for them, nor undertake their cause. This is poor sophistry. " Community of love " is not sovereign love to sinners. All this too is sad confusion of mind. God commends His love to us in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. The power of tradition is curious enough here, where Dr. W. says such a passage as " God reconciled the world unto Himself," when there is absolutely no such passage in Scripture, just where he is insisting, quite rightly, on seeing how does Scripture speak? The conflict of theologians I leave with Dr. W., thoroughly decided with him to know only what Scripture says. It is quite true that justice is not wrath or judgment. But as far as men go, we may justly say we turned God into a judge by sin, not assuredly into a righteous Being. When He had created Adam innocent, there was nothing to judge. It would have been judging His own workmanship. But righteousness becomes wrath (not hatred) when evil is in the presence of judicial authority exercised in righteousness. The righteous Lord loveth righteousness; but God is a righteous judge, and God is angry every day. And now wrath is revealed from heaven as surely as infinite love is. In sovereign grace He rises above the sin, and loves without a motive, save what is in His own nature and part of His glory. Man must have a motive for loving. God has none but in Himself, and " commendeth His love to us " (and the " His " is emphatic as to this very point), in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us; the best thing in heaven that could be given, for the vilest, defiled, and guilty sinners. Dr. W. seems to me to lower and depreciate the love of God quite as much as His justice and His righteous wrath. There is one other point to which, though I have noticed it, I return, as of vital importance. Dr. W. holds that Christ represented God before men, not men before God. The first part is most blessedly true, but even that not to the extent of the inferences Dr. W. would draw from it, that there must be identity of operation. The Son did not send the Father, nor not spare Him, but deliver Him up for us. The thought would be utterly anti-Christian. He accepted His part of the work of grace. " Lo, I come to do Thy will, 0 God;" and, a body being prepared for Him, He took upon Him the form of a servant, and was found in the likeness of men. I may return to this point elsewhere; I merely take note of it now, and turn to the question of representing God to men and man to God. Now, in His life down here, he that had seen Him had seen the Father, a most precious and sanctifying truth. John 14:1-31 is express in stating it, as the whole life of Jesus is the verification and illustration of it. He is, moreover, in His person the image of the invisible God, the brightness of His glory, and the express image of His being, His hypostasis. As to this Scripture is plain; and I have no controversy with Dr. W. Further, that He was true God and true man, united in one person, is not in question either; it is believed, by both of us. The question is, Did He stand for men before God as well as for God before men. That He does in heaven is quite clear. He is gone into heaven now to appear in the presence of God for us (Hebrews 9:24). But was all His life down here only a manifestation of God to men? When He took His place with the godly remnant in Israel, being baptized with John’s baptism, assuredly not confessing sins as they did; but fulfilling righteousness, having emptied Himself and taken the form of a servant and entered upon the path of obedience, ἐν σχήματι εὐρεθεὶς ὡς ἄνθρωπος, saying to John, " thus it becometh us to fulfill all righteousness." When He was led of the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted of the devil, did He represent God to men? Was it not, as the first man was tempted and fell, the, Second man held fast and overcame? Did He not overcome, Saying, Man shall" not live. by bread alone, but by ’every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God, and overcome by refusing to go out of the place of a servant which He had taken, though challenged by Satan to do so as being Son of God? Did He not hold the place of man when He said thou shall not tempt the Lord thy God? Did He not, when He dismissed Satan, saying, Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and Him only shalt thou serve? He was always the obedient man before God, as Adam was the disobedient one; and though He abode alone till redemption was accomplished, the corn of wheat falling into the ground and dying, yet. He stood in this world as man before God, as well as God before man. Who was the obedient man, did always such things as pleased His Father, pleaded in Gethsemane when His hour was come in the days of His flesh, with strong crying and tears made His supplication unto Him that was able to save Him from death, and was heard in that He fearedἀπὀ τῆς εὐλαβείας -was this representing man or God? That He was alone till redemption was accomplished I fully recognize, but alone as the sinless man amongst men, to accomplish what was called for from man for God. If He tasted death for every man, was that as representing God to men or standing for men before God? When God laid our iniquity on Him, was it representing God before men? When it became Him, for whom are all things and by whom are all things, to make the Captain, ἀρχηγόν, of our salvation perfect through suffering, whom did He represent? When He cried in deep agony, My God, my God, why hast Thou forsaken me, did He represent God to man? That He must have been God to be fit and able to do it is most true; but He was not representing God before men, but drinking the cup given to Him. When He was made sin, for whom was He made sin? Did He represent God to man then, or stand for men before God when He took up the cause of man (Hebrews 2:1-18)? He did not represent God to men, but it is written in a certain place, What is man that Thou art mindful of him, or the son of man that Thou visitest him? Thou madest him a little lower than the angels, Thou crownedst him with glory and honor. He was the second man, the last Adam. He was the ἀρχηγός of our salvation, the obedient, sinless, suffering man who overcame Satan as man for men, was made sin for us, died for our sins, that is, represented us before God, our iniquity being laid upon Him, and drank that dreadful cup, taking it from His Father’s hand, "the curse of wrath." Was suffering the curse of wrath representing God to men, or man as made sin under the righteous judgment of God? I add that, though the priesthood of Christ be now in heaven where He appears in the presence of God for us, yet all His life was in every sense a preparation for it. He had so taken up man that it became God to make Him perfect in that heavenly place through suffering, He was tempted, suffering being tempted, that He might succor them that are tempted. Not only so, but He was made like to His brethren in all things, that He might be a merciful and faithful high priest in things pertaining to God, to make propitiation for the sins of the people. And so in chap. 5. of the same epistle comparing Him with the Jewish high priest, though showing the difference; and it is clear that the priest represented the people before God, confessed their sins on the scapegoat, and went into the sanctuary for them, as Christ has done into the true sanctuary for us. The priesthood of Christ is no doubt for believers; but to deny that He represented men, stood there as man for them before God, and that on the cross, as in Hebrews 2:17, as man, alone indeed but for men, is a ruinous error. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 144: VOL 02 - THE BAPTISM OF THE HOLY GHOST: IS IT ONCE FOR ALL OR CONTINUOUS? ======================================================================== The Baptism of the Holy Ghost: Is It Once for All or Continuous? The baptism of the Holy Ghost was on the day of Pentecost. The Comforter came; He cannot come twice in this order of things, because He was to dwell forever. But He is given, says Peter, to all them that believe. Again: " Repent, and be baptized, every one of you, for the remission of sins, and ye shall receive the gift of the Holy Ghost." Cornelius was a special case, God demonstrating that He would receive the Gentiles, when even the apostles would not as such. He was not previously baptized, which was the regular order (Acts 2:38). Samaria is nothing to the point, but to show how He was given by the laying on of the apostles’ hands; so with Paul proving He had the same title (Acts 19:1-41). The pouring out of the Spirit is what happened on the day of Pentecost (so Peter tells us), but individuals receive it on believing in Christ’s work for the remission of sins. That giving of the Holy Ghost to the individual is the unction and the sealing, and becomes the earnest. Being filled with the Spirit is another matter. It is the Spirit which is in me, so taking possession of all my mind and faculties that naught, else is there, and the things. He reveals occupy the mind, and there is power from God in the soul as to them. As to a person subsequent to Pentecost being baptized with the Holy Ghost, I should say He was introduced into an already baptized body, but by receiving the Holy Ghost by which he is united to the Head-Christ. I am not anxious as to the word baptism, but it is not generally employed as to the individual reception. Acts 11:17 and 1 Corinthians 12:1-31 are the nearest to applying it to an individual or individuals; but it is not actually used. But the receiving of the Holy Ghost is equivalent, they having what was originally treated as baptism of the Holy Ghost, and are looked at, as they are, as partakers of the same thing. The sum of the gathered disciples were baptized on the day of Pentecost. An individual receives the same Holy Ghost, and is a member of this same body, and is one, and is looked at as one of the baptized body. Acts 1:5 tells us when; but Acts 2:38 tells them, that on repentance and baptism for the remission of sins, they will receive this same Holy Ghost; so did Cornelius (see his case before). Thus they were incorporated, and were the same as those to whom the Holy Ghost was first given; and that continued when all the first were gone, for the Comforter was to abide forever. As to 1 Corinthians 10:1-33, verses 3, 4, there is a certain general analogy, but that was baptism with water, the sacramental assembly- not the body. It is only in verses 16, 17, we come to the inner circle of the body. Abundance of Scriptures show that it was not merely for testimony the Holy Ghost was given. It is the Spirit of adoption: the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost. I know that God dwells in me by it, and I in Him; that I am in Christ and Christ in me; the body is dead, and the Spirit is life. A thousand precious things concerning my state with God and the Father depend on the Holy Ghost dwelling in me, and my consciousness of these things abounding as life through Him. He is the Comforter come down withal, on which all our condition depends. He is sent by the Father in Christ’s name, and by Christ from the Father-one giving conscious relationship as sons, the other knowledge of Christ’s glorifying and its consequences; and a great deal more than all this, for He is the power of all good here. No doubt, therefore, He is the power of testimony, and so the Lord plainly declares (Acts 1:1-26) The word itself is the sword of the Spirit. All true .power and wisdom so flows into us. All truth is revealed, communicated as revealed, and received by the Holy Ghost. As to 1 Corinthians 12:12-13, it is the aorist (ἐβαπτίσθηεν) and therefore says nothing of continuity: it is continuous, if we speak of individuals receiving the Holy Ghost. But people look for a re-giving of the Holy Ghost, as if He did not abide forever; and the thought of re-giving denies that, and also the responsibility of the church consequent upon it, which is a great evil. Asking that an individual who is not free -is not sealed-may receive it, is quite another thing. Asking in general for the Holy Ghost for the church says He is not here, which is wrong; yet I doubt not, where sincerely desired, though expressed ignorantly, God has answered the desire, and blessed. But that leaves the ignorance; and the conscience is left unmoved as to the responsibility in respect of a present ever-abiding Spirit. It is not accurate language I look for, but faith working in the conscience. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 145: VOL 02 - THE BODY OF MOSES ======================================================================== The Body of Moses The opinion that "the body of Moses" in Jude means the Jewish people is a stupid old Rabbinical notion. One says truly of this and similar notions, "All such explanations are of course out of the question; and the literal matter of fact alone to be held fast." That it is matter of fact is evident by the very form of it. Moses is the only man God is said to have buried, "and no man, knoweth his sepulcher unto this day;" but "Michael the Archangel" evidently did so; and it is possible Michael, His highest heavenly servant, may have been the instrument of Jehovah to give His greatest of human servants the most honorable burial; and, if it were then that the "contending " happened, it might be that Satan disputed his right to this high honor, considering that his sin, in speaking unadvisedly with his lips and smiting the rock instead of speaking to it, had caused not only his exclusion from the land of Canaan but his death. Michael, standing before God, dared not bring against him a "railing accusation," but (overawed by the majesty of God) said, " The Lord rebuke thee." And, besides, the context in Jude would lead us to infer that he also had respect for the original greatness, dignity, and glory of the devil. In this Michael sets us an example to cherish a respectful spirit when speaking of Satan, because of his greatness as a creature of God; and if we stand in God’s presence with a profound sense of His majesty we will not be found indulging the lawless spirit of the day that allows men to speak evil of dignities, whether earthly, supernal, or infernal. The maintaining of his servantship in Jehovah’s presence enabled him calmly to put him under the rebuke of the Lord and leave him there. Thus must we feel and act if we would "resist the devil and have him flee from us." " Whom resist, steadfast in the faith;" "Strong in the Lord and in the power of His might." But are we to be satisfied with the explanation given as to the ground of the contention? The object of their contention was "the body of Moses;" but was the ground of it that he should be buried by God, or that the "body of Moses" should not be in Satan’s power as having "the power of death" (Hebrews 2:14), Christ’s death, which alone delivers, not having yet taken place; but that it should be in the special keeping of Michael, that Moses should appear in it on the transfiguration hill along with Elijah, also in his body, and Jesus, in His glorious transfigured body, shining above the brightness of the sun in the midst? When Satan’s power over the bodies of the saints of God who slept in their graves was broken " through death" when Jesus died on Calvary, the right and title to deliverance from the domain of death appeared openly in this that " the graves were opened and many bodies of the saints which slept arose " (Matthew 27:1-66); but "they came out of their graves after His resurrection." " He was the first to rise from the dead " in the power of life, that "could not be holden of" death or of "him that had the power of death," whom He "through death," "destroyed" or " annulled." But when the disciples were with Jesus " on the holy mount " " there appeared unto them Moses and Elias talking with Him "-and before "the two men" could be seen talking they must have been there in their bodies. Then may we not conclude that the contention was that "the body of Moses" should be buried by God, angelically guarded all along by Michael from the devil’s domain of death, and supernaturally brought forth, even before the death and resurrection of Christ, to appear with Jesus " on the holy mount?" Thus this greatest of God’s pre-Christian servants, who was denied entrance into the terrestrial and transitory kingdom of Canaan as the leader of the tribes of Israel, was honored to enter it in company with Jesus the Son of God when " He received from God the Father honor and glory," and there was given him a momentary vision of the coming of the kingdom of God in power and glory at the Lord’s glorious advent, when earth and heaven shall be united, and the dominion and the kingdom under the whole heaven shall be administered by Him to the glory of God the Father. "The body of Moses" is then the body of "the man Moses," and is unfigurative, just as "the body of Jesus" was the body of "the man Christ Jesus," which Joseph the counselor begged of Pilate (Luke 23:52). It is only sheer ignorance of the meaning of God’s counsels and ways, and of the mind of the Spirit, that could lead any man to affirm that "the body of Moses " is a figurative expression for the Jewish people, just as "the body of Christ" is for the church of God. The expression that answers to "the body of Moses" would be "the body of Jesus," the historical person, not of the official person Christ; and Christians are never spoken of as the body of Jesus," nor are the Jews ever said in Scripture to be "the body of Moses." ======================================================================== CHAPTER 146: VOL 02 - THE CHURCH IN SARDIS: MODERN PHASES OF THE CHURCH ======================================================================== The Church in Sardis: Modern Phases of the Church IN the church in Sardis the change from the corruptions and depths of Satan in Thyatira is at once obvious and striking. Sardis is apparently clear of corruption and "depths of ’Satan," but worldly and dead; a prophecy of the condition of the Protestant profession after " the Reformation." Protestantism is to this day characterized by much reputation for life (" a name that thou livest "); but the fresh, living reality, is gone: "thou art dead." "And to the angel of the church in Sardis, write "- 1. SARDIS, the place where the church was, was the ancient capital of Lydia, situated in the fertile valley between the mountains Tmolus and Hermus, watered by the small river Pactolus, so famous in ancient history for its golden sands. It was 33 miles from Thyatira, 28 from Philadelphia, and 60 from Ephesus. It was the city of Croesus of fabulous riches: and it continued a rich and thriving town down to the close of the Byzantine Empire. In the eleventh century it fell into the hands of the Turks; and in the thirteenth was destroyed by Tamerlane. A village of two or three huts, called Sarte, is all that stands for it in our clay. Place and surroundings have invariably a good or a bad effect on the professing church; and here "the church in Sardis," a prosperous, worldly city, richer in Croesus’ time than any in all the world, seems to have suffered injury to its spiritual life by being located in the midst of prosperous worldly enterprise, resulting in great wealth. There is a worldly atmosphere generated in such places which saints are sometimes, from necessity, enveloped in, as well as others; and just as trees and flowers refuse to grow, or show only a stunted, loveless, languishing vegetation, in the midst of a great manufacturing and commercial city, so Christians, living in the atmosphere of worldliness and haste to be rich, are apt to have their spiritual vitality checked and injured by the influence of the place, unless they keep themselves, like men in a diving-bell, drawing their vital air from a higher sphere. Much faith, prayer, meditation, and converse with God by reading His word, are needful if we would isolate ourselves, and protect our spirits from the deadening influence of the surrounding worldliness. Living in the atmosphere of Sardis, heavily charged with soiling elements, the majority of the church there had defiled their garments; but not until their spirituality had just so declined, as to make them venture too freely into moral proximity to the defiling world. The fall is always first in the saints’ hearts: ("thou hast left thy first love,")-then it manifests itself in outward things. We come next to consider-’ 2. THE CHARACTERISTICS the Lord assumes in addressing the church in Sardis: "These things saith He that hath the seven, Spirits of God and the seven stars." "The seven Spirits of God" means that He has all spiritual energy to work, and the " seven stars " that He has all authority to entitle Him to do it. He could say, in view of the discipling of all nations, in Matthew 28:19, " All power (authority, ἐξουία) is given unto Me in heaven and on earth." And again, John 17:2, "As Thou hast given Him power (authority) over all flesh, that He should give eternal life to as many as Thou hest given Him." Although the church in Sardis may not acknowledge His authority, but give the world the right to regulate all things concerning its doctrine, discipline, and government, the Lord Jesus still says, though thus ignored, I have " the seven stars," 1:e. all fullness of authority to rule all things in "the house of God," as He will, by and by, as Revelation 5:1-14 declares, have authority given Him, with fullness of divine energy to carry it out and to make God’s will become law throughout the habitable world. He has " the seven stars," but they are not seen in His right hand; for Protestantism, though called "the Re-formation," never could be owned by Him ecclesiastically as His regular and re-formed order, with all His gifts and rulers in their right places, as they were in Ephesus, when they had " elders of the church " who could be sent for by the Apostle and charged to take heed to themselves and " to all the flock of God, in which the Holy Ghost had set them as overseers" (Acts 20:28). It was conspicuously obvious there that the most appropriate designation He could take to Himself when addressing that church was, "He that holdeth the seven, stars in His right hand, and walketh in the-midst of the seven golden candlesticks (Revelation 2:1). The various orders and authorisings throughout Protestantism are just as conspicuously and evidently not held in His hand; of its authority He must say, "I never knew you;" He is not their author, nor will He own them or be responsible for them; but, as they take ecclesiastical place, He will take account by and by of their doings; and meantime He has all fullness of authority, and He will so arrange matters that His will, with regard to the individuals who own Him and bow to His authority, shall be carried out. In Popery, both spiritual power and ecclesiastical authority are arrogated: Protestantism claims spiritual power, and allows the State to assume the ecclesiastical authority. Hence all the Protestant Church establishments. But where they do not own the supremacy of the State after an Erastian sort, they have set up an ecclesiastical authority devised by human skill, and without regard to Christ as possessed of the seven Spirits of God and the seven stars; they establish doctrine, discipline, worship, and government, and tyrannize over the consciences of the more spiritual by means of this man-made order. The immediateness of contact with Christ Himself, which faith gives, is denied by this evil system, and spiritual death is the issue. We might almost say that the state of this Sardian profession is chronic deadness. The Sardis state, though chiefly. human, not divine, is still ecclesiastical history, and men must be held responsible for the church-action which they take; and though the Lord is no longer seen walking in the midst of the candlesticks, He is there as truly as ever, taking note of and judging all that conies before Him, though it may be largely man’s wilfulness substituted for His authority. As long as men attempt church-building, and potter in ecclesiastical ordering, and call it by the name of Christ, the Lord Jesus must inspect it and pass judgment on it. The great mass of believers are in the sphere of Sardis; and, Christ’s gifted servants being there also, He must assert His authority over them though in a wrong place and put to a perverted use-" to draw away the disciples after them." They are His as well as all that by which He represents Himself on the earth: " He bath the seven stars." If they administer things so very badly as to unite the professing church with the world, and advocate the unscriptural and suicidal alliance of Church and State, He will take note of it; and being His converted and gifted servants, He will call them to account for their bad work, and judge them for it too, just because they are His: "He haft the seven stars." It is " to the angel of the church in Sardis " He gives this designation of Himself; not to the world. And, besides having authority,, He has all fullness of spiritual power. " These things saith He that hath the seven Spirits of God and the seven stars." This figure of the seven Spirits of God as had by Christ, not as connected with Christ’s person, are seen in ch. 1: 3 as before God’s throne: " the seven Spirits which are before His throne:" and in Revelation 4:1-11; Revelation 5:1-14 they are seen as " seven lamps of fire burning before the throne;" when He is seen as the Lamb that was slain, 5: 6, the seven Spirits are His seven eyes; " which are the seven Spirits of God sent forth into all the earth." See also Zechariah 4:2-10. This indicates His fullness of spiritual qualities, intelligence, and power of the Spirit in connection with Him to accomplish the will of God in the world. Isaiah 11:2 has the same form of speech; "And the Spirit of Jehovah shall rest upon Him; the Spirit of wisdom and understanding; the Spirit of counsel and might; the Spirit of knowledge and the fear of Jehovah." The subsequent context shows that "the seven Spirits" of Jehovah here mentioned are His in reference to the judgment and government of the earth. The seven Spirits are the Holy Ghost in such comprehensive qualities as these. The last promises to the faithful in Thyatira" authority over the nations," and." I will give him the morning star "-indicate the end: and as if the kingdom were about to come, He says to Sardis, "These things saith He that hath the seven Spirits of God." He has fullness of divine power to subjugate the nations, and to carry out authoritatively whatever is the will of God. There was a misapprehension of Christ’s power and authority by those who went down to Egypt for help and leant on the arm of the world in their organizing Protestantism against the Pope. But now the Lord would show the futility of so doing, for He has authority over all, and the fullness of spiritual energy to bring about whatever is God’s will on earth. "He hath the seven Spirits of God and the seven stars." And if so, may not individual Christians trust themselves, and all that concerns them, in His hands? The way the Lord speaks of Himself here is appropriate to the condition of the church in Sardis, which was dead and worldly. If they were dead, the fullness of the Spirit giving life was His. If they had gone formally into the world, and invited and used its authority and support, yet He had the seven stars. If they had gone wrong ecclesiastically and spiritually, it was not because of want of fullness of authority and spiritual power in Him to meet all their need. 3. THE NAME WITHOUT THE THING: "I know thy works, that a name thou hast that thou livest, and thou art dead" (verse 1). It is utterly impossible for churches in alliance with the world to be in a state of spiritual life and vigor. When men in their own wisdom think to better their condition by giving up Christ’s rights to the world, or by organizing churches according to their own pattern, and systematizing divine truth into Creeds and Confessions (as if they could put all God’s truth into a human mold), they bring upon themselves a condition of spiritual death as the fruit of their folly. For they thereby either go to sleep on the lap of that ease which the world affords, or they preclude their being acted on by truth beyond their creed, which the Spirit, in His fullness, would give them from the word of God: and thus their organizations being human, and their creeds human, they degrade the divine system of Christianity into a merely human system, which keeps out Christian truth, the only means by which life is maintained. Theology is preached, not Christ, and man’s learning is looked to for getting a knowledge of the truth, not the Holy Ghost; (yet He says " the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God; ") and logic is admired in formulating and inculcating theological sentiments, while the people are famishing for Christ, the living bread, who came down from heaven and gave His life for the world. There was a powerful working of the Holy Ghost, producing the divine life and its fruits, which is ordinarily called the Reformation of the sixteenth century. Then it was that, under the preaching of Luther and other servants of Christ of that age, multitudes of men, in all lands, were convicted of their sins and converted to God, and, with many others who were only convinced of the evils of Popery, they broke away in whole nationalities from the domination of the Papacy, and, by means of the Spirit working with a preached gospel and a printed Bible circulated in the language of the several countries, rid themselves of the corruptions of Rome, and held a comparatively scriptural creed, and lived a life becoming the gospel. But as everything given into the responsibility of man becomes spoiled and has proved a failure, so the result of this great work of God in man’s hands also lost its life, power, and freshness, and, in course of time, with the old reputation for life as much insisted upon as ever, its vitality was only in name: " Thou hast a name that thou livest, and art dead." This is the judgment of no ignorant or impetuous critic, but of the omniscient Savior. " He that hath the seven Spirits of God and the seven stars" saith, "I know thy works that thou hast a name that thou livest, and art dead.” 4. " THY WORKS! " there seem at first sight to be none, only a dead profession. Strange it is to make it their work to live a life of mere quotation, or to pride themselves on a reputation for life because their fathers once enjeyed it, when the coldness of death so obviously prevails. There are many who have a name that they live, but their life is one of reference to times gone by, rather than a present enjoyment of life in Christ; a living by talking of extraordinary times and experiences which they have had in the past, but they have no present enjoyment of living fellowship with the Father and with His Son Jesus Christ, which is the Christian state. Others live on the traditional reputation of that with which they are connected. Their name for life is that they are members of an historical church, whose fathers long ago did self- sacrificing exploits, or were men of faith, prayer, and power, witnesses for Christ, of world-wide renown, men of God, who had sealed their testimony with their blood. But the Lord repudiates all historical religion, and insists on a present life of faith, carried on in the living power of the Holy Ghost, like Paul, who said, " I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave Himself for me,"-Galatians 2:20. But in this connection the Lord is testifying of the mass, rather than of the salvation of individuals. What characterizes Protestantism is a boast of living when it is a painful anachronism. " I know... that thou hast a name that thou livest, and art dead." The corruptions and Jezebels of Thyatira had no place, in Sardis, which, with a name to live, was but dead. But we will treat of this death and its causes more fully when we now consider the works of Sardis; for there are works, though defective. There had been the recovery of much truth, zeal for the Lord and His word, suffering for His name, liberty of conscience, the purging away of gross evil, and coming out from corruptions; but the. Lord complains, "I have not found thy works perfect before my God." They were works that He found incomplete, being only in meager outline, not filled to the full measure of Christian works (Ephesians 2:10; Ephesians 4:5.) What works were wrought at the Reformation? They were evangelic more than ecclesiastical, and of a practical kind; but in none of them did the Lord Jesus, the great Head of the Church, find anything like completeness or filled-fullness (as the word signifies). It is not the ordinary word for perfect, but one that means a filling to the full (πεπληρωμένα), (1 John 1:4; Colossians 2:10; John 3:29; John 15:11; John 16:24; John 17:13; 2 John 1:12; Php 2:2.) It is the same word that is used in many places about the fulfilling of Scripture, "that the scriptures might be fulfilled," and the same as when Paul says that he was not only a minister of the gospel, but a minister of the church, to fulfill (or complete) the word of God (Colossians 1:25), and rendered in Colossians 2:9 complete, where the apostle writes, "and ye are complete in Him," filled to the full in Him. Now, with this the meaning of the word, and the Lord’s declaration that the works were not completed ones before His God, " before MY God," we have a whole flood of light thrown upon the subject. (1.) Let us look first at the incompleteness of the works of the Reformation period in bringing out with scriptural fullness the great doctrines of Divine Revelation. Whoever reads even Luther’s writings, great instrument of God though he undoubtedly was to deliver from superstition and give in good measure the saving truths of the gospel, will find, even the works of Luther and his co-laborers in formulating the doctrines of justification, righteousness, sanctification, the Spirit and His mission, Baptism and the Lord’s Supper, were seriously incomplete. There was as much as gave life, if not settled peace, to thousands; the Lord gave great blessing with it, but the incompleteness of the doctrine, and especially the gross fundamental blunder about what they called " the sacraments "-retaining Baptismal regeneration, and framing the figment of consubstantiation, left the seed of evil doctrine so embedded in the very heart of reformation theology that it must ever keep those who receive it from doctrinal completeness. (2.) And again, the works in church-forming were just as imperfect as those in creed-making. Just as there is not one doctrine of Holy Scripture to be found in its revealed completeness in the whole of Reformation theology, so there is not a trace of the true doctrine of the church of God to be found in the history of the Reformation, nor was there ever a practical approach made by the most enlightened of them to accepting and presenting the true manifestation of the church of God. They never got down to the true rock-basis (Matthew 16:18) of the church of God as it is in Scripture. The clergy were retained, and they by their presence kept the Lord from acting out His will, as well as giving full blessing by the Holy Ghost. The church of the Reformation period was built on man; they "put confidence in princes," contrary to the express teaching of Scripture (Psalms 108:9), and they left room and liberty for man to work, but ignored the Lord as the Head of His body the church, and as the One who should have been allowed liberty to direct all and work all by His Spirit, having as He has "the seven Spirits of God" and " the seven stars." The church of God, as revealed in the Holy Scriptures, being unknown in the Reformation period, all that could be done with a view to setting it up was necessarily not filled to the fullness of the pattern we have in the word. The Reformation allowed the stars to be regulated by the States of the world, and made it impossible for the Holy Ghost to have liberty in the Church to work by whom He pleased, according to Christ’s will, and subsequently men who did not like this argued for the stars being put under the regulation of the church, both being equally unscriptural. And these incompleted works of the Protestantism of three hundred years ago come down in creeds and confessions to hamper and torment all the more conscientious " in Sardis" to this day. The evil that men do lives after them. The simple Scripture doctrine that rule and gift are retained by Christ in His own hands, and that we should believe this, confess it practically, and be filled with life and blessing from our living Head, and kept in perennial freshness by being immediately in contact with the fountain of life by the Holy Ghost, is what never was seen in Protestantism at the Reformation, nor since, and what it is the daily effort of the chiefs of Sardis to prevent. This being the very secret and source of spiritual vitality the serious incompleteness in regard to the church lets them put something between them and Christ-a system, a clergy, ordinances; and thereby scriptural worship becomes an impossibility, for the material of worship, the perfect purging of the worshippers, the place of Christian worship, the power for worship and liberty in worship (as Christ ordained all) are unknown in Protestantism, and no wonder then that with a name to live, it should be said by Him "that hath the seven Spirits of God and the seven stars "-" thou art dead." " Become watching and strengthen the things which remain, which are ready to die; for I have not found thy works perfect before my God." (3.) In regard to Christian practice, their " works " were not filled out to Christian fullness. How could they, when Christians were put under the law as their rule of life-as they are to this day? The word tells us there is no perfect rule of life for a Christian but Christ Himself in contrast with law. The first piece of Christian ethic was a brief paper sanctioned by the Holy Ghost to guard the churches against legalism (Acts 15:23-29). Christian obedience and walking "in newness of life" are set on other grounds than those of " the law," namely, on those of having life and salvation not in order to have them nor to improve them, and we obey and serve from other causes and motives: and the love of Christ constraineth us. The spiritual man delights in that to which the Lord calls us in His word, and the Spirit working in the new man impels to do good, and gives strength to perform it: and the obedience of the Christian is more comprehensive than that of the Jew under law. " Ye are not under law, but under grace." There is a word used by our Lord, though dropped out in our English version, which has great significance; it is "My: " "thy works " are not " completed BEFORE MY GOD." The works may be such as to give a good name for life before men, but not "before My God." "Man looketh on the outward appearance; but the Lord looketh on the heart" (1 Samuel 16:7). Again, works that might have passed with Israel’s God, before God was fully revealed according to his nature in Christ, and before He raised and glorified Him, and before the Holy Ghost came down, giving in all its completeness the Word of God, and giving us the consciousness of relationship with the Father, and making us "one Spirit" with the Lord, will not do now that we are brought into the presence of "the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, and are blessed in Him with all spiritual blessings in the heavenlies," and are led of the Spirit and have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry Abba, Father.; our works must be found such as will be pleasing to Christ’s God, "perfect before MY God." Every work in Protestantism-even to the saints being still mixed up with the world, in politics, pleasure, or worship-filling its places of power and authority, or exercising the rights of citizenship, or going to its shows, amusements, and entertainments-or attending its places of worship (Hebrews 13:13), all tell of defectiveness in practice, a lack of being up to that fullness demanded by Christianity, and will not pass with the Lord, before His God, when the fire shall try every man’s work of what sort it is. That is a solemn word by which He pronounces judgment on them even now-" I have not found thy works perfect before My God." In this nineteenth century of Christianity, they cling to " that which is abolished," and the doctrine, discipline, and moral ethics of Protestantism are so incomplete that the practice of professing Christians in Sardis is hardly in anything higher than that of the Jews before the coming of Christ. 5. " THE THINGS WHICH REMAIN and are ready to die." The things which remain are to be strengthened. The angel is enjoined to do this. There is always some " angel" on whom the responsibility is laid. The embers of an expiring Christian life may be almost extinguished, but if there are any " things that remain," the Lord would have them strengthened. Most part of even saints would have them to die out. They are so cold. and dead, they will say, what good can come of working with them? Not so the Lord, who has "the seven Spirits of God." He would have them strengthened. They are of long standing, chronic in their moribund condition, "the things which were ready to die," but His command is " Strengthen them." There are a few names in Sardis which have not defiled their garments, and they at least could be helped and strengthened. There is an undefiled remnant, dear to the Lord’s heart, who are groaning over the deadness that surrounds them, living a life of faith and prayer, devoted to the Lord, pious, exemplary, and walking with undefiled garments in holy separation from the world, and yet having little light and little strength-they see nothing for it, but struggle on where they are, and try to serve the Lord with a good conscience, though in the midst of things which they have an instinct if nothing more) are not in accordance with His mind. These the Lord bids strengthen. Their whole surroundings are such as to threaten them with a complete extinction of their spiritual life: they could be strengthened by having the complete Christian teaching presented to them, and then fully knowing Christ as He now is at God’s right hand, they would follow Him into a path of Christian separation from the world, and "walk as He walked." But this word of the Lord’s may be of wider significance, and may refer to the mass rather than to individuals, though the body cannot be reached without acting on the individuals. In modern times we have read of missions in Asia stirring up the dying embers in the all but fossil churches of Armenia, and the churches of Scandinavia are being stirred up and the remaining life strengthened in so powerful a manner that they now speak of a disruption of the national church, because in it they are bound down to those practices which bind them over to spiritual death. In last century the strengthening of the things ready to die in the English Church issued in Methodism; and in this century the strengthening of the things that were ready to die in the Church of Scotland resulted in a disruption of that church and the building up outside of it of what is called the Free Church of Scotland. And in Germany, France, Switzer land, Italy, the strengthening of things that are ready to die in recent times has given better doctrine, faith, and life to thousands; and many are finding their way to the Lord Himself. But if the effects of such strengthening only result in their settling down with a fresh set of incomplete works, such as one sees all these awakenings have produced, what is the good. of it? The Lord enjoins it, and if the full Christian truth be given His saints they will be more blessed where they are as Jong as they do not have light and strength (as they ought and might) to "go forth unto Him without the camp, bearing His reproach" (Hebrews 13:13). There has been immense help rendered to saints and servants of Christ in " Sardis " during the past fifty years, and though the majority have not profited by the light that has reached them, to as to answer in the completeness of their practice to the fullness of the Christian doctrine, those who know the full worth of Christianity, and desire to serve Christ and meet His mind fully, should not on that account slacken their efforts for their strengthening as long as the Lord sends unclear and unemancipated believers across their path. The Lord’s command creates the duty; and the possession of the truth makes us their debtors. They are our brethren, members of Christ’s body, and dear to Him; and it would be specially pleasing to Him were we making special prayer that His groaning captives should be delivered. His languishing " things" in Protestant systems should be strengthened, leaving in His hands the issues from death." The word here translated " strengthen " is so translated in only one other place of Scripture when the Lord said to Peter, "When thou art converted, strengthen thy brethren" (Luke 22:32). In all other places save Luke 1:51; Luke 16:26, it is rendered by "establish" or " stablish " (Romans 1:11; Romans 16:25; 1 Thessalonians 3:2; 1 Thessalonians 3:13; 2 Thessalonians 2:17; 2 Thessalonians 3:3; James 5:8; 1 Peter 5:10; 2 Peter 1:12); from which one would gather that the Lord is here giving a commission to place on a firm solid basis of divine truth the unestablished-" Rooted and built up in Him " is the aim. The work of the teacher is to the end that Saints, by accepting the truth and acting upon it, they "may be established." After the apostle had given the Romans "the gospel of God " in an epistle full of establishing truth, he ends it thus-" Now to Him that is of power to stablish, you according to my gospel, and the preaching of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery which was kept secret since the world began," etc. (Romans 16:25-27). This is the means of establishing souls wherever they need to be strengthened, by fixing them down on Paul’s gospel, and " the revelation of the mystery," that they may know God according to the fullest and latest revelation of Himself. This alone gives stability. A sack filled with chaff has no power in itself to stand, but a sack of wheat stands erect by the weight of the wheat put into it; so those Christians who are filled with the truths peculiar to Christianity will be established by the word of truth communicated, whereas those who are filled with the mere chaff of theology will always be unestablished, incomplete in their works, and "ready to die; " and what we affirm as true of the individual is true also of the community. And it is to the remaining collective though languishing vitality of the church or professing body "in Sardis" that special reference is here made. When souls are really delivered and solidly grounded in the truth of Christianity before God in Christ, rooted and built up in Him, and stablished in the faith, as they have been taught, they generally show it by their delighting in God’s word, and in their subjection to it, and in their determination to allow of nothing that is not formed upon the Bible and regulated by its precepts; and this will be extended to doctrine, church communion, and practical life in the world. "Become watching," then. Wherefore He saith, " Awake, thou that sleepest, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give thee light" (Ephesians 5:14). " Watch" is a word which was frequently spoken by the Lord in the days of His flesh, as we see on consulting the Gospel history (Matthew 24:42-43; Matthew 25:13; Matthew 26:38; Matthew 26:40-41; Mark 13:34-35; Mark 13:37; Mark 14:34; Mark 14:37-38; Luke 12:37; Luke 12:39). His apostles also used it in their speaking and writing (Acts 11: 31; 1 Corinthians 16:13; Colossians 4:2; 1 Thessalonians 5:6; 1 Thessalonians 5:10; 1 Peter 5:8). And the Lord, in addressing the churches, again employs it just as in another place of this Apocalypse (Revelation 16:15), when it would seem as if it were almost a repetition of His address to the church in Sardis. 6. EXHORTATION TO REMEMBER, KEEP, AND REPENT.-" Remember, therefore, how thou has received and heardest, and keep it, and repent" (verse 3). This clause begins with remember and ends with repent. The Lord would call memory into exercise, that He may reach their consciences and bring about a better moral state. The " how" is said by some to be indicative of the subjective manner of reception, how they had "received;" others would make it more objective-" after what sort; " while others would unite both, which seems to give the true meaning. There had been a permanent deposit of Christian truth committed to them; the way they came by it was by hearing, and now that it had been committed to writing they were exhorted to. keep it. The Reformation was chiefly brought about by hearing the preaching of the gospel; the manner of hearing was characterized by intense earnestness, and the truth thus received was prized by tens of thousands as an inestimable treasure, while at the same time the Bible was translated and put into the hands of the people, and they were thus everywhere placed in the enjoyment of an open Bible, liberty of conscience, and liberty of assembling to hear the word read and expounded. They had received much by hearing, and much more by having the entire word of God laid open to them by means of the printing-press; and in our day it is the boast of Protestantism that there never were so many millions of copies of the Holy Scriptures in the homes of the people; and while this is a mighty boon it is just thus that the responsibility of Protestants is increased, and their sin of not acting on the full truth of the Bible affords the most solemn proof of their dead state. Where is a good conscience in the midst of this full blaze of Bible light, when men will admit that their creeds and systems are not in accordance with God’s word, and yet they subscribe the one and remain in the other? " Remember, therefore, how thou hast received." It is impossible to have repentance without remembrance. " Remember how thou hast received." With what a fervent grasp of a living faith Christ, who is our life, was embraced, and with what flowings of grace and joy in the Holy Ghost we accepted through Him forgiveness of sins and justification from all things; how we breathed the atmosphere of divine love, and were filled with all joy and peace in believing, the Spirit shedding abroad the love of God in our hearts, and giving us to live by the faith of the Son of God. This was "how" the apostolic churches received the word, not. as a mere system, but as the good news of God concerning His Son, becoming the power of God unto salvation: and thus, no doubt, the church in Sardis was formed. It was thus the church in Thessalonica received the word, as we are expressly informed. "For our gospel came not unto you in word only, but also in power, and in the Holy Ghost, and in much full-assurance, as ye know what manner of men we were among you for your sakes; and ye became followers of us and of the Lord, having received the word in much affliction, with joy of the Holy Ghost, so that ye were ensamples to all that believe in Macedonia and Achaia (1 Thessalonians 1:5-7). This explains the "how" of reception of the gospel, and doubtless there had been a similar reception given to the gospel in Sardis; there had been something striking and memorable in the way they had received the word, to make the exhortation of the Lord to call these days to remembrance appropriate, searching, seasonable, and impressive. In days of languor, when those who were once consuming them selves with fervor and zeal for the Lord have settled down in carnal ease, holding a heartless orthodoxy, there is no more likely means of leading them to repentance than by the Lord reminding them of the liveliness, heartiness, fervor, zeal, and love with which they had received the truth when it was first brought to them in power and in the Holy Ghost. "Remember how thou hast received"-"hast received," as He says in chap. 2: 27, " even as I received of my Father." "Let the word of the Christ dwell in you richly in all wisdom." And with regard to all things, not only in the salvation of souls but in the ordering of Christian worship and the regulation of the affairs of the Christian assembly, we are not at liberty to deviate from what the church received and heard from the beginning. His word remains in all its divine sufficiency; "keep it" is the Lord’s injunction, deviate not a hairsbreadth from it, abate not a jot of it, hold it fast, and count on the working of the Holy Ghost, who remains still in the House of God to work in grace, power, and blessings by whom He chooses, in order to make good to His saints all that His word contains. To men in Sardis who have so widely departed from thefaith of Christ and obedience to the mind of God, and who have set aside Christ’s will to do according to their own, the Lord’s call is not only to remember the original deposit of divine truth committed to the church, and that it may be kept as originally given, but seeing that their practice has been in neglect of it and in opposition to it, He also enjoins them to repent; and the very form of the word suggests that He urges upon them a quick and decisive work of self-judgment and amendment. 7. THE LORD’S AWFUL THREAT if there was not attention paid to His solemn and impressive exhortation to wake up and repent. "If, therefore, thou shalt not watch, I will come (upon thee) as a thief, and thou shalt not know what hour I will come upon thee " (verse 3). This shows us that the prophetic mystical meaning-that which gives a. bird’s-eye view of the complete phases of the church in responsibility from the Apostles’ days to Christ’s second coming-must be the one that is chiefly intended. Were it the historical Sardis of St. John’s day that had been intended, there is no longer either a " church in Sardis " or the city of Sardis itself. A prophetic earnest of the judgment coming on the symbolic Sardis may be found. in the sudden, unexpected, and exterminating catastrophe which befel the wealthy and prosperous Sardis of this epistle. " Its overthrow came like a thief in the night during that great earthquake, which leveled its proudest compeers with the dust. It did certainly undergo a temporary sickly recovery, but it was only to relapse into a more slow but equal debasement, and the modern Sart scarcely merits to be called the dust of Sardis." The testimony of another writer is even more striking. " If I should be asked what impresses the mind most strongly on beholding Sardis, I should say, its indescribable solitude, like the darkness that could be felt. So the deep solitude of the spot, once ’ the lady of kingdoms,’ produces a corresponding feeling of desolate abandonment in the mind which can never be forgotten. Connect this feeling with the message of the Apocalypse to the church in Sardis-’ Thou hast a name, that thou livest and art dead.... If therefore thou dost not watch I will come as a thief, and thou shalt not know what hour I will come upon thee,’ and then look round and ask, Where are the Christians, where is the church of Sardis? The tumuli beyond the Hermus reply, ’All dead! ’ suffering the threatened judgment of God for the abuse of their privileges. Let the unbeliever then be asked, Is there no truth in prophecy "-no reality in the words of Christ? Thus has passed away the great and ancient capital of Lydia, whose wealthy monarch Croesus was master of all the nations within the river Halys, and in its sudden destruction we have an earnest of the sudden destruction that shall come upon the world, 1 Thessalonians 5:1-28, and on lifeless Protestantism, which being found at the time of Christ’s second coming merely part of the world, shall be judged by Him as He shall judge the world: "I will come as a thief, and thou shalt not know at what hour I shall come upon thee." It is a threat of solemn and awful import, "/ will come as a thief." It tells that this Protestantism, which has such an enormous boast and reputation of life, will, in the end, terminate in utter worldliness, and become thoroughly identified with the world, the absorption of it by the world being so complete that they will have ceased to have any distinct existence as a church body, and its register will have no names at all-indeed it will be altogether discontinued. For "the comprehension" (which is now eagerly sought for by some notable church dignitaries) will have become so complete that the world and the church will have become identical, and citizenship in the world will be deemed enough. It is a sad thought that masses of the human family who had " escaped the pollutions of the world through the (Protestant) knowledge of the. Lord Jesus Christ should again become entangled and overcome, and the latter end of them be worse than the beginning:" and having re-merged themselves in the world, that they shall ultimately share in its tremendous and unexpected doom; for the peculiar way in which Christ shall come in judgment on the world is the way in which He shall come to judge them, " I will come as a thief, and thou shalt not know at what hour I will come upon thee." "I will come as a thief! " While Thyatira shall be passed through terrible tribulation and special judgment,-but judged as a corrupt church, -Sardis shall be treated as the world and judged as the world. This is taught by our Lord, as to "the evil servant," in Matthew 24:1-51, where the Lord uses the illustration of the thief, and then goes on to say: " But and if that evil servant shall say in his heart, My lord delayeth his coming, and shall begin to smite his fellow-servants, and to eat and drink with the drunken" (that is go into the world), "the lord of that servant shall come in a day when he looketh not for him, and in an hour that he is not aware of, and shall cut him off; and appoint him his portion with the hypocrites: there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth." If we refer to 1 Thessalonians 5:1-2, we shall find the figure of the thief again used, when (coming as it does after the rapture of the saints in chap. 4.) it can refer only to Christ’s coming to the world. Writing to the saints, he says:-" Yourselves know perfectly that the day of the Lord so cometh as a thief in the night," suddenly, stealthily, unwelcomely, and for evil. " For when th4 shall say peace and safety, then sudden destruction cometh upon them as travail upon a woman with child, and they shall not escape." But he adds, " ye, brethren, are not in darkness that that day should overtake you as a thief." " Those that sleep in Jesus will God bring with him;" and when Christ, who is our life, shall be manifested to take vengeance on them that know not God, and that obey not the gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ, then shall we also be manifested with Him in glory; and so we being associated with the Lord, when He comes as Judge to the world, cannot be of those who are to be judged by Him-but we are to come with Him to the judgment of the world. This proves conclusively that Sardis, or Protestantism, will be utterly destitute of all signs of vitality when Christ comes upon it " as a thief." The work of the Holy Ghost, all that is of the new creation, all possessed of everlasting life, shall not come into judgment; for God is not to judge His own work, nor Christ the work of the Holy Ghost; but the result in man’s hands becomes the object of judgment, and being destitute of life, shall share the doom of those who are in the darkness of spiritual death. And an ominous premonition of the coming of this judgment on Sardis, as on the world, is that the Scripture eschatology is a blank to the Protestant world, and the coming of the Lord is generally left out in the preaching of Protestants. Indeed, if they refer to it at all, it is only as regarding the Lord as one who is coming to execute judgment--coming for "the general judgment" as they say-a thing unknown to Scripture-not as one who has their affections and whom they are looking for, as the best beloved of their hearts, according to His promise to come to receive them to Himself (John 14:2-3), and take them up to the Father’s house, as 1 Thessalonians 4:1-18 teaches, before He comes with them in judgment on the world. There is no surer sign of the deadness of Protestantism and its worldliness than that the Lord’s pre-millennial coming to take up His saints, which, according to Scripture, His saints should be waiting for every moment-that which was the hope of the apostolic church,-should have generally dropped out of the belief of the professing church of modern times, as a present expectation to be waited for day by day. Christ does not seem the most loved object to many; for, out of the many millions of nominal Protestant Christians, there are scarcely any who hold correctly and intelligently " that blessed hope," and who are waiting. for God’s Son from heaven, as an immediate expectation, and as indicative that the Lord has the supreme place in their hearts. Only living spiritual men whose soul and life are commanded by Christ Himself are the persons who wait lovingly and longingly for their Savior’s coming again. Might we not now find whole denominations of professing Protestant Christians in whose midst the hope as well as the doctrine has become obsolete? It is a sad fact that it is so! They will tell you it is not essential. It may be possible to get to heaven by Christ’s blood without looking for His second coming; but it is indeed essential to life and godliness, as is abundantly declared in the Holy Scriptures, 1 John 3:3, Colossians 3:1-25, 2 Peter 3:1-18, and the general deadness and worldliness of the Protestant profession are no doubt largely owing to the neglect and want of it. It is the doctrine of a standing or falling church: and the absence of this "blessed hope" is at once a fertile cause of the deadness of the Protestant profession; and a sure premonition of its coming doom. The belief in the Lord’s coming in the Protestant world is nothing higher at present than the uncertain dread of the visitation of a midnight marauder. He would inspire with similar surprise, and terror, and consternation, and aversion, as the sudden appearance of a thief in the house; and as thus it is they regard Him and His coming, He threatens to visit them just in this manner "I will come as a thief, and thou. shalt not know at what hour I will come upon thee." They have had a great reputation for life and activity; but their place has always been in the world, and they will be visited with the world’s judgment. Sad and solemn end of living on a reputation not sustained by the fact, but all the time being closely united to the world, and forming a part of it, and the totality of her ecclesiastical systems constructed after the pattern of the world, and administered in strict accordance with a worldly-wise expediency, and with a view to comprehend, attract, and hold the world! The great modern mass of worldly but active ecclesiastical Protestant systems will be judged with the same thief- like suddenness and exterminating severity with which the infidel world will be judged. " I will come as a thief!" The whole aim of Protestantism has been to assume the world, to pervade all its institutions, to sanctify all its arts, sciences, and daily life, and to use Christ incarnate and the gospel merely for civilizing, humanizing, and world-elevating purposes; and of this it is impossible to get it to repent and accept Christ risen, and a new creation. Consequently, as it was said of old, " Ephraim is joined to his idols, let him alone," so they will be ultimately left to their Protestant idols, and the Lord will say to them, As you will not repent, you may expect Me as a thief: Have your worldliness, but its end is swift and unsparing judgment! "Behold I come as a thief! Blessed is he that watcheth and keepeth his garments " (Revelation 16:18). 8. A FEW NAMES. "But thou hast a few names in Sardis which have not defiled their garments, and they shall walk with me in white, for they are worthy. He that overcometh, he shall be clothed in white raiment" (ver. 4, 5). The question may be raised, If you make Sardis symbolical of Protestantism, after the fresh start at the time of the Reformation, when deadness had set in, can it be said that after all the revivals and religious awakenings that have become so general in our times, " a few names" would describe the number of Christians in the Protestant world? Have we not heard of men numbering converts by the ten thousand? and are we not now told that there are at present more Christians in the world than at any former period? We acknowledge, with grateful hearts, that the Lord has been working graciously, and that of late many have been wakened up as well as converted; but, though all this be admitted, yet the proportion of living, separated, consecrated believers are but "a few names" compared with the dead mass of the professing body. The recent awakening throughout the churches of Great Britain and Ireland that was supposed at the time to be so effective for good, has left only "a few names" of true believers, where hundreds, and even thousands, were counted as being converted; the ministers, as a rule, are not more spiritual in their preaching since then; while the churches seem to be more immovable in their worldliness; and the world itself is more mad on its pleasures, more determined in its own evil courses, and its people more given to drunkenness and profligacy; while our scientific and literary men are more daring in their opposition to a Divine Revelation, more outspoken in their skepticism, and more reckless in their assaults on the Bible. Were the mass of professors themselves appealed to, to say whether they knew their sins forgiven (what all babes in St. John’s day knew and enjoyed, 1 John 2:1-29), you would get only " a few names in Sardis " who would confess Christ, and own that they knew Him as the One who had saved their souls and washed away their sins in His precious blood. And if they would not venture to say they are saved, what right would others have to become responsible for them, and affirm that they are good Christians, though they have no assurance of their salvation? How few are the names in Sardis who have settled peace, and a believing knowledge of Christ’s work for them! Are not the majority unestablished, worldly believers, or mere professors? Are not the few godly pastors and pious Christians continually complaining of the deadness of the churches, the dearth of living godliness, the lack of consecration to the service of Christ? But there are " a few names " in Sardis who keep themselves apart from the prevailing worldliness. The lives of such men as one’s reading in modern Christian biography will readily recal to memory, tell us of a holy walk " unspotted from the world." No doubt " a few names " are still doing this in the midst of dead, hollow, and worldly profession; for there are saints who are vexing their righteous souls daily with the unlawful deeds done within the sphere of " Sardis," and who, at the same time, " have not defiled their garments." "Names" are persons; but those who are known to the Lord as His "by name" (John 10:3). Before the Holy Ghost came, "the number of names in Jerusalem was about one hundred and twenty;" after Pentecost, we read, "the number of the men was about five thousand." When the Lord called Saul, it was "by name," and thus He speaks of him to Ananias-one, " by name, Saul of Tarsus " (Acts 9:11). The Lord knows " the few names " of His saints even in the mass of lifeless profession "in Sardis;" and He recognizes them individually as His, and owns them as such; and He gives the encouraging word for such, " they shall walk with Me in white, for they are worthy." How different Christ’s estimate and man’s In Sardis all had a name, a reputation of life; but His judgment is, the living ones are few. But all Christ’s people, wherever found, are named and numbered. If only " a few names:" He has said to each, " I have called thee by name, thou art Mine." " Which have not defiled their garments." The word " garments " is symbolic of moral character and conduct. Though the praise is only negative, "not defiled," yet it is high praise in the circumstances; for how very few in the sphere of the great Protestant profession ever think of keeping away from theaters, operas, concerts, oratorios, assemblies, or, at least, private evening parties for dancing and folly; from shows, fancy fairs, bazaars, or even worse things in business, and private retellings, and banqueting! There is a huge system of utter worldliness carried on, and those who are the great leaders of it-the men who are the very soul, life, and energy of the worldliness of the present day, which Scripture condemns - are religious professors. " And they parted His garments, casting lots." They gambled beside the very cross, and for Christ’s clothes too! Strange sight was it to see the soldiers parting Christ’s garments among themselves beneath-the very shadow of the cross;-so Sardis has assumed Christ’s garments outwardly, in having a name to live, but it remains, like the heathen soldiers, the same world still, though arrayed in Christ’s garments. The world’s worst phases of gambling and deceit are in this very sphere. Where do we find the greatest business swindles, the most consummate overreaching, the most dishonest bankruptcies, and the sharpest practice in roguery, but just within the sphere of this vaunting religious profession called Sardis? " Thou hast a name that thou livest, and art dead," dead not only to God and the high claims of godliness and spiritual worship, but to the claims of moral rectitude, commercial uprightness, and common honesty. It is then no small praise that the Lord can say, " Thou hast a few names that have not defiled their garments." There are still a few men of probity, honesty, integrity, who are marked by name by the Lord as those who have an unsoiled moral character-men who have not defiled their garments by evil or dishonest practices in daily life. "They shall walk with life in white, for they are worthy." Where are they? In Sardis. Does the Lord acknowledge, them there? Yes; and He says " they are worthy," and as they have walked apart from the prevailing worldliness in the sphere of the great Protestant profession, " they shall walk with Me in white." With Me, the living One, in the sphere of true life, where the tree of life is the food, and the river of the water of life the ornament and refreshment; where the overcomer shall be displayed in glory, " clothed in white garments," and his name left standing with honor in the book of life, and when, He adds, " I will confess his name before My Father, and before His angels." This is a high commendation, a full recognition, a great encouragement, and a dazzling prospect. Then whispers the spirit of ease, of unbelief, of unfaithfulness to Christ, If all this is said of the undefiled in Sardis, then Christ must approve of their being there. Consequently those who would represent to them that it is not pleasing to the Lord that devoted Christians should remain in Protestant churches, which are not framed after the pattern of Holy Scripture, but that they ought to come out to Christ Himself, " the Holy and the True," must be under an entire misapprehension of His mind, and those who would endeavor to put before them such things, even from the word of God, as would lead them outside of mere Protestantism into a position alleged to be one of greater faithfulness to Christ, must be doing the devil’s work. The leaders in " Sardis " now boldly say this, but it is reckless, blasphemous, and entirely unwarranted by Scripture. For, let, The time when they were approved of by Christ in Sardis was when, in the development of the phases of the church (symbolically) there was only Popery and Protestantism. But now there is another phase of fidelity come out called " Philadelphia," where there is a fresh revelation of Christ personally, and in new moral characteristics, and in which fresh testimony is given, and definite faithfulness as to keeping His word, and not denying His name, according to the present mind of Christ, for His saints, is commended. There is a present mind of Christ for His own at the present hour, and this is, that they should break away from all that is unscriptural ecclesiastically in fidelity to Himself. " Sardis " may not teach this; but other Scriptures do. Sardis, though dead, was a church established on Scripture principles, and to have left it then would have been apostasy; but no modern " Sardis " being so, it is apostasy, in principle, to be in the membership of any Protestant " Church " (2 Timothy 2:19-22). But, 2d, There is also, and ever will be to the end, a remnant in Thyatira, or Popery, who will remain there, and who may never be in any way visited by the new light that shines upon Philadelphia. Would you then say that the Lord approves of their remaining in connection with Popery? Of course not, you say, for that would stultify our being in Protestantism. But does not the advance to Philadelphia stultify equally those who linger in Sardis? and if you would take all Christians out of Popery, why not also take them out of Protestantism, seeing that their being there ecclesiastically is as entirely out of the present mind of Christ as the other? Their being in Sardis is an anachronism. "There is no difference; for all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God," is said in reference to our sin before God, and so may it be said of Popery and Protestantism ecclesiastically: there is no difference, for both have sinned and come short of the glory of God. Corrupt Popery allows Jezebel to seduce, and dead Protestantism allows the world to rule, and neither of them meets the mind of Christ as to His church. Wherefore, in neither of them dare the believer who knows Christ Jesus, "the Holy and the True," outside the world, and in the glory of God, remain if he means to meet the mind of Christ, and walk in faithfulness, keeping His word, and not denying His name (Revelation 3:8). But some may ask-" Is not all this the mere notion of fanciful men? " Not at all. " We have the mind of Christ." The many thousands who have been called out of both Thyatira and Sardis, if not also out of Laodicea, can testify that it is the solid truth of God they are acting upon, attracted by the living person of the Christ, to whom they have gone forth; and they know that in their so doing they have been led by the Holy Ghost, who has shown them the path and the privilege of leaving all for Christ, and who Himself has led them forth to Him. There was a day when one man came out against the world in the belief that the earth went round the sun, and not the sun round the earth, and though the false theory had the benefit of overwhelming numbers, it did not alter the solid fact, and although the church condemned the astronomer, time has now turned all men to the same belief. There was a pious monk in Germany, fully three hundred years ago, who found in the word of God that justification is by faith, and though the Pope and the Church of Rome condemned it and him, he stuck to the new light given him, and, as a consequence, a great part of Europe came out from Popery; but after the first flush of awakening was past, the Sardis phase of the church was formed, and, as we have seen, it is entirely out of the Lord’s mind, and will be judged by Him with the same punishment as the world, and now the Lord is calling His own out of this. There is always a man of God for the day, who is used by God to bring out His present mind to meet any particular phase in the evolution of His purpose, and it is in vain to oppose it. If it be of God, no man can overthrow it. Then would it not be wise in modern theologians and God-fearing private Christians, at least to pause and consider whether or not the Scriptures give us an advance on Protestantism, and whether or not it be the mind of Christ to have His people outside of it as well as of Popery, and linked in the closest way with himself? It can be nothing but prejudice, or interested wilfulness, that keeps the spiritually-minded from seeing that Philadelphia is a stage beyond Sardis when they have the thing pointed out to them; for while there are only " a few names in Sardis " whom the Lord acknowledges, and the bulk of professors is a mass of deadness, He gives His unqualified approbation of the whole company in Philadelphia, and tells them that He will make the ecclesiastical party, who, through Satan’s malice, are their adversaries, to come and do homage to them, and acknowledge that He has loved them. The Philadelphian Church phase having come, there is no ground for believing that if Christians remain in Sardis with the light of the truth acted upon in Philadelphia, they will have the approbation of the Lord as when they were in ignorance: for would not this be a premium on unfaithfulness to the truth and to Christ? Does not the most palpable teaching of facts tell this in the ear of faith? The Lord’s approval in this day can be secured for those who have adequate knowledge only in the outside place; for the midnight cry has been raised, " Behold the Bridegroom; go ye out to meet Him; " and thus we are in the last great revival marked by the person of Christ being brought out with fullness and distinctness, and the faithful are being attracted by their bridal affections to answer to the affection in his heart that wakes them from their long slumber to go out to meet Him. It is likely that there may still be "a few names in Sardis" that the light and " cry " have not reached, whose hearts are breaking on account of the deadness. They have real attachment to Christ, and lead a life of moral purity, and not having been visited as yet by this great revival, of such the Lord will say, " They shall walk with Me in white, for they are worthy." There are, no doubt, such persons, but the light is rapidly spreading, and if it reaches them, and discloses Christ, they must go forth unto Him, and will certainly do so. 9. THE PROMISE OF THE LORD TO THE OVERCOMER.-" He that overcometh, the same shall be clothed in white raiment; and I will not blot his name out of the book of life, but I will confess his name before my Father, and before His angels," verse 5. This promise is threefold. 1. White raiment; 2. The name left unblotted out of the register; 3. His name confessed in glory. The last word of Jesus’ valedictory address to his disciples before He suffered was this-" I have overcome the world" (John 16:33). He is the great overcomer. Satan presented it to Him in the temptation in the wilderness in the different forms in which it addresses us, and He overcame it. And since then He has overcome through death, and broken the power of Satan in his own trusted stronghold; for through death He has destroyed him that had the power of death, and is now giving from His conqueror’s place on high those powers to men which fit them for being deliverers of their fellows from Satan’s power (Ephesians 4:8-11). And now to them who believe this word is spoken: " This is the victory that overcometh the world, even your faith." Faith would feel in the midst of a name to live in Sardis the necessity of actually living by receiving constant accessions of the elements of vitality from heart-contact with Christ, who is the life. " He that eateth Me, the same shall live by Me " (John 6:1-71) Being strong in the Lord, and in the power of His might, and growing in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, we are in a fit state to meet and vanquish our enemy. " I write unto you young men," says St. John, " because ye have overcome the wicked one " (1 John 2:13). We read in Revelation 12:11, " And they overcame by the blood of the Lamb, and by the word of their testimony, and they loved not their lives unto the death." Thus only can the saints overcome. Satan’s great object is to keep Christians from making good to their own souls their heavenly privileges and blessings in Christ, and then getting them to mingle in the world. Only a few names in Sardis have any adequate spiritual apprehension of their standing and privilege in a risen and glorified Christ. The majority stop short with a happy sense of pardon, and an escape from hell; but such will not prove overcomers of mere nominal dead religion, nor of the world from which they do not separate. But those who know Christ in His fullness of spiritual power, and fullness of living authority, and count on Him for grace, preserve themselves, and lead a holy, blameless, moral life. To such the Lord promises white garments. " He that overcometh, he shall be clad (or clothe himself) in white garments." There is a "he" here in the text. "The overcome; he shall be clothed in white raiment;" he shall be so, not those who had a name to live and were dead, not the men of defiled garments who said Lord, Lord, but heeded not Christ’s word. Whatever good moral character we have here, we shall stand invested with it in the glory. It is a solemn word said of Judas that he went "to his own place," the place given him by his character of thief, betrayer, and suicide. And so it is with dead professors (Matthew 13:42). But the overcomer in Sardis shall be arrayed at last with all the character he acquired in keeping his garments undefiled on earth, in the midst of the general deadness and worldliness. He shall go to his own place, the place of Christ who overcame the world. His raiment shall be the white garments of moral purity. In chap. 19: 8, " To her was granted that she should be arrayed in fine linen, clean and white, for the fine linen is the righteousnesses of saints; " the very word signifies moral requirement answered to in the holy lives of the saints. It is the same as in Romans 8:4, " the righteous requirement of the law" should be fulfilled in us. That character which the saints acquire by their holy Christian life and walk shall be recognized and reproduced in glory. They shall walk there in a higher condition of enjoyment when heaven is opened and the throne is seen: we read, "And round about the throne were four-and-twenty thrones, and on the thrones four-and-twenty elders sitting clothed with white garments, and on their heads golden crowns." The promise to the victor in Sardis takes its complexion from what has gone before, and indicates that the overcomers as well as the undefiled ones of verse 4 are persons of whom the Lord said, " They shall walk with He in white, because they are worthy." (2) The name unblotted out from the book of life is the next part of the Lord’s promise, "And I will not blot out his name from the book of life." Just as members of any society have their names struck off the book of membership when they die; so the Lord implies in his promise to the overcomer, that all mere professors who- only have a name that they live, and are spiritually dead, will be struck off the book of life. Jesus is inspecting the churches in responsibility as a judge, and according to what He finds so will He judge, approving or condemning. All who take the name of having life are allowed to stand if . they show by their walk that they are true Christians; otherwise their names, given by their own act as being Christians, will not be retained on the register. The names in the book of professed life in the church below will be admitted by Christ to be worthy to stand if they have had real life under the name, otherwise they will be blotted out. These are all the places where the expression occurs. We have (1.) Thy book (Exodus 32:32); the book of the living (Psalms 69:28); the book (Daniel 12:1). (2.) We have the book of life (Php 4:3; Revelation 3:5; Revelation 20:12; Revelation 20:15). (3.) We have the book of life of the slain Lamb (Revelation 13:8; Revelation 17:8; 21: 27). We read the books were opened (Revelation 20:1-15) There shall be no erasure of any name of an overcomer from the book of life. He who, in the surrounding worldly profession with a great reputation for life but dead, maintains a holy Christian life, shall find his name in the book of life when he stands before the judgment-seat of Christ, when names of the defiled in Sardis which were in everybody’s mouth will be forever blotted out. This will be no small mark of honor " on that day." This subject of blotting out the name presents a difficulty to many, and is solved in various ways. Some insist that if their names were inscribed in the book of life and then wiped out, it makes for the possibility of people being saved and having divine life falling away and being lost. Others affirm that, although the Lord promises not to blot out the name, of the overcomer from the book of life, He does not say He will blot out any names from the book of life who have ever been in it. In order to get a scriptural view of what the book of life is, let us examine a little the Scriptures which speak of it. The figure of this is found in Exodus 32:32-33, when Moses in his extremity prays-" If not, blot me out of Thy book which Thou hast written." And the Lord said unto Moses, " Whosoever hath sinned against Me, him will I blot out of my book." This is clearly responsibility, just as in Sardis. The language in the LXX. is the same as far as it goes. Again we have the same words in Psalms 69:28, "Let them be blotted out of the book of the living, and not be written with the righteous." These two passages state that there will be blotting’ out for those who deserve it. The same word for book occurs in Daniel 12:1, " every one written in the book." In the New Testament we have, " whose names are in the book of life" (Php 4:3); here, "I will not blot out his name out of the book of life" (Revelation 3:5), and in 20: 15, " And if any one was not found written in the book of life he was cast into the lake of fire." Another word is used in Revelation 13:8; Revelation 17:8; Revelation 20:12; Revelation 21:27. But there is yet more in the Lord’s promise to the overcomer. (3.) The name confessed.-" But I will confess his name before my Father and before His angels." Not only will his name be left standing in the book of life, but when " the books are opened," and the deeds done in the body of the saints of God are looked into with respect to the bestowal of the rewards of glory, the Lord Jesus says, He will confess such a name before His Father and before His angels. Such an one in overcoming the worldliness of Sardis’ will have his name cast out as evil, and it will be a name of reproach and scorn on earth, as the name of Jesus was-if people even trouble themselves to take it at all in their lips. How great the honor of having the Head of the Church and the crowned Lord of glory confess his name before His Father and before His angels 1 What a change! Jesus had said when on earth, "Whosoever shall confess Me before men, him will I confess before my Father who is in heaven" (Matthew 10:32). And in another place, " Whosoever shall confess Me before men, him shall the Son of Man also confess before the angels of God (Luke 12:8). It is said in John 12:42, "Among the chief rulers also many believed on Him, but because of the Pharisees they did not confess Him lest they should be put out of the synagogue. Better for them to have confessed Him and to be confessed by Him, than to hear the withering word of rejection: "Many will say unto Me in that day, Lord, Lord, have we not prophesied in Thy name, and in Thy name have cast out devils, and in Thy name done many wonderful works?" (It is Sardis all over.) " I never knew you; depart from me, ye that work iniquity." "And then will I confess to them, I never knew you. Depart from Me, workers of lawlessness." Their works-that which they had a name for-are disowned; themselves repudiated. How cutting for men with such a name to hear Jesus not only refuse to confess them, but order them from His presence as workers of lawlessness! Oh! that such would be aroused by His faithful warning to be born again, that they may have the reality of spiritual life, and not a mere profession and a name that they live when they are dead. But the overcomer and true confessor shall be confessed by the Lord in the presence of the Father and of His angels. To have Him say when his name is read out from the book of life, " I know that man as a living believer in Me, and a faithful confessor of My name on earth, when I was made nothing of, and cast out; I own him here, in My Father’s presence and before His angels!" It was as an overcomer John departed from the presence of the council, rejoicing to be counted worthy to suffer shame for His name (Acts 5:41). And now he is made the medium of the message to the overcomer in Sardis, that his name should be confessed by the Lord Jesus in glory. There is one thing conspicuous by its omission: Sardis had no trouble lying upon her, no persecution, no conflict with foes within or Without, and this indicates that, like Laodicea, the church in Sardis knew nothing of that separateness which stirs up opposition; for instead of acting like " the two witnesses," and tormenting " them that dwell upon the earth," they themselves were the very persons characterized as dwelling upon the earth, and as having their sphere and home there; but as such they will be involved in "the great temptation" and overtaken by the Lord’s coming as a thief. Now this is the condition of the mass of professors of religion everywhere: they have a name that they live, and are dead, and they dwell on the earth, and feel quite at home; they think not of overcoming the world, but of enjoying it; they can stir up no opposition from the world, for they have annexed it, and cultivate it into as much religious propriety as it will allow; and the Church is the world and the world the Church. But how terrible the doom of such! " I will come ’upon thee as a thief; and thou shalt not know at what hour I will come upon thee." Avoiding the indifference to Christ which allows of holding the greatest amount of His truth without acting upon it, as in Laodicea; and leaving Sardis with its deadness and its great reputation for life; may it be ours, in all our felt feebleness, to cling in loving attachment to the person of Him who is Holy and True, and so act towards His Word and Name as to have from Him the divine approval he gives to Philadelphia: " I KNOW THY WORKS: BEHOLD, I HAVE SET BEFORE THEE AN OPEN DOOR, AND NO MAN CAN SHUT IT: FOR THOU HAST A LITTLE STRENGTH, AND HAST KEPT MY WORD, AND HAST NOT DENIED MY NAME (Revelation 3:8). " He that has an ear, let him, hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches." ======================================================================== CHAPTER 147: VOL 02 - THE DAY STAR IN OUR HEARTS ======================================================================== The Day Star in Our Hearts 2 Peter 1:19.-" What is the bearing of this difficult Scripture? The distinction drawn in the recent Lectures on Christ’s Second Coming’ (Broom), between the dimness of the λύχνος and the brightness of the φωσφόρος, is undeniable; also the one being clearly objective or external to us, the other internal or subjective-’ in your hearts.’ But I cannot see how ἕως οὗ can mean aught else than something future to the writer (at least readers), and the absence of which the προφητιχὸς λόγος was to supply. And as the anointing of the Spirit (1 John 2:20-27) could hardly be regarded as future to either, I doubt of the interpretation...." The following remarks may furnish help for determining the true scope. First, the apostle is writing to the same Christians who had received the first epistle, that is, Jews of the dispersion in Asia Minor. These of course were familiar with Old Testament prophecy, which the apostle shows was confirmed by the transfiguration, as it also gave a living tableau of the kingdom to the chosen witnesses. Next, he intimates that, while the prophetic word was rightly heeded, it was comparatively no more than a λύχνος excellent in a dark place, but of course eclipsed in the superior brightness of daylight when it dawned, and the morning star, Christ Himself-not as the Savior only but the hope-arose in the heart. I think this is left purposely vague; and for the sufficient and wise reason that some of these saints, though truly converted, were so deficient in the discrimination and enjoyment of what is thus distinctively Christian, as compared with what of course always abode true of the Jewish testimony, that he could not assume this to be the fact with them, at least, not with them all. In my opinion the same lack exists now in real saints of God, and mainly from the same cause, the Fathers so-called being the mainspring, as far as the Gentile is concerned, in confounding Jewish things with Christian, and thus obliterating the distinctive lineaments of each to the ’’great detriment of both. Thus the παιδία of the family (the babes among the τεχνία) have unquestionably the unction from the Holy One, and know all things; but through exclusive heed to the προφ. λόγ., and thus inattention to the proper New Testament teachings as to the coming of the Lord, there might not yet have been the dawn of that better light, ἡμέρα, or the arising of Him who brings it in His own person, in their hearts. That is, though the principle was true, and the capacity or power there in virtue of the indwelling Holy Ghost, there might not yet be that developed practical hold of it which the apostle so greatly desired for them, while carefully owning the value of what they did attend to. This at least is my conviction of the passage. The great thing to seize is the contrast of a good light with a better, and even this last to be enjoyed here (not when the προφ.λόγ is accomplished). It is not the day, nor the daystar as a literal matter of fact, but that character of thing in the heart (and hence necessarily and properly without the Greek article); not the Lord’s future appearing, but the apprehension of better light about the future now,-Christian fullness of light as to this supervening on their previous Jewish measure. But it was in no way the prophetic word which could supply what they lacked. Prophecy is connected with the lamp which gives light on earthly changes and divine judgments: an important thing to profit by; else one may be disappointed and deceived; but it is not that which lets in the light of heaven on the soul, or discloses the object of hope for the heart. This is the work of the apostles and prophets of the New Testament. No prophetic word could supply it, but the newly given Christian teaching. It may be added that there is only a shade in ὁ ἀστὴρ ὁ πρωἵνόν (Revelation 2:28; Revelation 22:16), and φωςφόρος here, one referring to its early’ appearance, the other to its introducing dawn or light. Peter speaks of prophecy as a lamp or candle shining in a dark place, a testimony for God to His people in the darkness of this world, with which he contrasts the hope of the saints in Christ’s coming to take them to heaven, as bringing in the light of a new day. ’0 ἀστὴρ ὁ πρ. is Christ Himself, before the day comes for the world, the Morning Star for those who follow Him in rejection during the night, not as connected with the kingdom, which precedes in Revelation 2:28, and is found rather in the " Root and Offspring of David," in chap. 22. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 148: VOL 02 - THE DOCTRINE TAUGHT IN ROM_11:1-36 OVERLAID BY MISTRANSLATION ======================================================================== The Doctrine Taught inRomans 11:1-36Overlaid by Mistranslation Allow me, as you are introducing such points, to draw your attention to Romans 11:1-36, where the doctrine taught is overlaid by mistranslation. The subject is the supplanting Israel in the tree of promise by the Gentiles, though Paul will not allow it to be more than some branches broken off. It is not the church, where all is wholly new in connection with a glorified Christ, but promises with Abraham for the root, and Israel for the stem of the olive tree. Some of the branches are broken off and Gentiles " graffed " in their place, which Jews, as such, would not hear of, scarcely the apostles. The apostle admits it, and warns the Gentiles therefrom, lest they should be cut off too, as they will be, and Israel " graffed " again into their own olive tree. Enemies as to the gospel, but beloved for the fathers’ sake, God’s calling of them was an unchangeable purpose. His inscrutable wisdom was shown in this. They had birthright promises subject to the condition of circumcision only. They had lost all under the old covenant of the law that was conditional on obedience; but what about the promises? These were in. Christ, and they had rejected Him and them; so that they had now to come in under sovereign grace with no promise at all, just like a Gentile. Yet God would accomplish them all. They had forfeited them, but He was faithful to Himself. The passage, then, runs thus:-" As therefore, you once disbelieved God, but now are brought under mercy through unbelief of these, so they also have disbelieved in your mercy, that they also might be brought under (mere) mercy." That is, having forfeited their title to the promises (for Christ was a minister of the circumcision for the truth of God, to fulfill the promises made to the fathers), they had been thrown on the mere pure mercy of God as a Gentile without promise was. For God has shut up all into unbelief that He might exercise mercy towards all, that is, that all might have the blessing by pure sovereign mercy. And this produces the exclamation, not for wondrous mercy, but for wondrous wisdom in His ways. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 149: VOL 02 - THE FAITH OF GOD'S ELECT ======================================================================== The Faith of God’s Elect I hold as to expiation or atonement fully and simply what every sound Christian does: The blessed Lord’s offering Himself without spot to God and being obedient to death, being made sin for us, and bearing our sins in His own body on the tree; His glorifying God in the sacrifice of Himself; and His substitution for us; and His drinking the cup of wrath. I believe, though none can fathom it, that what I hold, and have taught, and teach, makes this atonement clearer. I mean the not confounding the sufferings of Christ short of divine wrath with that one only drinking of the cup when He was forsaken of God. I see this carefully brought out in Psalms 20:1-9 ii In the midst of cruel sufferings, of which the Lord in Spirit speaks prophetically there, He says, " But be not Thou far from Me, 0 Lord," twice over. Yet (and that is the great fathomless depth of the psalm) He was, as to the sorrow of His soul, forsaken of God. With that no other suffering, deep and real as it was can be compared. But the Holy Ghost makes here the distinction in order to bring out that wondrous cup, which stands alone in the midst of all things, the more clearly. And this makes other suffering more true and real to the heart, and the drinking of the cup (that on which the new heavens and the new earth subsist in immutable righteousness before God, and through which we are accepted in the Beloved) has a truth and a reality which nothing else gives it. The mixing up accompanying sufferings with this, in their character, weakens and destroys the nature of both. We come to the atonement with the need of our sins; once reconciled to God, we see the whole glory of God made good forever in it. I add, as regards Christ’s relationship with God, I have no view but what I suppose to be the common faith of all Christians of His being His beloved Son in whom He was well pleased, that, as a living man here below, divine delight rested upon Him. Though never so acceptable in obedience as on the cross, there He was, as for God’s glory, bearing the forsaking of God. That of course was a. special case. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 150: VOL 02 - THE FAITH OF THE SON OF GOD ======================================================================== The Faith of the Son of God There is a character of truth in the EPISTLE TO THE GALATIANS, very seasonable at this present time, and very strengthening to the soul at all times. It teaches us to know that the religion of faith, is the religion of immediate personal confidence in Christ. A truth which is, again. I say, seasonable in a day like the present; when the provisions and claims of certain earthly church forms, and a system of ordinances, suggested by the religious, carnal mind, are abundant and fascinating. To learn, at all times, that our souls are to have their immediate business with Christ is comforting and assuring. To be told this afresh, at such a time as the present, is needful. The apostle is very fervent in this epistle-naturally and properly so-as we all should be, as we all ought to be, when some justly prized possession is invaded; when some precious portion of truth, the dearest of all possessions, is tampered with. In this epistle, in the first instance, as at the beginning, the apostle lets us know, with great force and plainness, that he had received his apostleship immediately from God; not only his commission or his office, but his instructions also; that which he had to minister and testify, as well as his appointment and ministry itself. He was an apostle immediately from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ; and what he knew and taught he had by direct, immediate revelation. And, in connection with this, he tells us, that as God had thus dealt immediately with him, so had he, in answering confidence, dealt immediately with God. For, having received the revelation, having had the Son revealed in him, he at once with-, drew from conversing with flesh and blood. He did not go up to Jerusalem, to those who were apostles before him, but down to Arabia, carrying, as it were, his treasure with him; not seeking to improve it, but as one that was satisfied with it just as it was, that is, with the Christ who had now been given to him. And, here, let me say, this brings to mind the Gospel by St. John, for that gives us, before this time of Paul, sample after sample of the soul finding its satisfaction in Christ. Every quickened one there illustrates it. Andrew, and Peter, and Philip, and Nathanael,- in the first chapter, afterward the Samaritan and her companions at Sychar, and then the convicted adulteress and the excommunicated beggar,-all of them tell us, in language which cannot he misunderstood, that they had found satisfaction in Christ, that having been alone with Him in their sins, they were now independent-having had a personal immediate dealing with Him as the Savior, they looked not elsewhere. Arabia will do for them as well as Jerusalem, just as in the experience of the Paul of the Galatians. They never appear to converse with flesh and blood. Ordinances are in no measure their confidence. Their souls are proving that faith is that principle which puts sinners into immediate contact with Christ, and makes them independent of all that man can do for them. How unspeakably blessed to see such a state of soul illustrated in any fellow-sinner, in men " of like passions with ourselves," like corruptions, like state of guilt and condemnation. Such things are surely written for our learning, that by comfort of such Scriptures we may have assurance and liberty. And what is thus, in living samples, illustrated, for our comfort, in John’s Gospel, is taught and pressed upon us in this fervent Epistle of Paul to the Galatians. Having shown the churches in Galatia the character of his apostleship, how he got both his commission and his instructions immediately from God, and was not debtor to flesh and blood, to Jerusalem, the city of solemnities, or to those who were apostles before him, for anything; and having discovered, as it were, his very spirit to them, telling them that the life he was now living was by the faith of the Son of God, he begins to challenge them; for they were not in this state of soul. He calls them "foolish," and tells them they had been "bewitched." For how could he do less than detect the working of Satan in the fact, that they had been withdrawn from the place where the Spirit and the truth, the cross of Christ and faith, had once put them. But then he reasons with them, argues the matter, and calls forth his witnesses. He makes themselves their judges, appealing to their first estate. "Received ye the Spirit by the works of the law, or by the hearing of faith?" He cites Abraham in proof that a sinner had immediate personal business with Christ, and through faith found justification. And he rehearses the character of the gospel which had been preached to Abraham, how it told of Christ and of the sinner and blessing being put together and alone. " In thee (Abraham’s seed, which is Christ) shall all nations be blessed." Precious gospel! Christ and the sinner and blessing bound up together in one bundle. And he goes on to confirm and establish this, by teaching them how Christ bore the curse, and, therefore, surely was entitled to dispense the blessing. Surely these are witnesses which may well be received, as proving the divine character of the religion of faith, which is the sinner’s immediate confidence in Christ. But then, he does further and other service in this same cause. He goes on to tell us the glorious things faith works and accomplishes in us and for us. "After faith is come," he tells us in chapter 3: 25-27, "we are no longer under a schoolmaster. For we are all the children of God by faith in Christ Jesus. For as many of you as have been baptized unto Christ have put on Christ." Here are precious deeds of faith! It dismisses the schoolmaster; it brings the soul to God as to a father, and then it clothes the believer with the value of Christ in the eye and acceptance of God. And "God hath sent forth the Spirit of His Son into our hearts, crying, Abba, Father " (4: 6). And "we are redeemed from under the law (4: 5). Can any more full and perfect sense of an immediate dealing between Christ and the soul be conceived, than is expressed and declared by such statements? We are brought from under the law-the school-;. master, and, with him, tutors and governors are gone; we are children at home in the Father’s house, and have the rights and the mind of the first-born Himself put on us, and imparted to us! Can any condition of soul more blessedly set forth our independence of the resources of a religion of ordinances, and the poor sinner’s personal and immediate connection with Christ Himself? But Paul finds the churches in Galatia in a backsliding state. They had turned again " to weak and beggarly elements." They were " observing days, and months, and times, and years." It was all but returning to their former idolatry, as he solemnly hints to them, " doing service to them which by nature are no gods," as they had been doing in the days of their heathen ignorance of the true God (4: 8). What a connection does he here put the Christianity that is merely formal and observant of imposed ordinances into? Is it not solemn? Was it not enough to alarm him? And does it not do so? " I am afraid of you," says he to the Galatians in this state, "lest I have bestowed upon you labor in vain." But, man of God as he was, gracious, patient, and toiling, according to the working of Him who was working in him mightily, he consents to labor afresh-yea, more painfully than ever-to travail in birth again of them. But all this was only to this end, that Christ might be formed in them; nothing less, or more, or other, than this. He longed for restoration of soul in them, and that was, that they and Christ might be put immediately together again; that faith might be revived in them-the simple hearty blessed religion of personal and direct confidence in God in Christ Jesus; that, as in himself, the Son might be revealed in them; that, regaining Christ in their souls, they might prove they needed nothing more. How edifying it is to mark the path of such a spirit under the conduct of the Holy Ghost! How comforting to see the purpose of God, by such a ministry, with the souls of poor sinners! How it lets us learn what Christianity is in the judgment of God Himself! The going over to the observance of days and times, the returning to ordinances, is destructive of this religion; it is the world. "Why, as though living in the world, are ye subject to ordinances?" as the same apostle says in another place. Confidence in ordinances is not faith in Christ. It is the religion of nature, of flesh and blood; it is of man, and not of God. And surely it carries in its train the passions of man. Man’s religion leaves man as it found him-rather, indeed, cherishes and cultivates man’s corruptions. This showed itself in Ishmael in earliest days-nay, in Cain before him-but in Ishmael, as the apostle in this same epistle goes on to show. And he declares that it was then, in his day, the same; and generations of formal corrupt Christianity in the story of Christendom, the prisons of Italy some few years since, and the prisons of Spain still later, declare the same. " As then, he that was born after the flesh persecuted him that was born after the Spirit, even so is it now." Man’s religion, again I say, does not cure him; he is left by it a prey to the subtleties and violence of his nature, the captive still of the old serpent, who has been a liar and a murderer from the beginning. The decree, however, has been pronounced. It was delivered in the days of Isaac and Ishmael, of Abraham and Sarah; it is rehearsed and re-sealed by the Spirit Himself in the day of the Apostle Paul; and we are to receive it as established forever. It is this: " Cast out the bondwoman and her son " (4: 30). What consolation to have this mighty question between God and man settled! And, according to this consolation, we listen to this further word: " Stand fast, therefore, in the liberty wherewith Christ has made you free, and be not entangled again with the yoke of bondage " (5: 1). All, surely, is of one and the same character. The Holy Ghost, by the apostle, is preparing the principle, the great leading commanding principle, of divine religion. It is faith; it is the sinner’s personal and immediate confidence in Christ; it is the soul finding satisfaction in Him, and in that which He has done for it; and such a religion as this, the sinner in possession of this faith is set, as I may express it, next door to glory. The apostle quickly tells us this, after commanding us to stand fast in the liberty of the gospel, for he adds, "We through the Spirit wait for the hope of righteousness by faith" (5: 5). This hope is the glory that is to be revealed-" the glory of God," as a kindred passage has it (Romans 5:2). We do not wait for any improvement of our character, for any advance in our souls. Should we still live in the flesh, only fitting will it be to " grow in grace and in the knowledge of the Lord and Savior Jesus Christ." But such things are not needed in the way of title. Being Christ’s by faith, we are next door to glory. " Whom He justified, them He also glorified" (Romans 8:1-39) Being in the kingdom of God’s dear Son, we are " meet to be partakers, of the inheritance of the saints in light" (Colossians 1:12). As here, in the liberty wherewith Christ has made us free, we wait only for glory; glory is the immediate object of our hope, as Christ is the immediate confidence, of our souls. It is all magnificent in its simplicity, because it is all of God. No wonder that Scripture so abundantly discourses to us about faith, and so zealously warns us against religiousness. The " persuasion," as the apostle speaks, under which the Galatians had fallen, had not come of God who had called them; and the apostle sounds the alarm, blows the blast of war on the silver trumpet of the sanctuary, uttering these voices in their ears-" A little leaven leaveneth the whole lump;" again, "If ye be led of the Spirit, ye are not under the law" (5: 8, 9, 18). And in the happy structure of this epistle, as I may also speak of it, the apostle ends with himself as he begins with himself. We have seen how he told them, at the first, of the peculiarities of his apostleship, how he had received both his commission and his instructions immediately from God, and how he had then, with a faith that was an answer to such grace, at once conducted himself in full personal confidence in Christ, and independently of all the resources of flesh and blood. And now, at the close, he tells them that, as for himself, he knew no glorying but in the cross of the Lord Jesus, by whom the world was crucified to him, and he to the world; and he tells them further, that no one need meddle with him or trouble him, neither fret him nor worry him, with their thoughts about circumcision and the law, or the doings of a carnal religiousness, the rudiments of a world to which he was now crucified, for that he bore in his body the marks of the Lord. He belonged to Jesus by personal individual tokens, immediately impressed on him as by the appropriating hand of Christ Himself; and no one had any right to touch the Lord’s treasure. Precious secret of the grace of God! Precious simplicity in the faith of a heaven-taught sinner! It is not, beloved, knowledge of Scripture, or ability to talk of it, or even teach it, from Genesis to Revelation-it is not the orderly services of religion -it is not devout feelings-but, oh! it is that guileless action of the soul that attaches our very selves to Jesus, in the calm and certainty of a believing mind. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 151: VOL 02 - THE FATHER ======================================================================== The Father Joh 14:-17 " I HAVE declared unto them Thy name, and will declare it." These words were spoken to the Father by Christ respecting the saints. They tell us that the great business of the Lord was to acquaint saints with the Father, that such had already been His business, and that such He purposed should be His business still. (*Under this heading we intend giving such papers, by a well-taught and much-esteemed brother, as we may think likely to help our readers to a spiritual apprehension of the word and truth of God. The author having gone to be with the Lord about ten years ago, we can present only what he has left in his published writings or in MS., and we will draw on both sources. We obtained permission from this beloved brother, about twenty-five years ago, to make this use of his writings.-En.) This is full of blessing. To think that our souls are under such instruction as this! The Son nourishing and enlarging in us the sense and understanding of the Father’s love, and using His diligence to give our hearts that joy and to give it to us more abundantly! We may be slow, and we are slow, to learn. it. We naturally suspect all happy thoughts of God. Christ has to use diligence and to put forth energy in teaching us such a lesson. " I have declared unto them Thy name, and will declare it." But so it is. This is the lesson of which He is the teacher, and our inaptness to learn it magnifies His grace, for He is still at it, still teaching the same lesson. The earlier chapters (14.-16.) show us Christ declaring the Father. They begin with His telling us that the Father has opened His own house to us-nay, that He had built it with direct respect to us, having made it a many-mansioned house for our reception. (Chapter 14:2.) He then, with some resentment of their unbelief, tells them that the Father had been already revealing Himself to them. " Have I been so long time with you, and hast thou not known me, Philip? He that hath seen Me hath seen the Father." Because the things He had said and done, He had said and done as Son of the Father, as the One who was in the Father, and in whom also the Father was. (Ver. 5-14.) * (*The Lord’s rebuke of Philip has not such direct application to Philip’s unbelief touching the person of the Son, as to his unbelief respecting the revelation of the Father which had been made by the Son: the other is involved.) For this was natural unbelief, the indisposedness to learn the lesson of the Father of which I have spoken; and happy it is to find it here rebuked by the Lord. Indeed, it is only faith which can sit as Christ’s pupil-that principle which only listens. The moral sense of man reasons itself out of that school. Jesus, however, goes on with the lesson in spite of this dullness. He tells them, after this interruption, how He purposed, when away, to glorify the Father in. their works and in their experience (ver. 12-14); and then He tells them that the Comforter, the Spirit of truth, the Holy Ghost, who was about to come to them, would come as the Spirit of the Father, letting them know that they were not orphans, but had the life of the Son in them (ver. 16-20); and again He tells them that the keeping of His word would secure to their souls the presence and fellowship of the Father, as well as His, because the word was not His but the Father’s who had sent Him (ver. 21-24). This word or commandment, which was to be kept in order to this fellowship being secured to the soul, was about love; because it was the word brought by the Son from the Father, and not a word brought from a king, or from a judge, or from a legislator. (See chap. 13: 34; 15: 12, 17.) In all these truly blessed ways He declares the Father to us, and uses Himself only as the witness or servant of such a revelation. His own personal glory is implied in such a service; but that is not His object-the declaration of the Father is. And so also, as He proceeds through this wondrous discourse, He declares the Father to be the husbandman of the vine, thereby letting us know that the fruit sought for is fruit worthy of a Father’s hand, fruit which children, not servants or subjects, must yield. (Chapter 15:1-14.) And again, the friendship He introduces them to with Himself has respect to the Father, because it was the Father’s secrets He was communicating to them in the confidence of friendship. (Ver. 15.) And then, at the close of the same chapter, He presents the world simply in the character of having hated the Father, testified in and by the Son. (Ver. 23, 24.) How does all this make good the word, " I have declared unto them Thy name!" But further: He anticipates the day of the Holy Ghost; but He does this in constant recollection and mention of the Father. The Spirit was the Spirit of the Father, given by Him, sent by Him (chap. 14: 16, 26; 15: 26); and when He came, their divine Teacher now tells them that they should ask the Father and receive from Him, that this their joy as children who know a Father’s love and blessing should be full. (Chapter 16:23,24.)* And He further tells them that in that day they should plainly know their adoption, or their place with the Father. (Ver. 25.) (*It is not the thing they receive which makes their joy full, but the proof they get through it that they have their Father’s heart and ear. The Father, not the gift, does this for them, filling up their joy. (See chap. 16: 24.)) And somewhat beyond all this, and as crowning all He had said, He tells them that His prayers for them in heaven were not to be understood as though they and the Father were somewhat distant from each other, but that rather they must assure themselves that the Father’s love rested immediately on them, as in the full power of the relation in which He stood to them. (Chapter 16:26,27.) Thus, it was the name of the Father He was declaring to them all through these wonderful chapters, bringing the Father into the thoughts and enjoyments of their hearts. And if love and heaven be prized by us, what welcome communications will these be! So, on the closing chapter (17.) we may say, No tidings from us return to God so acceptably as this, that we have, by faith, received these tidings of the Father. The Son brought a message of love to us from the bosom of the Father, and if He now report to the Father that we have received the message, this will be the most prized answer with the Father. And such receiving of this word about the Father will also be our truest sanctification or separation from the world, for the world is that which refuses to know the Father. I might more shortly express it thus chapters 14.-16. the Lord purposes to put our souls into communion with the Father. He fills the soul with thoughts of the Father; recollections, present exercises of spirit, and prospects, are all by Him connected with the Father. He tells us, it is the Father’s house that is to receive us by and by, it was the Father who had been working and speaking in Him, so that what He had said and done had been the sayings and doings of the Father; that greater works than He had done they soon should do, for He was going to the Father; that the Comforter would be sent to them from the Father; that their fruitfulness should arise from the Father being the husbandman; that the world would hate them, because it knew not the Father nor Him; that the Father Himself loved them, and that they should soon enter into the sense of their relationship to Him. If the Spirit of truth, the Comforter, realize these things to us, we may set our seals to that word, " It is expedient for you that I go away."* (*So, I may say, the Lord’s purpose in chapter 13. is to put our souls in communion with Himself in heaven. He shows us Himself in heaven, as the very home of love and of glory, because He was to be restored to the Father there, and to have all things put into His hand by God there; and after this manner He anticipates heaven as the home of love and of glory to Him. But then He lets us know that He would ever continue in His love towards us there, and in His service of our necessities―that, though there, He could never forsake either us or our need. Thus He seeks to put us into communion with Himself as He is now in heaven, just as afterward (in chapters 14.-16.) He seeks to put us, as I have been observing, into communion with the Father.) May this blessed sense of relationship fill and satisfy our souls more abundantly! ======================================================================== CHAPTER 152: VOL 02 - THE FORCE OF GREEK EN ======================================================================== The Force of Greek En Εν has the force of what, by that which operates in the word governed by it. διὰ is used, in a similar connection of the instrumental cause. Thus Colossians 1:16ἐν αὐτῷ ἐχτἰσθη. This past act of creation was wrought in the power which was personally in Him. For this cause He is πρωτότοχος when He personally takes His place in it. So continuously all things consist ἑν αὐτῷ. It is the same power which continuously holds all together in the unity of the χόσμς. When the instrumental action by which all have been, and are created is spoken of, it is διὰ and εἰς αὐτόν (ver. 19). ’Ev is the ordinary sense of in a place, πᾶν τὸ πλήρωμα being the nominative (comp. 2: 9), and this will recreate all things δἰ αὐτοῦ; so 22, ἐν τῷ σώματι and διὰ τοῦ θάνατου. So ἐν in a lesser case (ver. 29) ἐν δυνάμει, ὲν αγάπῃ 2: 3 (comp. 2: 23) so often. So in the well-known contrasts, ἐν οάρχι, ἐν πνύματι. Ye are (Romans 8:1-39) ἐν πνεὐματι. So that the creation of all things was characterized and wrought by the inherent power which was in the Lord Jesus Christ the Son, and all things subsist together as an ordered and law-governed whole, by the same constant and inherent power. When the πλήρωμαis spoken of, then His person is distinguished as the one by whom, and for whom, it was created, He being to take it personally as the πρωτότοχος. All the fullness was pleased to dwell in Him and by Him to reconcile. πρωτότοχος is what He is in creation; the reason, ὃτι ἐν αὐτῷ ἐχτισθη, not His divine nor His human nature (comp. 2: 9, 10), where we have the πλήρωμα τῆς θεότητος in Him on one side, and we πεπληρωμένοι in Him on the other- this consequent on, and in connection with, the place He has taken before God, head of all principality and power. The πλήρωμα of Godhead dwells in Him, but there He takes a place as man before God, a man, but personally, and above all principalities as man. The way in which the Godhead and person of Christ are connected, or both, before the mind of the Spirit is striking in what follows. Ver. 13 is clearly God; 14 passes on to Christ. " He has taken it out of the way," begins really a new sentence, grammatically distinct. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 153: VOL 02 - THE GLORY OF GOD ======================================================================== The Glory of God ======================================================================== CHAPTER 154: VOL 02 - THE GLORY OF THE ONLY-BEGOTTEN ======================================================================== The Glory of the Only-Begotten " The Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, full of grace and truth." This was the manifestation of the Christ as Son, and declared through the Spirit by John. And it is this glory, this fullness of grace and truth, which shines throughout the public ministry of the Christ as recorded by John in chapters 1.-9. And in the progress of that ministry, I have observed two attributes or actings of this glory. 1. It always refuses to join itself with other glory of any kind whatever. 2. It perseveres in displaying itself in defiance of every kind of resistance. These two ways, constantly adhering to it, evince the value it had for itself, and the fixedness of the divine purpose to bless the sinner, to whose condition and necessities this glory suits itself. In chapter 2. Jesus is tempted by His mother to let the glory of power break from Him. In chapter 3. Nicodemus invites Him to display Himself as a teacher. In chapter 6. the multitude would make Him a king. In chapter 7. His brethren would have Him show Himself to the world. In chapter 8. the Pharisees would have Him use the thunder of mount Sinai in judgment. But no offer or solicitation prevails. Jesus will not show Himself save as "full of grace and truth," or in the glory of the " only-begotten of the Father." He refuses to appear in any other glory or act in any other character. But then in that glory He will shine, and in that character He will act, be the resistance or hindrance what it may; and in considering this I would be, at present, a little more particular. In chapter 4: we see the Lord insisting to shine in the glory of grace and truth, in spite of hindrance and resistance from a most determined quarter-" the law of commandments contained in ordinances." The Jews had no dealings with the Samaritans. But Jesus, the Son of God, shines with as bright and diffused a beam in one region as in another, refusing to be hindered. In chapter 5: the Lord holds on His course in the same undistracted character, in defiance of fear or danger. The Jews sought to slay Him, because He did these things on the Sabbath day. But His answer to such danger or threatening was only this-" My Father worketh hitherto, and I work; " and on He goes, still He perseveres, as the witness of the way of the Father or the grace of God, though this might’ only sharpen the enmity and dispose the Jews the more to seek to slay Him. In chapter 6. this peculiar glory, by which alone He was tracking His path, again has to meet a sore hindrance. The Lord evidently feels a great moral distance from the multitude. They were very much, as we speak, His aversion. They had stirred some of the holy loathing of His righteous soul. This is evident, and this the heart knows to be a -sore hindrance. But this does not hinder Him from maintaining the display of His proper glory, which was for their blessing. "Labor not for the meat that perisheth," says He to them, "but for that meat that endureth unto eternal life, which the Son of man shall give unto you; for Him hath God the Father sealed." And so in chapter 7:, as in chapter 5:, He holds on His way, though enemies were angry and confederating, and sending officers to take Him.. For after all this, the glory that was full of grace and truth breaks forth into some of its brightest shining, on the great last day of the feast, Jesus standing and saying, " If any man thirst, let him come unto Me and drink." What vigor in the purpose must there have been which could have thus borne it on in triumph through such a series of opposition and hindrances! And so, to the very last, I may say, this glory appears in unmeasured regions. Jesus "passes by." (Chapter 9) He goes wherever He may go. But it is still in the same character. Change of climate, so to speak, makes no difference. The glory is still full of grace and truth, the glory " as of the only-begotten of the Father." Jesus sees a man blind from his birth; but He is " the light of the world." And Jesus afterward finds him cast out, but takes him up for eternity. I know not that anything can more thoroughly assure the heart of a sinner of his interest in the Son of God than all this. No resistance prevails, no temptation. Nothing can force Him, nothing withdraw Him, from His purpose to bless them, for a single moment. That glory, and that only which suits their necessities, breaks forth on every occasion in which we see Jesus acting, urging its way through every hindrance, and retiring from every distraction. What intimates fixedness of purpose like this? If you see a man going on with his work, undaunted by opposition and undiverted by allurements, what need we more to know the singleness and decision of his soul? And such is the Son of the Father in this action. In the glory that suits the need of sinners He shines, and in that only, be the medium that would obscure it as thick as it may, or the solicitation that would distract it as flattering as it may. 0 precious saving grace! How does all this, in other language, tell us that God has found it more blessed to give than to receive! Jesus was " the Word made flesh," " God manifest in the flesh." And had He pleased, as these chapters show us, He might have received the praises of men, the admiration of the world, the crown of the kingdom; but He passes all by, fixed on the one purpose of carrying out the blessing to poor sinners. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 155: VOL 02 - THE GOD OF GLORY WITH ABRAHAM AND THE SON OF MAN IN THE GLORY OF GOD ======================================================================== The God of Glory With Abraham and the Son of Man in the Glory of God THERE is a path which may be traced in the Old Testament, into which God has led one and another who were called out to walk with Him, and that may be profitably observed by us in our day. It was acquaintance with Him, not so much in the general and public ways by which He made Himself known in acts and deeds to all; as in the thoughts of His own mind, and the undisclosed purposes of His own glory and His people’s blessing, which were always His object; and for which the external workings of His government cleared the road. Such an intimacy with God must necessarily be more individual than general; more learned in the privacy of His own mind in communion with Himself than by the mighty signs and wonders of His arm, and more acted out under the guidance of His eye than by the instruction of His hand. " Shall I hide from Abraham the thing that I do?" at once illustrates and establishes the principle of which we are speaking, and supplies the example. " THE GOD OF GLORY," who appeared to Abraham, and called him out from a fallen creation, as well as from a judged world at the deluge, was far more astounding than when He first created Adam, and led him in innocency into paradise, and gave him " lordship " over the creation He had made. Each of these men began a race of people-the one after he fell by transgression, and " begat a son in his own likeness;" the other called out from that race, and from their confederacy at Babel, to walk with God outside the world, in the privacy of a path which none knew but Himself, and to GLORY OF GOD.’ 353 begin thus another history. God and a man are together again, but not as in creation with Adam, nor in the world after the flood, as with Noah, but in a path which He will develope with a man called out to be "the Friend of God." Other and new names are accepted and given, suited to this intimacy between God and him, and another principle is established by which Abraham becomes the head of a new race of men, as " the man of faith, and the father of us alL" It is into these secret ways of God that our progenitor is introduced, and he steps outside Adam’s groaning creation, and Noah’s world, spared and renewed, that he may, in virtue of his own peculiar calling by " the God of glory," walk with Him. He thus resigns the world after the flood and its divisions into north, south, east, and west, to Noah and his three sons, coming out of it all, as a solitary man of faith, to walk with God by promise in a path which He will show him. Though Abraham takes his place necessarily " as a stranger and a pilgrim " in Noah’s world, yet we shall see how he gets a possession in it by a new title and through another channel, according to the secret counsels of God made known to faith and to another race of men, of which Abraham is the beginning and the head. "And when he was ninety years old and nine, the Lord appeared unto Abram, and said unto him, I am the Almighty God; walk before me, and be thou perfect." This is the original salutation that is known in this intimacy with God. The strength of man in the flesh is given up for the almightiness of God; the reasoning of the natural mind is set aside for faith in infinite wisdom; the efforts of human power are judged to be intrusions in the way of unbounded grace; and the resources of a sinful world under Shem, Ham, and Japheth, but temptations to seduce, or obstacles in the path of this family of faith. And God said, " As for me, behold my covenant is with thee, and thou shalt be a father of many nations, Neither shall thy name any more be called Abram, but thy name shall be called Abraham... and I will make thee exceeding fruitful, and I will make nations of thee, and kings shall come out of thee." Which of us that looks at these three remarkable heads of the family of men-Adam, Noah, and Abraham-in the light of Scripture and of God’s ways with each, can question the advance which the God of glory, and the calling out of Abraham as the man of faith and promise presents to the heart, either acquainted with itself, or instructed as to the nature of God? Adam was personally great in an unfallen creation, and Noah was relatively great in the midst of natural and covenanted blessing, as witnessed by the bow in the cloud; but Abraham was great by calling, for "the Lord had said, Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred... unto a land that I will show thee... and I will bless thee, and make thy name great, and thou shalt be a blessing... and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed." Noah’s world was the vast external globe, and by him and his three sons " was the whole earth overspread;" whereas, of Abraham and his seed it is said, " When the Most High divided to the nations their inheritance, when he separated the sons of Adam, He set the bounds of the people according to the number of the children of Israel." Indeed, the order of God has been since the fall a separating off to Himself " the elect," whom he calls out from the great outer world, either on the principle of faith and redemption, or else to Himself by new creative power and resurrection life, as known now by us through the Holy Ghost. Another thing is important to observe, that not only did Abraham learn in this nearness what the real objects were which God had in reserve for faith, and for which His government in Noah’s tumultuous world only cleared the way, but " the friend of God " had to walk by the same rule with any who joined him company. " Lot went with him," but this only brought out the difference between them when tested by the seeing of the eyes and the " hearing of faith." The distinction and separation between the earthly-minded and the heavenly-minded in their walk and ways is founded upon this principle, and divides the two men who started out of their own country for " the land that I will show thee." Outwardly and in act they were one, but inwardly and in the governing purpose of the heart they were two. This contrast is marked even by the language, "And Lot also which went with Abram." This shows him to have been not personally under the real power of the calling of God, as was the man of faith; and this, though but one remove " from Him that calls," marks a great distance in the moral principle of the soul, and in the end fatal, as it widened itself out in a departure to Sodom and the well-watered plains In reality Lot was not linked with the power itself, which is necessary to maintain the call of God, and that leads on into the final possession of the object of faith by a complete separation from the external world, and a refusal of the lustings of the flesh, which can attach to nothing else. Lot was connected with Abram, and " went out with him." Yea, further, for it is written, " into the land of Canaan they came;" but Abram walked with God in the path which opened itself out into His own unfailing glory. Nature, even in Adam, did not unite itself with God’s purpose, nor can the flesh in Lot walk with Abram, and so breaks down at the very point where it is tested. When "Lot lifted up his eyes and beheld all the plain of Jordan, and thought of his flocks and herds," he was at his weakest moment, and gave up the call of God, proving he was not at the first united in the living power of the " God of glory, who appeared to Abraham." The journeyings of the children of Israel through the wilderness, long after this breakdown of Lot when in company with the man of faith and power, were but an extended proof, and a fatal one, that nature, accompanied even by the rod of Jehovah’s power, could not follow in the path where God is working out His own counsels. In yet later histories, and in other company, Peter said, " Lord, I am ready to go with thee both into prison and unto death;" and Jesus said, " I tell thee, Peter, the cock shall not crow this day before that thou shalt thrice deny that thou knowest me." Indeed we may ask, in our own church times, What is the message to Laodicea but the ripened yet bitter fruit of the declension first, and then the departure originally brought out in Lot’s history? " I know thy works, that thou art neither cold nor hot: I would thou wert cold or hot. So, then, because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spue thee out of my mouth." And Lot, which went up with Abram, chose him all the plain of Jordan, and Lot journeyed east; "and they separated themselves the one from the other." Nor is this all, for," Lot pitched his tent toward Sodom," and the Spirit of God marks this and the accompanying fact that " the men of Sodom were sinners, and wicked before the Lord exceedingly." This further separation is of great moment in its moral truth as regards the two narratives; for in Lot it was departure from God and the blessedness of His calling, which betrayed a condition of soul that could not rise up in present faith to find its satisfaction in what suited "the God of glory;" whilst in this Abram took delight, and found out who God was by the height of His calling. The separation of Lot from Abram was unto Sodom, a place which wondrously displayed the goodness of God outwardly, for it was "as the garden of the Lord;" nevertheless it was "goodness despised " by the men who dwelt therein, and was made the occasion of corruption and excessive wickedness, which in the end brought down the judgment of God. Lot is on his way to meet God, but to meet Him where the anger of the Lord heavily falls. Abram is in the way with God, and in a path which unites to Him as the friend of God.. Lot is gone, but it only brings the Lord nearer to Abram; for " He said unto him, after that Lot was separated from him, Lift up now thine eyes, and look from the place where thou art, northward and southward, eastward and westward; for all the land which thou seest, to thee will I give it, and to thy seed after thee." This marks a new point in the history of the man of faith and of God; for he has not only come out from his country and kindred and father’s house, but separated from "Lot who went up with him." Thus the earthly-minded and the heavenly- minded are divided on the pathway of faith and the calling of God, though they came out together and appeared as one company. As the proper effect of this separation in the power of holiness, Abram takes his ground yet more firmly before God, Who established his friendship in the society of the living God, which imparts its own enchantment to his present position. " Then Abram removed his tent, and came and dwelt in the plain of Mamre, which is in Hebron (for these three things are what Hebron signifies), and built there an altar unto the Lord." He is alone now with God, in all that God is in Himself, and will be to Abram and his seed; and this to him is "Hebron," which forms the place for his altar, and which gains further distinction in the life and death of the new family, of which he is the distinguished head by faith and calling. It is not that Hebron is always or ever conspicuous to the outward eye, that looks for what is striking and natural to the senses; for it lies out of sight, yet not concealed to the family of faith, so that it becomes their token of present " friendship " one with another as well as. with God, and their accepted pledge of unbroken " society," and which lends " enchantment" to their bright future in the kingdom of glory. Thus " Abraham sojourned in Hebron, as did his son Isaac afterward. Jacob also came unto his father Isaac to Mamre, unto the city of Arbah, which is Hebron." Nor was this place remarkable only as the sojourn of the illustrious living, but also as the burial-ground of the illustrious dead, who are (in the secret of this intercourse with God) only departed for a season. Sarah was the first to be led in this direction. So Abraham stood up from before his dead (for she died in Kirjath-arba, the same is Hebron, in the land of Canaan), and said, " Give me a possession of a burying-place with you." And Abraham weighed to Ephron the silver which he had named- four hundred shekels of silver-" and the field and the cave were made sure to Abraham." And after this, he "buried Sarah, his wife, in the cave of the field of Machpelah, before Mamre; the same is Hebron." The burial-place of Sarah, and of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob afterward, did but add its secret of resurrection out of the grave to the characteristics of Hebron. It had only enlarged its circumference, and deepened its truth. Death could not violate the "friendship," nor break up "the society," nor dim "the enchantment," to the eye of faith and hope which has come out to walk through sin and death with the living God. It only transfers "the called" into the circle of God’s own delights, where these interruptions cannot enter or follow them. In later times " Moses showed this at the bush," when he called the Lord the God of Abraham and the God of Isaac and the God of Jacob. And Jesus himself spoke of this unbroken fellowship to those around, " for God (said He) is not a God of the dead but of the living; for all live unto Him." The Holy Ghost by Paul has added His witness to these: "For I am persuaded that neither death, nor life, nor angels…nor things present, nor things to come... shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord." " Then Abraham gave up the ghost, and died in a good old age, an old man and full of years, and was gathered to his people; and his sons Isaac and Ishmael buried him in the cave of Machpelah, in the field of Ephron," which is Hebron. The man who walks with God, in the pathway of faith, under the power of His calling, whether. in patriarchal days or in church times, will surely find that God leads all such away from the outside world and its confusions by man, as well as its delusions by Satan, into the thoughts of His own mind, and the undisclosed purposes of His own glory and His people’s blessing as His ultimate object. Abram’s earliest steps in this secret path were "as he passed through the land unto the place of Sichem, unto the plain of Moreh. And the Canaanite was then in the land." Moreover, Lot his brother’s son "went with him." In the onward journey of faith Abram quits Sichem and his first altar there, for Hebron, a spot remarkable (as we have seen) for the separation of " the friend of God "’ from the earthly- minded Lot into a closer fellowship with the hidden counsels of God, and the manner and times of their accomplishment by the way of Sarah and the burial-place at Machpelah, or " the good will of Him that dwelt in the bush." In the intermediate steps of Abram’s walk with God he is for a moment drawn out from his privacy, and becomes the deliverer "of Lot, and his goods, and the women also, and the people," from the hands of the confederated kings in the day of battle. " There came one that had escaped, and told Abram the Hebrew.... and he divided himself against them, he and his servants by night, and smote them, and pursued them." Here it is that the competency and readiness of the heavenly-minded one to rescue " the dweller in Sodom" from the hand of the spoiler, is brought into the foreground; as afterward, Abraham takes the place of intercessor to deliver out of the fire, in the day of Sodom’s condemnation and of Lot’s escape. What a lesson for the earthly- minded is thus taught for to-day; and what a position it was into which "the God of glory" led his friend, as the public deliverer by act and deed (as now He does "through testimony ") out of the strife of the world; four kings, with five, " in the slime pits " of the vale of Siddim. Indeed, this energy of faith for the rescue of Lot, in the day of fierce conflict by the spoiler, and afterward in the prevalence of intercession with God alone for the dwellers in Sodom, are exercises by which the man of God can really help others, "pulling them out of the fire, and hating the garments spotted with the flesh." How different is Sodom, with Lot led by nature’s power; to Hebron, with its great history of the man in the power of faith. They separated themselves, the one from the other, "and one departs to the left hand, but the other to the right." The well-watered plain is a witness of the breakdown in Lot, as regards the calling of God and the path of faith; whilst Hebron becomes to Abraham and his seed, what Gilgal was to Joshua and the twelve tribes after, when in possession of the land itself-the pledge of deepening acquaintance with God, in the place of real strength and unfailing power. It is to be observed too, that where Lot was carried away captive and stripped of all he gained in Sodom, in the days of Amraphel, the king of Shinar, when Abraham entered the battlefield and delivered him, becomes the place " where 1VIelchisedec, the priest of the most high God, brought forth bread and wine, and blessed Abraham after he returned from the slaughter of the kings." The friend of God shines out in distinguished brightness, in company with this priest of the Most High, sealing, as he does to him, the blessing from the most high God, the possessor of heaven and earth. Hebron has introduced the man of the right hand to these inside intimacies with Melchisedec, the priest of the Most High; whilst outside this circle Abraham maintains an absolute separation from Sodom by a refusal of all it could offer, and which, alas! had tempted Lot to the left hand, in the hope of outward prosperity. And " Abraham said to the king of Sodom, I have lift up mine hand to the Lord, the most high God, the, possessor of heaven and earth, that I will not take from a thread to a shoe latchet, and that I will not take anything that is thine, lest thou shouldest say, I have made Abraham rich." Hebron and its altar are thus the witness that the friend of God has been let into "the secret counsels of peace and blessing" connected with this illustrious stranger Melchisedec, type of Him who is yet in future days of manifested power and glory in the kingdom, to come forth in the double title, as "king of righteousness, and king of peace." The onward walk of faith, or the path into which " the God of glory" leads any outside the great world of Noah, and the divisions of the earth amongst the nations, is by revealing to Abram in a vision the secret that the steward of his house (this Eliezer of Damascus) should not be the heir, for God would bring in a son as the rightful heir, and displace the steward. " And he brought him forth abroad, and said, Look now toward heaven and tell the stars, if thou be able to number them. And he said unto him, So shall thy seed be." It was in this intimacy with the undisclosed secrets of God touching this new race, of which Abraham was to be the father, that he reached personally the further point of " righteousness " by faith. God had shown that He had taken into His own hands all that had to do with His own glory or the blessing of His people; and Abram was content to be " an old man," and Sarah his wife " past age," that the excellency of the power may be seen to be of God throughout, and not of man. How precious is Hebron, when it is the witness of such friendship in the social intercourse of the heart with the sufficiency of God, that it can refuse the seeing of the eye, and the strength of nature, to make room for the grace and power of God. This confidence in Him, and such nothingness as to self and the resources of nature, form the ground for righteousness by faith, and prepare a place for this weighty Scripture: " He believed in the Lord, and He counted it to him for righteousness." The comment of the Holy Ghost upon this scene is to be remembered by us, in its extraordinary language: " Who, against hope, believed in hope.... according to that which was spoken, So shall thy seed be." Now that the friend of God is established before Him in faith, and " by calling in righteousness," there are deeper mysteries of His mind and wisdom to be revealed. "And Abram said, Lord God, whereby shall I know that I shall inherit this land?" and this question was answered by the word, "Take me an heifer, and a she-goat, and a ram of three years old, and a turtle dove, and a young pigeon; and he took unto him all these, and divided them in the midst." Nor was it only by the secret of sacrifices, in death and by substitution, that the inheritance would be secured "to him that had the promises," and he made meet to inherit them; but the night held its mysteries as well as the day. The going down of the sun, and the deep sleep that fell upon Abram, and the horror of great darkness, opened out the hidden path in which God’s purposes from everlasting lay, whereby the promised blessing should be secured to him and to his seed. Moreover, the smoking furnace must take its place and do its work; yea, the burning lamp must pass between those pieces before the covenant could find its sure foundation, and God say as the result, in the same day to Abram, " Unto thy seed have I given this land, from the river of Egypt unto the great river, the river Euphrates." Hebron must still shine forth in deepening colors as the friend of God and the Almighty grow in this intimacy with each other; and if Eliezer the steward is displaced to make room for the son in the house, as the only rightful heir of such an one as Abram, this son Isaac must himself be the way in whom the further thoughts of God, as the Blesser, are to be revealed to faith. The haste of Abram to obtain this link with God through Hagar, could only bring forth its wild gourd, in Ishmael the wild man, and shred death into the pot; as in the beginning of our records in Genesis, Eve as hastily folded her first born, Cain, to her bosom, saying, " I have gotten " the promised seed of the woman from God. But the flesh, and its way, by its own will in the house, can only mistake and complicate, as Lot did outside the house. Eve had to learn her lesson, and a terrible one too, in Cain and Abel, and to wait upon God to bring in His Seth, or the " substituted " seed, as head of the family of men, who then began to call upon the name of the Lord. The precipitancy of Abraham with Hagar after the flesh, gets its rebuke in due season, by Sarah and the child of promise brought in by God-known by His friend in a new character of power, as " the God who quickeneth the dead, and who calleth those things that be not as though they were." Hebron gets its social meaning authenticated, and its characteristics of friendship, society, and their enchantment confirmed, when " the Lord appeared unto Abram in the plain of Mamre, as he sat in the tent door in the heat of the day." Simple and beautiful is it to hear him say to the three men, ‘,‘ My Lord, if now I have found favor in thy sight, pass not away, I pray thee, from thy servant; let a little water, I pray you, be fetched, and wash your feet, and rest yourselves under the tree." " The blessing that maketh rich " is assured in this intercourse through the promised Isaac, and the house filled with joy and gladness, so that Sarah laughed. Other and different secrets were to be made known to Abraham in the privacy of this friendship with God; for, as surely as the blessing was established in the tent, so really must the curse and the judgment of fire fall in righteous government upon the cities of the plain. " And the men rose up, and looked toward Sodom, and Abraham went with them to bring them on the way, and the Lord said, Shall I hide from Abraham the thing that I do?" Noah had been saved out of the first world of corruption and violence by its judgment " at the flood," and had begun another under the covenanted " bow in the cloud," as the token of preservation and the pledge of blessing to every creature. Day and night, summer and winter, seed-time and harvest, were, and are still, fulfilling their appropriate seasons, and God, as the Creator and " Preserver of men," is satisfying their hearts with food and gladness. But Abraham had a distinct calling, and is to be seen in his own inner circle of Hebron, as the friend of God, standing in the wonderful place of intercessor with " the Judge of the whole earth," on account of the exceeding wickedness of the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah. In this walk before the Almighty it was that Abram’s heart became established in the knowledge of sure blessing in grace to himself, through the son in the house; but now he has to learn the severity of God in righteous judgment upon the inhabitants amongst whom Lot dwelt, and by their destruction through fire and brimstone. The earthly-minded one had been already rescued by the heavenly-minded man of faith, at the slaughter of the confederated kings; but this time Lot is delivered administratively by angelic agency. "And when the morning arose, then the angels hastened Lot.... and while he lingered, the men laid hold upon his hand, and upon the hand of his wife, and upon the hand of his two daughters, the Lord being merciful unto him." Two great principles spring out of this action upon the cities of the plain, which are afterward established by Peter, as confirmatory of the government of God. One of these principles is, that in righteous judgment he " turned Sodom and Gomorrah into ashes, making them an ensample to those who after should live ungodly." The other is, that " the Lord knoweth how to deliver the godly out of temptations, even as He delivered just Lot, vexed with the filthy conversation of the wicked." He is not condemned with the world, it is true; but even at this point Abraham rises into his own pre-eminence with the Lord; for " it came to pass, when God destroyed the cities of the plain, ’that God remembered Abraham, and sent Lot out of the midst of the overthrow; but his wife looked back from behind him, and she became a pillar of salt." She, too, abides a beacon set in perpetuity, by the ministry of Jesus, to any who are half-hearted towards Himself and their heavenly calling. "And Lot went up out of Zoar, and dwelt in the mountain, and his two daughters with him, for he feared to dwell in Zoar; and he dwelt in a cave, he and his two daughters." Sad it is to see that this is what became of " the garden of the Lord " to the earthly-minded man, who dwelt in it, with " those who were sinners exceedingly," so that the Lord condemned it with an overthrow, yet saved him as by fire. Abraham takes his own path with the Lord, and has to purge his own floor, and cleanse himself and his own house from "the strange woman " and her son Ishmael. So Abraham circumcised his son Isaac, being eight days old, as God had commanded him. " And Sarah saw the son of Hagar the Egyptian, which she had borne unto Abraham, mocking; wherefore she said, Cast out this bondwoman and her son, for the son of this bondwoman shall not be heir with my son, even with Isaac." Here we find ourselves in the midst of " allegories," as Paul calls these occurrences in Abraham’s house, when, writing to the Galatians, eighteen hundred years after, upon the grave matters of the two races and the two covenants, and the weighty obligations under the law, and the weightier privileges of grace-affirming that "he who was of the bondwoman was born after the flesh, but he of the free woman was by promise." If these actions are looked at in relation merely to Abraham and Sarah, or Hagar and Ishmael, they will be of every-day occurrence, and limited to their own personal histories; but viewed in connection with the mind ’and ways of God amongst nations and kindreds, and peoples and tongues, they find a diameter and describe a circle which distinguishes those who are born of the Spirit from those who are born after the flesh, with all their attendant destinies. Hagar, in this sense, answereth to " the covenant of. Mount Sinai, which gendereth to bondage" through the law of works. Hagar is further the city " of Jerusalem which now is," and is under judgment with all her children, and turned out as was Ishmael. On the other hand, Sarah and the new covenant, with the children of promise, are connected with " the Jerusalem which is above, and is free," to which Abraham himself looked -" the city, whose builder and maker is God." Indeed, the ground of this intimacy and of all these diversities, as stated in Genesis 18:1-33, is, " For I know him that he will command his children and his household after him; and they shall keep the way of the Lord, to do justice and judgment: that the Lord may bring upon Abraham that which He hath spoken of him." And he was called the friend of God. One secret more, and apart from the ways of the world under government, and judgment, has yet to be disclosed between Abraham" and "the God of glory" respecting the son in the house, touching the ways and seasons of this promised blessing to all the families of the earth, which God keeps in His own power. One of the mountains in the land of Moriah was chosen for this communication. " And the Lord said, Take now thy son, thine only son Isaac, whom thou lovest, and get thee into the land which I will tell thee of; and offer him there for a burnt offering." The heavenly-minded one, who staggered riot at the greatness of the promise when given by " the three men at the tent," in the day of their visitation, and who hesitated not to turn out Hagar and Ishmael on " the day of Isaac’s circumcision, and of the great feast," will not hesitate to deepen his acquaintance with the mind and purpose of God in any closer intimacy to which in grace He might yet call him. This is the only and simple reckoning of faith: " So Abraham took the wood of the burnt offering, and laid it upon Isaac his son; and he took the fire in his hand and a knife, and they went both of them together." Will he not lose his confidence when called out to learn the heights and depths of the mind of God by such an action as this? Will not the springs of human nature snap asunder when Isaac says to his father, "Behold the fire and the, wood; but where is the lamb for a burnt offering?" No; for his faith strengthens itself in God, and only rises the higher as he settles himself in quietness and peace to reply, " My son, God will provide Himself a lamb for a burnt offering. So they went both of them together." The comment of the Holy Ghost in Hebrews 11:1-40 may well find its place here, by which Abraham is distinguished among the men " of whom the world was not worthy," accounting that God was able to raise Isaac up, even from the dead; from whence also He received him in a figure. The father of us all has well-nigh gone through the hidden mysteries of our faith with "the God of glory"; among them he has learned life out of death in the son Isaac, born into the house; then the sacrificial death of this only-begotten and well-beloved son; followed by his resurrection in figure, and then given back to him in the power of another life, as the ground and confirmation of all promised blessing. " And the angel of the Lord called to Abraham the second time out of heaven, and said, By myself have I sworn, saith the Lord; for because thou hast done this thing, and hast not withheld thy son, thine only son: That in blessing I will bless thee... and in thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed; because thou hast obeyed my voice." Personally, Abraham has been thus called out from the world, and brought into the secret of God’s mind and purpose; yea, led into the way that the Father and the Son of the bosom took in counsel, and since in act and deed, when in due time the Child was born into the house, and upon the cross, as " the Lamb of God’s providing," He put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself. Relatively, too, the head of the family of faith has taught us the lessons of the burnt offering, Christ’s substitution for the guilty, and our forgiveness and justification; as also eternal redemption and acceptance in the Beloved One, whereof the Holy Ghost is a witness and earnest and seal to us, as believers in Christ. The original altar of Sichem and Bethel, in the plain of Moreh, gave place in the proper season to Hebron, and its closer intimacy with the Almighty; till Hebron completed itself in the mysteries of Mount Moriah to Abraham, or the threshing-floor of Ornan to David, and the foundation of the Temple to Solomon, or finally the new Jerusalem coming down out of heaven. There remains yet one scene, and a marvelous one, to fill up the circle of enchantment with the mind and heart of God the Father, into which Hebron conducted Abraham, and this last thing is a bride for Isaac, as the sharer of his joys, and the helpmeet and companion of all that his affections could desire. Now " Abraham was old, and well stricken in age, and the Lord had blessed him in all things. And Abraham said unto his eldest servant of his house, that ruled over all that he had... Thou shalt go unto my country, and to my kindred, and take a wife unto my son Isaac." It was in the deep sleep of Adam in creation that the rib was taken out of his side from which God made the woman, and brought her to the man; and now it is after the deeper sleep of Isaac in redemption by that typical death of Mount Moriah, that the bride is provided by the servant, " who was ruler over all that his master had," and brought to Isaac in the tent of Sarah. Another marked difference must be noticed here, which the Creator did not teach in the garden of Eden, where all was perfect, and good and evil only known as yet in connection with the tree whose fruit was forbidden. Abraham is the head of the new family of faith,, and the eldest servant is in this respect to be like his master. The journey, too, is one of faith from the beginning to the end, as well as the purpose of the father in all his instructions to Eliezer for the marriage of his son, in the life and power of that resurrection in which Isaac had been unbound and given back. It is in perfect keeping with the house and the family that the servant should commit himself and the object of his mission to the living God, in acknowledgment that this new principle of faith which honors him is the gift of God, and finds its scope and exercise, not in an unfallen creation, but in the necessities of a fallen one. " And he said, 0 Lord God of my master Abraham, I pray thee send me good speed this day, and show kindness unto my master Abraham." How truly does it come about, that "while they are yet speaking I will hear; " for it came to pass that before he had done praying, behold Rebekah came out who was born to Bethuel... " with her pitcher upon her shoulder." Moreover, the signs and the tokens are all completed to the eye and mind of the servant, through the pitcher and the well of water, by which Rebekah was "made perfect," and he and the camels refreshed; so that the man, " wondering at her, held his peace," to wit whether the Lord had made his journey prosperous or not. " Therefore it is of faith, that it might be by grace, to the end the promise might be sure to all the seed," is the new rule between God, as " the God of glory," and those who are of the faith of Abraham, who is the father of us all. .Abraham does in truth "command his household after him," and the eldest servant is as "perfect-in the exercise of faith " and confidence towards God as his master. And he said, " Blessed be the Lord God of my master Abraham, who hath not left destitute my master of His mercy and His truth, I being in the way, the Lord led me to the house of my master’s brethren." The servant has not only learned the secret of faith, as " the substance of things hoped for," and which bound Abraham up in the counsels and ways of God, but finds his joy in celebrating their accomplishment, in the final blessing of Isaac and Rebekah, far more than in his own success. " I being in the way" is all he has to say of himself-as another and a greater servant of the only begotten Son of the Father said long after, " he that hath the bride is the bridegroom; but the friend of the bridegroom, which standeth and heareth him, rejoiceth greatly... this my joy therefore is fulfilled. He must increase, but I must decrease." And the man bowed down his head and worshipped the Lord; moreover Laban said, " Come in, thou blessed of the Lord; wherefore standest thou without? " for the savor of the knowledge of God had filled the house. So Eliezer made one of this family after the flesh, to win and carry out from it this elect vessel as the bride of Isaac, according to the Spirit. Already he has secured her by the pledges of love, which the earrings and the bracelets declared to her eye and heart. Beyond this, he begins the untiring story to her, and to her father’s kindred, of the manner in which (as he says) " the Lord hath greatly blessed my master, and he is become great:" All these outward and natural blessings, however, are but introductory to the distinguishing and supernatural gift of the son, that supplanted the steward of the house and the ruler of all that was in it. It is now that Eliezer tells out the secret " that Sarah, my master’s wife, bare a son to my master when she was old, and unto him hath he given all that he hath." It is the father’s delight in the son, and the fact that he hath given all things into his hand, and made him the heir of the world, that sets loose the tongue of this devoted servant, who, true to the oath which his master made him swear, is so faithfully accomplishing it and making it good, by the guidance of the eye, which faith ever follows. The servant carries them back over the pathway of power, which he had trodden with the God of Abraham, being led (as he tells them) in the right way to take my master’s brother’s daughter unto his son. "And now, if you will deal kindly and truly with my master, tell me, and if not, tell me. Then Laban and Bethuel answered, and said, The thing proceedeth from the Lord: we cannot speak unto thee bad or good. Rebekah is before thee; take her and go;" so, faithful to him that appointed him, he salutes no man by the way, nor will he tarry amongst those with whom he has no further mission. On the contrary, he says to them, " Hinder me not, seeing the Lord bath prospered my path; send me away, that I may go to my master." Conscious in measure it may be, of who and what Isaac must be, as the heir of all the promises, and the child of him that quickeneth the dead, and calleth things that are not as though they were, ’they unitedly " bless Rebekah," and said to her, " Thou art our sister, be thou the mother of thousands of ’millions, and let thy seed possess the gate of those which hate them;" and the servant took her and went his way. The bride is prepared, and made ready for the bridegroom; and now we may observe how the God of Abraham and the God of Isaac brought out the husband to meet her, for " all his work is perfect." And " Isaac came from the way of the well Lahai-roi," which means " the living One that sees me," and in this light of God’s presence he walked, in the path of his father; and he went out, as such an one would, to "meditate and pray in the field at eventide." And he lifted up his eyes, and saw, and, behold! the camels were coming. " And Rebekah lifted up her eyes, and when she saw Isaac she lighted off the camel." The servant, "rejoicing greatly," has but to tell Isaac all things that he had done, and to present her in all her grace and beauty to his master’s only and well-beloved son, that the blessing of God may rest upon them. "And Isaac (no stranger to Rebekah’s heart) brought her into his mother Sarah’s tent, and took. her, and she became his wife; and he loved her, and Isaac was comforted after his mother’s death." The child of resurrection could alone interpret and understand this-the son who learned with his father at Mount Moriah the hidden path, the mystery of life and of death, by which " the better thing that God had provided" could only be brought in by the way of Rebekah, and her son Jacob, and Judah, of the twelve Patriarchs. When "the God of glory" traverses the original order of creation, "Be fruitful and multiply," as given out to every creature-it must be to act in another circle of His own and upon a new principle " where all things are of God. " So we read in the history of His grace and election, " He setteth the solitary in families, and maketh the barren woman to keep house." And what is this to the eye of faith, which we have been tracing, but the histories of Abraham and Sarah carried out in the elect family under the indelible writing of His own hand upon Isaac by circumcision? " The flesh profiteth nothing, but that which is born of the Spirit is spirit," comes from the lips of the Great Teacher of our " heavenly things," and shows the way into them. What, again, is Rebekah in Sarah’s tent, with Isaac the son in resurrection as the heir of the world, and of all that the father had to give, but the carrying out of the Holy Ghost’s testimony to the one and the other, in Hebrews 11:1-40, " Through faith also Sarah herself received strength to conceive seed, and was delivered of a child when she was past age, because she judged Him faithful who had promised. Therefore sprang there even of one, and him as good as dead, so many as the stars of the sky in multitude, and as the sand which is by the sea shore innumerable." Two questions which Abraham was allowed to ask of God have thus definitely received their full and explicit answers, touching the son in the house, and the promised inheritance. We may remember the Lord had proclaimed Himself, "Fear not, I am thy shield, and thy exceeding great reward;" and upon this declaration Abraham said, "Lord God, what wilt thou give me, seeing I go childless? Behold, to me Thou hast given no seed?" The Lord had further said to Abraham, " I am the Lord that brought thee out of U of the Chaldees, to give thee this land to inherit it. And he aid, Lord God, whereby shall I know that I shall inherit it?" w en he had not so much as to set his foot upon. Nothing can be so great for man, or so grand for the path into which the God of glory leads, as the first step that faith takes with Him in it; and the record given by the Holy Ghost to Abraham, the head of this new family, is, " He went out, not knowing whither he went." We have thus traced a path into which God has led those whom He called out to walk with Him, not so much in the general and public ways of government as in the secret thoughts of His own mind-before the manifestation of His glory in connection with His people’s blessing to the world, by the seed of- the woman, the promised Messiah, and the Xing of Israel, and the setting up of His own kingdom with the elect nation. Nor are the principles of God’s calling changed a whit, nor the path of separation to Him in the power of the Holy Ghost altered as regards the heavenly standing, or those who now know God as "the God and Father of. our Lord Jesus Christ," and who are risen and seated in heavenly places together with Him. There was an inner circle then, and much more now, which has nothing to do with the great outward world, except to bring the knowledge of God into it, and of ultimate blessing likewise by the seed of the woman, and the child of promise, born in the house, after the first man had forfeited his place as lord of all creation, and Eliezer of Damascus was set aside as steward and the ruler over all things which Abraham had. God had His elect vessels out of the original world with whom He walked, and to whom he gave testimony that they pleased Him, of whom was Enoch before his translation. The world that now is, and which began again with Noah (as we have said), has had its teeming populations in all its divisions under Shem, Ham, and Japheth, with its Babe’s and cities and towers. It carries along upon its surface the melancholy record of God’s visitation and displeasure: "Let us go down and there confound their language, that they may not understand one another’s speech;" and so it remains to this day an abiding proof that there is a God who judgeth in the earth. In the external ways of God in government with men as the inhabiters of this world, He remembers most surely His covenant; " for in Him we live, and move, and have our being," as Paul said to the Athenian rationalists. He with whom a thousand years are as one day, and one day as a thousand years, preserves His own tokens of " the bow in the cloud " with the great outward world, but gives them out afresh, nevertheless, to His elect ones from " the opened heavens," with which they have to do. It is in the Apocalypse (thousands of years after Noah’s day) that John, the beloved disciple, writes to us of these governmental ways of God, and their undoubted establishment under the Noah covenant. " And immediately I was in the spirit; and, behold, a throne was set in heaven, and one sat on the throne. And he that sat was to look upon like a jasper and a sardine stone: and there was a rainbow round about the throne, in sight like unto an emerald." The bow no longer spans the cloud of judgment, as the witness of mercy from above, but has come into union with the throne of God and Him who sits thereon, for accomplishment in authoritative rule and blessing to every creature. " And round about the throne were four and twenty seats: and upon the seats I saw four and twenty elders sitting, clothed in white raiment; and they had on their heads crowns of gold." The elect ones " out of the world," called away from its corruption and violence into this inner circle of God’s own purposes and secret actings, are here brought out in manifested association with the throne of God’s power in establishing blessing. " The God of glory had long ago appeared to Abram," and called him out to be blessed, and to be made a blessing; for He had retired from the works of His hand in creation after the fall of Adam, to bring forth the hidden things which were in his mind and heart, and found them upon the undoubted rights of His own sovereignty and of is electing love. Satan had tempted man away from his allegiance to God, and made him a child of the devil by disobedience and trespass. All was in ruin, and lay as one great wreck under the curse of God-man was driven out. Noah’s world was no better, with his three sons; for when he awoke from his wine, and knew what his younger son had done to him, he said, " Cursed be Canaan (Ham): a servant of servants shall he be." So slavery to man was inflicted on the inhabitants of the smith. And he said "Blessed be the Lord God of Shem, and Canaan shall be his servant. God shall enlarge Japheth, and he shall dwell in the tents of Shem;" and thus it is that the western powers occupy the eastern territories. In this day, yea, and more remarkably than ever, is this prophetic judgment of Noah carried out in the families of his sons, after their generations in their nations. The greatness of Europe is made greater by Asia, and her sons go thither for conquest and worldly honors and wealth; yea, even the Queen of the United Kingdom of Great Britain has added a bright glory to her crown by being proclaimed the Empress of India. All this moving mass of nations, which divided the earth after the deluge, constitutes the great outward world, into which " the God of glory " came to introduce in Abraham the new principle of " calling out to Himself," established upon pure sovereignty and boundless grace. This was the divine action which necessarily brought Abraham into this inner circle as the friend of God, to be made acquainted with the secrets of His mind, and the ways and means of their establishment, as well as the times and seasons of their full accomplishment. All this we have seen in outline, from Bethel to Hebron, from Hebron to Mount Moriah, and from Mount Moriah and the son in resurrection to Sarah’s tent, into which Isaac, the heir of all that his father had, introduced Rebekah as his affianced bride, and was comforted in the presence of death. The true seed, on the other side of death, with the wife whom he loved, and the families of the earth in blessing, together with the inheritance which God had chosen for the elect nation, and their coming glory in the kingdom, when in Immanuel’s, under this new arrangement, by the sovereignty and purpose and calling of God to his father Abraham, and transmitted to his only son. Who amongst us can enter into these meditations with. Isaac in the field, as he came from the well of Lahai-roi, or have followed Abraham in the earlier steps of his walk with God, by which he at last comprehended the whole mind of the Almighty touching the prospects and calling of the earthly family upon the earth, and not see that we are led now into a far higher path by the Holy Ghost? The Messiah, true son of Abraham, when come in the flesh, could say of him " He saw my day; and saw it, and was glad." The Holy Ghost could add to this afterward, by saying, "He looked for a city whose maker and builder is God;" and the first voice which John heard in the Apocalypse said, " Come up hither, and I will show thee things which must be after these." A further, and we may say another order and qualification was necessary for us who are called out of the world to walk with Christ, as the rejected and departed One " at the right hand of God, sitting upon the Father’s throne," to those endowments by faith, in the power of which Abraham walked with God, in the expectation of the coming of the promised son into the house, and the setting up of the earthly kingdom. " Immediately I was in the spirit," marks the new style of the disciple whom Jesus loved, and the state and condition requisite for him to whom He would make known the secrets which lay in His mind for this present day, that John might communicate them to the seven churches. In the inner circle of these revelations it is that we hold our communion with the Father and the Son. We have seen in spirit the throne, and one that sat thereon, as well as the rainbow that encircled it, and " the four and twenty elders with their crowns of gold," which John beheld, while the great outward world is heading up its iniquity amongst the Shem, Ham, and Japheth divisions of the earth. We have thus our secrets, which we hold as to everything that is to be done under the sun, by " the revelation of Jesus Christ which God gave unto Him, to show to His servants things which must shortly come to pass." " Blessed is he that readeth and they that hear the words of this prophecy, and keep those things which are written therein," are words of encouragement for the simplest faith to follow on. Do we think of the adequate power necessary to bind Satan, and put aside the confederacy of the nations against the sovereignty of God, and the rights of Christ, and the redeemed ones of His electing love? We have already marked this in the " twenty-four elders sitting with crowns of gold upon their heads;" and how "out of the throne proceeded lightnings and thunderings and voices: and there were seven lamps of fire burning before the throne, which are the seven Spirits of God," ready to be sent forth into all the earth, for the establishment of righteousness and true holiness therein. In this inner circle, of which the throne and the rainbow formed the center, there was no evil to judge. How could there be? On the contrary, there was a sea of glass before it, like unto crystal, and in the midst of the throne and round about it were four living creatures full of eyes before and behind. Rest and peace in communion marked the crowned elders within, as the representatives of the elect; whilst activity and energy, combined with the clearness of perception in an intelligent exercise of all their capabilities, distinguished the four living creatures, " full of eyes before and behind," in their actings without. Creation is plainly the sphere, in the midst of which this administrative power of the throne, as its center, will be connected; and it gladdens the heart to witness the happy concurrence of the sitting elders with " the One who sat upon this throne," as well as the simultaneous co-operation of these living creatures, by eyes and wings (for each one had six wings), completed in the full vigor of life and motion for executive power and agency amongst men. God had said to Noah, " This is the token of the covenant which I make between me and you, and every living creature that is with you, for perpetual generations: I do set my bow in the cloud;" and in correspondence with this covenant the fourth of Revelation now takes up the four heads of animal creation, and associates them with this throne of universal government. " And the first living creature was like a lion, and the second was like a calf, and the third had a face as a man, and the fourth was like a flying eagle r for creation that now groaneth under the bondage of corruption shall be delivered into the glorious liberty of the children of God. " And the four living creatures had each of them six wings about him; and (the Spirit marks again to us) they were full of eyes within: and they rest not day and night, saying, Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty, which was, and is, and is to come;" " for the earnest expectation of the creature waiteth for the manifestation of the sons of God." Four and twenty seats, and white raiment, and crowns of gold upon their heads, describe the nearness and intimacy of communion in which the elders were established "with Him who sat upon the throne;" whilst externally the living creatures proclaim and celebrate the Holy One above the power of Satan and all evil below, whether in the Noah world or in the Adam creation. The prevalence of holiness and righteousness in rule is spread far and wide by these cherubic creatures, full of eyes and clad with wings, who rest not day and night in sounding forth the praises of the Almighty God. " And when those living creatures gave glory and honor and thanks to Him that sat on the throne, who liveth forever and ever, the four and twenty elders fall down before Him that sat on the throne, and worship Him that liveth forever and ever." The difference of position and occupation between the crowned elders and these living creatures is that of worshippers; and they "cast their crowns before the throne, saying, Thou art worthy, 0 Lord, to receive glory and honor and power: for thou hast created all things, and for thy pleasure they are and were created." God, as the Creator, has come in by the perfection of the burnt offering, and thus established Himself in the midst of a creation " that was made subject to vanity not willingly, but by reason of him who subjected the same, in hope," and recovered it for Himself, by the rainbow round about the throne, and Him that sits thereon. Adam’s world closed itself up by judgment at the flood, and then opened itself anew to the ark, and every living creature therein, under the covenant of the sweet savor which God smelt upon Noah’s altar. That world closed itself up afresh (so to speak), when in righteous displeasure God confounded their tongues and scattered men abroad upon the face of the earth; but opened itself anew to the "God of glory," and the calling out of Abram as the head of the new family of faith. " By faith he sojourned in the land of promise, as in a strange country, dwelling in tabernacles with Isaac and Jacob: for he looked for a city which hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God." Sovereignty and election, as the fruit of divine purpose and counsel, are not merely established by Almighty power in the throne of government, through Him who sat thereon, sustained, moreover, by the lightnings and thunderings and voices, and the seven lamps of fire, which are the seven Spirits of God; but the fifth chapter of Revelation opens out to us, in connection with the throne, redemption by blood as the only but sure basis of its operation in blessing, to every creature under the heavens. Abraham learned not only that the son born into the house would supersede Eliezer the steward, and become heir of the promises, but that, in order to make all sure to the seed, he must pass through the dark and deep lessons of Moriah if he would ever find a bride for Isaac, and see Rebekah as " the mother of thousands of millions " in the tent of Sarah after her death. So in the revelation of the opened heavens to us, against which the earth has again closed itself up by the cross of Christ, the one " who was in the Spirit " tells us, " And I beheld, and, lo, in the midst of the throne and of the four living creatures, and in the midst of the elders, stood a Lamb, as it had been slain, having seven horns and seven eyes, which are the seven Spirits of God sent forth into all the earth." It is in this scene we get the double title of the Lamb and the Lion, or of death and the power of resurrection; for one of the elders said, " Weep not: behold the Lion of the tribe of Judah, the Root of David, hath prevailed to open the book, and to loose the seven seals thereof" The four living creatures, which were distinct from the elders in their occupations and services in chap. 4:, are here connected: " And when he had taken the book, the four living creatures and the four and twenty elders fell down before the Lamb, having every one of them harps, and golden vials full of odors, which are the prayers of saints." The ruin and groaning of creation in corruption is here met by the Lamb of God, " the taker away of the sin of the world;" and it is into this glorious circle with God and the Lamb that the redeemed ones are introduced out of this present evil world. " And they sung a new song, saying, Thou art worthy to take the book, and to open the seals thereof: for thou wast slain, and hast redeemed them to God by thy blood out of every kindred, and tongue, and people, and nation: and hast made us unto our God kings and priests; and we shall reign over the earth." As was said at the outset of our meditations, the external ways of God by government do but clear the way for the establishment and ultimate display in blessing of His hidden counsels, into which He called Abraham by the way of the city and the great river Euphrates, but into which He now has called out the church of the living God, as the body and bride of Christ under the anointing and baptism of the Holy Ghost. This distinction is necessary to be observed, in order to maintain the difference between the kingdom and the church, to the former of which Abraham belonged, as well as to the city, whose builder and maker is God. The intermediate chapters of the Apocalypse, being in connection with the government of. the throne of God, and the book taken from the hand of Him who sat thereon, are mainly descriptive of the judgments upon the inhabitants of the earth whilst denying the only Lord God and our Lord Jesus Christ. These are swept away, as seen under the vials and the trumpets and the thunders of the great day of His wrath; till finally Babylon is destroyed, and the beast and the false prophet which deceived the nations are cast into a lake of fire and brimstone. The slaughter of the kings and their armies (as in the typical days of Abraham and Amraphel) must likewise take place, as in chap. 19., where " the remnant were slain by the sword of Him" who had on His vesture and thigh a name written, " King of kings, and Lord of lords," and all the fowls were filled with their flesh. After this " he carried me away in the Spirit to a great and high mountain, and showed me that great city, the holy Jerusalem, descending out of heaven from God, having the glory of God: and her light was like unto a stone most precious, even like a jasper stone, clear as crystal." The throne and the city, the scepter and the king, the reign and the kingdom, are thus in view, and the songs of every creature in heaven and earth, with the harpers above harping upon their harps, take the place of the long and loud groan of creation once waiting for its deliverance. God has destroyed them that destroyed His earth. One burst of universal praise goes forth from everything that hath breath, saying, " Blessing, and honor, and glory, and power be unto Him that sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb, forever and ever. And the four living creatures said Amen, and the four and twenty elders fell down and worshipped Him that liveth forever and ever." The point of view for the man of God now is by the side of the One in the glory, whom Stephen saw when he looked up out of this world into the heavens. It is to him that the Holy Ghost has come down to bear witness. How blessed thus to change our center of observation from Abraham below to the " Son of man " glorified above-to step out of the first creation into the second-to know that Adam was not the man of God’s purpose, but Christ " The first man is of the earth, earthy; the second man is the Lord from heaven," and this Son of man is now established in the glory of God, and has become the center and sun of that eternal glory, and Head of the new creation of God. Another order of manhood was brought into this world by the Son, in the glory of the incarnation, and is now manifested in the heavens by the glory of the ascended Lord, who has been raised by God the Father, "above all principality and power, and might and dominion, and every name that is named, not only in this world, but also in that which is to come." Moreover, in the sovereignty and supremacy of His own righteous title and power; God " hath put all things under His feet, and gave Him to be the Head over all things to the church, which is His body, the fullness of Him that filleth all in all." This marks the difference, and is the measure of the distance between "the God of glory," who appeared to Abraham, and the Son of man " in the glory of God," of which this paper treats. Indeed it is of vast importance to trace, in the Gospel of John particularly, how much this glory of the Son, in connection with the Son of man in the heavens, was the subject of the Lord’s own ministry. For example, at the very outset it is written, " No man bath seen God at any time, the only begotten Son which is in the bosom of the Father, He hath declared Him;" for John’s anointing is to follow his Lord, as the one " who came out from God, and went to God." However much arid rightly " the Child born and the Son given " may be genealogized in the synoptical Gospels as the son of Abraham and the son of David to connect Him as the Messiah of Israel with all covenanted and promised blessings for Immanuel’s land and the whole earth -so John, in his turn, is occupied with the personal glory of Him who was God, and who was in the beginning with God- "the Word made flesh." Our Lord’s words with Nicodemus are of the same character, "No man bath ascended up to heaven, but He that came down from heaven, even the Son of man which is in heaven." Thus, the Son "in the bosom of the Father," when upon this earth, or the Son of man " in flesh and blood," was never for a moment dissociated from the Father, or the heavens. So, likewise, in speaking with His disciples, to whom some of His glories were hard sayings, He asked, " Doth this offend you? What and if ye shall see the Son of man ascend up where He was before?" But further, and as regards " the Son of man in the glory," and the sending down of the Holy Ghost-the two grand characteristics of Christian life and blessing-He said, when speaking to His disciples of the Spirit, which they that believe on Him should receive, "for the Holy Ghost was not yet given, because that Jesus was not yet glorified." As the Son of man coming in His kingdom, He had reached the highest place of majesty and glory upon the earth, when He was transfigured before His disciples, and His face did shine as the sun, and His raiment was white as the light on the Mount below. Of this kingdom’s glory in the earth, in a yet future day, Matthew and Mark and Luke alike speak, but not John- for to the eye of the beloved disciple Jesus was not yet glorified, so as to bring out all that was divine and in reserve in the heavens. As Son of man he had "received from God the Father honor and glory, when there came such a voice to Him from the excellent glory " - but this was to eye-witnesses of His majesty, who were with Him "in the holy mount," and was short of the Son of man in the glory, "at the right hand of God." In the central chapters of John it is that our Lord passes into His own glory with God, outside and far beyond all these promised and covenanted blessings, whether to Adam and creation, or Abraham and his seed, with all the families of the earth, or David and the royalties of the throne and kingdom in "Jerusalem, the city of the great King," having first made them all His own by birth, as the Seed of the woman conceived by the Holy Ghost, when the power of the Highest overshadowed her. Outside the range of these sure blessings for the earth, and men in it, He passes in John, going down into His own unfathomable depths to glorify God, on account of sin and Satan, death and. the grave, the judgment of God and the condemnation of man because of the fall. To "this hour Jesus came," in John 12:1-50, and into this hour he passed with his Father, saying " Now is my soul troubled, and what shall I say? Father save me from this hour: but for this cause came I unto this hour." To the soul of Jesus the power of God was to follow Him down into the darkness of the grave, where He lay in the perfectness of His own obedience unto death, even the death of the cross, to get a new glory for itself on the morning of the third day, as the God who raiseth the dead. He was not saved "from that hour," but gained glory for God by going down into its depths, and saying " Father, glorify Thy name." The death He should die was the way to it, " Then came there a voice from heaven, saying, I have both glorified it, and will ’glorify it again." He who alone could make sin and death and the grave a high road for honor and glory at the right hand of God, trod that dreary path, and "was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father." The power of God waited for this Son of man at the door of the sepulcher, and an angel rolled back the stone and sat upon it. Nothing, perhaps, so distinguishes the person of Christ as to see Him lay hold of the penalties which were inflicted by God upon man as a sinner, and do the work by their means at the cross and in the grave, in which He made expiation for the offenses on account of which they were incurred, and put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself. 0 Death! I will be thy plague; 0 Grave! I will be thy destruction. " Father, glorify Thy name," was the desire of our Lord, and this was further secured by " the lifting up of the Son of man," as Jesus said, " I, if I be lifted up from the earth, will draw all unto me." Else how could we read afterward, in connection with the glory of the Father’s name, " that in the ages to come He might show the exceeding riches of His grace, in His kindness toward us through Christ Jesus, in quickening us, and raising us, and making us sit together in Him, in the heavenly places "? " Father, glorify Thy name," had another answer by this lifting up of the Son of man in righteousness, "Now is the judgment of this world," and again, "Now shall the prince of this world be cast out," two actions equally necessary for the establishment of the sovereignty of God in government, and the vindication of the rights of Christ against the wrongs which He suffered from His betrayers and murderers. Therefore God hath " appointed a day in the which He will judge the world in righteousness, by that Man whom he hath ordained; whereof He hath given assurance to all men in that He hath raised Him from the dead." If we leave this great outer circle, where all contradictory and opposing powers are brought into crisis and turned round in the person of Christ for the glory of God, and the exaltation of the Son of man to the right hand of the Majesty in the heavens, we shall find in the inner circle, with His own disciples, that the depth of human depravity in Judas was, to the eye of Jesus, only an opening to the glory beyond. " He then having received the sop went immediately out, and it was night. Therefore when he was gone out, Jesus said, Now is the Son of Man glorified, and God is glorified in him," for in no other way in this Gospel (when brought into relation with His death) can the Lord look at, or speak of man and Satan. "For this cause came I to this hour," is not only the disclosure of His own devotedness, but the secret by which we can alone understand His intercourse with His Father. Thus in the darkest moment after the last supper, and in the foulest act of the man to whom Jesus had given the sop when He had dipped it, He was above the enormity, and said " I know whom I have chosen, but that the Scripture might be fulfilled, he that eateth bread with me, hath lifted up his heel against me." Satan entering into Judas, and making him his tool, could only be the occasion to Jesus for that remarkable utterance, "Now is the Son of man glorified, and God is glorified in Him." And further, " if God be glorified in Him, God shall also glorify Him in Himself, and shall straightway glorify Him." The penalties inflicted by God upon man, and the opposition of Satan, when his hour came, which rolled in the mighty power of darkness upon Jesus in the garden of Gethsemane, so that He sweat, as it were, great drops of blood falling to the ground, only led Him the more devotedly to see the Father’s glory in it and beyond, and to say, " The cup which my Father hath given me, shall I not drink it?" " Said I not unto thee, that, if thou wouldest believe, thou shouldest see the glory of God?" were the words of rebuke to Martha, at the grave of Lazarus. And it is remarkable that from the narrative of the man who entered the world "blind from his birth," to the one who went out of the world by death, and was in corruption too, our Lord would see nothing in such matters but an extraordinary occasion "for the glory of God " to be displayed. To the eye of Jesus the man was " born blind, that the works of God should be made manifest in him," and He refuses the question of His disciples, " Who did sin, this man or his parents, that he was born blind?" When Jesus was at the grave of Lazarus, He would only go in His own proper character, as " the Resurrection and the Life, that He might wake him out of sleep." Indeed we may say that the divine light in which our Lord shines at the grave, and the glorious power by which He wrought with the man in corruption, is the necessary counterpart and completion of the splendor in which He was transfigured on the holy mount. He went up with His three disciples to be glorified, according to the power and majesty of His kingdom-rights and dignities-but at the grave He does more wondrously, by bringing "the glory of God down" where sin and death and corruption, under the power of Satan, held manhood, originally " created in the image of God, and for His pleasure." Jesus received from God the Father honor and glory as His righteous due on the mount of His transfiguration, but with Lazarus, bound hand and foot with grave clothes, He had other thoughts, and groaning within Himself cometh to the grave. Here was a far deeper matter than even the kingdom glory, for God as the Creator, and Satan with his ill-gotten power of death and corruption, were in question to the heart of Jesus. "And he lifted up his eyes, and said, Father, I thank Thee that Thou hast heard me." Like as He used up the penalties at the cross to put away sin, so now at the grave " the glory of God " is wrought out by the power of Jesus, as the Resurrection and the Life, and " He cried with a loud voice, Lazarus, come forth." His disciples, who were eye-witnesses of His glory on the holy mount, are likewise the witnesses of the power and majesty that descended to man in his lowest and worst state-in the grave and under corruption. Everywhere "the Son of man is glorified, and God is glorified in Him," so Jesus saith unto them, "Loose him, and let him go." Nothing but " the glory of God " has come forth out of sin and death and corruption in the grave, by the work and ways of Christ. " It is sown a natural body, it is raised a spiritual body," completes the victory for the elect, when we are changed in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, and put off the image of the earthy man, and put on the image of the heavenly man, to be forever with the Lord. Founded upon this work, by which the Son of man has fully. glorified the Father, rests the other part of that wonderful utterance, "If God be glorified in Him, God shall also glorify Him in Himself, and shall straightway glorify Him " Beyond this Scripture, are the words of our Lord in the 17th chapter, when "Jesus lifted up His eyes to heaven, and said, Father, the hour is come, glorify Thy Son, that Thy Son also may glorify Thee." Indeed, " the Son of man in the glory of God," which is part of the title of this paper, does not measure the various glories of which the Son here speaks to the Father. Precious it is for us to see again, that all is founded on the fact, "I have glorified Thee on the earth, I have finished the work Thou gavest Me to do. And now, 0 Father! glorify Thou Me with Thine own self, with the glory which I had with Thee before the world was." He takes His place as Son of man in the heavens, and in the assumed manhood, which He has united with Himself, as the Eternal Son in the Godhead, His first thought is " the glory which I had with Thee, before the world was." His love to us and the Father’s love are then unfolded in this marvelous intercourse-viz., " And the glory Thou hast given Me I have given them, that they may be one as we are one," and further, Jesus says, "Father, I will that they also whom Thou hast given Me, be with Me where I am; that they may behold My glory, which Thou hast given Me." We are thus introduced as partakers with Christ, in all that His own love and the Father’s delight in us from everlasting has suited us for. " Thou hast given Him power over all flesh, that He should give eternal life to as many as Thou hast given Him. And this is life eternal that they might know Thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom Thou hast sent." This wonderful chapter leaves no glory out of view, or disconnected with the Son, as Son of man-be it the glory before the world was, or the glory given as the fruit and reward of the travail of His soul, or the glories counseled from everlasting, as the Head of a new heavens and a new earth wherein dwelleth righteousness-or as "Head of His body the church, the fullness of Him that filleth all in all." Any, and every revelation after this, yea whatever is dispensed,. even by the Holy Ghost through the apostles, must be according to these glories of the Father and the Son, and out of this fullness. The Acts, for example, is but the historical record of the departure of our Lord into the heavens on the right hand of God, that He might, in the first place, send the promise of the Father in the descent of the Holy Ghost. The next fact necessary for our subject is the witness of Stephen, " a man full of the Holy Ghost," who looked up steadfastly into heaven, and saw " the glory of God, and Jesus standing on the right hand of God." The Son of man in heaven is authenticated by those who saw Jesus received up, as well as by the Holy Ghost which came down at Pentecost, and by Stephen, the first martyr in Christianity, who called upon God, saying, "Lord Jesus, receive my spirit." Besides this testimony of Stephen to "the Son of man in the glory of God," from the suffering member of Christ below, the Lord could say to Saul, " Why persecutest thou Me?" as being in living union with this faithful witness. Blessed as this personal unity with the glorified Son of man was, as the Head of His body the church, there must necessarily be a new revelation from God, embracing the things which had been kept secret from the foundation of the world, the mystery which had been hid in God. In the first place, there was a ministry of life in the power of the Spirit, from " the Son of man in the glory of God" as the second Adam, the new Head of life and righteousness, in order to life and holiness in us, for the pathway which Jesus had made for Himself and His own, which were still on the earth. The second Epistle to the Corinthians opens out the source and character of this ministry in full, not on tables of stone, but on the fleshy table of the heart, and written by the Spirit of the living God, in connection with the light of the knowledge of " the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ." Life, and its ministry by the Spirit and the apostles of Christ, was the prerequisite either for communion with the Father and the Son, in the light where God dwells, or for service and obedience as dear children, whilst in these earthly places. This was followed by "the whole counsel of God," which Paul was especially qualified to declare to the church of the living God. The things concerning "the Son of man in the glory of God" and this ministration of the Spirit, in the power of which they are dispensed to us, act so that " we, all looking on the glory of the Lord with unveiled face, are transformed according to the same image from glory to glory, even as by the. Lord the Spirit." We might safely stop at these two points which we have reached-viz., " the Son of man in the glory of God " in the heavens; and the corresponding ministry by the Holy Ghost, which Makes those who are united to the Head, " epistles of Christ, known and read of all men." What a new calling it is to be so livingly with the Son in the glory, that morally and spiritually beholding Him, we can take our places on earth, as " sons of God, in the midst of a crooked and perverse nation, among whom we shine as lights in the world, holding forth the word of life." What a day will that be both: for His glory and ours, when He comes with a shout to call us up to meet Him! He will withdraw us from the world altogether, and bring us into the closer intimacies of His own love, inside and beyond all the displayed glory, to learn the lesson that His own love, and the Father’s love in "the Father’s house,’ are even sweeter than the manifestations in public of " the glory of the Son of man." However blessed these surely are, and necessary for the government of God in establishing His righteous kingdom, and confirming His covenants and promises as " the God of glory to Abraham" in Immanuel’s land with the earthly people Israel, and the Gentiles, yet there lay counsels and purposes in the Godhead known only to the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost from before the foundation of the world. These formed no necessary part of mere temporal and material blessing, and were not connected with covenants and promises, except as requiring to be made good by the Seed of Abraham and David, when, as the Son of man, He should come "in the clouds of heaven, and sit upon the throne of His glory." The eternal counsels and purposes of God, on the other hand, make the heavens their center and birthplace. They tarried for the Son of man, exalted to the right hand of God, in whom alone they were conceived, and with whose Person they were concentrated, and, as a matter of fact, were only revealed by the Holy Ghost in connection with the ascended Lord and Head, when the earthly order had been refused, by the rejection of Christ. " The Son of man, in the glory of God" on high, is essential to the revelation of the hidden counsels of God, and He has entered into that glory with God the Father. The Holy Ghost, as promised by the Father and the Son, descends from that height, and comes forth from that new source, to gather out the church of God upon the earth, as the body and bride of Christ, now called by grace into " fellowship with the Father and the Son, in the light where God dwells." We have thus in the records of the Old Testament the God of glory appearing to Abraham; and in the Revelation of the New Testament the Son of man in the glory of God; and it is the connection, and yet the distinction and difference between these two sources of ultimate blessing for the heavens and the earth which are now, and the new heavens and the new earth hereafter, which have mainly occupied us. These form two grand centers, and each with their respective systems or circles, for the glory of God, and dependent now upon "the Son of man, at the right hand of the Majesty in the heavens "-relations, and titles, and offices manward; belonged to him, as " conic in the flesh," which He will yet open out upon this earth in the day of His power; but other relations Godward, with their new names and titles, together with their offices and headships, waited upon Him as " the Son of God passed through the heavens," and Crowned with honor and glory. The calling of God the Father now is to be one with "the Son of His love" in eternal life, and our place and portion to be like Him, and be with Him, and to see Him as He is! Blessed hope! ======================================================================== CHAPTER 156: VOL 02 - THE LORD'S SUPPER ======================================================================== The Lord’s Supper WE should, on Divine authority, and in spiritual, scriptural intelligence, hold to it, that the Lord’s supper is the due characteristic expression of the Lord’s day-that which should then be made principal. If we read Luke 22:7-20, we shall learn that the Passover of the Jews and the supper of the Lord being then exhibited successively-the one after the other-the latter, thenceforth, was to displace the former, and that forever. The former, with other meanings attached to it, was the foreshadowing of the great Sacrifice which was in due time, to put away sin. The latter is now the celebration of the great fact that that Sacrifice has been offered, and that, for faith, sin is put away. After the Lord’s supper, therefore, is instituted, it is impossible to return to the Passover. It would be apostasy-a giving up of God’s Lamb and of the atonement. But, if the supper has thus displaced the Passover, we may then inquire, Is anything to displace it? We may read our answer in 1 Corinthians 11:26, and there learn that the Lord’s supper is set as a standing institution in the house of God till the Lord’s return. The Holy Ghost, through the apostle, gives it an abiding place all through this age of the Lord’s absence. I conclude, accordingly, that we are not to allow anything to displace the supper. It is of our faithfulness to our stewardship of the mysteries of God, to assert the right of that supper to be principal in the assembly of the saints. It has displaced the Passover by the authority of the Lord Himself; but we, on the authority of the Holy Ghost, are not to allow anything to displace it. It is the proper service of the house of God. The Lord’s supper is the -principal thing for the Lord’s day. This comes out naturally in the progress of the story of Christianity in the New Testament. We read in Acts 20:7, " And upon the first day of the week, when the disciples came together to break bread." And again, in 1 Corinthians 11:33, " Wherefore, my brethren, when ye come together to eat, tarry one for another." If we abandon the supper for a sermon, or for a large congregation, or for any other religious scene or service, we have given up the house of God in its due characteristic and divinely appointed business and worship. So far we are guilty of apostasy. We have ’hot, it is true, returned to the displaced or superseded Passover; but we have allowed something or another to displace or supersede what the Holy Ghost has set as principal in the house of God. And, were we right-hearted, we would say, What sermon would be more profitable to us? What singing of a full congregation more sweet in our ears than the voice of that ordinance which tells us so clearly and with such rich harmony of all kinds of music of the forgiveness of our sins, of the acceptance of our persons, and of our waiting for the Lord from heaven, and all this in blessed and wondrous fellowship with the brightest display of the name and glory of God? Yea, the table at which we sit is a family table. In spirit we are in the Father’s house. We are made by the table to know ourselves in relationship, and that lies just outside the realm of glory; for " if children, then heirs." If we be in the kingdom of God’s dear Son, we are next door to the inheritance (Colossians 1:1-29). And there the table is maintained until Christ comes again. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 157: VOL 02 - THE LOVE OF THE TRUTH THE SOUL'S SECURITY ======================================================================== The Love of the Truth the Soul’s Security I fully believe that a just and divine understanding of the present state of things must be accompanied by this trial of mind-that while the great advance in all the accommodations of life, and in the general refinement and culture of all classes is acknowledged, and the public boast in such things is allowed to have apparently most full warrant; all this is known to be only in progress to a something that is to meet the most awful judgment from the hand of the Lord-because it is to be a mocking of all that is blessed, and not really blessed-the kingdom of man, and not of " the Lord and His Christ "-the energy of the god of this world, and not of the Spirit of the living God. This divine intelligence must bring its sorrows. For the saint possessed of it will hear that condition of things continually gloried in, which he knows is most fearful; and the more the ground of this carnal and ignorant boast is day by day unfolding itself, the more does the saint discover the ripening of human pride, and the progress of that fair structure of the enemy’s device, which is to bring the judgment. At midday there is to be night in the world’s history. God will turn man’s noontide splendor into the shade of night: as touching His own, He will turn the shadow of death into the morning, and at their evening time give them light (Zechariah 14:1-21) Such, I doubt not, is the position which the intelligent believer takes at this moment; one of sorrow to his spirit, as he listens to man every day; one of joy to his spirit, as he listens to the promise that the great redemption is only drawing the nearer, through all this that he looks at and listens to. His security lies in " the love of the truth " (2 Thessalonians 2:1-17) He is not to expect that the hand of God will interfere to stop the progress of this fair structure. He is not to commit himself to the hand, but to the word of the Lord. It is rather of the Lord to allow pride to get food whereby to nourish and swell itself, and to let the world prosper by its own devices. The soul that looks for providential visitations on all that is, and will be adoing, is in most imminent hazard. " The love of the truth " is declared to be the soul’s security. How fair were the deceits practiced at Jerusalem in the days of Ezekiel I Paintings on the temple walls, and exquisitely wrought, I doubt not. Ancient men, Men of character and of religion, kindling clouds of incense before them, adopting the delusions! Women melted into tears while occupied with their idols, exhibiting the fine and generous flow of human affections which is so attractive to the heart! And the sun in his beauty, and rising at the east, worshipped! (Ezekiel 8:1-18) What witchery was all this! What fascination for the religious and amiable sentiments of our nature! What protected the heart of the prophet while surveying it all? The hand of the Lord did not interfere-rain did not come down to quench the cloud of incense. It was allowed to wreathe itself upward in lovely forms, as though He who dwelt in the house was accepting it. Another hand did not appear to write on the wall, over against the paintings, their judgment. No; but the word of his divine Guide interpreted all these fascinations, and called them " abominations I" This was the prophet’s safety, and it is ours in a like moment. The truth that interprets according to God all that is now going on, must preserve our souls from taking part with this "fair show in the flesh," which is so much apparent comeliness, but real "abomination." ======================================================================== CHAPTER 158: VOL 02 - THE NEW SONG ======================================================================== The New Song ALL is mischief and disturbance; but all is ripening that revolted and apostate material, through the judgment of which the Lord is to take the kingdom. "The heathen raged, the kingdoms were moved: He uttered His voice, the earth melted." It is as Conqueror the Lord is to take His kingdom by and by, or enter His second sabbath. Of old the sabbath was the rest of One who had labored; but the coming sabbath will be the rest of One who has fought a fight and won the day. This " rest that remaineth " will, therefore, be entered by a rougher and more difficult path than the former; for it is to be reached through the afflictions and conflicts which sin has occasioned, and through the judgment of iniquity. The Lord God of old entered His rest or sabbath as Creator. He had gone through the work of six days, and on the seventh He rested and was refreshed. The sabbath, we know, has been disturbed and lost through man’s sin; but we also know of a coming sabbath, " a rest that remaineth," as we read.* (*The Creator has rested: His works were finished from the foundation of the world (Hebrews 4:1-16); but I may say, that is all. In other characters of gracious action God has not yet rested. As the Father, as the Christ, in the person of the Holy Ghost, and as the Lord of Israel and of the whole earth, God has still to reach His rest. The rest is one that "remaineth," we may say, as much for Him as for His people; for He still works in love and in power, and they still toil against sin and the world and the enemy. (See John 5:17; Ephesians 4:1-32)) We might ask, then, In what character will it be entered, or by whom? And all Scripture replies, By conquerors. David making way for Solomon is the type of this. Solomon was the peaceful-a name which implies not abstract or mere rest, but rest after conflict or war. It bespeaks triumphant rest; something more than cessation of labor. So the Lord enters the kingdom as " Jehovah strong and mighty, Jehovah mighty in battle;" as one fresh in victory, "with dyed garments." (See Psa. 24: 46, 47, 93.; Isa. 9: 63; Revelation 19:1-21.) Christ as Conqueror is, however, known in different scenes and seasons, and in different forms and manners, before He enters the kingdom. As soon as He gave up the ghost, the victory of His death was owned in heaven, earth, and hell; for the veil of the temple was rent in twain, the rocks were split, and the graves were broken up. As He entered the heavens, He was received and sat down as Conqueror. He was at once acknowledged there as fresh from His conflict and conquest here. As the One who had overcome, He sat down with the Father on His throne* (*We therefore now, in spirit, can sing a new song, or a conqueror’s song.) When His saints rise to meet Him, they will, in their own persons, display His victory-the victory He has achieved for them. Their ascending and responsive shout will utter it" Thanks be to God who giveth us the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ." (1 Corinthians 15:1-58) In these different seasons and forms the triumph of Christ is celebrated before He enters the kingdom. And animating and happy truth this is-Jesus ascended on high as a Conqueror. But never, till Jesus ascended, had heaven known a Conqueror. A distant report of His victory had reached it, I may say, when the temple vail was rent; but never had heaven been the place of a conqueror till the Lord returned there. The Lord God in His glories had been there, the Lord God as Creator and Ruler also, and the angels that excel in strength had waited there. Some who kept not their first estate there may have been cast down, and others have sung at the foundations of the earth being laid; but never had the presence of a conqueror adorned and gladdened it till Jesus ascended. But then it was so. He had then destroyed him that had the power of death; He had led captivity captive; He had made a show of principalities; He had overcome the world; He had, as the true Samson, borne the hostile gates to the top of the hill The grave-clothes had been left in the empty sepulcher, as the spoils of war and trophies of conquest. And thus, as conqueror, Jesus ascended. Heaven had already known the living God, but never till then the living God in victory; and our ascension after Him will only, in other terms, tell of triumph, and be another display of a host of conquerors. Then, at the end, when the kingdom is entered, it will be entered (as we have already said) by a Conqueror after His day of battle and war of deliverance out of the hand of enemies.* (*The kingdom thus reared upon the ruin of the enemy will be an immovable one.) Now, according to all this is, I believe, the " new song " of which we read in Scripture; for the songs there are conquerors’ songs, and they are so many rehearsals, so to speak, of the kingdom’s song. Such was that of Moses and the congregation on the banks of the Red Sea; such was Deborah’s; such were the utterances, if they may be called songs, of Hannah and of Mary; and such is to be the song of Revelation 15:1-8 in its season-the harpers in heaven standing there in victory over the beast, and over his image, and over his mark, and over the number of his name. This gives a "new" theme for singing or gladness, and hence " the new song." The old song, sung by the morning stars over the foundations of the earth, was not a conqueror’s song, a song celebrating a divine victory either for the redemption or avenging of God’s chosen. There was no theme of victory then, for no battle had been fought and won. But sin since then has entered. A great counter-force has been in action, and the Lord has had to go forth as "a man of war," the God of battles; and therefore at the end a new song, a song with a new theme or burden, must be awakened to celebrate Him in this new action or character of glory. The song of Moses was a conqueror’s song, and so the song of the Lamb. " 0 sing unto Jehovah a new song, for He hath done marvelous things; His right hand and His holy arm bath gotten Him the victory." The song over creation must give place in compass and melody to the song over the triumphs of Jesus.* What new honors, we may adoringly and thankfully say, are preparing for Him through our history, and what new joys for heaven For His victories have been for us, accomplishing, as I observed, our deliverance and vindication in the face of our enemies. The glory of those victories is His, the fruit of them ours.** (*The first " corner-stone " was laid by the Creator, and angels sang (Job 38:6); the second is brought in in victory, and Israel shouts. (Psalms 118:1-29; Zechariah 4:1-14)) (**Christ does not appear as a Conqueror in what He does with God for us, as our ransom, or re-purchaser by the value of His blood. In all that action He suffers instead of conquers; but He is Conqueror as against the enemy, redeeming us from him or avenging us on him.) And it is a joyous thought that the Lord is to enter His coming kingdom as a conqueror, taking the throne of Solomon the peaceful after the wars and victories of David. But this joy implies scenes of a tremendous character. Triumph, of itself, is a bright idea, but it is full of recollections of fields of battle and scenes of bloodshed. And so with the Lord Jesus. The joy of seeing Him in triumph and the power of His kingdom is bright and gladdening, but " the winepress " has first to be " trodden." And still more-though that is solemn-the treading of the winepress, or the execution of divine judgment, speaks of previous corruption or of the ripening of the " vine of the earth." If the Lord in judgment have to tread the winepress, the winepress has first to be filled. And where are we, at this moment, actually standing? Not in the possession of the immovable kingdom; not in the sight of the triumph that is to usher it forth, or in the audience of the new song which is to accompany that triumph; not in the vision of the field of Bozrah, and the garments dyed with blood, the day of divine judgment which leads to the triumph; but in a certain stage of the ripening of the vine of Sodom which is soon to be cast into the winepress, or to meet the judgment of the Lord. There we stand, and the moment is solemn. Every day, like the heat of summer, is but maturing and mellowing the grapes of gall or the clusters of Gomorrah. Our prospects are thus strange, awful, and glorious beyond thought. We look for the increasing growth of evil, for the winepress of the wrath of God to receive and judge it, and then for the triumph and the kingdom of Jesus. For such things we look, as far as our eye is turned, to the earth; but " we stand at the head of two ways." Enoch stood there before. He looked down the way of the earth, and there he saw the maturing of ungodliness, and the Lord with ten thousand of His saints coming to execute judgment; but he himself was borne upward, the way of the heavens. (Jude 1:14; Hebrews 11:5.) The new song was sung by Jesus after His resurrection (Psalms 40:3); it will be sung by the saints after their resurrection or ascension to heaven (Revelation 5:9); and then it will be sung by Israel in the kingdom which is their resurrection (Psalms 98:1). ======================================================================== CHAPTER 159: VOL 02 - THE SUFFERINGS OF CHRIST ======================================================================== The Sufferings of Christ A GOOD deal that is current on the sufferings of Christ leads me to desire to draw the attention of your readers to this point, and to some simple yet important distinctions which it behooves us to make, as to their character and nature. The sympathies of Christ are so precious to the soul, His entering into our sorrows in this world of moral woe so comforting, so softening, and yet so elevating, that we cannot treasure too highly the realization of them in our hearts, nor guard too carefully against anything that is spurious. That is the more important, because the character of His sufferings more or less connects itself with His person and nature. I shall endeavor to be as simple as possible. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 160: VOL 02 - THE SUFFERINGS OF CHRIST DISTINGUISHED ======================================================================== The Sufferings of Christ Distinguished In the first place, we have to distinguish His sufferings from man and His sufferings from God. Their cause, and the result of them, are equally contrasted. Christ did, we know, suffer from men. He was despised and rejected of men, "a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief." The world hated Him before it hated His disciples; it hated Him because He bore witness of it that its works were evil. He was "light," and he that doeth evil hateth the light, nor comes to the light, because his works are evil. In a word, Christ suffered for righteousness’ sake; even as it was from the beginning, in that which was a type of Jesus’ history in this respect, Cain slew Abel, because his works were evil and his brother’s righteous. We may add that the love which caused the Lord to minister to men in the world, and testify of their evil, brought only more sorrow upon Him. For His love He had hatred. This hatred of man against Him never slackened till His death, when, in the folly of human exultation, they could shout, " Aha aha! so would we have it." Righteousness and love, and what was indeed the manifestation of the divine nature and ways on the earth, brought out the relentless hatred of the human mind and will. Christ suffered from man for righteousness’ sake. But He suffered also from the hand of God upon the cross. "It pleased the Lord to bruise Him; He hath put Him to grief; when He shall make His soul an offering for sin, He shall see His seed." He was made sin for us who knew no sin, and then "He was wounded for our transgressions, and bruised for our iniquities; the chastisement of our peace was upon Him." There He suffered the just for the unjust; that is, He suffered, not because He was righteous, but because we were sinners, and He was bearing our sins in His own body on the tree. As regards God’s forsaking Him, He could say, " Why hast Thou forsaken Me? " for in Him there was no cause. We can give the solemn answer. In grace He suffered the just for the unjust; He had been made sin for us. Thus He suffered for righteousness, as a living man, from men; as a dying Savior, He suffered from the hand of God for sin. It is most interesting to notice the result of these two characters of suffering as expressed in the Psalms. In Psalms 20:1-9; Psalms 21:1-13, we see the Messiah prophetically viewed as suffering on the earth from men. It was the day of trouble. They imagined a device against Him, which they were not able to perform. But He asks life, and has length of days forever. Glory and great majesty are put upon Him. What is the effect of His being thus glorified by Jehovah, in answer to the scorn and violence of ungodly men? Judgment: His hand finds out all His enemies. He makes them as a fiery oven in the day of His anger; as He said, "Those mine enemies that would not that I should reign over them, bring them hither, and slay them before me." The same thing may be seen in Psalms 69:1-24. The effect of His suffering from the hand of wicked men is judgment on themselves. In Psalms 22:1-31 we have, besides all these sufferings from the hand of men, and when they had reached their height (see the whole Psalm up to verse 21), His ’suffering from the hand of God. When under the pressure of the others, God, His only resource, forsakes Him. This is the great theme of the Psalm. But what is the result of this? This was the bearing of sin-at least the consequence of His bearing it. It was the judgment, so to speak, which our sins brought on Him who had taken us up in love. But He came to put sin away by the sacrifice of Himself; and to bear our own sins in His own body on the tree. Hence the result is unmingled and full of grace -nothing else. Who was to be punished for His having drunk the cup at His Father’s hand? He is heard. God takes the new character of one who has raised Him up and given Him glory, because He had perfectly glorified Him about sin. He is raised from the dead by the glory of the Father. The name of His God and Father He immediately declares to His brethren, " I will declare thy name unto my brethren." So in fact He did, when He said to Mary Magdalene, " Touch me not [He was not now coming to be corporally present in the kingdom], for I am not yet ascended to my Father; but go to my brethren and say unto them, I go to my Father and your Father, my God and your God." The testimony was now grace, and Jesus leads the praises of His redeemed. Next, all Israel, the great congregation, is found in the praise also; then all the ends of the world. The fat eat and worship; all that go down into the dust; and the generation that shall be born, when that time of peace is come, shall also hear the wondrous story of that which the angels now desire to look into-that He hath done this. It is an unmingled stream of grace and blessing, widening to the ends of the earth, and flowing down the course of time to the generation which shall be born. Such is the effect of the cross. No word of judgment follows the tale it has to tell. The suffering there was the judgment on sin, but was the work done to put it away. The judgment was borne but passed away with its execution on the victim who had in grace substituted Himself; and if, indeed, we shall be manifested before the judgment-seat of Christ, He before whom we shall appear has Himself borne our sins; yea, we arrive there because He has Himself come to fetch us, that where He is, there we may be also. In a word, it was suffering from God; and suffering from God is suffering for sin,* not for righteousness, and the effect, unmingled grace, now freely flowing forth. (*Positive direct suffering from God is for sin, from man for righteousness. But that does not set aside the sorrows of Christ’s heart in respect of Israel’s rejection, and His own cutting off as Messiah. It does not set aside that He felt what death was, that it became God to make the Captain of our salvation perfect through sufferings. This is not in the true sense of the word suffering from God in that sense of the forsaking of God of which Psalms 22:1-31 speaks.) Christ had been baptized with the baptism He had to be baptized with. He was no longer straitened in the exercise and proclamation of love. When he suffered from man through the whole of His witness among them up to death itself, He was suffering for righteousness. Sin He had not, in His person, to suffer for. He was no substituted victim in the eyes of men. The result of these sufferings from the power of men is judgment, accomplished on His return-in a providential way already in the destruction of Jerusalem, but fully when He shall return. But there is another point of contrast, consequently, very important for us. Christ suffered for sins that we never might. We are healed by, not partakers of, His stripes. What Christ has suffered from the forsaking of God as the consequence of sin, He has suffered alone and exactly, as to us, with the object that we never should taste one drop of that dreadful, bitter, to us insupportable, cup. Did we drink it, it were as condemned sinners. But in the sufferings of Christ for righteousness, and in those which were caused to Him through His work of love, we are, poor and feeble as our faith is, to have a part. To us it is given not only to believe on, but also to suffer for, His name.* (*"If we suffer with Him we shall reign with Him.") If we suffer for righteousness’ sake, happy are we, and yet more blessed if we suffer for His name. The Spirit of glory and of God rests upon us. We can rejoice that we are partakers of His sufferings, that when His glory shall be revealed, we may be glad with exceeding joy. The suffering for righteousness and for Christ, I may remark in passing, are distinguished by the Lord Himself (Matthew 5:10-11); and by Peter (1 Peter 2:20; 1 Peter 3:17; 1 Peter 4:14). The principle of these two kinds of suffering, however, as contrasted with suffering for sins, is the same. The difference of suffering for good and for evil is touchingly contrasted in Peter’s Epistle, while both are attributed to Christ; and we warned against the latter. Christ is presented as suffering as an example, chapter 2: 19-23, where we see in verse 23 he refers to the revilings and violence of men; in verse 24 he adds His bearing our sins, showing that it is in order that we may be dead to sin, not suffer for that. But this is brought out, as I said, touchingly, chapter 3: 17, 18, the force of which I take to be this: The apostle had been speaking of suffering for righteousness, and adds, It is better, if it be God’s will, that you suffer for well-doing than for evil-doing; for, he adds, Christ has suffered once for sins. That is, this is not your part in suffering; He has done this once for all. Suffering for righteousness may be your happy portion; suffering for sin is, as regards the Christian, Christ’s part alone. I would notice two other characters of suffering in our blessed Lord. In the first place, His heart of love must have suffered greatly from the unbelief of unhappy man, and from His rejection by the people. We read of His sighing in opening the deaf ears and loosing the tied tongue (Mark 7:34); and on the Pharisees asking a sign (chap. 8: 12),.of His sighing deeply in spirit. So, indeed, in John 11:1-57 at the tomb of Lazarus, He wept and groaned within Himself at seeing the power of death over the spirits of mess, and their incapacity to deliver themselves; and as He wept also over Jerusalem, when He saw the beloved city just going to reject Him in the day of its visitation. All this was the suffering of perfect love, moving through a scene. of ruin, in which selfwill and heartlessness shut every avenue against this love which was so earnestly working in its midst. It must have been-with bright and blessed moments where its exercise proved sweetness to itself, and led His heart out by times to fields white for harvest-a constant source of sorrow. This sorrow, blessed be God, and the joy that brightens it, we are allowed, in our little measure, to partake of. It is the sorrow of love itself. A weight of another character pressed upon the Lord, I doubt not, often through His life; and must and ought to have done so, though only showing perfectness, that is, in blessed submission to the divine will. I mean the anticipation, when the time was there for Him to look at it (how often are we distracted by our little anticipated sorrows!), of His sufferings on the cross and their true and pressing character. On His path of life death lay. He could not, as we see, take His part with the excellent of the earth, and bring them into the purposed, or need any real and permanent blessing, without going through death, and death is the wages of sin, for they were sinners. If the corn of wheat did not fall into the ground and die, it abode alone. There none could follow-not indeed the disciples, as He tells them, more than the Jews. And for Him death was death. Man’s utter weakness, Satan’s extreme power, and God’s just vengeance, and alone, without one sympathy, forsaken of those whom He had cherished, the rest His enemies, Messiah delivered to Gentiles and cast down, the judge washing his hands of condemning innocence, the priests interceding against the guiltless instead of for the guilty-all dark, without one ray of light even from God. Here perfect obedience was needed, and, blessed be God, was found. But we can understand, and just in the measure of Christ’s divine, while human, sensibilities, what such sorrow must have been in prospect for a soul who looked at it with the feelings of a man made perfect in thought and apprehension by the divine light which was in Him. We have examples of these sorrows of the Lord’s heart in two remarkable cases, which, of course, though none were like the last, do, not at all exclude the thought that others may have been, nor give full light on what He may have felt when in perfect calmness He spoke of His future sufferings to His disciples. The cases I refer to are those of John 12:1-50 and Gethsemane. In the former we read, " Now is my soul troubled, and what shall I say? Father, save me from this hour." The coming up of the Gentiles had opened out before Him the scene of the rejected Christ passing into the wider glory of the Son of man; but then the corn of wheat must fall into the ground and die. This brings before His soul the true and necessary path of His glory-death, and all it meant, to His soul, and He looks for deliverance. He could not wish for, nor fail to fear, the forsaking of God and the cup of death He had to drink. He was heard in that He feared. That was truth, and true piety, in presence of such a passage for His soul. So in Gethsemane, when it was yet nearer, and the prince of this world came, and His soul was exceeding sorrowful unto death; when the cup was just, as it were, being brought to Him, though He had not yet taken it (for He would take it from none but from His Father’s hand, when His will was that He should drink it, because it was not possible it could be otherwise, if the purpose and word of God was to be accomplished), there this character of sorrow and trial, or temptation, reached its fullness. The tempter (who on His entrance on His public service, and to hinder His doing so, had tempted Him with what was agreeable to the flesh in the wilderness and on the pinnacle of the temple, and had been baffled and bound, and during the Lord’s life had his goods spoiled) now returns to try Him with all that was dreadful for the soul of man, and above all for the Lord, if He persevered in His obedience and work unto the end. Power had been displayed capable of delivering living man from all the dominion of the enemy. Another awful, dreadful truth had now come out: man would not have the Deliverer. If the Lord was to persevere in interesting Himself in the wretched race, He must be, not a mighty living Deliverer by power, but a dying Redeemer. It was the path of obedience and the path of lOve. " The prince of this world cometh and bath nothing in me; but that the world may know that I love the Father, and as the Father has given me commandment, so I do." But in both the cases we are now considering we find Him still with His Father, though occupied with Him about the cup He had to drink, and His obedience only shining out in its perfection. There was no forsaking of God yet, though there was dealing with His Father about that cup which was characterized by His being forsaken of God. " Father, save me from this hour. But for this cause came I unto this hour. Father, glorify thy name." Here He gets the answer to obedience to death in judgment, of real and complete victory, and the widespread opening out of the revelation of love, though the world was judged therein. But in Gethsemane all was closing in. It was the power of darkness, and, the deeper agony of the Lord told itself out in few (yet how mighty) words, and sweat as it were drops of blood. But the obedience was perfect. The tempter utterly foiled, the name of Jesus suffices to make all his agents go backward and fall to the ground. He, as far as they were concerned and Satan’s power went, was free. But the Father had given Him the cup to drink. He freely offers Himself to drink it, showing the same unweakened power as ever, that of those given to Him He might lose none. Wondrous scene of obedience and love! But whatever the suffering may be (and who can tell it?) it was the free moving of a man in grace, but of a man perfect in obedience to God. The cup His Father has given Him to drink, shall He not drink it? How utterly, though indeed there, do the unhappy instruments of this power of evil disappear before the offering up of Christ by Himself in obedience and love! The power of death, as that of the enemy, gone through with His Father, and gone, and He in blessed, willing obedience now taking the awful cup itself from His Father’s hand! Never can we meditate too much upon the path of Christ here. We may linger around the spot and learn what no other place nor scene can tell-a perfectness which is learned from Him and from Him alone. But I must turn now to. other parts of Christ’s sorrow, for I can only touch on its causes and character. Sin itself must have been a continual source of sorrow to the Lord’s mind. If Lot vexed his righteous soul with seeing and hearing when so practically far from God, what must the Lord have suffered in passing through the world! I doubt not that, being perfectly in the place God would have Him, He was, not only in degree, but in the very nature of His feelings, calmer than the righteous man in Sodom. Still He was distressed by sin. He looked about upon them with anger, being grieved at the hardness of their hearts. His perfect love was relief here, but did not hinder the sorrow it relieved. " 0 faithless and perverse generation, how long shall I be with you? how long shall I suffer you?" was met by " Bring thy son hither." But the unbelief was not the less felt. This was at the close, doubtless, and had special respect to their unbelief; which His own love instantly. rises over. Still He was in a dry and thirsty land, where no water was, and felt it, even if His soul was also filled as with marrow and fatness. The holier and more loving He was, the more dreadful was the sin to Him; where His people wandered, too, as sheep without a shepherd. The sorrows, too, of men were His in heart. He bore their sicknesses, and carried their infirmities. Not a sorrow nor an affliction He met that He did not bear on His heart as His own. " In all their afflictions He was afflicted." It was no light-hearted remedy that, even as a living man, the Lord applied. He bore in His spirit what He took away in His power, for all was the fruit of sin in man: only it was in gracious love. Our sins He bore too, and was made sin for us, but that, as we have seen, was on the cross-obedience, not sympathy. God " made Him to be sin for us who knew no sin." All the rest was the sympathy of love; though it was sorrow. This is a blessed character of the Lord’s sorrow. Love brought Him to the cross we well know; but His sorrow there had not the present joy of a ministration of love. He was not dealing with man, but suffering in his place, in obedience, from God, and for man. Hence it was unmingled, unmitigated suffering-the scene, not of active goodness, but of God forsaking: but all His sorrow in His ways with men was the direct fruit of love, sensibly acting on Him-He. felt for others, about others. That feeling was (oh! how constantly) sorrow in a world 9f sin; but that feeling was. love. This is sweet to our thought. For His love He might have hatred, but the present exercise of love has a sweetness and character of its own which no form of sorrow it may impart ever takes away; and in Him it was perfect. I do not indeed deny that righteous anger filled His soul when occasion called it forth-we know it did-yea, brought out such denouncement of woes as I believe nothing but perfect love could produce; for what must He have felt of those who took away the key of knowledge, and entered not in themselves, and hindered those that were entering! Righteous indignation is not sorrow, but the love that gives birth to it, where it is righteous, stamps its own peculiar character upon it. Another source of sorrow (for what has Christ not drunk at?) was, perhaps, more human, but not less true-I mean the violation of every delicacy which a perfectly attuned mind could feel. " They stand staring and looking upon me." Insult, scorn, deceit, efforts to catch Him in His words, brutality and cruel mocking, fell upon no insensible, though a divinely patient spirit: I say nothing of desertion, betrayal, and denial-He looked for some to have pity on Him, and there was no one, and for comforters, but found none-but of what broke in upon every delicate feeling of His nature as a man. Reproach broke His heart. He was the song of the drunkards. Doubtless Jehovah knew His shame, His reproach, and His dishonor; all His adversaries were before Him, but He passed through it all. No divine perfection saved Him from sorrow. He passed through it with divine perfection, and by it. But I do not believe there was a single human feeling (and every most delicate feeling of a perfect soul was there) that was not violated and trodden on in Christ. Doubtless it was nothing to the cup He had to drink. Men and their ways were forgotten there.; but the suffering was not the less real when it was there, and even when, at least, anticipating that cup of wrath, He would have His too confident disciples watch by Him, He only found them asleep at His return. All was sorrow but the exercise of love, and that must, at last, make its way to obedience in death, where the judgment of God against sin closed over and obliterated the hatred and wickedness of man. Such was Christ. All sorrow concentrated in His death, where the coriafort of active love and the communion with His Father, could put no alleviating sweetness, or be for a moment mingled with that dreadful cup and the curse He had to endure. There, promises, royal glory in title, all was given up, to have them infallibly anew, received in glory, from the Father’s hand, with a better and higher glory, which He had ever had indeed, but now would enter into as man. * * * ======================================================================== CHAPTER 161: VOL 02 - THE SUFFERINGS OF CHRIST IN ATONEMENT ======================================================================== The Sufferings of Christ in Atonement We cannot have too deep a sense of the depth of the Lord’s suffering in His atoning work, of that which no human word is competent to express (for in human language we express but our own feelings)-what the Lord’s drinking the cup sin had filled under the judgment of God was to Him. With this nothing can be mingled and mixed up. Divine judgment against sin, and the being made a curse, really felt and truly felt in the soul of One who, by His perfect holiness and love to God, and sense of God’s love in its infinite value, could know what the forsaking of God was, and what it was to be made sin before God; of One, too, who was, by virtue of His person, able to ’sustain it stands wholly apart and alone. Dreadful as the anticipation of it must have been, as it surely was, it was not that which was anticipated. No simple fact of death, dreadful as it was to the Prince of life, still less any human suffering, real and absolute as His were (and without one eye to pity, one heart to feel with the Sufferer), could be put on a level with being made a curse before God. Hence, in Psalms 22:1-31, the Lord expresses it Himself alone; He refers to the violence and wickedness of man in that Psalm; He refers to His own sense of weakness; and, in the midst of all that, contrasts with it God’s being far from Him, as the distinct point of conflict in it, but openly declares that in all sorrow where others had help, God had forsaken Him. Hence, as has been said elsewhere, the fruit of this is unmingled grace, and grace and blessing alone, because it was executed judgment against sin and suffering from God for it. Sorrows from man’s hand might, and will, bring judgment, if viewed as the fruit of enmity of will; the forsaking of God when Christ was made sin-who is to be judged for that? No, this stands absolutely and wholly alone, and Christ wholly alone in it, It works atonement, expiation. Can anyone else suffer what works this? Hence Christ puts Himself wholly alone in this Psalms 22:1-31; Psalms 23:1-6; Psalms 24:1-10; Psalms 25:1-22; Psalms 26:1-12; Psalms 27:1-14; Psalms 28:1-9; Psalms 29:1-11; Psalms 30:1-12; Psalms 31:1-24; Psalms 32:1-11; Psalms 33:1-22; Psalms 34:1-22; Psalms 35:1-28; Psalms 36:1-12; Psalms 37:1-40; Psalms 38:1-22; Psalms 39:1-13; Psalms 40:1-17; Psalms 41:1-13; Psalms 42:1-11; Psalms 43:1-5; Psalms 44:1-26; Psalms 45:1-17; Psalms 46:1-11; Psalms 47:1-9; Psalms 48:1-14; Psalms 49:1-20; Psalms 50:1-23; Psalms 51:1-19; Psalms 52:1-9; Psalms 53:1-6; Psalms 54:1-7; Psalms 55:1-23; Psalms 56:1-13; Psalms 57:1-11; Psalms 58:1-11; Psalms 59:1-17; Psalms 60:1-12; Psalms 61:1-8; Psalms 62:1-12; Psalms 63:1-11; Psalms 64:1-10; Psalms 65:1-13; Psalms 66:1-20; Psalms 67:1-7; Psalms 68:1-35; Psalms 69:1-36; Psalms 70:1-5; Psalms 71:1-24; Psalms 72:1-20; Psalms 73:1-28; Psalms 74:1-23; Psalms 75:1-10; Psalms 76:1-12; Psalms 77:1-20; Psalms 78:1-72; Psalms 79:1-13; Psalms 80:1-19; Psalms 81:1-16; Psalms 82:1-8; Psalms 83:1-18; Psalms 84:1-12; Psalms 85:1-13; Psalms 86:1-17; Psalms 87:1-7; Psalms 88:1-18; Psalms 89:1-52; Psalms 90:1-17; Psalms 91:1-16; Psalms 92:1-15; Psalms 93:1-5; Psalms 94:1-23; Psalms 95:1-11; Psalms 96:1-13; Psalms 97:1-12; Psalms 98:1-9; Psalms 99:1-9; Psalms 100:1-5 ontrasts Himself with others who are believers. They trusted God and were delivered: He was forsaken. Suffering can go on of the deepest and most poignant kind, distress and anxiety even in respect of sin: suffering can go on even to death with its terrible power as such over the heart of man-can culminate to the very point where wrath is also found; but all close and reach their limit here; all stop totally and wholly in their nature short of the wrath of God. They have their place and character as elements of human sorrow, however extreme; but all give way when this is there. Who could feel sorrow though sorrow was there, when wrath, God’s wrath against sin, is there? Not merely bitter consequence on the sinners, even to death, for all that is true-and Christ has trodden that path-but to stand as sin before God, in Christ’s case, surely as made it, and God deal with it as such, in His holy majesty and divine righteousness against sin-this stands alone: woe be to him who does not know it. Hence, even in Psalms 69:1-36, far, very far as it goes in the sorrows. and sufferings of Christ, and that in connection even with sins known to God, long as may be His cry, and to sense and feeling long unheard; yet the Spirit can introduce others into the same place. I do not say they suffer as much or as deeply-surely not; but they could suffer in the same way, because of the position their own sins have brought them into. For they persecute Him whom Thou hast smitten; and they talk to the grief of those whom Thou hast wounded " (ver. 26). Hence judgment is looked for on them. It is not atonement. These sufferings from man bring judicial visitation on man. In Psalms 22:1-31 all suffering saints are, as we have seen, contrasted with Him. When the redemption is accomplished by it, when He has been heard from the horns of the unicorn, then indeed He associates His brethren with Him; but it is in deliverance, joy, and peace. Who could make atonement; or be made a curse for its accomplishment, but One? In every other sorrow we can bear a part. And this difference between Psalms 22:1-31 and Psalms 69:1-36 is so marked that in Psalms 69:1-36, while dwelling on the sufferings. which came upon Christ on His drawing near to death, and giving the cry of deep distress as to state and circumstances as its thesis, instead of presenting to us His being forsaken of God while crying to Him, says, "But as for me, my prayer is unto Thee, 0 Jehovah, in an acceptable time: 0. God, in the multitude of Thy mercy hear me, and in the truth of Thy salvation " (ver. 13). Hence, even in the expression of His anguish and sorrow. deep as it was, we have, no word like Psalms 22:1-31; " but thou hearest not." Now, it is impossible that a spiritual mind, one who knows something of the value of divine favor and being able to look to Him, however deep and inward the distress, be it even through sins and failures, can fail to understand the manse and absolute difference of these two states: equally impossible, it is true, yea, blessedly so, to fathom the depth of that which Psalms 22:1-31 expresses. Now, it is the sense of the true character of Christ’s sufferings as made sin, alone before God, and God’s dealing with Him as so made sin before Him, the being, as to the state of His soul, really forsaken of God, and because of sin, so that it was necessary and deserved, though through others, but really undergone-that it is of the very last importance, fundamentally important, to keep quite clear and fast hold of and maintain, and to hold as a clear foundation of everlasting truth. As regards the truth itself, I repeat, no divinely-taught mind, however obscure it may be as to the doctrine of the proper nature and character of Christ’s living sufferings - however it may (through feelings) run up the depths of Christ’s sorrow into mixing with those sorrows His atoning work-no divinely-taught mind will, as to the positive truth, fail to distinguish from all else the reality of Christ’s own soul as made sin for us, exposed to and enduring God’s righteous dealing with sin, and being forsaken of Him, which in grace He underwent-will fail to distinguish this from all other sorrow and suffering, however deep, in which He could say, for example, "But as for me, my prayer is unto thee in an acceptable time," in which He did not say, "But thou hearest not." He may find many passages difficult to explain-may be confused by the reasonings of others. He may, as to his feelings, confuse anticipating the cup and drinking it. We have all, more or less, done this; but when the real bearing of our sins, being made sin before God-His being forsaken by reason of sin, is before our soul and conscience, we shall bow our souls before that solemn work-we shall know that Christ stood alone in it: nor shall we ever mix it up, for one instant, with sorrow, however deep, in which others could bear a part. In all sorrows of active love, in all brought upon us by the government of God for sin, we-at any rate man-(as, for example, the Jewish remnant, and, in principle, sinners under the law, or at any time in chastisement when needed) can bear a thankful part, or have to bow under it. Reproach may break man’s heart; he may stand alone and be forsaken of men; he may cry out of the depths because of sin; but bear the weight of divine wrath he knows he could not. He adores when he finds another has. taken his place, and that the chastisement of his peace was upon Him. But this demands a more orderly exposition. There is a double character of suffering besides atoning work, which Christ has entered into and which others can feel: the sufferings arising from active love in the world; and the sorrow arising from the sense of chastenings in respect of sin, and these mixed with the pressure of Satan’s power on the soul, and the terror of foreseen wrath against sin. In the former we suffer with Christ as privilege; in the latter we suffer for our folly and under God’s hand, but Christ has entered into it. He sympathizes with us, and especially with Israel. But all this is distinct from suffering instead of us, so as to save us from the suffering, undergoing the chastisement of our peace, that we might not remain under God’s wrath. In atonement He suffers for us, in service we suffer with Him: in our distress about sin and agony of mind He felt with us. We shall see that the Lord Himself and the teachings of the Gospels clearly distinguish the sufferings of Christ during His ministry here, and His closing sufferings, and these last (even though taking place at the same time) from His atoning work. As soon as the Lord was baptized of John, the Holy Ghost came upon Him, and He entered on His public ministry; but as a first and introductory step to it, "He was led of the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted of the devil." He overcame- the strong man was bound, and He proceeded to spoil His goods; He "went about doing good and healing all that were oppressed of the devil, for God was with Him." Let it be demoniacal possession, sickness, death: all and every fruit of the power of the enemy disappeared before His word. He went through sorrow -reproach from man, He took their burdens upon Himself. I have no doubt that Christ never healed a sick man without bearing in His spirit and heart the burden of it, as the fruit and power of evil: but all this was the activity of His love. "Himself bare our infirmities and carried our sicknesses." This is said, remark, when He healed them. Bearing our griefs and sorrows, and delivering us from them by power, is not bearing our sins, and being made sin before God in judgment. But further, Satan was not with Him in the way of direct temptation during the course of His ministry.. We read in Luke, " And when the devil had ended all the temptation, he departed from Him for a season." But at the close of His life He could say, " Henceforth I will not talk much with you, for the prince of this world cometh and bath nothing in me," etc. Here a distinct change takes place again, as to the position of the Lord in respect of the presence of Satan. Hence He could say to those who came from the chief priests afterward, "But this is your hour and the power of darkness." Previously He had sat daily with them in the temple, and they had laid no hands on Him; but this (terrible word for these unhappy men!) was their hour and the power of darkness. He that had the power of death was busy there with the Lord, nor did He withdraw Himself from the trial. His soul was exceedingly sorrowful, even unto death, and He who had the power of darkness brought it all to bear upon His soul; but even here He could look for His disciples to watch with Him. They could be sifted as wheat, though their only resource (as that hour came on with real power) was to flee, or they entered into the temptation; at least when they knew not the power of the Holy Ghost working in them, for they should follow Christ afterward, as He told Peter at least. This difference of His own position the Lord marks to them very dearly: "When I sent you without purse, and scrip, and shoes, lacked ye anything? And they said, Nothing. Then said He unto them, But now he that hath a purse let him take it, and likewise his scrip, and he that hath no sword let him sell his garment and buy one; for I say unto you that this that is written must yet be accomplished in me. And He was reckoned among the transgressors, for the things concerning me have an end." Now all was changed. Before, He had protected them by His divine power, by which He wrought in the world. Now, while His divine person was ever the same, and His power in itself unchangeable, He was to be rejected and suffer. The glory would come, but first He must suffer many things, and be rejected of that generation. This He taught specially to His disciples from the time of Peter’s confession of Him as Son of the living God, from the transfiguration onward, and in His last journey from Galilee to Jerusalem. Not that He was suffering these things then-His hour, we read in John, was not yet come -but He taught them that He must. (See Matthew 16:21; Matthew 17:12; "shall suffer"-μέλλει πάσχειν-and chap. 17: 22. Mark 8:13; Luke 9:22).. And it is the more remarkable because it is then He charges His disciples to tell no man He was the Christ, saying, "the Son of man must suffer." He was giving up, practically, His ministry of the circumcision for the truth of God, the witness of Jehovah Messiah,* and about to enter on another, the sufferings of the Son of man. (*This, however, was continued in patience up to His entry into Jerusalem on the ass, when He announces the vineyard was to be taken away from them.) It will be remarked that it is on the suggestion of this title also to His spirit by the coming up of the Greeks, in John 12:1-50, that His cross and death rise up at once before His soul. (Compare Psalms 2:1-12 and the use made of Psalms 8:1-9 by the apostle in Hebrews 2:1-18) But to return to our immediate point. He tells them that He was about to suffer. We have seen that the prince of this world was to come. Satan entered into Judas, and it was the hour of His enemies and the power of darkness. This He spoke at the time He met the band from the chief-priests, at the close of Gethsemane. Here there was a distinctly announced and openly declared change that took place in the character of the Lord’s service and suffering-His position. It is not His service as Prince of life, though He ever was this and proved it, spoiling the goods of His vanquished enemy; " the prince of this world cometh." It is the power of darkness, and His undergoing it in agony for our sakes-His soul sorrowful, even unto death-the whole power on His own soul of the enemy, as having the power of death; still this was as yet in communion and supplication with His Father about it, and heard of Him. And here we have the most distinct and definite revelation from His own lips, that He was not yet drinking the cup which His Father gave Him to drink. He prays that He might not drink it, that if it were possible the cup might pass from Him, but that, if not unless He drank it, His submission to His Father’s will was perfect. Here, doubtless, His soul enters in the deepest way into what it was that He had to drink-it was sorrowful even unto death; but being in an agony He prayed more earnestly. He was heard. He did not take the cup from man’s hand, nor from Satan’s hand, though both were there to press Him down, and all His weakness felt as man; but He goes through the thought of that, and death itself, in heard supplication with Him who was able to save Him from it, and takes the cup in perfect peace as to man and Satan’s power of darkness, from His Father’s hand, and offers Himself freely, that none that the Father had given Him might be lost. (See. John 18:4-11.) The Father had given Him the cup to drink. He does not draw back from it, but freely offers Himself for us. Had He not done so in blessed obedience, He had only to walk away before His prostrate pursuers, or have demanded legions of angels to free Him from their power. But how should the Scriptures have been fulfilled? But on the cross all is finished. God forsakes Him, and He, who knew no sin, is dealt with as made sin before God, alone with God, dealt with as became His holy majesty, as sin uncovered, and wholly such. If any there had been, any sin, or any had been possible, the time for consciousness of it had been then. Every trial which could have drawn it out, if it had been there to be conscious of, had reached its full height; but the spotless offering on which no yoke had been, He who offered Himself without spot to God, was made sin for us, that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him He made His soul an offering for sin, as it is said too in the passage of Isaiah (referred to by the Lord Himself (Luke 22:37) as that which was yet to come), "and He poured out His soul unto death, and was numbered with the transgressors, and bare the sins of many." And now, before I go farther, I ask, Is not His death presented in Scripture as that by which redemption was wrought -His precious blood as its efficacious means? Have we not " redemption through His blood, even the forgiveness of sins? " Is it not " by the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot?" Is it not declared " that without shedding of blood there is no remission?" Let the reader take Hebrews 9:1-28, which I shall allow myself to quote here in full. It is well worth all human authority, be they of what age they may. " But Christ being come an High Priest of good things to come, by a greater and more perfect tabernacle, not made with hands, that is to say, not of this building; neither by the blood of goats and calves, but by His own blood, He entered in once into the holy place, having obtained eternal redemption [for us]. For if the blood of bulls and of goats, and the ashes of an heifer sprinkling the unclean, sanctifieth to the purifying of the flesh; how much more shall the blood of Christ, who, through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without spot to God purge your conscience from dead works to serve the living God? And for this cause He is the Mediator of the new testament, that by means of death, for the redemption of the transgressions that were under the first testament, they which are called might receive the promise of eternal inheritance. For where a testament is, there must also of necessity be the death of the testator; for a testament is of force after men are dead: otherwise it is of no strength at all while the testator liveth. Whereupon neither the first [testament] was dedicated without blood. For when Moses had spoken every precept to all the people according to the law, he took the blood of calves and of goats, with water and scarlet wool and hyssop, and sprinkled both the book and all the people, saying, This is the blood of the testament which God hath enjoined unto you. Moreover, he sprinkled likewise with blood both the tabernacle and all the vessels of the ministry. And almost all things are by the law purged with blood; and without shedding of blood is no remission. It was, therefore, necessary that the patterns of things in the heavens should be purified with these; but the heavenly things themselves with better sacrifices than these. For Christ is not entered into the holy places made with hands, which are the figures of the true, but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God for us: nor yet that He should offer Himself often, as the high priest entereth into the holy place every year with blood of others; for then must He often have suffered since the foundation of the world: but now once in the end of the world hath He appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself. And as it is appointed unto men once to die, but after this the judgment; so Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many, and unto them that look for Him shall He appear the second time, without sin, unto salvation" (ver. 11-28), Let the reader remark that " without shedding of blood is no remission,"-and the declaration that He must often have suffered if He was to offer Himself often, as the high priest entered with the blood of others, but that it was once, in the end of the world, He appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself. " So Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many!’ Let. H., turn to chapter 10:, where, in contrast with standing for daily ministrations, " this man, after he had offered one sacrifice for sins forever, sat down." Was the way into the holiest to be opened? It was through the veil, that is to say, His flesh. Indeed, if we examine the value of the death of Christ, what do we find attached to it in Scripture? Do I need redemption? We have redemption through His blood, an eternal redemption, for " neither by the blood of goats nor of calves, but by His own blood, He is entered in once into the holy place, having obtained eternal redemption." Do I need forgiveness? That redemption which I have through His blood is the forgiveness of sins-yea, without shedding of blood is no remission. Do I need peace? He has made peace through the blood of His cross, Do I need reconciliation with God? Though we were sinners, yet now bath He reconciled us by the body of His flesh through death, to present us holy and unblamable, and unreprovable in God’s sight. When we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of His Son. Do I desire to be dead to sin and have the flesh crucified with its affections and lusts? I am crucified with Christ. " Knowing this that our old man is crucified with him, that the body of sin might be destroyed; for in that He died, He died unto sin once, and in that He liveth, He liveth unto God." This is my deliverance also from the charge and burden of the law, which has dominion over a man as long as he lives. Do I feel the need of propitiation? Christ-is set forth as a propitiation through faith in His blood. The need of justification? I am justified by His blood. Would I have a part with Christ? He must die; for except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abides alone; if it die, it brings forth much fruit. Hence, unto what am I baptized as the public expression of my faith? Ac many of us as have been baptized unto Christ have been baptized unto His death; for what indeed has broken down the middle wall of partition and let in the Gentiles, slaying the enmity and reconciling Jew and Gentile in one body to God? The cross. How have we boldness to enter into the holiest? By the blood of Jesus, by that new and living way which He has consecrated for us through the veil, that is, His flesh; for till that was rent the Holy Ghost signified by it that the way into the holiest was not yet made manifest. Hence it was a lifted-up Christ that was the attractive point for all. "If I be lifted up from the earth, I will draw all men unto me." In the power of what was the great Shepherd of the sheep brought again from the dead? Through the blood of the everlasting covenant. How was the curse of the law taken away from those who were under it? By. Christ’s being made a curse for them; as it is written, " Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree." How are we washed from our sins? He has loved us and washed us from our sins in His own blood, for His blood ’cleanseth from all sin. If I would be delivered from the world, it is by the cross, by which the world is crucified to me, and I unto the world. If the love of Christ constrains me towards men in the thought of the terror of the Lord,. how is it so? Because I thus judge, " if One died for all, then were all dead; and they that live should live not to themselves, but to Him who died for them and rose again.". Hence the apostle knew no man after the flesh -no, not even Christ. All was a new creation. If I would live in divine power, it is always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life of Jesus may be manifested in my mortal. body. If He would institute a special remembrance to call Him to mind, it was His body and shed blood. It is not less a lamb as it were slain that. is found in the throne. All was love, no doubt; but do I want to learn it? Hereby we know it that He laid down His life for us, and even that of God in that He loved us and gave His Son as a propitiation for our sins. It is to the sprinkling of that precious blood of Christ that we are sanctified, and to obedience; and through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once (contrasted with the many Jewish sacrifices) sanctified and perfected forever, so that there is no more offering for sin; for, having offered one sacrifice for sins, He is set down forever at the right hand of God.* (*I reject entirely as utterly senseless, what is become somewhat the fashion- the reading it, " one sacrifice forever." It does not, however, touch our present subject.) “For He should not offer Himself often, as the high priest entered into the holy place once every year with the blood of others; for then must He often have suffered since the foundation of the world; but now once in the end of the world He hath appeared to put away sin by the sacrifice of Himself; for as it is appointed unto men once to die and after this the judgment, so Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many, and to them that look for Him shall He appear the second time without sin unto salvation." Do I desire, then, to have my conscience purged? It is through the blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered Himself without spot to God.* (*Note this, and indeed all those passages, for they show what is the meaning of Christ’s offering Himself to God.) For it is by means of death that there is the redemption of the transgressions which were under the first covenant, and in that view He became Mediator. Indeed, a testament could have no force while the testator lived. Do I seek the destruction of the power of Satan? It is through death that He destroyed (the power of) him that had the power of death. What do I find to be the central object of Christ’s coming- the groundwork of His glory as man? " We see Him made a little lower than the angels, for the suffering of death, crowned with glory and honor, that He by the grace of God might taste death for every man." And even the purifying and reconciling all things in heaven and earth depends on this. (Hebrews 9:23; Colossians 1:20.) Would He sanctify even the Jewish people to Himself? It must be by His blood, suffering, rejected, without the gate. No remission for us, no privileges of the new covenant for us, nor establishing of it with them, without this blood: redemption is not without it. The living sinner as such cannot be presented to God, nor a living Christ offer that by which the sinner must draw nigh. The veil remains unrent, the conscience unpurged, the propitiation unaccomplished. God forbore with the Old Testament saints, and has shown His righteousness in doing so now- a righteousness now declared in that propitiatory set forth through faith in Christ’s blood. It is alleged, indeed, that He came to do God’s will in taking the place of the sacrifices; and that His obedience during life is available in expiation; but we read, " By the which will we are sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all." It is alleged that His living obedience had the same legal character as His death. Is it the same thing, then, to obey the law with unfeigned heart, so as to be perfectly acceptable to God personally, and to bear its curse for others under the wrath and judgment of God? Is it possible that Christians, who know what the need of their own souls as sinners is, can use such reasoning. Having thus proposed the blessed value of Christ’s death from Scripture, and leaving it to its own force without comment, allow me to go yet a little farther into the elements and character of His sufferings as available for us, so that we may the more fully appreciate His grace. Man may be looked at morally in three conditions: first, as a sinner under condemnation; secondly; as a saint through grace, partaker of the divine nature, and of the Holy Ghost as his force; and, thirdly, as suffering, though awakened, quickened, and upright in desire, under the exercises of a soul learning, as still, as to his mind, in the flesh, the difference of good and evil under divine govern-, ment in the presence of God not fully known in grace and redemption, whose judgment of sin is before his eyes, exposed to all the advantage that Satan can take of him in such a state- such suffering, for example, as is seen in the case of Job. Christ has passed through all these kinds of sufferings-only the last, of course as Himself a perfect being, to learn it for others; I need not say that He was perfect in all. But what met the first condition, that of a sinner under condemnation, He went through as actually bearing sins, and so enduring the penalty of sin vicariously for others, that they never might have it to endure. The second He was truly in Himself, nay, our leader in that path. To the first of these conditions, our being under judgment and condemnation for sin, Christ’s death upon the cross is the divine answer in expiation. All that God was in His nature, He was necessarily against sin; for, though He was love, love has no place in wrath against sin, and the withdrawal of the sense of it, consciousness in the soul of the privation of God, is the most dreadful of all sufferings-the most terrible horror to him who knows it: but Christ knew it infinitely. But God’s divine majesty, His holiness, His righteousness, His truth, all in their very nature bore against Christ as made sin for us. All that God was, was against sin, and Christ was made sin. No comfort of love enfeebled the deep suffering of His soul, the forsaking of God there. Never was the obedient Christ so precious; but His soul was to be made an offering for sin, and to bear our sins judicially before God. At the end of the three hours of darkness, this is expressed by the Lord in the words of Psalms 22:1-31, "My God, my God, why hast Thou forsaken me?" The result, and that to the end of time, and indeed for an endless eternity of unmingled grace for us, has been already touched on, and I will advert to it again in connection with remarkable facts as to the expressions of the Lord Himself. Here the Lord suffered that not one drop of what He took might remain for us. If it had it would have been everlasting misery and ruin for us; His own divine perfection in love went through it without one ray of comfort from God or man. All other sorrows pressed Him onward with accumulating power to this, and merged in it, in that darkness which hid all but what He was enduring in the forsaking of God. Judges had been heartlessly unrighteous, and washed their hands of such a One and His matters; the chief priests, who should intercede for the infirm, cry for cruel death upon the guiltless; the friends on whom His heart ought to have been able to count (and He looked for comforters., and would have had the most favored of them watch with Him) actually forsake and deny Him: and the unfaithfulness of a friend is bitterer than the assault of an enemy. But all this was the proof of the power of one who exercised unlimited dominion (save so far as grace delivered) over, and had his rights through sin and the power of death over, him whom the Lord came to deliver; and it was his hour and the power of darkness. All he can do he does; but it only led the Lord through conflict, of which I will speak just now, in willing offering of Himself, letting His own go their way, to the last scene, when, deprived of all human comfort, He was to accomplish the work of propitiation, alone with God judging sin-that scene which stands alone, which no eye can fathom (though, blessed be God, we truly know its meaning) but His who knows God’s judicial hatred against sin as God alone knows it. Bulls of Bashan were there, dogs with no shame of heart, but only to drive the Sufferer to seek for succor where He was to learn in all its utter depth for us what it was to be forsaken of God-an hour passed forever with divine and eternal glory for fruit. He even could say, so great was the infinite and truly divine value of that hour and work, " Therefore doth my Father love me, because I lay down my life, that I might take it again." But, willingly as I expatiate on this blessed yet most solemn subject, I must leave it, and turn to another and brighter, yet to us humbling character of the Lord’s sufferings-those which He endured as the Holy One glorifying God, when the reproaches of those that reproached God fell upon Him. This went on up to His death. They flowed from His declaring righteousness in the great congregation; from His perfectly manifesting God- amongst men, who had no relish for the light, so that for His love He had hatred. I do not enlarge upon this simply because I apprehend it can offer no difficulty to my reader. In our little and imperfect measure we have our share in. this kind of suffering. It is our privilege as saints... " To you it is given... not only to believe on Him; but to suffer for His sake." " If we suffer with Him, we shall reign with Him." "To do well, suffer for it, and take it patiently, this is acceptable with God." Quotations could be multiplied to show how we are thus called to suffer as He suffered, as Paul speaks of his filling up that which is behind of the sufferings of Christ, for His body’s sake, the church. In the measure in which we manifest Christ as He manifested His Father, in our walk and testimony, we shall suffer for it as He suffered, and His consolations will abound- a meat to eat which the flesh knows not of. He could thank His Father when He had most sorrowfully and justly to ’reproach the world. But I now come to the third character of trial in which man may stand, which requires a little more attention-that which is not the fruit of holy witness in the world (though it may in a certain way-accompany it), nor the enduring the judgment of God in condemnation, which for us would be everlasting misery, but the fruit of sin under the government’ of God in this world, and connected with the power of Satan in it-that which as used of God, is the means of our learning the difference between good and evil, whether in terror before the knowledge of redemption, or even by various exercises, though in an altogether different state of soul after we know it (for God continues even then His instructive government, founded on His immutable judgment of good and evil); that which brings righteousness in the way of terror, though not without hope, before us, or when redemption is known and divine righteousness is our state, ministers to practical holiness of life and judgment, according to the divine nature of which we are made partakers. If we take the case of the remnant of the Jews in the latter day, we shall more readily understand this, though it is in principle the case of thousands of upright souls under the law, and a principle on which God has acted from the beginning of man’s failure. The sentence of. death, of sorrow on the woman, were judgments pronounced upon sin, as part of the display of God’s government in this world, not in themselves everlasting condemnation and separation from God because of the holiness of His nature. That power of death and its terrors over the mind Satan wields. (Hebrews 2:14.) Here it is that the thought of God’s righteous judgment against sin, and the pains of death, and the power of Satan, unite in their pressure upon the soul. So when a soul is convinced of sin, and practically under the law (that is, the requirements of God’s righteousness on living man), the judgment of God is feared, the terrors of the Almighty can drink up the spirit. God thus teaches a man what he is, what he is worth in this solemn question between Satan and God-the power of evil and of good. See the case of Job. God sustains man in grace and the sense of integrity, so that he clings to dependence on God, come what will; yet judgment is feared, God’s holiness and righteousness pressed on the spirit weighed down with the sense of sin, the power of death as ending nature’s hope, and leading to judgment is there, and Satan uses it to drive to despair, to destroy faith, and break the spirit of man away from depending on God and believing in His love. Without the atonement there could be no answer in grace to this state, because we have deserved condemnation; and if new life be there which clings to God, yet this very life gives the sense of God’s holiness,. which brings judgment on the soul conscious of sin. When the full work of grace in redemption is learned, the soul obtains a peace only the more solid, and indeed only thereby really solid, that it has passed through these exercises by which sin is known, by which God’s judgment of it is before the soul by His own convincing work, and Satan’s effort spent, and resulting only in bringing us to the answer which atonement gives, and thus his power over us destroyed and gone forever. But though the answer to, and deliverance from, this state is the full and perfect redemption wrought by Christ, by which we are wholly taken out of the state in which we stood accused and liable to judgment, and transferred into the position of the Last Adam before God, of Him who is now gone to His Father and our Father, His God and our God, there is positive and direct grace in the exercise itself. For, beside this deliverance and salvation by which our miserable state is met, there is the real learning of the difference of good and evil before God- learned, I admit, more blessedly when redemption is known, and we are in possession of perfect good in grace, so that evil is thus judged, and we are delivered from its deceits; but still, profitably learned in the knowledge of our wretchedness, guilt, sin, powerlessness against evil, even when we would what is good, and the solemnity of the question involved in the salvation of the soul, where the claims and power of Satan through sin in which we have listened to and subjected ourselves to him, and the righteous nature and title of God are brought to issue in a soul, subject to sin on one side, and quickened to own God’s title, and delight in His nature, and so to judge its own evil on the other, and that in the presence of the righteous judgment of God. Now, before obtaining the peace acquired by the knowledge of redemption, Christ sustains, encourages, relieves by times the soul in this state, but not so as to hinder its learning this deep and solemn lesson which has its fruit in eternity; nor so as to prevent its finding its only resource in the redemption He has accomplished. But in the case of the remnant of Israel in the latter days we find these exercises of heart and spirit gone through in circumstances where the government of God is historically developed as to a people sinful under law, yet renewed and quickened of God, so that the desires and consciousness of uprightness are there. The circumstances are, with more complete development, the continuation of those in which the Jews were in the time of our Lord: only that Antichrist is manifested, the body of the people are given up to unbelief and the unbridled influence of Satan-seven devils, worse than the old spirit of idolatry, but along with it, are entered into them. In a word, it is the time of Satan’s power, the power of darkness, of the oppression of. the Gentiles, of the same Roman beast. In the midst of this the remnant find themselves, on the one side conscious of the nation’s guilt under the law, and of their filling up of their sins, so that wrath was come upon them, the just vengeance of God; yet they feel this because they are renewed and quickened; and the Jehovah they have sinned against is their only hope. Yet how difficult to trust God for help in difficulties in which we find ourselves under. His hand by our sinning against Him! Without atonement, they could not be dealt with in grace. The goat of atonement had been offered so that God could deal with them about their sins for their good, sustain their faith, yet make them feel the weight of their sins, and the darkness they had brought themselves into; and, at the same time, say, " Who is among you that feareth the Lord, that obeyeth the voice of His servant, that walketh in darkness and seeth no light? let him trust in the name of Jehovah, and stay himself on his God." But the true Aaron will not yet have come forth, so that Israel’s sins should be, in administrative application, sent away on the scape-goat into the land not inhabited. Now here the judgment of God against them, the sense of guilt under a broken law and national unfaithfulness, the full power of Satan and the darkness it brings-all rest on the spirit of the people: yet, though smitten in the place of dragons, there is integrity of heart, earnest desires after the law, and after God Himself and His worship, and trust in Aim as their only resource. Thus the full judgment of evil is wrought in them, in hope of goodness and mercy prophetically revealed. Who is to furnish thoughts, feelings, faith, hope, which can be known to be acceptable and a sustaining ground of faith, till they look on Him whom they have pierced and find peace? The answer to this question, as well as the groundwork of atonement, is found in Christ. All this exercise Christ entered into so as to be able to help them: " This poor man cried "-" God bath not despised nor abhorred the affliction of the afflicted," and that, when* He had been really forsaken of God, the real ground of hope for the people. (*This is, perhaps, obscure through its brevity. The meaning is "the answer tame, the proof He was not abhorred nor despised; when," etc.) He had been really forsaken) When He was on this earth, the power of Gentile evil, with no fear of God before their eyes, was there; the apostate wickedness of the priestly rulers of Israel who would have no king but Caesar, and who called for the blood of their King to be on them and their children-the power of Satan and darkness was there; the judgment of God standing out in all its truthfulness and terror, not one godly man left; the guilt of Israel under a broken law and a rejected Jehovah and King-of the anointed as of the Lord-pressed upon the spirit of any intelligent saint, if such there were, as in the last days. It was not now, in these last scenes of Christ’s life, the manifestation of the Lord in grace to Israel, the revelation of the Father’s name to the few given to Jesus out of the world, but the endurance of Israel’s own case under the government of Jehovah when guilty and rejecting their own mercies, yet with the sense a holy soul, wrapped up in Israel’s blessings, would have of such a state before the judgment of God; not made a curse and drinking the cup, but the sense of it under God’s government and Satan’s power. Here good and evil were fully entered into and proved by the Lord. That is, He must undergo the whole power of evil, not as in judgment, but as trial. Was Satan using death and darkness, sorrow and terror, with God’s judgment sanctioning the pressure of it on the soul -men but His instruments to add to the grief, be they friends or foes? Was Israel’s sin and rejection of good come to its height? Was all this used by Satan against the soul of Christ to stay Him in the path? Was He to enter into the temptation which thus pressed on Him and give way; or, trusting God, was He to go on in the path of obedience, and drink the cup itself in obedience to God His Father? In the synoptical Gospels we have the trial; in John the full and blessed answer. He passes through the trial with God, does not take what death imports from Satan’s hand, so to speak, nor stop in His path; but, while going perfectly through it as the power of darkness, receives the cup itself (instead of drinking from it under Satan’s terror) from His Father’s hand, and gives Himself freely up in love and obedience to expiate the sin under God’s hand in the atonement, which Satan had in vain wielded to deter Him from it. The power of evil as trial was broken entirely, and Satan’s power of darkness annulled for us. Man might be made to pass through it under the government of God, to learn what he was, what sin is, what the power of evil, in which he had been lying, is; but the sympathy and sustaining grace of Christ can support him through it, suggest the right thoughts and feelings under it, and be found a resource in every pressure, so that faith should not fail, however sore that pressure may be. Atonement was needed for this, but the sympathy and consolations of Christ in the trial are what sustain and encourage the hearts of the remnant through their various trials down to the lowest depths of sorrow. If it be asked how they can profit by it, not having any direct knowledge of or faith in Christ, I reply, It is exactly what is furnished in the most admirable detail in the Psalms, where every part of their external sorrow and internal distress is expressed and entered into, the dreadful weight of a broken law, the power of adversaries without conscience, the temptation and pressure of the adversary, with the thoughts and feelings whether of distress or faith are given a voice to by divine grace, with the witness that He who in all their afflictions was afflicted, and the angel whose presence succored them, has not forgotten them in their deepest distress; but, as the poor man, has passed through it for them, and can comfort them under it, putting His seal upon the holy desires He has awakened in them, with the certainty of a divine answer, and that even by that Son of man, the branch which God made strong for Himself. Hence it is that these Psalms, besides the personal piety which is found in them, have been the comfort of distressed souls who were under the law, and not yet knowing the fullness of redemption, for such will be the state of the remnant. Hence, too, we find in them the desire of the judgment of enemies and the execution of vengeance, because it is by that judgment alone that the remnant of the people will be delivered. Hence, too, we find the assurance that the Lord will build up Zion, and the remnant of His people inhabit it, in Psalms where the sufferings of Christ are entered into in detail. Indeed, we have in the Psalms a complete and perfect history of the remnant in every circumstantial and moral phase of their path, both of Jews and Israel, and the result in blessing with Messiah, together with the way in which Christ has entered into it, these last Psalms being prophetic of Christ personally, though in many we have the remnant also, while all the Psalms are the expression of His spirit. The godly remnant is the first thought in them - their subject; Christ’s sympathy is with them. The first Psalm gives us the godly remnant, the subject of God’s government; and the second, Messiah, King in Zion, object of His counsel and decree; and after that, all the various experiences which flow from His rejection, up to the glory at the end. I have already shown that the time in which Christ went through the distress and sorrow, under which the remnant fall through their sin, was not that of those public services by which He was the Light of the world revealing to others His Father’s name, but when (going again up to Jerusalem for that purpose, and setting His face as a flint for it, and not hiding His face from shame and spitting, His rejection being the ground of Israel’s divorce, Isaiah 1:1-31.) He was subject to the fullest exercise of soul, under the power of darkness, in the hour of His rebellious rejecters, who could triumph in His apparent rejection; when all was changed from the time that He sat daily in the temple, and no man laid hands upon Him; when the Prince of this world came. Few, comparatively, of the Psalms apply wholly and exclusively to Christ. The great body of them express the working of His Spirit in the hearts of His tried ones. The difference (even where suffering is the subject) between those which are, and those which are not, exclusively applicable to Him is very evident, and particularly between His sufferings from the hand of. God and from the hand of man, even when this was under the visitations of God and the power of the enemy. It is worth while to note these points distinctly. Psalms 2:1-12 refers personally to Christ as Messiah, the Son of God, born in this world; Psalms 8:1-9, as Son of man. In Psalms 16:1-11 we find Him formally taking His place among the godly remnant, treading the path of life through death up to fullness of joy in resurrection. Psa. 20: 21. have, in a certain sense, also Christ alone for their subject-Psalms 22:1-31 clearly so. Sins are not confessed till Psalms 25:1-22. The integrity of heart of the remnant is presented, or Christ Himself. Besides these Psalms 11:1-7., though mainly of Him, is not absolutely so. (See ver. 5.) In Psalms 45:1-17 He is clearly celebrated: Psalms 69:1-36 speaks also chiefly but not exclusively of Him. (See ver. 26.) In Psalms 72:1-20 we find Him again as Solomon; Psa. 101. 102. treat also of Him as King in. Israel, and as, though cut off, Jehovah the Creator. In Psalms 110:1-7 He is exalted to Jehovah’s right hand to be priest after the order of Melchizedek. In other Psalms He is introduced, but He is not their personal subject. I do not call to mind others of which He is exclusively or pre-eminently the subject, though it is possible some one may have escaped me; my object is rather to give a certain number of distinct examples than a list of them. As regards the Psalms which speak of His suffering, the marks which distinguish those which speak of His sufferings from man and those which express His sufferings under the hand of God, are very clear and decisive. Thus Psa. 20: 21., He suffers from the hand of man. The consequence is, Psalms 21:1-13 announces judgment on man. So it is in Psalms 69:1-36; though other elements are found there. The Psalm treats of the number of those who hate Him without a cause, who gave Him gall for meat, and in His thirst gave Him vinegar to drink; and He desires that their table be a snare to them; that their eyes be darkened, and that God should pour out His indignation upon them. So even in Psalms 31:1-24., though it has less of this character, yet it still has this distinctive mark of the looking for judgment on the wicked. (vers. 17, 18.) I have already remarked that in sorrows from human persecution, on account of what is good, His saints can have a part. The pressure of it, in connection with sins, and the desire of vengeance or judgment, finds its accomplishment in the remnant of the Jews in the last day.* (*It is one of the things which characterize the Revelation also as distinct, in its prophetic part, from an address to the church on its own ground of blessing, and its taking a proper prophetic, and not evangelical, character, that we find joy over the judgment of Babylon, and in the souls under the altar the desire of vengeance.) In Psalms 102:1-28, where, though the enemies are seen, the sorrow of Messiah is traced to God’s indignation and wrath, who has lifted Him up as Messiah, and cast Him down, even to the dust of death, no desire for judgment is expressed, but blessing and grace are the result. This is most strikingly displayed in Psalms 22:1-31, where the atoning work of the cross is the distinct and definite subject. As soon as the Lord is heard from the horns of the unicorn, His first thought is (as indeed it historically was) to make known all the blessing of His God and Father’s name, where in unclouded blessing and righteousness He now stood, to His brethren. Then He praises in the midst of the church, then in the great congregation-all Israel in the latter day, then the blessing reaches all the ends of the earth in millennial mercies; then the seed afterward born. To all, the word is that He has done this. No trace of judgment from Him who has borne our sins and drunk the dreadful cup for us, nor from Him who made Him to be sin for us, in the counsels of unutterable grace. Now, in Psalms 69:1-36 we have the cross also, and not merely the wickedness of man, though that is fully entered into; but the trusting of God and distress under the sense of sins. How is this to be distinguished from the atoning work of Christ? Here the difficulty presents itself fully; but if we wait patiently on the Lord, all difficulties of Scripture are inlets to light and blessing. The marks I have noticed as indicating sufferings from man, and other distinguishing ones, are clearly found in this Psalm. Judgment is looked for on the enemies-an absolute and conclusive distinction in the very nature of the suffering; and there is another characteristic already noticed, but to our purpose here. We read, verse 26, " They persecute Him whom Thou hast smitten, and speak to the grief of those whom Thou hast wounded." Here we have evidently more than man’s persecutions. They take advantage of God’s hand upon the sorrowing One to add to His burden and grief. This is not atonement, but there is sorrow and smiting from God. Hence we find the sense of sins (ver. 5), though of course in the case of Christ they were not His own personally, but the nation’s (in a certain sense we may say ours, but specially the nation’s sins). But we have the clear proof that they are not viewed as atoning sufferings; because, instead of suffering in the place of others, so that they should not have one drop of that cup to drink, others are associated with the Lord here in them. " They persecute Him whom Thou hast smitten, and speak to the grief of those whom Thou hast wounded." When men are wounded, too, when Christ is the companion with them -not a substitute for them-then atonement is not wrought, nor the judgment of condemnation endured. Yet God has smitten and wounded. It is not merely man that has caused suffering. Man comes in in malice to add to the sorrow. Thus we have, along with the suffering from man at the epoch of the crucifixion (the special object of the Psalm) bringing judgment on man, the third character of Christ’s sufferings, His entering into the suffering of Israel under the government of God, at the epoch of His final sorrows, sufferings, and rejection, they were bringing on themselves in refuting Him, and through which the remnant will pass, and into which Christ is entered for them, afflicted in all their afflictions. Hence,-too, though in most deep waters, overflowed, weary of crying, Christ is not forsaken-His prayer is to God in an acceptable time. Deep as is the distress, it has a character Wholly and entirely contrasted with atonement, yet it is not the ministry of Jesus in blessing in the enjoyment of the light of His Father’s countenance, but the conflict and agony of His soul when the power of darkness is at work. Another very striking fact in the path of the blessed Lord which I alluded to, is this: during the whole of His life of service, all through, including Gethsemane, Christ never addresses God by the name of God. He always says "Father." On the cross we know his words were, " My God, my God." In His life this title would have been out of place-not, of course, because it did not belong to Him whom He addressed, but because it was not the expression of the unclouded relationship and conscious blessedness of Sonship in which the blessed Lord always stood: On the cross God was dealing with Him about sin, and therefore as God, in His nature, majesty, righteousness, and truth. Here sin was to be dealt with as such by God, and the blessed One expresses according to truth the position in which His holy soul stood. We are permitted in wondrous grace to see Him in such a one. Infinite and wondrous grace it is. But the terms the Lord makes use of mark very clearly and solemnly the difference of the two positions in which the blessed Lord relatively stood. Till the cross the Lord walked in the enjoyment of the relationship of a Son with the Father, yea, an only-begotten Son, knowing that the Father heard Him always. On the cross, as we have seen, all that God was against sin, He made sin, had to feel, and meet, and endure; but then, returned into the full joy of all that His Father and God was in righteousness, redemption being accomplished, He brings His disciples into the enjoyment and joy of both. " I ascend to My Father and your Father; and to My God and your God." When I speak of three characters of the sufferings of Christ, it is not that He did not in detail suffer in a thousand ways; yea, everything was a suffering, His perfectness and love being shown in enduring. I speak merely of three distinct positions in which, or principles on which, He suffered. Another question arises, connected with these points, as to the active and passive obedience of Christ, as it is called-whether the righteousness of Christ, as obedient under the law, is imputed to us; and then, also, as to His priesthood. But this I must reserve, if the Lord will, for another paper; it will be time enough then to consider the opinions of men. One thing is certain, that "without shedding of blood there is no remission; " and it is a singular atonement and vicarious work which had no such effect. There was, we are told, a " sin-bearing life "-that the sufferings of Christ during His life were satisfactory; yet they obtain no remission, for without shedding of blood is no remission. My earnest objection, however, is not against this, but against a doctrine which, on the contrary, declares that these sufferings were not vicarious, but the effect of Christ’s being born a man and a Jew, and which makes us, consequently, partakers of these sufferings under wrath as our privilege. Still, those who insist that Christ’s living sufferings were satisfactory, and that all His sufferings wrought the work of redemption, should explain how it is that remission is wholly by something else. Finally, I say that he who says that Christ-when He said, " I cry in the day-time, and Thou hearest not," and when He said, " I know that Thou hearest Me always," when he said, "My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken Me? " and when He said, " He that sent Me is with Me; the Father bath not left Me alone, for I do always those things that please Him "-was in the same position, and accomplishing the same work before God, knows neither the tenor of His life, nor the true power of His death rightly before God. Acceptable He always was; but bearing sins unheard, drinking the cup given Him in the forsaking of God, and enjoying divine favor, knowing He was always heard, is not the same thing; and he who holds that it is, does not yet know what his sins have cost the Lord. One great root, let me just add, of all this (prevalent evidently in Scotland, and I fear not confined to it, and the true root of Irvingism and semi-Irvingism) is an abuse of Scripture language.... that Christ was made bone of our bone, and flesh of our flesh. These words have no such application or use in Scripture; they are not, indeed, found there. We, the church, may say, figuratively, are bone of His bone, and flesh of His flesh,* now that He is glorified, and the saints united to Him who is on high. The thought is a totally different one, and does not refer to His incarnation, but to our union with Him when glorified. As incarnate, He abode alone. But this would lead me to a point I hope to touch on, the Lord willing, in another paper.** (*These words are not held to be genuine in Ephesians 5:1-33 by the best authorities.) (**Christ is never said to be united to men. Believers are united to Him in glory, when sealed by the Holy Ghost.) I close this paper, already too long, but justified by the importance of the subject, by stating the different characteristic periods of Christ’s life as presented by Scripture. First, until He was about thirty years old (save His going up to Jerusalem at twelve years old and disputing with the doctors, given, doubtless, as a testimony to what He was in person and grace, and to show that His relationship to the Father did not depend on any extraordinary anointing for office by the Holy Ghost), He remained in the obscurity of a patient and perfect life, awaiting His calling of God. He then associates Himself publicly with the remnant, and is baptized by John, and is owned by the Father, sealed and anointed with the Holy Ghost. He thereupon goes up, before His public service, into the wilderness to be tempted of the devil. He overcomes and binds the strong man. Satan departs from Him for a season. Subsequently to this He goes about doing good, and healing all that were oppressed by the devil, for God was with Him; does always such things as please Him; is always heard and knows it. Satan comes back as prince of this world, and having the power of death. At the beginning he had tempted Christ with all that might be hoped to allure Him, physically, spiritually, and by the glory of the world. Christ, having overcome, displayed the power which could deliver man from all the effects of that of Satan. Now, man’s enmity is brought out, and Satan proves Him by the power of death and the terrible consequences of what man was in judgment, what He must go through if He will take up his cause being such. This was at the epoch of His last visit to Jerusalem. Finally, He drinks the cup which He had freely and submissively taken at His Father’s hand, and works redemption on the cross for those who believe in Him. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 162: VOL 02 - THE TEMPLE OF GOD ======================================================================== The Temple of God 1. The Two Temples. In the two temples, that at Jerusalem in the old dispensation, and that of the Spirit in the new, we see a meaning in everything within them. Hebrews 9:8-9 gives us notice of this touching the sanctuary; and shows the character of the service there; the veil being constantly down to forbid the access of the worshipper into the presence of God, or the Holiest, was the figure for the time then present. It exhibited the character of that dispensation, which never, with the sacrifices it provided, gave the sinner confidence, or purged the conscience, never brought him near as a worshipper. We see the same significancy in the New Testament temple; everything said of it has a voice which tells us of the time now present, and exhibits the character of the dispensation in which we are as clearly as the other did. In proof of this, I would look at 1 Corinthians 11:1-34, where (and down to the close of chap. 14.) the apostle is treating of the ordinances and worship of the house of God,’ or the New Testament temple. This chapter assumes the saints to be in assembly or church order, and in looking at their order as detailed here, several objects strike our notice.* (*Until verse 17th we do not see it to be the assembly.-ED.) 1st, We see men and women seated together. This tells of their equal and common interest in Christ, where there is neither male nor female, as we read here, " For neither is the man without the woman, neither the woman without the man in the Lord;" for, personally considered, they have the same standing in the church of God. 2dly, We see the man uncovered, and the woman covered. This tells us of their difference mystically considered, as we read here, " For the man is not of the woman, but the woman of the man" (8th and 9th verses). And these two things are true, not only of Adam and Eve, but of Christ and the church, so that in the assembly the woman is to carry the sign of subjection (1:e. the covered head) Genesis 24:65, and the man to appear without it, thus mystically setting forth "Christ and the church." 3dly, In the next place we see the supper spread. This tells why the assembly have come together, and the character of the dispensation into which the church is now brought; for it shows us the veil is gone. The blood of Jesus has rent it, and been brought in its stead. The table tells us of the Paschal Lamb and of the feast of unleavened bread upon it, and thus of the full remission of sins, and also of the exercise of self-judgment, and these are just what the church enjoys and observes till the Lord comes. Thus these features in the assembly have all their signification. Thus the assembly of saints formed in this manner the New Testament temple of living stones, and thus raised is a blessed testimony to the time now present. Every object tells us of its character; we look into the assembly of saints, and see the great truths of the present age reflected as in a glass, just as in the sanctuary under the law there was a figure of the things then present. All this i5 clear and simple; but in further meditation on the subject, observe that there is still more meaning in the coverings of the female in the congregation than I noticed before (1 Corinthians 11:5-6). This power or covering on the head is primarily to be regarded as signifying that subjection which the woman owes the man, who is her head, or the subjection ’ which the church owes her Lord. Power, or covering on the head, was the sign of that, and therefore was suitable to the female in the congregation, because without it she thus dishonored the man, who is her head (5th verse). But there is more than that, for the apostle adds, that if the woman be not covered, let her also be shorn or shaven, which he then says would be a shame to her (6th verse). What was the shame of which the shaven or shorn state of a woman’s. head was the confession? This must be determined by a reference to the Law, and under it we find two occasions on which the female was shaven, or uncovered. 1st, When she was a suspected wife (Numbers 5:1-31) 2dly, When she had lately been taken captive and was bewailing her father’s house, not yet united to the Jew who had taken her in battle (Deuteronomy 21:1-23) This shaven State of a woman thus expressed showed that she was not enjoying either the full. confidence, or the full joy, of a husband. Now the female ought not to appear with such marks on her; for the church ought not to be seen as though she were suspected by Christ, or still felt herself a sorrowing captive. This would be her shame! But the covering on her head shows the church to be in neither of these states, but, on the contrary, happy in the affection and confidence of the Lord; and this is as it should be-this is her glory. Thus the female covered in the assembly shows out the two things touching the church-the church’s present happy. honorable estate with Jesus, as well as her entire subjection to Him as her Lord-i.e. both owning Him as Lord, and enjoying the cherishing presence of Christ, which puts away the sense of captivity; while on the other hand the uncovered head would be a denial of both-a dishonor to the man, and a shame to the woman, and it would bear a false witness to angels, who are learning the deep mysteries of Christ from the church, (Ephesians 3:1-21; 1 Corinthians 9:1-27) Christ was seen of them first (1 Timothy 3:16), they marked and attended His whole progress from the manger to the resurrection; and now they are learning from the church and mark her ways, and if the woman in the assembly were to appear uncovered, the angels would be learning the lesson incorrectly. The shorn head of the female would have done for the dispensation of the Law; for then the sense of captivity was not gone, the spirit of bondage was yet in the worshipper, kindredness in the flesh was not then fully forgotten; but now "we are not in the flesh but in the Spirit," as being joined to the Lord, and there is liberty and not bondage. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 163: VOL 02 - THE TRUE WORSHIPPERS ======================================================================== The True Worshippers The Church of God is a true worshipper on exactly the same grounds, worshipping according to God’s enlarged revelation of Himself. The true worshippers now are those whom the Father in His grace has sought and found, and their worship proceeds on this-that the Son has revealed the Father to them, and they have fellowship with the Father and with His Son Jesus Christ. This is still, like all the other cases of worship in truth, because of God’s revelation of Himself. But there is something beyond this in the present worship of the church; it is " in spirit," as well as " in truth " (John 4:21-24; 1 Corinthians 12:12), because the Holy Ghost has been given us faculty to worship, enabling the saints to call God "FATHER" and Jesus Christ "LORD." There is now communicated power, as well as revelation for the ends of worship. The worshippers are sons, and also priests (Hebrews 5:5-6); having access with filial confidence they are in the holy place-the brazen altar (the remembrance of sin) behind them, and the fullness of God disclosed, and all that must be for blessing. Everything is told to the worshippers now, for the second veil is rent before them, and they see their Father on the mercy-seat, on the throne of the sanctuary; the blood of the Son has introduced them there, and the indwelling of the Holy Ghost makes them to worship in a way worthy of such a sanctuary, and the Father seeking such to worship Him does not rest on anything short of this, which thus the confidence and love and honor of children give Him. Such is worship, I judge, in spirit and in truth, for thus it is where it is according to revelation, and in the grace of the Holy Spirit. But its materials or its form may be very different, as we may further notice; for, properly and simply understood, it is rendering glory to God in the sanctuary, according to His own revelation of Himself. Many things may gather around it or accompany it, but which are not so properly and simply worship. Abel worshipped when he laid his lamb on the altar, though that was very simple; but it was enough, for it was meeting God in the appointed way, and owning His glory. So did Abraham worship when, he raised an altar to God, who appeared to him (Genesis 12:8). Israel worshipped when they bowed the head at God’s revelation by Moses (Exodus 4:30-31; Exodus 12:27); as Moses did at another revelation (Exodus 4:8). So David worshipped (1 Chronicles 21:21). And so Solomon’s congregation (2 Chronicles 7:3) and Jehoshaphat’s (2 Chronicles 20:18) worshipped; and though it be not so called, yet Jacob’s anointing the pillar at Bethel was worship, because it was owning God according to His revelation; and so David’s. " sitting before the Lord" was worship, I judge, on the same principle (2 Samuel 7:1-29) Job worshipped when he fell down in subjection to God’s dealings with him. Eliezer worshipped when he bowed his head, for in that act he owned the Divine goodness to him (Genesis 24:26; Genesis 24:52). The nation of Israel worshipped when they presented their basket of first-fruits, for their basket told God of His own gracious ways-set forth His praises in the sanctuary (Deuteronomy 26:1-19.) The appearing of the males at the three annual feasts in " the city of the great King" was worship, for such feasts set forth God’s own gracious acts and ways, and that is worship. What were all these acts but the thankful acknowledgment of God, according to what He had either done or spoken, and the acceptance of His mercy accordingly? It appears to me that the congregation of the Lord should enter the sanctuary of the Lord now with like worship-with the purpose of showing forth God’s praise-the virtues or praises of Him who bath called us out of darkness into His marvelous light-the praises which He has earned for Himself by His own blessed acts and revelations-and this is done in breaking of bread with thanksgiving, according to His ordinance. That is the service which sets forth what God has done, declaring that He has provided a remedy for sin. It is a remembrance, not of sin, like the legal sacrifices (Hebrews 10:3), but a remembrance of " Me," says Jesus, and consequently of sins put away. Thus it is an act of worship, or a giving to God His own proper glory -the glory of His acts and revelations. To pray about the forgiveness of sins would be discord with the table; it would be (quite unintentionally, it might be) a reproach upon the sacrifice of the Son of God; it would be building again the things that Christ had destroyed; and, in the language and sense of Galatians 2:1-21, making Him the minister of sin-making His blood, like the blood of bulls and goats, only the remembrance of sin, and not the remitter of sin. But to surround the table with thanksgiving, and wait on the feast with praise for redemption, this would be honoring the work of the Lamb of God which the feast sets forth, and, accordingly, it is always as thus accompanied that Scripture presents it to us. Jesus, in taking the bread and the cup, " gave thanks " (Matthew 26:1-75; Mark 14:1-72; Luke 22:1-71) He did nothing else. The words blessing and giving thanks are, to all moral intent, used in the same sense; and, in the like mind, the apostle calls it "the cup of blessing which we bless," because by that cup, or by that death and blood-shedding of Jesus which it sets forth, He has richly entitled Himself to praise. It may be accompanied with confession of sin, for such confession would not be in discordance with this supper. But still we do not find that alluded to in any passages which refer to the Supper; by them it takes the simple form of being a Eucharistic feast, or a season of thanksgiving for the remission of sins. It says (at least the table has this voice in it)-" Give strong drink unto him that is ready to perish, and wine unto those that be of heavy hearts: let him drink and forget his misery, and remember his poverty no more." Yet, surely, the service of self-judging and self-examination may well precede this feast. In due order the covered females and the uncovered males appear before the Lord, and they break bread (1 Corinthians 11:1-34). This is taking the place the Lord has called them to, and this, therefore, publishes His name and praise, and that is giving Him the glory He has so blessedly earned; so to speak, it is like Israel presenting their basket. It is like bowing the head at the revelation of His mercy. The service is Eucharistic. It is a feast upon a sacrifice. It is the Father’s house opened upon the prodigal’s return. And this is our proper worship, for it is " in truth," according to the revelation, according to that perfect provision which our GOD has made for our sins in the gift and sufferings of Jesus. Accordingly, when the first disciples came together, it was to this act of worship or service (Acts 20:7; 1 Corinthians 10:11). Other things may gather round it or accompany it, but this was their worship; this brought them to the sanctuary-this was their business there. I find in Deuteronomy 26:1-19 that other things might accompany the worship, for after Moses directs them as to their basket, he tells them about confession and prayer. So Moses prayed after his worship in Exodus 34:1-35 So the elders ate and drank in God’s presence, which was properly their communion or worship. But Moses had previously spoken to them about the covenant (Exodus 24:1-18), as in Acts 20:1-38 the disciples came together to " break bread," but Paid addressed a long discourse to them: as also, at the first institution of the supper, the Lord gathered His disciples purposely for the supper, but He teaches them about other things also, and ere they separate they sing a hymn; and most significantly is the same thing conveyed to us in 1 Corinthians 11:1-34; 1 Corinthians 14:1-40., where the house of God, or place of present worship, is widely opened to us. For there the apostle shows the disciples mystically, and duly covered and uncovered, in the worship, a service of breaking of bread. He clearly tells us it was for that end they had met together. But then he considers " spirituals." He considers what may accompany warship-the calling upon Jesus, or the ministry of the word in the life and power of the Holy Ghost given to the saints - and thus he unfolds the sanctuary and its actions and furniture, showing what the worship itself was, and then what might duly attend upon it. In 1 Timothy 2:1-15 we get directions as to the further service of the saints in the assembly, -that prayer and intercession, as wide and free as the grace that had rescued themselves, should mark their union and fill God’s living temple. But still this intercession is not simply and properly worship. Their worship was still the breaking of bread, because that was the act which set forth God’s praise, or gave Him the glory of His present acts and dealings with them and for them, and that was what brought them together. The giving of alms also duly accompanied the worship, as prayer and ministry of the word may; but, in like manner, it is simply an accompaniment, like the releasing of the prisoner at the feast. The two things are presented distinctly in Abraham’s history. He is a worshipper at his altar. But then we hear no supplication addressed to God by him. He is a supplicant about Sodom, and there we see no altar (Gen. 12: 23). This is very plain, clearly defining the character of worship, and showing that the breaking of bread is clearly the service of the sanctuary now, whatever else may enter with it. For God is to be worshipped according to Himself (John 4:1-54), and the taking of any- thing as authority in religion but what is from Him mutilated worship, as the Lord told the Jews in Matthew 15:1-39 (of which principle Deuteronomy 12:1-32 is a further witness),* shows us man is not to determine his own ways as a worshipper. Willingness in worship is right; wilfulness destroys it all. Of their own voluntary will they brought their offerings (Leviticus 1:3; Leviticus 7:16); but this was to be done as and where the Lord willed. So with us; we are to worship " in spirit," that is most true-in the grace and liberty of the Holy Spirit which is given to us; but we are to worship " in truth" also, according to God’s revelation of Himself and of His worship. This I have already spoken of. (*[And a striking Scripture it is. Here the Lord of Israel tells Moses that He would Himself choose a place to record His name, and to that place alone the people were to bring their offerings, and not only to the place chosen by the Lord, but according to the manner prescribed by Him, they were to worship. They were not to imitate the worship of the nations, but to render their worship according to God’s own word, or " in truth " (ver. 29-32).]) The maintenance of groves and high places in Israel was always the witness that the people had not duly prepared their hearts to seek the Lord God of Israel, the only true God, who had set His name at Jerusalem (2 Chronicles 14:3; 2 Chronicles 15:17; 2 Chronicles 17:6; 2 Chronicles 19:3; 2 Chronicles 20:33). On the subject of worship, I would still add that joy and a spirit of thankfulness and liberty have characterized. it at all times. Adam’s enjoyment of the garden and its fruits was worship. Israel’s presentation of the basket and their keeping of the feasts was worship, and what gladness and thanksgiving suited such occasions! The saints surrounding the table of the Lord is worship now, and the spirit of filial confidence, of thanksgiving, and of liberty, should fill them. All these acts of worship at different times were marked by joy in different orders, for surely a God of love is a God of joy. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 164: VOL 02 - THE USE OF THE HEBREW VERB KAPHAR ======================================================================== The Use of the Hebrew Verb Kaphar A few remarks on the way the sacred writers make use of the verb כִּפֵּר may not be without interest. It is used without, or with prepositions. Without, where the thing to be covered is the prominent thought, e.g., sin (Daniel 9:24; Psalms 65:3 (4); 78: 38); the land, and the people of Israel (Deuteronomy 32:43); the altar (Ezekiel 43:20). We meet with the verb followed by; in Leviticus 6:30 (23); 16: 17, which tell of the place; in Leviticus 7:7; 1 Samuel 3:14; 2 Samuel 21:3; Numbers 5:8, which speak of the means by which atonement could be effected. Where the one by whom it is made is the prominent thought, we meet with the verb in connection with בְּעַר to tell us on whose behalf he is acting-e.g., Leviticus 9:7; Leviticus 16:6; Leviticus 16:11; Leviticus 16:17; Leviticus 16:24; Exodus 32:30; Ezekiel 45:17; and in 2 Chronicles 30:18, where Hezekiah looks to the Lord to effect it. Where things inanimate involved in man’s guilt, but guiltless themselves, are spoken of, the verb can be followed by אֶח (Leviticus 16:20; Leviticus 16:33; Ezekiel 43:26; Ezekiel 45:20); and where persons are before the writer’s mind, whether guiltless themselves of the actual transgressions or not, we meet with the preposition לְ e.g.,Deuteronomy 21:8; Isaiah 22:14; Ezekiel 16:63. But when the guilt, and the dealing with it, is the uppermost thought, we have used, pointing out on whom or on what the sin rested, which was to be covered, whether (1), the sinner’s; (2), the place of standing; or (3), the victim to which the sin was transferred-e.g. (1), Leviticus 4:20; Leviticus 4:26; Leviticus 4:31; Leviticus 4:35; Leviticus 12:7; Leviticus 14:18-20; Leviticus 19:22; Numbers 15:25; Numbers 15:28; (2), Exodus 30:10; Leviticus 16:16; (3), Leviticus 16:10. Keeping in mind what is said to be the primary meaning of the verb, we can understand then its use in the different places referred to; and the force of Hebrews 10:4, Romans 3:25, is felt. The sins of God’s people in old days were covered by the blood, and so God passed by them. At times we meet with the fuller forms of expression (a) מִ٠זעלבִּפֵּר, and (b),כִּפֵּר(a),Leviticus 5:6; Leviticus 14:19; Leviticus 15:30; Leviticus 16:16; Leviticus 16:34; (b),Leviticus 5:16; Numbers 5:8; the former marking from what, and the latter by what, the sin was covered; but always, where the sin is the prominent thought, we meet with עַל of the person or thing in whom it is covered. See Leviticus 16:33, where we have אֶחכִּפֶּר of the sanctuary and vessels, and עַלכַּפַּר of the people. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 165: VOL 02 - THEN WERE ALL DEAD ======================================================================== Then Were All Dead ======================================================================== CHAPTER 166: VOL 02 - WHAT IS THE CHURCH AND WHAT ARE THE CHURCHES? ======================================================================== What Is the Church and What Are the Churches? "The Church of Christ is the most free society; and every particular church founded upon the same principles, and acting upon them, is free; and it is by adhering to these principles that a church maintains its freedom. For what is a Church? A body of men voluntarily agreeing that, as they are joined together in one mind and one judgment, they shall unite in acts of worship and in the profession of their common faith, and that they shall take counsel together for their mutual improvement, shall claim no lordship over each other’s faith, and that if any one of their number shall change his opinion and shall cease to be in unison with his brethren on those matters on which they had united, he shall be at full liberty to withdraw from his brethren; and, on the other hand, those who shall retain their opinions shall have liberty to dissolve the relation and declare it dissolved. It is free thought in the most honest sense of the word; leaving to every one to profess what he thinks, and allowing others to do the same: those who wish change, to change; those who prefer remaining as they are, so to remain, till they see sufficient cause to change their mind. Their right to do so is a right heaven-bestowed, which a church cannot, -without unfaithfulness, surrender. Thus church-freedom has brought church confessions. We exercise freedom in forming our religious opinions, and we exercise freedom in confessing them- others who do not hold them having the same right and liberty not to confess them. We are thus in a condition to forbear with one another, and love and live as brethren. What, then, is the meaning of all the outcry some people raise about confessions, our own, among others, more especially? When a body of men agree as to what they believe, they no more exercise tyranny over one another than does an individual tyrannize over himself when he makes up his mind upon a religious question. What invasion is there of the rights of private judgment when it is in the exercise of these very rights that a church adopts a belief, and asserts her right to profess it? If that is a yoke upon conscience, it cannot be galling to the man who, by his own free will, puts it on, and who any day he likes may put it off. It is not the church that binds it upon the individual; it is the individual who binds it upon himself." This is part of a report of a lecture delivered by a Principal at the opening of the Theological Hall of one of the Presbyterian Churches at Edinburgh, November 6, 1877. It is a deep grief to any one who feels for the honor of Christ, and who has received Scriptural thoughts as to the church, to see such a total misapprehension and misstatement of what the church of God is; for the lecturer’s mind appears to be an entire blank as to what is taught by the Holy Ghost in the New Testament on this important subject. Professors are supposed to know the whole breadth of the literature of their respective subjects; and it is not likely to produce a fitting respect in ’their students when they find their teachers making an exhibition of the grossest ignorance on a great subject like the church, of which some of them are not altogether uninformed or untaught from other sources. One such, when he heard of the lecturer’s liberality in giving full liberty for the dissatisfied person to withdraw from the church, said, " He cannot leave the church if it be Christ’s, as he has said it is; and if it be not, the sooner we all leave it the better." Young men, who have some knowledge of what is taught in Scripture regarding the church, will prove rather awkward elements in a professor’s class, who makes the church " a voluntary society," which you can join and withdraw from at your own will, as you may see cause! For Scripture light is spreading on all the great subjects of divine revelation, which will effectually sap the foundations of traditional theology and ecclesiastical institutions which have no warrant in the word of God. I do not intend at present to enter upon a discussion on what the church is, nor to seriously controvert the sad views of this report at any length, but briefly to point out wherein they are opposed to Scripture, and then to avail myself of the letters of another to give the doctrine on the church which exactly meets the case, and shows the falsity of such views as those before us. " The church of Christ is the most free society, and every church founded upon the same principles and acting upon them is free, and it is by adhering to these principles that a church maintains its freedom." Although this is strangely worded, yet we might have little difficulty in accepting it, did we not know from what follows that he does not mean the " church of Christ" at all, but a voluntary society got up on the ground of so much recognized truth on which they can all agree; and when a man changes his opinion, he has full liberty to leave the society, and " those who retain their opinions shall have liberty to dissolve the relation between him and them, and declare it dissolved "! His is thus the church of mere " opinions." A thought of its being God’s church, the unforfeitable home of every saved man and woman, and, in another aspect, the body of Christ, to whom every member is united by the Holy Ghost come down from heaven for that express purpose, and that all are thus not only members of Christ but members one of another never seems to have entered his mind. The church of the Scriptures is built on the rock Christ of living stones, and all being Christ’s building, who shall dare to " dissolve the relation?" All are built on the Son of the living God after He has died for their sins and risen again for their justification, and are in living connection with the last Adam, "a life-giving Spirit;" and all united to this glorified Head in heaven, "the church which is His body," by the Holy Ghost, and also indwelt as God’s house by the Spirit of God; having "the truth" (and not merely united on certain mutually acknowledged doctrines), " the unity of the Spirit "-a unity made by Him and which all are to " keep," and to make nothing but to walk, worship, and be in practical fellowship "with all saints," not merely those of the same doctrinal pattern, but those also who, as Scripture enjoins, are "otherwise minded," for "there is one body and one Spirit." All truth and all saints are in " the church of God," " according to the Scriptures," and none has a right to make churches, nor to exclude any from the manifested fellowship of God’s church, who hold the Head and walk in holiness. "For what is a church? (` founded on the same principles as the Church of Christ’)." Only think of the sad answer! "A body of men voluntarily agreeing that as they are joined together in one mind and one judgment they shall unite in acts of worship, and in the profession of their common faith," etc. Is the church of the Scriptures founded on "voluntary agreement," making it a thing of man’s will, or is it by divine agreement and operation and "by the will of God?" God, uniting all believers by the Holy Ghost to the glorious Man at His right hand, has made the church "one body and one spirit," without consulting with men; and it is the merest ignorance of this divine fact that allows men to make their voluntary societies and call them churches. If they had any knowledge and sense of the greatness of the person and work of Christ, or the divine operation of the Holy Ghost in forming and continuing the church on earth; and that the Holy Ghost has come down to abide in and with the saints of God forever; and that He has made of all saints on earth one living organism, as real, perfect, and interdependent in its members as are the members of the human body (1 Corinthians 12:1-31); and that He is present to guide all in worship and for mutual edification (1 Corinthians 14:1-40) as in apostolic times; and this being so, that men are as little permitted to potter at church-making as they were while the apostles lived; they would not hold such language nor have such unscriptural thoughts as those on which we now animadvert. "Free thought" is as entirely excluded from church-making by the Holy Ghost speaking in the Holy Scriptures, as is " free will " from our being made God’s children (John 1:12-13). The words of the Christ are, Upon this Rock I will build my church and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it (Matthew 16:18). " For as the body is one and hath many members, and all the members of that one body, being many, are one body: so also is the Christ. For by one Spirit are we all baptized into one body, whether we be Jews or Gentiles, whether we be bond or free; and have been all made to drink into one Spirit" (1 Corinthians 12:12-13). This declares three things-(1), Christ builds His Church, and all He builds infallibly stands; (2), He does it through the Holy Ghost’s baptism, not by regeneration or being born again; (3), That this church thus formed, though composed of many members, are " baptized by one Spirit into one body," and are as indissolubly one as all the many members of the one human body " being many are one body." " So also is the Christ," that is, the Head, and all the members form one body. And this is the only principle on -which we are gathered to the name of Christ, so as to be on the divine ground of God’s church on earth. But the lecturer speaks as if he did not believe in, the divine principles of the church of God; and consequently, having a humanly-constructed church and a humanly-framed confession of faith on which it is based, he thinks he has found a short and easy method with all malcontents who raise an outcry against confessions; they may cease confessing and give tangible proof of this cessation by withdrawing from the society! This is all just and right and in accordance with common sense and public conscience if man has made it. But if the church be divine, if its formation be an act of God’s sovereign grace and not "a body of men voluntarily agreeing," if the Holy Ghost baptizes all who can say " Abba Father " into one body, the body of Christ, and if it is founded on the Father given confession of Christ as the Son of the living God, then all that he has said about the matter is in direct opposition to the testimony of God, the work of Christ, the agency of the Holy Ghost, and the entire Scripture teaching regarding God’s church; which is a serious matter for one occupying the responsible position of principal of a theological hall and a teacher of the future ministers of his church. His address goes no higher than to make the church he is connected with a "body of men voluntarily agreeing," a mere sect possessed of as much freedom as their confession of so much doctrine which they believe to be conformable to Scripture entitles to; but the whole thing is an affair of man’s will to the setting aside of God’s will for His church, as well as the Scripture principles on which the church of God is founded, whether looked at as the body of Christ or the house of God. Two things, then, are obvious in this address-(1.) That he claims nothing higher for his Church than that it is a mere sect into which men may come if they like it, or go elsewhere and join some other sect if they like it better; and (2.) That the churches of men, known as the various ecclesiastical denominations, are not the church of God at all, nor are they meant to be framed on the principle of there being "one body and one Spirit." As this lecturer has plainly admitted the human origin of his church, it can be nothing other but a sect; and What is a Sect? We give for answer the light-giving answer of another, hoping that the Lord may use it as an eye-salve that some may see:- The word sect is employed in the English translation to express The Greek word " hairesis." It is used (except in the Acts of the Apostles, where it is found six times) only once in the Epistle to the Corinthians, once in the Epistle to the Galatians (5: 20), and once in that of Peter (2 Peter 2:1-22) In the First Epistle to the. Corinthians it is translated by the word heresy (1 Corinthians 11:19). It signifies a doctrine, or a system, whether of philosophy or religion, which has its adherents united as adopting this doctrine. Its meaning is a little modified now, because the professing church (at least the greater part of it) has taken the name of Catholic, that is to say, universal. Then every religious body, every Christian gathering, which does not belong to this community (so-called Catholic), is by it called a sect; from this the word has become a word of censure. All the Christian bodies are sometimes called sects, in the sense of divisions, when they separate themselves from the whole complement of Christians, or from those who bear this name However, the word sect implies in itself always more or less of censure, from the idea that those who compose it are re-united by a doctrine or a particular denomination. We cannot say that this way of looking at it is entirely false; the application may be false, but not the idea itself. But what is important is to discover that which, in fact, is an assembly of Christians justly deserving this name; or, since it is applied to assemblies or Christian corporations, it is necessary to understand the true principle on which we ought to assemble: that which is not based on this principle is really a sect. Although the Catholics (so-called) have made a bad use of this truth, it is not less true that the unity of the church is a truth of the greatest importance for Christians, whether the unity of all individually manifested in the world (John 17:1-26), or that of the body of Christ, formed by the Holy Ghost, come down here (Acts 2:1-47; 1 Corinthians 12:13); so in the seventeenth chapter of John’s Gospel the Lord asks the Father, with regard to those who shall believe through the word of the apostles " that they all may be one in us: that the world may believe that Thou hast sent Me " (John 17:21). We see there the practical unity of Christians in the communion of the Father and the Son. The apostles should be one in thought, word, and deed, by the operation of one Spirit, as the Father and the Son in the unity of the divine nature (ver. 11); then those who should believe by their word ought to be one in the communion of the Father and the Son (ver. 21). We shall be perfect in the unity of the glory (ver. 22); but we ought to be one now, in order that the world may believe (ver. 21). Further, the Holy Ghost came down from heaven on the day of Pentecost (Acts 2:1-47), baptized all believers of that time into one body, united to Christ as a body to the head, and manifested here below on the earth in this unity (1 Corinthians 12:13). We see clearly that it is on the earth, where it says, in the twelfth chapter of the First Epistle to the Corinthians, " If one member suffer, all the members suffer; and if one member be honored, all the members rejoice with it." We do not suffer in heaven. But then it is added, " Now ye are the body of Christ, and members in particular." The whole chapter shows the same truth; but these verses suffice to demonstrate that it treats of the church on the earth. See here, then, the true unity formed by the Holy Ghost; first, the unity of brethren between themselves, and second, the unity of the body. The spirit of a sect exists when we see disciples unite outside this unity, and when it is around an opinion that those who profess it are gathered, in order that they be united by means of this opinion. This unity is not founded on the principle of the unity of the body, or of the union of brethren. When such persons are united in a corporation, and mutually recognize each other as members of this corporation, then they constitute formally a sect, because the principle of the gathering is not the unity of the body; and the members are united, not as members of the body of Christ (when they are even such), but as members of a particular corporation. All Christians are members of the body of Christ-an eye, a hand, a foot, etc. (1 Corinthians 12:13-25). The idea of being a member of a church is not found in the Word. The Holy Ghost compares the church on the earth to a body of which Christ is the Head (Ephesians 1:22-23; Colossians 1:18); then each Christian is a member of this body, so of Christ. But to be a member of a particular corporation is quite another idea. Now, the supper of the Lord being the expression of this union of the members (as it says, 1 Corinthians 10:17), when a corporation of Christians recognize its right to receive its members to it, there is a unity formally opposed to the unity of the body of Christ. It is possible that this may be ignorance, or that these Christians have never apprehended what is the unity of the body, and that it is the will of God that this unity be manifested on the earth; but, in fact, they form a sect, a denial of the unity of the body of Christ. Several of those who are members of the body of Christ are not members of this corporation; and the supper, although the members partake piously of it, is not the expression of the unity of the body of Christ. But now a difficulty is presented: the children of God are dispersed; many pious brethren are attached to this opinion, to that corporation, and mixed up for advantage’ sake, even in religious things, with the world. There are, alas! many who have no idea of the unity of the body of Christ, or who deny the duty of manifesting this unity on earth. But all that does not annihilate the truth of God. Those who unite themselves, as I have already said, are but a sect in principle. If I recognize all Christians as members of the body of Christ-if I love them and receive them, from an enlarged heart, even to the supper, supposing that they are walking in holiness and truth, calling upon the name of the Lord out of a pure heart (2 Timothy 2:19-22; Revelation 3:7), then I am not walking in the spirit of a sect, even although I cannot gather together all the children of God, because I walk according to the principle of this unity of the body of Christ, and seek the practical union among the brethren. If I join with other brethren to take the Lord’s supper only as member of the body of Christ, not as a member of a church, whichever it may be, but verily in the unity of the body, ready to receive all Christians who are walking in holiness and truth, I am not a member of a sect; I am member of nothing else but of the body of Christ. But to gather together upon another principle, in whatever manner it may be, to make a religious corporation, is to make a sect. The principle is very simple. The practical difficulties are sometimes great by reason of the state of the church of God; but Christ is sufficient for all; and if we are content to be little in the eyes of men, the thing is not so difficult. A sect is, then, a religious corporation, united upon another principle than that of the body of Christ. It is formally such when those who compose this particular corporation are regarded as being the members of it. It is to walk in the spirit of a sect when those alone are recognized in a practical manner, without properly saying so, who are members of a corporation. In principle, then, the lecturer’s church is nothing better than a sect, and, indeed, so are all modern " churches." But now to come to the second point, I will allow the same writer to give the Scriptural thought about Churches and the Church:- You ask me, Were there not churches in Scripture? I answer, there were; but what are churches? The effect of the question is to bring out the state of the mind. Most Christians would immediately think of what are called churches in the religious world, perhaps in Christendom at large. They would think of the Presbyterian Church, or Congregational and Baptist Churches, or else of the Church of Rome, or the like. The person who lived habitually in the mind of Scripture would think of Corinth or others which we meet with in Scripture. Are then the facts which exist in Christendom, or the thoughts there current, different from the facts found in Scripture, or the thoughts formed by it? Let us inquire into this, not with a haughty heart, but if we find all gone far away from the Scriptural state in principle and practice-if we find all ruined, instead of power in the Holy Ghost and unity-" a fair show in the flesh," let us mourn in heart, and cry to the Lord. He will meet us in our need. What, then, were churches in Scriptural times? Church means simply an assembly, or, from local use in Greek, an assembly of privileged persons, of citizens. The whole multitude of believers gathered into one by the Holy Ghost formed the Assembly, or Church. Only here, of course, it was God’s assembly; of course those in Rome or Corinth could not meet in Jerusalem. Hence there were assemblies in different places, forming each locally God’s assembly in the place. It may be well very briefly to examine how the assembly is viewed in Scripture as a whole, before we speak of local assemblies. It is viewed as the habitation of God; and also as the body of Christ; and first of the former. In one sense the church is not yet formed, not yet complete. All that shall be united to Christ in glory form part of it. " I will build My church," says Jesus, " and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it." This will be infallibly accomplished; so Peter, evidently alluding to this, " unto whom coming as unto a living stone, ye also; as living stones, are built up a spiritual house; " so Ephesians 2:1-22, " in whom the whole building fitly framed together groweth into an holy temple in the Lord." This is yet unfinished, and still goes on; and though at first a public and evident body, the Lord adding daily to the church such as should be saved, it is now become what is called "the invisible church." It is "invisible": though if it was to be the light of the world, it is hard to tell the value of an "invisible" light. If it is acknowledged to have fallen for ages into corruption and iniquity, a very Babylon in character, this has not been "the light of the world." The persecuted saints-for God has surely had a people-gave their -testimony, but the public body in the world was darkness, not light in it. But there is another way in which God’s assembly is spoken of, and still first as the house of God, that is, as established by the instrumentality of man, and under the responsibility of man. "As a wise master-builder," says Paul, "I have laid the foundation, but let every man take heed how he buildeth thereon." There is human instrumentality and human responsibility. It was a large body formed on earth which was God’s house or temple, the Holy Ghost dwelling in it down here as descended on the day of Pentecost (1. Cor. 3.), not the body; there can be no wood and hay and stubble, which is to be burned, in "the body of Christ." Again, "Ye are builded together for a habitation of God through the Spirit " (Ephesians 2:22). This is a very interesting and precious truth, I mean God’s dwelling down here in His house prepared for Him according to His will. God never dwelt with Adam innocent, though He visited him, nor with Abraham though He visited and singularly blessed him; but the moment Israel was redeemed out of Egypt, God came and dwelt among them. The dwelling of God with men is the fruit of redemption (see Exodus 29:46). The true "redemption" has been accomplished, and God has formed "a habitation" for Himself, where He dwells by the Spirit. It is so indeed as to the individual (1 Corinthians 6:1-20), but I now speak of the assembly, " the house of the living God." This is now on the earth, " the habitation of God by the Spirit." He dwells and walks among us. We "are God’s building." Man may have built in wood and hay and stubble, but God has not yet executed judgment to remove the house out of His sight, though judgment will begin there. The assembly is also "the body of Christ" (Ephesians 1:23). It is by one Spirit we are baptized into one body. This, though the final completeness of it will be in heaven, yet is established on earth, for the baptism of the Holy Ghost was His coming down on the day of Pentecost (Acts 1:5; 1 Corinthians 12:13). That this is on earth is further clear, for in the same chapter we find He has set in the church, first apostles, secondarily prophets, where we have "miracles, gifts of healing," clearly on earth. Where, remark also, that they are set in the whole church, members of such or such a kind in the one whole body. Such is the church or assembly as depicted in Scripture. But what were churches or assemblies? These were local. The apostle could say, " To the church of God which is at Corinth." It represented the whole unity of the body in that place. "Ye are the body of Christ, and members in particular." Two bodies of Christ being in one place, representatively, there could not be. In Galatia, which was a large province, we read " the churches of Galatia." So in Thessalonica, a city of Macedonia, we have "the assembly of the Thessalonians." So in the seven churches; so John writes to the assembly. So everywhere there was God’s assembly in any given place which could be distinctly addressed as such. In Acts 20:1-38 he calls for "the elders of the assembly." There were several appointed by the Holy Ghost to be overseers of God’s flock. Hence Titus was left in Crete to ordain them in every city. We have (Acts 11:22) "the assembly which was in Jerusalem," though it was exceedingly numerous. In Acts 13:1-52 the assembly that was at Antioch. So Paul (Acts 14:21-23) returns to Lystra, Derbe, and Iconium, and chooses for them elders in every assembly. All Scripture clearly shows there was one assembly in a place, which was God’s assembly. Churches as buildings they had none: the Most High dwelleth not in temples made with hands; and hence they met in houses where they could; but all formed one assembly, God’s assembly, in that place, the elders being elders in the whole as one body. The local assembly represented the whole assembly of God, as 1 Cor. shows us plainly. The position which Christians who composed it held was that of members of Christ, of the whole body of Christ. The only membership known in Scripture is membership of Christ’s body; as an eye, a hand, etc.; ministry was directly connected with this last thought. When Christ ascended up on high, He gave gifts to men, apostles, prophets-they were the foundation (Eph.;-at their head, and people are members of this so-formed church or assembly, and vote in it as such; they may be members of Christ or not, that which gives them their title is that they are members of that particular assembly. In most churches a majority, if the vote does not create a division, carry out their will. The Holy Ghost is not in question. All action from beginning to end is man’s. The Presbyterians may have various church courts, and have an aristocratic element in their organization. Congregationalists have all their decisions come to by each separate body and the vote of the members of the assemblies, but the whole is a human arrangement formed and carried on by man. A man is a member of a body which man has organized, and acts as such,. The actual state of things is a church or assembly of which a certain number of persons are members, with a person educated for the ministry at its head. It is Mr. so and so’s flock or church; he is paid so much a year-he may or may not be converted, but he is ordained; he may be an evangelist and put into a pastor’s place; he may be a pastor, but must preach to the world! although if he does not succeed in this he may be dismissed; generally directly, sometimes indirectly. The whole constitution of the church of God-God’s constitution, is ignored and man’s substituted for it. And the order and the power of the Holy Ghost are ignored, or not believed in at all. In Scripture there is no membership of a church, no pastor of a flock peculiar to him, no such voluntary assembly formed on its own particular principles. Not a trace of such an order is in the word, if it be not in the incipient divisions called "carnal," in the epistle to the Corinthians. There was God’s church or assembly, not man’s churches. If Paul were to address an epistle to "the assembly of God" at -, no one could get it; there is no such body in existence. Man’s churches have set aside "the church of God." The operation of the Spirit of God is set aside-that is, evangelists, servants of Christ for the world; pastors and teachers, not of a flock who have chosen them, or their flock, but exercising their gift where God may bring them; teaching at Ephesus in God’s assembly if they were there, at Corinth if they were there, acting according to the gift given them from on high wherever God sent them, trading with their talent because their Master has charged them with it, as every man has received the gift, ministering the same as good stewards of the manifold grace of God; if they exhort waiting on their exhortation, if teachers on their teaching, and that in God’s assembly as a whole. Man has organized; but he has wholly set aside, as far as his arrangements go, God’s order and arrangements as to the assembly. Thus the church, God’s assembly, is set aside to have man’s churches; the Spirit who gives gifts to various members is set aside to have a minister of their own choosing; and so also is the word in which God’s order is revealed. The church, and Spirit, and word are all set aside by what is called "order," that is, man’s arrangement and organization. We are told it must be so. That is, there is not faith to trust the Lord to rule and bless in His own house according to the ordering He gave to it, yet true blessing can only come from His operation by the Holy Spirit He has sent down. And what is the effect? It would be ungracious of me (nor am I the least inclined to do it) to expose the miserable consequences which often ensue. They are well known; the world knows them. My object is to show that the system is anti- scriptural, and denies the Holy Ghost and the true church of God; but it is evident that a person chosen and paid by an assembly, of which very commonly half or more is unconverted, where the object is to increase numbers and influence, and have rich people, must please those whom he serves. And, says the apostle, " If I yet pleased men I should not be the servant of Jesus Christ." They must adapt themselves to their audience. For the practical result I appeal to every godly conscientious person conversant with the state of things. I hear their groans on every side. But it is the natural and necessary effect of the evangelists, pastors, teachers, these were set in the whole church or assembly (1 Corinthians 12:1-31) If a man was a teacher at Ephesus, he was such at Corinth. Even as to miraculous gifts, a man spoke with tongues where he was; the gift belonged to no particular assembly, but was that member or gift in the whole body on earth, wrought by the Holy Ghost (1 Corinthians 12:1-31.), and by which a man was a servant of Christ. In 1 Corinthians 12:1-31 we have the Holy Ghost on earth distributing them as they then were. In Ephesians 4:1-32 they are given from Christ on high, and only such referred to as ministered to the perfecting of the saints and edifying of the body till we all grow to the stature of Christ. They were the talents with which a man was bound to trade, if he knew the Master, in virtue of having them, " as every man has received the gift so minister the same as good stewards of the manifold grace of God" (1 Peter 4:10). They were to wait on their prophesying or exhorting. Rules are given for their exercise in Scripture. Women were to keep silence in the assemblies. But my main object now is to show that it was as gifts in the whole assembly of God everywhere that they who possessed them acted. Elders were local and were not a gift, though aptness to teach was a desirable qualification. Still all had it not (1 Timothy 5:17). Elders were elders, in a given city, of God’s assembly there. Gifts were exercised as set in the whole body, wherever the gifted member was, according to Scriptural rules. The result of the examination of Scripture is, that there was one assembly of God in each town where there were Christians; that these were members of the body of Christ - the only membership known in Scripture; and gifts were exercised in the whole church, or one assembly of God in the whole world, as members and servants of Christ, by the operation of the Spirit, according to rules given in Scripture. Eldership was a local office to which persons were chosen and appointed by the apostle or his deputy, and they were elders in the one assembly of God in the place, over which the Holy Ghost had made them overseers (Acts 14:23;. Titus; Acts 20:17; Acts 20:28). It was not a gift, though one gift was desirable to make the office more effective, but the chief requisites were qualities which made them fit to be overseers. No trace of this subsists at present in the common order of what man calls "churches." Thank God, men cannot hinder the Lord in His work, or His raising up such as may minister to His own, in a sovereign way; but man has organized "churches" each according to his fancy, and the "church of God" and "the word of God" are forgotten save the owning by some of an "invisible church" which the Lord is faithful to carry on. But that they leave to His care, and arrange the visible church each as he sees good. The church as a public body in the world had sunk into Popery (or Greek corruption, with which we have less to do in the West). All was in ruin, as the apostle had predicted; and at the Reformation civil Governments set up national churches. The church of God no one thought of, and for some time nothing else was allowed. Religious liberty then became more common, but no one thought of "the church of God," but of mere organized churches united by a system of man’s devising, or independent one of another, but man arranged and organized them. The unity of the body; that membership was membership of Christ alone; that the Holy Ghost was on earth; that gifts were given by Christ and brought responsibility for their exercise with them; all this was wholy forgotten and left aside-that is, the whole original Scriptural truth on the subject of the church and the presence of the Holy Ghost. The Episcopal body was so far different that they pretended to have the original title by succession, and made people members of Christ by the baptism of water, a dream of which there is no trace in Scripture. It is by one Spirit that we are baptized into one body. Baptism with water is to the death of Christ. But leaving aside the Episcopal pretensions and errors, the existing system is that of assemblies formed by men on some principle they have adopted with a man chosen by themselves system. Ministry with them is not the exercise of gift given of the Lord, but a person educated for a profession and ordained, so that a great many are not really converted. The true church of God established on earth (1 Corinthians 12:1-31) is ignored, as are true churches, God’s assemblies in each place, and churches are made by men according to their view of what is right, and men are members of their churches, not viewed as members of the body of Christ. An unconverted member of a church has all the rights and power of a converted member of Christ. The influence of wealth, not of the Spirit of God, is paramount, and a majority decides cases, not the guiding of the Spirit. If a majority had decided at Corinth, what would have been the effect? In the whole system, man, and man’s will, and man’s organization, have taken the place of the Spirit and word of God, and of what God organized Himself as declared in the word. People say, Were there not churches then? I answer, Surely, and that it is that shows the anti-scriptural character of what exists. Let any one show me in Scripture such a thing as a separate distinct body such as is called a church now, and membership of it; or, as I have said, if Paul wrote " To all the church of God at ---," who could get it? All is anti- scriptural, and sets aside what is in Scripture to form something else. I do not touch on many collateral subjects-the ruined state of the church as a whole, the coming of the Lord-wishing to confine myself to the question; is the existing order of things scriptural or anti-scriptural? That men having drunk old wine straightway desire new, I understand, is not likely; but happy is he who follows the word, and owns the Spirit, if he be alone in doing so. The word of the Lord abides forever, as does he who does His will. The 2. and 3. chapters of 2d Timothy clearly point out the condition of the church in the last days, and the path of the believer in them, as the first Epistle gives the external details of the church when first arranged by apostolic care. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 167: VOL 02 - WORSHIP ======================================================================== Worship With this little view of the temples, let us consider the worship which might fill them. True worship, like true know ledge of God, ever flows from the revelation, for man by wisdom knows not God. Worship, to be true, must be according to that revelation which God has made of Himself, and this I would trace a little through Scripture. Abel was a true worshipper; his worship or offering was according to faith-i.e. according to revelation (Hebrews 11:1-40). The firstlings of his flock which he offered were according to the bruised seed of the woman, and according to the coats of skins with which the Lord God had clothed his parents. Noah, followed Abel, and also worshipped in the faith of the woman’s bruised seed; he took his new inheritance only in virtue of blood (Genesis 8:20); lie was therefore a true worshipper-worshipping God as He had revealed Himself. Genesis 12:7; here we see Abraham following in their steps, a true worshipper.* (*I might observe that there is strikingly an absence of self-will in Abraham: he believed God, and what was told him; he went out as he was commanded; he worshipped as had been revealed to him.) Isaac, precisely in the track of Abraham, worshipped the God who had appeared to him, not affecting to be wise, and thus becoming a fool, but in simplicity of faith and worship, like Abraham, raising his altar to the revealed God (Genesis 26:24-25). Jacob was a true worshipper. The Lord appears to him in his sorrow and degradation, in the misery to which his own sin had reduced him, thus revealing Himself as the One in whom mercy rejoiceth against judgment, and he at once owns God as thus revealed to him, and this God of Bethel was his God to the end (Genesis 48:15-16). Here was enlarged revelation of God, and worship following such revelation, and that is true worship. The Nation of Israel was a true worshipper; God had revealed Himself to Israel in a varied way-He had given them the law of righteousness, and also shadows of good things to come. By the one He had multiplied transgressions, and the other provided the remedy: and the worship of Israel was according to this. There was an extreme sensitiveness to sin, with burdens to allay it, which they were not able to bear, and thus the spirit of bondage and fear was gendered. Israel_ had thus become increasingly acquainted with the good and evil, and their worship was accordingly. The tabernacle or temple where all the worship went on as the established worship might still be set aside, because it was not the perfect thing, and God might show out the better if He pleased in spite of it; and so He did on various cccasions. Witness Gideon, Manoah, and David. Gideon worshipped according to a new revelation of God in spite of Shiloh and the tabernacle; his rock became the ordered place, or the anointed altar, just because of this revelation and command of God (Judges 6:14-26). Manoah turns what he had supposed a repast into a sacrifice, because the Lord had revealed His wish that it should be so (Judges 13:15; Judges 13:19). David at the bidding of the Lord turns from the ordained or consecrated altar to another, which was in the unclean inheritance of a Gentile, where, however, as at Bethel of old, mercy had rejoiced against judgment, and where accordingly God had built Himself another house. " This is the house of the Lord. God," says David, (1 Chronicles 22:1-19) Thus, then, these three instances were cases of true worship, though manifestly a departure from God’s own established worship. The healed Leper was a true worshipper, though in like manner he departed from the established, the divinely established, order, just because without a command he apprehended God in a new revelation of Himself (Luke 17:11-19). The healing had a voice in the ear of faith, for it was only the God of Israel who could heal a leper (2 Kings 5:7). This was more excellent even than the same kind of faith in Gideon, Manoah, or David. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 168: VOL 03 - A FEW WORDS ABOUT THE EPISTLE TO THE EPHESIANS ======================================================================== A Few Words About the Epistle to the Ephesians WAS this Epistle sent by Paul to the Church of Ephesus? It was; and the words "in Ephesus" are so decisively attested (the evidence of the versions is unanimous for en Epheso), that they cannot be deprived of their right to a place in the text being decidedly genuine. The conjecture that it was a circular letter with the place of designation left blank, to be filled up when sent to various churches, seems to lack proof. Besides, the Apostle wrote the Epistle, and inscribed it to the Christians in Ephesus as a whole; not to a select body characterized by perseverance and fidelity. "To the saints that are at Ephesus, and to the faithful in ’Christ Jesus," is descriptive of the whole church of Ephesus. The Apostle uses the same method of address when writing to the church of Rome, " to all who are in Rome, beloved of God, called saints" (Romans 1:7). He does not write the word church, but we know he meant the church of Rome; so we may say, although he does not write the church in Ephesus, he intended nothing else in what he wrote in the opening of the Epistle to the Ephesians. It is a groundless notion that he could not address them as a church because " the church had been smashed to atoms." The church was there, and the churches, as established by the Apostles, were still there, and Ephesus was one of them; for the Lord, in sending an epistle to them by John, caused them to be addressed "the church in Ephesus." This tells us that the Lord could address them as a church if Paul could not! But he, too, wrote distinctly to the church " in Ephesus " and not to. Laodicea (as many would have it); nor is his Epistle a letter meant for general circulation among the churches of the district, a blank being left to fill in the name as copied and sent. It may have been so used with its Ephesian designation; and, no doubt, was meant for the profit of God’s Church everywhere, and in all ages. But the conclusion that this Epistle was written to and directed to the Ephesians and no further church, in keeping with the genuine en Epheso, is the only critical procedure which rests upon a historical basis, and is in agreement with the primitive and universal tradition of the church. It is an unsafe thing to found a doctrine upon the absence of a word. If we affirmed that there was no presbytery. in Ephesus because there is no mention of elders in the Epistle to the Ephesians, the cross light of Acts 20:1-38 would expose the unsatisfactory character of such reasoning; and to reason from the fact that the word church is not found in the inscription, that the Epistle was not addressed to the Church in Ephesus would be equally fallacious. The church had not gone to pieces when Paul wrote to the Ephesians. Elements of evil-such as clerisy and sectism― that eventually ruined it were working, but were kept down by apostolic power as long as the Apostles lived. " After my decease," etc., the Apostle told the elders of Ephesus the ruin would come. Paul wrote his Epistle to the Philippians with their " bishops and deacons" after he wrote to Ephesus, and also his First and Second Epistles to Timothy. In chapter 3. of the First Epistle he instructs him how to behave himself in the church of God; and, as we have said, thirty years after this he testified the whole of the Apocalypse "in the churches." The, churches being there, the church was too. They needed warning, but they were still acknowledged as churches by Christ. It is therefore a gross mistake to say that the church was all smashed to atoms when Paul wrote to the Ephesians. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 169: VOL 03 - AGAIN ======================================================================== Again ὅταν δὲ πάλιν εἰσαγάγῃYou ask if the text or the marginal reading in the A. V. of this clause gives the sense of the original. If we examine into the habit of the writer of this epistle when adducing quotations from the Old Testament, we shall be at no loss in determinining that πάλιν here is the mark of a new quotation, and not a note of time; for out of the ten occasions in this epistle on which the writer introduces this adverb (1: 5, 6; 2: 13, his; 4: 5, 7; 5: 12; 6: 1, 6; 10: 30) only three of them (5: 12; 6: 1, 6) can be said to express notations of time. Observe how this adverb comes in to mark a new quotation (Hebrews 1:5; Hebrews 13:1-25, his; 4: 5, 7; 10: 30). The text of the A. V. is correct. The objection made against it on exegetical, grounds, that πάλιν before a verb denotes a second time the thing is done, is a statement which will not always be found correct (see Matthew 5:33; Romans 15:10-11). The fact is that πάλιν is frequently used to introduce a fresh quotation from the Old Testament (Matthew 4:7; Matthew 5:33; John 19:37; Romans 15:10-12; 1 Corinthians 3:20; Hebrews 5:1-14; Hebrews 2:13, his.; 4: 5, 7; 10: 30). With this array of examples before us we can have no real difficulty, whether we examine simply the habit of the writer or the practice of those guided by the Holy Ghost, in determining that Hebrews 1:6 really means, " And again, when he brings the first begotten into the, habitable world." The reference is to Psalms 97:1-12, quoted not with verbal correctness but for the sense of the passage, the point being that as angels are to worship Him when He comes into the universe as the firstborn, He must be superior to them, though he has appeared in the ranks of the human race. So whether the sacred writer had quoted verbally correctly, or only as he has done, the point of the quotation would remain the same. And the writer of the epistle does not always quote verbatim from the LXX. or from the Hebrew. Compare Hebrews 1:7 with Psalms 103:4 in the LXX.; 2:12 with Ps. 21: 23 in the LXX.; 3: 10 with Psalms 94:10 in the LXX. and XCV. 10 in the Hebrew; 6: 14 with Genesis 22:17 in LXX. and Hebrews 8:11 with Jeremiah 31:34 in Heb. and XXXVIII. 34 in LXX.; 10: 7 with Psalms 40:8 in Hebrew and XXXIX. 3 in LXX. It is true that the words in Hebrews 1:1-14 are found verbatim in the Vatican LXX. in Deuteronomy 32:1-52, though in the Alexandrine LXX. we read, καἱ προσκυνησάτωςαν ἀυτῶ πάντεσ ὑιοὶ θεοῦ. But as neither the Hebrew, the Hebrew Samaritan Pentateuch, nor the Chaldee Targums, know anything of such words in Deuteronomy 32:43, nor the Vulgate or Syriac versions, we could not regard the Vatican LXX. as having preserved in that passage the words of the lawgiver ======================================================================== CHAPTER 170: VOL 03 - BIBLICAL ANNOTATIONS: DAN_9:24-27 ======================================================================== Biblical Annotations:Daniel 9:24-27 ======================================================================== CHAPTER 171: VOL 03 - BRIEF OUTLINE OF THE SCRIPTURE ESCHATOLOGY ======================================================================== Brief Outline of the Scripture Eschatology THE rapture of the Church having taken place, Jews and Gentiles will again be dealt with as such by God, and judicial dealing and actings in grace will characterize His ways. He will deal judicially with Christendom, as the New Testament says, and Revelation describes: He will deal, too, with His earthly people, and notably with that portion of them known as the Jews. Of this Isaiah, Ezekiel, Daniel, Joel, and the. Psalms especially treat. He will deal in judgment, too, with the whole world, and make all hear of His glory (Isaiah 13:11; Isaiah 26:9; Isaiah 26:18, etc.) And when the Lord takes His kingdom, He will reward His heavenly saints; judge and reward His earthly ones, Israel (Psalms 1:1-6.) and Gentiles (Revelation 7:1-17); judge, too, the living nations for their treatment of His brethren (Matthew 25:1-46); and finally judge the dead (Revelation 20:1-15) But before He rewards His earthly people, He will deal in fearful judgment with the Beast and Antichrist and their followers (Revelation 19:1-21), and with the king of the north; and certainly, ere He judge the dead, He will deal with Gog and all his multitude (Ezek. 38: 39.) Now for some details:- Judicial dealing with Christendom, preparatory to the Lord’s return, commences with the opening of the seals. War, famine, death, and wild beasts, God’s four sore judgments (Ezekiel 14:21), will be sent among men, and constituted authority within the area of God’s then visitation will be broken up, as described under the sixth seal (Revelation 6:12-17), to the dismay of rulers and all. Meanwhile, God will have been working in grace, and martyrs will have attested their constancy to His truth (Revelation 6:9); a work which; then seen as begun, will go on among the twelve tribes of Israel, and Gentiles also, till the Lord appears. Of this Revelation 7:1-17 speaks, telling of the sealed ones of the twelve tribes, and of the great company of the Gentiles, to come out of the great tribulation. These last are only seen after they have come out of it (7: 14). Here, then, God is seen working among the twelve tribes, before the Beast appears in the prophecy, and the special trial of the Jews, as such, begins. The second judicial dealing of God with Christendom is set forth in the trumpets. The fourth part of the earth felt the effect of the opening of the fourth seal. The third part of the trees, of the sea, and the living creatures in it, and men on it, the third part of the rivers and fountains of water, and of the sun, moon, and stars, feel the effects of the first four trumpets (8.) In the woe trumpets the ungodly are smitten with terrible judgments, for these are not sealed like those in 7. Hence it would seem that Israel are to feel the effects of this, for in the next trumpet the third part of men which are slain are not part of the Israelitish race. During the progress of these judgments the Beast of Daniel 7:9. and of Revelation 11:1-19. will have appeared in his true character. This turns attention directly to the Holy Land, and to. the Jews in it. Brought back, the majority in unbelief, and not outwardly owned of God (Isaiah 18:5-6), the temple will have been rebuilt (Daniel 9:27; Daniel 8:12) to be desecrated by the image of the Beast (Daniel 8:12; Matthew 24:15; Mark 13:14; Daniel 12:11), placed there by Antichrist, who himself will sit in the temple of God, showing himself that he is God (2 Thessalonians 2:4). By him, upheld by the Beast, the political head of the Roman Empire, sacrifices to God will be made to cease, the prelude to the destruction of the temple, the place of God’s sanctuary, by the Assyrian, or king of the north (Daniel 8:11; Psalms 74:7). The Antichrist under the Beast will make true sacrifice to cease, substituting in its place the worship of the image of the Beast. The invader from the north will raze the temple to the ground. But before this destruction takes place apostasy will have manifested itself among the Jews (Isaiah 8:21) and in Christendom. The whore will already have been destroyed (Revelation 17:16) by the Beast and the ten horns, the Roman Empire in its last form, comprehending seemingly only the western part of the old empire; for Antichrist does not form one of the ten kings, and the northern power arises out of the eastern part of the old Roman Empire (Daniel 8:9-12). The whore destroyed, there will be the way opened for the worship of the Beast by apostate Christendom, since with her destruction vanishes, it would seem, every vestige of Christianity from those who had openly professed to own it (2 Thessalonians 2:4). During that time of apostasy among the Jews there will be a testimony in Jerusalem itself-the two witnesses (Revelation 11:4-8) -for 1260 days; which is less by 17 days than the last three years and a half of the Beast’s reign. He had power to continue 42 months = 1260 days.* (*During this time his power remains unchecked. At its conclusion, after the witnesses are raised, the mystery of God will he finished, and divine power in judgment will commence its dealings with him and his constituents.) Martyrs there will be during his persecution (13:15; 15:2, 3), though probably not confined to Jewish saints; but a company of Jews will be kept on earth faithful throughout it (Revelation 14:1-3), who will be able to join in the special song of those in heaven who had been martyred by the Beast. The two witnesses unburied three days and a half will ascend to heaven, when the third woe will quickly come, and all heaven rejoice at the coming of the kingdom in power. 1263 days having elapsed, just 14 now remain for the Beast on earth, during which, I take it, the vials will be poured out, and the Lord (Revelation 19:1-21) appear to destroy him and Antichrist (2 Thessalonians 2:8), who, especially marked out for signal, condign, and everlasting punishment, are cast alive into the (not a) lake of fire (Revelation 19:20). During all this history, the ten tribes do not appear within the scope of the prophetic vision, which has for its sphere the Holy Land, and the Roman empire in its last form. God, however, I take it (Revelation 7:1-17), will have been working among them. Turning now to that power of the last days, called in Isaiah the Assyrian, and in Daniel the king of the north, the Jews being in their land, he will come down on them to possess it-this, the real solution of the eastern question, we have set forth in Old Testament prophecy. The Jews, in weakness and fear, make a covenant with the Beast for seven years (Isaiah 8:12; Isaiah 28:18; Daniel 9:27), but in the end to no purpose, as God has already forewarned them. For the northern power will enter the land after the apostasy is established by Antichrist, and will capture Jerusalem (Zechariah 14:1-2; Isaiah 29:1-4; Psalms 79:1-13), and go down into Egypt (Daniel 11:42-43). Whilst there tidings out of the north and the east troubling him, he returns with great fury. Are these tidings that the Beast has been destroyed by the Lord? Coming again to Jerusalem the second time, he is destroyed by the Lord (Zechariah 12:1-8; Isaiah 29:5-7; Isaiah 14:23; Isaiah 10:25; Isaiah 34:1-17; Joel 2:20; Psalms 76:1-12), and the prayer of Psalms 83:1-18 is answered. God’s glory displayed in judgment, the ten tribes are then brought back, so the whole nation is restored (Isaiah 18:7; Isaiah 11:11-16; Isaiah 66:20; Ezekiel 20:38). The temple, built by the Jews in unbelief, desecrated, and destroyed, will be rebuilt. In Ezekiel we see it, but read not of its being built. The prophet sees it all erected. Does the Lord do it (Zechariah 6:13)? The sessional judgment of Matthew 25:1-46 takes place, perhaps, about this time; after which Gog invades the land (Ezek. 38: 39.), when the people are dwelling securely. That cannot be till after the destruction of the northern power. Perhaps Isaiah 33:1-24 refers to this. Gog dealt with, peace outwardly will remain unbroken, till Gog of Revelation 20:1-15 comes against the camp of the saints and the beloved city-Satan’s last effort, to be signally and forever frustrated, and the way at last to be prepared for the new heavens and the new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness (2 Peter 3:1-18) ======================================================================== CHAPTER 172: VOL 03 - CURRENT DENIALS OF ETERNAL PUNISHMENT ======================================================================== Current Denials of Eternal Punishment THE shades of difference among those who do not believe in eternal punishment are numerous. They have been exposed very fully in F. W. Grant’s Facts and Theories as to a Future State, but one or two points have been pressed so as to present the subject in a comparatively fresh way in Scotland, in the public teaching of some ministers of the United Presbyterian denomination. It appears also, from the report of a recent sermon delivered in the Cathedral, Glasgow, that this view is being spread more widely than among the members of a denomination, and therefore some notice of the subject may be seasonable. This current view of the matter consists mainly of two parts -1st, that belief in the love of God renders it impossible to believe that He can punish forever any of " His erring children;" and 2d, that it is impossible to believe in an " eternity of sinning," but that to believe that " punishment is to be eternal means that sin is to be eternal," understanding sin in that sense of "eternity of sinning." It seems to me that a very little submission to Scripture serves to show that this view is founded upon a false idea of God’s love, that is, of God Himself; and also upon a thoroughly erroneous estimate of sin, which involves, consequently, a denial of the true condition of man as a sinner. There is also an additional incongruity in this sermon, viz. that of regarding eternal punishment as if it primarily referred to the Christian, or were intended to be a motive to Christian life; while the truth is that it has no relation to him personally at all, because Scripture declares that he "has been delivered from the wrath to come," and " shall not come into judgment." Perhaps this sermon lets us into a part of the secret of the ready reception of this false doctrine by many Christians, and reveals at the root of it the lurking fear that after all they may have to undergo punishment for sin. But besides a bad conscience, which always Makes us dread correction, it is only the lack of being established in the true grace of God which could permit the thought that one cleansed by the blood of Christ could become a subject of the punishment of sin. Thus either a lack of self-judgment, or a defective gospel preaching, or both, may lie at the root of the success of much of this evil. 1. The thought of God’s love, which is now put forward as a reason for non-eternity of punishment, when fully expressed, is, that the Cross reveals His character in such sense as that the gospel of Christ is " the gospel of God’s goodwill towards men;" that "His heart can never change towards the sinner or his sin," so that " He must always love the one and hate the other, and deal with the sin He hates so as to do good to the sinner He loves;" that, in other words, God as the Heavenly Father cannot punish "His erring children" after death with everlasting torment; finally, that " eternal love" cannot rest short of the highest good and blessedness of the object loved, and that good will triumph over ill, so that the universe will be purged from sin, and God will be all in all. Now all this assumes two things, viz. that God is nothing but love as far as man as an object is concerned, and that He is in the relationship of father to men as such. If these are disproved, the whole position falls to the ground. But the Cross is far more than a revelation of God’s love. It does show Him forth in love, His name be praised, as nothing else in the universe does, but inseparably associated with that there is in it also the display of His awful holiness, which made it necessary that sin must be estimated in the light of infinite purity and perfect obedience to God. It is in its entirety that it is a manifestation of God, and so we have no right, besides its being folly, to attempt to divide that display of Him, and accept a part as we please. His love is indeed manifested in giving His only begotten Son, but all the magnitude of that gift, and all the infinite value and unspeakable preciousness of that Son to the Father declare the terrible necessity for, and extent of; divine judgment against sin, as we perceive that He was forsaken of God on the Cross. What man can measure sin in this way? Who but Jesus possesses infinite holiness and perfect obedience to God? Yet without these, how can there ever be a just estimate of sin on the part of those who are creatures, and as such bound to be subject to God? But if God were only love,. why the display of His wrath against sin, such that we see it even visited on His Son when in human form and "made sin"? " My God, My God, why hast Thou forsaken me?" was His cry, in the midst of all the anguish of spirit, bodily suffering, and external horrors shown in the Scriptures. And, in His case, time or duration adds no element to the matter, for He then (being such an One as He was) entered in an infinite degree into the full character of and judgment against sin. It is in the nature of things impossible that any mere creature can ever do this. By nothing short of an eternity of suffering that judgment and the consequences of sin can man (apart from grace) ever reach a true estimate of what sin is. So the Lord’s. word, "Thou shalt by no means come out thence till thou hast paid the uttermost farthing," acquires a fearfully solemn force under such a consideration. It is, however, now urged that, because Christ has borne that judgment, therefore God must (or rather people undertake to say He will) give men the benefit of it in all time, and whatever their state. But this is not only gratuitous assumption, but also positive untruth. It is gratuitous assumption, for God announces in the gospel that He will apply the fruit of the Cross in grace only for a certain time; and how then dare men say that He must always go on applying it, and even to those who refuse it and die impenitent, or are declared disobedient to the gospel, when the Lord appears from heaven? See the solemn words in Luke 13:23-28; Matthew 25:10-12; Acts 17:30-31; 2 Thessalonians 1:6-10. It is false, because the fruit of the Cross is not even now presented as salvation to any apart from "the obedience of faith " in them. " Whom God has set forth a propitiation through faith in His blood," is what we read in the gospel, and consistently with this it is declared, " if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and believe in thine heart that God bath raised Him from the dead, thou shalt be saved." So the righteousness of God is "towards all," but is only "upon all who believe." There is no ground whatever then for the idea that God will apply the fruit of the Cross to impenitent sinners; but there is solid ground for the assurance that, when the day of grace has run its course, He will act in the severity of righteous judgment on the ungodly, and in holy wrath against sin and sinners who are, in part at any rate, its living embodiment. The Cross has not annihilated sin, as these men idly dream. Such a vindication of God’s nature and sovereign character as it affords was rendered necessary by man’s rebellion, and its consequences, even apart from the salvation of a single human soul. If any were to be saved it became doubly necessary, we may say. But it is entirely of God’s grace that it is constituted the basis of blessing to any from among sinful men, all being declared by it to be lost, and so that blessing cannot be theirs except on God’s terms. It is also the basis of the cleansing of the present system (" the heavens and the earth ") from sin in the future dispensation, and so sin will be "put away" only as regards this system, and this will be carried out partly by judgment on the ungodly. Sin is not annihilated, however, even then; and Php 2:9-11 cannot be confounded (as Mr. Macrae has attempted) with Ephesians 1:10 and Colossians 1:20, for these in speaking of the sphere which is to be " reconciled " and " headed up in Christ," expressly omit the infernal things (" things under the earth ") of Php 2:1-30, which will still exist apart, and will be compelled to " bow " to Him, and " own that He is Lord," even though His authority is known there only in righteous retribution. This is confirmed by the Scriptures, which speak of the time and scene where "God will be all in all," evil being practically excluded. For (1 Corinthians 15:23-28) this comes after the reign of Christ, who "must reign till He hath put all enemies under His feet; " and then, as Revelation 21:1-8 teaches, there will be a new heaven and a new earth in which righteousness will " dwell " (2 Peter 3:1-18), but existing apart from these will be "the lake of fire," the abode then (1:e. at the very time of which it is said " God is all in all ") of " the fearful, and the unbelieving, and the abominable, and murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars." The idea that men as men are His erring children, and that He is therefore in the relationship of " Heavenly Father " to such as Revelation 21:8 (for instance) speaks of, is a monstrous defamation of His character, and a clear contradiction of what Scripture says in describing the nature of those who are His children. See 1 John 3:2; 1 John 3:6; 1 John 3:9-10; 1 John 5:18. The New Testament makes it abundantly plain that those only are His children who are begotten again by the word of God, and who are the. " children of God by faith in Christ Jesus; " and the frequently-quoted passage in the Old Testament (Psalms 103:13), which applies the similitude of a father to Him, maintains the distinction between those in that relationship and the rest of mankind " Like as a father pitieth his children, so the Lord pitieth them that fear Him," But what about those who do not fear Him, but die hardened rebels against Him? Would these teachers have us believe that there is no difference between them? 2. It becomes plain, from an examination of the current view, that such a thought as the foregoing is really the conclusion to which it tends, and that it is founded also upon a thoroughly false idea of sin. The thought here is, that if sinners are supposed to exist forever as sinners, this is equivalent to our believing that God will uphold, as Himself the energy of it, eternal activity in sin. That " God will sustain in existence to all eternity creatures the sole end of whose existence has become active, implacable, and unchangeable hostility to Himself; " and that there must thus be " an eternity of sinning." Or as again put, " if sin’s punishment is to be eternal, it only means that sin is to be eternal-that it is to be possible for a human soul so to harden itself against the love of God as never to be softened, never to be won over from enmity to love, from estrangement to reconciliation." This is mixed up in the system (as developed by these teachers) with much that shows that immortality is confounded with eternal life (which thus to them means only eternal existence), and that the idea which it attaches to death is self- destructive when we see what Scripture teaches, viz., that it is the wicked who are already " dead " who undergo " the second death." That which the first change of condition, which is called " death," involves (see Luke 16:1-31), may therefore be taken in their case as an illustration of the meaning of the "second death" which they are to undergo. In the view of sin which is referred to, it is looked at as if it were something apart from man, a force acting on him from without, and urging him gradually into a state of hostility to God when he becomes a lost sinner and his case is hopeless. So we are told that " sin is the devil’s work," besides hearing about. " the sole end of the existence " of some creatures becoming active hostility to God, and also about the " human soul hardening itself against God so as never to be softened." Now this is fundamentally false. Sin may be said to be the. devil’s work only as regards its introduction into this world in which he was the active agent. But this was by presenting temptation to man. He did not make man a sinner, or compel him to sin. Man made himself such. " By one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin." God chose to create him a being of a certain order, under moral obligation, and with powers and capacities capable of enduring results, whether of good or ill. It is in the breach of his obligation and the consequent corruption of the moral springs of his being, with the addition of a new and ineradicable capacity, viz. the knowledge of good and evil, that man’s constitution as a sinner is found. So that it is now and here, not after an indefinite period of sinning, that. sinners are declared to be God’s enemies, " alienated, and enemies in their minds, by wicked works," as being possessors of and characterized by " the mind of the flesh," which "is enmity against God, for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be." It is, moreover, only now and here in this world that man has liberty to do these acts which manifest his enmity. But suppose that liberty taken away, does this effect any change in the man’s, condition morally? Does being shut up in prison even here make a man any less a criminal, or eradicate his desire to do evil? Does, the lack of power to do evil affect the will? Clearly not. So, although " an eternity of sinning," in the proper sense of the word is not possible, we are not therefore forced to conclude that there is nothing between that and pardon without repentance. But besides the denial that the principle of sin as to man is found in man’s will, really within man morally instead of outside him, or merely in his acts, what is denied by this system of noneternity of punishment is human moral responsibility. God is without doubt the sustainer of all things; but the false application of this which is thrust upon us is really destructive of the truth that in creating man He ordained a being in moral responsibility before Him, and necessarily therefore in full view of the unending character of the results of such responsibility. The blow is struck at this responsibility, for man naturally never relishes the thought of it, and there are many devices by which it is attempted to be thrown over on God. God is never the; energy of active sin, either in sinners now or after death-the. thought that He is is blasphemous-but He is the sustainer of the life of responsible beings, whose rebellion is not an easy way to rid themselves of their moral relation to Him (morally responsible because of the way in which He is their source and sustainer of life, see Genesis 2:1-25, Acts 17:28-31), but who must continue forever in that relation, whether in the blessedness which grace provides for the repentant or under the full consequences of their rebellion as such creatures. Nothing establishes the unchangeable character of the issues of responsibility as does the salvation of God. This is proved by the fact that (as Romans 3:21-26 teaches) it is the righteousness of God (and not primarily His love or mercy) that is manifested for sinners in the Cross, and He is thereby declared " just (not good or merciful merely), and the justifier of him that believeth in Jesus." For men are not saved by merely being acted upon from without by goodness, which changes by softening them into loving God and hating sin, simply thus changing the direction of their tendencies and the effort of their wills, but by grace ascribing to them the fruit of the work of the Cross, having first wrought in them the sense of their need as lost sinners, and, on the ground of its judgment being reckoned to them, replacing their old life and its nature by a new one of a different character which is communicated to them. The sentence on sin is not set aside in their case, but borne for them by the One who becomes their substitute. One consideration alone serves to write confusion on the spurious view of sin which is put forward, and this is that God is holy. But what He is, He is eternally; and holiness is separateness from evil which is known and abhorred. The idea, therefore, that He can have no eternal relation to evil in the way of punishment, which is the expression as well as the consequence of His eternal hatred of it, is simple ignorance or forgetfulness of what He is. Evil has necessarily always such a relation to Him as being that which He hates and is apart from; all that is contrary to Him is evil, and evil cannot be made good. So, when there are beings of an immortal spiritual order created (" the offspring of God" as to their human life), and evil finds its expression in them, they necessarily share the eternal doom of all that is contrary to God. If sin is the devil’s work, looking at its effects in this world, and Christ was manifested to annul his works and himself as to his power to do evil (it is not to save him that He was manifested), yet the lake of fire is not the devil’s work, or the means of his purification, but is his doom, with that of every form of evil, and it is never destroyed or even annulled for any who " go away" into it. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 173: VOL 03 - INSPIRATION AND REVELATION* ======================================================================== Inspiration and Revelation* WE have to avoid the wiles of Satan continually. His temptations are ever there in all we pass through; but there are some things which come more directly from him, errors by which he seeks to deceive Christians and undermine the truth, as Irving- ism, Puseyism, Rationalism. And these are to be met as coming directly from him. If we meet them thus we may expect help from God, while if tampered with in a friendly way we cannot. Such is the question which turns up on every hand around us now. Infidelity and the undermining the truth and the authority of the word are rampant. It does not surprise the Christian acquainted with Scripture; it confirms his faith in it, because he is warned there that it would be so. It is his painful experience however, but Scripture has taught him that in the last days perilous times would come. (*A review of Dr. Marcus Dods’ sermon Inspiration and Revelation, with a preface (Edinburgh: 1877); and the System of Rationalism of Dr. Ewald, of which it is a popular echo.) The active mind of Germany has been the officina, the workshop, of this in various phases in these latter years-Paulus and Strauss and Bauer, and the rationalists from Semler and Eichhorn down; and England and other countries have been infected with it. Scotland, through the forms of its church government, has recently been most openly under the public eye. I have nothing to do with the church matters of that little section of Christendom which made itself conspicuous in Europe, by a public claim to purity and disinterestedness beyond others, nor have I to do with what is expedient for United Presbyterians if the question arises there. Their internal affairs are no concern of others, save as the Christian must care for everything that concerns Christ’s truth and Christ’s people. Nor do I expect them to listen to Dr. M’Cosh advising the rationalists to leave and set up for themselves. If Satan is at work, as I have no doubt he is, honesty is not what you are to expect. But the question concerns every Christian. Dr. M’Cosh has told them,* what every one outside themselves can see, that the principal dissenting bodies in Scotland, and eminently the Free Church, are on their trial. It is not merely, as Dr. M’Cosh says, " What are the churches to do?" nor is any " shrewdness " required in the matter. The question is, What are those who believe that Scripture is inspired to do when Rationalism (Broad Churchism, as Dr. M‘Cosh calls it after its English name) has reared its head and infected the ecclesiastical bodies of the country, and when, as in the case of the Free Church, though it suspended Mr. Smith as professor, they are really trifling with the faith?-the latter, in the last form the question has taken, having shelved the matter by what is called moving the previous question.** (*In his pamphlet Broad Churchism in Scotland.) (**This paper having been long delayed, action has been taken since. Being out of the country I cannot state what with accuracy. [It was published in a pamphlet form before the case was decided.-ED.]) I do not trust in churches; I do not know which of them is to be trusted. Is Rome or Greece, is the Lutheran-the very seat of infidelity-or the reformed, who are in the same state? Holland is far worse than Dr. M’Cosh represents it; the well-known converted Jew Dr. Capadose left it a few years ago because it was universally infidel; France is notorious. Will the Anglican, with its Puseyism and. Broad Church- ism, give me rest? or now, Scotland falling into the same track of heartless indifference to the truth? " Ephraim has gray hairs here and there upon him, and he knoweth it not." The attack on the word of God is not from heathens as of old, or open infidels, but from the bosom of Christendom itself. Men who are called its ministers are undermining the confidence of the simple in what was the basis of their faith, the true basis of all faith, the word of God. " If it were an open enemy, I could have borne it; but it was thou, my companion, mine own familiar friend." They tell you they believe in the Bible, nay, in inspiration, only taking up literary questions. It is false; utterly false. None can deny that it is but the crambe repetita-the dishing up afresh- what is borrowed from the Eichhorns (though he is now left far behind), the De Wettes, Bleeks, Ewalds, Riehms, Grafs, Knobels, Bertheauts, and a host of others, to say nothing of Kuenen, who avows himself a Unitarian and ready to join with Jews, only they would not probably do so at present. I have not read all these. But I have read some of them. It is all one system. Some more insolent and bold, as Graf and Kuenen and De Wette (though there was in his history and views, it would seem, a drawing to the truth of Christ as he went on, which was interesting). But I do not speak of the individuals, knowing none of them. I speak of a regular system unfolded in their books, and now propagated by professors and ministers of the Free Church of Scotland. They differ from each other in details; nay, you must know what edition you read of the principal ones, or you will be stating something false about them. But this is not really the question. They all develop a system which destroys the authority of the word of God, which denies it comes from Him to us. This is attempted to be denied, and covered up, and softened down, not to frighten honest minds, not to say Christian ones, too soon. But this is only Satan’s craft, and if they who talk of literary inquiries into the history of the sacred writings believe really that we have God’s revelation, they must know that this system undermines it, that it denies that we have God’s revelation on God’s authority. I shall proceed to show this. There are two systems in the main, if you take thoroughgoing destructives as Graf and others (De Wette grew somewhat more sober); that Deuteronomy was the first book written, and in Josiah’s time, or a little before, but produced then by the high priest; and that the legal enactments of the Pentateuch were added after the Babylonish captivity, Moses’ name being used to secure the priestly influence established in them. I suppose this is not inspiration. According to Ewald, the great body of these laws was drawn up by a priest very soon after the building of the temple by Solomon. This is the " Book of Origins." He admired greatly the character of the writing which is the production of a great and elevated genius aroused by the reigns of David and Solomon. This, too, was to enforce the priests’ rights and authority. This history includes the creation, to which, being of an elevated mind, he could look back, and went on to the history of the Judges’ time, but this is lost, and was very briefly related; for he tells us what parts of it are clearly lost. But he holds there was before this a book of covenants which recorded various covenants of Abraham and Abimelech, and Isaac and Jacob, etc., and Exodus 20:1-26; Exodus 21:1-36; Exodus 22:1-31; Exodus 23:1-33. This was written about Samson’s time. Even before this there were written documents, as songs, and the book of the wars of the Lord, and of Jasher. After the Book of Origins, the great work of Solomon’s time, there were in his earlier editions a third and fourth, in the last a third, fourth, and fifth writer, to complete the recovery and collection of the old traditions, adding and connecting and modifying, and, besides this, one who puts all together and added some passages to make a rounded whole of it. Bleek is certainly soberer in his judgment of details, but he does not in the least believe in the inspiration of the word of God. None of them ever thinks of such a thing. The difficulty of showing it in positive statements arises, as far as any exists, from their taking it for granted there is none. Nothing of the kind ever crosses their minds. Even Lange, so much thought of, speaks of it in his Life of Christ as an obsolete thing which hindered all development of the truth. But before I show from Ewald and Bleek the real character of the system-and I choose the most capable and respected (indeed, Ewald may be taken as the most complete, and as a representative of the moderate system; as Kuenen, Graf, and others whom I have not read, of the daring and open contempt of the word of God, Bleek as the most sober of all); but, I repeat--for none regard the Scriptures as the oracles of God-according to none of them can man live, as the Savior teaches us (quoting Deuteronomy as authority against Satan, and silencing him by it) by words which proceed out of the mouth of God. But I shall begin nearer home with the sermon of Dr. Marcus Dods and his excusing preface. Dr. Dods goes so far as to admit that when prophets say, "Thus saith the Lord," a revelation has been made to them. Would he allow me to ask him, Has none been made to us, when the prophets say: " Thus saith the Lord?" This you will not find from Dr. Dods. Happily, if we do not find it from him, we can from such words find it out without him. But the whole point lies there; is there a revelation to us? How God revealed the truth to the prophet is not, as he would have us believe, in question at all. No one can tell how, save as, in some cases, told us in Scripture (Numbers 12:6; Numbers 12:8). But how the word of the Lord came to them, those to whom it has not thus come are not likely to know. Nor do I believe a prophet could explain it to one who had not experienced it. The question is: Is it the word of God for me as given out by the prophet? Well, if " Thus saith the Lord" be true, it clearly is; though Dr. Dods will not say so. " Similarly of the apostles," adds Dr. Dods, " I, of course, believe they are the authoritative teachers of the church, and that in order to fit them to be so, special revelations were made to them." Is what they have written the word of God to us? This is the question. Paul tells us very distinctly how the matter stood. God has given to us "not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit which is of God; that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God. Which things also we speak not in the words which man’s wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth." And he adds the third step too. " The natural man receiveth, not the things of the Spirit of God; for they are foolishness unto him, neither can he know them because they are spiritually discerned."’ (*And note here, there is a difference between revelation and inspiration, a point for many reasons I should insist on. But revelation is to the divine vessel or instrument; inspiration is the communication he makes of it. The spiritual apprehension is in him who personally profits by it.) We may compare the words of the Lord in the special case of their answering before magistrates: " Take no thought how or what ye shall speak, for it shall be given you in that same hour what ye shall speak. For it is not ye that speak, but the Spirit of your Father which speaketh in you." The theory of these doctors is that the gracious Lord would put words in the mouth of His servants for their difficulties; but in what was to be truth for the church in all times, the basis of its faith, and its security against error, direct communication (I do not say revelation) to us of the truth was not so made by those to whom He made the revelation of it for that purpose. Dr. Dods does not deny that in the case of the prophets men had revelations made to them; but he does carefully distinguish between this and the inspiration of the Scriptures, and distinctly denies that any revelation is made by them to us. Now, in the case of the prophets, the matter is palpable, and he shirks it in the sermon, and confines it to a revelation to thaw?, in the preface, and as to the apostles says: " In their case, also, I desire, as Paul himself obviously did, to bring the revelations made by God into the foreground, and to allow the inspired state of the human mind to fall back into a secondary place." This is very poor special pleading. Of course Paul’s business was not to explain a " theory of inspiration." Who thinks it was? But when the revelations were brought into the foreground, who received them then? to whom did they, or do they, become revelations? That I need to be spiritual to enjoy them is true; or, if it be gospel to a sinner, grace to work in bringing it home to him. But that is another question. But if Paul brought the revelation unadulterated, not corrupting the word of God, for so he calls it, into the foreground (that is, in his communication of it to others, I suppose, according to the measure of their spirituality), they received it; that is, the revelation he brought into the foreground, the revelation he had received himself. It was to this end it was so given to him. " When it pleased God who separated me from my mother’s womb, and called me by His grace, to reveal His Son in me, that I might preach Him among the heathen." And his boast is that through the Spirit he brought it to others as pure as he had received it himself (see the end of 2 Corinthians 2:1-17 and 2 Corinthians 4:2). Of course the revelation of truth was the thing of importance. But revelation to whom? If to the hearers or readers, it was God’s word to them as the apostles and prophets had received it. Thank God! I only recall here in passing the utter absurdity of a theory, which would tell us that God, willing in grace to give a revelation to the whole church, and, in some respects, to all men, gives it in such a way that, as a revelation, it goes no farther than the one to whom it is communicated. It is a very convenient system for the clergy, who may desire that we should believe all that they give us as authoritative teachers, but a poor case for us Christians that we have no revelation from God. Our good friends will say, Were not the apostles authoritative teachers? Surely; but they tell us how and why. " For this cause, also, thank we God without ceasing, because, when ye received the word of God which ye heard of us, ye received it not as the word of men, but as it is in truth, the word of God, which effectually worketh also in you that believe." (1 Thessalonians 2:13). They imparted to them the gospel of God. It was " not yea and nay, but in Him was yea;" yea " all the promises of God" were; and Peter took care they should have the things "in remembrance," and John wrote his epistle that they " might believe." There were not only authoritative teachers, which no Christian denies; but we have what was authoritatively taught, and was, and is, the word of God. Either we have what was revealed to Paul or others as purely and as fully as he received it, as he asserts (2 Corinthians 2:17); or, the authoritative teachers being gone, we have no authoritative word of God at all. Nor had they directly then. Nor has, in fact, Dr. Dods any, as I will plainly show a little farther on. But before I turn to his more direct subject, the historical part, there is another point I may notice, which refers also to the subject we have been upon. Dr. Dods believes the prophets when they say, " Thus saith the Lord." Now in the greater part of the Pentateuch (and he will ".contend for the historic credibility of the narratives"), we find, "And the Lord spake unto Moses," very commonly adding, " Speak unto Aaron," or " to the priests," or "to the children of Israel, and say unto them," etc. Is this true? If so, we have, not a revelation of God in history credibly reported, but the word of God revealed to us. So in Deuteronomy we find " These be the words which Moses spake unto all Israel," and then (chap. 4.) he says, "Ye shall not add unto the word which I command you, neither shall ye diminish ought from it, that ye may keep the commandments of the Lord your God, which I command you." Is it true? or did he deceive them or not? If not, all the commandments which are inseparable in the four last books from the history, and the history with them, are the word of God. If it is not true, or he deceived himself, or meant to deceive others, we have no sure warrant for the history, nor any revelation of God at all. If it be true, we have the revelation made by God to Moses. I do not insist on the absurdity of a system which makes the words of the prophets in warning to the Jews, and in statements occupied with their history and future hopes as a nation a revelation from God; and the account of the fall of man, the promises, the law, the judgment of the whole world-a subject infinitely more important to us all-no revelation at all The absurdity of it stares every intelligent Christian in the face. And now, to turn directly to the Historical part of Scripture, Dr. Dods’ theory is that God has revealed Himself in certain great acts, as the flood. These are revelation, and we have a credible history of them.* (*In the Bible, then, we meet with two things-God’s revelations of Himself, and the literature in which these revelations are recounted and preserved. Speaking of the flood, he says: "That is the revelation, and the Bible gives us an account of this revelation.") Dr. Dods ignores here the word of God, and the operation of the Spirit of God in every way, and represents in a way utterly false the documents he is speaking of. Speaking of Paul’s writings he says: " I may not be able at once to accept all he teaches; I cannot accept it merely because it comes to me with authority. I can only accept in doctrine that which fits itself in with my previously received ideas and my stage of mental growth.".... " Having accepted Paul or any one as an authoritative teacher, it is of course at my own risk I disagree with him in any one particular." Can there be a more complete denial that it is the word of God, or our having any revelation from God? Who in his senses would talk of disagreeing with God in any particular? Unless, with strange inconsistency, it be the inferior revelation of prophets, Dr. D. has no revelation from God at all. Next, it must "fit itself in with my previously received ideas, and my stage of mental growth." Could it not possibly correct your previously received ideas, Dr. Dods? If the ideas which Paul gives us are God’s ideas, do you not think they might? As to mental growth, I find, if it is mere man’s mind, He hides these things from the wise and prudent, and reveals them unto babes; He chooses the foolish things to confound the wise. That there is progress in divine knowledge no one denies, and that we need the Holy Ghost to apprehend spiritual things, I fully recognize; but in Dr. Dods’ statement, neither as to source nor power, is there the smallest recognition of God as to our receiving what is in Scripture. What Dr. Dods would have is to " apprehend the distinction between these two things-God’s revelation of Himself, and the narrative or record of that revelation in the Bible " (p. 12). There is no revelation in the narrative, note. So (preface, p. 6) " All that we need contend for is the historic credibility of the narrative." It will be said, he only refers to "a special theory of inspiration." He does in order to reject the plenary inspiration of Dr. Hodge, but his theory is a theory of no inspiration, but of historic credibility. So far as the historical contents of Scripture are concerned (we have spoken of the prophets and apostolic writings), "revelation stands firm, though there should prove to be no such thing as inspiration." Now this is absurd in principle; and Dr. Dods’ statements false in fact, and false as to the ground of reception. Paul tells us all or every Scripture is given by inspiration of God. I do not go through the proofs rapidly summed up in the tract "Have we a Revelation from God? "* but no honest man can deny that Christ and the apostles quote all parts of the Scriptures as inspired. Perhaps Dr. Dods may not agree with them; but if he does not, he does " wait with a warning over his head." He may be assured of that. (*Reprinted from Vol. I. Bible Witness and Review.) But his moral theory is all false. Truth is presented to the conscience, and the conscience reached; but the effect, according to Scripture, is to believe the message and the messenger. The woman of Samaria did not answer the Lord, when her conscience was reached, Who told you that? by what historical document, or story of another first witness, do you know that? but, " Sir, I perceive that thou art a prophet." Her convinced soul recognized the divine authority and source of the word spoken to her. The noble ones of Berea, when it was the general truth of Christ, searched the Scriptures whether those things were so; they recognized their authority; " therefore many of them believed." Their inquiry was not whether the new truth " fitted in with their previously received ideas." Most certainly it did not (it is always fresh truth which tests the faith of the heart); but whether it fitted in with the Scriptures, the certain word of God, the revelation of God. Fresh truth which calls for faith never can be part of the historical revelation of God, or it would not be fresh. It will never be inconsistent with, but confirm, what was previously revealed. The truth previously received one may adhere to, and pride one’s self in, and reject the new. " The time cometh when he that killeth you will think that he doeth God service. But these things they will do unto you, because they have not known the Father nor Me." I do not doubt we have all revealed truth in Scripture. In these " perilous times " we are referred to the Scriptures and expressly as inspired of God-certainly not to my previously received ideas. And we have the promise " they shall be all taught of God." Dr. Dods recognizes neither. Further, Dr. Dods refers to the narrators in the New Testament as claiming no other ground, but that of being eye-witnesses, referring to the common objection of infidels, namely, what is said in the beginning of Luke. Now that the Lord in gracious condescension did use eye-witnesses, so that men should have no excuse for not believing, is most true and precious; but that the credibility of Scripture statements is " grounded not on any inspiration " is utterly false. I will not rest on Origen’s comment on Luke’s words that the others had taken it in hand as men, and Luke’s was divinely undertaken in contrast with that. But, in the first place, Luke states exactly the contrary of what Dr. Dods says: " not," he says, " in any inspiration which could give him a knowledge of events of which he could not in any other way be cognizant, but upon the ordinary grounds of belief in history, namely, that he had his facts from those who were eye-witnesses." "Many," he says, "having taken in hand to set forth the things most surely believed among us, even as they delivered them, who from the beginning were eye-witnesses of the Word, it seemed good to me also, having had perfect understanding of all things from the very first " (παρηχολουθχότι ἄνωθεν, the word being the same as that used by Paul to Timothy, 2 Timothy 3:10, with the addition of &cagy). The others had related the history as delivered by eye-witnesses. But this did not satisfy Luke; so he wrote his Gospel having perfect knowledge of everything. But note here that it is not merely inspiration for the knowledge of facts which is denied, but such a guarding of the writer as should preserve him from writing a false account. It was " the ordinary grounds of belief in history." Now the Lord expressly speaks of both grounds as to the apostles. The Holy Ghost would come and testify of Christ; " and ye also shall bear witness, because ye have been with Me from the beginning." Nor is this all. In John 14:1-31 the Lord says to His disciples: " He, the Comforter, shall teach you all things, and bring all things to your remembrance, whatsoever I have said unto you." Dr. Dods puts as the ground of confidence a spiritual state in the apostles which made them sensitive to everything in Him which was of the highest value. We are in a spiritual region because we are in the hands of spiritual men. They had the Spirit of Christ, and so coincided with Him as to what was important. Now this shows the hollowness of all this theory. Dr. Dods has given up inspiration in the history of Christ, and even guidance, so that they should not commit errors, and we are cast upon the apostles coinciding with Christ, being spiritual men. When? When they saw all the things which passed in His life down here. What does Dr. Dods himself tell us? " We can scarcely suppose that the Evangelists saw all that had to be seen in Christ, but we can only see through them." But then they must coincide with Him, and see as important what He saw as important. Now, through grace they believed He was the Christ and had the words of eternal life, and clung to Him. But will Dr. Dods show me one single instance where they entered into His mind, where they understood Him, or if they did, did not remain entirely opposed to what He told them? " We have no bread," when the Lord warned them against the leaven of Pharisees or others. " Hath any one brought Him ought to eat?" when, rejected in Judea, the blessed Lord’s heart was expanding through the opening blessing that reached out beyond it through the conversion of one, a stranger to covenant and promise, and had meat to eat that they knew not of. And when He told them that He should die and rise again, "they were exceeding sorry," and again, " That be far from thee, Lord." One sole instance we have, a heart whose affections rose with the rising hatred of the Jews just ready to kill Him, and spent the best she had in lowliness on Him; and this was to be told wherever the gospel was to be preached-a solitary case, so strange to Him who looked for comforters and found none-and it has been. And even after the resurrection they say on the road with Him, "We trusted that it had been He which should have. redeemed Israel;" and the apostles most closely bound up with Him and with one another saw (were eye-witnesses, Dr. Dods), and believed, for as yet they knew not the Scriptures that He must rise from the dead, and went home again and that was all about it for them. And another woman, clinging to His empty grave (all the world was to her if He was not there), is made to the apostles themselves the messenger of the highest privileges the saint can have, from the lips of Jesus Himself. Then, after that, He opened their understanding that they might understand the Scriptures; but He assured them, too, that "blessed are they that have not seen and yet have believed." Were they, before He made them understand the Scriptures?-" Mainly this, that they had the revelation at first hand, that they were the men before whom the revelation was made, and who were so impressed with it, and saw its meaning as to be moved to preserve and perpetuate this impression for the sake of others?" What does John tell us in one case? " These things understood not His disciples at the first; but when Jesus was glorified, then remembered they that these things were written of Him, and they had done these things unto Him" (John 12:16). Impossible for anything to be more contrary to Scripture, or I must add greater insensibility to the sweetness and true history of that Bread which came down from heaven, than the statements of Dr. Dods. And, if it were only after He was glorified that they could tell the wondrous tale, and have told it to us, blessed be God It was not that they were impressed with it while He was there and saw its meaning; but that the Holy Ghost was come down from heaven, and they gave us a history of the Son of God, and Son of man, as none but the Holy Ghost could give, or make us understand and delight in. Dr. Dods’ theory and principle are utterly false. Nothing but the utter darkness of man’s mind and heart could give us such a statement as that it was spiritually valuing what He valued that made them competent witnesses; that it was those who were most in sympathy with the purposes of God and who were most imbued with His own Spirit, who were best prepared to see and recount His revelations. But it is every way false. First, who could tell them of a glorified Christ? They could follow Him to the cloud; the angels told them He would come again; but what about Him while He was away? The Comforter would come and take the things of Christ and show them to them. All things that the Father had were His: therefore He said, "He shall receive of Mine and shall show it unto you." Where were the eye-witnesses now? Yet, sweet as it is when at peace through His precious blood to dwell and feed on that Bread come down from heaven, and attractive in itself even to the sinner, the blessing is to look upon not the things that are seen, but the things that are not seen, which are eternal, to set our affections on things above, not on things on earth. Where is our Livy or Thucydides, as they miserably say, for this? Hence Dr. Dods tells us what we have got by Paul’s teaching is, "spirit supersedes law "-rather poor Presbyterian teaching; but that is all he can lead us to find in it. " This is the ultimate teaching the world needs or can have." Is there nothing of the person and glory of Christ and God’s purposes in Him? I find Him telling me that eye indeed " hath not seen, nor ear heard, neither have entered into the heart of man the things which God hath prepared for them that love Him; but God hath revealed them to us by His Spirit: for the Spirit searcheth all things, yea, the deep things of God. For what man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him? even so, the things of God knoweth no man but the Spirit of God. Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the Spirit which is of God; that we might know the things which are freely given to us of God. Which things also we speak." Now it is quite clear that all these blessed things on which our affections are to be set, where our conversation (our πολίτευμα) is, are known only by the revelation of the Spirit. For Dr. Dods all is simply "spirit supersedes law." Besides, Christianity is the ministration of the Spirit (2 Colossians 3:1-25.), and the veil on Moses is done away in Christ; and thus the sacrifices, the patterns of things in the heavens, and the whole scheme hidden in the shadows of the law, have their true force given to them through a suffering and glorified Christ, sitting at the right hand of God the Father till He comes again, His enemies being made His footstool, With all this history has nothing to do. It is all revealed and understood solely by the Spirit of God. There can be no history of the facts and glory of heaven. What could be heard when one went there could not be revealed at all; and the history we may in one sense have of it has no sense for us till it ceases to be history and becomes shadows of better things which the Spirit opens up to us in them. But even in the earthly part, to spiritual intelligence the operation of the Holy Ghost in the Gospels, in the revelation of Christ on earth, is as plain as in the heavenly part. The four Gospels reveal Him in four distinct characters, as has been long ago remarked-(1) Emmanuel-Messiah; (2) the Servant-Prophet; (3) the Son of man in grace (after the two first chapters showing Israel’s and the remnant’s position); (4) the Word made flesh, eternal life in the Son of God, and at the close, the other Comforter, the Spirit, promised. And in each Gospel the Holy Ghost calls up before us, through the mind of the Evangelist, what presents the Lord in the character it treats of. Take the closing scene: all is power and divine in John without suffering in Gethsemane and on the cross; in Matthew the sheep dumb before his shearers, the suffering victim without a comforter all’ through; in Luke more suffering expressed in Gethsemane, none on the cross: there all was grace and confidence. Mark is substantially here the same as Matthew; he takes the place of suffering instead of active service. The mission of the disciples is distinct in each Gospel. Into all this I cannot enter here, but it is not as eye-witnesses we have the accounts. Matthew was present when all went backward and fell to the ground, but tells us nothing about it. John was nearer to Christ when in an agony, but it is not his subject. John was one of those that slept, but there is not a word of it. Mark was not, but tells us all about it. Who told them the infancy of the Lord? If we believe Lange, it was Mary, with plenty of nonsense about it. The Lord Jesus, the Son of God, the Word made flesh, was worthy of one historian, alone capable of writing His history, the Spirit of God; happy those who were made the instruments of doing it! No Christian denies that the twelve, at least, were eye-witnesses, and he appreciates God’s grace in it in dealing with men. But none but an infidel as to God’s revelation denies the operation of the Spirit of God in the testimony they have given. It remains for me to speak of the history of the Old Testament, before. I show what the principles of this school are, a school with which Dr. Dods has fully identified himself, not only in general principles, but in the whole scheme on which these principles are carried out. My reader need not suppose I charge Dr. Dods with agreeing with them in details, for no two of them agree. Dr. Bleek, for example, declares Ewald’s as utterly unproved and ungrounded. So Ilgen’s, of which I only know by report. But these details merely refer to the dates at which the different histories of which the Pentateuch is compiled were written. There are in the main two schools, one making Deuteronomy the first book, and the body of the Pentateuch worked up after the Captivity, with some Mosaic tradition, but no regular book of law till Josiah’s time (that there was no regular book of the law is pretty much Bleek’s view too); the others that the body of the laws are Mosaic, though not written by him, save a song or two and register of journey, Deuteronomy, with Joshua coming in their natural order. But all leave a revelation by Moses entirely out of the question, indeed all revelation; and it is to this system in its actual form, in the note to p.18, Dr. Dods gives his adherence, besides insisting in the text on the infidel principle of it. The Bible is not a revelation, but a record of the historic facts in which God has revealed Himself; such as the flood, etc. Now all this is as shallow and poor as can be. We have an ordinary historical account "the ordinary grounds of belief in history." But first, by the historical writers of Scripture, Dr. Dods does not mean what we have actually in Scripture at all-that is merely an account compiled out of them; at any rate, " not always those who brought the books into their final state, but those, whoever they were, who first recorded the revelations made." One thing is never thought of in any shape-God’s having anything to do with the record. The prime requisite is knowledge of these facts at first hand. But this we have not got at all, "Whoever they were!" Some fragments may be preserved, songs and genealogies, and different documents, a very few from the first hand, and these curtailed, added to, fashioned according to the thoughts of those " who brought the books into their final shape." So that what we have got may be as to a part of the history from the first hand, whoever he was, but may not be. But at any rate " brought into shape," so that "first hand" we certainly have not! But there are other serious difficulties. Though there are important facts revealing God’s ways, the greater part of the historical books are not composed of facts at all. They are laws, exhortations, promises, warnings, prophecies, institutions, which were the shadow of good things to come-feasts which prefigured great future dealings of God; things purposely ordered to be patterns of things in the heavens; God’s estimate of men, the conduct of men as laying the ground of God’s ways with them, and that often of the deepest instruction and the finest development of motives in men, and in God as to His government: the elements, as in Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, of God’s future dealings; personages who came out involving immense principles of God’s dealings in otherwise trifling incidents, and principles and relationships which run through God’s ways on to glory, yet with no great revelation of God in the acts themselves, as for instance Melchisedec; things which " happened unto them for examples, and are written for our admonition upon whom the ends of the world are come." There seems a purpose here in their being written. Whose? Of those who first recorded the revelations, in all these details, or those who brought the books into their final shape? or of God in His wise and holy counsel? But I have some further inquiry to make on this statement that God gave revelations of Himself in His acts, and then we have a credible account of them from eye-witnesses at first hand. Take Dr. Dods’ example, the flood. What eye-witness gave us the account of this, or of the Tower of Babel-nay, even of Abraham’s altars, of Jacob’s wrestling? Did Adam record for the benefit of his posterity his disobedience and sin, and exclusion from Paradise, and the barring of the way back to the tree of life on which the whole history of man, and Satan, and redemption, and mediately or immediately judgment, depends? What "first hand" wrote the ordinary credible history of what passed in the garden? We may go farther, if need be, to do so. Has Dr. Dods got the morning stars and the sons of God who shouted for joy to give us a credible history of creation?* Was any one there to hear, " Let us make make man in our image?" (*The tabernacle, some of these doctors tell us, could not have been made or exist in the wilderness, did not in the land, as the history of the nation proves, but was invented, being copied from the temple when it was known. This shows the importance of the principle, for it was made after the pattern in the mount, and is so treated in the Epistle to the Hebrews.) But why should I continue? Was ever such senseless stuff? Whether we consider the delicate shades of thought in a thousand cases, small events of the utmost import, statements of what God thought and said, and a multitude of facts which no eye had seen, and all forming part of an immense scheme of God as to man, and His glory in Christ, and gathering together all things in Him, every part of the record, which, thank God, we do possess, shows the gross and senseless absurdity of the whole scheme. I shall show what the authors of this system, those from whom all this is drawn, and whose system is substantially accepted in Dr. Dods’ note, to which I have referred, make of these " Urkunde and Quellschriften," those who first recorded the revelations; but I thought it best first to take up Dr. Dods’ statements themselves as he presents them. He does not go so far as the gravest of them as to the prophets; he carefully confines himself to the historical books, and I have done so. Divine and interesting as the prophets are, the history contained in Genesis is of far more importance to us. Of this, according to the system, we have no revealed record, but only what rests on the ordinary grounds of historic credibility; and, moreover, in cases where the whole place of man with God depends on it, and redemption has all its sense from it, we cannot possibly have any such history at all. Does the revelation of the thoughts, and what I may call the private thoughts, of God, rest on the ordinary grounds of historic credibility? It is puerile absurdity, an infidel rejection of what Christ and the apostles have told and taught us as to these books; while the saint who has to live by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God, that word which pierces to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, has no such word to look to at all. I turn to Ewald and Bleek, leaving aside Kuenen and Graf, whom I may call openly infidel. Ewald shows at once his view of the matter. The beginning of his " Geschichte Israels " is a dissertation on the nature of legend; how it develops itself, and the forms it takes under various circumstances; in fact, a mere abstract statement of what he is going to tell us of the Bible, and drawn from his view of it. I leave aside. the references to the Book of the Wars of the Lord, and a supposed account of Moses’ life,* to one of which the Scriptures themselves refer, as not material, to come to his first larger source of the history, the " Book of Covenants." (*He refers what is said of Jethro to this,. and I think this only.) Here all refers to covenants-Jacob. and Laban, Isaac and Abimelech, Abraham and Abimelech-showing restless and unsettled times. This, therefore, will have been written in the time of the Judges,. in the latter half of the period, or more exactly at the beginning of Samson’s rule, etc. But Genesis 49:1-33 leads to a closer knowledge of the time. This flows entirely from seeing the twelve tribes as they dwelt scattered in Canaan in the time of the Judges. Nothing could describe in a more lively way their then state than this song. Deuteronomy 33:1-29, which was a copy of it made in the time of kingly rule to fill up the felt want in that of Genesis, shows it was made earlier, when Israel’s unity was not established. But verses 16-18, where Dan is spoken of most exactly, show us the time, as they clearly refer to Samson’s time and his being in the judge’s office, describing his heroic dealing against the Philistines; and in a note it is added, as also among the Arabs the image of a warrior as a serpent is largely developed. And the more certainly this position of the tribe under Samson was soon over, so the more surely must such an utterance be written down during the short happy elevation of Samson. So the state of things related in Judges 1:1-36. is evidently the state of things in the time of the composer-a state already so fully changed under the Kings, that the " Book of Origins" sketches a totally different picture of Joshua’s and Moses’ days. The stream of accounts handed down flowed more richly, as we might expect, when no more important time had eclipsed them. So the legends as to the patriarchs were taken up into this work evidently circumstantially, and with remembrances whose completeness subsequently constantly suffers. Their time was so distant from that of the composer’s that he could there venture on a higher artistic presentation with poetic freedom. That the dying man had a clearer sight, and specially a dying patriarch could cast his view over the future of his posterity, was the view of all antiquity. And so the composer dared to bring in the dying Jacob as a higher voice of pure truths to be spoken of all the tribes. As he had to praise and sharply blame some of them on seeing the state of the scattered tribes with a troubled heart, his spirit takes refuge in* the memory of the patriarch Jacob and it. (*Or "goes off to," fluchtete.) Not only Moses’ blessing, Deuteronomy 33:1-29, but such utterances as Genesis 48:15-19; Genesis 27:27-29; Genesis 27:39 ff. Numbers 23:1-30 f. depend entirely on this model. Now I ask if, in all this account of the recorders of the first revelation of God, there is the smallest sign of God’s Spirit, or of anything coming from God at all? It is purely a human composition, not a contemporary one; and if there be an allusion to an event which the professed author puts forth as a prophecy, it is a proof that it was written at the time prophesied of. That is, there is a complete denial of all inspiration. From this author we have the decalogue, only without the reference to the seventh day to the creation which was added by the author of the "Book of Origins." But that blessing of Jacob’s shows a genuine prophetical spirit, so in the conclusion of covenant with God, Exodus 23:20-23 He adopted older songs, already written down, into his work, as Exodus 15:1-19. Numbers 21:17, profiting by the above mentioned Wars of the Lord. " On the other hand, it is impossible to think that such verses as Jacob’s blessing, Genesis 49:1-33, springs from anything else than mere artistic power in composition." I add this part as showing what genuine prophetic spirit means. So we must regard a considerable part of the Mosaic laws as got from old writings, which must be from an earlier date as he introduces them as communicated to Moses by God after the decalogue to be laid before the people. " The Book of Jasher " contained songs which furnished abundant materials in historical songs. It was an historical book of instruction without connected history. It was written in the beginning of Solomon’s reign. This brings us to the Book of Origins, written, says Ewald, at that time. Only I must add (124) that Exodus 20:23; Exodus 23:19 was introduced into the Book of Covenants. But what I have given as to the "Book of Covenants" may suffice. " The Book of Origins," Ewald tells us, was a much larger work than " the Book of Covenants," and more recent, belonging to the reign of the early kings, which gives its whole character and we have much larger fragments of it. The date is clear from the way in which, in the midst of describing the time of the in his time, and specially in the northern kingdom, a number of books like the " Book of Origins," and not a few highly esteemed, were current, but not in the least heeded by the government. But this stream of myriads of written laws could not be very old.* (*In the English translation we read: I have written to them the great things,”רׅבֵּו of my law. Ewald translates " great things," 1;1 myriads, and I suppose does not heed my law חּו֗רׇחִ٠.) This expression of Hosea’s shows that such writings at first had no public recognition, but as free products of skill in authorship were current for centuries among the people, and some of them, perhaps, had won a higher consideration and become holy, and so must we evidently think of the " Book of Origins." This specially as regards the origin of the Mosaic sanctuaries and institutions and the rights of the priestly race, and as it paints all that was of law and rights as having its origin in the first beginning of the olden time (Urzeit); so also in that account sets it forth with so much the greater diligence and development, so that it should be valid at the present time (David and Solomon) as pattern and rule. So it was, he tells us, with the Indian Puranas. So, as the previous writer (Book of Covenants) had his point of departure from the idea of the covenant established in Sinai; so the " Book of Origins" undertakes to show what divine laws and covenants had their origins already in the beginning of the previous ages under Abraham, Noah, and Adam, and how the laws and precepts, like man’s race, even from the simplest beginnings onwards have always spread out and been developed (Genesis 17:1-27; Genesis 9:1-17; Genesis 1:27-30 are quoted). Right and law are not in all times the same. They change, especially according to the great changes and windings about of all human history: and yet every valid right must stand on ground above men and bind them as a divine command, as if it took effect through a covenant between God and mankind. And as he had the consciousness that many laws which prevailed in the community had their origin in the olden time before Moses, so he links the explanation of the obligation and use of circumcision to a suited occasion in patriarchal times. So in the proper Mosaical history he seizes every occasion to insert what is of law; expounds, at the exodus from Egypt, in full detail, the laws as to the Passover and firstborn; and puts off the chief subject of Mosaic institutions and laws (the sanctuary and the priestly race) into the short time of the sojourn of the people at Sinai; partly while according to all fixed remembrance the people were really formed anew under the establishment of the last great covenant of men with God, and partly because of the suitable resting place for the exposition of a great connected collection of institutions and laws; and specially so as to the sanctuary, the highest center of the religion and constitution of the people, and as to the ark glorified by being received into Solomon’s temple, made after the pattern of that sanctuary. And thus the author starts from that visible sanctuary (the temple) in his sketch of the whole that was to be pictured, and describes it with all that belonged to it as made according to the divine pattern shown and prescribed to Moses; and then gives the sacrifices and their order and use. Only Numbers 19:1-22 ought to be inserted after Leviticus 16:1-34. If we treat now the whole manner and way in which the author puts in order and describes the Mosaic laws in recounting the history, there cannot be the smallest doubt that it is solely on this account that he describes them as communicated from Jehovah to Moses, and through Moses to the congregation, or Aaron, if the contents concern the priesthood, namely, that, as in his time they were in force as holy, an historian could only place their origin in that commencement of the congregation. They had won their force and holiness through long use, and so the author puts them as divine commands And so he has to seek what goes back to Moses’ time, and what gradually or from other causes had come in. The author does not set up to be Moses. And when a prescription in the connected whole of the description applied only to the land not in the wilderness, the author makes Moses announce it prophetically, sometimes with the addition, "When ye are come into the land." He revives the law-giving time, and depicts Moses and Joshua as models of leaders of the people, himself imbued with the same spirit. And certainly he took much out of the former historical work, or worked it up after his own manner, and took what was already in it, the inimitably described manifestation, at Sinai, and with it the Decalogue (where the words Exodus 20:9-11 are an addition from himself), the rather, as it was necessary in itself. He then praises largely the author for a priestly, law-giving, leading royal spirit, and closes with thus apostrophizing the author’s elevated spirit whose writings have for centuries succeeded in being taken for those of the great hero Moses himself. " I knew not thy name, and guess only from thy traces where thou walkedst in time, and what thou didst; but these traces lead me irrecusably on not to take thee immediately for him who was greater than thee, and whom thou couldest thyself honor as he deserved. So see that in me there is nothing false and no desire not to recognize thee altogether as thou wast." Having given Ewald’s estimate of the historical books, and where it was of moment, in his own words, as regards the two chief original histories, the rest need not occupy us long. There were, he tells us, a third, fourth, and in the second edition, a fifth narrator, who worked it up. And here remark it is not that there were original documents used, which is possible; but what we have is the work of those who composed the history. The earliest (save a small fragment or two of a life of Moses, and the Book of the Wars of the Lord) was composed in the time of Samson; we have not even the ten commandments as they were originally given. The various morsels of the third narrator are given in p. 145 (third edition). The special excellence of this writer is the uncommonly high and clear view of the work of the prophetic and divine Spirit which appears more or less in different minds, and gives us some of the finest pieces in the Old Testament, as Numbers 11:1-35, Still though elevated, he is far from the artistic painting and bolder picturing of him (the fourth) who will soon be described. He had much to do with the account of Joseph, but a good deal was woven in afterward. He lived in the time of the prophets Joel and Elias, in the tenth or ninth century before Christ, and belonged to the northern kingdom, so that his work was for it what the " Book of Origins" was for Judah. He gives the different bits in the Pentateuch which belong to this writer. I shall only give what shows the estimate of these new German views, which are to replace inspiration and the revelation of divine thoughts and intentions in the word of God. The pieces of the fourth narrator show a high and ripest cultivation of all spiritual powers and capacities of the ancient people which can hardly be surpassed. One may justly maintain that, in the handling of the original early history, this work presents the progress to the extremest freedom of conception and picturing beyond which nothing more is possible as the pure artistic, giving form to, and profiting by, legend; and one recognizes easily, in the form of the whole popular life of the time which shines out from it, the commencing of loosening the chains of the old limits of the Mosaic religion, and the powerful rising again of many new thoughts and strivings. This he compares in a note to the reference to the bright days of Islam after the Crusades, though in a different spirit then. The prophetic spirit which characterizes it, flowing out ever wider, over its nearest limits, also completely fills now the original early history and transforms it with the greatest freedom into more beautiful new forms. Thus Messianic hopes link themselves, as we see in the great prophets, the most easily to the historical beginning of all the higher life of the patriarchs. The beginning and end meet-what is between is only development-so that we hardly find more elevated expectations uttered by the great prophets. The third narrator kept closer to tradition, and was in the prophetic point of view what the "Book of Origins" was to the lawgiving; whereas the prophetic thought in this work governs the history as its own field, and handles it from the outset onward with all freedom. To this is ascribed (Genesis 12:1-3; Genesis 18:18, ff. Genesis 22:16-18; Genesis 26:4, ff.Genesis 20:8; Genesis 20:13), the fully- formed Messianic hopes, the truth of the infinite grace of Jehovah surpassing everything, along with the deepest sinfulness and corruption of the earthly (natural) man, the like of the not accidental origin of evil in man, are such luminous thoughts as the sun of that century first elicited from holy ground (that is the ninth or eighth century before Christ). This fourth narrator introduces, losing sight of the difference of times, Mosaic sacrifices, as in the case of Noah, and even in Cain and Abel, without anxiously asking if they belonged to the gate of paradise. The wickedness of Gibea was the pattern of that of Sodom, as one cannot have originated without the other. And as Amos refers to Sodom and Gomorrha only, our narrator confines himself to these. Through this new birth of old history much has been preserved from legendary traditions, but also through this working up much has been broken up (aufgelost) and become unrecognizable, or thrown away as of no importance. The fifth narrator belongs to about Joel’s time. From him the first great collection and thorough working up of all the previous sources of the original early history proceeded; to him the whole present Pentateuch and book of Joshua must be referred, except the three kinds of additions which were inserted later. So that we have here a narrator who indeed sketches much altogether new with his own hand, and according to his own thought, as the need of his own time seemed to require it, but most of it only out of older writings, either verbally repeated, or here and there somewhat changed, and on the whole is more a collector and thorough worker-up than independent writer and original historian. The distinction of Israel and the other nations is more strongly marked, particularly Edom, Moab, and Ammon, who were then throwing off Israel’s yoke, whence the prophecy of Balaam, the Assyrian being looked at rather as a friendly power, Josephus enabling us to trace the place of Amalekites and Kenites then. The ships or Chittim refer to a war of the Phoenicians for the subjugation of Cyprus, whence pirates had been attacking all those coasts, as we read that Elulaus, king of Tire, conquered those of Chittim, etc. But, through this division of foes and friends of the spiritual religion, which was much more marked then, this historian introduces a remarkable supplement to the "Book of Origins," in that he sets up in the olden time before the flood an opposition of holy and corrupt, of good and bad among men (Genesis 4:1-26). After the previous one had already pursued the origin of wickedness farther up to the first man, and has developed it there at the same time in a prophetic way, he brings in striking pictures of things before the history, as Genesis 15:1-21 before 17., and so on. But he leaves out a great deal of what he had before him. So he sets Jehovah in addition to Elohim (Gen. 2: 5, 100: 3), which he had from the fourth narrator, but gives up the unusual dragging double name in the simple relation (Genesis 4:1-26) However freely the fourth narrator has handled the original history, it is never with a law-giving object; for the single time when he brings forward laws he does it only in his usual competition with the old sources (Exodus 34:10-26), in order to declare the Decalogue and its origins in his own way. Leviticus 26:1-46 is inserted by him, and could only have been written after the dispersion of one kingdom, as we have the sorrowful feelings of the descendants of those dispersed (36-40), so that this could not have been written before the end of the eighth or beginning of the seventh century (B.C.). Last of all came the author of Deuteronomy in the time of corruption after Hezekiah, and the author desirous, as this advanced age required, to improve the Davidical kingdom yet existing, introduces Moses himself as speaking; and as he conceals himself under the name of Moses, so does he the king, whom he wishes to improve the state of things, under the name of Joshua; but he deals more boldly with history as in so far removed a time. I need not go farther into the details as to Deuteronomy. Its character and that of Joshua in Ewald’s eyes is clear from what has been said. It was written in the latter half of King Manasseh’s reign, and in Egypt. It was the book which was the foundation of the reformation in Josiah’s time. Deuteronomy 33:1-29 is an imitation of Genesis 49:1-33 The song 32. already written in Jeremiah’s time. The wish that Judah should come to his people shows the time of composition when it was hoped all Israel would be subject to the king of Judah. It appeared as a distinct work, but was wrought up into one with the previous works, already much read. Ewald describes the way in which he who put it all together managed. The Deuteronomist calls the great previous collection the Law of God, or of Moses; so the old name of the "Book of Origins" and others was forced into the background. So by the later transformations and additions the true old divisions of the " Book of Origins " were made thoroughly obscure, and the whole work such as it became at last, we know not by whom, thrown into six parts. Still, out of the wreck of the older writings and the multitude of later additions, much of what was original glimmers forth, and all later transformations have been able to cast fully into darkness neither the elevated remains of writing of the earliest time, scattered in the work, nor the whole history of the origin of the work-at least with the more accurate search which alone is the fruitful as it is the becoming one. My reader will now understand what Dr. Dods means when he says of the historical writers of Scripture, "Meaning by the historical writers of Scripture not always those who brought the books into their final shape, but those, whoever they were, who first recorded the revelations made:" only remembering that Scripture is not a revelation; for Dr. Dods, God’s public acts are that, Scripture only an account of them. His "theory of inspiration" as to these books is that there is none at all. We have nothing really from God but old legends, the first a hundred years after Moses, containing a chapter and a half about Jethro, and then a number of books, the two principal writers in the Judges’ and Solomon’s time, but transformed (umgestaltet), worked up (umarbeitet and verarbeitet) and added to, for centuries, and at last Deuteronomy and Joshua added, and the whole brought into form. Prophecies of events giving the date of writing, because the reference to them showed the writer has these events before his eyes. The result is easily apparent now. What an uncommon fate this great work ran through before it received its present form 1 how from a little beginning, with every important change of the whole Hebrew literature on to the end of the seventh, or beginning of the sixth, century, it grew and was changed! In the course of the strong changes and transformations which this great work experienced, much in it has lost its original clearness and peculiarity more and more! A comfortable look-out this for those who sit down to read the word of God, or even a credible history of God’s revelations of Himself! I turn to Bleek. He is, in certain respects, more sober and moderate than others, but rejects all inspiration avowedly, and in his statements there is no ground left for any at all. I shall quote enough to show this, but be more brief, as the main general principles are already given from Ewald, and as to details none of them agree. Bleek rejects Ewald’s system, as Ewald had done one of his own previously formed. Bleek says, "Ewald there (in G. I.) assumes, as we have said, but for the most part without bringing forward any actual proof." And again, after speaking of Ewald’s system, he says, " I cannot say, however, that I see anything at all to lead me to this view, but the contrary," etc. Bleek holds to the notion of Elohistic and Jehovistic documents invented by Astruc,* but that with soberer judgment than most, holding that the great body of Moses’ laws were made for the desert, as shown by expressions in them, and written contemporaneously with their enactments, but that discrepancies, dislocations, repetitions of the same scenes, prove other hands, and diverse documents to have been made use of in compiling it. (*Ewald had resisted. this, but (it seems) changed his mind; so he says little about it.) But his proofs of Moses’ authorship or of that of contemporaneous authorship of the laws from the allusions to the camp and the naming of Aaron, Riehm (Stud-u-Krit.) holds not to be at all valid. Indeed we have only to read the various systems of the writers to see how untrustworthy they all are. United in one thing, the denial of inspiration asserted explicitly by the apostle Paul, whom they ignore, as indeed. the Lord Himself, who teaches us to live by every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God; (and where are these to be found if Scripture be not inspired?) not one of them agrees with the other. Each frames a system for himself, and often changes his own, as Ewald himself and Bleek did. Note here the immense difference as to` intelligence of Scripture involved in inspiration, and the way they are thrown into these false systems by denying it. First, the general purpose of God, the mind of God, is lost. It is the notion or feeling of the individual writer which governs the statements. All true clue to the bearing of the passage is lost, the difference between grace and government under law. But, further, as the denial of inspiration precludes prophecy, where any allusion to subsequent facts is made, this must be written after the things had happened. Paul tells us further, " these things happened unto them for ensamples (types, τύποι), and they are written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the world are come." Now, if God be the author, I have here, to be sought patiently and humbly, what the admonition is in the things which happened for this purpose; but if a possibly credible history framed by the feelings of the writer be all I have, I cannot look for what the apostle tells me is there. Again, as an illustration of their dislocations (Numbers 19:1-22) the Red Heifer ought to come after the sacrifices in Leviticus. Now this only shows total ignorance of the mind and grace of God in these things. In the beginning of Leviticus we have all the aspects of the sacrifice of Christ in the most exquisite detail, and the exact expression of its divine truth and bearing; but as it is in itself and its various value as the basis of our approach to God. Numbers gives us our journey through the desert, where we are in danger of defiling our feet, and rendering ourselves unfit for communion, though belonging to the Lord and under the efficacy of the atonement through which the Lord imputes no sin. Here, therefore, exactly in its place, the provision for the defilement which interrupts communion is made known. But, where there is no inspiration, there is no mind of God to be sought for. A mere credible arrangement of facts with human motives gives no ground for it. For these writers, consequently, there is no thought of a mind of God in the book at all. If there is such a thing, therefore, they have wholly lost the clue to the interpretation and order of the books. Thus it is not a question of a theory of inspiration. There is in the book no revelation of the mind of God at all. Bleek does not conceal this, nor make really any middle system between verbal inspiration and human authorship. Carpzov, he Says, holds that the Biblical historians generally received the whole contents of their works both in matter and form by immediate inspiration of the Holy Spirit, and not by means of tradition or independent inquiry. But such an assumption is altogether unnatural and untenable, if we take an impartial view of the contents and form of the historical works in the holy Scriptures. Opinions, indeed, vary as to the exact mode in which the Holy Spirit co-operated, etc.; but it will be acknowledged by all without further question, that, if their history treats of times and events which they had not themselves lived in or taken part in, the knowledge of them must have come to them by means of tradition.... But the probability of the purity of tradition handed down from ancient times is always greater if it comes through writings removed as little as possible from the date of the events than when it is merely oral. I have some doubt of this. Oral tradition may be vague, of course, but written accounts of this kind are not sober history but myths, and arranged by priests in connection with their false gods, ancestral worship, and what ministers to their influence. Take the written accounts in Cory’s ancient Fragments, or Vedas and Puranas, or even G. Smith’s account of the flood, one of the most striking of these legends, or Deucalion’s, or the history of the Titans; and see whether written accounts secure accuracy. I shall be told that these are poetry and myths. All of them are not save (which is the very point I insist on), that these ancient accounts always seek the marvelous. Accounts are handed down, and when by men left to themselves, they make myths of them in every country, and Scripture gives the divine account of events which in man’s hands were made myths of. But there must be more than man to present the truth, the divine view of it, and to give even a certain account of events far back in the world’s history. Besides, who is to select the facts which are morally important so as to bring out responsibility, and promise, and law in their order, and lay the foundations of grace in sin and God’s sovereign love, giving hope by prophecy, while law and responsibility were insisted on, till the rejection of the Son of God come in love showed that grace only could avail for man; while the ordering of the sacrifices gives a far fuller view of that of Christ than anything in the New Testament, though when offered, after all, they were not understood? It is a whole which certainly man never put together. I have no objection at all, as I have long ago said in reply to this infidelity elsewhere, to a thousand documents, provided it is God who out of them gives me His mind. But to return to Bleek. He accepts the Elohistic and Jehovistic theory of Astruc and others; and the main body of history he accounts with many to be the Elohistic one, the same, he declares, as Ewald’s Book of Origins. But repetitions of the same story as Bethel, Beersheba, etc., prove it was put together, not written by Moses, or one Mosaical author. But there is more. As to this he is very decided. The idea of inspired prophecy is not admitted. He might assume with Ewald that the interest in Joseph might arise from its being from a northern author, if their composition happened so late as Ewald states it. But if so, how came Judah to receive it? As to God’s having anything to say to the history, that is not in question. He then settles that this Elohistic writing extended down from the creation to Saul. The references to taking possession of the land of Canaan, and Joseph’s bones, so again the promise that kings should descend from Abraham, are proofs of the date at which it was written. This is done in such a way that it may be supposed with great likelihood that he had the fulfillment of these promises before his eyes; so that it was not written, at the earliest, before the days of Saul. No other author but one who had set forth the command of Joseph concerning his bones would have related so trivial a circumstance as their burial. The certainty of faith that God would fulfill His promises, noticed withal in Hebrews 11:1-40, never enters their head. It was doubtless drawn from more ancient accounts by the Elohistic writer; but it was natural that they should be interested in such a part of their ancestors’ history, and this was revised and expanded in our book of Genesis. However, Ewald’s account of it is lacking in proof and clearly arbitrary. It would seem, however, that the author of our Elohistic ground writing did not employ the materials he derived from the earlier records exactly in the same way as the Jehovistic completer of the work dealt with his sources. Instead of simply appropriating them in all their original peculiarities of form, he adopted them in accordance with his own individuality as an author. The Elohistic " writing endeavored to avoid introducing references to Mosaic or post-Mosaic circumstances and regulations into the patriarchal times." Thus there is nothing of clean and unclean beasts. Did Noah make the difference or did he not? "It does not certainly admit of a question that the author of the Elohistic writing formed his narrative in general accordance with the historical tradition as he found it already existing in ancient, perhaps pre-Mosaic, records. But we should expect from the individuality which he exhibits as an author, if he himself had belonged to a time when David and Solomon had raised the tribe of Judah to such great distinction and pre-eminence over all the other tribes, that the ancestor of that tribe would have come forward far more prominently among his brethren than is actually the case." Ewald’s view is quite inadmissible, etc. The sum of the discussion in which he seeks to refute Ewald is based on the principle that the whole character of the writing is produced by the circumstances in which the author found himself, whether under Saul, as he says, or Solomon, as Ewald holds. But it is too long for me to introduce here, Only all this shows that there is not a thought of God’s hand in it or inspiration, or even God’s guardian care, but simply and solely of man. But I will add a few passages to confirm this on Exodus 15:1-27. " As to a part of it," he says, " from the context, and the whole relation which this bears to what precedes, it is not likely that Moses would have expressed himself in this way immediately after the passage of the Red Sea," etc. Again, " These unmistakable inaccuracies and things not agreeing with the context could not in any way have got into the narrative if the latter had been appended to their laws by Moses himself or a contemporary of his, and, above all, not very easily if the whole were the work of a thoroughly independent historian.".... " The circumstances attending it lead us to think that the visit of Jethro to Moses is placed too soon in the history; also, that the Mosaic ordinances on the institution of the tabernacle of covenant likewise have too early a place." It is likewise previously remarked that in other respects the narratives are in themselves somewhat obscure and inaccurate, not rightly agreeing at least with other accounts of the Pentateuch. Now I do not hesitate to say that all this judgment flows solely from ignorance of the divine mind in the passages, and consequent inability to estimate the perfect and admirable order and connection in which the passages occur. They are a series in which that divine order is singularly striking; but those who leave out God in the matter cannot, of course, discern His wisdom or His order in it. " There are several times in Exodus accounts of something being written down by Moses, once in reference to historical matters of fact, and twice as to legal ordinances, yet there is plainly nothing about them which, by its whole internal character, would show them to be genuinely Mosaic. In Leviticus 26:1-46. the author of this admonitory discourse, as it here runs, probably had the circumstance under his notice that the people had been punished, at least partly, by expulsion from their country, and consequently its composition in its present form must have occurred at a later date than that of the Jehovistic. This last is, perhaps not later than the reign of David, and not quite in the latter part of his reign" (vol. 1: 299, V enables’ Translation). As to Balaam’s prophecy, I think it must be assumed that the speeches of Balaam were not literally recorded just as he delivered them, since even a contemporary Israelitish author could not easily have gained an exact knowledge of them. We have reason to suppose that the prophecies received the form in which we now have them through the Hebrew author who com- posed the whole narrative, and perhaps knew nothing more definite of their purport than that the foreign seer, instead of cursing the Israelites, conformably to the wish of the Moabitish king, had repeatedly blessed them. Can we have a more complete setting aside of God in the whole matter? After further dwelling on the language (Hebrew), and the name Jehovah, neither of which the Mesopotamian would have used, he says: "Now if our assumption as to the authorship be correct, we may, of course, very well suppose that the circumstances by which he himself was surrounded floated across the mind of the Hebrew composer of the narrative, and in this way he came unconsciously to intermingle with it references bearing the marks of his own time, or the wishes and hopes which he entertained." Thus he ascertains the date. He is disposed, though it be difficult, to decide it was in Saul’s reign. Hence the Elohist may have written it, otherwise the Jehovist must have met with and adopted it. There might perhaps have existed in the Elohistic writing a shorter and somewhat differently-shaped narrative of Balaam’s history; and this is pointed out to us in chap. 31: 8-16, since Balaam here appears under somewhat different circumstances It is not to be denied, however, that the last verses in Balaam’s speeches present great difficulties…..To me it continues to be the more probable view that the conclusion of his discourse ran somewhat differently in the original narrative than it does at present, and that its present form belongs to a later time than the composition of the rest of the account, and of the whole book of Numbers, etc. To such straits do those reduce themselves who deny inspiration. Denying the possibility consequently of prophecy, they fix the date of composition by the circumstances mentioned in it, and, when there are several as here, are at their wits’ end. But the ridiculous notion of a credible contemporary history disappears as much as inspiration, and what have we got instead of the word of God? But these, as we have seen, are substantially on the same ground, be it in the sober speculations of Bleek, or the enthusiastic admiration of the more poetic Ewald. The historic books of Scripture are treated as mere traditions worked up by human authors; that is, as human compositions, and if any part has the form of prophecy it is used as a proof that the author lived at the time the event referred to happened, and then put it in a prophetic form into the mouth of Moses or Abraham, etc. I do not think Dr. Dods, in the very flimsy sermon and excuse for it which he has published, honest on the point. He says, so far as regards the narration of events, in which God has revealed himself, we find the historical writers of Scripture in thorough agreement with criticism, asserting that the prime requisite is knowledge of these facts at first-hand, and quotes Luke, and quotes him falsely, making him say exactly the contrary of what he does say. But what has this to do with the matter in question? This is substantially the inspiration of the Old Testament, where he passes over the fact that in the most important parts of it such a principle can by no possibility apply. There are no accounts written by eye-witnesses, as in a measure, though not as to large and most important parts, in the New Testament. In all the law-giving part of the Old Testament divine communications are asserted to have existed. Jehovah, or Jahve, if they like it better, spake unto Moses. This does not go on the ground of credible witnesses, nor are they facts they could be witnesses of. They are not facts in which God revealed Himself, but words from the mouth of God. This is either true or false. God did speak to Moses or He did not. But it was not that of which any could be a witness save at the first revelation at the foot of Sinai. The great lawgiver might prove Jehovah had spoken by him by making the earth open her mouth and swallow up those who resisted the authority he had by it. Not God’s way, no doubt, in these days of grace; but this only proved that in the communications there were no witnesses. But this large part of the Pentateuch is not the case of credible witnesses to God revealing Himself in facts, but God giving a revelation of His will by His word without any fact at all. As to the fall and all the circumstances of it, it is the weightiest fact, save the coming of the blessed Lord to redeem us from it, that ever happened in the world; knowledge at first hand is just nonsense, unless it be first hand from God Himself, which Dr. Dods openly denies. But Scripture does not simply give facts in which God has revealed Himself. It tells us things in which man has revealed himself when there was no divine fact at all; in which the devil has revealed himself and will, and his ways, and wiles, till he be cast into the lake of fire, and all the development of the various relationships between God and man till he rejected the Son of God. I may say the whole history of the world as related to God, with all in man and in God, and in Satan that it depended on. Minute facts historically in which God had no part, but on which all depended; responsibility and life-giving power in all their bearings and relations one to another, from the garden of Eden till glory and judgment; in innocence without law, under law, under grace, through the cross and the Holy Ghost given; up to glory and judgment. Who would have the discernment to choose the right facts to give all this? This theory lowers the whole nature and moral value of Scripture, as it is ridiculous as a theory that we are to have the facts of Genesis from credible eye-witnesses. I do not think it honest of Dr. Dods to talk about a theory of inspiration: wisely or unwisely, men may have theories about this, in general unwisely I think; for God’s way of communicating, though He has partially in the case of Miriam and Aaron spoken of it, is not much within our ken, nor, as I have said, if I were inspired could I communicate the manner of it to one who was not. If it be said " The word of the Lord came" is clearly direct inspiration, what is the meaning of that as to the manner of it? But it is not honest, because Dr. Dods denies as to the historical parts of Scripture that they are a revelation at all. God’s acts are the revelation; the Scripture is not God’s revelation at all. Those may credibly record His acts; but this is man’s doing. It is nonsense, because the greater part of historical Scripture, and which is used in the N. T. as divine, is made up of what are not God’s great acts; yet all hangs inseparably together-what refers to man’s responsibility as well as what God often, consequently, did. It is nonsense, because of the most important part you have and can have no account from first hand eye-witnesses at all;-moral nonsense, because man would not be competent to choose the important facts on which the whole history depended morally, having, outside Scripture, proved himself incompetent even as to the great facts, by turning the tradition of them into myths, one more absurd than another, and in those most like Scripture connecting it with false gods and wrong principles, and falsifying the facts themselves, as in the recovered Babylonish account of the deluge. It is absurd, because it supposes God meant to reveal Himself to man, and yet did it so that the revelation could not in the most important points, or indeed in any, reach men with any certainty at all. And further, it is, as to the word of God, infidelity. According to Dr. Dods there is no such thing at all. Let not Dr. Dods flinch; may his conscience indeed feel the destroying the whole ground of faith for simple souls! But he expressly declares that the revelation is some act in which God revealed Himself; that Scripture is at best a credible account of it by man. I see nothing in it but the effect and flimsy reproduction of the more open infidelity of the Germans discussing Hebrew literature; and the note can leave no question as to its source in any mind acquainted with German writers. But it goes beyond, not their principles, but their statements; happily for others, unhappily for Dr. Dods, in that he denies that the historical part of Scripture is a revelation at all. I should have a great deal to say to many details of his reasonings; but I am not going to merge in a controversy of details the great and vital question, Have we in Scripture (1:e. the historical part) a revelation from God? I say the historical part, because Dr. Dods so expresses himself; but it would involve all the words of Christ and the apostles, for they all treat it as such. I may add, though it be of little moment in view of the all-momentous subject, that Riehm (though differing from Bleek in many details, as all these writers do from one another, constantly rejecting utterly the grounds on which their proofs are based;* yet) in all that is important, entirely agrees with him. Genesis 17:6 is a proof that it was written in David’s time! Bleek put it too soon in Saul’s; he is right in holding that Deuteronomy was written in Manasseh’s reign! The Deuteronomist had the four first books of the Pentateuch before him (see Studien and Kritiken, 1862)! (*Thus Bleek of Ewald. Ewald’s view is much more involved; much however, in it is incapable of proof and part quite erroneous. Again, the opinion of Bertheau, which is generally allied to Ewald’s, and likewise quite groundless. Such passages are common.) I add also that we may see what man and tradition make, not of creation, for none believe in that, but of the formation of things out of chaos Sanchoniathon quoted by Eusebius, (Cory’s Fragments). He supposes that the beginning of all things was a condensed dark misty air, or a breeze of thick air, and a chaos turbid and black as Erebus, and that these were unbounded, and for a long series of ages destitute of form. But when this wind became enamored of its own principles (the chaos),* and an intimate union took place, that connection was called Pothos (cupid or desire), and it was the beginning of the creation of all things. (*This explanation is Cory’s.) And it (the chaos) knew not its own production, but from it with the wind was generated mist, which seine call Ilus, mud, but others the putrefaction of a watery mixture. And from this sprung all the seed of the creation, and the generation of the universe. And there were certain animals without sensation from which other animals were produced, and these were called Zophasemin, that is, the overseers of the heavens, and they were formed in the shape of an egg; and from mist shone forth the sun, the moon, and the greater and lesser stars. I need not go farther; other such statements may be found, and less absurd perhaps in the records. This is Phoenician. But it is not only for the absurdity I note it, but to remark that we have a vague tradition of the Spirit of God (it is? πνεῦμα, the same word as wind) moving on the face of the waters, and find what it becomes when His account is not given in its purity by the hand and inspiration of God. It is connected with all the worst principles of the heavenly powers of the zodiac and of astrology; mere human generation, a great principle of heathenism; and in other accounts, as the Babylonish, with the creation of the false gods, the mundane egg encircled by the serpent; and after the flood, of which the tradition was naturally better known, though the facts are falsified and connected with idolatry, the tower of Babel- and the like, but all falsified and turned to the setting up false gods and mythological fables. Out of Scripture where is this credible testimony? how came it there only? The theory is a gross absurdity, contradicted by well-known facts. What a mercy it is to have the blessed WORD OF GOD, and to believe it, authenticated by the Lord Jesus and the apostles! What do men fall into where they have not got it? I have taken my review of Bleek’s statements from Venables’ translation, and Ewald from the original. I might have multiplied quotations from both, but the system is plain from what I have quoted. As to Deuteronomy, the author cannot well have been Moses. We have already seen that the Deuteronomic legislation contains those very laws which by their form and purpose are very unlikely to have been promulgated by Moses in this shape, e.g. the precept as to kings, and the legal ordinances as to military concerns, to which many others might be added; also that there are certain passages in these discourses of Moses which Contain much that it is most improbable should have been spoken by him in this way. The view taken of the high places is a great topic with Bleek and all these writers in connection with subsequent history. Hence he concludes: " It is evident from what goes before, that it (the date) cannot be fixed until a long time after Solomon, perhaps not before the age of Hezekiah, king of Judah;" Hezekiah having been the first who rooted out not only idolatry but also the high places. He rejects the postponing it to the Babylonish captivity; there would have been more reference to it in the threats. He rejects the Josiah fable, and puts it between Hezekiah and Josiah. What is said of the Josiah story he declares often quite uncertain, often absolutely improbable. The blessing of Moses is not from him, as he once thought. It was probably written about 800 in Jeroboam II. and Uzziah " The purport of most of the sayings, and particularly the conclusion of the whole song, leaves us no room to doubt that it was composed at a time when the Israelitish people, the ten tribes, were, as a whole, in happy circumstances. For if present circumstances can alone account for such being referred to, we must guess at the time of composition." He rejects here also Ewald’s view and says, " We may consider with the greatest probability that the author of Deuteronomy was also the last editor of the whole Pentateuch, and that the work received from him the extent and arrangement in which we now have it.... We may easily imagine that by his hand perhaps certain things were altered or inserted in the previous books." And I might add from his remarks on Judges, Samuel, Kings, a multitude of similar-perhaps of stronger passages; but the same principle of human composition and judging. Such is the account by the very soberest of these German speculators on the Pentateuch, on the date by the notices of events, which could only be known by their being in the author’s own day. One who rejects the wild statements of the bolder infidels believes the Mosaic laws in general refer to the desert, and rejects the fable about composing Deuteronomy in Josiah’s time. Not that we gain much by that, for it was after Hezekiah’s; but inspiration is utterly rejected by all, credible history and contemporary history not believed in; the most recent part of the history, the Exodus and Moses’ time composed some 500 years afterward, part of it 700 or 800 years with some traditions no doubt; and the whole under the influence of the state of things the composer was in and the supposed prophecies drawn from the circumstances in which the composer lived. And this is called a literary consideration of the Pentateuch, as contrasted with the religious point of view! Contrasted it is surely. Only one must remember that the literary point of view denies all that makes the Scriptural history a religious book at all. The later editors have composed it according to their views, and the writers arranged it according to theirs. God had no part in it at all, as far as appears in either. And I beg my reader to notice that I have not quoted here the more openly infidel, but the most solid and sober. Bleek, translated into English by Canon Venables, who though not agreeing with everything, translates it as a specially valuable introduction to the Bible. But they are all alike in their rejection of divine inspiration. It is not " every Scripture is given by inspiration of God," but no Scripture is. Dr. Dods does not go so far; he admits the prophets are when they say, "Thus saith the Lord." Mr. Smith, with versatile inconsistency, which on such a subject is the most culpable want of seriousness, says he believes for other reasons in inspiration, when he has published what he holds to be proof, borrowed indeed from others, that they are mere human compositions; and draws from and authenticates, unless I much mistake, from the worse class of infidels, that is, those who are more open and impudent in their treatment of Scripture. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 174: VOL 03 - MIRACLES AND INFIDELITY ======================================================================== Miracles and Infidelity I SEND you some remarks on the Scriptural view of miracles, from which infidels and the defenders of Christianity seem to me to have alike wandered. As to infidels, any moral apprehension of what miracles are, or anything else is, of the misery of man, or the love of God, or the power and value of the truth, is absent from their minds Exalting man as he is, the false fancy that in these days of enlightenment the lancet and the microscope have found out everything, and exploded God’s truth and love and man’s ignorance both together, reducing everything to general laws without being able to tell us where they came from, and thus to a materialism, which, as an able but honest materialist has said, leads them up to a blind wall, beyond which they cannot get. Such is the true character of modern science; very interesting in the. discovery of laws which govern matter, that is, the material world beneath us, but excluding from man every moral principle, every excellent affection, and all divine goodness and truth. They tell us that this is no part of science. I quite agree. But are there no such things as love, and goodness, and morality, and right affections? no knowledge of God? When they come to " the blind wall," can they assure us there is nothing behind it? or tell us something of what is? Neither. It is simply excluding man from everything beyond matter, even to openly denying all responsibility, degrading man and denying God. The first they do pretending to exalt him; the other is the stupid pretension to deny that of which they confess they are wholly ignorant (and they are quite right); though (thank God) it is a knowledge that is as open to them in God’s love as to those who already enjoy its light. There is an evidence of truth which one who has the Spirit of God cannot use to a mere natural man, though it often carries the strongest evidence with it, and in that way may tell upon him the possession of the thing that the other is disputing. To him who has it, it is the strongest of all evidences, different in its nature from external proofs. Take even natural things:-I am in pain. No surgical evidence is required for him who is in pain in order to make him know it; there is no deception as to it for the man who suffers. The surgeon may show the physical cause, a stone in the bladder, or what produced it; or inflammation of the blood, or of some mucous membrane; but with all his science he cannot tell me why it gives me pain, nor what pain is. Yet who that suffers it does not know what it is? He may talk to me about ganglions, or sensitive nerves distinguished from motor nerves. But this does not tell me one atom of what or why pain is; though he may talk, and in a surgical sense rightly, of what its cause, its material cause, is; but this is not what pain in me is. Does any one doubt what it is when he suffers it? That is, the most certain knowledge even in the lower creation is entirely out of the reach of science. I do not blame science for this; it is not its sphere. Science-it arranges phenomena, learns by experience their sequence, and often with great sagacity. Nobody denies it. But it cannot go farther. I can say I suffer, I am so made, constituted, that under certain circumstances I suffer. But no one can tell me what makes me suffer. He can tell me, very likely better than I can, the circumstances through which I suffer, and perhaps relieve them; he can relieve an animal that knows where and what it is suffering; he can trace the material part, bring in electricity or any other biological power; but what makes me sensible and suffer pain, he cannot tell me. Let him trace it to nerves and electricity and whatever you please; but electricity does not make a tree or a stone suffer, though it may make a dead frog leap perhaps (that is, produce material effects), but it cannot make dead matter feel. I feel, and hence have no doubt of it; I have absolute certainty of it, much greater than any of his science, however extensive and accurate it may be. You will tell me a dog knows it. Just so, but the scientific man does not; and that is the point I am upon just now, that there are kinds of knowledge which are the most certain of all, which science knows nothing of, has nothing to say to, which the boor is just as certain of as the philosopher. Now I say distinctly there is the same kind of knowledge in the things of God; its effects may show to others that it is there, but it is not to be explained to or by men. A man groans or writhes, and a dog howls, if he is in pain. That is not the pain, but a testimony to it. So where God dwells in man, where His Spirit dwells in him, there is no uncertainty in himself; the effect is one of which he is perfectly conscious in himself. It cannot be in itself a proof for another, because it is in himself, and another cannot be a partaker of that any more than he is of another’s pain; but it is absolute certainty for him who has it, and its effects make themselves known to others as pain and illness do to those who are not suffering. It has another effect which can hardly be communicated to another. It confirms, by its inward effects, the truth and authority of the word of God; because if the love of God is shed abroad in my heart by the Holy Ghost given to me, if I enjoy that love inwardly as a deep source of happiness; if I can look up and cry Abba, Father, in the unquestioning consciousness of what He is for me; if my soul is at liberty before Him in unfeigned confidence, and at liberty from sin that beset me before, and from a sense of guilt which I had; if I am conscious of my connection with Christ and His presence with me,-I find all these things which I have in my heart recognized and taught fully in that word. I find what is there said connected with the glorifying of the man Jesus when He had accomplished the work of redemption; this, with a life here wholly without parallel in holiness and love, absolutely unselfish,-meekness and self-denial and patience, understood of none,-a life which condemns me in spite of me by its perfectness, and which is yet not what men admire in their heroes, though more heroic in reality than all. This, with a statement that this man that none was like,-save indeed in a distant measure as following him,-was the Word, that is, God, made flesh. I find, that is, my own every day new but actual and known happiness (proved to others by the change they see in me) connected with an immense system of truth unfolded in the word, but which I find experimentally verified in my own soul (though the source of it be hidden from sense and science, and science can go no farther than inference from sense); but what that word declares to be the effect in me, by which the unseen is known and the revelation of what is divine is made to my soul,-is in fact produced there, so that what is unseen is known, and what is divine revealed; not a history, but what God is now though revealed in that history in its outward facts; and I know the truth of it by what I possess, and the inseparable connection with all the revelation made, which is but the divine development of that of which the effect is in me. And so Scripture speaks. "He that believeth in the Son of God hath the witness in himself; and he that believeth not God hath made Him a liar, because he hath not believed the record that God hath given concerning His Son." The infidel will say, That is no proof for me. In effect it may be; in itself I recognize that it is not. He has it not, and of course cannot have the proof that having it’ gives. But this does not weaken it for those that have. No more does the doctor’s not having pain alter my knowledge of having it; and if he were to tell me " I was perfectly in health: all the tissues right, and there was no cause for pain, it was imagination," I should know better; it would only prove his science did not reach to the knowledge of the cause. He will despise, too, my enjoyment of divine things, because he does not know what is enjoyed. He will tell me it is imagination; but imagination does not produce holiness and godly affections, but poetry. There is nothing permanent. It may take me out of self and sorrow for a moment, but never delivers from either-leaves the man what he was, or worse. No man can stay the hungry edge of appetite by bare imagination of a feast. Imagination deals with things outside us which are not real; this is what is actually and abidingly in us, a present reality. It is based on what is in its perfectness objective as a source outside us, just as my friend is, though I am conscious of my affection and of his. And when human imagination seeks to make a scene with which it can be occupied, it fails entirely, brings cannon into heaven, and makes Satan the most interesting person in the dramatis personae. Proofs may and do leave responsibility without excuse, but enjoyment of the thing itself within takes the need of proof away. " Whether he be a sinner or no, I know not; but one thing I know: whereas I was blind, now I see." Where was the proof that Christ could open the eyes of one born blind for him who was so? And note here, we are not speaking of the truth of that history, but of the nature of the proof. Let it be remembered that of love, obligation to God or man, or a father, or a wife, science can know nothing. It is not its business. But man’s happiness or unhappiness even as man here, and everything right and comely, depends upon this. Science knows material phenomena and their laws and connections, and no more. Up to a certain point they may prove a connection of thought and organic structure; but of one single moral idea it is incapable. I do not blame science for this. Phenomena and their laws are its sphere. It is degrading man’s moral nature I denounce. There is no love in geology or chemistry; and if, as they have done, they deny responsibility, the best answer is they are not to be trusted with my keys. Who would trust his child to them, if he had any love or sense of obligation? They have assumed that science has left all witchcraft, possession, and the like, far behind in the dark, and in the light they have these things dare not show themselves. But they delude themselves. That if men are completely infidels, trusting their puny reason, there is no need of superstition to dazzle them with what is false, is true because they are stone-blind already. But what is all the spirit-rapping that is in the midst of their pretended light, and putting people to sleep, and taking their minds, in a certain sense, into possession, and the coming up of spirits of the departed, the identical necromancy which we read of in Scripture? That there is a vast deal of deception I have no doubt, but they have not explained and cannot explain the half of it. Witchcraft is not gone. You may find half the housewives in parts of England stop haemorrhage instantly with a few muttered words; give them the number of your warts one day, and have none the next. To this day there are in France stones with certain marks upon them, to which women who desire to have husbands or children go, and which they worship, and which have jovial celebrations attached to them. They are similar to others consecrated to Mahadeva (Siva) in India, whose symbol is the linga, in the same way a little more grossly. They come with a dead child in them to revive it. They are probably also connected with the worship of the dead or fairies.-See Materiaux pour l’Histoire de l’homme, 1878, 6e livraison. It is very easy to sit in a drawing-room or a lecture-hall and say, See how, with our wisdom and science, all these things have disappeared! They have not disappeared; it is mere pretentious ignorance to say they have. It is very possible that infidelity, if it had penetrated where superstition reigns, might make it disappear, though bringing up the dead or spiritism is no great proof of it. Our infidels may not believe that they are spirits of the dead (I do not), but their science cannot explain what happens now. It is very easy to say, I don’t believe the facts, but plenty of other people know they happen, and at any rate the superstition is there if the facts are not facts. There is no difficulty in distinguishing such things from real miracles; but the things to be accounted for are there. It is quite idle to say it is in dark places-I do not doubt or question that certain of them are- not spiritism. If a man finds to-day he has no warts when he had yesterday, and you tell him he is living in an ignorant condition, he may say, May be so, but I have no more warts; and if he has been among the more enlightened, he may reproach them with spiritism, a great deal of which none of them has explained yet. If you ask me, I say a great deal of it is deceit, but there is that wherein there is power, not of man, and certainly not of God. Of what, then, but of Satan? In their infidelity all is of Satan to shut out God more completely in another way. Nor is it in the country parts of England only that superstition wields its power. I suppose we have infidelity and scientific light enough, and philosophy of all sorts in France; yet superstition reigns there. Not only has the worship of the Virgin Mary taken largely-increased proportions in general, but La Salette (proved false by judicial investigation of the civil authorities, and condemned by the prelate of the diocese thereupon) is now approved and in full vigor, and the poor railroad that passes by Lourde making a very good business with holy water and pilgrims; confessed to be false, yet educated English pilgrims going there. And what has science done to hinder it? It leaves both the imagination and the higher wants of man’s heart and conscience wholly unreached; it cannot satisfy heart and conscience, having none; it can explain the development of ova and protoplasm; but of what comes of me when all my ova, and what they tell me can alone rightly be called protoplasm-a living combination which chemistry cannot reach, are gone in death, not one word can they say; no gleam of hope, no cry of conscience met. A God unknown on earth makes all darker still beyond it: for God, or even for man, no love; for self, no conscience. What has science to do with them? Affection is at the utmost warmer blood as to this world! The whole moral world is wholly and absolutely outside their reach. Morality they have none, they will tell me it is the pursuit of the good of all. And what is that good, and who is to decide it? Their happiness; but for no two men is it the same, if I take man’s thoughts. It may be scalping, or opium, for the existence of passions forms no part of their philosophy. Many good people are not aware where philosophy has got to. Kant, in his treatise on morality,*-a man not nearly so bad as the fruits of the philosophy he set going,-declares in terms that if the will of God, or fear of God, be introduced, there can be none. (*A translation of it is used in Dublin University.) It is a principle outside man. Morality is the principle of pure reason applied to practical conduct. But he admits at the end that how the principle of pure reason can be so applied it is impossible to say. Mill tells me that justice is the animal desire for vengeance modified by utility to all. Kant’s is merely natural conscience with the name changed, and shutting out relationships with God and man, on which all morality is based. Mill, remark, feeling a motive was needed as a rule, makes vengeance the motive. Animal vengeance the sole motive of morality-the rule; one which has been never settled yet, save by Christ. But my object now is to take up specially the question of miracles, and see how Scripture presents them. There are those who are opposed to infidelity who take them as the basis of Christianity. Infidels tell us there cannot be miracles in the nature of things, that general laws cannot be infringed, that the vast mass of evil alleged to be removed by them is the effect of natural laws, and cannot be taken out of their uniform operation, that where they are such as cannot be so viewed, as demoniacal possession and the resurrection, they are proved to be mere superstition, or false. The first famous proof is, that they are contrary to experience; and we had not experience of miracles, but had of human falsity. But first it is to be remarked here that it is a question of induction (not deduction), which only affords probability, and this Mr. Hume admits. He weighs probabilities, the greater against the less. But inductions have nothing to do with facts. Hume says-" When at last he fixes his judgment, the evidence exceeds not what we properly call probability." Now I conclude, for all practical purposes (and man as an earthly creature has to act on such induction), that, the sun having risen day after day, it will rise to-morrow. But do I believe it shines to-day by experience, or induction? Clearly not induction. That is induction which calculates in the future from experience of the past, having nothing to do with facts at all. And note here, talking of concluding for a long time hence how it will be is throwing dust in the eyes. For it is because it has always been the same I conclude it will be. But the whole proof rests on its remaining the same. There is nothing to foretell. One is the certainty of a fact, the other the probability of an induction. I may deceive myself, reasoning badly; my senses may deceive me as to facts. But the nature of the proof is different. Induction has absolutely nothing to do with facts. Take even. sunshine. I believe the fact that the sun has risen every day, not by any induction but as a fact on testimony, and hence conclude that it will; but the ground of my believing is distinct. I may question the evidence of a fact; but, question it or not, it is not induction; and if I have to reason on experience of motives or circumstances, and bring in induction, it is then only a probability and not a fact. The scientific men say the course of the physical world is such that it must have had a beginning, and must come to an end. If they are right, the sun will cease to give its light as it has done, and the experience of the past would not be a sound induction in an absolute way. And this leads me to another important principle, the character of the experience and the induction from it, and the whole basis of reasoning from it. It is based on this, that the material phenomena in which we live are the limits of all man has to do with. Hence, in speaking of the good of all, the view of the object of man’s life is confined entirely to the material system in which he lives. It is perfectly clear that phenomena and experience exist only in what is phenomenal, and induction from experience, as to what may or must be, cannot go beyond the sphere to which the experience applies. It belongs to that. It may so far go beyond what is material, as that we have a certain experience of men’s passions and motives; but the motives are too various and unknown, and the will and circumstances have too much to do with it to have any definite general laws. And this Mr. Mill admits, though he reasons as if it were not so, and declares that he was founding a new science, to which he gives the name of Ethology, as sure as any science referring to matter; for these men can pretend to anything. But this system of general laws, which in ordinary material things no one denies, is assumed to be the only possible existing cause for anything. Yet no one can go one step beyond observed facts with which reason has nothing to do, save classifying and binding them together by experience as cause and effect, from which man has an instinctive habit of thought that they will continue. But it is only what is observed, and continuously observed. Take such a thing as death. It was only after centuries,-if the patriarchal ages are true,-many long centuries -that death could be taken to be a law of nature. Seeing a man die, or a world destroyed, would not prove it, as Mill so illogically states. Man must have seen, what was practically, all die, to make it a general law. Till then life was the general state, and death might be casual. Thus the conclusion as to anything could be only after a regularly consecutive experience of facts not known by reason at all, but by sight or testimony, facts which (in its very nature, as I have said, and it is all- important to observe) reasoning never gives. It gives conclusions, or the natural tendency to think that what is, as a general law, will go on as it has because it has hitherto, which while sufficient to act on, and no doubt meant to be acted on, yet can only give probability, which is never a fact, but necessary if the principles are true. That is, reasoning never can, in any case, give us a fact or truth, but a conclusion by deduction or by induction, a mere probability. Let us have it fixed in our minds-No facts are known by reason. Thus the fact of Christ’s existence in the world, or His miracles, cannot be the subject of reasoning, but of sense or testimony. All the conclusions of reasoning, or the inductions of man’s mind, are founded on facts which are known without those, and form the basis on which they are grounded. But further, experience does not touch the origin of that which observation takes notice of. The experience being of phenomena cannot go beyond phenomena. Thus, the sun rises; but what makes it rise? We may find successive sequences, and come to where we can go no farther, as well as immediate ones; but this alters nothing. First or last we come to a point where something has produced the facts, or produces the facts, which form the experience. With that something science has nothing to do. Science does not go beyond the phenomena and conclusions from it. But here I come to a power producing these facts or these laws, of which reason has no cognizance. I do exist. I did not always exist. I began to exist. Of that, the first cause to which it leads, there can be no experience. Now whether I take "causa causata," or " causa causans," is all one. I have something that has given rise to the phenomena, something which science cannot touch or reason about,-admits it cannot (even Mill and materialists do). That is, a thing being no matter of experience and yet existing is certain. If I say anything had a beginning; clearly when it began, it was contrary to experience, or rather no experience did or could exist. This cannot exist, till the constant succession expressed by general laws had lasted long enough to be known as such. Science tells us things had a beginning. That is, there was a time when judging by experience had no place at all, and yet facts were there and true, or experience never could have come to exist. I quote one passage from Mill: " This class of considerations leads to a conception which we shall find to be of great importance; that of a permanent cause, or original natural agent. There exist in nature a number of permanent causes, which have subsisted ever since the human race has been in existence.... These have existed, and the effects or consequences which they were fitted to produce have taken place (as often as the other conditions of the production met) from the very beginning of our experience. But we can give no account of the origin of the permanent causes themselves. Why these particular natural agents existed originally, and no others, or why they are commingled in such and such proportions and distributed in such and such a manner throughout space, is a question we cannot answer.... The co-existence therefore of primeval causes ranks to us among merely casual occurrences. Not only, for instance, is the earth itself a permanent cause.... the rotation itself is entitled to be ranked as a permanent cause. It is, however, only the origin of the rotation which is mysterious to us." This last I may touch on, but do not pursue here. He then states that no event happens in the known universe, which does not depend on some preceding one, the necessary, or, in other words, the unconditional consequence of some former collocation of the permanent causes. He admits that these effects, though invariable while these causes coexist, would, if the co-existence terminates, terminate along with it. " We can only calculate on finding these sequences or co-existences where we know by direct evidence that the natural agents-on the properties of which they ultimately depend-are distributed in the requisite manner."-Logic (Ed. 8: pp. 398-400). But all this, "at least unless some new condition of a power capable of constructing the universe should supervene " (400). Another able materialist, but who declares himself at the same time a Christian, arrives at the same result, after quoting indeed part of what is quoted above from Mill. The method of science is thus essentially skeptical, and continually leads to reject all interference of casual powers not themselves phenomena, till we reach a point where analysis can go no farther, and we are compelled to admit a primordial cause or causes, of whose nature logic and science can tell us nothing. Thus we are conducted to a blank wall by a method which is wholly powerless to penetrate the mystery which lies behind. The only thing it conducts to is not really what these authors say. The last says, " What we may term logical or negative atheism; " the former, who could not-being melancholy almost to madness for several years-but see the misery and degradation in which men were, and even creation itself, and not believing in the fall of man, concluded that a God of very feeble power, but in the main benevolent, had made the best he was able out of the materials he had at hand. The simple and only true history of the matter is this-Man is so constituted that he cannot conceive a thing which has a form or individual existence without a cause. He sees something so existing: it came into existence by a cause; hence he goes on to a primordial cause because he cannot conceive anything existing without one. But that is exactly what a first cause does, it exists without one. That is, he cannot conceive it. He knows it must be. What it is he cannot conceive. That is where man’s mind ends, so that such is the result of science; " it conducts us to a blank wall by a method which is wholly powerless to penetrate the mystery which lies behind." Poor comfort to those led by it. Or, to use the larger work, and say with Mr. Mill, " We can give no account of the origin of the permanent causes themselves. Why these particular natural agents existed originally, and no others, or why, etc., is a question we cannot answer." Now, in these statements, the substantive truth of which cannot be denied, we have the proof that the whole a priori argument against miracles entirely fails. Science, based on experience, reaches no farther than the actual sensible course of things already set in motion within the present limits of our senses or experimental discovery. Now, within that course- and science knows nothing but that, as science-we have of course no reason to expect a change so far as we reason from that, and this is all we can do. It is indeed tautology. It would not be a course of things else’ But it does do something more. It leads us to the blind wall, to its own end; but to what discloses that there is something of which it knows nothing, for it proves that everything we know comes from something that preceded it. This is a fixed principle, then. There are primeval causes of which we know nothing but that they exist, save that they must have a cause of which science is simply and wholly ignorant,-cannot touch, as beyond its kind and sphere of knowledge. Things exist of which to science the origin is not known. What the men of science know is only the actual course they follow when they exist. Of their origin, of the force which gave them that course, what imposed on them the form of operations we find them to have, of everything that is constituent, science is ignorant; the constituted it can inquire into. Not only this, but it must, for its conclusion, have the circumstances, the collocations of existing things, their conditions of existence, just the same, or else all conclusions fail, indeed are false, have no bases, for they are drawn from what exists. Hence the condition is inserted by Mr. Mill, and very justly, "unless there is a counteracting cause." One step farther. Mr. Mill tells us, that any one who knew all the agents, their collocations in space, the laws of their agency, could predict the whole subsequent history of the universe, at least unless some new volition capable of constructing the universe should supervene. Now, there is not much science in this, which merely says that a state of things going a regular This is not strictly true, if, as men of science affirm, the course itself proves its beginning and its ending. But this hardly affects present practical use of it. course would continue what it is unless something changed it, a proposition which I suppose no one would contradict, save by reason of another possibility that the course is a changing one (as is said to be the case), so as to come to an end. Further, I must add that it is not necessary to change the universe: a power which could originate anything could do that without changing an atom, anything whatever, of the regular course of things, though he might introduce something new which was not of that course. Thus a man might rise from the dead and go to heaven, or an angel come down from heaven and leave the course actually known to science untouched. I am not saying any such thing ever happened, but that a power which can originate does not necessarily change anything in that beyond which science cannot go. Men may go on eating, drinking, dying, and an angel come down, or a man may be raised, without anything of experienced phenomenal order being changed. This might go on as usual, and, physically speaking, its course be predicted just as before. When the man died, science came to its absolute end, to the blind wall, as much as in primeval causes at the other end, and the angel go away again, and no one care whether he had been there or not. Science can know nothing but the existing course of sensible phenomena, and presume its continuance as it is, if nothing interfere. If it attempts to go farther, it must say, I cannot answer, or knock its head against a blind wall. (*Yet the unity of plan and law is the strongest possible inductive proof that the primeval cause is one.) But then, mark, we have this positively recognized, that there is a primeval cause, perhaps causes* (for they do not like to own one,-it would be too near God,-though Mr. Mill in the most wretched way did), whose origin is wholly unaccounted for. Science has its sole task to investigate their course when they are at work, but their origin and the origin of the laws which govern their course must be ascribed to a source of which science is ignorant. The course they follow is the whole it can inquire into; their existence is a " casual circumstance," stands by itself, is no part of the general law which science can discover when it is in operation. The conservation of force now insisted on alters this in nothing; it is only a more general law, which we cannot apply beyond the universe subject to observation, nor does it reveal its origin more than the rest. Let evolution be true, which in some respects it may be, and cells and protoplasm be the starting-point of everything. You only have the starting- point of development, only what is material with possible action, as organic, on mind. As to the origin you are exactly where you were. A’ volition capable of originating, science can tell nothing of, cannot say it does not exist. For science, save that there is the insuperable conviction of a cause, it is the other side of a blind wall. This being so, all that denies the possibility or credibility of a miracle is wholly out of court. Experience has nothing to do with it, It is not the subject of its knowledge, or this knowledge would not be experience. That knows the course of what is, and nothing more; but the origin of all that is, and of the force that acts in the uniform operations which they call a general law, is out of their reach, but must be, for these things so governed exist; and it may of course operate independently now, as it did in the origin, when it could not be a matter of science, for the knowledge of a general law was only when they had existed long enough, and been so operated on as to be able to predicate a course. Of these causes or cause there never was knowledge in science. They were there when the ground of science was laid. They had an origin, and what originated them may originate a miracle, a casual circumstance, for what was originated were only " casual circumstances " at first. Science can tell us nothing about those " casual circumstances;" such are altogether out of its sphere. No experience applies here, and so of miracles. I do not say this proves any particular miracles true, but it proves the reasoning as to their credibility and possibility utterly foundationless and false. Whatever power produced, was the origin of the first, may be of the other, and is just as active in one as in the other. All the appeal to experience is only to say that the continued action of general laws, which they can explain as a mere fact, is not the same as the power that originated them, which they cannot explain at all. And even this, which in a certain sense may be admitted, so far as that it is a different kind of exercise of it, they cannot say. For my own part, I am satisfied that the force or power which created and set the universe in movement is a power which keeps it in movement. The material world would not move itself unless it was moved, and the power and will which started it must always operate to continue it, or it could not continue. This is the true conservation of force: the perpetual operation of Divine will, just as it operated at the beginning in setting what appear now as general laws agoing. It is always exactly the same thing. This force was acted by and followed a certain order in starting, by will and power, and it continues by the same power and will every instant. It has never been proved that the power which sustains is not the same power which at first originated. Science knows no more of one than the other. It only knows phenomena and the recognition of general laws by which they are governed, that is the fact of constant sequence, or uniform effects when all is already there, the whole of which, is as to its existence confessed to be a casual circumstance, just as a miracle is. Both are known by sense or testimony, and by no other means. The infidel argument is utterly illogical. It is this-" We cannot admit a proposition as a law of nature, and yet believe a fact in real contradiction of it. We must either disbelieve the alleged fact, or believe we were mistaken in admitting the supposed law." But this is merely saying there is no possible power in existence but the law of nature, which is not only not proved, but the contrary is admitted. We have seen that it is admitted that there are primeval causes, of which science knows nothing-that is were contrary to experience. The effect B, they say, must follow from A, as it has always done, unless there be some counteracting cause; confining thus all possibilities to the existing phenomena, 1:e. assuming the whole question; denying anything else can be, yet admitting primeval causes. That anything happens not the consequence of existing phenomena, they say, must be disbelieved. A general conclusion that the usual phenomenon will follow no one disputes, because it always has. How the phenomena themselves did originally, unless it be a changing, not an unchanging course. But it is not the question. That is, whether Z cannot do something, which is neither A nor B, or set A in motion to produce B. The consequence is supposed in the order of known phenomena. But the conclusion cannot go beyond a positive one: that there will happen a consequence when these causes act according to the known course. The action of power (for law is not power, but order produced by power) cannot be touched by that order, unless originating be denied, for that is power independent of existing order, and an origin, no part of the sphere of science, is admitted; were it not its possibility cannot be denied. With that science has nothing to do Mill then takes the ground that we must first believe in the existence of a being with supernatural powers before we can believe miracles. Now this proceeds on the supposition of our large ignorance of natural causes; a pretty plea for men of science who profess so to know nature, that the course of it is so fixed that we cannot believe anything that contradicts that course; nay, which is not part of it. Now, when there is the consciousness that they cannot be denied, there must be previously the belief of supernatural. power. But supposing we did so believe, which it is clear to me that we may, and must without any miracles at all, that would not help us on a bit, because on their own showing it may be from some unknown cause. Nay, they say that He who formed the course could not interrupt it. But this previous belief is not necessary. I may now assume miracles, for the question is their cause. Events happen which no known cause ever yet produced. They happen not of themselves. There is no antecedent natural cause discoverable; they happen only by the intervention of particular persons, and do not exist when they are not there. A man walks on the sea, stops the earth going round, raises a dead man who was buried and passing into corruption. All outward evil disappears before a given individual, a word suffices even when he is not there. No sorrow or evil withstands his word. The facts happen before hundreds of thousands, and to thousands, and nobody is able to call them in question, they cannot deny it. You say, But I do not believe what really would be miracles, as Joshua’s stopping the day, or Lazarus’ resurrection,- etc. I quite understand you, but you do not, because they would prove the supernatural power if admitted. Now that is our present question, and you contradict your own statement; and I say, that a man who could deny that miracles cannot prove miraculous or supernatural powers, as they might be attributed to causes unknown to boasting science, ought not to write on logic, or pretend to analyze the true character of induction. Thy wish was father, Harry, to that thought. The truth of alleged miracles may of course be disputed, their character be investigated; but to say that miracles, if true, cannot prove supernatural power, but that this must be first assumed, is in every sense absurd, and worthy only of infidelity and men of science, who cannot get beyond phenomena and the petty investigations of the general laws which govern them; very entertaining I admit, but which in no possible case lead to a right affection or the sense of moral obligation. And this is the proposition of the Humes and Mills, and the anonymous author of Supernatural Religion. But Mr. Mill makes one or two remarks Of great importance here: "The miracle, as an extraordinary fact, may be satisfactorily certified by our senses or testimony." But then there is a power which can interrupt the course of general laws and act by its will so as to produce " casual circumstances." Mr. Mill will say there is no miracle, but a previously unknown law. I only admit an extraordinary fact. But I have a fact that is not accounted for by any known law or cause. Adequate evidence is admitted of facts, and that there is no way to account for the fact. Suppose the fact to occur at the command of an individual, and repeatedly, and to be contrary to every known law, as walking on the sea. We have clearly what is not the effect of general laws but contrary to them, and attached to an individual and those empowered by him. That there may be evidence of it is admitted; to deny it is merely returning not to evidence or science, but to the assumption that there cannot be, which is just a petitio principii, which before he did his best to deny practically, but now, pleading the ignorance of science, seeks to throw necessary uncertainty on its being supernatural. We find, if adequately certified, they always happened by the intervention of given individuals, never without them, that they never happened before at any time, by any natural cause known or unknown, they belong to no general laws, and they always happened when the will of these gifted persons interfered. The other remark is that an important element of the question will be the conformity of the result to the laws (read character, for with laws given to others, save as sanctions, they had nothing to do) of the supposed agent. I have said that the statement that a miracle can be certified by observation or testimony is important, as it was sought to be proved impossible. This may be easily understood by the statement, " If an alleged fact be in contradiction, not to any number of approximate generalizations, but to a completed generalization grounded on a vigorous induction, it is said to be impossible, and to be disbelieved totally."-Mill’s Logic (8th edition, 2: 115). We have already seen there is no ground for this, for the induction is only from the course of nature known as general laws. And the miracle, if such, is a casual circumstance, like the origin of permanent causes, and has nothing to do with these laws, or it is not a miracle. The statement, then, that " we cannot admit a proposition as a law of nature and yet believe a fact in real contradiction to it " (Mill, 2: 167), is simply a statement that there can be no exercise of power other than the course of nature known to us. Which is simply absurd and a mere assumption, contrary, moreover, to their own admission,-that the origin of all is by some power which science knows nothing of. In sum, we have come to the conclusion, or rather gathered up their admissions, that casual circumstances have taken place revealing power not within their experience or the general laws of science, and of which science can give no account. And that is just what a miracle is. Let me now consider the way in which Scripture presents miracles. It is alleged, and Christian apologists seem to acquiesce in it, that miracles are the proof of Christianity. This is a great mistake. They are graciously given of God in compassion to man’s weakness to confirm the Word. But the revelation of God in the Word, His nature and actings, are the first things. Thus we have in Mark 16:1-20 the Lord working with them, and confirming the Word by signs following. So in Hebrews 1:1-14, God also bearing them witness, both with signs and wonders and with divers miracles and gifts of the Holy Ghost. And this is so much the case, that a faith founded on miracles is not owned of the Lord, the moral element which links man’s quickened soul with God is wanting. " Now when He was in Jerusalem at the Passover on the feast day many believed in His name, seeing the miracles which He did; but Jesus did not commit Himself unto them, because He knew all men and needed not that any should testify of man, for He knew what was in man." It was a human conclusion, drawn from the testimony of His works, and a just one; there was no new life, no moral renewal, it was " what was in man." Hence we find as a fact in the ways of God, that, as a rule, miracles were wrought only at the introduction and establishment of a divine religious order, or where it was abandoned by those whom He had not yet abandoned; in a word, where a testimony needed to be confirmed in this way. Thus Moses wrought miracles but no prophet in Jerusalem, where, however evil the people were, as a system the religion established by Moses remained, ever wrought miracles. When Israel had set up the golden calves, and God visited the people to maintain a testimony of the truth, for a poor remnant Elijah and Elisha work miracles. Again, whatever the miraculous power, it was to confirm the truth proposed, never for self. Paul leaves Trophimus at Miletus sick. Yet how many had he healed? Epaphroditus was sick nigh unto death, but God had mercy on him. Hence, if a miracle was wrought leading away from divine truth the miracle-worker was to be stoned (Deuteronomy 13:1-18) In mercy to man, adequate outward testimony was given, leaving man without excuse; but faith which God owned rested in the Word, and its effectual working morally in the heart. So the Lord puts the double character of His testimony: " If I had not come and spoken to them they had not had sin, but now they have no cloak for their sin. If I had not done among them the works which none other man did they had not had sin, but now they have both seen and hated both me and my Father." But while condemned for rejecting this testimony, faith formed on this alone is not owned, because it was purely human faith and not the moral power of the revelation working in the heart, and faith which is owned is always by the word. Of His own will begat He us by the word of truth. " My sheep hear My voice. He that heareth My word and believeth on Him that sent Me hath everlasting life. The words that I have spoken unto you they are spirit and they are life. It is equally even the ground of judgment. The words that I have spoken the same shall. judge him in the last day."* (*See John 10:38; John 14:11; and other like passages.) Thus, while special miracles confirm the truth, yet if they are not attached to the truth known from the Word they are to be rejected. The Word is the test. Further, closely connected with this is the fact that these miracles were entirely separated from any honor attached to the persons who wrought them, though of course they attested the divine character of their ministry; they were wholly a testimony borne to the living word, the Lord Jesus Christ, and all He taught. This is true even as to Moses’ works of power; as Exodus 16:8, and elsewhere, " What are we, your murmurings are not against us, but against the Lord." And when once they provoked his spirit, so that he spake unadvisedly with his lips, saying, " Hear now, ye rebels, must we bring you water out of this rock," as an expression of the strict regime of the law, he was not suffered to lead the people into Canaan (Numbers 20:10). So, Acts 3:13, Peter disclaims all regard to himself or John, putting Jesus alone forward. The Lord’s power and resurrection are that to which the miracles testified. This gives a definite character to them. There was no personal relief, as we have seen, no self-aggrandizement by them, no glory sought for themselves or for their company. So Paul and Barnabas (Acts 14:14). Now, it was the opposite of this in every other case. It was to glorify the individual, a St. Anthony, or Gregory Thaumaturgus, or Martin, or the church corporately,-in a word themselves. They were always from motives, or for objects, which the scriptural miracles never were. The religion was already established as a religion, for which they had been needed. They were wrought in mercy to a tigress who brought a deer-skin in recompense to the saint for giving sight to her cubs, and was told the saint could not work miracles for her if she went on with such work; or setting a cow right whom a demon was riding, whom the saint only could see, the cow coming and kneeling to him, and she was ordered to go quietly back to the herd, which she did. This saint promised Satan salvation if he ceased to tempt man. Cr let any one take the miracles of the, pseudo-gospels, and see the miracles attributed to Christ, and if they cannot discern the difference of these and Scripture we need not be troubled about their judgment as to anything. The things I have referred to were in the very first centuries. The church was utterly fallen. It is a constant fact in the ways of God that He gives counter-checks. The Holy Spirit is the Spirit of truth. The form of holiness cannot be received as of God if it be not founded on the truth nor what is presented as the truth if it be unholy, nor one who presents truth itself as a minister of God if he be unholy. So pretended miracles, or apparent works of power, if used to confirm what is not the truth of the word, are to be at once rejected. I may be unable to explain them. That alters nothing, they are not of God. He can only give testimony to the truth. If the sign be one of real power, as we have seen in Deuteronomy 13:1-18., if it deny the Lord or His word, it condemns the worker, but does not deceive him who knows the Lord, and walks with Him This supposes the truth known; the testimony of the Lord in the word received, and that is our case, or else a heart deceived by falsehood, which of course cannot discern. And here we see the importance of the scriptural fact that miracles were on the introduction of the truth and to confirm it. There holiness of walk, truth and power, went inseparably together. It was not a record of past miracles; nor, on the other hand, when truth was there, a means to judge pretended ones by, but the truth introduced with the accompanying testimony, which none could deny. In the case of Christ neither heathen nor Jews denied them; they might ascribe them to Beelzebub, or magic, or the shem hammaphoresh, but the facts were there. Miracles were a present visible testimony which, in point of fact, did so affect men that the religion was established in the face of, and in despite of, all the power of the world. For, after all, Christianity exists, and has had a cause of its existence. That that existence was identified with the person of the Lord Jesus Christ is unquestionable for any. sober-minded person. Next to His person and death, of which even heathen authors (of course of more weight with infidels because they believed no truth) testify, came the truths they testified of, which indeed could not be separated from Christ’s person and work, but with these, both in the case of Christ Himself and those He sent out, miracles accompanied the testimony to confirm it, and the testimony was believed, and the religion was founded, in the midst, doubtless, of violent opposition and persecution, but the testimony and the miracles were before the eyes of those who did believe. The account is, that they saw persons who had been dead and buried, alive again and conversant with men. All sickness at once healed. Lunatics, and those held to be possessed-for the difference is clearly made-instantly healed and delivered. And a religion which has possessed the civilized part of the world, was founded through the effect produced making head against every prejudice and the whole power of the Roman Empire. And divine truth such as meets and heals man’s soul introduced by it. Other religions have been compared with it. Mahometanism, every one knows, was propagated by the sword, and gives a sensual paradise of houris consecrating men’s lusts. Buddhism, the most interesting phenomenon in the world, had no god, and was despair at the state of human nature without a remedy, and its founder obtained-Nirwana-practical annihilation by eating too much pork when he was fully eighty years old. Now he is a kind of god, and in one vast country where it prevails, embodied in a man, and when he dies another is ready prepared, and the living power passes into him. The miracles the word of God insists on were for the establishment of the faith, and the faith was established, and the grace and truth taught in it shines yet with undiminished and undeniable moral luster, while its shell is picked at by those who do not like the truth itself, because it has a power which speaks too plain to conscience; proves itself too clearly divine for the conscience to like it. And this leads me, too, to the character of the miracles, which, as Mr. Mill says, ought to be characterized by what suits the law (character) of the author of them. Let us consider them in this view. Christianity views man as guilty and lost by sin, and while recognizing the law as the just measure of what was required from man, yet none having fulfilled it purports to be the revelation of God in sovereign goodness to save what was thus lost. Now, Christ’s miracles and those of his disciples were not merely signs of power, but all of them of goodness as well as power. There is but one absolute exception, and the accessory of another. The cursing of the barren fig-tree, a usual figure of the Israelitish nation, that is of man under the old covenant. This is finally judged, and it was never to bear fruit. The other was the case of the swine, when the miracle itself was a striking and mighty act of delivering goodness, and a sufferance thereupon of the demons showing themselves such as they were; a sad picture of what happened to the Jews when they rejected Christ as the Gadarenes had. The allowance of the manifestation of the reality of these evil spirits is a remark of one of the old so-called fathers. With these exceptions, all the miracles of the Lord were the expression of goodness present in power, that man might be won back to confidence in God. Every outward effect of sin, all the evil that was in the world, was removed and set aside when met by the power that wrought in goodness amongst men. This did not change man’s heart, but it did reveal God’s, and that was what man wanted. God came into the midst of sinful men showing that love flowing from His own thoughts and nature was greater than the sin and evil that was in the world. For what we have in Christianity is what never was before. God came out in grace revealing Himself in goodness when man was a sinner, and man gone in, in righteousness, into the divine glory. So that God’s love and God’s righteousness should be revealed to sinners far from Him. Now, no one can show that one miracle of Christ’s, or of those sent by Him, was not thus power displayed in a way suited to the present. need and sorrow of man. Moses’ miracles, though partly the glorious deliverance of a people and the proof of governmental care, were not always this. There were judicial wonders suited to the position of the people when God was hid behind the veil and the people placed under the law and tested there. To be exact, I should add one temporary judgment pronounced by Paul on Elymas, a sad picture of the state of the Jews resisting grace, and, after all, the means of far better blessing to the proconsul, before whom the question of the truth of Christianity was raised. The miracles of Christ were then not only perfectly suited to God’s nature and character, but perfectly suited to man and the purpose of Christ’s mission, and the expression of it where man’s heart could feel and understand it. His birth, if God was to be thus manifested, so that if man should learn God’s nature and feel His profound interest in him, was exactly what it must have been, a true, real man, born of a woman, but perfectly sinless; such was the suited temple for God as near to man as God could be, and yet God near to him. As to the resurrection, having become capable of dying to accomplish the work of redemption, and having accomplished that work, there was the recognition of its effectual value for the justification of every one that believed. God had accepted it, and inseparably from this a-to us-new life,* and a new state of it beyond the effects of sin, in a people of which he was the first-born and head. (*Christ had life in Himself, and could not be holden of death, but I speak of what it is for man in general.) And thus mark that all His miracles were an essential part of an immense scheme of truth, the only key to man’s state in connection with God’s righteousness and mercy, and the only full and real revelation of what He is which exists in the world. The infidel may condescend to have to say to God, provided He keeps far enough away from him for them to have nothing to do with one another; but this is a revelation, when man, beyond all controversy, is in sin and misery and degradation, as a fact, if there be no revelation-a revelation of God having to do with him in grace and love, and yet maintaining His holy and righteous nature, no trace of which is found anywhere else. But, further, while miracles were a confirmation of the word, which was the proper and express revelation of God’s mind, they were also a testimony in and of themselves, for they told not simply of power but of goodness, of God working in goodness in the midst of sorrow and misery, and that in the most definite and distinct way. He had compassion on the multitude. Still there was distinctly and definitely a testimony to the person and truth, or, to speak again as Scripture speaks, the grace and truth which came by Jesus Christ, and word and works were a like testimony to it. Hence, too, both belonged specially to the person of the Lord and his immediate followers, whose part after his death I will speak of just now. Thus in John 10:37-38, we read, to the world, " If I do not the works of my Father believe me not; but if I do, though ye believe not me, believe the works, that ye may know and believe that the Father is in me and I in Him." To the disciples (John 14:10-11), " Believest thou not that I am in the Father and the Father in me? the words that I speak unto you I speak not of myself: but the Father that dwelleth in me, He doeth the works. Believe me that I am in the Father and the Father in me: or else believe me for the very works’ sake." I add what follows for another point that will come before us. " Verily, verily, I say unto you, he that believeth on me, the works that I do shall he do also, and greater works than these shall he do, because I go to my Father." Again 15: 22, " If I had not come and spoken unto them, they had not had sin: but now they have no cloak for their sin. He that hateth me hateth my Father also. If I had not done among them the works which none other man did they had not had sin, but now they have both seen and hated both me and my Father." Thus both the word and the works give testimony to all the expression of the perfectness of the person who was there. Of God’s living dealing with men. As to the word, this is the force of John 8:25 -την αρχην ὁ τι και λαλω ημιω-in principle and wholly what I say to you. His words were the expression of. Himself. He was the truth, and the truth thus expressed was the revelation of Himself and so of the Father. This gives a distinct character to His words and miracles, and the difference between His and all others. None could be in themselves a similar testimony. The fact that the apostles, and probably some on whom they had laid their hands, wrought miracles, and more and greater works than Christ Himself, may seem a contradiction to this. A few words here may be called for. It was a necessary consequence of the truth as to Christ. As to His life He was the necessary and natural witness to Himself. But this manifestation of God in grace in the world was only half the truth. If he as God descended here in love, becoming a man, as man He is gone up into heaven, the righteousness of God being so revealed to men through the Holy Ghost sent down. Of this the Holy Ghost, speaking and acting in men sent out by Christ, was the witness. " Greater works than these shall ye do because I go to my Father." But the testimony was still to Jesus alone, the apostles disclaimed all glory for themselves. The miracles were all for the establishing of Christ’s religion upon earth, and belonged entirely to that testimony, either to His coming here from on high or to His being gone up on high as man. No miracles of wandering Jews or Christians in subsequent times can be compared with them, and he who can compare warnings to grateful lionesses and demons riding on cows’ backs, done to the honor of thaumaturgs, must have lost every trace of moral sense and divine apprehension. The infidels must remember that the judgment we form on things is sometimes a test of the state of our minds. The state of the church fell with the departure of the apostles, and even in their time. All, says the apostle, seek their own, not the things of Jesus Christ; and John and Jude both testify that the failure was come in their days. The history of the church shows it utterly fallen in doctrine and practice at once, as all that had been entrusted to man ever had. It is all very well to talk of the primitive church with those who know nothing about it. But the doctrine and practice were such as are not fit to be put upon a drawing-room table for common reading, and that what was read in the churches forty or fifty years after John’s death; one hundred years after this corruption was general. That superstition and spiritual ignorance governed the " Fathers’ " minds, there is not the smallest doubt. Milner in his Church History admits that not one ever held the fundamental doctrine of justification by faith. I should go further, but let that suffice. It became quite early the practice to get drunk in the churches in honor of the saints whose memorial had taken the place of that of the demi-god on the same site. In Africa, Augustine tried to put a stop to it, and was nearly stoned for his pains; he excuses "the primitive church" by saying, they thought it better to get drunk in honor of a saint than in honor of a demon. But more of this in detail hereafter. The disposition of the Jews to believe all sorts of signs and wonders is insisted on by infidels, as in the book Supernatural Religion, referring to Lightfoot, and Schoetgen, and Gfrorer, quoting the Talmud, etc. Now this is freely admitted. But such infidels forget that the Jews as a body did not receive Jesus as the Christ. Light had come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light. John the Baptist claimed repentance without miracles, those whose consciences were reached received the Lord’s testimony, but none else. They might rejoice in the miracles for present comfort, but did not believe, so that the faith in Christ was exactly in contrast with this superstitious temper of the Jews; one would think that these wise men had forgotten that Christ was crucified, rejected, and that the Jews’ wonderful love of the marvelous failed to reconcile them to the light, perhaps helped to darken their eyes. At any rate the argument is worse than nothing, because they did not believe because of the truth that came with the miracles, but rejected him that wrought them; ascribed them to Beelzebub-anything rather than receive the truth, and the judgment they were warned of came upon them. I should not demand better evidence of the difference of the human mind and the divine as communicated in the gospels than for a person to read the spurious gospels, if he has patience to get through them, and compare the senseless fatuities of what was not written by inspiration in those days and the four gospels, and if he cannot find out the difference he is quite fit to be an infidel author. Christ when a child was making little mud birds and ponds, and it was the Sabbath, and a big boy came and broke his ponds, the birds took flight and went away, and Christ said, As you have dried my ponds, may you be dried up, so he dried up and died. In this kind of way he became the means of the death of so many that his mother had to keep him at home in the house. He maltreated the master that taught him his letters in a like way. Let me remark here that Scripture gives perfectly and soberly according to God, what there are legendary traditions of, or the truth of God’s ways in connection with Himself, where man’s imagination has invented a mass of false statements to impose on man’s fears or love of the wonderful. Thus, take the Book of Tobit, the expression so far of Talmudical and Jewish ideas when they had not present revelation, and the Scriptural account of the service of angels, and see how the last is worthy of God and comfortable to us. The denial of these things as if it was a settled point, and sober men had given it all up, is all very well for infidels and those who are afraid of them; but they must know that men as sober and as sound as they fully believe in the scriptural statements of angelic administrations and demoniacal power; the Sadducean denial of a world of spirits is prejudice not sober judgment, as if power because it was not visible and material could not exist. The Scriptures-and in spite of infidels, Christians believe them-are plain as to the ministration of angels: "Are they not all ministering spirits sent forth to minister to them who shall be heirs of salvation." As regards the wickedness of man they do believe in the fall of man, they do not believe that God made the world as it is morally. They see man degraded in abominable idolatries where Christianity has nothing to do with it, where in the highest state of civilization they worshipped and do worship objects that mark the lowest possible degradation, and indulge, even the wild Indians, in the careful practice of nameless degradation them selves; they know that in the center of modern civilization, man let loose and boastingly casting off Christianity and God, indulged in horrors too horrible to repeat. They know that where there are not such outbreaks, and where there is a great profession of religion, sin and vileness prevail and scarce hide their face, and they do not believe that God made the world in this state. They leave that to infidels. They believe, knowing God to be holy and good, that man is a fallen being. The evil state is a fact. They will excuse its violence as rising up against oppression, there is a measure of truth as to certain parts of this, but they are only deeper in the mire. Where did the intolerable oppression come from? and is violence, glutting in blood and debauchery, the only remedy they have? Further, God’s remedy they reject, and are helping people to reject, to their own destruction. Kuenen is referred to in Supernatural Religion as a very able book. With sufficient contradiction to make their judgment of little worth, all these rationalists are in substance on the same ground. The Pentateuch is not a really historical book at all, but a compilation from a few old documents partly. made in the time of Judges, partly in David’s or Solomon’s reign, partly after the exile. There, at any rate, it received its priestly form. Every divine element completely excluded, of course therefore, no prophecy. Hence, when events later than the professed date of the writing are found, it was written. after these events. Jahve was the national god, but Monotheism was only that into which they gradually grew up (through a Semitic tendency). Some think Jahve (Jehovah) a Canaanitish god; at any rate it was one party, and a small one, who held to his exclusive worship; other gods being equally recognized, even in the Pentateuch, and by the best kings. One party would have fellowship with the Canaanites; another drive them wholly out. I may mention two cases as specimens of their systems. As it is rejected as historically true, and what professes to be of Moses invented or legends, they try and compose a system, putting things together by the probabilities drawn from man’s motives; rejecting all thought of any revelation of God-of course all prophecy and any mind of God in the matter. The whole is put together and compiled finally after the exile, with the object of exalting the priests and the authority of Jahve. But I must give in my specimens: Abimelech was disposed to unite Canaanites and followers of Jahve, and did get power thus. Gaal was a Jahvist, according to the system. Genesis 49:1-33 was written in the time of the Judges. But what is to be made of vers. 5-7, the judgment on Simeon and Levi? According to them, the then state of Simeon and Levi led the poet of 49. to put into Jacob’s mouth this judgment of the tribes. That comes, says Dr. Oort, from Genesis 34:1-31, written at that time, "for we know of no other inducement for the invention of this story than the covenant made between the cities of Shechem." But it is not certain that we should know the inducement, says Kuenen, and 34. was written long after. Oort himself had a difficulty,-the statement in the 13th verse, that they dealt deceitfully. But that is easily met: it is interpolated. No, says Kuenen; it is a confused reminiscence of the time of the Judges, long after Gideon and Abimelech. It is well that those interested should know the principles of Dr. Kuenen, so lauded by the author of Supernatural Religion. At the beginning of his book, speaking of the standpoint of his history, he tells us it is one of a number of monographs of the principal religions. The idea of including the Israelitish and the Christian among the principal religions deserves approbation and applause only if there exist no difference between these two and all the other forms of religions, The idea of a special divine revelation, he says, would place too deep a gulf between them and others to count these among them; and at the end he adopts the statement of Mr. Reville, that if liberal Judaism prevails (for they have their rationalists) it will closely approach liberal Christianity, which, by its openly avowed Unitarianism, will not excite the same repugnance as orthodoxy. A fusion is hardly probable; but if all religious sects laid down their weapons, religious sentiment would only gain by it. Of course, if a man believes nothing, though there are principal religions, there is nothing to fight for. Divine revelation does not exist; and then, whether Genesis 34:1-31. be an existing fiction of the time of Abimelech, or a much later writing of confused reminiscences of that time, is very little matter, and may be left to Dr. Oort, and Kuenen who would hail a fusion of Judaism and Christianity, on the ground of there being nothing divine in either. The other specimen I would cite is, that the prediction of Genesis 49:16-17, is a clear proof that the chapter was written in the time of the Judges, more precisely of Samson; for then Dan rose up with some vigor. Such are the speculations we are to have, instead of the Word of God, publicly accredited by the Lord Jesus and the apostles. These are merely instances that occur to me, or rest in my memory. The whole system is composed of such. I have entered more into it elsewhere. I have read Kuenen, Ewald, Bleek, Graf, and looked at others.. But, as I have said, they are,-though the one upsetting the other in detail so as to destroy their proofs,-just the same in substance. Supernatural Religion is a catalog raisonnee of all the infidel German books; an advocate’s special pleading against revelation. But while I avow I have not read the half of those he quotes, I cannot say he is fair in those I am acquainted with. I don’t charge the author with false quotation, but with leading the reader to the opposite conclusion, as to what he quotes, to that the quoted book would, if the context be read. I quite agree with Dr. Trench that possession means possession; the case of Legion leaves no manner of doubt. But whatever Mede and others may say, these cases are expressly distinguished from lunacy, as Matthew 4:24; and not only the Evangelists speak of devils coming out, but the Lord expressly desires them to come out. And the case of Legion seems given expressly to show it is really so, as one of the " Fathers " remarks. Even now, with all their boasting, in cases of epilepsy the doctors on post-mortem examinations fail generally to find any adequate trace of disease. Scientific men have to learn that they are. not all the world, and Christians who are afraid through their pretensions and yield to semi-rationalism, are the most contemptible of all writers. Milman says our. Lord adopted the current language of the day because unbelief in spiritual agency was one of the characteristic tenets of the unpopular sect of the Sadducees; as if the Lord Jesus would maintain as a truth in the minds of the people a false doctrine on a most important point where the Sadducees were right, for fear of losing His popularity by identifying Himself with them by speaking the truth. Why should He even have said anything and not merely heal the sick person. It is next door to a blasphemy. Meyer says all the efforts to explain away the history of Legion are useless. Either you must take it as a true history, or recognize legendary parts and separate them, and take the story of the swine as the reminiscence of some mishap. He is as unbelieving on these points as the rationalists could wish. Lange’s explanation, which Canon Farrar has borrowed, Meyer treats with the contempt it deserves. The existence of good spirits and bad, the very dread expressed by them of judgment as yet "before the time," and the operation of divine power in miracles, is too interwoven with the whole structure of the Gospels to take them out without destroying its whole texture. I have already remarked that the allegation that the superstition of the Jews accounts for it, proves only the folly of the reasoner who makes it, for they were not believed in by the Jews at all. That there are many inexplicable facts, false miracles also, and wonders done by evil power is recognized in Scripture; but we are tested in such cases by them; they would deceive, we read, if it were possible, the very elect, and the power of spiritual discrimination, or the want of it shown; and all that the author of Supernatural Religion does is to confound them all together, showing his own incapacity to discern. Real miracles, such as those of the Old Testament, are not at all the same as the New Testament. Divine power was of course shown, and in grace to a people owned of God to found or guard a testimony; but the whole scene of the Lord’s ministry was the expression of power in goodness in a living person there, or in a still mightier testimony to His name and redemption when He was gone. But I ought to state why I account the statements of Supernatural Religion to be unfair. I just remark that the statement as to the book of Enoch, though very common, is entirely unfounded. The doctrine of Jude and that of this book are quite different as to the passage alleged to be borrowed. I do not call this unfair; it is too common. There was a tradition probably as to this prophecy, and the author of the book of Enoch uses it for his own objects; and in Jude the Holy Ghost gives us it, according to the truth of it. It is to me pretty clear that the book of Enoch was written by a great partisan of the Jews, and enemy of Christians, and not long after the destruction of Jerusalem. He sees up to the destruction of his tower, but then can see no farther, but is full of all promises to those faithful to Judaism. Enoch, 88: 22, 23, refers pretty clearly to the destruction of the temple by the Romans, and he could not perceive whether they afterward entered the house; in 92. we have the final judgment. Lawrence gives the passage in question thus from Enoch, " Behold He cometh with ten thousand of His saints, to execute judgment upon them, and to destroy the wicked, and reprove all the carnal for everything which the sinful and ungodly have done and committed against Him." Now there is in Jude a prophecy in general analogous, but copied they are not. In the book of Enoch the saints are judged, and the wicked destroyed. Judgment on the saints is unknown to Jude. It is the doctrine of the book of Enoch, because he holds the Jews to be God’s people. He says just before, "while judgment shall come upon all the righteous;" executing judgment on the preserved is the doctrine taught. Nor is the destruction of the wicked in Jude; nor is there anything of the speaking of ungodly sinners in the book of Enoch. Both the words and doctrine are different; nor is there the least proof that the book was before Jude. My own conviction is that the book of Enoch was written after the destruction of Jerusalem-I suppose, in that case, after Jude’s epistle. The idea that the prophecy was current before both is fair enough, but for copying there is no ground whatever. There are many passages in the book of Enoch which would lead us to suppose they were taken from the New Testament-doubtless some merely proverbial sayings used by both. Both the chronological elements and the contents of the book lead, on the closest scrutiny, to the supposition that the book was written by a Jew, who was obliged to admit the judgment of his saints, those faithful to Judaism, and treated the Christians as a perverse set, had picked up a good many truths which a Jew could own, and wrote after the destruction of Jerusalem, but sought to make the Jews still believe in the accomplishment of the promises made to the nation. It is curious as exhibiting a picture of the current notions of that day. He puts the Christ as existing before the creation, but hidden; calls him Son of man, but this is in the Old Testament; he makes the flood come from the world getting a tilt. I do not then speak of this as unfair. It is second-hand and superficial, but it is a current notion, only it has no foundation. But there is what I consider unfair. The author-as he does in countless other instances, stating as proved and certain, because the infidel clique he belongs to have so settled it, what is far removed from being so-tells us " It has been demonstrated that Ignatius was not sent to Rome at all, but suffered martyrdom in Antioch itself on the 20th December 115." He quotes then Bleek as witness of this statement. Now Bleek adopts the date, which had been greatly disputed, but in these words (Clark’s Eng. Trans. 1: 158), "Ignatius, Bishop of Antioch, who was martyred, at Rome under Trajan A.D. 115." In the same place (Sup. Reli. 1: 268-9), we find " there are no less than three martyrologies of Ignatius, giving an account of the martyr’s journey from Antioch to Rome, but they are all recognized to be mere idle legends, of whose existence we do not hear till a very late period. In fact, the whole of the Ignatian literature is a mass of falsification and fraud." The author quotes Milman, 2: 101. Milman says nothing about it there. He does reject the acts of martyrdom, but expressly declares that he was sent to Rome, and in 102 gives a summary of his journey to Rome as we have it in Ecclesiastical History, and quotes Cureton’s epistles as of authority, and fully receives the account of his journey and seeing the brethren on the way, using it as proof there was no general persecution. The author quotes also Ewald, 7: 314. Now Ewald does reject entirely the three martyrologies published by Dressel. But he not only holds the whole history itself to be true, and the author’s statements wholly wrong, receiving Cureton’s Ignatian epistles, but discusses it at length, and considers that the Syrian epistles have lost some passages which have been found in the Greek. As to Polycarp’s epistle, he not only receives it, but says, appealing to Irenaeus’ (3: 3, 4, a e) quotation of it, that its originating with Polycarp, people in our time have doubted and even denied, but that they were utterly wrong. " Es ist die grosste Ungerechtigkeit." That a mass of infidel Germans, no two of whom have the same theory, and make systems at pleasure, refuting one another, agreeing only to doubt what is true, may be cited, or Davidson, who does nothing but copy from them, no one need deny. But this seems to me very superficial, as well as unfair, in cases I have quoted. There is no original research into the questions, nor even care or fairness in quoting what is quoted in the cases referred to; a vast number I have not examined; that many German infidels sustain the author in Many things he says I have no doubt of. As regards Justin Martyr, with all his details he seems to me very weak; and here also he has either borrowed or is only on the surface. That there were a multitude of accounts of Jesus current, written and unwritten, is notorious, and it is stated in Luke’s gospel; that Justin, who was of Palestine, had heard and refers to such is most probable. But these accounts never stood on the ground the four Gospels did. Origen notices, be his remark solid or not is alike as to this, that the others had taken in hand, which was merely human, not as Luke. Tremens insists that there could not be more than four Gospels, of which I will speak further on, and Tatian made a harmony of these four-plain proof that in the very earliest ages these four were distinctly recognized. That Justin,- who was of Palestine, was familiar with the accounts current as published there, and reproduces them, is most probable; but no one can read even what is cited by the author of Supernatural Religion without seeing that Justin was fully acquainted with and recalls what he had read in the canonical Gospels. He does not take the roll down to copy it, but we could not have what Justin gives without our gospels.* (*Curiously enough, I have had to correct several quotations, carelessly made like Justin’s, in reading over this paper.) As regards the gospel to the Hebrews, it can hardly be doubted that Matthew wrote some account of Christ in Hebrew, at any rate early Fathers so state; but, after all, their statements are very vague as to what it was, and Epiphanius says it was corrupted, Jerome that he translated it, but that would prove it was not the canonical Matthew. What did he. translate? It does not affect our gospel, which is clearly original, as even the language proves. Jerome says he saw it at Caesarea, and translated it, so that there was such in the fourth century. Still the statements of Jerome are so inconsistent that it is hard to draw any clear conclusion from what he says. He says he translated it, and that it was practically the same as Matthew. This it certainly was not by his own testimony elsewhere. The writers of introductions, Bleek, De Wette, etc., say he gave up afterward this thought, and I suppose did not like saying plainly he had been wrong; but it seems to me the dates do not bear this out. I do not think he is much to be trusted in the matter. Papias a man " σφοδρα μικρος νουν- there was such a Hebrew gospel by Matthew, but there were afterward seemingly two differing editions; a few of the "Fathers" accepted it; but Origen, disposed to receive everything, says every one was free to use it if he thought it genuine, only not as authority. But it was in Aramean, and there is no proof that Justin, a Greek, understood the tongue. He was a Greek, and though living in Palestine, it was in the Roman town Flavia Neapolis. Further, though he preferred being put to death rather than deny Christ, when, as is said, brought to martyrdom through a jealous philosopher, Crescens, yet he never gave up his philosopher’s cloak, was a Platonist, and unsound in fundamental doctrines; and though we cannot doubt his sincerity, was on the surface of Christianity. At any rate, the gospel to the Hebrews is surrounded critically with the greatest obscurity, with no proof that Justin understood it, or was one of Papias’s " every one interpreted as best he could." All this part of the book comes to nothing. The inspiration of Scripture is known by divine teaching, it asserts its own inspiration formally, more formally, if possible, than the spoken word; but its authority is demonstrated by evidence of every kind, such as no other book in the world possesses. The author quotes the writers of the Baur or Tubingen school in numbers, which is merely part of a progressive effort, not simply to undermine the authority of the New Testament history, but to do so by the invention of a system already seen through and refuted as alike historically unfounded and absurd, and which has now not merely lost its weight outside a few partisans, but has demonstrated the animus of the inventors and their untrustworthiness in every respect. It is this school that the author of Supernatural Religion relies on. We have seen that his quotations from others, themselves rationalist enough, cannot really be trusted. There has been little real research into the character of the gospels. The Fathers say Matthew wrote in order-chronologically in fact. Mark, on the contrary, no one knew how (supposed as he heard it from Peter; this from the foolish notion that an apostle must be the author, from not really believing in inspiration). Now it is exactly the contrary, Matthew’s gospel bringing forth Christ as Messiah, Immanuel sent to the Jews, but rejected of them; the kingdom of heaven and the church and the kingdom in glory being substituted for the present establishment of Messiah’s glory, gives a perfect moral order of subjects with this view. Hence, too, you have in fact no proper history with a chronological sequence. This is given in one single verse (4: 23), and we have his service in Galilee, and at the very end no ascension, but the whole closed with the remnant in Galilee and their mission to the Gentiles. In all the three gospels blind Bartimaeus at Jericho begins the last events. There he is Son of David. Mark and Luke are chronological, and relate events in the same order, as far as they are the same, up to the middle of Luke 9:1-62, which terminates the history of Luke (save always the last events). See Luke 9:51. From that verse to 18: 34, it is in general his last journey up to Jerusalem, introducing various discourses by the way, and adding others to the same purpose, without note of time In general, Luke will give a quantity of events together, and develop facts which have a strong moral bearing. The difference of John is essentially this: It gives not a history at all, but Christ as God the Word made flesh, the Jews being rejected altogether early in the first chapter, and so treated all through. The three first chapters are preface before His public ministry, John being not yet cast into prison-the two first going together; the third, the foundation principles of the new thing, being born again, and the cross; fourth, Judaea left, and the transition to the worship of the Father; fifth, Life-giving power, and exclusive judicial authority of the Son of God as Son of Man; sixth, Self-emptied and suffering Son of Man; seventh, Glorified Son of Man, giving the Holy Ghost instead of appearing to the world; eighth, His Word rejected; ninth, His work; tenth, He has His sheep at any rate (for John all through goes on the ground of electing grace), also the Gentile ones; eleventh and twelfth, He is testified to of God as thus rejected as Son of God, Son of David, and Son of Man. But to take up this He must die-episode of Bethany. In the thirteenth, He begins with what refers to His departure out of this world. These rationalists find the resurrection of Lazarus out of place, not having the most distant thought of the mind of God in Scripture, nor any idea, of course, that there is any. To return to Justin Martyr, the author’s account of his quotations is not at all trustworthy, and all that really bears on the true character of Justin’s citation is left out. In the first place, Justin’s manner of quoting is practically that of all the Fathers. They habitually quote not verbally, and put two passages together if it meets their point, just as Justin does constantly. Secondly, Justin also quotes very largely indeed from the Old Testament, which there is no question he received as proper Scripture, exactly in the same way he does from the New. He writes as a philosopher to the Gentiles, and habitually quoting the Christian writings, as authority would have been useless. He calls the gospels memoirs (a term borrowed probably from Xenophon’s account of Socrates, showing the tone of his mind), the gospels written by the apostles and their companions, and says they were read in the Christian assemblies. He quotes them as such expressly-seven times we are told by those who have exactly examined the details. Five agree with our gospels; the others have variations; one a transposition of words, probably right; the rest inaccurately recorded with the same sense, and two words added-" and walk"-found nowhere else. He gives the substance as it stood in his mind; the common way of patristic quotation, as of our own. As to the other professed quotation, we find it in others of the earliest Fathers in different words and order; and, just as in Justin, by Fathers who beyond all question recognized the four gospels and nothing else. That Justin used other traditional accounts, and perhaps the gospel of the Hebrews, is very likely. There is no question that the four gospels were held to be of paramount authority at that date. Tatian’s harmony of the four was made only some twenty years after; and Jerome recounts the same of Theophilus a few years still earlier. When the Supernatural Religion says competent critics agree, it only means the infidel Tubingen school so hold. Take not only Westcott, who may be thought a prejudiced churchman, but Bleek’s introduction, a theologian sober-minded and candid, but as free-thinking as any rationalist could desire, and the statements alleged in Supernatural Religion to be quite certain are treated as certainly false. The system followed by the author is a mere and evident effort to get rid of the large and developed testimony given with so much fullness in Justin to the Christian gospels. The citations, says Bleek, are for the greater part unquestionably taken from our present Gospels. Few, as I have said, in words saying it is written in the memoirs, but quoting them as they were in his mind with a reference to other current statements as to those found in other writings of the Fathers. The allegation which refers them to one given writing or to heretical sources has no foundation, though the doctrines and position of Justin would give no guarantee for his own soundness. He was doubtless a Christian, but still a Platonist philosopher. It seems another philosopher got him put to death through jealousy. This statement, accompanied by a reference to Bleek in p. 289, contradicts all Bleek’s teaching (as does 293), and is as careless as it is unfounded. As to inspiration, indeed, none of them believe it; but as to the repute and esteem in which our four gospels were held in Justin’s days, Bleek is as clear and decided as possible, and as to the use of them by Justin Martyr, among others. See with other places section 261-2. That infidel Germans have disputed over it, as in p. 288, is perfectly true, seeking by all means to undermine the Scriptures and contradict the testimonies which support their authenticity. The whole of this part of the book is full of statements which are unfounded. It is not my part to go into it in detail here. When he says (215) that the first and second epistles of Clement have a canonical position, it is merely trifling with the fact of their being in God. Alex. There are three hymns there also. He himself says the second was rejected, as every one who has inquired knows. In Justin’s reference to the Lord’s baptism, instead of all being referred to the apostles’ memoirs, he carefully distinguishes what is in them, which is found in fact in our gospel, the Holy Ghost coming down like a dove, from other things which are not there, but stated by other Fathers. And this is also the case in his second reference to Christ’s baptism (Supernatural Religion, p. 317), what follows is special pleading. I have no interest in defending the " Fathers," one has only to read them, and specially the Apostolic Fathers, to see the difference of inspiration and the unsound and immoral stuff they write. You fall down a precipice from God to Man 1:1 It is treated as an extraordinary anomaly that Justin could quote as he did if he received the four gospels. It is a common thing with Fathers. Thus Bleek speaks of this when insisting on Justin’s use of the four gospels (section 87). These variations are of little moment when we remember that the Fathers seldom quoted Scripture verbatim and word for word. It is in this place Bleek gives the true account of what the author makes so much about (in 288). He assumes (367) that there were a number of gospels current-" In how many more" gospels-but this is falsifying the facts. That there was probably a gospel according to the Hebrews is not denied; but if there was, it was in Aramean, which, as a rule, not one of the Fathers whose works are in question understood. A mass of apocryphal gospels we have-one has only to read them to judge of them. Traditions no doubt there were and referred to, but gradually lost. My business is in no way to justify the accuracy of Justin, but the attempt in 1: 370 to prove his altering the text is the weakest absurdity. Such passages are justly quoted by writers on the canon to prove that Justin was acquainted with the gospels; but to look for the words and to insist these must be found, and that it must be a quotation from some other, is trifling with Scripture. If I were to say Jesus condemns a person looking on a woman to lust after her, as much as adultery, people would justly conclude I had read the gospels; but who that it was some other apocryphal one? It is just folly. In communicating Christ’s doctrine to the heathen for their information, it seems to me that Justin’s statements are just what we might expect in a philosophical mind like his, proving clearly that he had read and used our gospels, though occasionally referring to other traditions, as all the Fathers did. If men were to consult him for various readings it would be the same kind of folly as the author’s who is looking for the identical words. Justin is communicating Christ’s moral instruction to the heathen, and it is done in the most natural way. His repeating the summing-up and motive is thoroughly so. He spoke thus, he taught thus, he said thus, just show the true character of the citations. The author of Supernatural Religion does not even understand the force of the reasoning. The existence of the gospel according to the Hebrews is admitted and known, though perhaps seriously altered by certain parties, though never in the canon. The possibility of Justin having used it is not generally denied. What is said is that his quotations are sufficient to prove he knew our gospels. That is a question of judgment on comparing them. The possibility of another gospel having what is in Justin does not alter this. If it be produced with the whole passage as he has it, and all else is consistent, we shall have another witness. I do not believe it is or can be. Nor have they any hint of the existence of any such thing in all the writings of that day, save the gospel according to Peter, the supposed reference to which is quite otherwise understood by sober critics, as it is in the only place in which Justin refers to it.* (*The gospel of Peter is a well known but lost book. We are chiefly acquainted with it through an extract from Serapion of Antioch in Eusebius, H. E. 6: 12. He had found it in the assembly at Rossus in Cilicia, and not read it through, but hearing some had been mislead by it, got it and read it, and tells them that there was a great deal that was right, but some parts were perverted; but this was in 191, twenty or thirty years after Justin’s death. It is mentioned by Origen in Matthew 13:54-56 (3: 462, De la Rue). But he merely says that it was held by some that James and Jude, etc., were sons of Joseph by a former wife, and that they had received this as a tradition taken from a gospel entitled of Peter or James. Theodoret mentions it as the gospel used by the Nazarites. That there were two kinds of Ebionites, one using only the gospel of Hebrews, the other only that of Matthew, so that he had no idea they were the same. The Nazarites, a sort of Unitarians, holding the law as valid, who used only the gospel of Peter (Theod. Hoer. Fab. 2: 1-2). Jerome, under Peter, the first of his De Viris Mts., says the gospel of Mark was called the gospel of Peter; but under Serapion 41: he speaks of a current. gospel under the name of Peter, under James 2:1-26 :, a foolish story out of the gospel according to the Hebrews, which he says he had lately translated.) What were the numerous other works in use in the early church? Various accounts were current but were lost, I may say, at once, in the prevalence of the four gospels recognized as an authority and divine, and so used. And the author must remember that what we have in the written gospel are the accounts of what Jesus said, and three witnesses or four alters nothing if they are true. The facts may be called to memory by the Holy Ghost according to Christ’s promise, according to the point they were connected with, and a writer quoting it may give it according to the point which is in his mind, and in the connection which the subject he is on suggests. The question, further, is not whether Justin may not have known other current writings or traditions, but whether what he writes furnishes evidence of acquaintance with the Scriptures, particularly with the Gospels, as we have them. We have only to read what he says to be convinced of it. The four canonical being acknowledged thus as such. The way in which the Sup. Bel. insists on verbal quotation is, for any one who has read Justin or other Fathers, perfectly absurd. Indeed, in the apologies it is the last thing we should look for; these are addresses sent by a philosopher to the heathen authorities to give an idea of what the Christians were and did, to clear them from certain charges, and sometimes appealing, to show the principles they held, to what their master had said. I must say the discussion on Justin Martyr and other like writers seems to me to be the poorest piece of superficial criticism I ever wearied myself with reading,* full of unproved assertions too, the difficulties raised by Fathers and traditions diligently searched out second-hand. (*To tell the truth, I never yet thought it worth while to finish the book.) The reconciling Papias and Irenaeus, and Jerome and others, proved to be difficult, but no serious research after truth at all. It is simply putting into English the infidelity of the Baur school, Schwegler, Hilgenfeld, etc., and nothing else. Of course all inspiration is ignored. Bringing up uncertainties of what may be, to prove what is to be uncertain, and the positive testimonies to mean nothing. What is not spoken of may be true, hence what is said cannot be. The Fathers, as to their judgment, are worth nothing; tradition as untrustworthy for certainty of details as you please, but they suppose and prove to an intelligent mind certain facts. My faith does not rest on external evidence, but there is a certain kind of pretentious destructive criticism which is profoundly contemptible. Our critic speaks of many other gospels, our four thus coming into an uncertain mass. But no one can examine the facts without knowing that these four were, from the earliest days, recognized as distinct. But which are these many? He speaks of the Egyptian, the gospel according to Peter, the Ethiopians, and all depends upon this kind of thing. But these - unless the gospel of Peter once mentioned in a phrase of disputed meaning-are all the same, if we can trust various patristic accounts. Adapting an account, say the gospel according to the Hebrews, to the Ethiopians was very natural, but is not another, and says nothing about the recognition of the four which were not counted with them, nor does it alter anything. The gospel according to the Hebrews and the Ethiopian were not in Greek, so that reasoning from quotations is utterly without force, but it serves a -turn. I must add that I do not think an honest man, knowing our gospels, could read the passage in Justin through, and hesitate one moment as to his acquaintance with them. It is a long discourse, in which he brings forward, to satisfy the heathen, the various teachings of Christ as they stood in his mind from the gospels, to clear the Christians from the false notions held of them, quoting as I might quote Scripture myself, sometimes verbally exact, sometimes the sense, and bringing in passages from another place which gave the connected thoughts which were in his mind for the heathen. There is one passage, "and walk," not accounted for, in reference to the cross, and not a whit more accounted for by the infidel writers. For their view of Justin’s quotations there is not the least ground whatever. In one place the author of Sup..Rel., to make it easy to think that he used a Hebrew gospel or other Jewish traditions, says he was a Jewish Christian; whereas he states himself, as was the case, that he was a heathen, and after trying Stoicism, Peripateticism, Pythagoreanism, and Platonism, found rest in Christianity; visited many Grecian cities, and afterward went to Rome. The best thing the reader can do is to read the passage chiefly referred to (in my copy of Justin, Col. 1686, p. 61-66, about a tenth of the whole apology from the beginning). As to the apocryphal gospels which remain to us, of which there are several, their contents speak for themselves; a proof of the total want of spiritual discernment in the primitive church, and also how impossible it was for an age which concocted, and more or less valued, such stuff, could have produced anything in the least resembling our gospels. In this sense they afford the strongest proofs of the inspiration of the others. The epistles according to the Hebrews, of Peter, to the Egyptians, are not extant, and so afford a fine field for rational criticism, the connection of these with Justin I have spoken of. In Bleek’s introduction, sec. 119, and also 87, 88, the reader will find the whole system fully judged. Bleek is a rationalistic critic. Perhaps it may be well to quote his words (Clark’s Translations, Lee. 119, 1: 335): "But with regard to the memoirs of the apostles, so repeatedly cited by Justin, it is at once quite clear that these were not some single treatise, but a collection of writings differing from one another, and usually called gospels." Now, since he expressly attributes these writings to the apostles and their coadjutors, we are directly led to conclude that they were the canonical gospels we have, which ecclesiastical traditions and their very titles assign partly to the apostles and partly to their fellow-laborers and disciples. The citations made from the memoirs are, at any rate as to the greater part, unquestionably taken from our present gospels, only, like most of the Fathers, and according to his own practice in Old Testament passages, Justin uses greater freedom in quoting, and mixes together the text of different gospels, especially Matthew and Luke. He ’describes them as written by the apostles and their companions. The supposition of some modern scholars that what Justin refers to and makes use of was some one distinct work is clearly false. Again: " His own words (Justin’s) explicitly declare that they were more than one, and the citations themselves witness, that all our four canonical gospels were included." (Sec. 87, p. 242.) De Wette says (sec. 74, p. 124) of the gospel to the Hebrews: " This is the oldest (of the uncanonical gospels), but its use is traceable no further back than Hegesippus (about A.D. 160), nor beyond the circle of the Jewish Christians; for the orthodox Fathers, far from placing it on a par with the canonical gospels, reckon it among the ungenuine." And (76, 125) as to the current acceptance of the four gospels; "Various countries and parties in the church also furnish testimonies which run back nearly to the Apostolic age." Again, as to the gospel to the Hebrews, he says, " But the oldest accounts contradict the idea of its being an original and independent work by representing it as apocryphal, and as wavering between Matthew and Luke" (sec. 63, p. 88). One of these alterations indicates a Greek original. Hence the opinion that the gospel to the Hebrews is the most ancient gospel writing falls to the ground (sec. 65, p. 93). Justin mentions as the source of, these sayings and accounts, writings left behind by the apostles and their assistants, which he calls memoirs of the apostles, also gospels. The old opinion that they mean our canonical gospels is by no means contra-. dieted by the inexactness of the citations, for it is probable, nay it is established by the repetitions that occur, that parties cited the gospels, as sometimes the Old Testament writers, freely from memory.... and gospels which were read in the assemblies of the Christians cannot well be other than our canonical gospels, all of which (Mark and John more seldom) he made use of." (Comp. s. 66, p. 94.) De Wette goes into the objections which I have already gone over, but I do not go further into them. Those whom I have now quoted are in the fullest sense rationalist writers, but sober and serious men, who weighed facts, instead of indulging in inflated and foundationless speculations, where there is no trace of a search after truth, but merely the effort of an advocate to prove his point. It is perhaps well to remark that the gospel according to the Hebrews indulged in the grossest form of Jewish mysticism. We read " The Savior said, My mother the Holy Ghost took me by one of my hairs and carried me to the great mountain Tabor," and much more (Gfrorer, Tahr. der Heils. Stuttgart, 1838, pp. 332 ff.) This is quoted by Origen only saying, "if any one received it," in Jer. Hom. 15: 4. He elsewhere definitely declares the church had only four gospels, the heretics many. Jerome quotes it, on Micah, lib. 2: cap. 7: vol. 6: 521, Ed. Vail., where he states he had just translated it, so that it was not a mere Ebionitish addition. So in Comm. Isaiah 11:1-16 Vall. 4: 156.-Juxta Evangelium quod Hebreo sermone inscriptum legunt Nazaraei. But it came to pass that when the Lord went up out of the water, the whole fountain of the Holy Ghost descended and rested upon Him, and said to Him, My Son in all the prophets I expected thee, that thou shouldest come and I should rest on thee, for thou art my rest, thou art my first-born son, who reigneth forever. So 4: 485. He quotes the strange phrase, my mother the Holy Ghost took me by a hair, etc., from the gospel according to the Hebrews, which the Nazarenes read, adding that no one ought to be offended, as spirit is feminine in Hebrew, masculine in Latin, and neuter in Greek, that thus being of the three genders in the three principal languages respectively, we might know that what is different is of none, going pretty far in owning the work. Origen excuses it also, De la Rue, 4: 69, but on the plea that as Christ called those who did His Father’s will, brother, and sister, and mother, so we might call the Spirit His mother. But the passage of Jerome on Isaiah 11:1-16 proves it was a systematic doctrine, and the gospel probably heretical, on the system of Simon Magus and Helen. Yet Jerome translates it and says, many call it the authentic Matthew. This, it is said, was in A.D. 398. Later still, A.D. 415, he says it was in the library of Caesarea (the Nazarenes there using it); the gospel according to the apostles, or, as many think, according to Matthew (Dialogus 3: contra Pelagianos). He quotes or refers to it very often. A.D. 321 circa, he speaks of it as in the Caesarean library, and composed in Hebrew letters and words. Who translated it into Greek was uncertain (De Finis Ill.) The Ebionites, he says, used it, joining them and the Nazarenes, where he speaks of lately translating it. But the Nazarene copy he translated. The Ebionites at any rate were divided into two classes, one certainly heretical, as were the Nazarenes or Nazarites. Origen, he says, often used it. Jerome translated it into Greek and Latin; strange if he thought it the same as Matthew, and Matthew translated by we know not whom. That there were but four gospels recognized is perfectly clear; Jerome, Irenaeus, Origen, all speak decidedly. Jerome speaks of the others as concocted, of the writers without the spirit and grace of God, that to the Egyptians among them-not naming that according to the Hebrews, but he does that according to the twelve apostles, and this in Dial. 3. contra Pelagianos, he declares to be the same. He then goes on to say that the church has four, which the Lord poured forth as the four rivers of paradise, and four angles and rings, by which, like the ark of the Lord and keeper of the law of the Lord, she is carried on unmovable bars (liguits); and then speaks of our canonical gospels, and referring them to the cherubim, connects the four animals there represented with the four gospels, and declares that only four ought to be received, and the rest as useless fables to dead heretics. (Preface to Matthew 7:1-29 p. 1, Vail.) He was somewhat late in date, but Irenaeus says the same thing. He says, lib. 3: 8, There can be no more than four, nor can there be fewer. There are four regions of the world, and four principal winds, and as the church is spread over all the world it must have four columns, whence it breathes forth life. So he who sits between the cherubim has given us a fourfold gospel, composed by one spirit ενι δε πνευματι συνεχομενον, referring, I apprehend, to the τεχνιτης Λογος ο συνεχων τα παντα, and he then enters largely into the four cherubims, saying the gospels are consonant to those in which Christ is seated. Irenmus had been showing that the heretics themselves received one kind one gospel, another another, but in result all four, and were self- condemned by what they did accept; but the church all four, the sure and full pillars of the truth. I will now cite one or two of the miracles of the apocryphal gospels, heretical often it may be, but in general mere fables, but often valued by the "Fathers." Christ was sent to one master, and told him all the letters and their meaning, and the master brought Him back, and said He must have been born before Noah. Then to a more learned one, and the master having raised his hand to beat Him his hand withered and he died; then Joseph said to the divine Mary, From this time we will not suffer T-Tim to go out of the house, since every one that opposes Him is struck with death. There was a rabid boy who, when the fit took him, bit every one, and being in company with the boy Jesus, sought to bite his side, and struck it so that Jesus cried, but Satan fled out of the boy like a mad dog. The boy was Judas Iscariot, and it was that side was pierced with the lance. Then he was making figures of animals and birds out of mud. Now, he says, I shall order them to move. Are you, said the boys, the Creator’s son? But then he ordered them, and they, went and came back when he called. At another time at a dyer’s he threw all the articles out into the yard; the dyer was in a great way about it, when he returned them piece by piece of the right color. He made all Joseph’s work fit exactly. He went out to play, but the boys left and hid themselves, and when in each house they were denied to be there, what have you there in the furnace? Three-year-old goats, said the woman; and he said, Come out here to your shepherd, goats, and they came out like goats and leapt around him, and the women were all terrified, and besought him; and then he said, Come, boys and let us play, and immediately they were restored to their proper form. Then he made ponds and twelve little birds, three of a side, and a Jewish boy, Hananus, it being the Sabbath, came up and reproved him and destroyed his fish ponds, but he, clapping his hands on the birds, they flew away piping; and Hananus coining up to destroy the fish ponds of Jesus also, the water disappeared, and he said, as the water disappeared, Your life shall disappear also, and immediately the boy dried up. I will now take up some of the gospel miracles, and, first of all, using that of Matthew, as the structure of the gospel is very evident with a little attention, and the place and character of the miracles through it. The difference of the three synoptical gospels and the fourth is this. The three first present Christ as Emmanuel-Messiah, the prophet servant, and Son of man, to men, and, in a narrower sense, to the Jews. Whereas in John this is not the case; it reveals what Christ is in Himself, that the world, when He was revealed in it, did not know Him, though He made it, and that His own rejected Him. But that He put into the place and privilege of sons those who did receive Him a new thing, but then they were born of God, not of the flesh nor of man’s will. The Jews are therefore treated all through as reprobate, but He declares that He would have His sheep out from their midst, and others from among the Gentiles; and then the Holy Ghost is spoken of as living on the earth instead of Him; when He was gone as man to the Father. Now this presentation of Christ in the three first terminates and reaches its climax in the transfiguration, which changed all, for it was as a revelation bringing in a glorified Christ. This divides the three first gospels into three parts; the history of the Lord up to the transfiguration (His birth, as Mark gives the prophet, being there left out), the continuance of patient mercy up to blind Bartimaeus, with various instructions, chiefly for the coming time; and, from meeting with the blind man, His last presentation as Son of David to the Jews, and the details of His being taken and crucified. Miracles Christ wrought at all times, even to the last days, when He was free in the temple, healing the ear of Malchus at the moment of his capture. Perhaps we may call the greatest of all His living miracles was His giving up His own spirit to His Father on the cross. But, in the active life of Jesus, it is the time which closed in the transfiguration, beginning after His temptation in the wilderness, which forms the proper period of His working miracles as a testimony. The goodness expressed itself at all times in them, but that on which it rested, "or else, believe me, for the very works’ sake," was from his victory over Satan, binding the strong man, till the transfiguration revealed a wholly new order of things coming in connected with a rejected Christ, from which time He forbade His disciples to tell men that He was the Messias, saying the Son of man must suffer, though still till His hour was come continuing His work of grace. The general character of the Lord’s miracles I have spoken of. The revelation of God in power and goodness that He might be known and trusted by man; man, wicked as he might be, have confidence in Him. As the beginning of Eve’s sin was losing confidence in God’s goodness by the guile of Satan, if God did not seek their happiness fully they must seek it for themselves, as even now, hence will, lust, transgression, so now, God was there to give in perfect goodness blessed ground of confidence in Himself; but, I add here, so graciously and perfectly suited to the state and need of man. The person Who can be insensible to the, perfectness of the revelation of God in goodness to man in Christ down here is incapable of feeling what God and goodness is. But I turn now to look at the miracles recorded in particular as suited to the special testimony given, and first Matthew. The general testimony is in 4: 23. "And Jesus went about all Galilee teaching in their synagogues and preaching the gospel of the kingdom, and healing all manner of sickness and all manner of disease among the people, or, as expressed by Peter (Acts 10:1-48), went about doing good, and healing all that were oppressed of the devil, for God was with Him. Matthew’s testimony is to the Lord as Emmanuel and as Jesus, that is Jehovah the Savior. For He shall save His people from their sins. He was Jehovah; but first of all Jehovah, according to promise to His own people. Hence his genealogy is traced from Abraham, and also David, to whose seed the promises were made; as Paul states it in the Romans, of the seed of David according to the flesh, a minister of the circumcision for the truth of God, to perform the promises made to the fathers, as this He was rejected; and then comes in another character and title, proved Son of God with power, according to the " spirit of holiness by resurrection of the dead." This last, on which Christianity is really based, is not our subject. The order of the gospel is this: 4: 23, had gathered multitudes around Him. He announces to His disciples, but in the audience of the multitude, the principles of the kingdom, and who were such as could enter, adding reward in heaven itself when suffering for Christ existed. There is nothing of redemption or justification in it. In 8. we have the Lord personally as Jehovah, still as rejected Son of man; in 9. the character of His service down here- grace. 10. Mission to the Jews alone, any other forbidden; but from verse 15 carried on after His departure, but still in the cities of Israel, till the Son of man be come. 11. His ministry as well as John the Baptist’s in their midst rejected, but John owned by Him, and He as Son of God revealing the Father and calling the weary to Himself for rest. 12. His utter rejection of and by the pharisaic Jews, and final break in principle with the nation. 13. He is out of the house, and unfolds the status of the kingdom when the king was rejected. 14. 15. His mercy as being still there continues in a sovereign way, but the principles of what is brought in anew, both as to dispensational position, trial, and relationship, are unfolded; then pharisaism, man’s religion, man’s heart and God’s laid bare, the great foundation truths of his dealing in Christ. 16. The church replaces Judaism. 17. The glory of the kingdom does, only for all this He must die. 18. Individual and collective directions founded on the new thing. 19. and 20. to 28. complete these new principles and their consequences. Verse 29 of 20. begins the last events up to the Lord’s death and resurrection, only you have no ascension; the remnant are sent out from Galilee to the Gentiles. Now in chapter 8. we have the person of the Lord as present here. First, He meets the leper. The cleansing of the leper was a simply divine work. On the other hand, not only the leper was put out of the camp, but if any one touched him he was put out too. Here the leper had seen the exercise of power in the Lord, but was not sure of His willingness, His love. If thou wilt thou canst. With divine authority and reassuring love the Lord says, I will, be thou clean. But more, though He were Jehovah who cleansed in love, He had become a man in grace; touched man, so to speak; not infected or unclean with the uncleanness of man, but healing and cleansing them in grace through faith. He put forth His hand and touched him, saying, I will, be thou clean. Impossible to have a more striking testimony of all that the Lord was in this world than this miracle. Next I find the recognition of universal divine authority in a Gentile. Though come amongst the Jews according to promise, God could not be confined to Israel; there was greater faith here than in heartless self-sufficient Jews; speak with a word and all was done, and so it was. Next, in home mercies, He bears our griefs and carries our sicknesses (not our sins here, though these were the fruit of sin being here). He not only heals with a word divinely, but comes as man in this power to know our sorrows. Still He is the rejected Son of man, not having where to lay His head, but come into the midst of an evil world, God manifest in the flesh. Adherence to and following Him at all cost was the test of righteousness, but following Him led into dangers and difficulties. Calm in the midst of the power of evil, rejected though He might be, He commands creation. All the power of the enemy, moreover, allowed therefore to be manifested, quails and bows before Him; not the less rejected for that, for man, who cannot drive away Satan, gets rid of God by his will even when come in grace* (*But at the end of chapter 14. we have Jesus after the trials received joyfully, after He had rejoined the disciples in the country where he had been rejected.) His presence disturbs him too much. In chapter 9. we have the same divine power in the midst of Israel, but the character of His mission, through His person of course as manifesting God, still shines out. It is grace, He declares to the poor paralytic that his sins are forgiven him; the scribes in their hearts within judge Him as guilty in attributing to Himself what belonged to God only. He replies by exercising the power united to that of forgiving in Jehovah’s ways with Israel in Psalms 103:1-22, while taking still the place of Son of man. " Who forgiveth all thy sins, and healeth all thy diseases." Forgiveness and healing, such was His mission if they would receive Him come in grace in the flesh. He proved the announced power and dealings of Jehovah present, but as Son of man by the exhibition of it in that part of what was announced which was sensible to men in goodness. Then he calls Matthew, not come to call the righteous but sinners. The departure of the present bridegroom is noticed, and the change from form to power. But then what was passing in Israel? Come to heal what was ready to die, He has in fact to raise the dead, for dead in sins we all are; but whoever by faith touched the hem of His garment was even then healed of a disease which no human physician could cure. But blind and dumb were men (Israel), as well as spiritually dead. We have here, then, miracles which show present healing there for faith which nothing else could afford; we have what was really in its fullness being wrought; raising the dead, the blind eyes opened, the tongue of the dumb loosed, and also, as ever, the harvest more plenty than the laborers; forgiveness and grace, the true character of what He was, being brought in, but showed in acts which manifested in present power what man could feel in his body, as in sorrow and evil down here, what God was, and that as present in goodness in the midst of man. The character of the mission and the character of the miracles are inseparably interwoven, and both the expression of the character of God come down here and dealing in grace with man. In the sad close of this chapter we see the effect on man’s unchanged heart of goodness in power of this manifestation of God; rather than receive the Lord they ascribe miracles which they could not deny to the power of the devil. But the time for entirely giving them up was not yet come. Divine patience had yet a work to do. The unfaltering love of Jesus continues to seek the poor of the flock, if the Pharisees preferred blasphemy to grace, preaching the gospel, and healing every sickness and every disease among the people, for He had compassion on the multitude, weary sheep without a shepherd, and this led to a further manifestation of power and grace, He sends others into the field, the harvest was plenty and the laborers few. Ever is it so. In 10. we have not only power in goodness but power to give power, and that is properly divine. Their work here is wholly confined to Israel. The mission to the Gentiles was from Christ as risen (28.), but by His gift they were to exercise the same power as He did. But it was seeking the remnant in Israel. If the house was worthy peace was to rest upon it. The chapter is divided into parts all referring to Israel, their work then, to the end of verse 15; from verse 16 more general and continued, still in Israel, after His death till the Son of Man came; but at present they must expect rejection; it is our lot in this world. They were not to fear. Not a sparrow fell to the ground, not merely without God but without their Father. For the Son revealed the Father’s name; but we have seen this tested men. They could not stand the revelation of God. It brought out the enmity of the human heart against good, and especially against God; an enmity which, stronger than natural ties, wrought most where the relationship was nearest, and where the hated object-for hated, alas, as Christ has proved it is-is more galling. The disciple is not above His Master; we have to take up our cross and follow Christ. Thus divine power, and its manifestation in goodness, and its rejection, go together as before. This is fully developed in a solemn commentary on all in 11. The ways and works of the Lord are summed up as testimony to John Baptist, now in prison, on the question, Art thou he that should come? The blind saw, the lame walked, the lepers were cleansed, the deaf heard, the dead were raised, the souls of the poor were cared for, but blessed he who was not stumbled at the rejected Son of man-power in goodness and rejection; the Lord gives, not receives testimony. But the solemn warnings of the Nazarite prophet of the wilderness, and the gracious association of grace with sinners to win them, men alike rejected. But this brought all to a point, the mighty works were in vain. In fact the truth of his person, too glorious for man as he was to receive, and in the perfect submission of Christ to His rejection as come among the Jews, His eternal personal glory, the Son revealing the Father in grace to burdened and needy hearts, taught submission withal by His own, that they might every way have rest, was what was really there, the new thing, and glory in grace shine out through the rejected but obedient Son of man. The twelfth chapter completes the statement of the position in which Christ is here found, as well as that of the Jews as a body. There are but two particularized miracles referred to in it. The Sabbath was the seal of Jehovah’s covenant with Israel; as with the rejected David, so with the rejected Son of David, all things in Israel were made common; a greater than the temple, too, was there, the Son of man was Lord of the Sabbath; had they understood mercy as contrasted with mere law they would not have condemned the guiltless. Under the Son of man’s authority as Lord of the Sabbath they were guiltless, but in their state of soul the Jews could not understand this. In the synagogue there was a man with a withered hand; convicting them of hypocrisy, well-doing was the manifestation of God and not the legal Sabbath. The old covenant was passing away. He withdraws and heals all that come. Meek and lowly, the time would come for him to show judgment. He then works the second miracle referred to above, casting out a devil. The people say-Is it not the Son of David? The Pharisees repeat their blasphemy-He casts them out through Beelzebub. Now all was brought to an issue. If it was by the Spirit of God, the kingdom of God * was come amongst them, they were openly blaspheming; divine power they could not deny, they were fully condemned, and at the end of their history would come under the full power of Satan. (*Note here, Matthew says of God. That of heaven could only be when He was gone to heaven. It was at hand.) He did not own relationship in nature with Israel down here, those in whom His word wrought were His true relations. His connection with man was through what He brought, not what was in man, though He was a true man. This closes the proper history of His ministry or service in Israel, though in divine mercy it continued, but with a testimony modified in character. But what His miracles were in testimony is clearly seen, and what they meant and said. His final breach with Israel leads to His going out and announcing the kingdom of heaven, but without the present king; full of interest, but not introducing any miracles. It is the first thing presented as taking the place of Messiah then presented on earth, but in 14: His mercy continues, though in a sovereign and divine way, not as Messiah, Son of man, presented to them. The putting to death of John Baptist brought actual rejection close to His Spirit, a solemn moment, felt deeply by the Lord, so that He retired apart, but the multitude came; but the feeling for others or the solemnity of the moment never hindered the readiness of divine goodness. He was moved with compassion when He saw the multitudes; He meets it as Jehovah will fully in the last days, according to Psalms 132:1-18 He will satisfy her poor with bread. This as a sign He does. He then goes on high to pray-as He now is-the disciples left to toil their way across the sea without Him, and rejoins them and all is still; and then is joyfully received where once He had been rejected, but historically exercises the same divine power in goodness; goodness above all the rejection and heartlessness of men, the hem of his garment made perfectly whole. 15. is a very remarkable chapter, but I must touch on it only in connection with the miracle. There human will-worship, as contrasted with God’s law, and really to the temporal advantage of the priests, is utterly rejected man’s religion in alleged offerings to God as contrasted with God’s law. Next man’s heart, the source of all the evil; and then with one of the accursed race of Canaan, so that as come to Israel there could be no blessing for her, the reckoning on God’s heart in sovereign goodness met at once a response. He could not deny Himself, or say God is not as good as you suppose. He was divinely above the barriers of Judaism and dispensation, and divinely good. Again, the miracle is a present witness of what and who He is. He returns to the field of ministry in the land of Israel, and satisfies yet again the poor with bread in the same divine way. I have no doubt there is an intentional specific difference between this and the 5000, the 12, and the 7. This latter more specifically divine with the remnant, but it is not here the place to enter into these details of interpretation. The general principle of wonted mercy, verse 30, gives us again His full and constant character. In 16. we find the, church substituted for a Christ present on the earth, on the confession of Jesus as Son of the living God, and the keys of the kingdom * given to Peter, but no special miracle demands our attention. (*Not of the church. Keys of the church is a thought unknown to Scripture.) In 17. we have the kingdom in glory. This was the Son of man revealed in the glory of the kingdom. Here we find the disciples themselves unable to use that power in Christ which faith would have done. Only separation of heart and spirit, and reference to and confidence in God, could wield it and set aside the power of Satan down here. This answered, so to speak, to the coming glory of the Son of man, and made Satan powerless in presence of a humbled Savior. But now, for all that, the new place belonging to the disciples, connected with His resurrection, is strikingly brought out. The coming glory did not belong to Christ’s then position, that was the fasting and praying part of His path, they were not to speak of the vision of glory till He was risen. But meanwhile He shows divine knowledge and divine power over creation. Those who collect the didrachma for the temple ask Peter if his master was not a faithful Jew. Christ shows His divine knowledge of things in anticipating Peter, but puts Peter in the same place with Himself, that we offend not. They were both children of the great King of the temple, that we offend not. Then He shows His power, making the fish bring the needed money, two didrachmas, and Peter was to give it for me and thee. Redemption has brought us into the place of Sons with Christ. Grace bowed to the lowly place, but power over all creation showed who was there; but grace then brought believers into the place of new and infinite blessing in which Christ stood. This blessed " me and thee" closed, in fact, the path of Christ here with the displayed glory. We have characteristics of the walk suited to this new place of the disciples individually and collectively, but the present testimony to Christ was over, they were charged indeed not to say any more that He was the Christ. We have one notable miracle in 21. The fig-tree of God’s planting, Israel after the flesh, man under the old covenant, when the Lord of the vineyard came seeking fruit, was judged as fruitless forever. Herewith the manifestation of the truth of Satanic power in the swine are the only miracles which were not the direct exercise of power in goodness. But they not only confirm the constant character of all the others, but show the state of man and God’s judgment of that state as to man’s responsibility, when all the testimony of grace and power had been given. The story of the didrachm showed the new place in grace; that of the fig-tree man’s condition under responsibility and law as he was. In 20: 17 to 28 are shown Christ and the disciples place here below as finally rejected. Then 29 begins His last presentation to Jerusalem as Son of David, and God’s testimony to Him by the mouth of babes and sucklings. The mercy indeed continued, but the testimony was closed. He who believed He was Son of David received sight, the rest were judged. The greatest miracles of all were His death, giving up His own Spirit, when He could say, It is finished; and His resurrection. But these were either for stability of faith to believers or for the display of power in others as the subject of their testimony. Our subject has been Christ’s own works as a testimony to His person, and the true character of God as so revealed. For the present I close this paper, already extended far beyond my thought in commencing it. It may be interesting to examine the other gospels, and study any peculiar aspect of the miracles connected with them. But for the general principle what we have found in Matthew fully suffices, and gives a character of divine goodness and entering into our sorrows which infidelity cannot touch, and, through the hardening of heart it always produces, cannot feel or see the beauty of. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 175: VOL 03 - PSA_84:1-12 ======================================================================== Psalms 84:1-12 To the director on the Gittith, for the sons of Korah. A Psalm. How lovely are thy dwelling places, Jehovah of Hosts! My soul has earnestly desired, and has also wasted away for the courts of Jehovah; My heart and my flesh cry aloud to the living God. Yea, a sparrow has found an house, And a swallow a nest for herself, Where she has placed her brood, Thine altars, Jehovah of Hosts, My King, and my God. Blessed are (lit. happinesses of) the dwellers in Thy house: They shall still praise Thee. Pause. Blessed is (lit. happinesses of) a man whose strength is in Thee; High ways in their heart. Those passing through a valley of weeping, A fountain they make it; Moreover, the rain covers it with blessings. They go from strength to strength, He (1:e. each one) appeareth unto God in Zion. Jehovah, God of Hosts, hear my prayer: Give ear, God of Jacob. Pause. 9. Our shield see, 0 God, And look on the face of Thy Messiah (lit, anointed). 10. For a day in Thy courts is better than a thousand. I have chosen to remain at the threshold in the house of my God, Rather than to dwell in tents of wickedness. 11. For a sun and shield is Jehovah God: Grace and glory will Jehovah give: He will not withhold good to those walking in integrity. 12.Jehovah of hosts, Blessed is (lit. happinesses of) a man who trusteth in Thee. The above forms part of the third book of Psalms, which, commencing with Psalms 73:1-28 and ending with Psalms 89:1-52, treats of the desolation of the sanctuary (74.), the city (79.), and the throne (89); and therefore concerns Israel at large, and not merely the godly remnant of the Jews. In keeping, then, with the character of this book, Psalms 84:1-12 describes God’s altar as neglected, worship no longer ascending to Him as it had done after the return of the Jews, and before the development of the plans of antichrist. Both the brazen altar and the golden altar are left uncared for, and unused; so the birds can, unmolested, find about them suitable places whereon to place their broods. Reading Psalms 79:1-13 we are introduced to Jerusalem in the lowest condition in which she will be found after the last sue’ cessful siege yet to be undertaken against her by her enemies is a fait accompli. To this Isaiah 29:1-4, and Zechariah 14:1-2, refer. Following on to Psalms 80:1-19, we read of the vineyard wasted, and the vine trampled down, hence God is therein supplicated to raise up the vine, and to restore prosperity to the nation, their hopes resting on Messiah, the man of God’s right hand (vv. 14-19) for full deliverance. So the Psalm closes in prayer, recalling to mind part of the formula of the blessing of Israel in Numbers 6:1-27Psalms 81:1-16, carrying on the subject, sets forth the principles on which earthly blessings can be enjoyed by Israel (vv. 8-10), in answer to the cry of the preceding one. With this before them, they are exhorted at the outset of the Psalm to sing to God, and to count on the restoration of festivals, that of the new moon being typical of renovation in store for the people. Psalms 82:1-8. celebrates God again among them, judging among the judges. For evil must be dealt with ere full blessing can be known. But taking His place as Judge in Israel, He will judge the earth and inherit all nations. Hence, as a needful prelude to this last thought, the confederacy against Israel is described, and God’s interference is implored to overthrow it definitely and forever, as He did the Canaanites and Midianites of old. This is the subject of Psalms 83:1-18 How the cry is answered, Isaiah (10: 25-26; 29: 6-8), Joel (2: 20), and Zechariah (12: 1-9) prophetically describe. That destruction accomplished, the way to God’s house will be opened for His people, whither the desire of their heart is to go, as Psalms 84:1-12 beautifully describes. In vv. 1-4 the writer expresses the longing desire of his heart to be there. In vv. 5-8 he describes the way thither. And in vv. 9-12 he sets forth that all must be accomplished for them by the Messiah, God’s anointed one. The pause, Selah, here as elsewhere marks the divisions of the Psalm. In each portion the writer speaks of blessedness. It will be blessed to dwell in God’s house. It is blessed for the man whose strength is in God. It is blessed, too, for Him who trusteth in Jehovah, God of Hosts. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 176: VOL 03 - REDEMPTION ======================================================================== Redemption RESTORATION to a condition of innocence, such as Adam and Eve have alone known upon earth, is clearly impossible. By the fall the knowledge of good and evil was acquired, and man got a nature which is enmity against God (Romans 8:7). Continuance forever in the condition spiritual and physical, which was engendered by the fall, would be dreadful to contemplate. Yet deliverance from it by his own power is what man can never achieve. Redemption, therefore, becomes a necessity, if the consequences of the fall are not always to be experienced by members of the race of Adam. For creatures we are, called into being at the will of the Creator, each alike possessing a soul that never dies, which dwells, whilst the man is upon earth, in a body which never can be annihilated. Were redemption unheard of, how truly wretched would be our prospect! Were it impossible, how had the enemy triumphed, by involving in ruin inevitable the whole race of beings, on the head of which God the Creator had once looked, and saw that it was very good (Genesis 1:31)! But the Bible treats of redemption ἀπολύτρωσις by the blood of the Lord Jesus Christ, and assures all who believe on Him that they share in it already (Ephesians 1:7; Colossians 1:14), even the forgiveness of sins, whilst awaiting that exercise of divine power, which will effect the redemption of their bodies (Romans 8:23). The subject, then, is one of great importance and of world-wide interest, since it concerns Israel, Jerusalem, our souls, our bodies, and the purchased possession, to the enjoyment of which, with the Lord Jesus Christ, believers are taught to look forward (Ephesians 1:14; Ephesians 4:30). Far-reaching have been the results of sin, widely extended will be the effects of redemption, but all of God, to whose activity in grace we are, the Psalmist knew (Psalms 71:23; Psalms 103:4) and looked for (Psalms 69:18), and Israel will enjoy. Of this, too, Jeremiah could speak (Lamentations 3:58); whilst of man’s inability to give to God a ransom for his brother, that death should not overtake him, we are admonished in a psalm for the sons of Korah, in which same inspired composition we are taught that God can preserve. His own alive (49: 7, 8, 15). By and by redemption of the poor and needy from deceit and violence will be a marked feature of Messiah’s reign (Psalms 72:14), when precious will their blood be in His sight. Thus in all ages redemption by God from trouble, danger, or even impending death, could be known and enjoyed, and in this aspect it is of course independent of dispensational position or national connection, its two essential requisites being a human creature in need, and God willing to rescue him from it. The need might be great, and often recurring; the danger might be imminent, death staring the man in the face; the person, too, might be friendless, as far as man was concerned; yet even if fatherless he could find in God a redeemer נּו֗אֵלGoel (Proverbs 23:10-11), as much as the Lord’s anointed (Psalms 19:14), or Job (19: 25), or the nation of Israel as a whole (Isaiah 41:14). But what are we to understand by redemption as set forth in Holy Writ? It is deliverance from a condition, and may be effected in various ways. Hence it differs from purchase, which implies a change of ownership. A slave purchased changes his master, one redeemed changes his condition. If the special subject is the one redeemed, his change of condition is before the mind. If the subject be how he was redeemed, the price paid, the power exercised, according as his redemption was effected by price or by power, will be present to the writer’s thoughts. If the former is more particularly treated of, his redemption is especially brought into view; if the latter, the redeemer will occupy a marked place in the mental vision. As regards God’s people, whether earthly or heavenly, they are both purchased and redeemed. In Exodus 15:13; Exodus 15:16, both are stated of Israel. In 1 Corinthians 6:20, and Ephesians 1:7, we have authority for the statements in connection with Christians. But purchase may be predicated of people not redeemed, and can now be affirmed of all men (Matthew 13:44), though all have not been redeemed (2 Peter 2:1). As purchased, however, responsibility to serve the Lord attaches to all who have heard of Him, though love to the One who has bought them may not thereby be engendered. A slave purchased of an old master would be bound to serve his new master, whether the purchase took place with his consent or not. It is the ownership which determines to whom the service should be rendered. But who would remain indifferent to the one who has redeemed him? Purchase attests the rights of the buyer; redemption reminds us of the love and compassion of the redeemer. Pursuing our investigation the subject, let us first confine our attention to redemption as set forth in the Old Testament, wherein we meet with two terms commonly used to express it, viz,נׇּאַל to set free what was bound, and to פׇרׇה divide or separate, hence to redeem. Two other verbs are each once translated in A. V. to redeem, viz.פׇרַק (Psalms 136:24), and קׇנׇה (Nehemiah 5:8). The former of these treats of deliverance, the latter of acquiring possession in order to redeem. Without, then, concerning ourselves any further with these latter verbs, let us turn to the consideration of the use of the two words so commonly employed, נׇּאַל and פׇרׇה. At times both occur together, e.g. "The Lord hath redeemed פׇרׇה Jacob, and ransomed him נְּאׇלו֗ from the hand of him that was stronger than he" (Jeremiah 31:11). Again, "I will ransom them אֶפְרּם from the power of the grave, I will redeem them אֶנְ٠אלם from death" (Hosea 13:14). See also Isaiah 35:9-10; Isaiah 51:10-11; Leviticus 27:27-29; Psalms 69:18. Both verbs are used, too, of the redemption out of Egypt,נׇּאַל being met with in Exodus 6:6; Exodus 15:13, and פׇרׇה in Deuteronomy 7:8; Deuteronomy 9:26; Deuteronomy 21:8. Both, too, are met with where the deliverance, still future, is treated of (Isaiah 52:3; Psalms 130:8). On the other hand, there are occasions on which one is always used, and never the other. For instance, where the kinsman was required by law to act, we have always the participle of נׇּאֵל; and wherever the Lord Jehovah is called the Redeemer of Israel or of Jerusalem, it is always by the term נּו֗אֵל that He is mentioned. He is the God of His people, though He can be described as one who redeems פו֗רֶהPodeh, His servants from the dangers which threaten them (Psalms 34:22), as well as the One who redeemed Israel from the house of bondage (Deuteronomy 13:6). When writing then of what God is in this character, He is always called the God. When mentioning what He does as such, He can be described as the Podeh. And when Moses writes (Exodus 21:30) of the owner of a malicious ox having to ransom his own life by reason of the homicidal act of his beast פִרְיו֗ן ransom, from פׇרׇה, is employed. Again, where the redemption of the firstborn is written about, whether of man or of beast, פׇרׇה is the verb generally selected; but where houses, lands, or tithes are the subject, נׇּאֵל a is met with (Leviticus 25:26.) Hence these two words, though freely used, and often applied to the same things, are not after all interchangeable. The Psalmist, for instance, more often uses פׇרׇה; with Isaiah it is just the reverse. By the law the subject of redemption was brought into great prominence. As a nation Israel had shared in it. As a settled people, in the possession of houses, lands, and animals, they were frequently reminded of it; and were taught subject to what conditions they could exercise the power of redemption on behalf either of themselves, their brethren, their houses, lands, or animals. For all these could be redeemed under certain specified conditions. From the claims of man, and from the claims of God, deliverance could be effected, and that whether they had arisen from the voluntary act of an individual subjecting himself or his possessions to the power of another, or from causes beyond any man’s control. We will look at the subject in this order, taking up first those cases where the claims of man were in question, next where the claims of God had to be met, both arising from the voluntary act of an Israelite. After that we will consider redemption from Egyptian bondage, the bringing out Israel from under the power of their oppressors, and the redemption of their firstborn males from the claim which God made upon them. And first of the claims of man arising from the voluntary act of an Israelite. These are set forth in Leviticus 25:1-55 Suppose a poor man of the race of Israel had fallen into poverty, and had parted with some of his land, its redemption by money was his right, of which none could legally deprive him. Any of his kin could redeem it, or, if able, he himself might do it, on payment of the equitable price (25: 27). The Lord thus watched over him, and preserved him from the oppression and the rapacity of the richer man who had purchased it. In the year of Jubilee, indeed, it would go out free, and the poor man would regain possession of it as unencumbered as when Israel first inherited it, yet at any time short of that the portion sold could be redeemed. The poor, the needy, were God’s charge. He took them under. His protection; for, poor though they might be, they belonged to Israel; and the land in question belonged to the Lord (Joshua 22:19), who had the exclusive right, as here exercised, of prescribing the terms on which any should enjoy its produce, or reap the benefit of its fertility. Strictly righteous as between man and man was this provision, yet how gracious! The purchaser bought it on well-known conditions, and no mental reservation nor legal quibble could bar the right of the vendor to be reinstated in his possession before the Jubilee came round. Where else upon earth were such laws in force? Who but the poor Israelite enjoyed such an advantage? But this provision implied ability either in the man, or in his kin, to redeem it. If able himself, or if his kindred were able, it could be done. If not, he must abide the consequences of his act of sale till the Jubilee arrived. How easily but for the privilege of the Jubilee would he have lost his land forever, then became apparent. And, that he did not lose it forever, he owed solely to this gracious enactment of his God. His poverty might compel a sale; God could not be blamed for that. Its redemption by the law was permitted, though it could give no ability to those concerned to avail themselves of it. And this is the principle of law throughout. There must be power in man to reap advantage from it. If in such a case it was lacking, nothing but the Jubilee deliverance could be expected. How precious to Israel will the Jubilee appear, when they shall return to their land, which they have not been able to redeem from the hands of the stranger! How interesting to us is this Jubilee provision, a rehearsal as it were of what God has in store for His people in spite of all their failure! With a house in a walled city the case was different. Within a year from its sale redemption was permitted. None were to be deprived of the opportunity of changing their mind, or to be taken irrevocable advantage of unawares. If, however, it was not redeemed within that time, it became the absolute property of the purchaser, and the vendor had no further right by himself or by his kin to claim its redemption at all. The reason for this difference between the land and the house in a walled town is evident. The land was the man’s patrimony, the house in the city was not. His patrimony the Lord carefully guarded. The house, however, was the Israelite’s own, to do as he pleased with it. In the case of the Levites, who had cities with their suburbs assigned to them--for they shared not in the tribal division of the land-their cities and houses could be redeemed at any time, being treated as land, which could not be permanently alienated from the tribe to which it belonged, except under certain conditions (Leviticus 27:20-21); and they enjoyed this further advantage, in that the suburbs of the fields of their possessions could never be sold. They were theirs for an inalienable possession. The Lord specially cared for those whom He had taken up to do the service of the tabernacle, and to minister to Aaron the high priest. But suppose a poor Israelite had fallen into a condition still lower, and had sold himself to a stranger, or sojourner by him, he could be redeemed from servitude by the payment of an equitable price any time before the year of Jubilee (25: 47-55). One of his brethren could redeem him, or any near of kin, or he himself, if able, could effect his deliverance. One of his kin, however, it must be, if not himself. A friend could not do him this service. In such a case mere friendship, however true and great, had no opportunity to display itself. Relationship alone was the ground on which such a kindness could be shown. A privilege this was, but a right as well. It was a privilege for one of his kin to deliver his poor relation from the yoke of the stranger. It was also a right which could be claimed at law; and his master, whatever might be his wish, had no power to gainsay it. If the proper price was offered, the master could ask no more. And God fixed the scale which regulated the price. If it was one of the man’s kin who paid it, or the man himself, the redemption was accomplished. These conditions complied with, the Israelite was free. But if he had sold himself to one of his countrymen, he had no power to claim his redemption. In such a case he was to serve till the Jubilee (25: 40). From servitude to the stranger he might be redeemed, for the poor Israelite was Jehovah’s servant. The Lord, however, did not interpose and secure his deliverance, He only allowed it, leaving it to those interested to see if they could effect it. At the Jubilee the poor man would certainly get free. Liberty therefore was secured to him, the only question being how, and when. But why the difference of regulation between the case of servitude to an Israelite and to a stranger? Is there not here something in harmony with the future of the nation? The Lord Himself will act as the God or Redeemer of Israel who have become servants to strangers; and will rescue them from subjection to a foreign, not a domestic yoke. The year of His redeemed will come. In that sense it will be to them as a Jubilee. But the moment for action the Lord reserves to Himself to decide, as the Goel or redeemer under the law had a right to do. Here again we have a little picture of the future. Further, although redemption from servitude to the stranger could be demanded as a right, all parties were reminded that it was the special privilege of Israel. A bondsman from among the nations was a bondsman forever. For him no year of Jubilee arrived with its clear ringing trumpet sound, sending a thrill of gladness through his heart, and that of his wife and family, if he possessed them. No redemption by money could he claim, no going out free could he anticipate; for though equally with the Israelite he might trace his genealogy up to Noah, and through him to Adam, and although made of one blood with the seed of Jacob (Acts 17:26), he was not one of God’s redeemed people, so could not share in the privileges of such (Leviticus 25:44-46). Suppose an Israelite and a Gentile in the service of a stranger in Canaan; both were bound to serve their master; but the Israelite might be redeemed at any moment, or would certainly go out free at the Jubilee, whereas the Gentile had nothing but slavery to contemplate, unless his master voluntarily set him free. His condition therefore might never alter till death released him from his servitude. With the Israelite how different! How precious must that privilege have appeared in the eyes of the Gentile, which his fellow- bondsman the Israelite possessed! But other claims there were besides those of man. Of these Leviticus 27:1-34 treats. God had a claim on whatever had been sanctified by a vow, provided one legally qualified had consecrated it to God. For a married woman had not this power without her husband’s sanction, and the unmarried daughter in her father’s house was equally incapable of so acting unless her father allowed it. But a man, or a Widow, or a divorced woman, was free to vow without the consent of another to make it valid, and the Lord would certainly require the fulfillment of it (Numbers 30:1-16) His claims must be enforced. The act on the part of the person was merely a voluntary one. No law enforced it, but the law forbade most strictly the breaking of it (Deuteronomy 23:21-23). Men, animals, houses, lands, and tithes could be vowed to God. Of these some could be redeemed, others could not. If a clean beast, of which sacrifices could be offered, was the subject of the vow, that beast was holy unto the Lord, and no exchange was permitted of a bad one for a good one. The very animal sanctified was to be offered upon the altar. If any exchange was attempted, God claimed both. Besides this, for things devoted, called חֵרֶםcherem, as men under certain circumstances, or animals, or a field, no redemption was permitted. Every devoted thing was most holy unto the Lord (Leviticus 27:28-29). Under these circumstances the life of the man was to be taken, whilst the beast and the field were for the Lord, and if they had belonged to any in Israel, were given by God to the priest (Numbers 18:14). Instances of this law as affecting men we have in the Old Testament. The Canaanites were thus to be devoted (Deuteronomy 20:17), and their cities Israel vowed to destroy (Numbers 21:2). So every living thing in Jericho was killed, Rahab and her house excepted. The Amalekites too were to be thus treated by Saul (1 Samuel 15:1-35), and enticers to idolatry in Israel (Deuteronomy 13:15). And in fulfillment of such a vow Jephthah slew his daughter (Judges 11:31). How inexorable was the law Jephthah felt. How dangerous to fail in the observance of it Saul learned. If men were vowed to the Lord, but not devoted, a money payment was accepted according to the estimation of the lawgiver. " The person," we read, " shall be for the Lord by thy estimation," which varied according to age and sex. The value of the person vowed having been ascertained, the price could be paid in his stead. If a certain measure of poverty could be pleaded by the one who made the vow, the priest was to estimate the price according to the ability of the man who had vowed to the Lord. The lawgiver had announced from God Himself the ordinary scale, from which no departure could be permitted, except at the discretion of the priest. Thus no man was released from the consequences of his vow, yet God provided that the man’s ability should be taken into account. On no man was to be laid more than he could pay, yet the engagement, though voluntary on his part, was binding when once entered into. A solemn consideration this was for the man. A word of warning surely for us, who are taught that we have of ourselves no strength or ability wherewith to pay any vows we might make unto God. Whether the redemption in this case was optional or imperative does not seem so certain. It may have been imperative. In that case the making such a vow was equivalent to devoting a certain sum of money to God, for the one who made it must have known pretty nearly to what the money commutation would amount. There were, however, instances where persons vowed to the service of God were never thus redeemed. Of such Samuel is an example, lent to the Lord as long as he lived. For unclean beasts, if vowed to God, for houses, for fields, or for tithes, redemption by price was permitted. Here the priest came in. He valued the thing, whatever it was, and his estimation held good; for as a type surely of the true priest, the Lord Jesus Christ, his estimation was correct: " As thou valuest it, who art the priest, so shall it be;" " as the priest shall estimate it, so shall it stand" (Levit. 27: 12, 14). The value thus fixed, a fifth part was to be added if redemption was to take place, and the former owner thereby recover that which had once belonged to him; but in these cases, unless the one who had owned them exercised his right of redemption they could never be set free. The person who had sanctified them could alone redeem them. With the land the provision was somewhat different; for if the field sanctified originally belonged to another person than the one who sanctified it, it returned at the Jubilee to the original possessor, since no one could permanently alienate the land of another. If, on the other hand, it had been the property of the one who sanctified it, he had the right, till the Jubilee, of redeeming it, on the terms prescribed in the law. But should he fail to exercise his right, from whatever cause, it became the Lord’s forever. In the case, then, where man’s claims had to be met, redemption by the individual concerned, or by his kinsman, was permitted. In the cases where God’s claims were in question, redemption, if permitted, could only be effected by the one who had made the vow. In both classes of claims redemption depended on human ability, and perhaps, in the case of the poor brother’s land, in his kinsman’s willingness likewise. If none redeemed the land, or the poor Israelite, the Jubilee set both free. So that the poor man could always look forward where man’s claims were in question. All the time till the Jubilee he might live in a state of expectancy, with the certainty of a release, and re-entrance upon the land of his possession as soon as the Jubilee trumpet sounded. But the Jubilee did not restore the field to the one who had sanctified it to the Lord. Till the Jubilee, unless he had sold the field to another, he had the right to redeem it. But the trumpet which announced to the poor man the recovery of his possessions, proclaimed to the one who, having sanctified his field, had not redeemed it, the irrevocable condition of his property. It was henceforth the Lord’s. The claims of God, if unsatisfied within a given time, could never be met. The claims of man, on the other hand, could only last up to a given date. The year of the Lord’s redeemed would come, when every one in Israel who had parted with his land to another could return to his own possession. " The gifts and calling of God are without repentance" (Romans 11:29). Happy was the poor man who had a kinsman to act on his behalf. Happy he would feel if he could deliver himself or his land. But privileged above all other people were Israel; for they could share in the gracious provisions of the Jubilee. Thus God provided that they should not be permanently dispossessed of their inheritance. Restoration was their proper hope, and of that they shall never be ashamed. With a vow it was different. But a vow implied that the man had something to consecrate. It was poverty that made the poor brother part with his land. Out of a man’s fullness, whatever was the measure of it, he vowed to God. Now, is all this but dry and uninteresting law, which once concerned Israel when in the enjoyment of that land of which for centuries they have been dispossessed? Surely there is more in it than that. The regulations, being of God, acquaint us with His ways, and show us how great a privilege those enjoy whose God is the Lord. The Jubilee was, as it were, their pole-star and their dial. To it they could always turn, regulating their transactions by it, and recalling to mind the time which must elapse ere it could be proclaimed. It however conferred on them no new privilege. It gave them nothing that they had not before possessed. It only provided for restoration to a condition formerly enjoyed. Thus it kept alive hope in their hearts; and this is.a principle in God’s ways with His people in all ages. And we who are saved in hope understand what that principle must have been to them. As keeping alive hope in them, it told them that a permanent order of things upon earth had not yet been established, and we know such cannot be until the Lord Jesus shall come to reign. Moreover, it witnessed of the possibility of a man losing his portion in the land; but it witnessed, too, of the grace of God, who provided for the certainty of his recovering it. He might lose it by his own fault; he would recover it through the favor of the Lord, by the operation of this law, and this he would owe solely to God’s mercy and goodness. What a tale, then, the Jubilee told on the one hand of man, and on the other of God: of man, that he could lose for a time that which God had assigned to him; of God, that Israel should not be deprived of their possessions in perpetuity. But whilst the Jubilee witnessed of this, doubtless the provisions for redemption must at times have made the poor Israelite keenly alive to the precariousness of such a hope of deliverance ere the trumpet sounded, since that hope rested for its fulfillment on man’s ability, and perhaps on a kinsman’s willingness as well to come to his assistance. How much better has God provided for us, who have " an inheritance incorruptible and undefiled, and that fadeth not away, reserved in heaven for us, who are kept by the power of God through faith unto salvation, ready to be revealed in the last time" (1 Peter 1:4-5). Surely those to whom Peter wrote, who had once been Jews, must have noted the difference between being on the ground of law and on the ground of grace; and the immeasurable advantage in favor of the latter. The law contemplated the possibility of Israel losing their portion for a time. The strangers scattered abroad were illustrations of it. Grace provided for its safe keeping forever, and for their safe keeping to enjoy it. What a poor prospect we should have if our redemption depended in any measure on our ability to effect it! Besides this, the regulations about vows, and the strict enforcement of their fulfillment, must have made them see, and should make us see, what a solemn thing it is to enter into engagements with God. For unless the man himself was able to pay that which was requisite, he could not set free what he had once sanctified. To vow to God was no light matter. The man was to feel that. To redeem that which he had vowed might be a very difficult matter. The man had to learn that, and none could help him where the claims of God were concerned; he must act for himself, and in his own strength. But all these provisions were for a nation in the enjoyment of redemption from Egyptian bondage, and recognized by Jehovah as His peculiar people. They were themselves redeemed before they could act in redeeming power. In the cases already looked at, the need of redemption arose from the person’s own act in putting himself or his possessions under the power of another. But redemption was requisite, and was accomplished in setting living creatures free from a condition to which they had been subjected either by God’s will, or by God’s law. By the exercise of the former it was, that Israel became servants to the Egyptians, and so needed redemption from bondage to their masters. By provisions of the latter, the firstborn males of man and of unclean beasts amongst Israel, which were holy to the Lord, could be set free from God’.s claims over them. Into this let us now look, taking these two subjects up in the order in which they have been severally mentioned. First, then, of the redemption of Israel out of the house of bondage. Here we enter upon a subject of great importance, and it teaches us what redemption by God involves. It was new, and something unheard of, that God should redeem a whole nation. The patriarchs had, it is true, tasted of what God could do in redeeming them individually from evil, but never as a whole nation, set free from servitude to another nation stronger and mightier than they were. Nothing like it had ever before been known (Deuteronomy 4:34). We can understand a nation rising up in its strength to shake off a galling yoke, and, if unable alone to cope with its foe, interesting others in its behalf. But Israel did nothing of this kind. There was no national movement, no combination amongst them against the common enemy, no rising up with irresistible might, to compel their masters to set them free. All that Israel did was to spoil the Egyptians by borrowing their jewels of silver, and jewels of gold, and raiment, and then marching out of Egypt, and passing through the Red Sea, at the word of command by Moses. They lifted up no arm, they struck no blow, they never even attempted to measure their strength with that of their enslavers. Egypt’s power was unbroken when Israel journeyed from Rameses to Succoth, and thence to the Red Sea before Pi-hahiroth; brought out with a high hand, in the sight of all the Egyptians, who were engaged in burying their dead (Numbers 33:4). Hence it was that Pharaoh and his princes, waking up to that which they had done in letting Israel escape, determined to pursue after them, saying, " Why have we done this, that we have let Israel go from serving us?" So he made ready his chariots, and summoned his people. All that had been done, had been done of God. New, too, was the thought to Israel, the lineal descendants of Jacob, that God could act in such a way; for when Moses, commissioned by the Lord, gave the message, "I will bring you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians, and I will rid you out of their bondage, and I will וְנׇאַלְחִּי you with a stretched-out arm, and, with great judgments " (Exodus 6:6), those heart-stirring words fell on ears dull of hearing. Israel knew not what a redemption of this kind could be. They hearkened not " for anguish of spirit, and for cruel bondage." Their manner of receiving the divine communication evidenced that it was something new. But how like God to act in a manner at once unprecedented, and to man inconceivable! God originates; men and the devil may imitate, All, however, that Moses told them came true. So, when next we meet with the verb נׇּאַלּ to redeem, it is Israel who, with Moses, make use of it in their song of praise: "Thou in Thy mercy hast led forth the people which Thou hast redeemed: נׇּאַלְּחׇּ; Thou hast guided them in Thy strength to Thy holy habitation " (Exodus 15:13). Redemption from Egyptian bondage was now accomplished. In Egypt, with the blood on the doorposts, they had learned how the firstborn within had been sheltered from the visit of the angel of death. At the Red Sea the whole nation experienced redemption by divine power, and they celebrated it. Their chains of slavery were broken, for the arm of Jehovah had been bared on their behalf. Henceforth they were God’s redeemed people; and this condition once entered upon, never altered; for redemption from Egyptian bondage never was and never can be reversed. Without effort on their part was all accomplished. It was for God to act; it was for them, in obedience, to march into the bed of the sea, when told to go forward. The effects were immediate; the results were abiding. This their history elucidates, proving on what unchanging ground redemption by God had placed them. At Sinai, less than six months after the exodus, they made a golden calf to worship, forfeiting thereby all claim to blessing, and deserving punishment; and this God intimated to Moses, when He said, " Now, therefore, let me alone, that my wrath may wax hot against them, and that I may consume them" (Exodus 32:10). But Moses would not. He interceded for them as the redeemed of Jehovah (Deuteronomy 9:26). Again, at Kadesh, after they had despised the pleasant land, and murmured against the Lord, and actually proposed to return into Egypt, surrendering in a moment all their privileges and their special position as the Lord’s people, Moses reminded God that He had brought them up from amongst the Egyptians in His might (Numbers 14:13); how, then, should He destroy them with the pestilence? They were His people. Thus, on these two occasions in their past history, when their sinfulness might justly have entailed their cutting off, Moses, by the ground he took with God, evidenced how well he understood the value of such a plea; and when again they shall be in the depths of trouble, the consequence of their fathers’ sins in having rejected the Lord Jesus Christ, and the testimony of the Holy Ghost by Stephen and others, redemption from Egypt will still be urged as a ground on which God should be gracious to them (Psalms 74:2). Thus, at all times, when God is dealing with them as His people, however grievous their sins may have been, or however desperate their condition, the plea of redemption accomplished will prove to be never out of season. God’s wrath can be deprecated, and His favor entreated, on the ground that they are His people, whom He brought up out of Egypt. Nor was it only when judicial dealing was deserved that such a plea was urged. If the body of a man was found in the land, the murderer of whom was unknown, the elders of the city nearest the spot where it was discovered were instructed to say, "Ile merciful, 0 Lord, unto Thy people Israel, whom Thou hast redeemed, and lay not innocent blood unto Thy people of Israel’s charge" (Deuteronomy 21:8). The people were thus taught the value, and the privilege of their exceptional position as a nation which God had chosen for Himself, and though their deliverance was a thing of the past, they were never to forget it, and were reminded that God would ever acknowledge it. So, later on in their history, when the returned remnant were in much weakness in their land, the wall of Jerusalem broken down, and the gates of it burned with fire, Nehemiah could lay this pitiable state before God, as that of His people whom He had redeemed by His great power and by His strong hand (Nehemiah 1:10). A thousand years intervened between the exodus and the days of Nehemiah, yet Israel’s redemption by divine power was not forgotten; and the Tirshatha, as he was afterward styled, had evidence of the validity before God of the plea which was based upon it. They were God’s servants and God’s people, however much they had dishonored Him and willfully disobeyed His law. And what is so gracious, the Lord Jehovah, by Isaiah the prophet, puts His people in remembrance of that which He did for them in Egypt, as the pledge of that which He will yet do for them (Isaiah 43:1). Hence at various times in their history God has sanctioned the mention before Him of redemption from the house of bondage, and in His word refers to it to sustain His people’s hopes of divine intervention on their behalf, Who but Israel enjoyed such a privilege? for a privilege it was, as David confessed (2 Samuel 7:23; 1 Chronicles 17:21), and the Psalmist attested (Psalms 106:10). There was, however, another side to this question, and it is important that we should remember it. They could remind God in their troubles that He had redeemed them. He reminded them in Deuteronomy, when pressing on them the duty of obedience, that redemption involved corresponding responsibility. It was all of grace at the outset, for none could have claimed it. If, however, they were God’s people, it behooved them in a special manner to act in conformity with such a privilege. Obedience is due to Him from the creature, whether redeemed or not; but if redemption has been effected by God in grace, should not the creature that shares in it serve Him with alacrity? In faithfulness to His oath to their fathers the Lord brought them up out of Egypt (Deuteronomy 7:8). If others on earth were ignorant of Jehovah, Israel was not. If others refused Him the homage and obedience due from the creature, Israel certainly was bound by every consideration to submit to His sway. So on the confines of their land, in the plains of Moab, by Jordan, they were exhorted to keep from evil of various kinds. The Lord knew well what their hearts were. These exhortations display that, and Israel’s history but too well attests that no considerations of fear or of gratitude can keep men in the path of obedience and duty. Who had seen the Lord’s power as they had? who had heard His voice speaking out of the fire as Israel had? who were bound to Him by the ties of gratitude for deliverance from slavery, who but this people which He had brought out of Egypt? And yet they had never put away their idols, which had provoked Jehovah’s wrath in Egypt (Ezekiel 20:8). In the wilderness too they had their images, and they worshipped the host of heaven (Acts 7:42). But now in the plains of Moab, having crossed the brook, or valley of Zered (Deuteronomy 2:13-14), and the land of their inheritance lying just before them, they are exhorted to guard against all enticers to idolatry, and to put them to death. How should they allow such to turn away their hearts from Him who had redeemed them from the house of bondage? (Deuteronomy 13:5). The Lord Jehovah was their God. He had proved it in Egypt, and at the Red Sea. " Who," they had sung, " is like Thee among the gods, glorious in holiness, fearful in praises, doing wonders?" (Exodus 15:11). Israel’s history, position, and possession of the land would forever attest that Jehovah was the true God. Indifference, therefore, to Him was not to be suffered for a moment. There could be no question of opinions on such a matter, for their God had shown most unmistakably that He was Jehovah (Exodus 14:18). Again, as the redeemed of the Lord, they had known what servitude in Egypt was; of its oppression they had fully tasted, and had drunk deep of its cup of bitterness and anguish. Hence, when they should be sending forth the Hebrew servant at the end of the seventh year, the year of release, they were to furnish him liberally out of their flock, their floor, and their wine-press; for of that, wherewith the Lord their God had blessed them, should they give to the servant just set free: "And thou shalt remember that thou wast a bondsman in the land of Egypt, and the Lord thy God redeemed thee: therefore I command thee this thing to-day" (Deuteronomy 15:15). Men are apt to forget the days of adversity when prosperity smiles upon them. Such was not to be the case with Israel. Affliction’s lessons were to be turned to account, and consideration for the poor Hebrew and liberality towards him was pressed on them, as having themselves once known servitude, from which Jehovah alone had rescued them. How much the master was to give is not stated. Liberality is all that is enjoined; thus leaving it to the richer man to show how much he valued that redemption, the fruits of which he so abundantly enjoyed. And so with oppression of any kind; the remembrance of redemption from Egypt was to act as an incentive against it. The poor man who pledged his garment, the hired servant, the widow, the fatherless, the stranger -all were to be protected from acts of unrighteousness by any who might be in a position to deal harshly or fraudulently with them; for the creditor, or the patron, being himself a subject of redemption, was to act as became such an one towards any who were cast upon his compassion (Deuteronomy 24:18). But Israel forgot all this. Even the wilderness bore witness to their shortness of memory on this point. " They turned back, and tempted God, and limited the Holy One of Israel. They remembered not His hand, nor the day when He delivered them from the enemy" (Psalms 78:41-42). And God brought it as a grievous charge against them, that though He had redeemed them, yet Israel had spoken lies against Him (Hosea 7:13). And still later in their history He pleaded with them in these words, " 0 My people, what have I done unto thee? and wherein have I wearied thee? testify against Me. For I brought thee up out of the land of Egypt, and redeemed thee out of the house of servants; and I sent before thee Moses, Aaron, and Miriam " (Micah 6:3-4). God had not forgotten what He had done for Israel, however little Israel had owned their responsibility in connection with it; and hence the prophet proceeds to remind them how Balaam and Balak’s attempts to curse them on Pisgah were frustrated, and more than frustrated, by the direct intervention of Jehovah. They were His people, His redeemed ones; so the power of evil could not prevail against them. In what a manner then had God shown the inviolability of the relation He had established between Himself and Israel! How such grace should have called forth obedience on their part! But we know how all this failed to effect a real reformation in the days of Hezekiah, or even of his great-grandson Josiah. Still they were God’s people. And though in the post-captivity prophets God never calls them such, except in view of the future (Zechariah 8:7-8; Zechariah 13:9), Nehemiah had not forgotten what they were to God (1: 10; 9: 32); Cyrus had owned it (Ezra 1:3); and the Lord by Zechariah promises to have mercy on them, as though He had not cast them off, adding, " I will hiss for them, and gather them; for I have redeemed them " (Zechariah 10:8). Far-reaching, indeed, for Israel are the results of redemption. How stable is such a foundation! How memorable and irreversible is the condition into which the nation, as such, was brought by the exercise of God’s power at the Red Sea, delivered forever from all the claims on their persons and services which the Egyptians had asserted and enforced with rigor! Practical results, then, should have been displayed. In their daily walk, and in their ordinary matters of business, the redemption out of Egypt should have been kept in their remembrance, and have borne fruit in their life. They could never be in a position in which it could become them to forget it; and God never left them without a frequent reminder of His intervention in Egypt on their behalf. By the Passover they were reminded, how God had sheltered the houses of their fathers in Egypt through the blood being placed upon the doorposts. By the redemption of the firstborn males of man and of beast they were to be kept in remembrance how He had destroyed the firstborn of the Egyptians, both of man and of beast. So from that time God claimed the firstborn males of Israel as His. On the morrow after the first Passover the Lord made known to the people His claim (Exodus 13:15-16), in words in which the fathers were to instruct their children. The claim once made, provision was thus made for its remembrance from generation to generation, and several times in their history were the people reminded of it. Embodied in the covenant made with them in Horeb (Exodus 22:29-30), it was reiterated in the covenant the Lord entered into with them at Sinai, after they had made the golden calf and forfeited, as far as they were concerned, everything they might have enjoyed if obedient (Exodus 34:19-20). Again, ere they left Sinai, they were reminded of it (Leviticus 27:26; Numbers 8:17). In their wilderness wanderings the Lord reasserted it, and prescribed the price and the age at which the firstborn of men were to be set free, viz. five shekels of silver when the infant was a month old (Numbers 18:15-18). In the plains of Moab God’s claim was once more set before them (Deuteronomy 15:19), and was incorporated into the covenant then made by His command with them. Thus in each of the covenants the Lord inserted it; and in the four last books of the Pentateuch Moses wrote of it. No book of the law, Genesis excepted, could they read without meeting with the mention of it. The firstborn males were God’s. They were His, for He had sanctified them to Himself (Numbers 8:17). Both the firstborn of men and of beasts were alike in this, though there were differences made by the law between them,’ so that we may divide them into three classes-the first where redemption was imperative, the second where it was impossible, the third where it was optional. In the first class were the firstborn males of men. In the second were the firstborn males of oxen, sheep, and goats,-clean animals of which men could offer sacrifices to the Lord. The third comprised the firstborn males of unclean animals. Children were to be redeemed by money. No life was taken on such occasions in their stead. A money payment only was enjoined; that paid, the Lord’s claim on the child was satisfied, and ceased. Unclean beasts were, if redeemed, to be redeemed by lambs. Here life was taken instead of that of the unclean beast. The animal belonged to God by birth, so the Israelite could not use it for his own purposes unless it had been set free by redemption from the divine claim upon it. As God’s, he had no right to it. If he redeemed it, he could have it and employ it in his own service. If not, it was to be killed. Redemption or death was the alternative, but not redemption or judgment. The life of the animal God claimed as His, because He had slain all the firstborn of beasts in the land of Egypt. If the owner gave a lamb in exchange, well and good. If not, the animal’s death was demanded, for on no other conditions except on that of redemption could he be allowed to profane, 1:e. apply to a common use, what God had sanctified or set apart for Himself. The firstborn males of the flock and of the herd could never be redeemed. They were holy. Their blood, therefore, was to be sprinkled upon the altar, their fat to be burnt thereon, and the rest of the animal was to be the priests’ as their portion. Now all this makes it clear that redemption in this aspect was not redemption from judgment. Men were redeemed by money. Clean beasts could not be redeemed at all. Unclean beasts might be redeemed on certain conditions.. These directions, however, were to come into operation after they had entered their land (Exodus 13:11). Meanwhile, in the wilderness, the Lord maintained His right over the firstborn in another way. After Moses had numbered the different tribes of Israel, that of Levi excepted, as they lay encamped at Sinai, before starting on their march to Canaan, the Lord gave His servant a second command, having reference only to the firstborn males of the twelve tribes, and then made apparent (Numbers 3:40-51) the reason for not numbering the tribe of Levi at the first, for the Lord was about to take the males of that tribe, from a month old and upward, instead of all the firstborn males in Israel, and their cattle in the place of the firstborn males of the cattle of the other tribes. Thus Levi occupied an important place in Israel, and a large section of the book of Numbers is occupied chiefly with the concerns of that tribe. Let us trace it out. In chapter 1. we have the numbering of the twelve tribes with the sphere of Levitical service distinctly marked out. In chapter 2. we have the outer circle of the camp described, each of the twelve tribes having their place in the camp assigned them. Next follows, in 3. 4., the numbering of the Levites, and the assignment to the three great families of that tribe of their special service and place in the camp and on the march. Thus the inner circle of the camp was provided for, formed, as it was to be, of the tribe of Levi alone, for had we visited it in the wilderness we should have seen the twelve tribes, three on each side, encircling the tents of that of Levi, which in its turn encircled the tabernacle, which last was separated from all else by the fine white linen hangings of its court. The camp arranged in order, the command to cleanse it from all defiling objects is next given, with the law of the jealousy offering, typical probably of Israel’s history, though yielding instruction also to us (5.) Then follows the Nazarite vow of devotedness to God, the contrast spiritually to conjugal infidelity (6.); after which we have the form of the blessing wherewith God’s High Priest was to bless the people (6: 22-26); the order of subjects being here suggestive of the rich results to flow to Israel when the Nazariteship of the Lord Jesus Christ shall cease. After this, we read first of the offering of each of the twelve princes of Israel, when the tabernacle had been fully set up and sanctified, which really took place previous to the announcement of all that we have passed in review (compare Numbers 1:1 with 7: 1), but is introduced here as intimately connected with Levitical service, since the families of Gershon and Merari profited by the oxen and wagons then given to the Lord (7.) Following this we have the special priestly service in connection with the candlestick, and the consecration of the Levites for ministry in the tabernacle of the congregation (8.), with the age at which they should go in to wait on their service, and the duration of that service, though all their subsequent life was to be spent in ministering and keeping the charge of the tabernacle of the congregation (8: 23-26). To carry burdens required strength, and the Lord would lay upon none more than they were able to bear. To minister, and to keep the watch of the tabernacle of the congregation, would be within the compass of a man’s power, when more arduous work might overtask his strength. Thus the Lord manifested His care and thoughtfulness for the sons of Levi. The tabernacle then, and its vessels, and what belonged to it, closely concerned the Levites. They kept the charge of the tabernacle of testimony (1: 53); the charge of Aaron, and the charge of the whole congregation before the tabernacle of the congregation, to do the service of the tabernacle; and they kept all the instruments of the tabernacle of the congregation, and the charge of the children of Israel to do the service of the tabernacle (3: 7-8). Selected by the Lord, they were duly set apart for their work to minister to Aaron; given to Aaron and to his sons; being wholly given unto him out of the children of Israel (3: 6, 9). Taken for God instead of the firstborn males of Israel, we learn therefrom something of the responsibility, and of the privilege, which attached to that class. Their service, as sketched out, tells us of the responsibility; whilst the mention of the one to whom they ministered-Aaron, and the mention too of Him whose they were-God, acquaint us with privileges which normally belong to all in that class. They were God’s (3: 12, 45; 8: 14; 16). He had said it: " They shall be mine," said the Lord. They shall minister to Aaron, was the word of God by Moses. This last statement is not without significance when we remember of whom Aaron was the type, and who before God now fills the place and performs duties which typically belonged to Aaron, the brother of Moses. Of the redemption of their firstborn males, then, the twelve tribes were commanded to avail themselves. In this redemption Levi had no part. In common with all the rest, that tribe shared in the redemption from the house of bondage. Differing from all the other tribes, it did not share in the redemption of the firstborn males. What then was the character of such a redemption? This we have already intimated, and the history of the Levites fully confirms. ’It clearly was not redemption from judgment, else the tribe of Levi must have specially endured that judgment. But they did nothing of the kind. This redemption was deliverance from the service of God, not from the wrath which they each and all by nature deserved. The firstborn males of Israel were released from the divine claims on them for service when the Levites were taken in their place, and the redemption-money of five shekels a piece had been paid for the 273 males in Israel, in excess of those substituted from the tribe of Levi. (*The careful reader will remark that the males of Levi really outnumbered the firstborn males of Israel by 27; the number being of all Israel 22,273; of the tribe of Levi, 22,300. The difference may be accounted for by deducting first, the males of Aaron’s house, who clearly were not included in the exchange, and next all the firstborn males of Levi, which, as such, were the Lord’s already. By this means it may have been that the numbers were arrived at of 22,000 of the Levites being exchanged for the same number of Israel’s firstborn males.) The Levites, on the other hand, could never. be released from the service of Jehovah, and surely they never would have desired it. A great privilege, they must have felt, was theirs,-to be allowed to serve. And serving Jehovah, He cared for them, providing for their need by tithes, and the cities, and the suburbs of their cities in the land. The honor, too, and the favor was theirs of ministering to God’s High Priest. But what is all this to us? some may inquire. Surely it contains instruction for Christians, who form now before God that privileged class of firstborn ones, for we are part of the church or assembly of firstborn ones, ἑκκλήασια πρωτοτόκων (Hebrews 12:23); the characteristic responsibility and privileges of which the directions concerning the duties of the tribe of Levi unfold to us. For all Christians are both priests and Levites. Their priestly service Peter sets forth (1 Peter 2:5-9) in its double character. Levitical service is more general, but is equally common to all. And as the Levites were to minister to Aaron, so true Christian service, of whatever character (for we cannot confine it to ministry in the word), should never be separated from the. Lord, but be done, all of it, unto Him How varied is the service, Romans 12:1-21 and 1 Corinthians 12:1-31 can teach us; but as with the Levites, so with us, each is appointed by God to his work. The Lord directed about the Gershonites and the Merarites, as much as about the Kohathites. And though to some it might have seemed more honorable to carry the table and the candlestick, yet, unless the boards of the tabernacle and the curtains had been carried likewise, the Kohathite service of carrying the vessels of the tabernacle would have been labor spent in vain. From the claims of God in service we can never get free. Would any real Christian desire it? But how great is the responsibility of those who are Christians only in name! By the law, then, as we have seen, the subject of redemption was brought into great prominence. In family matters, as well as in questions concerning Israel’s duty to God, it would at times mark out with a distinctness impossible to be overlooked the path of action that should be followed. For not only did it treat of redemption, how it could be accomplished, and when, and the duties of those who shared in it, but it decided also the duties incumbent on the kinsman who was to act the part of redeemer, called in Hebrew the Goel, being charged with the responsible service of caring for the interest of those who, by reason of death or other causes, were unable to act on their own behalf. In criminal as well as in civil matters the Goel might be called to act. But such a duty only devolved on one connected by ties of consanguinity with the person on whose behalf he was acting. No mere friend could act as the God or redeemer. Cases therefore, might arise where one who had died had no one thus to represent him. Such a condition might be the result of God’s judicial dealing, as with Baasha the son of Ahijah, who had no God to avenge the death of his son at the hands of Zimri or his house (1 Kings 16:11). But it might also happen that an unoffending Israelite had died without leaving any representative to act as his God, and to whom any recompence the law might award for a trespass committed against him could be paid by the offending party. Under such circumstances the Lord claimed that restitution should be made to the priest, for the trespasser was not to be excused making the appointed amends because no kinsman of the injured man could claim it (Numbers 5:8); for the injury, though done to the man who was dead, was really a trespass against the Lord. But where a kinsman existed, he was bound, as circumstances called for it, to act as the Goel. In cases of murder he could claim justice to be done. In cases of homicide he would take up the cause, and have it decided by the elders of the city in whose jurisdiction the case lay (Numbers 35:1-34; Deuteronomy 19:6; Deuteronomy 19:12; Joshua 20:3; Joshua 20:5; Joshua 20:9); having always the right of killing the manslayer if he found him outside the city of refuge. But other duties devolved on the God, and these were in connection with the land. Instances of such we have in Jeremiah and Ruth. On these occasions it was optional with the nearest male relative to discharge the duties of the office. Jeremiah, when directed by the Lord, bought the land at the hand of his uncle’s son (32.) Elimelech’s nearest of kin, on the other hand, declined to buy of Naomi, when he learned that he must also marry Ruth (4: 6). By this the way was made clear for Boaz, who bought the land and married Ruth; a little picture of Israel’s history in the future (how full is the Old Testament of such!) when it will be seen that the land cannot be permanently possessed apart from the restoration of the nation, now as it were dead. The interests of Israel are indissolubly connected with the fortunes of the land. Many might like the land just as the nearest kinsman of Elimelech; but then it will be seen that the one who takes it must have Israel’s interest at heart, and raise up the name of the dead on his inheritance. One alone will be found in that day to act as Boaz acted by Naomi and Ruth. So we cannot study the book of Ruth, which gives us the bright side of the picture in the days of the Judges in Israel, without being carried on in thought to the future time of blessing for the children of Israel. Nor should we fail to observe how God has always had this in view. From the law, as is fitting, we gather what were the responsibilities of the Redeemer or God." In the prophets we are taught that Jehovah will show Himself in that character on behalf of His people and Jerusalem. Already in measure has He acted as such, as Jeremiah predicted (1: 34), and Isaiah prophetically described (43: 14). The overthrow of the Chaldean monarchy was the earnest of the Lord’s active interposition as the Redeemer of Israel. And as the God was concerned with taking vengeance on behalf of his kinsman, receiving what was his due from any who had injured him, redeeming the land of the impoverished one, raising up the name of the dead on his inheritance by ’marrying the widow, and setting free the man sold to a stranger, so will the Lord Jehovah act on behalf of Israel and Jerusalem. Ages have rolled by since that memorable night when Belshazzar was slain. Troubles upon troubles have since befallen the Jews and Jerusalem; but their day of deliverance will come. For Jehovah, the self-existing One, is their Goel or Redeemer. Israel, therefore, can never want a kinsman to espouse their cause, and will never be in too low a condition for the Redeemer to interpose. It was when the Israelite was in his lowest possible condition that the services of the Goel were called into requisition. And the people will yet prove this. Hence the Lord encourages them: " Fear not, thou worm Jacob, and ye men of Israel, יִשְרׇאֵלמְחֵי; will help thee, saith the Lord, and thy Redeemer, the Holy One of Israel" (Isaiah 41:14). And what strength it will be to them to remember who their Redeemer is, viz. The first and the last, beside whom there is. no God; for He is the Maker of all things (Isaiah 44:6; Isaiah 44:24). Happy people will they be to find themselves in such a case; for they will be authorized to say, in the language of inspiration, " As for our Redeemer, the Lord of Hosts is His name, the Holy One of Israel " (47: 4). And if the God of armies is their God, He will fully avenge their cause, and most certainly set them free from all the claims of man over their persons and their land. The greatness of this privilege, too, will then become apparent, when, notwithstanding their past disobedience (48: 17-19), He will interpose actively and effectively in their favor. And encouraged surely by these gracious declarations, as well as by the remembrance of what the Lord did for their fathers at the Red Sea, the godly remnant of the future will call on Him to act as becomes the one who is to discharge the duties of the Goel (63: 16). But not only will the Lord prove Himself to be the Redeemer of Israel, He will also act in that character for Jerusalem. He will return to her (59: 20), all flesh shall know it (49: 26), and she shall know it (60: 16) when sucking the milk of the Gentiles and the breast of kings, for the God of the whole earth will be her Goel, who will never forsake her again (54: 5, 8). Here redemption, as set forth in the Old Testament, reaches its climax. Israel will enjoy it, and Jerusalem likewise; and creation will be glad when He comes by whom it is to be effected (Psalms 69:11-13; Psalms 98:7-9), for creation’s interests are bound up with the condition of God’s people. God will then rest in His love, rejoicing over Jerusalem with singing (Zephaniah 3:17). Then, too, that which in the reign of Solomon Israel once knew they will permanently enjoy, rest given them by God on every side, with neither adversary to vex them, nor evil occurrent (1 Kings 5:4). And looking into this, one learns how those legal enactments about redemption are figures and shadows of the future in store for Israel. The Goel of the law is the shadow of the true Goel; a kinsman, indeed, connected with Israel by the ties of birth, of the seed of David after the flesh. Who then was before God’s mind when He gave those regulations to Moses? We cannot doubt. It was His Son, the Christ. And those occasions on which the redeemer was called upon by the law to act, were shadowy representations of the, intervention of the true Goel for Israel, when He shall act for them, reduced as they will be to their lowest possible condition. Shadowy representations we must call them, for the intervention of the Lord in the future will far exceed that which any kinsman has done in the past. Doubtless all that Israel looked forward to when the law was given was entrance into the land, rest under their fig trees, and the enjoyment of the fruit of their vines, and the productiveness of the ground in general. But that never satisfied the desires of God for them. He was not, He will not be satisfied, till the true kinsman-redeemer acting in power sets them and their land free, not for a time, but forever; for nothing less than permanent blessing in Canaan will meet all the divine purposes and wishes for them. How far beyond man’s thoughts are those of God! " High as the heavens appear above the earth we tread, So far the riches of God’s grace our highest thoughts exceed." But, were this all that Scripture teaches us in connection with this subject, what part should we have in it? To what prospect could we look forward? All that we have looked at concerns Israel. God will redeem Israel out of all his troubles (Psalms 25:22), when He shall set them free from the consequences of their iniquities (Psalms 130:7-8). Gentiles, it is true, will enjoy blessing when the Lord reigns; but the Redeemer is spoken of as the Redeemer of Israel, and so markedly is this the case, that when the nation shall have experienced the Lord’s delivering power afresh, they will be distinguished by men on earth as the redeemed of the Lord (Isaiah 62:12; Isaiah 35:10; Isaiah 51:11). New Testament teaching, however, makes plainer what the Old also sets forth, that He who will redeem them by power had first to die for them on the cross. But we close the Old Testament volume without finding directly taught in it redemption as it concerns us, either that which we now possess, or that for which we wait. Yet we cannot close its pages without remembering the irreversible character of redemption when God is the accomplisher of it, so fully set forth in its writings. Israel’s position as God’s redeemed people was never altered, though they still await redeeming power. That past intervention to which they were taught to look back, will, as we have seen, inspire them with confidence in the future. Daniel could remind God of it when a captive himself, with the temple laid low, and Jerusalem destroyed; for the Lord’s people he knew Israel to be, and that forever. Hence we get acquainted in the Old Testament with a principle connected with redemption, which, when we get New Testament teaching on the subject, becomes of practical value to us. To that let us now turn. As we open its pages the hope of Israel’s redemption, of which the prophets had written, is seen animating the faithful among them; but there is a difference to be marked between them and their forefathers. The faithful remnant are expecting the fulfillment of the hope, as no longer a distant event, whilst the prophets of old were directly taught of the Spirit that they ministered to men of a generation posterior to their own (1 Peter 1:12). Thus Anna the prophetess, of the tribe of Aser, was well acquainted with the proper hope of Israel, and knew too those in Jerusalem who were looking for its fulfillment. What, however, stirred her heart, as it had Zacharias’ and Simeon’s, was the coming of the Messiah into the world, so long waited for, but now at length to be seen and handled in the person of the Virgin’s child. Zacharias, on the occasion of the birth of his son, the immediate forerunner of the Christ, looked forward to the near accomplishment of that which the prophets had foretold (Luke 1:68). Anna, after she had seen the child, went to tell of his presence to all that looked for redemption in Jerusalem, or, as some would read with B " the redemption of Jerusalem" (Luke 2:38). One sees how the hopes and prospects of the godly remnant of that day were bound up with the appearance of the Christ. The heart of the aged priest was illuminated with joy in the thought of the near approach of the Messiah. The aged prophetess gave thanks to the Lord when her eye lighted on the infant in the temple. Till He came the remnant treasured up the hope of redemption. When He appeared they looked for its fulfillment. And we learn how really their hopes were bound up with the presence of the Christ upon earth, from the sorrowful confession of the two disciples on their way to Emmaus to the stranger, as they thought Him, who had voluntarily joined their company-" We trusted that it had been He which should have redeemed Israel " (Luke 24:21). How this told of expectations concerning the virgin’s Son, but of shipwrecked hopes and disappointed hearts as well. For all that concerned the blessing of Israel in the future was connected in their minds with the presence among them of the Messiah, and that in the person of Mary’s child. Nor were they mistaken in all this. The Lord Himself had taught His disciples to look forward to the redemption of Israel, and had instructed them in the signs which would herald its approach and His appearance (Luke 21:28). But besides that, He taught them the need of His death for full redemption to take place. That they had not understood. Redemption by money they were fully conversant with. Redemption by divine power their fathers had experienced. Redemption of the firstborn males of unclean animals by a lamb the law had set before them. But the need of the Messiah’s death to effect the final redemption of Israel and of Jerusalem they had never taken up. The Old Testament had spoken of the death of the Lord Jesus Christ (Psa. 16, 22. 102.; Isaiah 53:1-12) The prophets had predicted the deliverance of Israel and Jerusalem, but the remnant of the Lord’s day had not understood the intimate connection there is between His death and their national deliverance. They clearly had not yet learned how the mercies of David would be made sure (Isaiah 55:3; Acts 13:34). But far more than Israel’s redemption is accomplished by the shedding of that precious blood, and the Lord Jesus it is who first in the New Testament opens up to us the subject. Indignation had filled the hearts of the ten at the request made by the mother of Zebedee’s children and concurred in by those children, that they should sit one on the right hand and one on the left of the Lord in His kingdom. The Lord’s answer was enough both to check their indignation and to rebuke the ambitious desires of the mother on behalf of her offspring. True greatness amongst them was not to be reached by the mere favor of the King, as so often has been the case with earthly greatness and earthly monarchs. He who would be great among them should be their minister, and whosoever would be chief among them should be their servant; for the path to true greatness lies through the lowliest service, as exemplified in the ways of the Son of man, the highest in dignity in the universe (God, of course, excepted), who came not to be ministered unto but-to minister, and to give His life a ransom for many (Matthew 20:28; Mark 10:45). Here we are carried at once beyond the narrow bounds of Jewish interests by an announcement which, if expressed in few words, is rich in thought. The Son of man would give His life a ransom for many. A ransom, λύτρον, was needed, and the Son of man would provide it. Now the title here made use of shows that the Lord has to do with men, and not with Israel only. He is the Son of man, and in that character He will appear by-and-by as placed by God over everything (Psalms 8:6). His words, "for many," convey no thought of the continued maintenance of dispensational distinctions, but are in keeping with the abolition of them. The fact, too, that He would give His life tells of the self-surrender on His part, and the cost at which the ransom that He speaks of would be obtained. Hence the question is hereby immediately raised, Why should such a sacrifice be required? Israel had experienced what the putting forth of divine power in redemption could accomplish, and they annually commemorated it. When, however, the Lord brought them out of Egypt, He was dealing with them in pure grace, for as yet they had not been placed under law. But when they had promised to do all that God commanded, and had subsequently broken the covenant, redemption from the condition entailed on them in consequence of their sins required, not merely the putting forth of divine power, but the atoning, death of the Lord Jesus as well, in virtue of which their transgressions under the first covenant would be fitly and finally dealt with (Hebrews 9:15). The exercise of power will indeed be needed to effect their deliverance from the thraldom of their enemies; and for that they will look, nor will they be disappointed. (Isa. 63:64; Psalms 98:1-9). But ere God can act in power for them, since the people have sinned, redemption, ἀπολ΄θτρωσις, of the transgressions that were under the first covenant becomes a necessity. Now nothing less than the death of the Lord Jesus Christ can meet the case; so He died, we are told, for that nation (John 11:50), though, thank God, not for that nation only. And since He gave His life a ransom for many, it becomes only a question of the sovereign grace of God as to who those are who can share in the effects of that ransom. The Lord speaks of many, viewing the question in the light of those who would avail themselves of it. St. Paul writes that Christ Jesus gave Himself a ransom, ἀντίλυτρον, for all (1 Timothy 2:6), viewing the question in the light of God’s willingness to save, showing thereby that none will be deprived of the benefits which flow from Christ’s death, but such as judge themselves unworthy of everlasting life (Acts 13:46). The Lord’s death then avails for all who believe on Him; and since all have sinned, and do come short of the glory of God (Romans 3:23), none certainly are righteous in themselves, and none can justify themselves before God (Psalms 143:2). What resource then have sinners but to hear what the Lord God can righteously do for those who believe on His Son? He justifies them freely through the redemption, ἀπολύτρωσις, that is in. Christ Jesus (Romans 3:24). Now of this redemption Paul treats in more places than one. By His own blood the Lord Jesus Christ, as High Priest, has entered into the holy place once for all ἐφάπαξ an act never to be repeated, having found, εὑράμενος, eternal redemption, λύτρωσις * (*λύτρωσις occurs but three times in the New Testament-Luke 1:68; Luke 2:38; Hebrews 9:12. ἀπολύτρωσις is met with much oftener-Luke 21:28; Romans 3:24; Romans 8:23; 1 Corinthians 1:30; Ephesians 1:7; Ephesians 1:14; Ephesians 4:30; Colossians 1:14; Hebrews 9:15; Hebrews 11:35. When the redemption itself is the special thought in the writer’s mind, λύτρωσις can be used; when the application of it to those on whose behalf it has been wrought is the subject with which the inspired writer is concerned, ἀπολύτρωσις s the word selected.) (Hebrews 9:12). So this can never alter, its validity can never be impeached, its effects can never pass away. It is an eternal redemption, and His continued presence in the holiest, without having any need to come out from thence, as Aaron was obliged to do annually after the service within the veil on the great day of atonement, witnesses to us of that which the Lord has found, who has entered in by His own blood. For whom it avails that verse in the Hebrews does not state. It is what the Lord as High Priest has found, not those who will share in it, to which our attention is there directed. He has found redemption, and such as is eternal in character. The ransoming from a condition of helplessness, and otherwise everlasting ruin, can now be treated of and set forth with confidence, for the High Priest of God, who is in the heavenly sanctuary, has found that which was wanted, and that which can meet in all the depths of his ruin the greatest sinner upon earth. But how helpless was our condition, hopelessly helpless, when nothing less than the entrance by His own blood of the Lord Jesus Christ into the sanctuary on high could procure for us what was required! In the doing of such a work man could have had no part; all must be done by the High Priest himself, and that in a place into which in person we on earth have never entered, and whilst on earth in person can never enter. Eternal then in its character, what stable ground do believers stand on? No argument can weaken it. The Lord’s presence in heaven must silence all reasonings, and set at rest all doubts about it. His estimate of that which He has found is revealed for the comfort and rest of the conscience before God. And the effects which flow from it are twofold, since forgiveness and justification are both inseparably connected with it. How well Paul knew this, and those to whom he addressed himself at Ephesus, where he had labored, and at Colosse, where he had not! In writing to the saints and faithful brethren in both these places, he stated that which was common to them and to him, that in the Beloved they had redemption ἀπολύτρωσις through His blood, even the forgiveness of sins (Ephesians 1:7; Colossians 1:14), according to the riches of God’s grace. And writing to all that were in Rome, beloved of God, Paul reminded them that they were justified freely by God’s grace through the redemption ἀπολύτρωσις that is in Christ Jesus (Romans 3:24). Christ Jesus has found it, in Him the Beloved one we have it, and are justified through it. It is a deliverance indeed, deliverance full and final, from judicial dealing at the hands of an offended God, which we all righteously deserved, and which the finally impenitent must forever endure, for where God’s nature is concerned duration of time cannot be taken into account. Hence the question is not whether sins deserve everlasting punishment; but since God is holy, how can He have those who have sinned in His presence, and at home with Him, except on grounds consistent with His righteousness? Then, if men refuse the atonement provided by God, nothing is left for them but punishment. Viewing the question in this light, and this is the right light in which to view it, since God’s nature is unchangeable, and man’s soul is immortal, punishment for the finally impenitent must be everlasting. Could God have been too merciful to punish sin, redemption, it is true, would not have been needed, nor would the Lord Jesus have died for sinners; but in that case God would not have been holy, and righteousness would not have characterized His ways. On the other hand, what security it gives a soul when it learns that God is righteous in saving sinners! All that He is is vindicated and manifested. Mercy on God’s part, unless it is exercised in righteousness, would afford no comfort or security for souls. But now He justifies freely through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus. Let the accusation be as grievous as it may, and all perfectly true, yet God will not listen to it if it concerns them whom He has justified (Romans 8:33-34). Once children of wrath they are such no longer, for redemption has been effected. Forgiveness and justification, these are present blessings; and the knowledge of justification through the redemption that is in Christ. Jesus should set souls free from seeking for justification through keeping the law. We are justified freely by God’s grace, if in truth believers on the Lord Jesus Christ. How many souls not settled in grace are virtually looking for something in themselves, or in their ways, to give them assurance as to their standing before God. This is the spirit of legality, against which the Galatians were so earnestly warned. The death of the Lord Jesus Christ, it was taught them, had redeemed ἐξηλόρασε those from the curse of the law who had once been under it, He being made a curse for them, that the blessing of Abraham might come on the Gentiles in Christ Jesus, that both, those once Jews and those once Gentiles, might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith (Galatians 3:1-29) Those, then, formerly placed by God under law had need of redemption from its curse, and they had it. The Jews never got justification by works of law (Galatians 2:16), and those Christians who had been formerly Jews under law had to be redeemed from its curse, Christ having been made a curse for them, and had to believe on Him to be justified by faith of Him, and not by works of law (Galatians 2:16). Deliverance from being under law such enjoyed, and justification likewise; but justification by faith, not by works. Hence, if we share in the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, all idea of justification by works of law before God must be abandoned as unscriptural, and therefore unchristian doctrine. We are already delivered from the condition we were formerly in, from which nothing we could do of ourselves could have ever extricated us. No charge against us can be maintained before God. We are justified freely through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus. Our condition is already changed, and our title to be in God’s presence is certain and everlasting. And if those formerly Jews had to be taken out of the condition of being under law in order to be justified before God, and that on the principle of faith, why should those whom God never put under law virtually put themselves under it, to seek for that which it is impossible on such a condition ever to enjoy? The incongruity of such mistaken teaching becomes apparent; and if the Christian remembers that he is justified freely through the redemption that is in. Christ Jesus, he will learn that he has what he wants, a title to be in God’s presence, and that he is in a condition to enjoy the blessing of it; yet not the least allowance is there for the working of man’s evil nature, when the doctrines of grace are rightly set forth and maintained. For, as the Israelites were reminded of their responsibility as redeemed, so we are taught our need of watchfulness, seeing we too are redeemed, and that not by corruptible things, as silver and gold, from our vain conversation, but by the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot (1 Peter 1:17-19). And the Apostle Paul, writing of the conduct of slaves in the most ordinary duties of life, reminds them of the Lord Jesus Christ, who gave Himself for them, that He might redeem them from all lawlessness, and purify unto Himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works (Titus 2:13-14). Deliverance from a condition in which judgment must overtake those abiding in it, we enjoy through the Lord Jesus Christ giving Himself a ransom for us. Redemption therefore from all lawlessness, as the fitting consequence, should be displayed in each one of us. Grace never weakens responsibility; on the contrary, it maintains it. To attempt to discharge our responsibilities to God in order to obtain a standing before Him is the essence of legality. To take heed to our ways because we are partakers of grace is proper Christian conduct. As far, then, as we hove investigated the subject, we have seen that our redemption has been procured by another, and not by ourselves; and that one, even the Lord Jesus Christ, had to surrender His life to procure it, because we were sinners against God; for nothing but His precious blood shed could avail for it. Further, this redemption is eternal in its character, never to be reversed; its effects never to pass away. And as Israel could always plead with God on the ground that they were His redeemed ones, we know what our ground as such is before God, even that which never alters. But as with them, so with us, the grace in which we share involves responsibility from which we cannot be set free. Christ gave Himself to redeem us from all lawlessness, ἀνόμια, 1:e. not only from any departure from the straight and right way, but from any allowance of insubjection of spirit to God. But in more than the redemption of the soul are Christians to have part. They await redemption in power, which will deal with their body as well. Already purchased (1 Corinthians 6:20), the body will be redeemed, and we await that putting forth of divine power on our behalf called adoption, νἱοθεσία, even the redemption, ἀπολύτρωσις, of our bodies (Romans 8:23). The believer’s whole person will be rescued from the consequences of the fall. Adoption is ours really now, and the Spirit of adoption, too, we have all received, who can cry " Abba, Father" (Romans 8:15); but the completeness of it involves the redemption of the body as well: so the enemy will never be able to say that he has finally ruined any part of the person of those who are sons of God by faith in Christ Jesus. Body, soul, and spirit, all will share in redemption, as fruit of the travail of His soul, who died for us that we should live with Him, and who of God is made unto us redemption (1 Corinthians 1:30). For until the body is redeemed, those words of 1st Corinthians will not have received their full accomplishment. Israel looked for the deliverance of their persons from the thraldom of their oppressors (Luke 1:71; Luke 1:74), the consequence of national transgression in earlier days; we await the final deliverance of ours from the consequences of sin. How deeply, then, are we interested in the ransom provided by the Lord Jesus Christ, by which there will be effected the full deliverance of creatures like us from the condition engendered by the fall; yet, great and wonderful as this is, God’s thoughts in connection with redemption take a still wider range, even the whole purchased possession (Ephesians 1:14), all of which is to be subjected to redeeming power. Interests, then, how vast and varied, are connected with this topic. Creation, subjected to vanity not willingly, but sharing in the fruits of the sin of its head, shall be set free from the bondage of corruption into the liberty of the glory of the children of God (Romans 8:21). We know redemption of our souls now, and await that of our bodies. Creation has received no part in redemption as yet, but awaits it in the day of the glory of Christ. The full need of redemption none of us could have surmised, for none of the children of men could have divined the extent of the ruin caused by sin, and the irrevocable condition, did deliverance depend on us, of all involved in it. Man might have groaned, as creation does, feeling intensely the wretchedness caused by sin, without after all having learned the impossibility of rescuing himself from it. That he had not delivered himself would be patent. That he could not, revelation alone teaches. But did revelation stop there, how awful would be the prospect! Man, this creation too, ruined, and, for all that we could have known, without any probability of emancipation from the bitter consequences of his sin. God, however, has revealed to us what He has done, and that which He will do, and bids us look onward in hope to the day of redemption, unto which He has sealed us by the Holy Ghost (Ephesians 4:30), given to all who believe the word of truth, the gospel of our salvation. Marked in this manner by God, as He looks onward to the future, so would He have us to look-forward, sharing His mind about it, and having interests in common with Him in connection with it. Intelligence about the future should therefore characterize us, and the certainty of the fulfillment of our hope should animate us. We are saved in hope, and the God of hope can fill us with all joy and peace in believing, that we may abound in hope through the power of the Holy Ghost (Romans 8:24; Romans 15:13). This God desires for us, having given us the Holy Ghost to be the earnest, or pledge, of the inheritance, until the redemption of the purchased possession, for which the Lord waits, we wait, and for which creation likewise waits. God, then, by revealing to us what He has done in giving His Son to die, tells us of the depth of ruin into which sin had plunged us. Revealing to us what He will do, we learn to what extent that ruin has spread, and have surely to own that whilst nothing but the death of Christ can meet it, none but God could have thought of and planned such a way of deliverance. And further, we cannot fail to see how deeply interested is God in His human creatures, and in creation likewise. He did not, He does not, sit aloof from all the sufferings and sorrows caused by sin, at rest in the undisturbed serenity of the atmosphere which surrounds His throne. He gave His Son to die. He sent His Son to be the Savior of the world (1 John 4:14). Sin had marred the beauty and spotlessness of God’s creation. And sin must have been the cause of man’s everlasting ruin and misery, had not God provided atonement, and redemption. By the former, the question of our sins has been dealt with; by the latter, deliverance from the consequences of the fall will be finally effected. God, we repeat, has provided for both; and His Son, when upon earth, manifested how really the One against whom we had sinned could and did enter into the sorrows and wretchedness of His creatures (John 11:33; John 11:35; John 11:38; Luke 19:41); and, providing for those who believed on Him deliverance from it all,’ provided too for the praise of His glory, when His purposes shall have been worked out. What a subject then is redemption By the fall its necessity became apparent, if the devil was not to triumph over God. By the cross its certainty was manifested, because that blood was shed, that death endured, on the grounds of which it could be wrought out. And, as we learn what Scripture teaches about it, the circles of interests affected by it get wider and wider. At first we read of one nation, and that a small one, which shared in deliverance by divine power. Next we learn that saints outside that restricted circle have redemption through the blood of Christ, and shall fully have part in redemption by power. And who can estimate what their number is? Then we hear that to the utmost bound of the purchased possession redeeming power will extend. What that possession is Ephesians 1:10 states. But who on earth can comprehend its vastness and extent? Heaven and earth, then, are to share in it, though not all the universe. There is a region in which it will never be enjoyed, where intelligent creatures must forever be, but without having part in it. All those under the earth καταχθόνιοι (Php 2:10) will have to bow at the mention of the name of Jesus, as much as all in heaven and all upon earth, yet without sharing in the blessed results of His death. The ransom is enough for all (1 Timothy 2:6); propitiation has been made for the whole world (1 John 2:2), but as all are not willing to be reconciled to God, so all will not be redeemed. This is the dark side, but there is a bright one on which we may dwell. The happiness of those upon earth, at that day, certain psalms and prophetic writings depict, and specially Psalms 150:1-6, which calls for Jehovah’s praise to be celebrated with every conceivable instrument of music, and by every creature on earth which has breath. What will be the joys of those in heaven we, who have believed on the Lord Jesus Christ whilst in our mortal bodies, shall then fully know. The gladness of creation when anticipating it Revelation 5:13 sets before us. Its gladness in the immediate prospect of it Psalms 96:11-13; Psalms 98:7-9, graphically describe. And never shall we forget to whose death we owe it, nor the ransom paid for us to participate in it. This is made manifest from that scene described in Revelation 5:9, where the elders, addressing the Lamb, make mention of the price at which saints have been purchased, rather than of the deliverance which they are forever to enjoy: " Thou art worthy to take the book, and to open the seals thereof: for Thou wast slain, and hast bought [us] to God by Thy blood out of every kindred, and tongue, and people, and nation; and hast made them unto our God kings and priests: and they shall reign over the earth." Purchase, ἠλόρασας, rather than redemption, is the theme of the elders here. Of the purchase too, not of the redemption of the hundred and forty and four thousand, who stood with the Lamb on Mount Sion, does the Spirit make mention in 14: 3. The elders speak of purchase from kindred, and tongue, and people, and nation. In 14. it is purchase from the earth and from men. In each place it is a special company, apart from others of the human race, of which the purchase is declared. All on earth, indeed, have been purchased by the Lord’s death, and hence He has rights over them, as a master would have over slaves. But in chapter 5. the, saints referred to are said to have been bought by His blood to God; and in 14. those there mentioned as bought, are first-fruits to God and to the Lamb. Purchase, then, is mentioned in Revelation; of it John speaks in this book rather than of redemption, for ἀλόραζω, though translated redeemed in the A. V. in the passages noted, is not, it would seem, used in the New Testament, nor in the LXX version of the Old Testament in any such sense. But all the saints of whom we read that they are purchased will enjoy redemption. Saints on earth as well as saints in heaven will know in their measure its blessedness. But who speaks of all this? It is God. Who provides for it? God. On what grounds can He righteously do it? He gave His Son to die, the Just for the unjust, to take up the question of His people’s condition, and to settle it, that those might forever rejoice in redemption who believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, the Savior of the lost. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 177: VOL 03 - RESTORATION ======================================================================== Restoration IN reading the prophecies of Hosea one cannot fail to be struck with two things-the insensibility of. Israel to their moral condition, and the yearning of Jehovah over the people He had chosen. " When I would have healed Israel, then the iniquity of Ephraim was discovered, and the wickedness of Samaria " (7: 1). When this was the prophet does not state. Perhaps 2 Kings 13:3 may throw light on the matter. God had interposed in the days of Jehoahaz, and given Israel a savior, " so that they went out from under the hand of the Syrians, and the children of Israel dwelt in their tents as before time." What a picture of security and rest after trouble have we here. Did they not value this respite, which surely they could well appreciate? Let us hear the historian again, " Nevertheless they, departed not from the sins of the house of Jeroboam, who made Israel sin, but walked therein; and there remained the grove also in Samaria." God’s recent intervention on their behalf made no more permanent impression on the people than did His several gracious dealings with them, from their earliest origin in patriarchal days to their entrance into the land under Joshua. That all was not right with them their political condition in the days of Hosea might prove to the dullest of intellects; but how to rectify matters was another point. This is brought out in the prophecies of Hosea in a most beautiful way. His presence among them witnessed that God had not finally cast them off; his official position as Jehovah’s prophet was a sign that they had departed from the right way. And, since the great feature of this book is God’s moral dealings with those who have wandered far from Him, with a view to their ultimate restoration, and that in the fullest of blessings, so we see portrayed in Israel’s history what God’s people may become if they turn away in heart from Him; and we learn what is the only road to be traversed if restoration is to take place, and favors from God are to be again enjoyed. Glancing at the book we may see it divides itself into three great parts-the historical outline of events from the day of Hosea till the ultimate return, and recognition as God’s of the people He has now disowned the moral condition of the people (chiefly the ten tribes) in the days of the prophet, because of which judgment would have to take its course (9.-10.); and the past dealings of God in sovereign grace with the people, closing with the future dealing with their souls, because of which those "lo Ammi" shall become again "Ammi," and "lo Ruhamah" rejoice in the full tide of mercy then to be experienced (11.-14.). Attention to this order will help us in the study of the book. In the first portion we get Israel’s present political condition predicted, like the woman of chap. 3. waiting for the prophet; abiding "without a king, and without a prince, and without a sacrifice, and without an image, and without an ephod, and without teraphim," with the promise of future blessing, but only after she has been allured into the wilderness. God’s gracious dealings are thus promised at the outset. But why is the distant future brought forward " after many days "? Was He not willing even in the prophet’s day to deal in grace? lie was, but they were unwilling to receive it. This the second portion brings out. Nothing is more common than for any one smarting under the consequences of disobedience to look for some way of getting free from the present distress. But, like a man caught in a net, who, the more he struggles, the more he gets entangled, and at last sinks down exhausted by his efforts, yet still a captive; so does the soul, which knows not the divine way of restoration, weary itself with fruitless efforts to get free from the condition induced by its disobedience. Is God, then, hard to be entreated? The surrender of His only Son for us, when ungodly and without strength, must ever be a sufficient, an overwhelming, answer in the negative. God desires the restoration of His people. He who wills that all should be saved and come to the knowledge of the truth, longs, may we say it, for the recovery of His children who have strayed. But how shall this be accomplished? What ’Israel in the prophet’s day would attempt, we learn: " They shall go with their flocks and herds to seek the Lord, but they shall not find Him" (5: 6). Was it not right to bring sacrifices? He had commanded them. Why, then, would God not receive them? Because this step on Israel’s part was really an endeavor to approach Him as if nothing had happened. They would bring sacrifices as of old, and then look for His favor. Now, such conduct would be no confession of their grievous departure from His ways. Had they never sinned, sacrifices ought still to have been offered up, as they will be again in the Millennium, when the law will be written on their hearts. Thus the mere outward conformity to the Mosaic ritual was no recognition of their grievous declension. God would not have this conduct. " They shall not find Him," is the warning of the prophet. "He hath withdrawn Himself from them," is the oracular announcement of the sure failure of all such measures if attempted by the people. In a similar way do not souls sometimes attempt to act now, and with a corresponding result? The end looked for is not secured because there is no acknowledgment of failure. Activity in service, attention to duties, can never obliterate the past nor atone for previous neglect. After failure has come in, we cannot present ourselves before God as if no failure had taken place. Hence acting, as He ever must, according to what He is, if Israel would thus approach Him, He could only withdraw Himself from them: and of this they are warned beforehand, not left to find it out afterward. But if He should withdraw Himself, how should they follow Him? how penetrate the thick darkness in which He enshrouded Himself? As far as they were concerned, their condition seemed desperate, the case hopeless. It was so, had not God been willing to act in grace, being desirous to restore them as a nation. At the close of the chapter this is brought out. " When Ephraim saw his sickness, and Judah saw his wound, then went Ephraim to the Assyrian, and sent to King Jareb; yet he could not heal you, nor cure you of your wound." They confessed by their action what their condition was, but took steps in their own wisdom to recover what they had lost. Need we wonder that disappointment attended them? Their plan had failed. " He could not cure you," proclaimed the inability of any man to effect such a restoration to blessing as they needed. Far worse, however, than the mere failure of their efforts was the insult to Jehovah of which they were thus guilty. They had turned from God to man. Would He forsake them? He would, but not finally: " I will go and return unto my place, till they acknowledge their offense, and seek my face: in their affliction they will seek me early" (5: 15). The Lord would withdraw from them until.... not a final withdrawal. That would have ended in everlasting rejection: they must feel, however, the consequences of their sins by the absence of Jehovah from their midst, until-they acknowledge their offense. Confession must take place; then He would again be gracious. He had not withdrawn Himself hastily: their conduct necessitated it. ’It had not been the wish of His heart; but their pride and obstinacy left Him no other course to pursue. Now, apart from them, He would await the acknowledgment of their sins. Renewed activity was not what He wanted. How ready is man to proffer that! Confession He desired; then activity and worship would find their place. Such was the line marked out for Israel. Would they follow it? To show God’s desire for the people’s restoration, the prophet, His messenger, immediately, on this announcement, exhorts all to return. There was but one course open for them; surely they would take it. " Come, and let us return unto the Lord: for He hath torn, and He will heal us; He bath smitten, and He will bind us up. After two days will He revive us: in the third day He will raise us up, and we shall live in His sight. Then shall we know; we shall (so we should translate) follow on to know the Lord: His going forth is prepared as the morning; and He shall come to us as the rain, as the latter and former rain unto the earth;" or, as some render it, " as the latter rain which waters the earth." Human resources had failed; there was still the unfailing divine one open to them. " He bath torn, and He will heal us," etc. This was not the language of uncertainty, or the utterance of one clutching hold of what might prove unequal to the exigency of the case. It was the language of one who knew from whence their troubles came, and who was assured of the true remedy. Thus the prophet spake; but not a word of response have we from the people. Life as from the dead and returning fruitfulness he depicted; but all in vain. He spake to what was dull and insensible to its welfare. He exhorted; but to no purpose. They did not turn to the Lord; so judgment had to take its course. The afflictions of those days were not enough to bring them to their right mind, so yet darker times must come, and severer trials must be endured, are confession would be drawn from their hearts. " My people are bent to backsliding from me: though they called them to the Most High, none at all would exalt Him" (11: 7). The prophet’s exhortation unheeded, for the people in his day there was no hope of averting the threatened judgment. They deserved it, as these chapters (4.-10.) bring out; therefore all their " fortresses should be spoiled, as Shalman spoiled Betharbel in the day of battle," and transportation to Assyria would be undergone. Was there any hope of recovery in the distant future? There was, because they had to do with God, who had dealt in sovereign mercy with them at the first. So, commencing with chap. 11:, another key-note is struck, not the past and present doings of the people, but the past dealings of God with the nation and with their ancestor Jacob; and now it is not the deserts of the people, but the heart of God that Hosea so beautifully depicts, He could not give them up, though they had so grievously sinned against Him. Restoration, both national and spiritual, should take place. As Admah and Zeboim He would not make them: the exiled nation should return, ransomed by God from the power of the grave, and redeemed by Him from destruction (11: 8, 11; 13: -14). Again, -therefore, the prophet speaks, and this time there is a response. Is it that he acts in a different manner to what he did before (6.), and therefore they listen and answer? Does he justify them, or let them justify themselves? Far from it. He exhorts them to return to the Lord their God, for they had fallen by their iniquity. No excuse for them is allowed, no extenuating circumstances admitted. " Thou hast fallen by thine iniquity," yet there was hope. Confession, however, must take place before they can again enjoy the light of Jehovah’s countenance. How should they then confess who had, as a nation, so grievously sinned, and aggravated it by refusing to comply with the exhortation of the prophet in his day? The Spirit of God by the prophet puts the words into their mouth. God teaches them what to say, who, now so fearfully chastised, have sought Him early in their affliction. They cast themselves upon God, saying, " Receive us graciously;" and learn from His immediate response what they can look for: " I will heal their backsliding, I will love them freely: for mine anger is turned away from him" Confession made, no uncertainty or torturing doubt is allowed to remain in their hearts. God speaks at once, and how beautifully! He will heal, and He will love, and He will refresh. They had abused His gifts in days of old. He will make them fruitful on the earth in the days yet to come; and predicts it in most beautiful language, abounding with illustrations from nature. The dew which revives the plant after the scorching heat of the day, and the fragrance which perfumes the air on a summer morning, the tender lily and majestic cedar, with the corn, wine, and oil, proofs of fertility, are all needed to depict their final blessing, for healing will take place and returning freshness and fruitfulness be experienced. And Ephraim will discern the difference, as he will say-" What have I to do any more with idols?" Then Jehovah will answer-" I have heard him, and observed him." And to Ephraim’s rejoinder in the happiness of his heart-" I am like a green fir tree," the Lord will give him the word of caution-" From Me is thy fruit found." Different, indeed, are the circumstances of Israel in the past and in the future from that of God’s children in our day. The principle, however, on which restoration to the enjoyment of divine favor and renewed fruitfulness can be experienced is the same. God desires the blessing of His people, but confession after failure is the appointed road to it. Subjective teaching, too, whilst needed to show man what he is, does not, as Hosea sets forth, draw out the heart to God. Objective teaching is needed for that. The appeal in 6., after the setting before them of their way (4: 5.) is unheeded. But the recital of God’s ways with them (11.-13), which brings out His character in grace, evokes a response from them. Are they peculiar in this? This book, it is true, is full of special application to the condition of Israel, amongst whom the prophet labored; but its closing words show its value for all time. " Who is wise, and he shall understand these things? prudent, and he shall know them? for the ways of the Lord are right, and the just shall walk in them; but the transgressors shall fall therein" (14: 9). ======================================================================== CHAPTER 178: VOL 03 - THE CENTER OF CHRISTIAN WORSHIP AND THE CAUSE OF ECCLESIASTICAL RUIN ======================================================================== The Center of Christian Worship and the Cause of Ecclesiastical Ruin FROM 2 Corinthians 1:4 it would appear that the persecution at Ephesus was more violent, and that it continued longer than during the public events recorded in Acts 19:1-41 What these particulars may have been we are not told; but, after the stormy assemblage in the theater, Paul calls the disciples together, embraces them, and departs into Macedonia. Going over those parts, he exhorts the brethren, and arrives in Greece. There he remains three months. He had thought of returning from Greece to Syria; but the Jews (ever envious, and enemies to the gospel, as well as to the one who preached it outside their limits, since they bad rejected Christ, and hope for them was gone) lay wait for him. The truth which they had had was always the truth; but now that the Son of God had come, and the Father and His love been manifested in Him, this no longer possessed any power or value as regarded present relationship with God.. For the Christian revelation was one of life eternal, and of the satisfaction of divine justice. They could not endure the thought of being placed on one side on account of the truth they would not receive, and therefore laid wait for Paul. When this becomes known to the apostle, he returns by way of Macedonia. Let us remark in this brief narrative, which is not accidental, that when Paul has planted the gospel in a country, he does not abandon the converts, but returns with affectionate solicitude, instructs, exhorts, edifies, and watches over the seed planted by his instrumentality, in order that it may be preserved and grow in the knowledge of Christ. He does not neglect the Lord’s garden, well knowing that tares may spring up where the good seed grows, and that the enemy can spoil the harvest if it is not well guarded. It is more needful now than ever to do this, for we are in the perilous times of the last days. Though the enemy can never pluck the sheep out of the Good Shepherd’s hand, yet he may disperse them; they may be subjected to the effect of every kind of evil doctrine, by which their growth is hindered, the Lord’s glory trampled upon, testimony to Him destroyed, and the candlestick taken away. Let the Lord’s servants take warning. Paul then returns by Macedonia. It is not important; but in verse 4 we should read, " Gaius and Timotheus of Derbe." From verse 5 we see that many attached themselves to Paul in the work; and others, besides those in verse 4, went before. Luke, the author of this book, and perhaps still others, accompanied the apostle in his journey towards Troas. The others tarried for him at Troas. It is not without interest to see this emotion of hearts moved by the gospel which Paul preached. All were free; some, such as Apollos, laboring apart; the others, the companions of the great central figure-great for his faith in Christ, and as sent directly from Him by the voice of the Holy Ghost―occupied and sent by him to carry on and accomplish the work in places he would himself have visited had he not been obliged to go elsewhere, when the opportunity presented itself for them to be thus sent. Leaving Philippi, in five days they come to Troas, and there remain seven days. Everywhere assemblies had been formed. Here a door had been opened to Paul in coming from Ephesus; but he had not been able to remain long, being uneasy about the Corinthians, since he did not find Titus there, whom he had sent to them. It was at Troas that Luke, who wrote the Acts, had attached himself to Paul, to accompany him the first time he visited Macedonia. We do not know how the gathering at Troas was formed; but there was one, and we are given to see into it a little, not its discipline or gifts, as in 1 Cor., but its ordinary walk. The first day of the week the disciples met together to break bread. This was evidently their custom. It was the first day of the week, and the disciples gathered themselves together, according to their habit, to break bread. It was the first object of the meeting, the center of their worship. Other things were done; they spoke, taught, as Paul did, sang; but they met together to break bread. This is confirmed by 1 Corinthians 11:20, where the apostle says that the Corinthians did not really assemble for the Lord’s supper, since each ate his own supper, not thinking of the others, but eating and drinking for his own pleasure. Now, this shows clearly that the object of the assembly was the Lord’s supper. At the beginning, they broke bread every day, Acts 2:42; Acts 2:46. When gatherings were formed everywhere, and zeal had been enfeebled, they met only on the first day of the week, the day of the Lord’s resurrection. This was not a rule; but Luke speaks of it as a usage well known everywhere among the Christians. It seems that Paul had awaited this day to speak to the disciples, simply because it was the day of their meeting together; however, that is not certain. However that may be, he profits by the occasion to preach to them before setting out, and he speaks till midnight. They met, it seems, in the evening. The discourse was long, and they had not yet broken bread;? the weather was hot, and there were many lights; such is human weakness, that all this so affected a certain Eutychus that he was overcome with sleep, as Paul was long preaching, and fell down from the third floor, where he was sitting by the window. He was taken up by the men dead. Paul naturally interrupts his discourse, goes down and throws himself on him, declaring that life is still in him. The separation had not yet taken place; he was stunned by the fall, and if the power of God had not interposed, he would have been caught in the clutches of death. Life, however, had not yet gone out of the body; and by the Spirit Paul so works on it, that the functions of life are restored. The bonds between soul and body are re-established. In the case of the child restored to life by Elijah (1 Kings 17:21-22), the soul had already left the body, and returned to it. From these cases, as always elsewhere, we see that the soul is entirely distinct from the body; and though in our present state it works by means of the body, yet it is in its habitation; that life in this world is the activity of the soul by means of the functions of the body, the activity of which is restored by sleep, because we are feeble; that when the soul leaves the body, the man is definitively dead, but that the activity of the soul by the functions of the body may be interrupted, as is partly the case in sleep; and this action is reestablished if the soul have not left the body, if God does so and permits it. In its higher part-the spirit-the soul in relation to God is, alas! at enmity against Him; it will not, and does not, submit to Him. With its inferior part, it works in the body. Marvelous creation!-in relation with God above, and with nature below! It is a mixture of thoughts which seek to rise to God but cannot, and of creature thoughts. It is responsible to God according to the nature it has originally received from Him. When born of God, it receives a totally new life, in which it is in relation with God, according to grace and redemption-a life animated by the Spirit which it receives from above, and which makes of the body an instrument for the service of God. Possessing this life, we know that " if our earthly house of this tabernacle were dissolved we have a building of God, an house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens." I have said this in reference to Eutychus, because in these days the simplicity of the truth regarding the soul is lost sight of by many. Paul then goes up again, and, having broken bread, talks still, even till daybreak, comforting much the souls he saw, perhaps, for the last time. He then departs, leaving Eutychus alive to the joy of the brethren. Paul sends on his companions by ship, and goes himself on foot, desiring to be alone. For us this is often a wise thing-to be alone, apart from men, but alone, too, with God, where we can think of Him, of ourselves before Him, of the work as He sees it, and where, in His presence, responsibility is felt, instead of activity before men. No doubt this activity ought to appear in His presence, because it is holy; but at all events the activity of man is another thing than to place oneself before God such as He is for us. It is not less true that this communion with Him, as His servants, gives and sustains a blessed confidence in. Him, an intimacy of soul with Him, full of goodness and of grace. Paul had instructed his companions to take him in at Assos, which they do; from thence they proceed to Mitylene, to Chios, and finally to Miletus, half a day from Ephesus. Paul had determined not to stop there, desiring, if possible, to be at Jerusalem on the day of Pentecost. If he had stopped at Ephesus he must have remained some time, as he had labored there for a long period, and with great blessing. He passes on, therefore, sending from Miletus for the elders of the assembly at Ephesus, the center of the work in that region. It is evident that the apostle was pre-occupied with the circumstances in which lie was placed--with the apparent end of his career. This thought, it is probable, exercised an influence over him when he went alone on foot to Assos. And, also, it was the cause of his long speech at Troas. It is not only imagination which suggests this idea; the apostle expresses at the end of the Epistle to the Romans, written when he was about to leave. Corinth (Romans 15:31), his fear that he might be an object of hatred to the rebels in Judea; and he desires the Romans to pray that he may be delivered out of their hands, hoping thus to be able to see their face with joy, and from Rome to continue his work in Spain. We know that in Palestine he was taken, and after two years’ confinement at Caesarea, went a prisoner to Rome; that he remained there as such two years more, and that there, as far as the Word is concerned, his history terminated. It is possible that he may have been liberated; I believe so from what we find in the Epistles to the Philippians and to Philemon (Php 1:25-26; Philemon, ver. 22). From the 2d Epistle to Timothy, too, it seems that he was set free, and that he returned to Asia. But as to the biblical record of his labors, all is finished at the end of the Acts, which leaves him a prisoner at Rome. According to God’s thoughts, such as they are communicated to us in the Scriptures, that was the end of the apostle’s work. Arid he felt that such was the case; and it is no more a question of going to Spain or traveling anywhere beyond Rome. The Holy Ghost spoke of bonds and tribulations; and Paul’s thoughts now turned towards his departure from this world. The elders being come from Ephesus, and assembled before him, Paul speaks of his ministry as of a thing accomplished. A little before he had told the Romans that he bad no longer any place in those parts, his career there being over (Romans 15:23). Revisiting the scenes of his work in Asia and the regions of Asia- Minor, he shows us the character of this work and the effect of his departure; and this renders his discourse very important. He had served the Lord with much humility, in trials and in tears, caused by the snares of the Jews, whose opposition was continual and without conscience. In spite of it, however, he never failed, both in public and in private, to preach and teach all that was necessary for them-repentance towards God and faith in Jesus Christ, as the true state of a soul brought to God. Nothing is said as to the order of these two things in the heart, although in such order there is something practical, but of the true character of repentance and faith. Repentance was to be preached in the name of the Lord Jesus (Luke 24:47), so that His name might be owned, and that sinners might repent. It was founded on the ground of the grace and truth that came by Him; but true repentance takes place in the presence of God, and goes beyond sorrow for having done wrong or shame, or the mere work of the natural conscience. The soul revealed to itself through grace comes with open eyes into God’s presence. All is judged according to Him whose presence is manifested to the soul; everything is judged as it appears in His eyes. The word of God is His eye in the conscience, and makes us feel that He has seen all, and these things appear to us as they do to Him We no longer excuse ourselves, nor do we desire to do so; the result is confession to God by a conscience which feels itself in His presence (Hebrews 4:12-13); while the heart restored desires holiness, and the soul feels its responsibility for all that we have done. We justify God in our condemnation (Luke 7:29); though in such a case there is always some confidence in His grace-not peace, but confidence, for He who has become light to the soul is also love, Himself being both these things. When He reveals Himself as light in order to show us our sins, it is in love He does so in Jesus; and He is love. He cannot reveal Himself to the soul without being the two things, for in His nature He is both. Take the case of the woman in Luke 7:1-50 The light and the love of God had penetrated into her soul; she did not yet know what it was to be pardoned, but her heart had confidence in Jesus; and at the same time her conscience was deeply convinced of sin. Take again the case of Peter (Luke 5:8); of the prodigal son (Luke 15:17; Luke 15:19);, and of the thief on the cross (Luke 24:47). Repentance then is the effect of the revelation of God to the soul, which then knows itself; and up to a certain point it knows God as light, which manifests everything;-" Come, see a man which told me all things that ever I did,"-but as love to the soul. The Lord inspires confidence, though the remission of sins be not yet known. This is discovered’ by the soul by faith in Christ Jesus-not only that Jesus is the Christ, but that by Him its sins are pardoned, for He died for our sins; and if we receive the word of God, we know, that believing in Him, He has taken all our sins oil Himself on His own body on the tree. When He had by Himself purged our sins, He sat down at the right hand of the Majesty on high; because by one offering He has perfected forever them that are sanctified by that, sacrifice, Although faith in the work of Christ is necessary in order to possess peace, yet His Person ever remains as the object of the heart;-the Christ who has loved us, and given Himself for us, who now is glorified at the right hand of God, after having borne our sins, and submitted to death and the curse for us, but ever living for us now; who Himself will return to seek us, and make us perfectly like Himself in glory. We believe in Him, not only in the efficacy of His death. He is our righteousness before God, made such by God Himself; and we are accepted in the Beloved. John 17:1-26 tells us that we are loved with the same love wherewith the Father loves the Son. If there be true repentance in the presence of God, and in respect of Him, confidence and peace come by means of the faith of the Lord Jesus Christ. He has made peace by His own blood. Such was the testimony of Paul. Truth in the conscience, peace, and the knowledge of God by His Son Jesus, come down here in love, ascended into heaven as man, having accomplished the work which His Father had given Him to do. So great were the truths and the revelation, and so like the apostle in the execution of his ministry! But this ministry was drawing to its close, without Paul’s knowing what awaited him. The Spirit testified in every place that bonds and tribulations awaited him; and he foresees that they would see his face no more. This furnishes the opportunity to speak of the effect of his departure. The sheep of Jesus are safe in His hands; as to the life He has imparted to them, they can never perish, none can pluck them out of His hand. But a temple had been established, a house on the earth, of which the apostle was by grace the founder, according to the will of God, the wise master- builder (1 Corinthians 3:10). According to another figure, He has placed a candlestick on the earth to shine round about Himself, and this He can take away. There will always be a house of God built with His hand, and by His power, which will never grow less;-Christ the foundation, the stones living, by grace placed on this chief corner-stone, and growing to an holy temple for the Lord (Matthew 16:18; 1 Peter 2:4-5; Ephesians 2:11). Against this work of the Lord-a work carried on by grace in the heart-the gates of hell cannot prevail; for it is the fruit of the power of the Lord Jesus, working in grace. Moreover, this temple is not yet entirely built-it is growing. At least we may expect that, by grace, new souls can be introduced into it. God alone knows the moment when the work of grace which forms the assembly, the body of Christ, shall be accomplished (see 2 Peter 3:9). But God’s will has been to form an assembly on the earth. The work of Jesus, of which we have spoken, is done here below; but beyond this, as we have seen, God formed an assembly by the ministry of Paul, a temple on the earth, confiding the building of this temple into the hands of men, and under their responsibility. It is now the habitation of God through the Spirit, Jews and Gentiles being built up together; founded according to the will of God, but left to the responsibility of man. " But let every man take heed how he buildeth thereon." " Now if any man build upon this foundation (Jesus Christ) gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, stubble; every man’s work shall be made manifest; for the day shall declare it, because it shall be revealed by fire; and the fire shall try every man’s work, of what sort it is." There are three kinds of workmen; a good Christian and good workman, such as Paul; a good Christian and bad workman, himself saved, but his work to be consumed; then he who seeks to corrupt and destroy the temple of God. In this case he himself shall perish. Such were the Heresiarchs, who, moved by the enemy, sought to corrupt the faith. Three sects of them existed during Paul’s own time; but as long as he remained in the world his spiritual energy resisted and overcame evil; such as immorality among the Corinthians, and the loss of the doctrine of grace among the Galatians. But with his departure this energy disappeared. He had already said (Php 2:21) that all sought their own, not the things which were Jesus Christ’s. No soul was to be found like that of Timothy to care for the state of the Christians. Paul tells the elders then,, that after his departure grievous wolves should enter in among them, and that even of their own selves, perverse men should arise, to draw the disciples away. Till Satan be bound, and the Lord come to do it, there will ever be conflicts. Since the beginning of the world, whenever God has established anything good, man’s first act has been to destroy it. First, there was man himself; then, in the world after the flood, Noah got tipsy, and his authority was lost. Israel made the golden calf before ever Moses came down from the mountain Nadab and Abihu offered strange fire the first day after their consecration, for which cause Aaron could never enter into the inner sanctuary with his priestly garments of glory. Solomon having loved strange women, his kingdom was divided. So in the assembly established on the earth, soon after the apostle’s departure, evil presents itself; and it is of this that the elders are forewarned. Where were the other apostles? At Jerusalem. Peter, the apostle of the circumcision, a part of the gathering scattered by the destruction of Jerusalem. The chief of the apostles abandon to Paul the preaching of the Gospel among the Gentiles, to which work the Lord Himself had called him at the first, and then again expressly by the Holy Ghost at Antioch. To the other apostles, therefore, he does not entrust his ministry. Still less does Paul imagine that there can be successors in his office. He knows nothing of successors; but exhorts the existing elders to faithfulness and watchfulness, recommending them to God, and to the word of His grace, " which," he says, " is able to build you up, and to give you an inheritance among all them which are sanctified." Christ, ascended up on high, can still give evangelists, pastors, and teachers; and He does give them; but the office of personal apostolic care has disappeared. "After my departure," says the apostle. This is a departure without succession. It is sad, surely, yet true; and we have seen it in all that God has established among men. His grace continues, the faithful care of Christ can never fail. The Spirit has given His instructions for this time, as at the beginning, and the Lord is enough for the present condition, as He was faithful in the past. But such a thing as a succession to his apostleship is unknown to Paul when he speaks of his absence. God, and the word of His Grace, are for him the refuge of God’s people. They can meet together, and Christ will be in their midst; they can profit by the gifts He has granted according to His promise. The rules for our walk are contained in the word; but the apostleship, as a personal energy, watching over the organization of the assembly, has disappeared, leaving no succession behind it. This is a solemn truth, which must be well borne in mind But we must never forget that Christ is always enough for the assembly; that He is faithful in His care of it, and that He can never fail in strength, in love, or in faithfulness. What we have to do is to count on Him, and that with purpose of heart. Divine power is manifested more in Elijah and Elisha than in all the prophets of Jerusalem from the time of Moses himself. The Lord gives what is needful to His people. The word of God confirms sadly, but abundantly, what Paul says here. His testimony is that not only should evil appear in the exterior constitution of the church, but that it should continue till the Lord comes in judgment. Let us consider what the word of God says. Jude declares that it was already needful to write to them, to exhort them to contend for the faith once delivered to the saints, because certain men had crept in unawares, who turned the grace of our God into lasciviousness. They were corrupting the assembly from within; and what is very remarkable, he declares that these are they (that is, the class of persons) who will be among the objects of the Lord’s judgment, when He comes with ten thousands of His saints. The corruption begun during the time of the apostles will continue till the coming of the Lord. So much for internal corruption. But this is not all. Evil unfolds itself from the other side, as we find in the Epistle of John. Some had abandoned Christianity openly (1 John 2:18). " Little children, it is the last time: and as ye have heard that antichrist shall come, even now are there many antichrists; whereby we know that it is the last time. They went out from us, but they were not of us." Thus we see that though this apostle survived Paul for many years, and certainly watched over the assemblies, in Asia- Minor at least, dwelling, as it is said, at Ephesus, it was only in order to record the fact that the last time was already come, which was shown by the presence of these antichrists, and by the apostacy of many. If it be asked why God waits so long before executing judgment, the answer is to be found in 2 Peter 3:9; "The Lord is not slack concerning His promise, as some men count slackness; but is longsuffering to us-ward, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance." To Him a thousand years are as one day. In the time of the Jews, judgment was pronounced (Isaiah 6:1-13) eight hundred years before it was executed, that is, when they had finally rejected the humbled, but also glorified, Son of God. The epoch of this ruin of the assembly on the earth is determined, namely, on the death of Paul-" after my departure." Doubtless, corruption had been rapidly growing. The mystery of iniquity was already working during the apostle’s life; but his spiritual energy knew how to resist it. He being gone, however, it went on increasing without hindrance, except from the grace of God in individuals, and the chastisement by which God arrested the decline into ruin and corruption. The testimony of God, although hid under a bushel, has yet never been extinguished; and God has from time to time raised up witnesses in the midst of darkness, feeble perhaps, but true; and, at the time of the Reformation, delivered whole countries from open corruption. But we have seen that the evil introduced in the time of Jude was to continue till the judgment. This solemn and humiliating truth is confirmed by other passages. The assembly has never been restored. Not only does John say that the last time has come, but that this is marked by the presence of antichrists. Now, Antichrist shall be destroyed by the coming of the Lord. Paul reveals to us that the apostacy that began to show itself in John’s time will be fully unfolded at the last time; when Antichrist himself shall be manifested, whose coming shall be after the working of Satan, and whom the Lord shall destroy when He comes in glory. The mystery of iniquity was already working, even during the apostles’ life, and the progress of evil was to continue from his days till the Lord should come. Thus, too, the Lord says, that the tares are to grow till the harvest. It seems to us, then, that the death of Paul is the moment from which we must count the prevalence of evil. We say prevalence, because evil was already working, though Paul resisted it by the power of the Spirit; and because this evil was to go on increasing till Christ should come; because in the last days perilous times shall come, and the form of godliness without the power of it. Then in 2 Timothy 3:1-17, we also get the word of God set forth as that which is necessary, and sufficient to render the man of God perfect, and furnished unto all good works. All this truth is powerfully confirmed by what is said in Revelation 2:1-29; Revelation 3:1-22., where the Christian who has ears to hear is called upon to hearken, not to the church, but to what the Spirit saith unto the church; and in his words we find judgment pronounced by Jesus Christ on the state of the church. We would add that it is one thing to submit to the discipline, or practical judgment of an assembly, regarding evil, and quite another thing to suppose, when we are called upon to judge of the state of the church by the words of Christ and of the Spirit, that the authority of the assembly is the perpetual safeguard of the faith. The univeral assembly, Christendom, is corrupted and divided, and cannot, even as an instrument in the hands of God, secure the maintenance of the truth. It is submission to the word of God only that can do it. In order to show how far the primitive church wandered from the truth we shall quote from a book read in the assembly one hundred and fifty years after the death of John, cited by one of the best fathers of the primitive church as part of the inspired Scriptures, and esteemed as such by another, who was less orthodox, it is true. The author, pretending to have received a revelation, says: A man possessed a vineyard, and commanded his servant to stake the vines. The servant, being very faithful, did what was entrusted to him; and, besides, out of devotedness to his master; rooted all the weeds out of the vineyard. The master was so much pleased with the servant that he consulted with his son and his friends as to what should be done for the faithful servant, and it was decided to make him heir with the son. Now, the master is God, the son is the Holy Ghost, the friends are the angels, and the servant is Christ. God had sent Him to establish the clergy for the support of the faithful; but He had done much more than this, and what God had not told Him to do: He had taken away sins. Hence he is, according to the consultation of God with the Holy Ghost and the angels, co-heir with the Holy Ghost, who is son and heir of God. Such is -What was read in the churches, written by the brother of Pope Pius, and pretended to have been inspired by God; and this one hundred and fifty years after the birth of Christ. What is recounted in the same book of holiness is no better. What is there related as holy in the visions of Hermas, it is impossible to transcribe on these pages. Such then is the testimony of the apostle; after his departure evil would prevail, active both within and without. He tells them nothing of the nomination of successors to the elders, any more than he does of a successor to himself. He insists on the faithfulness of those who were there, whom the Holy Ghost had made bishops (for bishops and elders were one and only one office); and commends them to God and to the word of His grace, which was able to build them up, and give them an inheritance among then’ that were sanctified. In fact, no means is established in the Word for the continuance of the organization of the assembly. People are mistaken on this point. The disciples were waiting for the coming of the Lord, the Lord Himself (see the parables of the servant, Matthew 24:1-51, of the virgins, and of the talents). But neither the Lord nor the apostles speak as if this coming might be delayed beyond the life of those to whom they spake. The sleeping virgins are the very same that are awakened; the servants who received the talents those found afterward at the coming of the Lord. Paul says, " We which are alive and remain till the coming of the Lord." They did not know when He would come, but still they waited for Him (Luke 12:36, etc.) What has produced the moral ruin of the assembly is that she has ceased to look for the Lord; not, said he, with welcome; but has said, " The Lord delayeth His coming" (Matthew 24:49). She has taken and beaten her fellow-servants; has eaten and drunk with the drunken. The hierarchy has been established; worldliness has invaded the assembly, and thus alliance has been made with the world. The apostle recalls his own faithfulness, how he had been an example to the elders, laboring with his own hands, since it was "more blessed to give than to receive." Then, kneeling down, he prays with them all. And they, weeping, embrace him sorrowfully, chiefly for the word that he had spoken, that they should see his face no more. And they accompanied him to the ship. Solemn departure; the end of the apostle’s public work. He speaks of it as of a finished work, announcing that henceforward, in consequence of his absence, evil would prevail in the outward assembly of God on the earth, but assuring the faithful that God and the word of His grace would be enough to build them up, and give them an inheritance among those that were sanctified. This was certain. The power of Christ secures it; but the exterior system, Christendom, would be corrupted having given up the expectation of the Lord’s return. Paul teaches the same truth in 2 Tim. 3 John tells us that the last time has already arrived. The patience of God continues to accomplish the work of grace; and Christ to supply the gifts necessary to the perfecting of the saints, and the building up of the assembly, although our coldness greatly hinders the Spirit. And this will be the case till the end of the gathering of saints. But Christendom has grown ripe in evil, as foretold by the apostles. It is evil which began in apostolic times, and which was already sufficiently mature in John’s time, the last of the apostles; for he says that the last times had already come. We trust that the cry, " Behold the Bridegroom [cometh], go ye out to meet Him," has already begun to go forth, and that many hearts will respond and kindle their lamps. May the Lord add daily to their number! ======================================================================== CHAPTER 179: VOL 03 - THE CHRISTIAN LATREIA (SERVICE OF WORSHIP) ======================================================================== The Christian Latreia (Service of Worship) " I BESEECH you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service." The word (λατεεία), translated service, means service-of-worship, in such a passage as Romans 12:1. It is a word that always points God-wards. There are other words in the New Testament translated worship, which are applied to men, devils, earthly powers, or even inanimate things; but latreia, without exception, is applied to the true God only, or to a supposed god (Acts 7:42; Romans 1:25). One of the other words (the word,προσχυνεῖν) is frequently used to others-men, devils, beasts. But latreia being a temple word is not used for anything but divine service, let the, divinity be supposed or real; so even in Revelation 22:3, when it is said "His servants shall serve Him," the meaning is, with service-of-worship. When work-service is intended, another word (60046) is used, as in this same chapter, verse 11th, "serving the Lord;" or as when Paul says, Acts 20:19, "serving the Lord with all humility;" or as Galatians 5:13, " serve one another," " with good will doing service" (Ephesians 6:7). There are also other words for serving, such as Luke 12:37, " Will come forth and serve them (διαχονςῶ).” The sacrifice and service of your faith (λειτουργία) (Php 2:17). Also, " After he had served (ὑπηρετέω)) his generation " (Acts 13:36). There is " divine service " (Hebrews 9:1); work-service (1 Timothy 6:2); private service, as done in the household (Luke 10:40; John 12:2); and public or business service (2 Corinthians 9:12; Php 2:17). But our word service, in Romans 12:1(λατρεία), is always applied to the service of God (John 16:2; Romans 9:4; Romans 12:1; Hebrews 9:1-6). Even the verb (λατρεύω) is always divine service, or what was believed to be so; for "the hosts of heaven " (Acts 7:42) were regarded as divinities when worshipped. It occurs most frequently in Hebrews, where we should expect to find it, and where the other word homage (προσχυνέω) never occurs as to Christians (8: 5; 9: 1, 6, 9, 14; 10: 2; 12: 28; 9: 10), which is an additional proof that it is intended to describe our worship-service. And then we have it in Revelation 7:15; Revelation 22:3, and there it ends. I am thus minute and decided about the express meaning of the word, in order to show that with the sacred writers service man-ward is not the first thing the Spirit contemplates and enjoins, but consecration to God and worship-service God-ward. " I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that ye present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable unto God, which is your reasonable service. And be not conformed to this world: but be ye transformed by the renewing of your mind, that ye may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect, will of God." When the children of Israel were delivered out of Egypt it was worship that was the first thing spoken of, "Thus saith the Lord God of Israel, let My people go, that they may serve Me;" and we have only to read Exodus 5:3; Exodus 10:24-29, to see that this was worship-service. Moses and Aaron said to Pharaoh, "The God of the Hebrews hath met with us; let us go, we pray thee, three days’ journey into the desert, and sacrifice unto the Lord our God;" and when he would not hear of them taking their flocks and their herds, they insisted on their having them. "Our cattle also shall go with us; there shall not an hoof be left behind; for thereof must we take to serve the Lord our God, and we know not with what we must serve the Lord until we come thither." This decision broke off the conference; the Lord interposed; Israel was delivered out of the Egyptians’ land; Egypt was judged, and the Egyptians were destroyed. " See my face no more," said Pharaoh; and Moses said, " Thou hast spoken well, I will see thy face no more." The material for the sacrifice must go out of Egypt as well as the worshippers. God has come in in judgment of Satan and his world, has not only screened His people from His sword as a righteous judge in Egypt, but has also delivered them out of Egypt, annulling him that had the power of death, and by dying to sin has given all believers the privilege of being dead unto sin but alive unto God in Jesus Christ, and thus being redeemed out of the place by the. power of God, working in connection with the death and life again of Christ, they are rescued, emancipated, living saints of God in virtue of Christ, and in their own happy consciousness and joy of faith; the world and its slavery left behind, they can now serve the Lord as those who are brought to Himself, and they have themselves-.even their bodies, the former vessels of the slavery of sin-now blessedly made members of Christ and temples of the Holy Ghost, so that they can be exhorted as having power over their " mortal body," not to let sin reign in it, but also thus " yield (present) yourselves unto God as those that are alive from the dead" (Romans 6:11-13): in Romans 12:1, "present your bodies." Why bodies? Are we not "waiting for the redemption of our body?" True. But "because of His Spirit that dwelleth in you, He who raised up Christ from the dead shall also give life to your mortal bodies," and faith holds it as good as done, and acts accordingly. "What? know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost which is in you, which ye. have of God, and ye are not your own? for ye are bought with a price: therefore glorify God in your body " (1 Corinthians 6:19-20): Ye are bought with a price; that is the whole man, body and soul and spirit. The whole of Satan’s contest is not only about "the body of Moses" (Jude 1:9), but about the bodies of all the saints. As Pharaoh strove to keep the cattle in Egypt, so Satan would keep the bodies of believers in the world, and allow them to serve God and worship with their souls. It is a striking parallel we have here to Moses’ decision with Pharaoh. "There shall not an hoof be left behind." The cattle must go, all of them: so our bodies also go out of Egypt, for they are the very substance of the sacrifice to be presented. "Present your bodies a living sacrifice." Call it consecration if you will, our bodies are not to be left out in our " service," but we, in our bodies, are to present ourselves " a living sacrifice, holy." This is so, for we are made masters of our bodies now in Christ through the power of God’s Holy Spirit, just as when we were in the flesh Satan and sin mastered us through our bodies: and, being in the power of the Spirit, it is spiritual work, and "an intelligent service." And with regard to our " divine service" (latreia), there is great importance in insisting on the consecration and sacrifice of the whole man, and that we present our bodies, for you will find the most of God’s saints presenting themselves every Lord’s day in places where they cannot but know there is no worship on a divine basis or in accordance with Scriptural principles. There was one city in Israel where God had placed His name, and in which His worship was duly performed, and to that center all the males repaired thrice a year to present themselves before the Lord and worship. They said rightly, then, "At Jerusalem is the place where men ought to worship." And is there no prescribed worship of God in Christianity? and is it all one whether we in our bodies are found in connection with a worship-service where Christ is served divinely and scripturally, or where the so-called worship is a direct denial of Christianity? Where the service is according to a pre-arranged and established form, conducted by religious officials, appointed and salaried for that purpose, or where a liturgy is used, there believers are not at liberty to be present at all, for that is not God’s way of worship. Christ is all in God’s church. He is the center for the worship (Matthew 18:20); He and His sacrifice glorifying God and perfecting worshippers as-to the conscience are the basis of worship (Hebrews 9:1-28) The only power for worship is the Spirit, who dwells not only in each individual, but is with the saints collectively, regulating all and guiding each, so that one and another may be employed in the service as He may see good to use them; and the worship being that of the Father (John 4:1-54), none but the children of God can join in it; and none are acceptable worshippers but those "who have received the Spirit of adoption, crying, Abba, Father" (Romans 8:1-39); and as all believers are members of Christ, true worship embraces all saints; and as all are baptized into one body, we dare not take our place where the principle of religious " bodies " of man’s invention is owned, whether unblushingly connected with this " present evil world," or framed according to some other contrivance of man’s will; for the worship of Christianity is on the principle of a complete break with man in the flesh and man’s world, and on the principle of being members of Christ, and one with Him, where He is at God’s right hand, and all the distance between earth and heaven placed between the worshippers and the world. " Having, therefore, brethren, boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus," tells us that our place of worship ’is outside the world; and we can no more worship in Egypt than could Jehovah’s Israel. Just as Moses said to Pharaoh, " I will see thy face no more," so when the bodies of the saints, the persons of the saved, are presented, there is decision as to having no more conference with the world-" Be not conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds to your proving what is that good and perfect and acceptable thing-the will of God." The not having your fashioning like that of the world which likes something visible, and with a fair show in the flesh-some golden calf-but being transfigured by the renewing of your mind, as Christ’s inward glory shone out on the transfiguration hill, then will you have capacity and power to experimentally prove that God has a " will " about " your service," as well as about everything;- " good, acceptable, and perfect." "Present your bodies.... your intelligent service." How many there are in these days who, when the saints have been visited by the Holy Ghost revealing Christ to His people’s minds, have grown so in the knowledge of Him and of the riches of the grace of God and of Christianity, that they have at length become transfigured, their whole body full of light, with no part dark; they have ceased to be conformed to the world, and have presented their bodies as God would have them; have worshipped by God’s Spirit, and have no confidence in the flesh. Paul had renounced the whole system for the excellency of Christ Jesus his Lord, and there came such power with the call that reached him from the glory, the light that shone around him revealing the glorious Man, that he was from the first completely outside the world to the Christ who had called him, and he found himself a worshipper where he had intended to be a ravener. And to this he refers repeatedly in the most touching terms: " Who was before a blasphemer and a persecutor, and injurious. But I obtained mercy. I obtained mercy that in me first Jesus Christ might show forth all longsuffering for a pattern to them who should hereafter believe on Him to life everlasting." And in Romans 12:1 he beseeches " by the mercies* of God," of which he has just given such a witness to Jew and Gentile in the body of this Epistle, " to present your bodies a sacrifice living and holy, acceptable to God, an intelligent service." (*The other places where "mercies " are mentioned in the New Testament are these: 2 Corinthians 1:3; Php 2:1; Colossians 3:12 (singular); Hebrews 10:28. "By the mercies " is literally "through the mercies of God," as the powerful means and motive that is to move you "to present your bodies a living sacrifice." In chapter 15: 30, he writes: "I beseech you, brethren, through our Lord. Jesus Christ, and through the love of the Spirit, that ye strive together with me in your prayers to God for me." In 1 Corinthians 1:10, "Now I beseech you, brethren, by the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, that ye all speak the same thing, and that there be no divisions among you." In 2 Corinthians 10:1, " Now I, Paul, beseech you by the meekness and gentleness of Christ.") "Present (παρεστῆσαι) your bodies," as those who once for all are sanctified by the offering of the body of Jesus Christ." This word present is "selected as the set expression for presenting of sacrificial animals at the altar." As the worshipper presented his living victim, so we present our bodies " a living sacrifice." For in this " service" we are by grace allowed to be oblivious of the fact that " the body is dead because of sin." We must regard our former existence in the flesh as non-existent, and we are in the spirit in Christ and Christ in us. Faith places us in the presence of God in Christ, body as well as soul, and so in our " service " we can look for the Holy Ghost enabling us to present our bodies filled with His power. In faith we who believe draw near our very selves in our bodies, which, as indwelt of the Spirit, the Lord’s, and not our own, we present a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God. We can never say as to fact and walk there is nothing in our bodies but the Holy Ghost, for we are to mortify the deeds of the body by the Spirit. But as to our place in Christ and to faith, we reckon ourselves dead indeed unto sin, and alive unto God in Jesus Christ; and we in our bodies are free to be used in " the service of God." " Mercies" are here (διὰ τῶν οἰχτιρμῶν τοῦ θεοῦ) the feelings of compassion in God’s heart, which have become embodied in the " mercy " which saves the lost (Titus 3:5), quickens the dead (Ephesians 2:4), and cares for the saints of God (Hebrews 4:16). Paul speaks of mercy to him in 2 Corinthians 4:1; 1 Timothy 1:13-16. Peter speaks of " abundant mercy," (1 Peter 1:3), and about obtaining mercy (1 Peter 2:10). Paul, in Romans does not speak of "mercy "until chapter 9: 15. Then we have it about twelve times, ten of which are in that portion of the epistle from chapter 9. to 11., in which he shows that the salvation of the Gentiles now does not argue that God has cast away His people, or that He will not make good in sovereign mercy. His promises of special place, blessing, and glory to Israel by and by. In the 11th chapter, at verses 31, 32, he shows that both come under sovereign mercy: "That he might have mercy upon all." This word (ἔλεος) looks to the outward act; "mercies" (οἰχτιρμοι) to the inward feeling. Man’s misery is met by God’s mercy, whether he be Jew or Gentile. On account of the rejection of Christ the Jew is no better than the Gentile, all being dead in sins, as in Ephesians, and God, rich in mercy, for His great love quickening together with Christ, saves by grace through faith, the entire thing being God’s gift; and if man is looked at in his living sin and misery, as in the Epistle to the Romans, then God’s inward feelings of compassion have been so stirred for him in his guilt, condemnation, bondage to sin, law, and death, that He has not spared His own Son, but delivered Him up for us all, and with Him has freely given us all things, such as free justification by grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus, whom He has set forth a propitiatory through faith in His blood. "The mercies of God" moved Him to deliver Him up for our offenses, and raise Him up for our justification, so that, being justified by faith, we might have peace with God, access through Him into a gracious standing before Him, so that the glory of God is made our boast, and God Himself our joy, by whom we have now received the reconciliation. But " the mercies of God " have not left us under the mastership of sin any more than in our sins, but giving us, in virtue of Christ’s death and resurrection, to hold ourselves as, non-existent, and the whole bondage to sin terminated, we are to Him who is risen from the dead, and bring forth fruit to God. Instead of raising the cry, "0 wretched man that I am! who shall deliver me?" the "mercies of God" have flowed forth in such wise as to relieve this misery, and put in the place of that cry of misery the " I thank God, through Jesus Christ; "... for the law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus hath made me free from the law of sin and death; "-for God has condemned sin in the flesh-and we are not in the flesh but in the Spirit-a new state altogether, with the Spirit of God, the Spirit of Christ, and Christ in us- the spirit of adoption given us, we are heirs of God, and joint- heirs with Christ, to be glorified together-the body to be redeemed; but meantime we groaning in it according to God, and waiting for the liberty of the glory, when creation itself shall be delivered from the bondage of corruption. Meantime, exulting in the prospect of coming glory, when we shall be conformed to the image of God’s Son in glory, being glorified together, God is for us. His compassions have been embodied and expressed in the gift of His Son, who has died, risen, and gone into heaven, and through whom we have God’s own love so commended in that while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us, and so we feel secure, God being for us in love and righteousness, and as we know there is now no condemnation to them who are in Christ Jesus, so we exult in the culminating grace of " the mercies of God," that none can separate us from the love of Christ, from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord. Such are the outflowings of His mercies to the Gentiles, who may well " glorify God for His mercy;" and chapters 9.-11. show also His mercies to Israel, for "so all Israel shall be saved, as it is written, "There shall come out of Zion the Deliverer, and turn away ungodliness from Jacob." " As regards the glad tidings, they are enemies on your account; but as regards election, beloved on account of the fathers; for the gifts and calling of God are not subject to repentance. For, as indeed ye also once have not believed in God, but now have been objects of mercy through the unbelief of these, so these also have not believed in your mercy, in order that they also may be the objects of mercy. For God hath shut up all in unbelief in order that He might show mercy to all " (Romans 11:1-36) Such are the " mercies of God." Is He not " the God of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies?" These mercies have found their objects in us, and now, having experienced them, what a motive to induce us to a whole-hearted presentation of our bodies-" our intelligent service." As God-taught saints we yield it. It is an intelligent service we render. Salvation is no longer a dark saying and a dim parable, but a revealed and embodied fact and reality. We have the Holy Ghost as the unction, and the risen Lord in the presence of God, and by Him heavenly realities are revealed, and we ourselves are in living fellowship with the Father and with His Son Jesus Christ in the power of the Holy Spirit- having the enjoyment of the mutual thoughts and affections of the Father and the Son. There is nothing else " reasonable," or in strict accordance with spiritual logic (λογιχὴν), or exactly as it should be, or at all answerable as a spontaneous response to the reception of "the mercies of God," save the presenting of our bodies a living sacrifice-holy, well-pleasing unto God. As the redeemed nation of Israel were supplied with motives for absolute giving up of themselves to God as His worshipping nation, solely in the mercy of God, manifested in their redemption and blessing, so "the mercies of God" to us should lead spontaneously to our presenting ourselves as His worshipping saints, and moving spiritually, as those under the entire control of the Holy Ghost, in the "intelligent service" of this New Testament house of God. When David sat in his house and mused on all God’s mercies, his mind got upon the ark of God, and he thought of building a house for it. The Lord did not allow it, but told him it was well that it was in his heart. Instead of thinking on God’s mercies to this effect that we are to be used to establish God’s worship or secure that the truth shall be perpetuated by our prudence or devotedness towards such an object, let our aim be to hold ourselves in ever fresh presentation before the Lord, that He may establish our hearts in grace, our souls in devotedness, and our minds in the knowledge of His will. Our intelligent worship-service is entirely dependent on God’s sustainment, Christ’s grace, and the Holy. Ghost’s presence in power and blessing. But when things are according to the mind of God, as when David caused the Levites to bear the ark, and there was worshipping gladness, and the permanent settlement of the ministry of song, it pertained not to the law, but to "the sure mercies of David." The one who had known first rejection and then exaltation began the settled ministry of song in Israel; so ours began with the Lord Jesus. The song in Christianity begins with the seating of the earth-rejected Jesus, crowned with glory and honor, on the throne of the Father in the heavens, and "Thou art worthy" shall be sung in the heavenly sanctuary forever and ever. There is always light, love, communion, joy in the Lord, and song where God’s mind is sought and enjoyed as to His worship, and when praise and thanksgiving are rendered to God from fully consecrated and devoted worshippers, for we joy in God through our Lord Jesus Christ, and our full cup running over, we offer by Him the sacrifice of praise to God continually, confessing His name. The basis of our worship is Christ and His’ perfect sacrifice of Himself-the Lord’s supper being the center of it, as it keeps Him in His death for the glory of God and our redemption visibly before us; our only power of worship the Holy Spirit; the object of worship the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. "For through Him (Christ Jesus) we both have access by one Spirit unto the Father" (Ephesians 2:18). " The FATHER seek eth worshippers;" and " GOD is a Spirit, and they that worship Him must worship Him in Spirit and in truth." Then " let us have grace whereby we may worship GOD acceptably with reverence and with godly fear, for our God is a consuming fire" (Hebrews 12:28); "Worship GOD" (Revelation 22:9). It would be edifying to inquire into the character of our worship, and ascertain the difference between worshipping God, the Father, the Lord Jesus, and " by the Spirit of God." A Christian who knows only Hebrews’ truth will worship God with reverence and godly fear; not with a childlike sense of relationship, " crying, Abba, Father." In " Hebrews " we never have the Father in our relationship or worship, and it never rises to the height or measure of the full worship of Christianity, for it is official not filial; of consecrated "priests unto God," not of children and the Father. We do not find either "joy " or " love" in our relationship with God in the epistle. Fear, not love, characterizes it (4: 1,12; 12: 29), " for our God is a consuming fire;" and in it we are on our way through the wilderness, and having liberty to enter into the holiest we draw near habitually and Worship; the epistle does not look at us as always there, as does Ephesians, which regards us as being before the Father in love, who hath "predestinated us to the adoption of’ children to himself," and in the happy enjoyment of the " Spirit of Sonship," ever in our Father’s presence as the loved ones of His own family. " For by Him we both have access by one Spirit to the Father," and we are as children of God, ever enjoying our fellowship with the Father, and with His Son Jesus Christ. The worship of the " holy priesthood " is the worship of God, and it is " with reverence and godly fear;" but as children we "worship the Father," and our joy is full. A most desirable state of mind it is to have "godly fear" (the same word [εὐλαβεία] is used of our blessed Lord, Hebrews 5:7); we cannot "serve God acceptably" otherwise; but the Spirit-given cry of " Abba" is essential to the worship of the Father, as offered by His " dear children "-His " loved children" (Ephesians 5:1). There is no priesthood with the Father, and our place as priests is never spoken of where our relationship to the Father is contemplated. Priestly place and worship of God are connected with a pilgrimage condition and the home in prospect; worship of the Father by His dear children and the loving consciousness of a filial relationship are connected with the Father’s presence. Worshipping God, on the level of the truth in Hebrews, 1st Peter, and Revelation, has an entirely different feeling to our souls from worshipping the Father on the basis of the manifestation of His purpose in Christ Jesus, in Ephesians. And if we are true worshippers, and not hollow pretenders, we will not venture to worship out of keeping with our state. The Spirit will guide us into that frame of mind and form of expression which accord with our present condition. There is great danger in leaving off worshipping God-where lie the deepest moral glories connected with the adorable Person and atoning death of our Lord Jesus Christ-and only worshipping the Father. No reason is there why both should not be observed in due scriptural proportion, as the state of worshippers may permit: but less harm will be done to souls from having the worship of God in excess than from the all but exclusive worship of the Father-although, as has been said, there cannot be the full and proper worship of Christianity unless there be, besides the worship of God, also the worship of the Father. Our Lord has joined both in St. John 4:23-24. Here we have the Father in relationship, and God in his nature; and it is the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. we now worship "in spirit and in truth." ======================================================================== CHAPTER 180: VOL 03 - THE CHRISTIAN SACRAMENTS ======================================================================== The Christian Sacraments By JAMES S. CANDLISH, D.D., Professor of Systematic Theology in the Free Church College, Glasgow. CREEDS and confessions of faith are helpful in gathering up into a short compass important articles of the Christian faith, but they become real hindrances to truth when made standards by which doctrinal teaching is to be measured and verified. In so far as they correctly summarize certain truths they are of use. But no creed that men have ever drawn up, no confession of faith ever yet issued, however comprehensive in teaching, or scriptural in statement, is fitted to be the standard by which the teaching of professing Christians can be fully tried. A confession of faith may meet the burning questions of the day in which it is compiled, but experience proves that it cannot wholly provide all that may be needed by another generation. The creeds of Christendom, called the Apostles’, the Nicene, and the Athanasian, drawn up one after the other, witness to this; and the various confessions of faith, under whatever name they may be called, that at different times have been framed and published, plainly prove the dissatisfaction of their authors with those already in existence. Teaching, too, may be in harmony with a recognized confession of faith which is directly contradicted by the Word of God. Thus whilst the Scriptures tell us that Christians have been reconciled to God by the death of His Son (Romans 5:1-21; Colossi 1.), the second article of the Church of England asserts that the Lord Jesus died to reconcile His Father to us. To be orthodox, then, in teaching, if bound by a confession of faith; one may have to assert and contend for as truth that which the written Word of God either has not declared to be such, or flatly, it may be, contradicts. A few examples from the Westminster Confession of Faith will illustrate this. And we turn now to that confession because the book under review appeals to it, and seems to uphold it as Scripturally correct. We give a few statements taken at, random. The Westminster Confession of Faith tells us in Chapter 4 that God created, or made of nothing, the world, and all things therein, whether visible or invisible, in the space of six days. Scripture has nowhere said this, and carefully, it would appear, draws a distinction between the creating the heavens and the earth in the beginning, and the making of the earth and the heavens in six days (Genesis 1:2; Exodus 20:1-26) And certain it is that God did not make the heavens and earth out of nothing. Again it tells us (Chapter 6) that every sin, both original and actual, is a transgression of the righteous law of God. Scripture, on the other hand, states that death reigned, from Adam to. Moses, over them that had not sinned after the similitude of Adam’s " transgression " (Romans 5:14). It tells us, too, that the Gentiles had not the law (Romans 2:14), that it entered that the offense might abound (Romans 5:20), and that was not till 430 years after the promise to Abraham (Galatians 3:17). Again, we read of the Lamb slain from the beginning of the world (Chapter 8), a manifest mistake from not understanding the words of Revelation 13:8, as may be seen by comparing them with Revelation 17:8. The names were written in the Lamb’s book from that date, not that the Lamb was slain from that time. Once more, in Chapter 19, we are told that " God gave to Adam a law, as a covenant of works, by which He bound him, and all his posterity, to personal, entire, exact, and perpetual obedience; promised life upon the fulfilling, and threatened death upon the breach of it." God did warn Adam of death if he disobeyed His command, but did not promise him life, nor announce that He would bind his posterity either.. A similar statement as " to the promise of life to Adam, and in him to his posterity," is met with in Chapter 7, but found in no chapter of either the Old or New Testament. Now, if men are to teach by this confession, they must teach things which God’s Word does not, and things which it directly controverts. Are standards of human authority, we may ask, to override the paramount authority of the Word? If loyal to the confession of faith it is clear that such a composition must override the divine Word; and anything which it has omitted to notice, however important it may be in the Word of God, no one bound by the confession could be dealt with for denying. Hence appeals as to orthodoxy are not made to the Word of God, but to the confession and standards, as they are called; and so man, not God, is made the judge to determine what is needful to be held as an article of faith or maintained as a portion of revealed truth. But our business now is not with the Westminster Confession, of Faith, but with the book noticed at the head of this article. Enough has been quoted from that confession to demonstrate that its statements cannot be accepted as Scripturally true, unless established by proofs from the written Word. As a summary of certain doctrines it may be useful, but even then its statements may need correction. As a standard it cannot be taken, unless the Westminster divines are more worthy of being listened to than God the Holy Ghost. Nor can it be accepted as a compendium of all the important doctrines which should be believed, to accredit a person as sound and instructed in the faith. We should look in vain for any recognition of the proper hope of the Church, the coming of the Lord Jesus into the air for His saints, of which the Lord spoke, and the Epistles of Paul treat; or for any teaching regarding the millennial reign of the Lord Jesus Christ, the theme of prophecy in the Old Testament, the expectation of His saints also in the New. Teaching, too, about the Church of God, and the presence of the Holy Ghost on earth, cardinal truths of Christianity, were but little apprehended by the divines assembled at Westminster, and certainly but poorly set forth. And when we read the chapter on baptism, which states that it is to the baptized person " a sign and seal of the covenant of grace, and of his engrafting into Christ," one wonders, if that statement be correct, how they could add, towards the close of that chapter (sect. 5:), that all baptized are not undoubtedly regenerated. The truth is, that amidst much that is true and valuable, the Scripture doctrine of baptism they had not fully laid hold of, so those good men unintentionally taught about it what is foreign to the Word, and landed themselves in contradictions fraught with the gravest peril to truth. What, then, it may be asked, is the teaching of Scripture on baptism? Let us turn to the divine Word for an answer to that question. In the New Testament we meet with three different baptisms-that of John, that instituted by the Lord, and that of the Holy Ghost. The two first were effected by water; the last by the coming of the Holy Ghost. Now, these are never confounded, though the two former are always termed βάπτισμα, baptism-a, never βαπτισμὸςbaptismos, which latter term is confined, in its use in the New Testament, to the Jewish rite of washing cups, pots, brazen vessels, or tables (Mark 7:1-37; Hebrews 6:2; Hebrews 9:10). The baptism of John was only for a time, 1:e. during the ministry of the Baptist. The baptism instituted by the Lord Jesus was for all His disciples, from Pentecost until He returns to reign, as the commission in Matthew (28: 19, 20) would seem to intimate. The baptism of the Holy Ghost, baptizing all believers into one body, is limited to Christian times, which, commencing with Pentecost, will terminate with the rapture of the saints (1 Thessalonians 4:15-18). The baptism of John was appointed for all whose consciences were stirred by his preaching of repentance. The person who heard him, and was convicted, and repented, owned, by submitting to that rite at his hands, that he had failed utterly and hopelessly under the law, but, confessing his sins and repenting of them, awaited the mercy of God to be manifested in forgiveness of his sins. For though John preached the baptism of having been made for their baptism in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. In truth, these last did not need it, as we can understand when we ask of the same Scriptures what Christian baptism really is. The answer to this question is given us in the writings of Paul. The practical teaching about it is furnished by the epistles of both Peter and Paul. Addressing the Galatians 3:27. Paul says, " as many of you as have been baptized εἰς unto Christ have put on Christ." By baptism, then, we put on Christ. It is profession of discipleship. It speaks of what we put on. It does not impart anything to us within. The putting on Christ is not the same as having. Christ in us. Of old all who passed through the Red Sea were baptized unto eh Moses in the cloud and in the sea (1 Corinthians 10:2). All believers since Pentecost have been baptized unto εἰς Christ, thereby openly entering the ranks of His disciples, to be known as such before all the world. When He was upon earth His disciples were seen and known to be such, as they journeyed about with Him, or owned Him to be their Teacher, and obeyed what He said to them. Such had no need to be baptized after His resurrection to be ranked as disciples of Christ. They had taken their place as disciples already. But since He has actually died, passing off this scene by death, how can people now be put into His company? If they actually died, they would be no longer on earth. That would not do. So they are buried with Him by baptism unto death, for burial is the open declaration that any one has passed off this scene; as Abraham, addressing the sons of Heth, asked for a possession of a burying-place that he might bury his dead out of his sight (Genesis 23:4). Would any desire, from fear of man, to be a disciple of Christ in secret, and so decline to confess Him openly by baptism? Scripture would not own such a one as a disciple, nor could that person be rightly credited with the name of a Christian. So Peter, addressing those Jews who were pricked to their heart on the day of Pentecost, told them (Acts 2:1-47) to repent and be baptized every one of them in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and they would receive the gift of the Holy Ghost. They had outwardly to separate from Judaism, and openly to be enrolled as disciples of Christ. And so really was this rite understood to be the confession of discipleship, that Paul at Corinth baptized himself but few, lest any should say that he baptized unto as his own name (1 Corinthians 1:15). Burial, then, by baptism with Christ can alone now put a person openly and professedly in His company. Hence the careful reader may remark that Christian baptism is defined as burial, not death, though it is " unto death." " We are buried with Christ by baptism unto death " (Romans 6:4). " Buried with Him in baptism, wherein also ye are risen with Him through faith of the operation of God, who raised Him from the dead " (Colossians 2:12). Burial with Christ, and resurrection with Him, are what that rite sets forth. It is profession, for we have thereby put on Christ. It is burial with Him unto death, so should not be mere empty profession. But no one, now on earth, can be put into the company of Christ, except as he is baptized unto Him. And since it is as the One who died that we know Him, we are baptized unto His death. By this rite then, as Colossians teaches, we get a position we could not otherwise procure. Three points we may now see come out with distinctness. Firstly, We understand why those who were disciples before the cross were commissioned to baptize others, but were never commanded to be baptized themselves. They were disciples already, and were openly recognized as such, so needed not to conform to that rite. But all who professed to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ after His death could only by baptism be enrolled as disciples of Christ. Secondly, We see from Acts 19:1-41 that John’s baptism was in no sense a substitute for Christian baptism. And Thirdly, since the rite speaks of burial unto death, it neither imparts life nor salvation. Of this Simon Magus is a proof, who, though baptized, had neither the one nor the other; and the Apostle, in Colossians 2:13, makes that plain. There quickening with Christ and forgiveness are viewed as distinct from baptism. The latter has to do with position on earth before God and man. The former have to do with the Christian’s standing before God. References, therefore, to such portions as John 3:1-36, Ephesians 5:26, Titus 3:5, are quite out of place when treating of baptism. The bath or laver of regeneration has not to do with that rite. Titus 3:5 speaks of what takes place in the soul; baptism of the position on earth into which a person is thereby brought. The water, of John Ephesians 5:26, is the Word of God, by which, as well as by the Spirit, the believer is begotten of God, and is cleansed from his old ways when he gives heed to what it says. Ephesians 5:26, explains that water is the divine Word; and James 1:18, and 1 Peter 1:23, tell us we are begotten by the Word, which, we elsewhere learn, acts on the soul as water does on the body (Psalms 119:9; John 15:3). Baptism, then, is not the new birth, nor regeneration, nor the means by which it is brought about. It is not the beginning of the new life, though it is the starting- point of Christian profession. How much confusion and wrong doctrine has been introduced by mixing up profession and standing, and by attributing to all those who are in the House of God the spiritual blessings of those who are members of the Body of Christ. We have spoken, in some measure, of what baptism is. We would remind our readers of the connection in which it is doctrinally introduced. Where Christian standing is the subject baptism is not named. Where Christian profession, and the proper practice of a Christian are treated of, there it has its place. In Romans 3:1-31; Romans 4:1-25; Romans 5:1-21 we should look in vain for a trace of it. In chap. 6:, where the Christian’s walk is the subject, baptism is introduced. In Galatians 3:1-29 the apostle refers to it as a witness of the folly of their new doctrines. Would they Judaize? What had they professed by their baptism? They had put on Christ. " Now in Him there was neither Jew nor Greek, bond nor free, male nor female. Nationalities, social position, sexual distinctions, all disappear in Christ. Why then Judaize? The ground they were taking up was diametrically opposed to all that they had professed by their baptism. In Ephesians 4:5 it is plainly connected with profession-one Lord, one faith, one baptism. In Colossians it reminds us of the position that we have with Christ, and in 1 Peter 3:1-22 we learn how in connection with it we can have a good conscience before God. For as those saved at the flood never left earth, but were landed by its waters in a new scene, so baptism puts us in a new position without our leaving earth, and by the resurrection of Christ we have what is desired, 47repitmwa, a good conscience before God. In this way it saves. The salvation of those in the ark determined nothing really about their soul’s everlasting condition before God. Baptism in saving us determines nothing about our soul’s everlasting condition either, but, acting up to what is professed by baptism, the individual will have what he desires, a good conscience before God; " buried with Christ in baptism, wherein also he is risen with Him through faith of the operation of God who raised Him from the dead." In this way it saves; and as in the Epistles of Paul, so in that of Peter, it is introduced where walk is insisted on, not where the Christian standing is the subject in hand (1 Peter 3:17-22; 1 Peter 4:1-6). Of the soul’s salvation Peter had previously written (1 Peter 1:9). One other passage there is which we have not yet noticed. Paul in recounting before the Jews at Jerusalem the history of his conversion, gives them, what we read not of elsewhere, the word of Ananias telling him what he should do: " And now why tarriest thou? Arise, and be baptized, and wash away thy sins, calling on the name of the Lord " (Acts 22:16). Life in his soul Saul already possessed, but as yet he had not openly taken Christian ground. That he was to do, entering by baptism into a new position on earth, and clearing himself from all association with the past, calling upon the name of the Lord, 1:e. openly professing to own Him whom God hath made Lord and Christ. Here, as. elsewhere, baptism has to do with’ profession and position. It did not, it does not, confer grace. Life it cannot communicate. The soul’s salvation it cannot secure. Forgiveness of sins before God it cannot procure. No external rite can affect the soul’s standing before its Maker, though this rite changes the person’s position on earth before God and his fellow-creatures. To the baptism of the Holy Ghost we must now turn. This concerns only true believers in Christ. None can receive the Holy Ghost, and thereby share in the results of this baptism, except such as have received the gospel of their salvation by believing on the Lord Jesus Christ (Ephesians 1:13). That it differs from John’s baptism the Baptist himself declared. He baptized with water. The Lord Jesus would baptize with the Holy Ghost, which He did, when, having received of the Father the promise of the Holy Ghost (for the Holy Ghost is what was promised), He shed forth that, which on the day of Pentecost was both seen and heard. Then it was the true disciples of Christ, who had been baptized of John in Judaea, were baptized with the Holy Ghost. Clearly, therefore, these two are quite distinct -and not less distinct is the baptism of the Spirit, from baptism in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. Cornelius, and those in his house who shared in the results of the baptism of the Holy Ghost, were, nevertheless, obliged to be baptized with water. Those in Samaria who had been baptized with water, had need, nevertheless, to receive by the apostles’ hands the gift of the Holy Ghost, by whose indwelling presence in each of them they were made partakers of the results of this baptism. What, then, does the baptism of the Holy Ghost do for us? By one Spirit all believers are baptized into one body (1 Corinthians 12:13). Christian baptism by water enrolls all who submit to it as disciples of Christ; making them Christians by profession, if that profession even be only in name. In the power of one Spirit all true believers are baptized into one body. The House of God, in its wide aspect called also the Church or Assembly of God, embraces all those who have been baptized with water in the name of the Trinity. The body of Christ, coterminous only with the House of God in its restricted aspect, is formed of those who share in the blessing of the baptism of the Spirit. John’s baptism was administered only by himself. Christian baptism, though instituted by the Lord Jesus Christ, was never administered by Him. But He and He alone baptized with the Holy Ghost. With the Scriptures fresh in our remembrance which treat of these important subjects, we may now turn to see whether or not the book, at the head of this article, is in accordance with their teaching on Christian baptism. The answer must be in the negative, for the writer confounds the baptism of John with that instituted by the Lord Jesus, and this latter with that of the Holy Ghost. Confusion on these points cannot consist with clear Scriptural teaching on any one of them. " There was no difference in the outward rite between the baptism of John, that of Jesus’ disciples during His life on earth, and that which He commanded His disciples to administer after His resurrection; nor does there seem to have been any difference in the meaning and purpose of the ordinance in each case’; although with the successive stages in which the ordinance is found, there was an advance in the fullness and clearness with which ’the spiritual things signified by it were understood and appropriated " (p. 48). What a sentence for a professor of Systematic theology to pen! Both, it is true, were effected by water. But granting that, was there no difference in the outward rite? Christian baptism is in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. The revelation of the Father was only made by Christ; John never could, and never did baptize in the name of the Trinity. No difference in the meaning and purpose of the ordinance 1 John baptized with water unto repentance. We are baptized unto the death of Christ. Nothing could be more marked than the differences between them. In the teaching of Professor Candlish all is confusion. In the teaching of the divine Word there is clearness and precision. Again the Professor writes " In the New Testament we are more distinctly told that it is Christ who baptizes, who sanctifies the Church by the washing of water, and that it is by the Holy Spirit that He does so. Christ is the immediate agent, and the Holy Ghost is the cleansing element in the washing that baptism represents. Hence we see that it is not only forgiveness, or deliverance from the guilt of sin, but a thorough purging of the soul from the pollution of evil desires, evil imaginations, evil thoughts, that is meant by the baptism of the Spirit" (p. 55). " Baptism teaches, fourth, that by this process of death with Christ and new birth, we become His as our Lord and God." "The real unity is effected by the inward baptism of the Spirit.... But of this real spiritual unity the rite of baptism is a type and sign.... Baptism is the great symbol of the unity of the Church of Christ, under Him her one Head" (pp. 56, 57). "Thus we find Paul frequently appealing to baptism as teaching truths that those whom he addressed seemed not to know, or to have forgotten, e.g., the gift of the Holy Ghost (Acts 19:3-6); the unity of the Church (1 Corinthians 1:13); the necessity of holiness Romans 6:3-4 " (p. 79). Here the baptism of the Spirit is confounded with baptism by water. But neither the baptism by water, nor that of the Spirit, nor any baptism of which sinful men are the subjects, deliver from the guilt of sin. That is effected by blood, not by water, as we are taught that " without shedding of blood is no remission" (Hebrews 9:22). Further, water baptism never did, and never can make us Christ’s. Romans 8:9 is clear on that point. " If any man have not the spirit of Christ he is not of him." No one belongs to Christ who has not received the Holy Ghost. But baptism by water does not confer that gift. The history of the Acts to which we have already referred puts that beyond doubt or controversy. Nor is it even the sign of it. Baptism by water is an act on behalf of an individual. The baptism of the Spirit had for its subject the whole assembled company. Nor does Paul ever appeal to water baptism to teach saints about the unity of the Church; 1 Corinthians 1:13, reproves them for the parties allowed in the assembly at Corinth, but does not teach how the unity of the Church is effected. How strange, too, that if Christian baptism teaches truth concerning the unity of the Church, Paul, who was the chosen vessel to reveal and insist on that truth, was sent, he tells us in that very chapter (1 Corinthians 1:17), by Christ not to baptize, but to preach the Gospel. Starting with confused thoughts about water baptism and that of the Spirit, we cannot wonder if the teaching about the former turns out to be anything but Scriptural. A few quotations will show the reader what it is. " The new life begins with union to Christ in the Spirit’s work of effectual calling, in which faith begins.... Thus by the sacraments, as really as by the Word, God truly presents Christ to us that we may receive Him by faith, and that receiving Him we may have life, and have it more abundantly" (p. 35). Life and union are here confounded. Union, we learn in the Word, is for those who have life, for such only receive the Holy Ghost, by whose indwelling presence in them union with Christ is effected. No one but a believer receives the Holy Ghost. To have life souls are born of water and of the Spirit. To be united to Christ life must previously exist in the soul. Again we read, page 37-" When a believer is baptized, he receives Christ for the washing away of his sins; " on page. 39, "that the sacraments become effectual means of salvation; " and on page 41, that " the sacraments are means of grace in the same sense and way as the Word is, both being alike presentations of God’s truths and promises in Christ, and of Christ Himself in them, to the minds and hearts of men, made effectual by the Holy Ghost, through faith on our part. But there are also certain differences between them, from which it appears to whom the sacraments ought to be administered. The sacraments being appendages to the Word, like illustrations to a book, and tokens to a promise, are of no avail without the Word; whereas it, even without the sacraments, would present to our faith Jesus Christ with all His benefits." If the Word can thus act without the sacraments to present to our faith Christ with all His benefits, of what use are the sacraments, we might reasonably ask? Bewilderment and astonishment must take possession of the student of such a book as that to which we are calling attention, for we read on page 42, "The Word naturally comes before the sacraments, and they cannot profit those who have not first heard and believed the Word." Again, " Who ought to seek or come forward to the sacraments? The answer that must be given is, Only those who truly believe in the Lord Jesus Christ." And yet the sacraments are effectual means of salvation, and by them Christ is received, for the recipient to have life and that more abundantly. Surely such writing is darkening counsel by words without knowledge. Are souls born of God by the sacraments? They are by the Word. Do souls receive everlasting life by the sacraments? They do by coming to Christ, and that is by believing on Him Life is received now by hearing the voice of the Son of God (John 5:25; John 6:40; John 6:47). How clear is Scripture, but how misleading is this book. At one moment we are told that the sacraments-mark not baptism only, but the Lord’s Supper as well-are means of salvation, by which, receiving Christ, we have life. Hence both sacraments, of course, must be received for a soul to possess everlasting life; yet Cornelius and his company received the Holy Ghost, the plainest token that they had life without partaking of either. At another time we are taught that those only who have life, and believed to have it, should partake of them. All this may be systematic theology, but it is not true Christian teaching, though it may be in harmony with the Westminster Confession of Faith, and with the Larger and Shorter Catechism. But in truth there is great confusion. What is done by the Word, and what is done by the sacrament, are quite distinct. What is done by the sacrament the Word could not do. What is done by the Word the sacrament could not accomplish. By the Word comes life and cleansing. By baptism we are buried with Christ unto death. By partaking of the Supper we show both the Lord’s death, and that all who partake are members one of another. And little need we wonder at any amount of confusion and doctrinal error, when we read the following startling statement in page 21:-" When we see the sacraments administered, we look upon rites that have been observed continually for the last 1800 years, and that are undoubtedly the same that Jesus directed His disciples to observe, and Himself observed along with them." The italics are ours. Indeed I Was the Lord Jesus Christ buried with Himself by baptism unto death? Did He eat the bread and drink the wine in remembrance of Himself? Was His body given for Himself? Was His blood shed for the remission of His sins? I! Does the professor understand the purport of such a sentence? Surely if any one was to characterize such language as it deserves, it would be in terms anything but complimentary to the author, The Lord did direct His disciples to baptize, as Matthew relates. He did tell. His disciples to remember Him by partaking of the Lord’s Supper. But He never was, nor could have been, baptized with Christian baptism; nor did He eat of the Lord’s Supper with them, as Luke shows, who alone of the Evangelists distinguishes between the Paschal Feast and the Lord’s Supper. Chapter 22:15-18 refers to the former; vv. 19, 20, tell us of the latter. Thus far we have briefly looked at the writer’s teaching about the sacraments in general, and that of baptism in particular. Want of adherence to that which Scripture says, as well as contradictory teaching, characterizes also what is written about the Supper of the Lord. At page 92 we are told that at the Supper " there must always be present at the observance one qualified to teach the people, and it is natural and fitting that he should preside in the feast, not however as one of a superior order, but as one of the brethren, who not only gives the symbolical elements to the others but also in turn receives them from them." What may be the meaning of this last clause we have not explained to us. But where, within the two covers of the sacred volume, do we read of the necessity of one being present at the Supper qualified to teach the people? Where do we read in the institution of the Supper, either in the Gospels or in the first Epistle to the Corinthians, of the need of a teacher at such a time? There is room for teaching if the Lord provides for it, but the Word says nothing about the necessity of it. For the purpose for which the saints are there gathered is to show the Lord’s death, and to give thanks at the remembrance of it. The characteristic service at the table is not that of teaching, but that of thanksgiving. When teaching goes on the company are receiving instruction. When thanksgiving flows out they are giving to God. What the Lord did at the institution of the Supper was to give thanks. After the Supper He spoke at length (John 14:1-31; John 15:1-27; John 16:1-33) These services are quite distinct. And who would think of presiding at the Lord’s Table if conscious that He Himself is present? The table is His, and all His people are there as guests. At page 95 we have another most erroneous statement: "In the very words of the Supper He declares that His blood is shed in order to remission of sins, and as that of the new covenant between God and man." The same mistake about the new covenant occurs on page 101. Now this is simply a question of What saith the Scriptures? With whom is the new covenant to be made, for it is not yet made? With the house of Israel and the house of Judah (Jeremiah 31:31; Hebrews 8:8). The new covenant between God and man is all a mistake. The blood of the new covenant has been shed. The new covenant will not be made whilst the Body of Christ is still on earth, though, as the blood on which it will rest has been shed, Christians do share in the blessings which Israel will enjoy under it, viz. the knowledge of God and forgiveness of sins. A new covenant then between God and man is a wholly unscriptural thought. Again we read, page 95, " As the bread and wine are not only held up for our contemplation, but held forth for our reception, we are taught that the Savior is not only presented as an object of historical belief and admiration, but offered to us for personal appropriation... The giving of the elements thus represents the free offering of Christ in the gospel, and the receiving of them represents the acceptance of that offer by faith, and indicates that saving faith implies a real vital appropriation of Christ... We are to close with Christ on the cross, bearing the chastisement of our peace, and dying for us." Again, on page 104, in a paragraph stating that the Supper was designed for disciples, we are told " This is an action which would have no meaning as done by one who does not believe in Christ, and is not willing to receive Him as offered in the gospel." Thus it would follow from this teaching that the table is open, not only for those who have received Christ, but also for those who are willing to do so, in other words, for souls still unsaved. But on page 105 we are told that "those only who are truly united to Christ by saving faith ought to come foward to partake of it." Such uncertainty in teaching is, however, little to be wondered at when human statements are the standards to which appeal is made rather than the divine Word. How can one be clear if the standards, in accordance with which he would teach, are cloudy in their statements? How can one teach Scripturally if those standards are unscriptural in their statements? Enough has been quoted to show the unsatisfactoriness of. Professor Candlish’s teaching on the sacraments. As a guide to such subjects it is untrustworthy and uncertain, as any one conversant with the teaching of Scripture may readily perceive. But his book may serve a useful purpose, if it demonstrates the grave mistake of making the teaching of the present day conform to the standards of the Church of Scotland drawn up two hundred years ago. Grateful as we all ought to be for the stand made by our forefathers for the truth, we should nevertheless remember that each movement in the Church of God for the truth’s sake has but resulted in a partial recovery of the whole teaching of Scripture known in apostolic times. To insist on conformity to the standards as drawn up two centuries back, is virtually to declare that Scripture has nothing more of moment to teach than what was then apprehended. Thus, what were designed as bulwarks against the special errors of their day become hindrances to the full opening up of the Word of God, and the doctrinal statements of uninspired though good men are in danger of blinding the eyes and prejudicing the heart against fuller teaching from the divine Word. To the written Word we should all go, and by its teaching be guided, advocating the fullest inquiry into the truth of Scripture with the most perfect subjection to the teaching of the divine Word. This will keep us from upholding on the one hand creeds or confessions of faith where they are not doctrinally correct; and will preserve us, on the other hand, from that spirit of insubjection which leads man to sit in judgment on the revelation of the divine mind, graciously vouchsafed us by our God. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 181: VOL 03 - THE COMING OF THE LORD THAT WHICH CHARACTERIZES THE CHRISTIAN LIFE ======================================================================== The Coming of the Lord That Which Characterizes the Christian Life I PURPOSE to take up a subject which I feel to be deeply important-the Coming of the Lord Jesus-and to take it up, not proving it as a doctrine, but showing that it was originally a substantial part of Christianity itself. The groundwork is Christ’s first coming, and His atoning death; but when we look beyond the foundation, then we see that the coming of the Lord Jesus is not merely a bit of knowledge, but a substantive part of the faith of the church of God, and that on which the moral state of the saints, and, indeed, of the church of God, depends. You will see, in going through the passages which I will now quote, that it connects itself and is mixed with every part of Christianity, characterizes it, and connects itself with every thought and feeling of the Christian. A person could not read the Scriptures with an unprejudiced mind without seeing it: it presents itself to you in almost every page. Some people have taken the pains to count how many times it occurs; but what I say is not merely this, but that it is so connected with every part of Christian life that if you take it out you take away what gives its character to the whole Christian life. It was identified with the system as announced to the world. I take conversion: people say what has that to do with the Lord’s coming? That is part of what they were converted to: " to wait for God’s Son from heaven." This waiting for God’s Son from heaven characterized their conversion; they were converted to serve God, surely; hut, also, " to wait for His Son from heaven." 1 Thessalonians 1:10. There are two subjects with which Scripture is occupied, when personal salvation is settled: one is the sovereign grace, which makes us, redeemed from sin, like Christ in the glory: this is the blessed portion of the church of God; and the other is the government of this world. The Jews are the center of the government of this world. (Deuteronomy 32:8.) " When the Most High divided to the nations their inheritance, when he separated the sons of Adam, He set the bounds of the people according to the number of the children of Israel. For the Lord’s portion is His people, Jacob is the lot of His inheritance." There we get, in the government of the world, Israel as the center. Israel would not have Christ, and so was set aside for the time. God’s throne was taken from Jerusalem at the Babylonish captivity, but a remnant spared and brought back, that the king might be presented to them; but Him they refused, and are now set aside till His return. There are only sixty-nine weeks of Daniel definitely* fulfilled. (*Christians know that half the last week is passed, comprising the time of the ministry of Christ. But for unbelief only sixty-nine are passed. Hence the covenant is made for a week. But God only counts from the beginning of the last half week, a time, times, and half a time.) The last week is not fulfilled; it is not come. So as to the great feasts. You have got the Passover fulfilled. " Christ our Passover is sacrificed for us;" and the feast of Pentecost has its fulfillment in the descent of the Holy Ghost; but the feast of Tabernacles is not fulfilled at all: you have no antitype yet whatever. But here the other blessed work of God comes in, that meanwhile God is calling out poor sinners to have a part with His Son, and be like His Son; for we are predestinated to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He may be the firstborn among many brethren. He has taken us poor sinners to have us in the same glory as His Son. That is another thing from prophecy, which gives us the portion of this world and the Jewish people. When He shall appear, we shall appear with Him in glory. The Christian’s position, as to the coming of the Lord, is that he is waiting for Christ to come according to His promise. People say He comes at death; I reply, Do you make death the same as Christ? If this were the case, we should have Him coming hundreds and hundreds of times, whereas we only read of His coming twice (Hebrews 9:28). Shall I tell you what will happen when Christ comes? Resurrection! This is quite a different thing from death. The coming of Christ is, for the saint, to be the end of death-exactly the opposite. I believe nobody can find a trace of the thought in Scripture that Christ comes at death. Instead of Christ’s coming being death, it is resurrection; we go to Christ at death, it is not Christ who comes to us. Blessed it is " to depart and to be with Christ; " "absent from the body, present with the Lord." But I am to show that this thought of the coming of Christ mixes itself with and characterizes every part of Christian life. In the first place, we have it in conversion, as already said. They were converted to wait for God’s Son from heaven. I will turn to other passages in support of it, but I will go through Thessalonians first. In the 2d chapter of the 1st Epistle, at the end, the apostle speaks of what his comfort and joy in service were. Re--had been driven away by persecution from the midst of the Thessalonians, and writing to them speaks of his comfort in thinking of them. But how? " For what is our hope, or joy, or crown of rejoicing? Are not even ye in the presence of our Lord Jesus Christ at His coming? " He cannot speak of his interest in them, and joy, without bringing in the coming of the Lord Jesus. Again, as regards holiness (end of chap. 3.): The Lord make you to increase and abound in love, etc., to the end He may stablish your hearts unblameable in holiness before God and the Father, at the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ with all His saints (1 Thessalonians 3:13). As to the death of a saint, they were so thoroughly looking for the Lord, that if a person died they thought he would not be there, ready to go to meet Him. They were wrong in this, and the apostle corrects their mistake. But now people say, when a saint dies, we shall go after him, we shall follow him. Here there is not a word about it. Suppose I were to go and say to a Christian now, who had lost some one dear to him: " Do not be uneasy, Christ will bring him with Him," he would think me wild, or find it utterly unintelligible; and yet that is the way the apostle does comfort them: " Them that sleep in Jesus will God bring with Him " (chap. 4:) He then shows the way He will do it: "They which are alive shall not prevent them which are asleep." " Prevent " is an old word for anticipate or go before. The first thing the Lord will do when He descends is to raise the sleeping saints. He is going to bring them with Him: if they have fallen asleep in Him, their spirits will have been with Him meanwhile; but then they will receive glory, be raised in glory, be like Him, as they had been like the first Adam, and, going to meet Him in the air, will be forever with Him; and when He appears He will bring them with Him, and they will appear with Him in glory. You get it in a general way in the 5th chapter, where he desires their whole spirit and soul and body may be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ. This hope, then, is a part of the Christian state in every aspect. Conversion, joy in service, holiness, a believer’s death, the goal of blamelessness, all are connected with the coming of the Lord. Turn now to Matthew 25:1-46 The wise virgins take oil in their vessels, but they all go to sleep and forget that the Bridegroom was coming; but what I have specially to inquire here is, What was the original calling? The statement, clear and positive, is, that they went out to meet the Bridegroom, but while He tarried they " all" slumbered and slept-they all forgot His coming, the wise as well as the foolish. They got into some comfortable place; bivouacking in the open air is not pleasant to the flesh. But at midnight the cry is heard, "Behold the Bridegroom!" The thing that roused them up from their sleep was the cry, " Behold the Bridegroom!" The original object, then, of the church was to go to meet Him who came; but even true believers forgot it; and, further, what awakes them up from their sleep is their being again called out to meet Him at His coming. Then you get in "the talents" the same thing in regard to service and responsibility. He takes His journey and tells them: " Occupy till I come." Another very striking fact as to this truth is, it is always presented as a present operative expectation. You will never find the Lord nor the apostles speaking of the Lord’s coming,. with the supposition that it would be delayed beyond the life of those to whom they spoke. It might be at cock-crowing or in the morning; but they were to be waiting for God’s Son from heaven. In the parables referred to, the virgins who went to sleep were the same virgins as those who awoke up; the servants to whom the talents were entrusted were the servants who rendered an account of them at His return. We know centuries have passed, but He will not allow any thought of delay. " In such an hour as ye think not the Son of man cometh." "Blessed is that servant whom the Lord, when He cometh, shall find watching." Again, what was the cause of the church’s ruin? It was, " My Lord delayeth His coming." It was not saying, " He will not come, but He delayeth His coming." Then the servant began to beat the men-servants and maid-servants, and to eat and drink with the drunken; and this brings on his judgment. If the bride loved the Bridegroom she cannot but wish to see Him. Her heart is where He is. When the church lost this she settled down to enjoyment where she was; she got worldly; she did not care about the Lord’s return. Turn now to Luke 12:1-59, and you will find how this waiting for Christ characterizes the Christian, and therewith the serving Him, while He is away. "Where your treasure is, there will your heart be also." They were to have their loins girded, their lights burning-such was the characteristic of a Christian. They were to be as men that waited for their Lord to open to Him immediately; their affections in order and full profession of Christ, but watching for their Lord’s return. It is not having the doctrine of the Lord’s coming. The blessing rests on those who are watching, " like men that wait for their Lord." Blessed is that servant whom the Lord, when He cometh, shall find watching. They must be girded and have their lights bright while He is away, and watch for His return; and then He makes them sit down to meat, and girds Himself, and comes forth and serves them. Now they must be girded and watch; our rest is not here. But, says the Lord, when I have things all My own way, you shall sit down to meat, and I will gird Myself and come forth and serve you; I will make you enjoy all the best that I have in heaven, and I will minister it to you: only be found watching. Christ is forever, in grace a servant according to the form He has taken. He is girded now according to John 13:1-38 They would naturally think that, if He were gone to heaven in glory there was an end of His service to them, but He tells them, " I am going away; I cannot stay here with you, yet I cannot give you up; but as I cannot remain on earth with you, I must make you fit for Me in heaven. If I wash thee not, thou hast no part with Me." It is water here, not blood. " He that is washed needeth not save to wash his feet." Lifegiving conversion, as well as salvation, is fully wrought; but if we pick up dirt in the way, even as to communion and the walk, grace and advocacy is there to wash our feet and have us practically fit for being with God where Christ is gone. Growth there is or ought to be, and, as to the unchangeable cleanness of the new man, this is certain; but if I have not been watchful, I shall pick up dirt in my path. I cannot have this in heaven, nor in communion with what is there, and the Lord says in effect, "I am not going to give you up because I am going to God and glory, and so I must have you in a state suitable to that, and washed as you are (though not all, for Judas was there), keep you fit, restoring you when you fall. But you must be watching while I am away." It is a comfort to me to know that all the virgins woke up in time, and I believe all His saints will wake up before the Lord comes. The difficulty to the heart in looking around is that so many do not receive it. But the true service of the Lord is connected with watching. That is the state to which the blessing and the heavenly feast is attached. Then you find another thing, serving while He is away; and the result of this is, " Of a truth I will make him ruler over all I have." It is far better to eat, as is said of Israel, of the finest of the wheat, and that in the Father’s house; but if we suffer with Him, we shall also reign with Him. With the serving in His absence, I get the ruling; as the heavenly feast with watching.. The Lord then goes on to what we had in Matthew, the saying: " My Lord delayeth His coming." What the Lord is pressing as to watching and serving is, " I am coming again; you must be watching for Me, as men that wait for their Lord: " that was to be their character as Christians. Supposing all the people in this town were actually watching, waiting for the Lord from heaven, not knowing the moment He would come, do you think the whole town would not be changed? A person once said to me that if everybody believed that the world could not go on at all; and the Christian cannot in a worldly way. If people were waiting for the Lord from heaven the whole tone and character of their life would be changed. I may have the doctrine of Christ’s coming, when I am really not looking for Him; but I should not like to be heaping money together when the Lord comes-I should, if possible, huddle it away out of His sight. Turn now to Philip. 3. Paul was running a race, and he forgot all things else but the goal, and how does he speak of Christ at the close of that chapter? " Brethren, be followers together of me, etc., etc.; for our conversation (our living association) is in heaven, from whence we look for the Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, " etc. He had seen Christ, and would not be content till he was like Him in glory. To be with Him then, was, no doubt, far better; but it was not the goal of his heart. People talk of going to glory when they die. There is no such thought in Scripture as being in glory, when we depart to be with Christ. Most blessed and happy to be with Him 1 This I would surely press; but it is when He comes that He will change these vile bodies and fashion them like unto His glorious body. I am waiting till I get my body changed, to be like Christ in glory; and, what is more, Christ is waiting too. The Lord’s coming affects all the truths. of Christianity. Christ is not now on His own throne at all. He is sitting now, according to the word in Hebrews 10:1-39 (and often from Psalms 110:1-7), at God’s right hand, sitting on the Father’s throne, as he says Himself in the promise to Laodicea. He has settled the question of sin for them at His first coming, and they have no more conscience of sins, they are perfected forever; and to them that look for Him shall He appear a second time without sin unto salvation. He is expecting in the heavens till His enemies be made His footstool. Why does He say " His enemies "? Because He is sitting down after He has finished all for His friends; that is, those that believe in Him. Have all your sins been put away out of God’s sight? If not, when will it be done? That you grow in hatred of them all-All right But if they are not borne and put away on the cross when will it be done? Can you get Christ to die again? Can you get anyone else to do it? If it is not done, it will never be done at all. Beloved friends, if the work is not finished, it will never be done at all: but it is done, and therefore He says, the worshippers once purged " have no more conscience of sins;" " for by one offering He hath perfected forever them that are sanctified." If you look now at Colossians 3:1-25, you will find the same thing in its full result held out as our hope. " When Christ who is our life shall appear, then shall ye also appear with Him in glory." The first promise He gave the disciples when going away was His coming again. Do not be troubled (as they naturally would be on losing the Friend for whom they had given up all); I am not going to be all alone in My Father’s house. There, there are many mansions, I am going to prepare a place for you: do not be uneasy; I cannot stay with you, so I must have you up there with Me, and the first thing is, "I will come again and receive you to Myself." It is not one by one by death, but by resurrection for the dead, and change for the living, His actual coming to receive them, raised or changed, to be with Himself where He was gone, and like Himself, that we shall be in glory with Him. Again, at His departing from His disciples left down here, what was the last they saw of Him 2 They saw Him go up before their eyes, and the angel said to them, "Why stand ye gazing up into heaven? This same Jesus shall so come in like manner." His coming is wrought into the whole texture of the Christian life. What is Scripture’s last word? " Surely I come quickly. Amen. Even so, come, Lord Jesus." In the same way you get it at the beginning, with warning and threatening, Jesus Christ, Faithful Witness, the First-begotten, etc., etc., "Behold, He cometh with clouds, and every eye shall see Him " (ver. 7). Then at the end (prophetic instructions are over, I do not enter into them), " I, Jesus, have sent Mine angel," etc.; " I am the bright and morning star." Now I get what these saints who were watching, and those only, see: there is no star to be seen when the sun is risen: they see the morning star, while it is yet early dawning, for the night is far spent, the day is at hand. Here He calls Himself " the root and offspring of David; the bright and morning star. And the Spirit and the bride say, Come." If the bride has got the sense of being the bride of Christ, she must desire to be with the Bridegroom; there is not proper love to Christ unless she wants to be with Him. Abram said of his wife, " She is my sister;" then the Egyptians, the world, took her into their house. I just add that you get here the whole circle of the church’s affections. "The Spirit and the bride say, Come (this is to the Bridegroom); and let him that heareth say, Come!" That is, the Christian, who has heard the word of his salvation, joins in. the cry. Then those who thirst for some living water are called to come. The saints of the church can say, though they have not yet the Bridegroom in glory, that they have the living water, and so call, " Let him that is athirst, come," and then address the call universally, " Whosoever will, let him take the water of life freely." This they have, though not the Bridegroom. What I find then is, that, in the word of God, the thoughts, and feelings, and conduct, and doings, and affections of Christians, are identified with the coming of Christ. Take all these things, and you will find that they are all identified with the coming of the Lord. Take the first Epistle of John, chap. 3. "Behold what manner of love," etc. Beloved, now are we the sons of God (that is settled), and it doth not yet appear what we shall be, but we know that when He shall appear, we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is." Beloved friends, we are " predestinated to be conformed to the image of His Son." This is what God has purposed for us. When are we to be like Christ in the glory? When He comes. It is not when a person dies, and the spirit goes to be with Christ, for then he is like Christ when Christ was in the grave; and I do not want to be like Christ when Christ was in the grave; but if I die, I shall be like Christ as to that, but this is not what I want, though blessed in itself. I want to be like Him in the glory. When will that be? When He comes, He will change our vile bodies and fashion them like to His glorious body; so here it doth not yet appear what we shall be, but when He shall appear, we shall be like Him. Now mark the practical consequences upon the man that has been in his faith brought up to God’s purposes. " He that hath this hope in Him, purifieth himself, even as He is pure." I know I am going to be perfectly like Christ in the glory, therefore I want to be as like Him as possible down here. You find here again what the Holy Scriptures are explicit in teaching, that holiness also is always referred to conformity to Christ in glory. I shall have that likeness to Christ in glory, and nothing else is my standard. You will find one passage already quoted, " That He may establish your hearts unblameable in holiness before God, even our Father, at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ with all His saints." The perfection of the Christian is to be like Him when He comes. What again I find, as to Christians, in the 15th chapter of 1 Corinthians is, " It is sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory." We have the blessed assurance that accompanies true assured hope of the first resurrection and its results. We shall be perfectly like Christ when we are raised from the dead. We give an account of ourselves, but it is when we are like the person to whom we are to give an account. The full efficacy of His first corning has been lost, and therefore people are not comfortable when thinking of His second coming. But for the saint " Christ is the firstfruits, then they that are Christ’s at His coming." Is Christ the firstfruits of the wicked? Surely not. Just as Christ’s resurrection was the public testimony of God’s approval of Himself and His work, the resurrection of the saints will be a testimony of God’s approval of them as in Him. As we find in Luke 20:35-36, "They which shall be accounted worthy to obtain that world and the resurrection from the dead, neither marry nor are given in marriage. Neither can they die any more, but are equal to the angels, and are the children of God, being the children of the resurrection." Could anybody show me a single passage about a general resurrection? There is no such thought in Scripture. You get the 25th chapter of Matthew quoted for it, that the goats and sheep represent the two classes; but He has come in His glory down here. He is not sitting on the great white throne: before this heaven and earth flee away. Here He is come and sits on His throne. When He does come and sits there, He gathers all the Gentiles, the nations, to judge them. It is the judgment of the quick or the living. You have three sets of people, not two; and you have nothing of resurrection. You have sheep, goats, and brethren (Matthew 25:40). So far from its being a general resurrection, there is no reference to resurrection at all; it is quite a different subject. Further, the only question is, How have they treated His brethren? The ground of judgment does not apply to ninety-nine out of a hundred of those who are to be judged, if it were a general judgment. Those that have had the testimony of the kingdom before He comes to judge the quick, will be treated according as they have received God’s messengers, but such only are in judgment. And now the point I return to is, that the coming of the Lord influences and forms the whole life of the Christian. You cannot separate anything in the whole course and ways of the Christian from the coming of the Lord Jesus; and there is but the first coming and the second coming. He has appeared once in the end of the world, and to them that look for Him shall He appear the second time unto salvation. It is true that He comes and dwells in us, but we speak, with Scripture, of actual coming. If you take holiness, or service, or conversion, or ministry, or a person who has died, they are all connected with Christ’s coming. He warns them to be found watching. I might quote other passages, but I have quoted enough to show that the Lord’s coming is connected with everything in the Christian life. When we see Him as He is, then and then only shall we be like Him, according to God’s purpose. And now I only ask, Are you waiting for God’s Son from heaven? His bearing the sins of many is the only ground of, hope for any sinner: that is, the finished work which enables us, through faith, to look for Him when sealed by the Holy Ghost. Then, I say, what am I waiting for? I am waiting for God’s Son from heaven. Can you say, I am watching for Christ? I do not know when He will come. Blessed are those servants whom their Lord, when He cometh, shall find watching. I do not ask you, Do you understand about the coming of the Lord? To wait far Him was the thing they were converted to. The thing that woke the virgins up was, " Behold, the Bridegroom 1" Are you actually waiting for God’s Son from heaven? Would you like Him to come to-night? Peter explains the delay. He says His longsuffering is salvation, not willing that any should perish. What would you think if He were to come to-night? Would it just be what your soul was looking for? I am going to sit down to table, and He is going to gird Himself and come forth and serve me. People think that it would stop the gospel to be waiting for God’s Son from heaven. Did the acceptance of God’s testimony about the deluge stop the preaching of Noah? Far from hindering, it was what gave edge to all. May the Lord give us to be ready, when He comes-found watching for Him! ======================================================================== CHAPTER 182: VOL 03 - THE CRISIS IN THE FREE CHURCH OF SCOTLAND* ======================================================================== The Crisis in the Free Church of Scotland* College, and I think I should be unfaithful to an old friend bestirring himself to do battle for the Word of God, if I did not ask him such a question as this at this solemn crisis. It is my settled conviction that this generation of Free Churchmen are suffering under the hand of God because of their unfaithfulness to what God had wrought for them, and also for refusing to accept the present testimony of God to His Son Jesus Christ, and to the presence, place, action, and object of the Holy Ghost on earth. We own the grace and blessing of God on the movement which led to the Disruption, though not as sanctioning their position-and I will never forget those times of blessing when souls drank in with earnestness the living water, and rejoiced in Christ Jesus; and when a divine enthusiasm pervaded the willing and devoted people, as it did the ministers, to have Christ exalted high above all the powers of earth, as God had given Him this place in glory at His own right hand. " God was in the midst of her." The river of God seemed to flow there; the Scriptures were to them the utterances of the living God, affording divine warrant, foundation, and authority for their action. The Spirit of God converted and established souls by means of the Gospel of Christ, preached by men of God, whose life was spent in unfolding the evangelical truths of Revelation, for the glory of Christ and the salvation and edification of their hearers. Their one aim was to exalt God’s Christ, and God owned them in their purpose and deed, though not very intelligent-and gave " showers of blessing " and divine establishing. "There were giants in those days," no doubt, in the best sense of the word,-men like Chalmers, Cunningham, and Candlish, whose ’teaching inspired men with spiritual chivalry, and gave solid energy and glowing fervor, with which to go forth from their side, strong in the certainty of having the saving truth of God in an inspired and authoritative Divine Book, " every writing " of which was " God-breathed; " and to give forth the word in the fullest faith, that, under the Spirit’s hand, it would be made I SEE what you are about in regard to the case on which you are writing, and am pleased to observe, from a perusal of your article, that you are endeavoring to uphold the integrity, inspiration, and authority of the Holy Scriptures, against this modern "wind of doctrine," in connection with "the higher criticism." Did it ever occur to you that this spread of rationalism among you, and the internecine war that threatens to blight and divide the Free Church, are the permitted if not inflicted judgment of the Lord, not only for her unfaithfulness to the truth and testimony to Christ and His grace and claims, but also for her being the most active and energetic agent in the rejection of the full "testimony of our Lord " as to Christ and the Church, and also the most virulent rejector of the personal presence and present action of the Holy Ghost, in gathering out the saints of God from all the confusions of man to own the unity of the body of Christ, as a witness to the Person and Word of Christ before He comes to take His people to Himself? (*[Expressions in this letter may be objected to as rather extravagant when applied to the movement referred to, but as the writer speaks in the opening paragraphs of it as one who had received blessing in the scenes he describes in such glowing language, he should be permitted to give utterance to the fullness of his soul as he has written it to his friend; and the reader may believe that though God did not own them as His Church, He owned them as His saints exalting His Son, and stamped their deed, however defective, with His blessing. - ED.) It is now forty years since we first met in the same class at "mighty to the pulling down of strongholds," and the upbuilding of the saints "in their most holy faith." But it was remarkable that the great men of that day were not the only men who were largely blessed. They did their imperial service in the high places of the field, battling for Scripture truth and principle against all assailants; but whoever lisped out the great truths about the person, work, glory, and headship of the Christ of God, and gave the Spirit’s testimony in the Gospel of God, was honored by the Spirit of God with more or less success in His service. The river of blessing flowed in full stream through the land. " Christ is all" was the battle-cry (for it was a time of warfare with the rulers of the darkness of this world), and onward went the conquering servants of God, in the spirit of a divine self-sacrifice, memorable in heaven, and He owned their sufferings and service with the stamp of unprecedented success. All true ministry is self-sacrifice. " They regarded not their lives " in their devotion to Christ, and their determination to preserve intact His rights and prerogatives to regulate all in His church, according to the testimony of the Holy Scriptures (as they saw it); and God owned it for the glory of Christ, and their own blessing, and that of thousands. As one who lived and moved in those blessed scenes I can say that those Disruption times were signalized not only by a witness to Christ’s Headship, but by a work of the Holy Ghost that ensured the deepest spiritual blessing, while it welded together the whole of the out- coming multitude in love and devotedness, and made them of one heart and of one soul for the honor of their exalted Head. But not even divine blessing, in the power of the Spirit, lasts in its original energy beyond the lifetime of the generation on which it comes. Whether in innocence, under law or under grace, that which the goodness of God has committed to man’s responsibility has been ruined in his hands not far from its beginning. The present state of the Free Church is a sad illustration of the uniformity of man’s unfaithfulness when any testimony or blessing has been committed to his responsibility on the part of God. A pre-Disruption minister said to me, above twenty years ago, "Don’t you think there is always something wanting about the preachers who have not heard Chalmers?" This godly evangelical man, who still lives, complained of the coldness and want of spiritual energy and love for souls that so sadly characterized the young men who were then coming forward to fill the ranks thinned by the hand of death, among the Disruption ministers. And I believe he was right. It was about this time that decline had set in, and it has gone on with steady progress until the Church is well-nigh rent in twain by internal strife, and finds itself on the verge of splitting up over the malignant and interminable case of the alleged unsoundness in his teaching of one of its professors. The cause of the ruin is seen in its bane, blight, and punishment. The Church made a fatal mistake in endeavoring to conserve and promote by natural means that which it had acquired of position, usefulness, and influence, as the fruit of God’s Spirit working in men’s consciences and hearts. They also showed great failure by trumpeting their own success over Christendom, and congratulating themselves as having achieved something notable from having their praises sounded in both hemispheres. They have stood before the world in the consciousness of a grand reputation for devotedness, and now they must endeavor by all means to keep it up and increase it more and more. In order to accomplish this object, the best talent of the Church must be sought out, and men of the highest acquirements must be placed in her professors’ chairs; and the thought being now the maintenance of a great reputation, gifts were more in request than grace, and so men of reputation for great ability, irrespective of true piety, were placed in her colleges, and the teaching of her students went on. The men now chosen were, generally, young as well as talented, that they might give the best portion of their life to their professional work, and be all the more likely to act upon young men, and succeed in forming a ministry that would develop greater power of learning in giving the Church a higher place in the world. This now appears to the more spiritual to have been a serious mistake. Meantime, the union proposal between the Free Church and another was discussed and fought over for ten years, which served as a satanic diversion and cover, while the seed of the new teaching was sprouting and getting into leaf. A time of spent power ensued, and things grew worse and worse. A spirit of blindness to consequences seized even some of the aged and godly leaders, so as to make them instrumental in continuing to furnish the colleges with young professors who had given no particular proof either of their piety or ministry, and now those very men are moving heaven and earth to get rid of them, and undo, as far as possible, the disastrous consequences of this fatal mistake. It is the solemn conviction of nearly one-half of your body that those men have poisoned the meal at the mill and the water in the well, and the whole Free Church is suffering in consequence. The whole tendency of the teaching given has been they believe rationalistic not Christian, but it has no doubt been in perfect accord with the skeptical spirit of the age. But if it has brought the church into harmony with the spirit of the age, by so doing it has taken it out of harmony with the Bible and the Spirit of God. The literature of the day is essentially infidel, and the rising race read it, and under its baneful influence will not care to listen to the preaching of a minister who is not, himself, abreast of it, and in full sympathy with it. The literature of the period has now more influence for evil than all the gospel that is now preached has for good. Literature and not the Bible, produces and rules the thought of the day; and that thought, of whatever sort, is intensely skeptical. Men trained by professors of rationalistic proclivities will aim at preaching so as to catch the ear and ensure the good opinion of the thoughtful, and in order to arrest and retain them they must largely keep the gospel in the background (even when they know it). I venture to say, from knowledge acquired from the most reliable source, without seeking it, that there is scarcely a student who leaves the colleges of the church to become a settled minister over a congregation, who will not naturally preach in an attempted literary style, and with a bias towards a modified rationalism, and will not give prominence to Christ crucified, as bearing our sins and delivering us from the world. There was, no doubt, a great outward and ecclesiastical movement at the time of the Disruption, which drew in many who had no spiritual life, but who were under the providential power of the force that was leading on those who had life for the glory of Christ; and when the energy that led them out died down, the " mixed multitude " that were among the true people of God, like the "mixed multitude" that came out of Egypt with the Israelites, led on the lusting for the things that they had left, and this class has caused much of the evil that has overtaken the Free Church in its wilderness-march these thirty- eight years, the time the Israelites were caused to wander in the desert because of want of faith to go up and possess the land of promise. Now, as the time wore on, there came over Scotland, contemporaneously with the commencement of the period of their decline, a wave of blessing from the Lord, such as had not been known since the times of the Disruption, even if then,-but with fresh features, and a peculiar direction and outcome. The action of it was evidently most felt within the borders of the Free Church, and the voice of God in it was "Remember therefore from whence thou art fallen (a heavy fall is the fall from `first love ’), and repent, and do the first works; or else I will come unto thee quickly, and will remove thy candlestick out of its place, except thou repent." It seemed as if the church were a little aroused by this revival call, and individual ministers and people received fresh blessing, and were used mightily in the blessing of others over a wide range, and they carried a public testimony forward in the majesty of the Spirit, and tens of thousands assembled to listen, and a work of grace was accomplished of a deep and lasting kind. But it was a work of the Spirit independent of churches, and its whole tendency was to go outside of them, and assert for itself an independent place as a free work of the Holy Ghost. The church at first seemed inclined to favor the work, and anxious to get the lead of it; they tried to get all the agents under its power, and even owned one of its workers though belonging to another communion. But when it refused to be ecclesiastically controlled, this great open work was at first feared and at length opposed, and those who were in the forefront of the movement carried on their work for a time in the face of the most virulent opposition; and at length it died away, and the workers went with it, some to be with their Lord, and others to the obscurity out of which God had called them. The church saw that this free work had an outward tendency; and when at length it came to their ears that, as the fruit of it, God was gathering saints outside of all the sects on the ground of the one body of Christ, and with the distinct aim to maintain the unity of the Spirit, that ignored all the existing ecclesiastical institutions of men as in Scripture times, even the most evangelical joined with the merely ecclesiastical in order to resist the Holy Ghost’s work, and stamp out the movement as earnestly and carefully as men do an epidemic. " Ye do always resist the Holy Ghost: as your fathers did, so do ye." When they saw that the movement did not stop short of gathering souls to Christ outside the churches, and exactly as they were gathered when the Pentecostal outpouring of the Spirit baptized the saints into one body in Christ, then they resisted it, for they would not allow it to subvert their system, but used every means to put it down by preaching and printing, and by stopping the circulation of the literature which the Spirit was using for the building up of the saints and their deliverance from their sins, and also from the ecclesiastical bondage of the day, into the liberty for worship, walk, and service, with which Christ makes His people free. God presented His testimony to the grace and glory of Christ in the power of the Holy Ghost, and the answer to it was very much a repetition of what happened when Stephen, " full of the Holy Ghost and of faith," presented the testimony to God’s goodness in Israel, winding up with the exceeding grace of sending Jesus to bless them, as had been witnessed by the Holy Ghost,-when he charged them with resisting the Holy Ghost, and told of heaven opened and the rejected Jesus seen by him in the glory of God- center of a new system of things, that necessitated the abolition of the old,-they stopped their ears, ran upon him, cast him out of the city, and stoned him. And what happened? God’s new thing went on, and the old vanished away, and wrath came upon them to the uttermost, as those who were guilty dispensation- ally of the sin against the Holy Ghost. It is a similar resisting of the Holy Ghost in His testimony to Christ and the Church that has so grieved the Spirit that He has left them to their own delusions, to reap the fruit of their own ways, and to know the misery of being delivered over to be filled with the thoughts of men, and be threatened with having their candlestick removed out of its place. At the beginning, " the wise," " the scribe," " the disputer of this world," had been all made foolish by God (in the form in which they presented themselves), and vanquished by the power of God, by which the people of the Disruption period were made to sacrifice themselves, and all they possessed, to the honor of Christ their Head and Lord; but now " the wise, the scribe, and the disputer of this world," not only assert a place of prominence, wisdom, and power, but they threaten to employ the old vessel of testimony, once so full of the power of God, as the very instrument of the malignant power of Satan to destroy the souls of the present generation, by sowing in them the seeds of infidelity by the agency of the very men who have been set for teaching and upholding intact the Spirit’s testimony in the Written Word. They refused the Spirit’s truth; and God may permit them to believe the devil’s lie (2 Thessalonians 2:1-17); and if there is not swift repentance when their cup is full, the judgment of God must come upon the unfaithful vessel of testimony, for He can-not permit a people He has so graciously condescended to use in upholding the name of Christ (as they knew Him) to continue before men as if still owned of Him, if it should become the chief instrument of His dishonor in the land. When the vessel of testimony to Christ has become the instrument of Christ’s dishonor and the corrupter of God’s Word, we do not need any prophet to be sent to tell us that the end must be the judgment of God upon the vessel itself, breaking it in pieces. When the Jews crucified an incarnate Christ, there was still a reserve of grace for them in connection with a glorified Christ; but after the Spirit had come, and they had sinned against the Holy Ghost in His witness to an exalted Prince and Savior, wrath came upon them to the uttermost. God is my witness that I do not desire to see the woeful day; but, judging from the very character of God, and by the testimonies of His Word, and by His uniform practice in such cases, the coming of judgment upon an incorrigible corruption that has established itself in the place of God’s testimony though long-delayed is inevitable. In the time of a great religious stir, occasioned by the preaching of a transatlantic evangelist, seven years ago, when souls were quickened through the life-giving Word and Spirit, the greatest care was taken to exclude the anxious from coming in contact with the ministry of those who had the gospel in its fullness to communicate, and who could have given them the delivering truth of redemption, so that they might have rejoiced in Christ Jesus; and, in consequence, they were left to flounder in the mud of their own misery, and at length settle down into the worldly Christian profession of the period, the evil air of which effectually represses all spiritual growth. The chief actors to hinder the gospel from having free course were the clergy, who, in this, went against the expressed wish of the evangelist, who had to submit to his clerical superiors as the price paid for their co-operation and the free run of their churches; and the Free Church was the principal in this opposition to the gospel. Thus, that which began as a free work of God’s grace, when its results were seized upon and the movement got into the hands of the clergy and was forced into their molds, became cramped, crushed, and very soon extinguished. Contemporaneous with this terrible and destructive action in ruining the evangelical work, and finally guiding it to gaol and private execution, came the reaction towards infidelity, which a light, forced, and sensational work, carried on at the level of current religious profession, uniformly produces. A " carnal" evangelism produces a scoffing worldliness, which refuses henceforth to listen to the solid gospel of the grace of God. To popularize the gospel is to take away from it every element of divine power which it possesses. Allow of human methods or ingredients, and immediately the flesh breathes freely and listens pleasantly; but bring in Christ crucified as doing away with man in the flesh altogether; and going on with the second Man, who is risen and gone into heaven, and the flesh is choked by the heaviness of the atmosphere, and makes its escape. This modern popularizing of the gospel has given even evangelical society its itching ears, and has turned away the thoughtful from listening to the Word as a divine thing. Thus the evangelical conspired with the rationalistic to ruin the whole crop and reduce the field to barrenness. "The land was as the garden of Eden before them, and behind them a desolate wilderness." A rationalized college and a popularized gospel have made the name of Christ odious, and the Holy Scriptures a suspected and distrusted book. And is not God permitting your present troubles as a chastisement for rejecting the Spirit’s work and the gospel of the glory of Christ leading on to the full knowledge of Him, and a going forth at the Spirit’s call, " Behold, the Bridegroom! Go ye out to meet Him? " A few of the saints of God, who have been treated " as the offscouring of all things unto this day," have sought and found God’s grace to stand by the full testimony of God as to the present truth, and also by the new work of God’s Spirit in recalling the saints from their confusion and disorder to Christ and the unity of the Spirit. And though you have resisted all this (no doubt most of the rank and file in ignorance-not the leaders), who have come forward most distinctly in this work of standing up for the perfection and authority of God’s Word as written, but those very people whom you have banded yourselves together to slay? This should speak with the very voice of God to your consciences and lay you down before His footstool in confession of your great sin in resisting the Holy Ghost in their testimony, and lead you to reconsider your duty towards this divine testimony and work of God for these closing days. One single pamphlet of this despised and persecuted people, entitled, "Have we a revelation from God?" despatched to the ministers of the church before the first great public trial of Professor Robertson-Smith’s case, warned, instructed, and delivered the church for that year, when the subject of the contention was comparatively unknown; and ever since, the same witnesses for Christ and the scriptures have, by a variety of writings shown themselves to be allies of those who are standing up for the truth against increasing and terrible opposition. They are the parties which the most evangelical among you have persecuted; and still they are forced, by holding on their way with God in personal fidelity, to be in the very path, so far as testimony to the Written Word is concerned, in which by force of circumstances you now meet them and find them-not your enemies-not taking advantage of your evil case to reproach you for the past, but, by the grace of God, "helpers in the war." They are one with you in resisting this fearful form of this " higher criticism " infidelity, that wrecks the Word as a revelation from God. But this is not all. They believe that though God blesses a community, in however great a state of ignorance as to the full truth of Church unity when they are true to the Spirit-given desire to uphold the name of Christ according to their light, yet, seeing that the full truth of God has now been recovered and published openly, and the place of the saints in Christ before God, and the place here in the Spirit where God would have all His children to be, God gathering out His saints to Christ in the unity of the Spirit as in the days of old, there is nothing short of this that God owns and will maintain in fullness of the blessing of the Christ, guide by the Spirit, and preserve from the destructive effects of the poisoned atmosphere of infidelty, and Laodiceanism, with which we are surrounded; so that it is labor lost for God’s people to remain in connection with human institutions now going on to divine judgment and doomed to perish, though in providence used of God, when the Spirit’s word by His holy Apostle is sounding in the hearing of every one that happens to hear, " Let us go forth therefore unto him without the camp, bearing his reproach." ======================================================================== CHAPTER 183: VOL 03 - THE EPISTLE OF PAUL TO THE CHURCHES OF GALATIA ======================================================================== The Epistle of Paul to the Churches of Galatia With Introduction and Notes, by Rev. JAMES MACGREGOR, D.D., Professor of Systematic Theology in the New College, Edinburgh. THE Epistle to the Galatians is essentially doctrinal in its teaching. The foundations of the faith were being undermined in Galatia by Judaizing teachers, who insisted upon circumcision, and the keeping of the law by converts from heathenism, as necessary for justification. Very strongly then did the Apostle warn the Galatian Christians against such teaching. " Christ is become of no effect unto you, whosoever of you are justified by the law; ye are fallen from grace " (Galatians 5:4). The matter was a serious, a vital one in his eyes, who travailed in birth again till Christ was formed in them (4: 19). Those teachers were not merely mistaken, they were leading souls really off Christian ground altogether. To Paul this was intolerable, so he writes, He that troubleth you shall bear his judgment, whosoever he be" (5: 10); and "though we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other gospel unto you than that which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed" (1: 8). So any study of this Epistle cannot be conducted aright unless the doctrines insisted upon therein are understood, and accepted by the student. And no exposition of it will be a fitting Handbook for Bible Classes if the doctrinal teaching contained in it is not clearly enunciated. Now of doctrines specially treated of in this apostolic and inspired letter are those which concern righteousness, faith, law, and the Spirit. To some of these we must refer. The doctrine of righteousness divides itself into two parts, according as we look at it in relation to God or to the ungodly. If we think of God in connection with righteousness, we know that He is righteous; and will by and by " judge the world in righteousness by that Man whom He hath ordained; whereof He hath given assurance unto all men in. that He hath raised Him from the dead" (Acts 17:31). But if this were all that we knew of God’s righteousness, who could be saved? For, if God enters into judgment with us, we know what the end of that must be (Psalms 143:2). Thank God, His righteousness is also manifested in justifying the ungodly, and this is one of Paul’s special subjects of instruction. The righteousness of God is revealed in the gospel (Romans 1:17). It is manifested now apart from law, though "witnessed by the law and the prophets, even the righteousness of God, which is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that believe" (Romans 3:21-22). To this people are to submit themselves if they would be saved (Romans 10:3); and all who do that become God’s righteousness in Christ (2 Corinthians 5:21). Viewing righteousness in relation to the sinner, we learn that God can impute to him righteousness without (or apart from χωρὶς) works (Romans 4:6). The principle on which God can do this is faith; hence it is called the righteousness which is of faith (Romans 10:6); and we are reminded of the Old Testament Scripture which declared, " The just shall live by his faith" (Habakkuk 2:4; Romans 1:17). An illustration of God justifying a man on this principle is given us in Abraham (Romans 4:1-3); the moral class who can share in it is exemplified in David, after he had sinned so frightfully in the matter of Uriah the Hittite (verses 6-8); whilst the special testimony now put before souls for them to be justified by faith, when they believe it, is set forth in verses 23-25 of that same chapter; and the effect on the man of this way of justification is this, he has peace with God, and can rejoice in hope of the glory of God (Romans 5:1-2); for the whole question of his standing before the throne of God is settled by the death and resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ, who, writes the Apostle, " was delivered for our offenses, and was raised again for our justification." Hence justification is more than forgiveness, for it witnesses to the soul of its unchallengeable standing before the throne of God. Forgiveness of sins the sinner needs to be assured of. Justification forms part of the gospel for God’s saints, as the Epistle to the Romans makes clear, in which forgiveness, only twice mentioned (4: 7; 11: 27), is assumed as known, and enjoyed by those to whom Paul wrote to unfold the manner and result of their justification by faith. Turning now to Professor Macgregor’s book on the Epistle to the Galatians, and testing its statements on this question of righteousness by the divine word, what is the result? Justification, he tells us (p. 34), is sometimes found " describing only pardon without express reference to what is further meant by acceptance, e.g. justified from all things from which,’ etc. (Acts 13:39)." But the passage cited does not bear out the assertion that justification sometimes describes only pardon. It is more than pardon, since it has to do with the standing of one before the throne of God who has sinned, and the one justified by faith has peace with God. This is more than pardon, and differs too from acceptance in this, that if we think of justification, we think of our standing before the throne of God; if we think of acceptance, we remember in whom it is we stand in the presence of God. Again, looking at Acts 13:39, if we follow the reading of BC³D ELP, the passage clearly distinguishes between forgiveness and justification, as we read, "Through this Man is preached unto you the forgiveness of sins, and by Him all that believe are justified from all things, from which ye could not be justified by the law of Moses." If, on the other hand, we agree to omit the conjunction and, in accordance with the reading of Acts 1:1-26 and the Sinaitic MS., the difference between the two is still apparent, " Through (Sat) Him is preached forgiveness. By (ἐν) Him all that believe are justified." We must demur therefore to the Professor’s statement, whilst we turn to another passage. At p. 35 we read-" At the present point we shall only dwell on the one expression about Abraham (3: 6). It was accounted (imputed, reckoned) to him for righteousness.’ We need not now inquire what was imputed, whether, for instance, it was his faith, or whether it was his work, or whether it was God’s righteousness received by faith." Again, in p. 66, in a note at Galatians 2:21, we read-Righteousness here " means either the result of the justifying process in placing a man on the footing of a servant entitled to reward, or the ground on which God proceeds in justifying; the legal reason why of the process-most probably the latter." It is clear that the distinctive teaching of Romans 3:1-31; Romans 4:1-25 : has not been apprehended. The righteousness of God is never imputed to the sinner. God imputes righteousness to the one who believes His testimony about His Son, that is, He reckons that person righteous; but He is never said to impute His righteousness. Romans 3:1-31 shows us how God can be righteous in justifying the ungodly; there, then, His righteousness is treated of. Romans 4:1-25 teaches us on what principle a person can, be justified: hence the term righteousness of God is dropped throughout that chapter, and righteousness alone is therein treated of. For the righteousness of God means that God is righteous, and acts consistently with what He is. The moment, then, that we seize the meaning of the term " righteousness of God," we understand why Scripture never speaks of God imputing His righteousness to the sinner, and the phraseology is seen to be clear and precise. Had this point been understood, we should not have read the sentence quoted from p. 35, nor would the simple meaning of Galatians 2:21, " If righteousness come by law then Christ is dead in vain," have been obscured by the note on p. 66. " If righteousness come by law," means simply, if a man is righteous by works of law, conformably with what the apostle has written in 5: 16 of the same chapter. Now this statement is a simple and withal an important one, because it cuts at the root of the teaching about the active and passive obedience of Christ, which Professor Macgregor evidently endorses on p. 37, writing of the " Pauline testimony regarding the way and manner in which the righteousness has been achieved by Christ, namely, through His vicarious obedience unto death- His passive obedience’ for the expiation of our guilt, and His active obedience’ for the purchase to us of sonship and inheritance." Now what says the Scripture-" If righteousness come by law Christ is dead in vain," not simply, as the Professor would paraphrase it, " Christ is superfluous " (p. 66, note), but Christ is dead in vain. If the active obedience of Christ purchased for His people sonship and the inheritance, then they had that procured for them before He died. Now such teaching really, though unintentionally, undermines the atonement. How did those under law get sonship and the promise of inheritance? " Christ," says the apostle, " has redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us... that we might receive the promise of the Spirit through faith " (3: 13, 14). Again, " God sent forth His Son made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons" (4: 4, 5). Again, "For the promise that he should be the heir of the world was not to Abraham, or to his seed, through the law, but through the righteousness of faith. For if they which are of the law be heirs, faith is made void, and the promise made of none effect" (Romans 4:13-14). In a word, the teaching of Scripture directly condemns the theory of the active, vicarious obedience of Christ. The Word knows nothing of vicarious keeping of the law. If righteousness come by law, by the sinner, or by anybody keeping it for him,-Christ is dead in vain. But what about the law? It was not given till more than four centuries after the promise to Abraham (Galatians 3:17). Abraham then was never under it, nor did God ever put Gentiles under it (Romans 2:14; Galatians 4:3-5), as the council at Jerusalem distinctly owned (Acts 15:14-21). Wherefore then serveth it? " It was added because of transgressions, till the seed should come to whom the promise was made " (Galatians 3:19). It " entered that the offense might abound " (Romans 5:20). It has not its application to righteous people, but to lawless, etc. (1 Timothy 1:9-10). It could not give life, so righteousness could not come by it (Galatians 3:21), and " as many as are of the works of the law are under the curse" (Galatians 3:10), and the righteousness which is of the law is clean contrary to that which is of faith (Romans 10:5-10). Further, it has dominion over a man only as long as he liveth, and those once under it as Jews, were, if Christians, dead to it by the body of Christ, to be married to another, even to Him who is raised from the dead to bring forth fruit unto God (Romans 7:4). Now, what says the Professor? " Of its use as a rule of life to the justified man (5:14) this is not the place to speak" (p. 77). But how can it be his rule of life if he has died to it, as Romans 7:6 distinctly teaches? " Now we are delivered from the law, having died to that wherein we were held, that we should serve in newness of spirit, and not in the oldness of the letter." Our rule of life is Christ (1 John 2:6; 1 John 3:16; Ephesians 5:2; Romans 13:14). Again, p. 91, "under the law, instead of under law, not only is unwarranted by the Greek, but is fitted to countenance the mistaken impression that Christ was, so to speak, merely a born Jew; that His subjection to law by birth had reference only to the law under which the Jews were placed by positive revelation, not to the law under which all men are by nature.... At or by His birth He was under the whole burden of law which has to be borne for man’s redemption and adoption, of which law the Old Testament revelation had made a full declaration." Now all this is a mere figment of man’s (we do not mean of Professor Macgregor’s) invention, clean contrary to Scripture and to the decision of the council at Jerusalem. Scripture distinctly speaks of a class who were under law, but only a class, to redeem them that were under the law. Is " them that were under law " a periphrasis for man? Christ was made a curse, says the apostle, " for us, 1:e. Jews, that the blessing of Abraham might come on the Gentiles; that we might receive (both Jews and Gentiles) the promise of the Spirit through faith " (Galatians 3:13-14). " When the fullness of the time was come, God sent forth His Son, made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them that were under the law, that we (1:e. Jews) might receive the adoption of sons. And because ye (1:e. Gentiles) are sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit of His Son into your (better our’) hearts, crying, Abba, Father " (Galatians 4:4-6). How clearly the apostle guards the doctrine that Gentiles were never put under law by God. Why the " for us " and " Gentiles " in 3: 13, 14, and the " we " of 4: 5, contrasted with the " ye " of 4: 6, if the Professor’s teaching is correct? The fact is, the purport of the law, and the position of the believer in Christ is not apprehended where such. doctrines are held; for he is looked at as in the flesh (Romans 8:9), instead of being alive in Christ risen from the dead (Romans 6:11). A third doctrine, referred to in the Epistle, is that of the Spirit whom the Galatians had received. Born of the Spirit (John 3:5), the believer bowing to God’s testimony concerning the atoning death of the Lord Jesus Christ and its results, has forgiveness of sins through His blood, and receives the Holy Ghost (Ephesians 1:13; Acts 2:38; Acts 10:43-45; Acts 10:47); and His body thereby becomes a temple of the Holy Spirit (1 Corinthians 6:19). What the believer receives is the Holy Ghost, called the gift of God (Acts 11:17). This is a gift quite distinct from any miraculous power, which last is an endowment by the Holy Ghost Himself; who divides His gifts; whether of miraculous powers or not, as He pleases (1 Corinthians 12:7-11). The gift, 80.yeci, then of the Holy Ghost means, according to Scripture, the Holy Ghost given by God to dwell in the believer. The gifts of the Spirit, χάρισμα, are from the Holy Ghost. Often in apostolic times the two went together, as at Caesarea (Acts 10:44-47), and at Ephesus (Acts 19:6), the display of miraculous power being the attestation of the reception of the Holy Ghost by the person so energized. Yet the two are not confounded. Speaking with tongues was a witness that the person had received the Holy Ghost. All who heard him would know that lie was energized. by the Holy Ghost; but more, they would understand that he had received the Holy Ghost. Now we have no reason to conclude that every believer in apostolic days was endowed with miraculous powers. 1 Corinthians 12:29-30, would lead us to believe the contrary; and there is no hint that all the Galatian Christians were endowed with such powers. Yet they had all received the Holy Ghost, and they knew it well; and as such were partakers of full Christian blessing, having the earnest of the inheritance, for the Holy Ghost is the earnest (Ephesians 1:14), and the Spirit of adoption too, for He also is that (Romans 8:15), by which they could cry, Abba, Father. Now having, received the Spirit, what did they lack of Christian blessing, the fruit of divine grace? Nothing. But how did they receive the Spirit? By works of law or by the hearing of faith? They knew. Hence the folly of their turning to be justified by the law, and to be circumcised in. order to become of the seed of Abraham. They were that already. For, writes the apostle, " If ye be Christ’s, then are ye Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise" (3: 29). Now how does the professor treat of this truth? "The gift of the Spirit," he writes (p. 68), "had, from the beginning, been recognized as divinely attesting the receiver’s Christianity, and consequently settling the disputed question about Mosaic ceremonial (Acts 10:44-48; Acts 11:15-18; Acts 15:6-17). The gift which then was so recognized appears to have been, and in some cases certainly was, properly miraculous (Acts 10:46; Acts 12:8-11). The distinctively miraculous ’gifts’ were, from the first, intended to be superseded by the abiding graces’ of Christian character (1 Corinthians 13:8-13), which, also supernatural in their origin, are really evidential (Ephesians 2:17; 1 John 3:14), though not so as to supersede the abiding evidence of miracles done in the first age." Now this statement confounds the gift of the Spirit with the gifts from the Spirit. The Apostle referred to the former in Galatians 3:2. Professor Macgregor confounds it here with the latter, and asserts what has no foundation in the Word, that the miraculous gifts were from the first intended to be superseded by the abiding graces of Christian character. The truth is, miraculous powers might cease, but the abiding graces of Christian character would continue. They would not supersede the others, for they existed from the first, even when miraculous powers were in the fullest exercise (1 Corinthians 13:13). But abiding Christian graces are not what Scripture calls the gift of the Holy Ghost, nor are they classed with the manifestations of the Spirit, but are contrasted with them (1 Corinthians 12:31; 1 Corinthians 14:1). Nor are all gifts of the Spirit miraculous in their character. The word of wisdom, and the word of knowledge, have these ceased to exist? Has faith, of which 1 Corinthians 12:9 treats, wholly ceased to be manifested? Has prophecy, as explained in 1 Corinthians 14:3, died out? With the exception of the first sentence the paragraph quoted above evidences a want of understanding of the Scripture teaching about the Holy Ghost. Again, we read, p. 91, " What we get back is sonship. Adoption we do not get back, we simply receive it." Indeed! With the last clause we can agree. But when did we lose sonship? Adoption is sonship,υἱοθεσία. When did Gentiles, as such, formerly enjoy it? How do we become sons? "Ye are all sons of God by faith in Christ Jesus " (Galatians 3:26). How did those under law get it? " God sent forth His Son, made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the sonship " (4: 5). That " we might receive" it is the language of Scripture, not that any might get it back, of which Scripture says not one word. Here, again, is confusion. Sonship is not spoken of as the privilege of a creature unfallen, but of those who are redeemed by the blood of Christ. We read not of angels that they participate in sonship, υἱοθεσία, though they all owe their existence to God the Father of all. Servants they are, but they share not in Sonship. On points, then, of important Christian doctrine, this book is unsound and defective. The Scripture teaching concerning the righteousness of God, the law, and the Spirit, does not agree with that set forth in its pages. Other points might be noticed, but these fundamental ones may suffice. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 184: VOL 03 - THE LORD'S DAY ======================================================================== The Lord’s Day RREMARKS ON A PAMPHLET BY DR. DONALD FRASER. ON the first day of the week the Lord Jesus Christ rose from the dead, and was found in the midst of the disciples, when assembled together in a room at Jerusalem, with closed doors, for fear of the Jews. On the next first day of the week He appeared again to them, when Thomas, who was absent on the first occasion, had ocular proof of the verity of the Lord’s resurrection, and confessed Him there as his Lord and his God. Six weeks after the Lord’s resurrection the Holy Ghost was poured out on the first day of the week on the one hundred and twenty disciples gathered together in the upper room in Jerusalem. Thenceforth that day of the week, hitherto unconnected with any special historical association, had a place in the minds of Christians not inferior to that which the Sabbath, or seventh day, had on the minds of the Jews. We say historical association, because the only reference to the first day of the week in the Old Testament is that given in Leviticus 23:1-44, in the ordinances of the wave sheaf and the wave loaves, the former being waved on the morrow after the paschal Sabbath, the latter waved on the feast of weeks, which must always have been on the first day of the week. On the Sabbath the Jews met in their synagogues (Mark 1:21; Acts 13:14). On the first day of the week Christians met to break bread (Acts 20:1-38; Acts 7:1-60). Christians from amongst the Jews evidently for a time observed the Sabbath (Romans 14:6), as well as the Lord’s day; but for the converts from the Gentiles, the first day of the week, subsequently called the Lord’s day (Revelation 1:10), was the only one with which, as part of God’s people, they had any historical association. As the first day of the week, we learn which day of the week it was that they observed. From the term the Lord’s day, we gather in what light it was viewed by Apostles and Christians in general. The Sabbath was given by God to Israel, to observe in remembrance of His rest on the seventh day from all His work which He had created and made. The seventh day then, not a seventh day, could alone be the Sabbath for them, because " in six days the Lord made heaven and earth, the sea, and all that in them is, and rested the seventh day; wherefore the Lord blessed the Sabbath day, and hallowed it" (Exodus 20:11). He blessed the Sabbath day, and hallowed it; and that day was the seventh, or last day of the week, from which what we call the Lord’s day is carefully distinguished in the New Testament, being called the first day of the week, μία σαββάτωνMatthew 28:1; Mark 16:2; Luke 24:1; John 20:1; John 20:19; Acts 20:7; 1 Corinthians 16:2; or πρώτῃ σαββάτου,Mark 16:9. Blessed by God ere the fall of man took place, its observance was not, that we read of, enjoined on any of mankind till God called Israel out of Egypt, and gave them His Sabbaths, to be a sign between Him and them throughout their generations (Exodus 31:13; Ezekiel 20:12), that they might know that He was the Lord who sanctified them. The measurement of time by weeks was known before the flood, it would seem (Genesis 8:10-12); and Israel, for aught we know, may have heard of the Sabbath (Exodus 16:23), but certainly they did not observe it till after the manna came down. In the wilderness they were commanded to keep it (Exodus 16:28; Exodus 9:8-11; Exodus 31:13; Exodus 35:3, etc.) By the prophets they were reproved for polluting it (Jeremiah 17:22; Jeremiah 17:27; Amos 8:5; Ezekiel 20:13; Ezekiel 22:8). By Nehemiah the returned remnant were exhorted to observe it (Nehemiah 10:31; Nehemiah 13:15). By and by they will again offer sacrifices upon it (Ezekiel 46:3-5), and duly hallow it. Israel, then, and Israel alone, were commanded to hallow it; and their non-observance of it, as the Lord commanded them, formed part of the criminal charge brought by Jehovah against them. For fifteen hundred years, therefore, they were called upon to sanctify the seventh day, ere those who had been Gentiles were taught as Christians to regard one day as different from the rest. Then the first day of the week came into prominence, which we call the Lord’s day. As to the necessity of observing the Sabbath the Old Testament is clear and precise. As to any command for hallowing the Lord’s day the New Testament is silent. We understand from Acts 20:7; 1 Corinthians 16:3, how Christians made use of it; and from the Gospels we gather how it came to have a place in the estimation of Christians in early days, and from the earliest time of Christianity above any other day.. The observance of the Sabbath was legally binding on Israel. We could not say the same of the Lord’s day with respect to Christians. No law, no injunction about it, that we read of, was ever promulgated, yet it was observed; and for converts from the Gentiles it was the only day of the week which had any special significance. On it the Lord had risen, the token to all that God had accepted Him, " in that he raised him from the dead;" and the witness, by His tomb being empty, that the surety was free, Death could not hold Him; so those, on whose behalf He had died and had borne their sins, were free from all charge of guilt before the throne of God. He, was raised again for our justification (Romans 4:25), and we are risen with Him, and are in Him who is risen, and is on high. Now there are consequences in connection with this subject, which flow from the truth, of which the Lord’s day reminds us, and from the very term in which, in accordance with Scripture, we speak of it. It is the day of the week on which He rose, who was raised by God for our justification, with whom too we are risen if Christians in truth (Colossians 3:1), and in whom we are (Romans 6:1-23;Ephesians 1:2.) Hence, by the very truth, of which the day reminds us, we are really outside the number of those for whom days, and months, and times, and years, were appointed for commemoration by God. Christians are risen with Christ, and are seated in Him in the heavenlies. Times and seasons have to do with earth and the earthly people, not with heaven and the saints in Christ Jesus (Php 4:21). The man who would intelligently urge on Christians rightly to observe the Lord’s day would most strenuously impress on them the incongruity, nay, worse than that, of observing what are called the Christian festivals. "Ye observe days, and months, and times, and years," wrote Paul to the Galatians. "I am afraid of you," he added, "lest I have bestowed upon you labor in vain" (Galatians 4:10-11). Perhaps some one will reply-But these were Jewish seasons of observance. Granted, but the Apostle does not tell them to keep Christian seasons instead. The observance of days, months, times, and years, indicated that they had lost in their hearts a characteristic feature of Christianity, which acknowledges a heavenly people, risen with Christ, and in Him also. But how, some will ask, should we observe the day, since Scripture lays down no law about it? The very name by which we speak of it-the Lord’s day, sufficiently indicates. Do we call it the Lord’s day? Then use it for Him, and the advancement of His work and glory. Now, that simple thought will solve a hundred questions on the subject, which no casuistry could determine. The Christian, if really seeking to do God’s will in the matter, will have no difficulty in settling what in his case would be a right use of that day. For the world we could lay down no rule about it. How make those who know not the Lord, and have no beneficial part for eternity in the results of His death and resurrection, observe the day made use of by Christians, because it speaks to them of all that? To a professing Christian one could of course appeal, and point out the inconsistency of his profession if he treats the day just as he would any other, and devote it, or any portion of it, to secular ends and temporal profit. In a country professedly Christian, we are thankful for the relief from toil which, by statutory enactment, has been provided. But were there no such enactments the Christian would surely, if he remembered what day it was, and what he is, and in whom he is, seek to make use of the opportunity, as the saints in early days did, when no relief from secular toil was permitted them by those who knew not that Lord and Master who had redeemed them, and for whom they now lived. They assembled together on that day to break bread. Should one be less diligent in this than they were? Now, if we own it to be the Lord’s day, we see at once what becomes us on it. Who then could rightly encourage the Christian, whether poor or rich, to visit museums or picture galleries on that day? Could any one, really conscious of the privilege of bearing the "worthy name by which we are called" (James 2:7), encourage such a practice in others, or allow it for himself? Granted we are not able to set the world right, nor are we called to do that; but are we not responsible, if we profess to be Christians, to act as such, and to remind each other that, professedly bearing the name of Christ, such practices are not to be encouraged, but discountenanced to the utmost of our power. We speak of course only with reference to those who profess to be Christians. These remarks have been suggested by the perusal of a pamphlet on the Lord’s Day, by Donald Fraser,- D.D. In it the writer insists most strongly on the difference between the Sabbath and the Lord’s day. So far he is right. But he evidently does not apprehend the consequences really involved in the observance of the latter; nor does he see the incongruity, to use no stronger term, of writing of it as the Lord’s day, and yet advocating the opening of museums and galleries for the less spiritual part of the Christian community. A few extracts will illustrate what we have said: " However Christians vary in their view of Church festivals generally, and of the degree of strictness with which this day should be observed, they all concur in assigning it to the first rank of Christian institutions. Now it is quite true that the present dispensation does not make so much of institutions as the previous dispensation did; but it does not despise them or overlook their importance. Wisely so, for men need the molding influence of venerable institutions, as well as the ever fresh inculcation of Divine truth, to hold them faithful to their religion" (p. 6), How, we might ask, has the molding influence of venerable institutions held men faithful to their religion? It was just that which Paul had to combat throughout his apostolic career. Again, " In like wise, only those Christians who are truly risen with Christ can keep the Lord’s day aright; but all Christians must be supposed to know that the Lord is risen from the dead, and all ought to be quickened together with Him, and so to keep the First Day Festival. Moral and spiritual defect, want of knowledge, of faith, or feeling, cannot be accepted as a plea of excuse, cannot relieve any one of obligation to keep the ordinances of our religion. And non-observance of the Lord’s day for its proper ends, which are sacred and spiritual, is not merely a loss to him who neglects the ordinance, but a sin against the Lord, and an unruliness in the Church " (p. 18). Again, " If a line can be firmly drawn against the opening of places of amusement, we see no valid objection to allow access to picture galleries and museums, at all events in crowded cities, on the day named after the Lord of all. But to open places of amusement would be quite derogatory to His sacred day, and therefore is rightly forbidden by civil law and national usage" (p. 22). To one who has learned how Scripture speaks of Christians, such language as we have quoted will make plain that the writer does not draw his ideas from the pages of sacred writ. We need not wonder, therefore, if in other parts of the pamphlet confusion as to things which in the Word are kept distinct is plainly to be seen. Nor will it excite surprise if the author be shown to quote Scripture unintelligently, as he surely does when he applies the rest of Hebrews (4: 3) to rest of conscience which believers now have; and tells us that the civil as well as spiritual power is bound to render allegiance to the throne of God and of the Lamb (pp. 12, 19). The rest of Hebrews 4:1-16 is God’s rest, into which believers are to enter by and by. Has God rest of conscience? He did rest from all His works, so will the saints in the future. Allegiance to the throne of God and of the Lamb! Perfectly right, when that throne is set up. At present it is not. John tells us, writing of the New Jerusalem, that the throne of God and of the Lamb shall be in it (Revelation 22:3). Till the church is on high, and the Lord reigns, that for which Dr. Donald Fraser now claims the allegiance of Church and State will not be set up. With one remark we fully agree: "If Christians generally were more correctly guided as to the character and value of the day, perhaps they would do better in its observance " (p. 27). Perhaps they would. But amongst guides for this purpose, we say it with regret, we could not class the pamphlet by Dr. Donald Fraser. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 185: VOL 03 - THE MOSAIC AUTHORSHIP OF DEUTERONOMY ======================================================================== The Mosaic Authorship of Deuteronomy IN the recent attack on the genuineness of the Book of Deuteronomy as part of the law given by God to Israel through Moses, Professor R. Smith attempts to support his case by " the Bible evidence, of a kind," he tells us, "which does not strike the ordinary reader of Scripture." We will state his position in his own words. " To realize its full force one must gather together all the laws upon a single topic, which are scattered through various parts of the Pentateuch, and compare them one with another, and with what is recorded of the practice of God’s servants, of men like Samuel, David, and Elijah, in later times than the days of Moses. We find two or three laws on the same subject, one in Exodus, one in Deuteronomy, another perhaps in Leviticus or Numbers; but the provisions of the several laws do not appear to agree. Then we turn to the history, and we find, let us say, that Samuel and David conformed their practice to what seems to be the natural sense of the law in Exodus, but habitually broke the law of Deuteronomy. We cannot suppose that these inspired men habitually violated a law of God that was in their hands, and therefore it seems probable that they only knew the law as it stands in Exodus. But we follow the history still further. We find that in the time of Isaiah and Micah corruptions had crept in which the law of Exodus was not strict enough to meet. We find these prophets contending against the corruption not on the grounds of the other stricter law of Deuteronomy, but by direct prophetic revelation. Then we come down to the time of Josiah, and find that he had the law of Deuteronomy in his hand, and put down the evil by appealing to it. Are we to suppose that all this time Deuteronomy had existed, had been copied and recopied, but never put into practice? If Moses gave two laws, why was one strict and the other more lax, and why was the laxer one alone known for so many centuries? Is it not more reasonable to think that the law of Deuteronomy was not revealed till the corruptions arose with which the old law was unfit to cope? There is nothing in such a supposition improbable or unworthy of the Divine, wisdom. The whole growth of the Old Testament Church was directed by the continual prophetic revelation. And it is only reasonable to believe that this inspired guidance watched over the law, as well as over the other concerns of the people."* (*Answer to the amended libel by W. Robertson Smith, 2d edition, pp. 10, 11.) When (perhaps some bewildered reader will ask, if Professor R Smith’s assumption is correct) was the law of Deuteronomy revealed, and the covenant based on it made known? He tells us that the covenant of Deuteronomy, the terms of which are given in chaps. 12.-26., was not revealed in the days of Elijah, and probably was revealed sometime between Isaiah and Jeremiah, " in order to give practical effect to the teaching of the former prophet and his helpers " (p. 13). Is all this sober truth? Let us test it. In the days of Isaiah and Micah the law of Exodus, he tells us, was inadequate to meet the corruptions which were dealt with by direct prophetic revelation. These prophets were pretty much contemporaneous, so an examination of the way. Micah deals with the people will sufficiently test the allegation in question. He reproves them for idolatry in chap. 1: 7; just that which was forbidden by the second commandment. He reproves them for covetousness in chap. 2: 2. Now, that was forbidden by the tenth commandment. And though in Exodus 20:1-26 the word fields does not occur in the text of that commandment, Moses, when reciting the commandment in Deuteronomy 5:21, which was given him for them at Sinai, distinctly introduces the word on which Micah founds one of his charges, showing that the commandment in Exodus condemned the act especially noticed in Deuteronomy. Thou shalt not covet his field, God had commanded His people. " They covet fields," was part of the prophet’s indictment against the people. In chap. 3. he reproves the leaders and teachers among them for their unrighteous ways towards Jehovah’s people, reminding us very much of the direct command in Exodus 22:1-31; Exodus 23:1-33. In chap. 5: 12 witchcrafts are denounced, which Exodus 22:18 had clearly condemned. The asherim, too, translated "groves," are also condemned, about which God, in Exodus 34:13, had expressed His mind. In chap. 6: 8 they are reminded of the conduct which God desired should characterize His people, and He condemns unrighteousness in business and the perversion of justice. We turn once more to Exodus for the inculcation of justice and mercy, whilst Leviticus 19:35-36 affords us evidence that scant measures were condemned when as yet the people were dwelling within sight of Mount Sinai. The allegation therefore falls to the ground that Micah met the corruptions of his day only by prophetic revelation and not by the law of Moses, for the law given in the wilderness of Sinai convicted the people of his time, and justified the heavy, indictment that the Lord by His servant brought against them. But Professor Smith has more to tell us. " The prophets after Samuel were not the rulers of Israel. They revealed God’s will, but had no power to enforce it in actual practice, except so far as they could persuade rulers to give it their sanction. Hence a prophetic new edition of the law was only a plan or program submitted to the nation-a Bill, as it were, not an Act of Parliament. Josiah, perhaps, was the first king who adopted this program of a code, though it may have been partially in force during the latter years of Hezekiah" (pp. 26, 27). To this, and much more that could be quoted, one might well exclaim, in the language of the heathen writer, Credat Judaeus Apella, non ego. Just to think what such statements involve! God’s word by the prophets, if it was God’s word, had no authority in itself till accepted by the nation, or the ruler on its behalf! It was like a bill presented to Parliament for the acceptance of the nation, and depended for its validity to be obeyed on the persuasive power of the prophet over the mind of the ruler!! Such statements, however, are not in accordance with facts. For God’s message by Jeremiah 7:13; 25: 3-11; 35:14-17, shows that the Lord held the people responsible to hear, and answerable, too, for their refusal to obey, the voice of His servants the prophets; and the captivity in Babylon, as 2 Chronicles 36:15-17 shows, gives the lie to such statements. One more extract to let the reader understand the Professor’s view of Deuteronomy. " I believe that the laws of Deuteronomy 12:26. were originally published either alone, or with the introductory address in chapters as a preface, and perhaps some part of 27., 28. as a conclusion. [Could he tell us what part?] ’The question is, Whether the person who took up this originally separate book into the account of Moses’ last labors and final exhortations to Israel was thereby guilty of fraud upon the readers such as to destroy the character of his book, and forbid us to accept it as part. of Scripture? The present book of Deuteronomy contains in addition to the code of chapters 12.- 26., several long speeches connected by a slender thread of narrative, the substance of which may be given as follows:-In the land of Moab, after the slaughter of Sihon and Og, Moses addressed the people and expounded to them the law (1: 1-5; 4: 44-49). He also separated three cities of refuge to the east of Jordan (4: 41-43). He further commanded the people to write the law on stones upon Mount Ebal, and perform there a solemn service of blessing and cursing (27.) Further, he wrote the law, and entrusted it to the priests, with a charge to read it publicly once in seven years. He also wrote and recited a prophetic song in connection with his last charge to Joshua. He then blessed the people, and ascending Mount Pisgah died there, lamented by the people. Now it is clear that the historical value of these details is really independent of the question, whether the code which comes in in the heart of the book has or has not been re-edited by a prophet later than Moses. The adoption of my view of that code does not in any way forbid one to believe that Moses solemnly set the law before the people previously to his death. It implies only that an editor of the Pentateuchal history, having the Deuteronomic code in his hand, and knowing it to be the form of the laws of Moses binding on the people in his own day, felt that it would be useful for his readers to have it inserted in immediate connection with the warm exhortations to follow God’s law that occupy the chapters immediately preceding its present place. It is clear that this course, instead of deceiving the people, was a simple and natural guard against misconception. Had this writer followed up the words of 11: 23, Ye shall observe to do all the statutes and judgments which I set before you this day,’ by giving the old law exactly as it came from Moses, with all the obsolete provisions which the new law had changed, he would have run a risk of betraying some of his readers into a wrong course of conduct. For, after all, as I must again and again point out, the Israelites went to this book not for antiquarian information about old laws, but for practical directions in daily life. I think that this view of the matter will commend itself to ordinary common sense as reasonable, and by no means inconsistent with veracity " (pp. 29-30). One may well doubt whether such a view would commend itself to ordinary common sense as by no means inconsistent with veracity, for it makes the prophet, by incorporating into the books of Moses laws which were not there originally, resort to a subterfuge, because he felt that such insertions would be useful to his readers! If the prophet had acted in this way he would have left God out of his thoughts, and have compiled or edited the book according to his own judgment, and apart from any divine guidance. But who was this prophet? The Professor undertakes to enlighten us, but without acquainting his readers with the source from whence he got his information. He was, he tells us, well known in his own day, and no mean man among the prophets, but "it was his duty, which he performed so singly and with such self-denial that his very name has been lost, not to lay stress on his own work and the novelties it contained, but to make the people feel that Moses though dead still spake [which, under the circumstances, was a lie]; that his law [but these new enactments, we have been told, were contrary to the true Mosaic legislation] was not an obsolete curiosity [yet this act of the prophet would show that it was], but, wielded by a prophet’s hand, could still be Israel’s guide to the knowledge and fear of Jehovah " (p. 24). Leaving to Mr. Smith the task of harmonizing his own statements, let us turn to Scripture to learn what it has to say to all this. It so happens that we have an instance of an alteration in the law of Moses made by a prophet, and by divine direction. Now how did this prophet proceed? Did he act as Mr. Smith suggests his nameless prophet did? By no means. For, instead of the alteration he introduced being foisted into the Pentateuch, it appears only in the historical books, yet it was held to be binding ever after. Further, the prophet’s name is openly stated. And we must add, however strange it may seem in the eyes of rationalistic critics, this manner of procedure answered every end for which it was designed. We allude to the alteration made by David as to the age when the Levites were to commence their service in the temple. According to Numbers 8:24, the Levites commenced work at twenty-five years of age and upwards, but they did not bear burdens till of the age of thirty. By the last words of David they were numbered from twenty years and upwards, and commenced their work for the service of the house of the Lord at that age (1 Chronicles 23:24-32), since the burdensome wilderness work they would no longer be called on to perform. Here, then, is an instance of a deliberate alteration in the law effected through the instrumentality of a prophet, the validity of which was never questioned, any more than the introduction of music into the worship of Israel, which was effected also by David (1 Chronicles 23:5). God could, and God did, make the change in the law about the Levites, and introduced into the ritual that for which Moses had made no provision. He did it by a prophet, but it was done openly, and it needed not the artifices suggested by Professor Smith to ensure its acceptance as the Lord’s mind for His people. For in the days of Hezekiah the ordinances of David were remembered and carried out (2 Chronicles 29:25-26). In the days of Jeshua and Zerubbabel these same ordinances were acted upon by the returned remnant (Ezra 3:10). Hence the supposed prophet of Jeremiah or Josiah’s date had before him the precedent of David, Gad, and Nathan, as to an alteration, and an important one, in the law of Moses, the validity of which was acknowledged by all in his day. Why then should he shroud himself in mystery, and work deceitfully with the writings of Moses for a purpose of which he had full proof could be successfully effected without any subterfuge or concealment? Again, we are told that Josiah had the law of Deuteronomy in his hand, and put down the evil by appealing to it. Surely he had that law, but not that only. The book found is called "the book of the law of Jehovah by the hand of Moses" (2 Chronicles 34:14, which may well have been the very copy written by Moses, and deposited by his command in the side of the ark (Deuteronomy 31:9; Deuteronomy 31:25-26). But whether it was that copy or not, there is evidence that Josiah must have had, and that he acted upon more than what was written, in the book of. Deuteronomy. The answer of the prophetess Huldah indicates this, when she said by the word of the Lord, " Behold, I will bring evil upon this place, and upon the inhabitants thereof, even all the words of the book which the king of Judah hath read; because they have forsaken me, and have burned incense unto other gods, that they might provoke me to anger with all the works of their hands, therefore my wrath shall be kindled against this place, and shall not be quenched " (2 Kings 22:16-17). Now part of what Huldah speaks of is not found in Deuteronomy, but is plainly stated in Levit. 26. For though Deuteronomy 28:1-68 predicts the sorrows of the people, if they should fail in the keeping of the covenant, Levit. 26: 31 it is which openly states what Deuteronomy 28:52 can only be said to hint at,-the destruction of their cities and their sanctuaries, and all because of idolatry; which sin is especially mentioned in that chapter in Leviticus (26: 1). No wonder the king put down idolatry with that chapter of Leviticus before his eyes. Nor need we wonder at the answer of the prophetess announcing God’s judgment on Jerusalem, when we peruse that part of the law of Moses. Deuteronomy 28:1-68 treats of the effects of disobedience on the people; Levit. 26. predicts divine judgment on the land if Israel should turn to idolatry; Huldah’s answer announces judgment on both. Professor Smith boldly asserts that the king acted according to the law of Deuteronomy, but gives us no proof that his statement is anything more than a mere assertion. A reference to the history and to Deuteronomy evidences, we submit, that his statement is unsupported by the word; and who, indeed, could limit the king’s acquaintance with God’s law to the last book of the Pentateuch, of whom it is written, that " Like unto him was there no king before him, that turned to the Lord with all his heart, and with all his soul, and with all his might, according to all the law of Moses " (2 Kings 23:25). So far, then, as we have tested the grounds by Scripture on which Mr. Smith would base his arguments, that the covenant, the terms of which we have in Deuteronomy 12:1-32; Deuteronomy 13:1-18; Deuteronomy 14:1-29; Deuteronomy 15:1-23; Deuteronomy 16:1-22; Deuteronomy 17:1-20; Deuteronomy 18:1-22; Deuteronomy 19:1-21; Deuteronomy 20:1-20; Deuteronomy 21:1-23; Deuteronomy 22:1-30; Deuteronomy 23:1-25; Deuteronomy 24:1-22; Deuteronomy 25:1-19; Deuteronomy 26:1-19, is not exactly that which came from Moses, we can only rise up from an examination of them under the conviction that the teaching of Scripture is very different from that of the writer in question. But he goes further, and attempts to show from Scripture itself that the Deuteronomic code " cannot have been published in its present form by Moses, because it contains precepts which can be proved, from other parts of the Bible, to have been revealed at a later date " (p. 10). Into this we will now look. " These are the words of the covenant which the Lord commanded Moses to make with the children of Israel in the land of Moab, beside the covenant which he made with them in Horeb" (Deuteronomy 29:1). These words plainly declare that there was a covenant made with them in the plains of Moab, in addition to the one made with them in Horeb. Now the book of Deuteronomy is the only portion of the word which professes to give us that covenant at all, and it professes to give us the whole of it. Part, too, of this book clearly was in existence when Joshua, with Israel, entered the land, for the twelve tribes under Joshua carried out the service appointed by Moses in Deuteronomy 11:1-32; Deuteronomy 27:1-26, at Ebal and Gerizim (Joshua 8:30-35), on which occasion there was not a word of all that Moses commanded, which Joshua read not before all the congregation of Israel, with the women and the little ones, and the strangers that were conversant among them. The covenant made in the plains of Moab, whatever it was, Joshua and Israel were aware of, and the blessings and cursings of Deuteronomy 28:1-68. are connected with the observance or non-observance of all the commandments which Moses himself commanded them, or, to quote his own words, " which I command you this day" (see 28: 1, 15; 29:12; 30: 2, 15). Now it is inconceivable that the terms of the covenant, on the observance or not of which so much depended, were not definitely settled till ages after the people had crossed the Jordan; yet, accepting Mr. Smith’s theory, we are pledged to that. Further, it is wholly unlike God’s ways at any time with men, placed on the ground of responsibility, that He should not have given them His full and definite commands, which they were responsible to keep; and who could conceive a true prophet of God, in the face of these words of Moses in Deuteronomy 28:1-68; Deuteronomy 29:1-29; Deuteronomy 30:1-20., already referred to, with those words also of the lawgiver in 4: 2, before his eyes, and the announcement of the prophet like unto Moses, for whose advent they were to wait to give them further revelations, foisting into the law of Moses commands, which he knew, whatever others did, that they were never given to Israel by the son of Amram, on the east of the river Jordan? The supposition is most improbable, and the acceptance of it would involve us in a host of difficulties. What, then, are those proofs from Scripture on which Mr. Smith seeks from his readers acceptance of his views? " The law of Exodus 20:22-26, allows the Israelite to approach God by sacrifice, and encourages him to expect His blessing in all places where-by some act of revelation-Jehovah has recorded His name. Such places were the ancient sanctuaries-Bethel, Shechem, Beersheba, Hebron-where God had accepted the worship of the patriarchs, or newer shrines like Gilgal, consecrated by some mighty deed of the Lord for His people. This law was strictly followed by Samuel, Saul, and David. They sacrificed at many shrines, but only at places known of old by some historical record of God’s name; or, if they raised a new altar, it was raised in memorial of some great mercy, whereby God associated the record of His name with a new place of worship (1 Samuel 14:35; 2 Samuel 24:25). Not so the law of Deuteronomy (see especially Deuteronomy 12:1-32) That law knows only one legal sanctuary chosen by the Lord out of all the tribes of Israel, and where all sacrifice must be offered. Every other sanctuary is heathenish (12: 1-4), and all other sacrifice is will worship, without foundation in divine law (12: 8), and not to be tolerated after the people are settled in Canaan (12: 9, seq.) This law, if it was actually uttered by Moses, would come into force as soon as the ark was settled at Shiloh (compare Deuteronomy 12:5; Deuteronomy 12:10-11, with Joshua 18:1; Jeremiah 7:12), from which time onward no other sanctuary could be other than superstitious" (pp. 11-12). Now this passage bristles with blunders. Scripture is misquoted; Scripture is misunderstood; and facts of history are really, though probably unconsciously to the writer, perverted. The Lord in Exodus 20:24,said-,"In all places where I shall record my name, ’come unto thee and bless thee.".Mr. Smith, who is a Hebrew scholar and should know better, writes as if Jehovah had spoken in the past tense, "have recorded," instead of " shall record." The effect of this mistake is to make Bethel, Shechem, Beersheba, and Hebron; as well as Gilgal, some of the places referred to, whereas by the Lord’s word they are all of them expressly excluded. For in Exodus the Lord is looking on to the future; and the first place in which He did record His name was Shiloh, as. He Himself, by His prophet Jeremiah (7: 12) tells us-" Go ye now unto my place, which was in Shiloh, where I set my name at-the first." Hence not one of those places mentioned by Professor Smith were in God’s mind when He gave that promise to Moses, and not till the event mentioned in Joshua 18:1-28 took place did God record His name for Israel in any place in the land. The statements of Scripture, the very words of Jehovah Himself, directly overturn the statement of the writer of that paragraph. Bethel, Shechem, Beersheba, and Hebron, were places connected with patriarchal worship. At Shechem and Gilgal Israel had been, and these places were connected most closely with their history; but the national association with them was prior to the erection of the tabernacle at Shiloh, where God set up His name at the first. Further, the Lord never recalled His people to worship at any place because of its connection with a patriarchal altar, for sanctuaries they did not, that we ever read of, erect. The only exceptions to this assertion that might be quoted are really no exceptions to it. We refer to Shechem and Mount Moriah. On Mount Ebal, near to Shechem, Joshua did build an altar; on Mount Moriah David did sacrifice to God; but on neither occasion was the altar erected because the site had once been used as a patriarchal sanctuary, or the place of a patriarchal altar. Shiloh, Nob, Gibeon, were resting-places of the tabernacle previous to the building of the temple; but not one of these places figures in any way in the histories of Abraham, Isaac, or of Jacob. So far, then, from Mr. Smith’s assertion being correct, the Lord seems to have carefully guarded His people from going back to such places. Jeroboam led Israel back to Bethel. The Lord did not, though in the days of the Judges* and of Samuel the children of Israel resorted to it. (*The ark was at Bethel during the war between Israel and Benjamin (Judges 20:18; Judges 20:26; Judges 20:31). There they sacrificed, but on an altar reared up for the occai (21: 4), the tabernacle and brazen altar being evidently elsewhere.) God bore with that then; but never, that we read of, commanded it. Again we are told that Samuel, Saul, and David, sacrificed at many shrines, but only at those known of old by some historical record of God’s name, or any altar they raised was raised "in memorial of some great mercy, whereby God associated the record of His name with a new place of worship" (1 Samuel 14:35; 2 Samuel 24:25). Is this correct? Samuel built an altar at Ramah (1 Samuel 7:17). Saul’s first altar was built on the battle-field, or near it, between Michmash and Aijalon, the witness rather of his folly in hindering the victory, than of a great mercy whereby God associated the record of His name with that place for worship. David built an altar on the threshing-floor of Araunah the Jebusite by express command from the angel of the Lord, in order that the plague should be stayed among the people (2 Samuel 24:13-25; 1 Chronicles 21:18-27). But that they sacrificed only at places known of old is an assertion without foundation as regards Samuel and Saul, and misleading as regards David: And we do not read of any one of them raising an altar in memory of some great mercy God had shown them. David raised his to obtain one. Not one of these three did that which Mr. Smith asserts. We need not then wonder, if facts in history are so ’misstated, that the difference between Exodus 20:22-26 and Deuteronomy 12:1-32 should be misunderstood. For the ground taken by Mr. Smith to prove that Deuteronomy 12:1-32 is a law that was not given through Moses is founded on a mistake. He confounds the permission to erect altars for burnt offerings and peace offerings with the recognition, when in the land, of only one lawful sanctuary. Exodus 20:1-26 speaks of altars, Deuteronomy 12:1-32 of a sanctuary. Keep these distinctions in mind, and the alleged contradiction between Exodus and Deuteronomy on this point at once disappears. God allowed the erection of altars anywhere in the land for burnt offerings and peace offerings to be offered thereon. He thus provided for His people to express their thankfulness, or devotional spirit, whenever they were so minded, But on these altars no sin offering, trespass offering, or meat offering, such as Levit. 2. prescribes, were the people authorized to offer. Further, to keep the people, when in the land, from idolatry, which the doomed nations had practiced and still carried on, God gave Israel the law relative to the one sanctuary, and that by Moses. Besides this, Deuteronomy speaks in chap. 27. of an altar apart from the brazen altar, and Joshua with Israel erected it (Joshua 8:30). Now is it not strange that the nameless prophet, whom Mr. Smith would introduce to our notice, should incorporate a law into Deuteronomy to supersede the law of Exodus, when there was in that very book a command, undoubtedly given by Moses, in full agreement with the law of Exodus 20:1-26 as to the erection of altars elsewhere than at the sanctuary? Why did he not eliminate from the Pentateuch chapter 27. of Deuteronomy, that one part of the book should not clash with the other? Surely, if he could insert, he could also strike out. But Deuteronomy 27:1-26 was not struck out, nor was Deuteronomy 12:1-32 inserted by a nameless prophet. For Deuteronomy chapter 12. cannot be the production of a prophet about the time of Hezekiah, Jeremiah, or Josiah. If so, that law was not extant in the day of Phinehas. How then shall we account for his language to the Israelites east of Jordan? What means, too, the answer of the two tribes and a half? Both the questioner and those questioned recognized that which Deuteronomy 12:1-32 insisted on, viz. the tabernacle, and the altar connected with it, as the one place of national worship (Joshua 22:19; Joshua 22:29). The language of the one party and the answer of the other would be inexplicable on Mr. Smith’s hypothesis, but both are quite in keeping with the acceptance of Deuteronomy 12:1-32 as part of the law given by Moses. We rest not, however, here. For 1 Kings 3:2 gives the true reason why, till Solomon’s time, the people sacrificed and burnt incense in high places, " because there was no house built unto the name of the Lord till those days." Scripture explains it all perfectly, but in explaining it refutes this theory, whoever may be the author of it, and convicts those who adopt it of ignorance on this point of the written word. Evidently, then, Deuteronomy 12:1-32 was known, and owned to be God’s law in the early days of Solomon. Could Samuel, Saul, and David have been unconscious of it? How much at fault in this matter must the verifying power of the critic be, who fixes on the time of Jeremiah or Josiah for the introduction of a law which was evidently known in the days of Solomon! We cannot, however, wonder at any mis-statement of facts when we read the astounding piece of information that " there is not a hint of anything exceptional in the worship of Israel between the fall of Shiloh and the building of the temple " (p. 12). A charity schoolboy might correct this. Nothing exceptional in their worship, when all that time the ark was away from the holy of holies, and no atonement could therefore be effected I Nothing exceptional in their worship, when Levites were with the ark in Jerusalem to minister before it continually, and all the priests were sent by David to the tabernacle at Gibeon (1 Chronicles 16:37-42)! Nothing exceptional, when by the slaughter of Abimelech and the priests at Nob, Abiathar the high priest had to take refuge with and share the fortunes of David (1 Samuel 22:23)! Another ground for the contradictory assertion, that the laws in Deuteronomy " are the laws of Moses in a new edition, embodying modifications which cannot have proceeded from him" (p. 20), is based on the law about a king in the 27th. chapter of that book. It is argued that in Samuel’s day that law was not on the statute-book (pp. 21, 22). A reference to what did take place, as recorded in 1 Samuel, will put the matter in its lawgiver? We have only to mark the difference between them, and the mountain of difficulty disappears like a dissolving view. Exodus 21:1-36 guards the interests of the bondswoman whom the master had betrothed to be his wife. Deuteronomy 15:1-23 guards the interests of the bondswoman who stood in no such position to her master. But here an objection is raised. " If a bondswoman, as a rule, went free after seven years, why does the law of Exodus specially provide that the wife, who came in with her husband, was to go out with him " (p. 18)? The answer is most simple. Exodus does not speak, as Mr. Smith puts it, of the wife going in with her husband to slavery, but of a man previously married going into bondage. Under such circumstances he was the slave; so the services of his wife could not be claimed by her master when her husband was free. The perfect justice of these laws is well worthy of notice. What the man had before he became a bondsman remained his when his term of service was over. What his master had given him, whilst a bondsman, remained his master’s when the year of release arrived. Another difficulty is raised on the plea of variance between laws in Exodus and Leviticus and those in Deuteronomy. But why might there not be variances between them, as the altered circumstances, from the wilderness life to settlement in the land, would necessitate? And why should such variances compel us of necessity to reject the Mosaic authorship of Deuteronomy in consequence? There are variances in the laws. Compare Exodus 23:4 with Deuteronomy 22:1-3, and Levit. 27: 3, 4 with Deuteronomy 12:21-22. See also Deuteronomy 14:23 compared with verse 24. Settlement in the land necessitated certain alterations; so, whilst those near to the sanctuary were to bring their tithes in kind every year, those at a distance were allowed to turn them into money, and to bring them up in that shape, instead of driving the animals before them. If such variances necessitate the rejection of the popular belief that Deuteronomy is part of the law given by Moses, are we to judge that Deut. true light. The people went to Samuel and said, "Make us a king to judge us like all the nations" (8: 5), language very similar to that of Deuteronomy 17:14, which was the prophetic announcement of what would be the expression of their hearts and lips. A simple reader would probably conclude that the people had that very law of Deuteronomy in their mind when preferring their request to the prophet. Compare 1 Samuel 8:5 with Deuteronomy 17:14, and let the Hebrew student turn to the originals, and see how close is the resemblance between the actual words uttered and the language which God foretold that they would utter. Did Samuel say they were asking for something never contemplated? No. He was displeased when they said " Make us a king to judge us," and Scripture makes us understand, from the Lord’s answer to him, something of the feelings of his heart. "They have not rejected thee, but they have rejected me" (1 Samuel 8:7). The prophet viewed their request as a personal slight to himself, who was the judge. The Lord knew that, and showed him that He knew it. As yet the true reason for their request, and their sin in asking for a king, had not been laid bare. In 1 Samuel 12:12 it all came out, "When ye saw that Nahash the king of the children of Ammon came against you, ye said unto me, Nay; but a king shall reign over us: when the Lord your God was your king" Here is the clue to the difficulty, if anybody really has one. The thought of a king was nothing new, the prophet’s mother had spoken of it (1 Samuel 2:10); but the motive for desiring one was wrong. Thus the history explains all that needs explanation, and surely demonstrates what unstable ground that incident would be whereon to rest an argument against the Mosaic authorship of the Pentateuch. Next, let us glance at the law of manumission in Exodus 21:1-36 and Deuteronomy 15:7-18. In the former, if a father sold his daughter to one who betrothed her to be his wife, her husband could not send her away in the year of release. In the latter, both bondsmen and bondswomen were to go out free. Are these laws irreconcilable with the belief that both were given by the 14: 23 is by him, and verse 24 by the unnamed and unknown prophet? The objections therefore raised on the ground of variance between Exodus 22:31 and Deuteronomy 14:21 can be explained in this way. But it is curious that in stating the difference Professor Smith cannot state it correctly. "Another plain instance of variance between Exodus and Deuteronomy is, that the former (22: 31) commands the flesh of an animal found torn in the field to be thrown to the dogs; and so in Levit. 17: 15 it is enacted that any one who eats such food,-be he an Israelite or a protected stranger,-must perform a statutory purification, and be unclean till evening. But in Deuteronomy 14:21 the Israelite is allowed to present carrion to the stranger who lives under his protection, and he in turn is permitted to eat it " (p. 18). Exodus 22:1-31 treats wholly of anything torn by beasts, which God forbade Israel to eat of. Levit. 27. prescribes the legal purification should an Israelite, or a stranger in the camp-for that chapter treats of camp life-have eaten of anything torn by beasts, or of that which died of itself. Deuteronomy 14:1-29 treats only of that which died of itself (not of anything torn by beasts), which might be given to the stranger. A principle runs throughout these laws, viz. that Israel, as a holy people, were to be careful about their eating; but when in the land, that which died of itself they might give to the stranger, or sell it to an alien. As Mr. Smith states it, the reader would suppose that what Exodus 22:1-31 forbade Deuteronomy 14:1-29 treated of. A perusal of the two passages compared with Levit. 17. will, we think, demonstrate the contrary. Exodus only treats of that which was torn of beasts, t’refah. Deuteronomy, on the other hand, has in view that which died of itself, n’belah. Levit. 17. mentions both, for they are really different. The same want of accuracy is evidenced in the statements about the asylums and the altar, on p. 19. The cities of refuge were not sanctuaries, though they were sanctified or set apart to be places of refuge for the man-slayer; but the altar mentioned in Exodus 21:14, is none other than that which was afterward known as the brazen altar. This Mr. Smith denies, referring to Numbers 18:3 as his authority. Numbers 18:1-32 forbids any one not of Aaron’s race approaching the altar to minister thereat, but does not treat of any criminal or a person in danger of death taking hold of its horns for security. That a person could fly to the altar of the Lord, and take hold of it and live, Adonijah is a witness (1 Kings 1:50-52). That a murderer was to find it no place of refuge Joab learned, and his death attests (1 Kings 2:28). A reference then to the Scriptures clears away this difficulty, and only demonstrates, in one more instance, the inaccuracy of the objector, and the sandy foundation on which he would rest so important and serious a statement. Similarly as to the law of firstlings, detailed in Exodus 22:30, Numbers 18:15-18, and in Deuteronomy 15:19-20. In the wilderness they were to be presented to God on the eighth day, and the priests fed on them after they had been duly sacrificed on the altar. In the land the people were to sanctify them, and to eat them year by year before the Lord their God, in the place which He should choose: for those far off from the altar would have been overburdened if each animal was to be brought up on the eighth day. Claimed, however, by God, He gave them in the wilderness to the priests; but in the land, where the priests must have been better provided for in other ways, the people ate of them, yet only before God. But there is nothing in the law to say the priest did not share in the feast, though it is true he is not expressly named. In the one case, then, and in the other, the Lord maintained His rights; for these animals were His, and He gave them to whom He chose. But the reason assigned by Mr. Smith for the change, viz, that the local altars were abolished when the Deuteronomic editor inserted that provision in the law of Moses, is a pure unfounded myth. Two other objections are raised in p. 21. We give them in the writer’s own words:- " The priest’s portion of a common sacrifice, what is technically called a peace offering, was, according to Leviticus 7:30-34, the breast and the right leg [shok]. In Deuteronomy 18:3 his portion is the foreshoulder [z’roang], the cheeks, and the maw. Dr. Douglas admits his inability to reconcile this discrepancy. Again, Deuteronomy (14: 23, 15: 20) bids the people eat the firstlings in a feast at the sanctuary. Numb, 18: 18 assigns the firstlings absolutely to the priests. They must be sacrificed, but no part of the flesh goes to the offerer-` their flesh shall be thine [the priest’s], like the wave-breast and the heave-shoulder, it shall be thine.’ Dr. Douglas still thinks that this may mean that only the breast and leg are to go to the priest. But the words are plain to the contrary. The practice of the second temple, as we know it from Jewish tradition, is also against him, Moreover, his explanations will hardly square with the fact that the firstlings of an unclean beast had to be bought back from the priest, or else might be sold by the latter (Leviticus 27:27; Numbers 18:15); and, finally, there is another absolute contradiction in the laws, when Numbers 18:17 forbids the redemption of any firstling fit for sacrifice; but Deuteronomy 14:24seq. allows the animal to be turned into money, and the price spent at the sanctuary on any kind of meat or drink. How can such discrepancies as these be got over without the hypothesis of two editions of the law, not both published by Moses?" (p. 21). As usual, there are inaccuracies in statement. The shok, whatever that was, in Leviticus, was assigned to the officiating priest, and the breast went to all the males of the priesthood. This distinction, if Mr. Smith has seized, he has not stated; but has told us something quite different, viz. that the breast and the right leg were the priests’ portion in Leviticus. Then his reference to Leviticus 27:27 is ’all wrong. There it, is the redemption of an unclean beast sanctified to God that is treated of. No man could sanctify his firstling of an unclean animal till he had redeemed it according to law, for till then it was not his but the Lord’s. Mr. Smith first falls into a. mistake, and then would parade as a contradiction in Scripture what has no foundation in fact. Thirdly, he refers to Deuteronomy 14:24, but omits to tell his readers that the provision contained in that and the following verses was only for those who were not located near to the sanctuary, verse 23 enjoining on those within easy reach of it to bring up the animal itself to God’s altar. On the laws of the firstlings we have already remarked. On the difference, as he states it, between the priests’ portion in Leviticus and that. in Deuteronomy 14:1-29 a few words are needful. In Leviticus the limb of the animal of the peace offering assigned to the priest is called shok, and so in Exodus and Numbers. In Deuteronomy it is called z’roang. Are these necessarily different limbs, the former being the leg and the latter the shoulder? Mr. Smith says, unhesitatingly, " Yes." The ancient versions-Chaldee, LXX,. and Vulg.-differ from him, and they are in agreement with modern scholars, as Buxtorf, Rosenmuller, Fuerst. The truth is, shok, derived from a verb shuk, to run, fittingly describes the limbs on which an animal runs. In a biped those are the legs, in a quadruped they would take in the fore legs as well as the hind legs. Hence, in the Authorized Version, wherever shok is used of a man it is always translated as the leg, where used of a. quadruped the translators have understood that it applied to the fore leg, being, equally with the hind ones, a limb on which it runs.. The same. holds good in our own tongue. We speak of the sheep’s foreleg when alive, but of a shoulder of mutton when it is dead. In accordance with this the LXX, uniformly where a quadruped is in question, translated shok by βραχίων, the shoulder, and this is the more remarkable, because in Numbers 6:19-20, we have both the above-named. Hebrew words mentioned, and translated in that version by the one word &axial’, just as in the Authorized Version. In their judgment; and we here give it only for what it is worth, shok does not of necessity mean only the shank. Giving, then, Mr. Smith every advantage possible, the most that can be said is, that if shok cannot refer to the shoulder, there is a change here in the law. But it rests with the objector to make good his objection. That he has not done, and we believe cannot do. " Again," he writes, " Hosea (9: 3, 4) cannot have known the Deuteronomic permission to kill and eat animals without offering them in sacrifice (Deuteronomy 12:15), when he says, that in exile the people must eat unclean food, because they cannot present their sacrifices at Jehovah’s house. He was still living in a time when all animal food was regularly presented at the altar, according to the law of Leviticus 17:11; Leviticus 17:4-10." Indeed. Leviticus (17.) had respect to camp life, as is stated in verse 3. The camp life for Israel had ended centuries before Hosea was born! Besides this, the prophet is setting forth the blessings of which they would be deprived; their enjoyment of the land they would forfeit (9: 3), and peace-offerings, which were connected with feasting, they would then be unable to offer (ver. 4). Mr. Smith presents a mistaken view of the passage, and forgets Ezekiel 4:12-14, which elucidates it. See also Acts 10:1-48. One more objection completes the list. " The prohibition in Deuteronomy 16:22 of the erection of what is called a macceba, that is, a sacred pillar or stone, set up like Jacob’s pillar, in connection with a sanctuary, cannot have been known to Joshua (25: 26), Samuel (1 Samuel 7:12), Solomon (1 Kings 7:21), or even to Isaiah, who (ch. 19: 19) prophesies the erection of such a sacred pillar, as a sign of the conversion of Egypt. The reason for the introduction of this new law into the Deuteronomic code is easily found in connection with the suppression of corrupt local sanctuaries, as I have explained at length in my additional answer, p. 71, seq." (p. 22). Now this statement is a very bad one. Inaccurate it is, but surely our readers will cease to wonder at that. But would it be believed, Joshua, Samuel, and Solomon erected no macceba. And this Mr. Smith ought to know. Joshua and Samuel put up each a stone, Solomon made the two brazen pillars, Jachin and Boaz. But the statement is a very bad one, because it would make out that Joshua, Samuel, and Solomon in the days when he walked well, deliberately did that which God declared He hated (Deuteronomy 16:22). For at whatever time, even according to Mr. Smith’s theory, that law was enacted, it clearly expressed their God’s abhorrence of such idolatrous erections. How, then, could He have guided David to provide for such a thing in His house at Jerusalem (1 Chronicles 28:11-19). But if Deuteronomy 16:22 must be relegated to some post- Mosaic period, what shall we say to Exodus 23:24; Exodus 34:13, and Levit. 26: 1, where the destruction of those already in the land is enjoined, and a prohibition against erecting any in Canaan is distinctly set forth (Levit. 26: 1)? Joshua, Samuel, and Solomon must, on the objector’s hypothesis, have directly. infringed this law, which is surely held by our author to be unquestionably Mosaic. The truth is, Israel were especially warned against erecting any macceba in the land, because such had been connected with idolatry. Jacob in his day did erect one, moved by the sense of the solemnity of the place where he found God. And in Egypt by and by, when idolatry shall have been put down on earth, a macceba will be reared up by those in that country. But Israel never were allowed, nor ever will be, to erect anything of the kind in the land. And these are the objections by which the Mosaic authorship of Deuteronomy is to be disproved! What we said in an earlier part of this paper our readers will see is only too true. Scripture is misquoted, and Scripture is misunderstood. Inaccuracies, too, abound, and not one objection adduced by Mr. Smith in support of his theory has any real weight in it for the purpose for which he produces it. As for scholarship, in all this there is none, but a great deal of ignorance of the word of God is displayed. What effect such a production may have on those to whom it is addressed it is not for us to determine; but surely it will be an evil day for Christians in Scotland when such rash statements are accepted as valid objections against the Mosaic authorship of this book. In conclusion, we would invite our readers to turn with us from the thoughts of men to trace out the orderly arrangement of the book. It divides itself into three great divisions, chap. 1.-11. forming the first, chap. 12.-29. the second, and chap. 30.-34. the third. In the first, the people are exhorted in view of their entrance into the land. In the second, the covenant to be observed when in it, if they would continue in their inheritance, is stated in detail, and the blessings and cursings which would result from their conduct are plainly declared. The third opens with God’s provision for them in grace, when they should have been driven out of their land for their disobedience; and closes with the law-giver’s death. But let us view each part more in detail. The first part, chap. 1.-11., commences with reminding them (chap. 1.) how they forfeited the land at Kadesh by their refusal to go up to possess it; and recounts (chap. 2. and how God wrought after that to bring them into it. Then their peculiar privileges are recounted, and their responsibility is pressed on them (chap. 4.-5.) After that they are reminded of the special feature of Judaism, that Jehovah their God is one Jehovah, to which they were to bear witness by declining all connection with idolatry (chap. 6.-7.) Next, Moses tells them that they will not enjoy the land by virtue of their power (8.), nor because of their righteousness (9.-10: 10), but because of God’s faithfulness to His word to their forefathers (10. 11:11). About to enter the land, Moses, in the second part (chap. 12.-29.) details the terms of the covenant made with them in the plains of Moab, besides that already made with them in Horeb. The observance of this was needful for their continuance in the enjoyment of their inheritance (12: 1). Hence we have laws relating to their worship, the administration of justice, and government, with regulations about military matters, and such as concerned them in their social life (12.- 26.) These are followed by the provisions for that solemn service on Ebal and Gerizim, when they would openly ratify the covenant and declare themselves bound by it (27.) After this come the blessings and cursings which would ensue consequent on their conduct (28.); this part winding up with the reminder by Moses that all Israel there present, and all not there present, were equally parties to this covenant (29.), the danger of breaking which he pressed on them most earnestly. The third part (30.-34.) foretells God’s ways in grace with them after failure and exile (30.) But if possible to keep them from disobedience, the law was delivered in writing by Moses himself, to be kept in the sanctuary as a reminder of what was incumbent on them, and a song was to be committed to writing likewise as a testimony against them (31.) Thereupon follows the song (32.) which prophetically describes what they would be, and how God would act in the latter day when they had utterly failed. Then Moses blessed the tribes, enumerating them in the order, by the Spirit of prophecy, in ’which they would be located in the land (33.).With that his work was done, and Israel were left to await the advent of that prophet whom he had foretold like unto himself, to whom they were to hearken. So, with the record of his death (34.), and the notice of the special feature which would characterize that prophet in common with him (34: 10), the Pentateuch ends. Thus the book is most orderly and methodical in its arrangement. This is seen when studied as a whole, but lost if we are to regard it as a kind of literary patchwork. And what should we think of God, who put the people under a covenant, the full terms of which were not known till about the days of Josiah? Would that be righteous? Would that be like our God? ======================================================================== CHAPTER 186: VOL 03 - THE MULTIFORMITY OF SECTARIANISM AND THE UNITY OF THE SPIRIT ======================================================================== The Multiformity of Sectarianism and the Unity of the Spirit MY DEAR BROTHER, I see what you say about the difference of our views about the gathering of the Saints of God for worship and the Lord’s Supper. I did not know that you professed to gather as saints at all in Sweden, as entirely separate from the religious world; for, when you gather for the breaking of bread, is it not as members of the " Lutheran Christian Mission," and not, simply, as "members of Christ"? My inability to acknowledge such a gathering of God’s people is, that it is, obviously, unscriptural. I do not need to prove this; for your connection with the world, in its religion, shows it. Give up Lutheranism as a system; and, by so doing, you will be (negatively, at least) in circumstances to assemble with all saints, on the scriptural basis of being members of Christ’s body: for Scripture says, " cease to do evil," " from such turn away," " depart from iniquity," etc. But, in order to take true scriptural ground, we must have the requisite spiritual state, by the spiritual working of the Holy Ghost; for, unless there be good ground, there cannot be a good crop. If the people you are associated with had in their souls a full knowledge of Christianity in power, then they would leave the " Mission " and take up Christian ground; which, you know, numbers of them are doing as they have their Lutheranism supplanted by Christian truth. Who are responsible for this division of the saints? Not those who make the division, under the necessity of obeying God rather than man: but those who cause it, by taking up a position, and holding to a system of doctrine and church order which are short of the truth. There being no warrant in Scripture either for your position or action, it is imperative on you to give up both. I know that, in a great movement in the souls of men, such as that which has taken place in Sweden, there is need of patience and forbearance: for instruction alone can give them the true doctrine of Scripture for their practical and ecclesiastical guidance. I can also well understand how you, and others who are leaders, should wish to go to work cautiously in introducing the teaching of the Word on subjects hitherto unknown, as the believers are able to bear it; but I grieve to think that you should unwittingly promote division among the saints, by taking up, and advocating as right, a principle of gathering and a place of gathering, which necessarily make those so gathered a divisive body, and thus prevent those whose minds are formed and whose conduct is guided by Holy Scripture, from assembling with you. The Holy Ghost is the sole guide in His Word. He has given there what is right, and this decides the matter for us all, so that we are not dependent upon the views and thoughts of men. There is such a thing as the truth, and this is what we read in God’s Word and are guided by, without any reasoning of our own. And, if we can act for God, on the warrant of God’s truth, and thereby take up an unassailable position, why should we vex ourselves and our fellow-Christians, and grieve the Holy Spirit of God, by acting independently of Scripture and according to the dictation of our own wills? No well-taught conscientious child of God can have either spiritual or ecclesiastical rest unless he does the whole known will of God as to individual or corporate position. As a matter of individual godliness, one would never think of its being left to our personal option whether we should obey the injunction," Let him that stole, steal no more," yet people think they may do as they please as to obeying the ecclesiastical precept, to "Walk worthy of the vocation wherewith we are called... using diligence to keep the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace: there is one body and one Spirit;" not taking note of the fact that both exhortations are found in the same chapter and under the same warrant of the Spirit, and that the first part of the chapter is occupied with ecclesiastical godliness, and the second part with personal and social godliness; and that the one is just as binding on all saints as the other: Were we all possessed of nothing but the truth of God, and subject to the will of God, we should be all together keeping the unity of the Spirit in the uniting bond of peace. You, as well as we, have had to give up many hereditary and traditionary ideas because we found no warrant for them in God’s Word; and all our hereditary church views, being totally wrong, must also be abandoned. For, as to their doctrines and ecclesiastical systems, there are no churches, in any country in Christendom, scriptural; therefore, wise men, and men of dependent, lowly, and obedient minds, will forsake them, and accept God’s way of gathering to the name of Jesus Christ alone. There has been for nearly half a century a growing dissatisfaction among Christians with the disorganized and divided state of the Christian profession, and various efforts have been made to obtain, at least, some show of the real unity of the body of Christ. Before we give the true unity which God made and we have been told to keep, let us look a little at the various substitutes for it which men have adopted in ancient and modern times. That which, if anything, represents historical Christianity -the Western Church, with Rome for its center, is gathered into its external unity around the Pope as Christ’s alleged vicegerent on earth. This even in outward form goes no farther than the unity of its own religious profession, as all churches err by doing. It is not based on the first set of unities, one body and one Spirit and one hope of our calling; but upon " One Lord, one faith, and one baptism." The Greek Church, which embraces not only the population of Greece proper but of Russia and a considerable part of Turkey, holding about a hundred millions of souls in its circle, is gathered around a Patriarch and governed by the world, and has been already judged by the Mohammedan power, and is held in bondage by the Russian Emperor, who is ostensibly its head and ruler. It is not likely that the fallen Eastern Church will ever emerge from its present identification with the world, and. act on its own responsibility, as is done by the Church of Rome. Established churches have been formed in many Protestant countries by the State assuming the power of the church which was taken from the Pope; and the principle on which they proceed is, that the nation and the church are co-extensive, and hence the clergy are the state-appointed officials for supplying the whole population with ordinances, and there is no gathering together of the saints: indeed, this would be utterly incompatible with the idea of a state church. This is a return in principle to the system of ordinances, out of which the church sprang on the descent of the Holy Ghost and the formation of the church of God. In such circumstances the keeping of the unity of the Spirit is an absolute impossibility. Episcopal churches are formed on the assumption that there are three orders of church officers-bishops, priests, and deacons; and their system is hierarchical. But there is nothing plainer than that there is no trace of this system in the Holy Scriptures; for there elders and bishops are identical; and there is no diocesan bishop such as they now have. The apostles knew no such thing as a prelate in the church-neither instituted them nor recognized them: nor do the Scriptures refer to any such functionary as a diocesan bishop. No one denies that at the end of the second century the episcopal system, not the diocesan, but one superior president of the principal local churches, was generally established. But it was not established in apostolic times by God, when the government of the Church was settled. There is no warrant for it in Scripture. But had it been otherwise, Scripture assures us that the ground, center, and principle of assembling, are other than in connection with an episcopal hierarchy. 5. The Presbyterian system adheres to the scriptural order of only two classes of ecclesiastical officers-elders and deacons: but they have neither, as the apostolic church had them. They overlook the fact that elders were never established save by the apostles or their envoys; and the presbytery never appointed them. But not heeding this fatal bar to their proceedings that they have neither warrant nor power to establish elders, they do so, and make the work of their own hands the foundation for their gathering as a church. Even if they had been in the days of the apostles when the Presbyterian care-taking of the church was in full force by divine warrant and apostolic appointment, they would have learned, as all saints may now do, that church union was not secured by external government, but by a power entirely outside of church government. It might expose their false ground of unity to ask where was the unity of the church in assemblies where no elders were established? The assemblies were owned by Paul and Barnabas to be true churches without elders; and they, and not the churches, "established elders in every church." But the church being there before the elders shows clearly that the church must have assembled on some other basis than that of having elders. This principle of gathering of theirs seems to have been very little successful in’ the past; and feeling this, they are now holding Pan-Presbyterian councils at stated intervals, to try to re-unite the scattered fragments of their body; and as many as forty-four differing churches sent up representatives to the council to demonstrate their ecclesiastical unity This shows total disorganization. 6. Congregationalists or Independents meet on the ground of the absolute independence of the local assembly. This is the complete negation of the unity of the body. They make life in Christ their professed ground of gathering,. but they appoint ministers and deacons, and there is neither liberty of ministry nor of worship. Independency -means that each church judges for itself independently of another. In every respect this system is wholly unscriptural. The church is not a voluntary system. It is not formed (or rather unformed) of a number of independent bodies or assemblies, each acting for itself. There is not a trace of such independency and disorder in the Word of God. The Baptists make adult baptism by immersion their principle of separation from other Christians, and of assembling themselves together. This principle is, on the face of it, unscriptural, for (though none should eat the Lord’s supper who are not baptized) Christ is the center of Christian gathering and not an ordinance, and the only ground of gathering is the unity of the body of Christ; not the merely mechanical thing of assembling around an ordinance, although the participation in the Lord’s supper is that by which the oneness of the Church is expressed. "For we, the many, are one bread, one body " (1 Corinthians 10:17), for we are all partakers of that one bread. The Methodists make no pretensions to being on a church ground at all, only " a society of penitent sinners fleeing from the wrath to come," and their creed is very much the Arminian doctrines of John Wesley, which are generally a reflection of the doctrines of Lutheranism. They are characterized by intense earnestness and zeal for the conversion of souls; but, as a rule, their converts know neither redemption nor peace with God; and to them the knowledge of the Church of God is simply an impossibility; and, as already remarked, they do not profess to be on church ground. They are like the Lutherans of the mission- houses in Sweden, who do not give up a nominal connection with the established church, yet, for their own convenience, have the Lord’s supper by themselves. The Methodists of to-day are just what the mission-house believers will become, unless they embrace and act upon the truth that "there is one body and one Spirit." Besides the above - mentioned, there is a multitude of sects assembling on bits of truth or falsehood, or ranged under different leaders’ names, such as Irvingites, Campbellites, Swedenborgians, Mennonites, Mormonites, etc. All this is simply the will of man and not the Word of God. Temporary ’unions are also formed by Christians for special purposes, on the principle of sinking their differences, and enjoying each other’s society for some days. They have their Bible and missionary societies, their Christian conferences, and the Evangelical Alliance. This last was formed nearly forty years ago. It is a great international society of the heavier portion of the evangelical world, who yet have a notion that some manifestation should be given that all Christians are one in Christ. The more spiritual and evangelistic part of the Evangelicals have their Christian Conferences, where they meet together for a few days on the ground of sinking their differences, and have preaching, prayer, and sometimes the Lord’s supper. But, even in both, the clergy never relax their grasp; and indeed, the owning of a clergy and ordinances is the real ground of their assembling; for those who own neither are excluded. The clergy always assert their place of usurpation as dispensers of the supper at such gatherings; and in all the church-making of the age they have the place of pre-eminence and supreme control. They are the cause of the ruin; and they perpetuate it (Acts 20:30). 13. But the divine unity is different from all these unions of men by which Christendom has been disfigured and ruined, and lies before the eyes of mankind as a wreck, to the dishonor of Christ and the disgrace of all the saints who sanction it All man’s churches are distinctly opposed to God’s church, and in defiance of the plain word of God-" there is one body." This does not mean many bodies. Man’s error lies in making churches instead of owning the church God has made. He has a unity of the Spirit He enjoins us to keep. He has united Christians in one body in Christ by His sovereign grace, and in virtue of the power of the Holy Ghost, without consulting with them and without availing Himself of their co-operation. He has baptized all saints into one body, and exhorted them, not to make unions, but, to act so as to maintain "THE UNITY or THE SPIRIT in the bond of peace." And that there may be no mistake he points it out in the words which follow-" There is ONE BODY and ONE SPIRIT, even as ye are called in ONE HOPE of your calling." And when saints assemble on this divine ground, they have only to worship God the Father and show their oneness in Christ by breaking bread together in remembrance of Him at His table; "for we, the many, are one bread, one body; for we are all partakers of that one bread" (1 Corinthians 10:17). This is the Spirit’s way of giving an outward expression of our unity; and He will admit of none other. The scriptural principles of gathering for worship and the breaking of bread require only faith, a mind subject to the Spirit, and a heart for Christ, to own them and act upon them in maintaining the unity of the Spirit. (1.) On account of the holiness of God, the necessary principle of gathering to Christ is separation from evil. Christ’s redemption takes the saints out of the ruin of themselves as well as of their sins, having delivered them from this present evil world. God sets them in the Spirit as those who are Christ’s in the midst of evil, but separated from it as He was. " They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world." " Cease to do evil." "Let him that nameth the name of the Lord depart from iniquity." God’s essential character demands separation from evil, for " God is light, and in Him is no darkness at all. If we say that we have fellowship with Him and walk in darkness, we lie and do not the truth " (1 John 1:5; 1 John 1:8). To think of this were to belie the character of God. If there is to be fellowship with God, and, if connected with the Holy One of God, the heavenly Christ, there must be separation from evil. This principle working in men’s consciences at Pentecost, the Holy Ghost formed a Christian unity in the midst of evil. The Reformation from Popery, if not some of the sects of Christendom, owe their existence in measure to this principle. But although they came out of gross evil they came far short of the unity of the Spirit. Not one church ever contemplated "the body of Christ." (2.) The only scriptural basis of gathering to Christ is that " there is one body and one Spirit." Although all the constituent members of this body do not assemble, the Spirit remains, and as many as see the truth, and have faith to act upon it, may scripturally meet to eat the Lord’s Supper and worship. All Christians being already members of this " one body " are all one thing, and do not require to wait until something be formed. The body is there; and if there is faith to own it, and dependence on the Spirit, they may manifest their oneness by eating together the Lord’s Supper at His table, and worshipping His God and Father. This is the privilege and duty of every saint on earth: and it is sin against Christ not to do this. The power of gathering, as well as of unity, is grace as revealed in Christ and His cross, which manifested God in His nature, and " God is love;" and in His character, for " God is light." Love, as grace in God revealed in Christ, alone gathers; Christ lifted up draws all men to Him. And He gave Himself to gather together in one the children of God scattered abroad. The Holy Ghost works in souls through the grace of God revealed in His nature in Christ, and thus brings them into oneness with Him. " By one Spirit are we all baptized into one body." The divine center of gathering is Christ Himself. God was in Christ; God in His nature was revealed in Christ; Christ in His person has revealed Him; in His Cross glorified Him; and vindicated Him in His character. Having died to clear God’s name and for our sins, we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of sins according to the riches of His grace. God has wrought from His own nature according to His counsel in Christ; and it is by the revelation of perfect love- Himself acting in grace towards us, clearing us for God’s presence, giving us a new nature too, and relationship as children of God; we cleave to Christ, our deliverer, where He is. Christ by His death has died to sin, and now liveth to God: and we are attached to Him by the Spirit in the heavenly places where He is-the world and sin left out-that we too might live together, with Him. The sphere where we are gathered, in spirit, is the Father’s presence in love and light. We have fellowship with the Father and with His Son Jesus Christ. The glorious Man, the Son of God, in the Father’s presence, is the One to whom we are gathered, and the One in whom we are blessed with every blessing in that heavenly sphere of light and love. As this point is of importance, we press it a little more precisely as Scripture teaches it. There must be an intrinsic power of union holding the body together to a center, as well as a power separating from evil to form it; and this center found, it denies all others. The center of unity must be a sole and unrivaled center. The Christian has not long to inquire here. It is Christ. The object of the Divine counsel-the manifestation of God Himself-the one only vessel of mediatorial power, entitled to unite creation as He by whom and for whom all things were made; and the Church as its redeemer, its head, its glory, and its life. And there is this double headship, He is head over all things to the Church, which is His body, the fullness of Him that filleth all in all. This will be accomplished in its day-for the present we take up the intermediate period, the unity of the Church itself, and its unity in the midst of evil. Now there can be no moral power which can unite away from evil but Christ. He alone, as perfect grace and truth, detects all the evil which separates from God, and from which God separates. He alone can, of God, be the attractive center which draws together to Himself all on whom God so acts. God will own no other-there is no other to whom the testimony could be borne, who is morally adequate to concentrate every affection which is of God and towards God. Redemption itself, too, makes this necessary and evident; there can be but one Redeemer, one in whom a ransomed heart can be given, as well as where a divinely quickened heart can give all its affections, the center and revelation of the Father’s love. He, too, is the center of power to do it. In Him all the fullness dwells. Love, and God is love, is known in Him. He is the wisdom of God and the power of God. And yet more than this, He is the separating power of attraction, because He is the manifestation of all this, and the fulfiller of it in the midst of evil; and that is what we poor miserable ones want who are in it, and it is what, if we may so speak, God wants for His separating glory in the midst of evil. Christ sacrificed Himself to set up God in separating love in the midst of evil. There was more than this, a wider scope in this work, but I speak in reference to my present subject now. Thus Christ becomes not only the center of unity to the universe in His glorious title of power, but, as the manifester of God, the one owned and set up of the Father, and attractor of man. He becomes a peculiar and special center of divine affections in man, round which they are gathered as the sole divine center of unity. For indeed, as the center, necessarily the sole center, "He that gathereth not with me scattereth." And such, as to this point, was the object even, and power of His death. "I, if I be lifted up, will draw all men unto. me." And more especially, He gave Himself not for that nation only, but that He might gather together in one the children of God which were scattered abroad. But here again we find this separation of a peculiar people. He gave Himself for us, that he might purify to Himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works. He was the very pattern of the divine life in man, separate from the evil by which it was universally surrounded. He was the friend of publicans and sinners, piping in grace to men by familiar and tender love; but He was ever the separate man. And so He is as the center and high -priest of the Church. " Such an high- priest became us, who is holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners"-and, it is added, "made higher than the heavens." Here, in passing, we may remark that the center and subject of this unity then is heavenly. By His death He broke down the middle wall of partition, and made both one, and reconciled both in one body unto God-making peace. Hence it is as lifted up, and finally as made higher than the heavens, that He becomes the center and sole object of unity. From what we have seen, it is evident that the Lord Jesus Christ on high is the object round which the Church clusters in unity. He is its head and center. This is the character of their unity, and of their separation from evil, from sinners. Yet they were not to be taken out of the world, but kept from the evil, and sanctified through the truth; Jesus having set Himself thus apart to this end. Hence, as well as for the public display of the power and glory of the Son of man, the Holy Ghost was sent down to identify the called ones with their heavenly Head, and to separate them from the world in which they were to remain; and the Holy Spirit became thus the center and power down here of the unity of the Church in Christ’s name-Christ having broken down the middle wall of partition, reconciling both in one body by the cross. The saints, thus gathered in one, became the habitation of God through the Spirit. The Holy Ghost Himself became the power and center of unity, but in the name of Jesus, of a people separated alike from Jew and Gentile, and delivered out of this present evil world into union with their glorious Head. (5.) The divine bond of unity is the Holy Ghost. "For by one Spirit are we all baptized into one body." " There is one body and one Spirit." He is in all, binding all together in Christ; and, dwelling in the assembly, gathers efficiently in love and holiness to Christ; and by His blessed Word, revealing Christ in fullest grace, engages our souls and hearts so fully with Him, that being separated to Him in love and grace, the good in Christ to which we are attached is the great presence to our souls and hearts, and not the evil from which we are separated. All saints are of the body of Christ, and, when it is practical, gathering in the unity of the Spirit, who dwells in the Church as His habitation, it will be in accordance with the Word of God; for light and darkness, Christ and Belial, cannot be linked together. For practical fellowship then, while the Spirit gathers by love He preserves from evil by holiness; yet He gives us such hold on the good that it is uppermost in our minds and hearts, and evil, as by very necessity of our communion with God, is left. The Spirit who gathers in grace yet maintains in light. In 1 John 1:1-10 we have the manifestation of the eternal life in love and the fellowship of the Father and the Son enjoyed-our joy full; but we have also the message "that God is light, and in Him is no darkness at all," and our walk is to be in accordance with this perfect revelation of God in Christ. But the manifestation of God in His nature comes before the message regarding God in His character. Love gathers us into this divine fellowship according to the nature of God: and light maintains us there according to the character of God. Such then are some of the principles of unity and gathering, according to the Scriptures. " If ye know these things happy are ye if ye do them." ======================================================================== CHAPTER 187: VOL 03 - THE OLD TESTAMENT IN THE JEWISH CHURCH ======================================================================== The Old Testament in the Jewish Church TWELVE LECTURES BY W. ROBERTSON SMITH. MERE is an order in the written revelation of God’s truth very different often from that which men in their fancied wisdom would have suggested; for the Bible, though made up of the writings of different servants of God, penned, too, at varying epochs in the world’s history, is really the product of one mind. Hence there is a plan throughout it, a moral order, which can be traced in the internal arrangement of its different books, as well as in the order in which the books appear in the sacred volume. The truth of these statements can be tested by a study of the books of Scripture, in detail, and, as far as the’ Old Testament is concerned, by comparing as well the order in the Hebrew Bible with that in the oldest known version, the Greek Septuagint. A strictly chronological arrangement, we learn from both the Old and the New Testament, was not always that to which it pleased the Spirit of God to conform. Comparing the Gospels of Matthew and Luke with that by Mark, we see this clearly brought out, The events recorded in Matthew 8:1-34; Matthew 9:1-38, are not related in the order in which they severally occurred. So of the Gospel of Luke; if the chronological arrangement was to be always followed, how could we understand the introduction of a notice of the Lord’s last journey to Jerusalem so early as in chap. 9: 51-56? Turning back to the Old Testament, with which we are now to be directly occupied, we find, from a comparison between the Hebrew and the Greek Septuagint, a difference of order in the internal arrangement of a book, as well as in the sequence in which certain books are placed in the volume. How the difference of order originated we may not be able to discover, but the existence of it is patent to every reader. It is well known that the arrangement of the prophecies of Jeremiah differs materially in the Greek version from that which we find in the Hebrew Scriptures, and the order in which the former version has preserved the twelve minor prophets differs from that in which the first six stand in the original. Hosea, Joel, Amos, Obadiah, Jonah, Micah, is the order in the Hebrew. Hosea, Amos, Micah, Joel, Obadiah, Jonah, such is their order in the Septuagint. There is a moral order in their arrangement in the former which is lost if we accept as correct the arrangement of the latter. So of the Prophet Jeremiah; the order of his prophecies from 25: 15-51. 64 is different in the Greek version from that which we meet with in the original Hebrew. Shall we accept the LXX. as our guide in this matter? We shall lose then the moral order in which the collection of his prophecies is presented to us in the Hebrew. By whom his predictions were arranged as we have received them in the language in which they were written, no one in our day, we presume, has authority to declare to us; but since each prophecy is but a portion of one great whole, the revelation in part of the Divine mind, we can readily understand how there may be an order in which predictions of old were committed to writing to be preserved for the benefit of posterity, and that the order was prescribed by Him whose mind was in part revealed by the different utterances of His servants, which form so large a part of the Old Testament Scriptures. Let us attempt to trace out the order in the book of the Prophet Jeremiah. The book divides itself into four great parts, viz., chaps. 1.-25; chaps. 26.-33.; chaps. 34.-45.; 46.-end. In the first we have the prophet’s indictment against the people set. forth in 2.-12., and summed up under three heads: general corruption empty profession coupled with idolatry (7.-10.), and, what is also grievous in God’s eyes, covenant breaking (11., 12.) God has therefore forsaken His ’house, left His heritage (12: 7). Prayer for them is now of no avail (11, 14). Yet afterward the Lord will be gracious, but in the meantime those who have provoked His anger must suffer for it. These three grand charges brought against them, the prophet is next shown, under different figures, the certainty of the Lord’s rejection of His people. The girdle marred at the Euphrates (13.) is symbolical of the bringing down of their pride. By the occasion of a dearth the prophet learns, when desiring to intercede, that the Lord will not accept it now; and even if Moses and Samuel stood before Him, He would not hear them. The sword, the famine, death, captivity, will be their portion, and nothing now remains for the faithful but separation from the ungodly (14., 15.). The two next chapters (16., 17.) bring out in full relief how far this separation is to be carried; not merely separation in heart, but also in act (16: 1-8). Trying indeed must such a path ever be, but the faithful are strengthened by the assurance of blessing to those who trust in the Lord, and of the curse that will follow such as trust in man (17: 5-8). Next God illustrates His right to act with men as He pleases by the potter’s vessel marred in the potter’s hand; and He demonstrates the certainty of His thus dealing with them unless they repent by the vessel broken by the prophet in the Valley of the Son of Hinnom (18.-19.) But what prospect was there of the nation’s. repentance if Jeremiah was put in the stocks because he prophesied such things? (20.) Hence in 21.- 24. we have the judgment declared which must come on the immediate heirs of David’s, throne, yet coupled with a bright promise of the King, the righteous Branch, who shall reign and prosper (23: 5, 6). But ere that time of blessing can arrive a judgment of the nations, as well as of Judah, must take place. The cup first drunk by Judah must be, drunk by all, and by Babylon, the scourge then used of God to carry out His purpose (25.) The second part of the book now commences. All hope of Judah’s repentance was extinguished. Jeremiah was threatened with death for declaring the word of the Lord (26.); hence the sovereignty departing from Judah is transferred to Gentile hands, and all must submit to Nebuchadnezzar, though only for a limited time. But submission to the Babylonish power on the part of Judah and that of the nations around her-Edom and Ammon, Moab, and Tire and Sidon, did not imply of necessity deportation from their homes. If they submitted to God’s will, and owned him and his throne whom Daniel describes as the head of gold, they would abide under his yoke and live (27: 12); for certain was it that no deliverance from that yoke was now near at hand, whatever the false prophets might declare (27:16-28:17). So the prophet of Anathoth writes to those already captive, and exhorts them to dwell in quietness and in subjection where they are; for the term of seventy years, dating from the fourth year of Jehoiakim, must be fulfilled ere any return from captivity could be expected (29.) But a return of the ten tribes shall take place, as well as that of the captives from Judah, and final blessing be enjoyed. With this prospect the Lord would comfort His sinful and captive people (30.-33.) Beyond that, which is still future, the prophet does not go. He expects the return from captivity of both Israel and Judah, and the throne at Jerusalem to be tenanted by David’s heir, the Branch of righteousness. That, as we have said, is future; hence, in the third part of the book (34.-45.), we have the contrast brought out between those who were obedient to that which they professed and those who were not, and God’s then ways of government with the one and with the other. So we see contrasted the unfaithfulness of the king and people to the covenant they solemnly entered into with God (34.) with the obedience of the Rechabites to the commands of their ancestor Jonadab (35.). Next, the impiety of Jehoiakim is recounted (36.) and the vacillation and fear of man which characterized Zedekiah (37., 38.), and which ended, as the prophet foretold, in the capture of the city and the overthrow of the Jewish polity by the Babylonian power (39.) Would those left in the land after the taking of Jerusalem learn the wisdom of subjection to God’s will, and of obedience to God’s word? The history of that company, related in 41.-44., is the answer to that question. Nothing would lead them to be wise and obedient, though they could see in the Babylonian general’s treatment of Jeremiah (40.) how the Lord can watch over those who are faithful to Him; and we see in the prophecy concerning Baruch another instance of God’s governmental ways with those who are true in heart to Him (45.) His life was given him for a prey, whereas those who would go into Egypt were to die there. We now come to the last part of the book, by which Jeremiah’s service was carried out as prophet to the nations (46.-51.); for if God deals with His disobedient people, He will deal with the nations also. Judah had first to drink the cup (25.), then Egypt and the rest, who were to submit to the Babylonish conqueror. So now Egypt, Philistia, Moab, Ammon, Edom, Syria, Kedar, and the kingdoms of Hazor, with Elam and Babylon, get each their word. But, differing from the prophetic messages of Isaiah and Ezekiel to those nations around the land of Israel, Jeremiah’s predictions against the Gentiles do not look on to their condition in the last days. As in the previous sections of the book, so in this; it is God’s dealings with the nations in the prophet’s own day that he was called on to predict.* With this his prophetic ministry ends. The book closes with chapter 53., a kind of historical appendix, almost identical in vers. 1-27 with the details in 2 Kings 24:18-20; 2 Kings 25:1-21; but adding in vers. 28-30 what is not found in that history, the whole chapter describing the Levitical code Ezra teaches were ordinances of the prophets. (* The reader may observe, that though the return from captivity of Egypt, Moab, Ammon, Elam, in the latter days is predicted, God’s final dealings with them is not in this book revealed to us.) Are his readers aware that only in one verse in his book does Ezra mention the prophets? and then it is with reference to one sin of the people, that of intermarrying with the nations around them. And why should there be any question raised about the promulgation of Levitical laws, seeing that God forbade the sin of which Ezra was speaking by the prophet Moses? (Exodus 34:15-16; Deuteronomy 7:3); and the injunction respecting them was reiterated by Joshua, in whose book (part of the writings of the former prophets) that reiteration is met with. Hence Ezra would be justified in writing of this law as the commandments of God’s prophets. But there is a want of accuracy in stating that Ezra speaks of, some of them as ordinances of the prophets. The reader would ’scarcely credit that the ready scribe was only speaking of one of the laws of God. But is Mr. Smith correct as to the time of its promulgation? Nehemiah, Ezra’s cotemporary (Nehemiah 13:26), distinctly declares that Solomon had sinned in that very way. He must then have understood that the law in question was of older date than what Mr. Smith would mean by the times of the prophets. And in truth it was, for the historian of 1 Kings (11: 1, 2) gives his readers to understand it was extant in the days of Solomon, and the angel at Bochim refers to it (Judges 2:2), for the children of Israel had already begun to contravene it (Judges 3:6). The bold, outspoken statement which we have quoted is the end to which, by his volume of lectures, Mr. Smith would lead both his hearers and readers, and the evident purport of the volume is to educate them up to it. Of course, by the one who broaches such a theory the Scriptures are not owned as inspired. Belief in their being inspired cannot coexist with a belief that they are not, nor were meant to be, what they profess to be. And if Mr. Smith’s statement is true, God has sanctioned in His Word imposture of the most flagrant kind. Over and over again we read, " Jehovah spake unto Moses, saying, the capture of the city and temple, with the different end of Zedekiah and of his nephew Jehoiachin. Now we think it is patent that there is a plan in this outline of the book, a moral order which would be lost if we accepted the arrangement of chapters found in the LXX. in place of the order which we have in the Hebrew. By whom this book, as we have it, and the order we have, attempted to trace out, was drawn up, it is impossible to say; but an examination of its contents, and the order in which they are given, does reveal the existence of a plan, the purpose of a mind, and whose mind no devout student of Scripture will be at a loss to determine. We have been led into this train of thought by reading the book named at the head of this article. It is a saddening work, as it shows how the minds of men, teachers, and students, are being carried along by the infidel current of the day, which, under the guise of scholarship and critical study, would undermine the belief of men that we possess in the Scriptures a revelation from God. A few words from the close of the twelfth lecture will put the question in a clear light. " In India, when the Government brings a new water-supply into a village, the Village authorities make rules for its use and distribution, but ’ these rules do not purport to emanate from the personal authority of their author or authors; there is always a sort of fiction under which some customs as to the distribution of water are supposed to have existed from all antiquity, although, in fact, no artificial supply had even been so much as thought of.’ In the same way the new laws of the Levitical code are presented as ordinances of Moses, though when they were first promulgated every one knew they were not so-though Ezra himself speaks of some of them as ordinances of the prophets" (pp. 386, 387). This is bold and outspoken, at all events, but it lacks the merit of being correct. Ezra 9:10-11, speaks of a particular transgression forbidden by God through the instrumentality of the prophets. Mr. Smith states that the new laws of Speak unto the children of Israel," &C. Was this true or not? Have we in the Levitical code what Jehovah said, and said to Moses, or not? (See for the date of some of them Leviticus 7:37-38; Leviticus 16:1; Leviticus 25:1; Leviticus 27:34.) If not, men, prophets, whoever they were, were inspired by the Holy Ghost to write what He knew, and they knew, was untrue; and the testimony of the Prophet like unto Moses we must reject as untrue. " Did not Moses give you the law? " He asked the Jews (John 7:19). Was He pandering to popular superstition, or was. He saying what He knew was true? " The history does not profess," we read (p. 320), " to be written by Moses, but only notes from time to time that he wrote down certain special things (Exodus 17:14; Exodus 24:4; Exodus 34:27; Numbers 33:2; Deuteronomy 31:9; Deuteronomy 31:22; Deuteronomy 31:24)." " He wrote of Me," said the Lord Jesus Christ (John 5:46). Where shall we find what he wrote of the Lord? It was extant in the days of the Apostles. What, and where is it now? But we are met with an objection supposed to be of overwhelming force. " It is a strong thing to suppose that so artificial a way of writing (using of one’s self the third person) is as old as Moses, and belongs to the earliest age of Hebrew authorship. One asks for proof that any Hebrew ever wrote of himself in the third person " (p. 321). Did the Professor never read Eccles. 1:1, 2; 7: 27; 12: 8, 10? Has he forgotten how John, a Hebrew, could write? (John 13:23-25; John 19:26-27; John 3:5). We have called attention to the conclusion to which the hearers and readers of these lectures are sought to be conducted. We would look for a little at some of the steps by which that is attempted to be established. The position taken up is as follows:-It was after Ezra came from Babylon. that we have the " establishment of the Pentateuch as the canonical and authoritative book of the Jews" (p. 158). "If we are shut up to choose between a Mosaic authorship of the whole five books and the skeptical opinion that the Pentateuch is a mere forgery, the skeptics must gain their case " (pp. 308, 309). " These facts... imply that the complete system of the Pentateuch was not known in the period of the kings of Judah, even as the theoretical constitution of Israel" (p. 247). "We know as a matter of historical fact that the Pentateuch as a whole was put into operation as the rule of Israel’s life at the reformation of Ezra, with a completeness which had never been aimed at from the days of the conquest of Canaan. From this time onwards the Pentateuch, in its ceremonial as well as its moral precepts, was the acknowledged standard of Israel’s righteousness (Nehemiah 13:1-31.; Malachi 1:7seq., 3: 8 seq., 4: 4; Acts 15:5) " (p. 208). From the days of Ezra "and forward the Pentateuch as we now have it... became the religious and municipal code of Israel " (p. 56). On what are such statements based? Was it only from Ezra’s day that the Pentateuch in its ceremonial and moral precepts was the acknowledged standard of Israel’s righteousness? The contrary, as regards the ceremonial part, was really the fact; for in the Temple, with which Ezra was personally acquainted, there was not the ark, nor did sacred fire ever come down on its altar, nor was there a priest with Urim and Thummim (Ezra 2:63). The ceremonial law in its completeness could not in his day be carried out. How could atonement have been made without the mercy-seat, which formed the lid of the ark? But Mr. Smith seeks to establish his position by reference to Nehemiah’s confession (9: 34), and his statement about the Feast of Tabernacles as it was observed in his day (8: 17). A simple mind would have supposed that since Nehemiah confessed that their kings, prince, priests, and fathers had not kept God’s law, they must have had it to keep. And as to the Feast of Tabernacles, we learn from his book that since Joshua’s day the people had not dwelt in booths during its continuance. It is to that. special point that he there draws the attention of his readers. Had they never kept the Feast of Tabernacles during all that time? we may ask. "Of course, never at all," (p. 56) is the ready answer of the exponent of critical results. But Scripture is precise about it. They did keep that of this procedure we have in p. 113, where he proposes, on the authority of the LXX., a shorter recension of Jeremiah 27:1-22; which, amongst other things, would eliminate from the Bible this remarkable prediction concerning the Babylonish monarchy, which is given, we believe, nowhere else: "And all nations shall serve him, and his son, and his Son’s son, until the very time of his land come; and then many nations and great kings: shall serve themselves of him " (27: 7). The shorter recension would deprive us of this prophetic announcement. The duration of the years of the captivity we read of in Jeremiah 25:11; Jeremiah 29:10. The omission, then, of 27: 7 would not, of course, deprive us of that. But here alone is it that we learn, that the first of Daniel’s four great empires Would only survive to the third generation of the family of its head. How that was really fulfilled the deciphering of cuneiform inscriptions has established, and set at rest. Belshazzar’s father was Nabonadius, who, was not a descendant of the great king Nebuchadnezzar, but marrying his daughter Nitocris, her son, who was Belshazzar, and reigned conjointly with his father, though the fifth in order of the Babylonish monarchs, was really the grandson of Nebuchadnezzar. Thus what may have seemed at one time unlikely was actually fulfilled; that empire did not survive the life of the great conqueror’s grandchild, Belshazzar. Now this prophecy, if we accepted the shorter recension offered, us, we should lose, and there would be a void in the Scriptures; for we think it can be maintained without a doubt that 2 Chronicles 36:20 refers to it. Where else does Jeremiah speak in such a way of Nebuchadnezzar and his sons that we can point to it as the prophecy to whose fulfillment the chronicler draws attention? With 2 Chronicles 36:20-21, before us, we must decline to accept what Professor Smith would press on us. " Is it natural," he asks, " that the prophet should turn aside to introduce such a prediction here, in the very midst of a solemn admonition, on which it has no direct bearing? " Perfectly natural. For three times over does he feast in the reign of Solomon (2 Chronicles 7:9-10). They kept it also, "as it is written," in the days of Zerubbabel, between seventy and eighty years before Ezra appeared at Jerusalem (Ezra 3:4), in truth, before he was born. But Mr. Smith may say it never was observed according to law, 1:e., dwelling in booths, till the occasion mentioned in Nehemiah 8:1-18 The words of Nehemiah do not even say that He dates the omission of dwelling in booths from the days of Joshua, not from the entrance of Israel into their land. Was the Pentateuch, we ask again, in its ceremonial and its moral precepts, unknown till Ezra’s day as the Standard of Israel’s, righteousness? As regards the ceremonial laws, 2 Chronicles 8:12-14; Ezra 3:1-13; Haggai 2:11, are an answer to such a statement. As regards its moral precepts, 1 Kings 2:3; 2 Chronicles 17:9, are proof to the contrary. The sacrifices in Solomon’s day were regulated by the law of Moses. The courses of the priests and the service of song were regulated by the ordinances of David. What the law had enjoined, and what David instituted, were known; and Owned as quite distinct, With the moral precepts of the law David was evidently acquainted, and he knew the law as a written law, the law of Moses, and charged his son to keep it, that he might prosper in all that he did, Jehoshaphat took away the high-places and groves out of. Jerusalem, and sent Levites and priests to teach in Judah, and they had the book of the law of the Lord with them. Upon what an unsubstantial basis would Mr. Smith rear up his structure! The Scriptures to which he appeals do not support what he says, and other Scriptures make plain that he is building on a sandy foundation. But we have Said that he endeavors to educate his readers up to that point to which he himself has reached. He tells them about the canon of Scripture, and teaches them about the Greek Septuagint. Now, to establish his position, he must break down in their minds all confidence in the correctness of the Hebrew Scriptures as we have received them... An example wish to impress on all the hopelessness of refusing the foreign yoke, but at the same time tells them of the limited period to which they would be called to submit to it. But Mr. Smith goes farther, and intimates his preference for the arrangement of Jeremiah’s predictions as found in the LXX. (p. 121); but we suppose he did not tell his hearers that 33:14-26 must then be struck out of their Bibles, for it was wanting in the LXX., and is said to have been supplied by Origen.* (* In the notes appended to the volume (p. 402) he refers to this passage in Jeremiah, and attempts to discredit its genuineness by, affirming that the prophet predicts (ver. 18) that the Levitical priesthood and its sacrifices shall be perpetual as the succession of day and night. He might with equal justice affirm that the prophet predicted the perpetual occupancy of David’s throne. What is promised is, that neither the royal nor priestly lines should be cut off, that there should be no heir to the throne, nor priests or Levites to minister. Jeremiah does not say that there should be no ’intermission of sacrifices, but that God’s covenant with David and with Phineas should be enduring as His covenant of the day and of the night.’ It is of the restoration of the Jewish polity and worship in the latter days that the prophet here writes (see vers. 15, 16), for that the royal and priestly lines must be preserved-not of an unbroken continuance of the kingdom and worship from the prophet’s day. For he writes of that which had not existed since Solomon’s clay-a man of David’s line sitting on the throne of the house of. Israel, and not merely of the house of Judah.) And he does not tell his readers that at times the New Testament writers discard the translation of the LXX.,. because it does not agree with the Hebrew. See, for examples, Matthew 2:15; Matthew 8:17; Matthew 26:31; John 19:37; Romans 11:4; 1 Corinthians 15:54; 1 Peter 2:7; though, on the other hand, there are instances in which the LXX. has preserved the true reading, and the Maseretic text is proved to be incorrect. See, for an example, Acts 2:25-28. An examination, however, of the whole question of the Hebrew versus the LXX. will result, we are persuaded, in the rejection of the text and arrangement of that version as better than that of the Hebrew. And as regards the book of the Prophet Jeremiah, we prefer the arrangement of it as we have it in the Hebrew, throughout which, as we have attempted above to point out, a moral order can be traced. From remarks on the canon of Scripture we are called by the lecturer to a review of the origin of individual books. He begins with the Psalms. The object he has in view is steadily maintained; the goal to be reached we have already pointed out. That Mr. Smith has not understood the purport of the Book of Psalms, nor caught its moral order, is not to be wondered at. Many a devout reader of the book has not perceived either the one or the other. We believe, however, there is a purpose in the arrangement of the book, and a moral order in the way each psalm is introduced, which, if seized, would deepen the impression that the Sacred Scriptures are indeed of God. The Psalter is divided into five books: Psa. 1-41-42,72.,73.- 89., 90.-106., 107.,-150. Now the subjects of the books are distinct, and the order in which they are arranged is prophetic, the different psalms providing suitable language, comfort, and instruction for God’s saints who will be on earth when true Christians will be down here no longer. They are really the expression of the Spirit of God for saints on earth. As far, then, as the experience of saints is concerned,. God’s people in all ages can find language in the book suited for them. But Christian experience is not their subject, so there are statements and desires, right in their place, which a Christian instinctively feels would be unsuited for him to take up. The Psalter is a collection of the writings of various authors, yet all of it inspired Scripture, and ranges over a great length of time. Between David and the writer of Psalms 137:1-9 centuries, of course, rolled by; hence it is plain that the book as a whole was not known to God’s earthly people before the Babylonish captivity, and the special circumstances of which, as a whole, it is the exponent did not, it is plain, exist till after the cross. The second psalm, as Acts 4:25-29 shows, supposes the rejection of the Lord Jesus Christ; and Psalms 74:1-23 describes a condition of things in connection with the people of Israel which has never yet taken place, viz., the Temple burned, no prophet among them to say how long, yet-God’s turtledove, the congregation of His poor, crying to Him about it. In the days of Nebuchadnezzar they had prophets, and they knew what was to be the duration of the captivity. When Titus besieged Jerusalem their house had been left to them desolate, and the Jews could not, in accordance with God’s mind, have addressed Him in the language of this psalm. Hence the design of the -book, as arranged, has reference to the future, when the remnant will be able thus to intercede with Him. By what human agency the book was arranged we know not. That there was a design in its formation, an examination of its contents makes manifest. But in the discovery of that design mere critical study will not aid us; we need to study the book in a different manner to get at the thread which runs through it, and to trade out its moral order. A few remarks will elucidate what has been expressed. In Book I, we have the remnant of the Jews of the future day brought back to the land. In II. they are viewed as outside Jerusalem. In III. we have the condition of the last days described as it concerns the whole of God’s earthly people Israel; the Temple destroyed (74.); Jerusalem captured (79.); and the throne as yet not tenanted by its only rightful occupant (89.) In IV. the -kingdom is viewed as being set up in power. In V. -we have exercises of the saints till the reign of peace is fully established; the whole closing with praise to God Jehovah in the fullest way.. The first book ends with Psalms 41:1-13, describing saints alive on earth at the Lord’s return. The second book ’ends with the description of the Lord’s millennial reign (72.;) The third ends with the cry to Him to fulfill His covenant to „David about the throne (89.) The fourth ends with 105., the recital of God’s ways in grace with Israel; and 106., their ways of rebellion in the past, and the looking for the nation’s full deliverance. Into a detailed account of each book it would be ’impossible within the limits of this article to enter. But just a few remarks on some psalms in. Books I. and II. may give an idea which, if the reader is so minded, he may trace out for himself more at length. Psalms 1:1-6 gives us the godly and the ungodly in Israel, characteristic marks of the former, and the future of both, but only as regards earth. Psalms 2:1-12 gives the political character of things. God’s counsel’ about the king rejected, but to be ultimately made good. The spiritual and political condition of things thus described, it is plain that the walk of the’ godly will be productive of trial to them, till the ungodly are dealt with by God. Hence Psalms 3:1-8; Psalms 4:1-8; Psalms 5:1-12; Psalms 6:1-10; Psalms 7:1-17 describe the different features ’of trial to which the saint will be’ exposed. Many rise up against Him, but he will trust in Jehovah (3.), and he cries to a known God, and appeals to the ungodly to act aright (4.) This leads to a meditation in 5: on the character of God and His ways with men (4-6), and the ways ’of the ungodly. In 6. he is further tried; God’s hand is on him. In 7. we learn how he is exposed to the secret plots of the wicked, so he desires Jehovah’s intervention in judgment. This is announced in Psalms 8:1-9, as we learn that all things are put under the Son of Man, the full effect of which the New Testament sets forth (1 Corinthians 15:1-58; Ephesians 1:1-23; Hebrews 2:1-18) After that we have in Psalms 9:1-20 the looking for God to judge the earth, and to destroy the ungodly man, whose character is set forth more directly in Psalms 10:1-18 After this statement (3,-7.) of the different trials of the righteous, and of God’s intervention in judgment-which ’is still future-we learn in 11.-15. the exercises of heart through which the saint passes whilst in trial, followed (16.-24.) by an outline of the Lord’s life, (16., 17.) victory, (18.) humiliation and death, (20.-22.) and return to earth, (24.) an answer to the saint’s desire, and an encouragement to hold still on his way. Interesting as it would be to go through the psalms seriatim, the limits of this article forbid more than a brief notice of portions of the book; so we would now ask the reader to glance with us at some of the psalms in the order in which they are arranged in the second book, a further proof that there must be a design, a moral order, in their arrangement. The remnant driven out of Jerusalem, they look’ and cry to be brought back (42., 43.) How changed their circumstances from those of their fathers of old! This they express to God and supplicate for His intervention (44.), that He will answer their cry; and how. fully Psalms 45:1-17 teaches us, as the person of the King is described by whose power it will be effected. Then God will be in their midst (46.), so the nations are next called to praise Him who is King over all the earth (47.) But further, He is to be praised in the city of Jerusalem, which He has preserved from the last assault of the kings of the earth;. "for this God," they add, "is our God; He will be our guide unto death " (48.) After this comes a meditation on the future of the ungodly, and on that of the saints; the former pass into the grave, the latter are redeemed from it (49.) Closely connected with that meditation is the description of God’s coming to the judgment of His earthly people (1.), approving of the saints, and then rejecting the wicked, this given in the spirit of prophecy to warn souls in time (1: 22, 23); and (51.) shows what becomes those who have sinned against God, and the grace which such, if they seek it, can find. The prophetic outline given, suited for the saints in their exile, we have next a series of psalms called Maschils, and another called Michtams, all by David, giving the feelings of the saints when driven out. Now, is it by accident or by design that in this book of the Psalter we have nearly all of those psalms of David whose titles, if correct, describe the exercises of his heart when driven out from house and home? We believe it is by design. But turning to Professor Smith, we are told of an improved arrangement of the Psalter, as he thinks. The five books he would compress into three. The Davidic psalms are, we are informed, Unnaturally arranged; they should all come together, instead of being separated, as far as Books I. and II. are concerned, by Psa 42:-1., which he would place between 72. and 73. " We may fairly accept this," he writes, " as the original order, which possibly was changed by the final collector, in order that he might show by a distinct mark that the two Davidic collections in his work were originally separate" (p. 188). For Professor Smith it is merely a collection of Davidic, Korahitic, and Asaphic compositions, which should be arranged as specimens in a cabinet, each class by itself. But where is the Spirit of God’ in all this? May we not say, in the language of the Psalms, that on such a subject " God is not in all his thoughts? " (Psalms 10:4). Unfortunately, however, for the theory of what ought to be, we have Psalms 1:1-6; Psalms 2:1-12, which are not said in the book to be by David, as well as Psalms 10:1-18; Psalms 33:1-22, which are also anonymous. Their presence, as they stand, upsets the proposed arrangement. Then in Book III. there is one psalm said to be by David (86.), and that we learn ought not to be accredited as such. A psalm of David there would be contrary to all critical order. (!) Hence he tells us its " title is unquestionably a mistake, for the psalm is a mere cento of reminiscences from older parts of Scripture. And the prayer (ver. 11), Unite my heart to fear Thy name,’ is based on the promise (Jeremiah 32:39), I will give them one heart.... to fear me continually.’ It is the law of religious life that prayer is based on promise, and not conversely" (p. 185). Is this last statement always correct? On what promise was the prayer of Jabez based? (1 Chronicles 4:10). But why say ver. 11 is based on Jeremiah 32:39? Why not on Deuteronomy 5:29? But that would militate against the Professor’s position. To sustain, then, the arrangement of a Davidic collection, Psalms 10:1-18 must be merged, as in the LXX., into 9., and 33. quietly shelved as one of a later date. But the question remains, how did it get there? Psalms 86:1-17, too, cannot be by David, he tells us, nor Psalms 122:1-9., nor Psalms 139:1-24. Into what a confusion the Psalter has got! What wonderful people are the critics to discern it, and to put all straight! But can they? Why should Psalms 10:1-18 be tacked on to Psalms 9:1-20? Its subject is closely connected with that treated of in Psalms 9:1-20 we freely grant; but if the whole psalm is really studied, we think it will be seen that it has nevertheless a distinct line of its own. The former takes up more God’s triumph over the wicked in general by judgment; the latter dwells more on the character of the wicked man. But we are told that 9. and 10. form together a beautiful acrostic (p. 183) or alphabetical psalm. We will refer to this farther on. Passing on now to Psalms 33:1-22, why get rid of it here as out of place, because it is not said to be by David? It comes in in real harmony with what we believe is the moral order of the book. Psalms 32:11 calls on the righteous to rejoice in God. What then more suited to follow than a meditation about the Lord in whom they are exhorted to rejoice (33.), who delivers the saints when man’s power is of no avail? This is succeeded by 34., the utterance of one who has been delivered, praising God, and desiring others to know Him likewise. All here seems in order and in harmony, and the arrangement is perfectly natural. Objections are urged against other psalms. In Book III. there is one, and only one, said to be by David,-86. But that cannot be, says our critic. All sense of order, it seems, would be lost if one Davidic composition is found amongst a number of Asaphic or Korahitic poems. But why not? On what authority does he insist on an arrangement which would place the Davidic psalms in a class by themselves? The Psalter unquestionably was not formed as a whole till after the Babylonish exile, and it is formed to express the full feelings, and to describe in detail the circumstances of God’s saints, which have never yet in their completeness been known. That Mr. Smith has not perceived this is no surprise. But to those who have, no manipulation of the arrangement of the book, such as he would advocate, could be satisfactory. And when it is seen, as it must be on examination, that the Psalter as a whole could not have been formed till after the captivity, the question which has to be settled, ere he is at liberty to bring it as a witness in behalf of his case, is simply this: Is the arrangement of it, as we have it in the Hebrew, the original one or not? Has it been rearranged since it was first compiled? Now the order of the psalms in the Hebrew is the order in the oldest known version, with the exception of Psalms 9:1-20; Psalms 10:1-18, being classed as one, and Psalms 147:1-20 being divided into two, so as to make up the number of 150: in that version. His position is, that the laws of the Levitical code are presented as laws of Moses, when they are only ordinances of the prophets. ’This reference to the Book of Psalms will therefore only avail him, if, he can show that the Psalter, as we have it, has been rearranged since it was first compiled. That he cannot do. The question of the authorship of the different psalms has really nothing to do with it. They are not arranged according to their authors, but according to the subjects of which they treat. Hence it is perfectly natural and suited that 86., as written by David, should come in just where it does. In Psalms 84:1-12 we have expressed the saint’s desire after God’s house, after which we have two prayers (85., 86.), the former the expression of the remnant in their national character, the latter the prayer of the saint individually for preservation of life, founded on what Adonai is, and His ways in grace, and on Jehovah’s ways in power. Who of God’s saints was more suited to express themselves thus than David, whose experience must have tallied with that expressed in the fourteenth verse of this psalm? Then, closing with a request to be shown a token for good, does not 87. come in well as the answer to that petition? The more we examine the Psalter, the more its moral order is apparent. But all this is lost on Professor Smith, or rather, we should say, he has not perceived it. The beauty of the arrangement is all lost on him, who only sees a quantity of Davidic, Asaphic, and Korahitic poems, all higgledy-piggledy, awaiting the critical acumen of the lecturer, or those whose opinions he is retailing, to arrange them as he thinks right,-a work which all must see the most ordinary clerk could accomplish in the short space of half an hour. But we may be reminded that other objections are urged against the Davidic authorship of some of the psalms. Psalms 122:1-9., we are told (pp. 192, 193), cannot have been written by David, for it speaks of "Jerusalem the rebuilt," and of the thrones of the house of David as a recollection of the past. Now the suggested translation of ver. 3, הַבְּנוּיׇה, Habbnuyah, " the rebuilt," is, for the purpose for which it is here adduced, a false one. Habbnuyah is simply ",the built one," or "that is built," without reference in itself to any former condition of that which is built. Nothing but the presuming on the credulity of one’s hearers or readers could, we should have thought, have led any one conversant with the original to have hazarded such a statement for the purpose of disproving the Davidic authorship. And why insist that the author speaks of the thrones of the house of David as a recollection of the past? יׇשְבוּ does not of necessity intimate that. Hebrew scholars, as Gesenius, would reject such a translation. This want of accuracy of translation we meet with on other occasions. Were such instances simple inaccuracies, one would let them pass; but made use of for a purpose, as they are, it is a very different matter. On p. 193 Professor Smith translates Psalms 144:10 ’ Thou that givest deliverances unto kings, who didst save David from the hurtful sword, save me." Why "didst save"? In both clauses we have the present participle in the original, " who giveth," " who saveth." It deliverances unto kings, who His actions that is celebrated, not a mere statement of a fact in history. Whilst on the point of translations, the reader should be warned to take on trust no translation or interpretation of the Divine Word given in these lectures. On p. 224 we read, " The worship of the sanctuary imperatively demands the tokens of material homage, the gift without which no Oriental would approach even an earthly court. ’ None shall appear before me empty’ (Exodus 23:15)." But that command in Exodus applies only to the appearance of every male before Jehovah at the three great festivals of the year. They worshipped at other times as well. Again, " In Levit. 17. it appears as a perpetual statute that no animal can be lawfully slain for food unless it be presented as a peace-offering before the central sanctuary, and its blood sprinkled on the altar. One has no right to slay an animal on other conditions " (p. 236). Has the author of these words read that chapter in Leviticus? That chapter distinguishes between domestic animals slain in or near the camp (ver. 3) and such as were taken in hunting (ver. 13), and lays down different rules for each, though forbidding the blood of any animal to be eaten. The Professor has not read that chapter, or, if he has, certainly not with care; so his statement about it, made, indeed, for a purpose, viz., to discredit its being really God’s revelation by Moses, is not correct. On p. 283, Isaiah 51:7 is quoted as if the prophet wrote, " The people in whose hearts my revelation dwells." The prophet really wrote "in whose heart is my law." On p. 293 we read, "The business of the Levites is to give Torah to Israel (Deuteronomy 33:10)." Moses really said, " They shall teach Thy judgments to Jacob, and Thy law to Israel." They were not to give a law (Torah), but to teach, what bad been given, " Thy law." But the true statement of Deuteronomy 33:10 would militate against his theory of the law. Micah too, we read, "declares that the priests give Torahs or legal decisions for hire (3: 11)." The prophet wrote, " Her heads judge for reward, and her priests teach for hire." Does the lecturer, we again ask, read the passages of Scripture on which he professes to comment? Farther on we are taught (p. 319), " In Exodus 33:7, which is non-Levitical, we read that Moses took the tabernacle and pitched it outside the camp, and called it the tent of meeting; but the Levitical account of the setting- up of the tabernacle; with the similar circumstance of the descent of the cloud upon it, does not occur till chapter 40." Here again a reference to the original convicts the Professor of Hebrew of making misleading statements. Why on Exodus 33:7 does he write of tabernacle and tent? The Authorized Version throughout the passage uses the word tabernacle. Mr. Smith uses both, though he must know that in. the Hebrew we have only tent,אהׇֺל,not tabernacle,מִשְבַּן, whereas in Exodus 40:1-38 the tabernacle is rightly called מו֗עראהֶֺלמִשְכַּן. The tent in Exodus 33:1-23 was only a tent, and not God’s dwelling- place on earth. We cannot acquit the Professor of intentionally misleading his hearers. He must know, as a professed teacher of Hebrew he ought to know, that the משְכּן of Exodus 40:1-38 is quite distinct from the אהֶֹל of 33. Such statements seem like an attempt to throw dust ’into people’s eyes, and one wonders on reading them, if they are genuine difficulties which the lecturer really feels, or only statements made by others, and taken up and repeated without careful consideration. Such a conclusion seems almost forced on the reader as he peruses the book. We cite one more instance. " How could Joshua, if he had known such a law (Deuteronomy 12:3), have erected a macceba,מַצֵּבׇה, or sacred pillar of unhewn stone under the sacred tree by the sanctuary at Shechem? " (p. 354). Again, "The two brazen pillars which stood at the porch (1 Kings 7:21) were not different from the forbidden macceba, or from the twin pillars of Hercules, from which their Tyrian artist probably copied them " (p. 248). The Lord hated mambas (Deuteronomy 16:22). Would He have authorized, would He have directed, the erection of such in His Temple? All that Hiram made was in accordance with that in which Solomon had been instructed (2 Chronicles 3:3), and the brazen pillars are mentioned as items in the list of things concerning which the king had been instructed. But the statement as to Joshua is quite untrue. He set up a stone eben, not a macceba, a stone of memorial, not an object of worship, nor to be connected with worship. The credulity of the audience, or its inability to check the misstatements, must be great, when such can be put forth as true without fear of contradiction. But to return to the psalms. The title of Psalms 139:1-24 must be wrong, since it " belongs to the period when Hebrew was being largely superseded as a vernacular by Aramaic. It contains at least four Aramaic forms, which are not such loan-words as one nation may borrow from another to enrich its vocabulary, but Aramaic pronunciations of roots also found in the Hebrew." Then we are reminded of Grimm’s law about English and German words, and Mr. Smith proceeds, " The Psalmist pronounces words with a guttural (ayin) where the Hebrew form has a sharp s (cade), and thus he declares himself a man whose vernacular was Aramaic as clearly, as the Ephraimites revealed their tribe by saying sibboleth" (pp. 193, 194). All this may sound very grand, but ’is it sound criticism? Was there no intercourse in David’s day with the Aramaic-speaking population, that Aramaic words might not have been adopted by the Israelites? 2 Samuel 8:1-18 and 2 Chronicles 18:1-34 show that there was. Does the existence of a few Aramaic words in a person’s writings prove that his vernacular was Aramaic? Was that Jeremiah’s vernacular, in whose writings (10: 11) we have a whole verse of pure Chaldee? But is the Professor’s statement unimpeachable? We presume the two words to which he refers are רֵעִי (ver. 2) and רֵבְץ (ver. 3). As to the former, if Fuerst is correct, it comes from a Hebrew root, and is not Aramaic at all. As to the latter, it comes from a root which we meet with three times in Leviticus (18: 23, 19: 19, 20: 16). Now, granting that רׇבַץ may be an Aramaic root equivalent to the common Hebrew root רׇבַץ, it is jumping to a conclusion indeed to determine, that the writer of Psalms 139:1-24 must have spoken Aramaic as his vernacular, because he uses a noun the verb root of which his ancestors had for centuries been acquainted with. We have warned the reader against taking on trust certain translations of the original. We must now point out how loose at times are the statements that we meet with, by which much may be left to the imagination of the reader. Omne ignotum pro magnifico,-Everything unknown is assumed to be magnificent. The remarks on the acrostic psalms will illustrate this. " Another clear sign that we have not every psalm in its original text lies in the alphabetical acrostics, Psa. 9;10;25, 34., 37., 111., 112., 119., 145., in which the initial letter of successive half verses, verses, or larger stanzas make up the alphabet. It is of the nature of an acrostic to be perfect. An acrostic poem which misses some letter, or puts it into a false place, is a failure, and therefore, when we find some of these acrostics are now imperfect, we must conclude that the text has suffered" (p. 182). Now there are three classes of acrostic psalms, as Mr. Smith states. Psalms 119:1-176 is an example of alphabetical stanzas, and a perfect one also. Psalms 111:1-10; Psalms 112:1-10. are examples, the only ones that we have, of initial letters in alphabetical order at the commencement of every half verse, and both of them are perfect But all the others are imperfect. Mr. Smith says some are imperfect. The truth is, of the seven acknowledged alphabetical psalms, only three are perfect. Not one of those in which each verse should begin with a different letter is perfect, nor is there any proof that any of them ever were so. And of the beautiful acrostic, 9., 10., as he terms it, the text must have been tampered with indeed, if his supposition is correct. So great is the variance from the alphabetical order in the latter, that it is difficult to believe the two were ever intended to be one alphabetical acrostic. On p. 179 he states: " The musical titles " of the psalms " are full of technical terms, which occur again in the Book of Chronicles in descriptions of the Levitical psalmody of the Temple." Out of about sixteen terms connected with the musical titles of the Psalms, six are met with elsewhere, one, שׁיִר, a song used several times in the Chronicles, and two more, שׁמיִניִח and נַצֵּחַ, occur each once, and in the same passage (1 Chronicles 15:21), in connection with the psalmody of the Temple, and that is all. A third example of this loose way of writing we meet with in p. 227: " The sanctuaries themselves were of ancient, and in great part of patriarchal consecration. Beersheba, Gilgal, Bethel, Shechem, Mizpah, were places of the most venerable sanctity, acknowledged by Samuel and earlier worthies." Samuel did make a yearly circuit to Bethel, Gilgal, and Mizpah, but Shechem is not mentioned once in the history of his life, nor, though his sons were judges at Beersheba, have we any record that he was ever at that place, nor does Beersheba appear, we believe, in the history as a place of sanctity after the days of the patriarchs. Who would have thought from reading the statement on p. 227 that Samuel had nothing to do, that we read of, with Shechem, nor with Beersheba, as places of sanctity? But there is something worse than all this loose statement, which may mean more than can be verified, and does not redound to the credit of the teacher. At page 186 we read, " In the greater part of Book II. and III. (Psa 42:-11.) the name of Jehovah is rare, and Elohim takes its place, even where the substitution reads very awkwardly…. In the Elohim psalms, and nowhere else in the Old Testament, we find the peculiar phrase, God my God,’ with Elohim in the place of Jehovah." This may be true, but does the substitution of God for Jehovah read awkwardly? Does Mr. Smith remember those words, " God thy God," are in Psalms 45:7? They are the words of God to the Lord Jesus Christ (Hebrews 1:8-9). Does God use language which reads very awkwardly? To ask the question settles the matter. But what irreverence there is in such a display of would-be critical acumen! We can understand a difficulty rising up about the introduction of the name Elohim in the place of Jehovah, and on comparing Psalms 14:1-7 with Psalms 53:1-6. the change is manifest. But the true solution will not be found in the hypothesis, of an editor who for some reason suppressed the name of Jehovah, but in the character of things described in that book. The remnant are outside the city, "their covenant connection," as it has been observed, " with Jehovah is lost, hence they address Him as God rather than as Jehovah." We must now briefly glance at other parts of these lectures. The reader, if the different statements of the lecturer were true, would learn much that was new and startling too. But are the statements that we meet with true, is a question which any thoughtful reader must of necessity ask. The difference of teaching, according to Mr. Smith, between the law and the prophets is divergent indeed. The law enjoined sacrifice, and without shedding of blood was there no remission. The prophets teach, we are told, very different doctrine. " What is quite certain is, that according to the prophets the Torah of Moses did not embrace a law of ritual. Worship by sacrifice and all that belongs to it, is no part of the Divine Torah to Israel. It forms, if you will, part of natural religion-[Does it? why then did Cain not bring an animal along with, or instead, of the fruits of the ground fl-which other nations share with Israel, and which is no feature in the distinctive precepts given at the Exodus..... The true distinction of Israel’s religion lies in the character of the Deity, who has made Himself personally known to His people, and demands of them a life conformed to His spiritual character as a righteous and forgiving God. The difference between Jehovah and the gods of the nations is that He does not require sacrifice (!! 0 but only to do justly, and love mercy, and walk humbly with God. This standpoint is not confined to the prophetic books; it is the standpoint of the ten commandments, which contain no precept of positive worship " (pp. 298, 299). "If it is true that they exclude the sacrificial worship from the positive elements of Israel’s religion, what becomes of the doctrine of the forgiveness of sins, which we are accustomed to regard as mainly expressed in the typical ordinances of atonement? " (p. 301). "According to the prophets, Jehovah asks only a penitent heart and desires no sacrifice. According to the ritual law, He desires a penitent heart approaching Him in certain sacrificial sacraments" (p. 304). Did worship by sacrifice form no part of the Divine Torah given to Israel? Was it unknown as such in the days of the prophets? 1 Samuel 2:29 directly contradicts this, as we read Jehovah’s message to Eli by one of His servants, " Wherefore kick ye at my sacrifice and at mine offering which I have commanded in mine habitation? " Ere the school of the prophets arose, Jehovah declared that He had commanded sacrifices. Further, Jehovah Himself, speaking to the child Samuel (1 Samuel 3:14), declared that " the iniquity of Eli’s house should not be purged (or should not be atoned for, ithcapper) by sacrifice or offering forever." A pretty conclusive proof that atonement by sacrifice, in certain cases, was part of God’s provision for His people centuries before the prophets, to whose writings Mr. Smith would turn us, appeared on the scene. Again, David was evidently under the impression that Jehovah had commanded sacrifices to be offered, and that continually, since after the entrance of the ark into Jerusalem he kept Levites to attend on it, and sent Zadok the priest and his brethren the priests to minister before the Tabernacle of the Lord at Gibeon, to offer the offerings there, " according to all that is written in the law of the Lord which He commanded Israel" (1 Chronicles 16:39-40). Solomon, too, the wisest of men (except, we must suppose, the critics of the nineteenth century), was under the same impression when he asked Hiram to forward his desire to build an house to the Lord in which to " burn sweet incense before Him, and for the continual shewbread, and for the burnt-offerings, morning and evening, on the sabbaths, on the new moons, on the solemn feasts of the Lord our God." And then he adds, " This is an ordinance forever to Israel" (2 Chronicles 2:4). And under the spell of this singular delusion, if Mr. Smith is right in his teaching, the king remained till the house was built, when (8: 13, 14) the sacrificial ritual appointed by Moses, and carried on in the Tabernacle, was transferred to the Temple, and the ordinances of David concerning the priests and the service of song put in force for the first time. The existence, then, and observance of the sacrificial ritual, such as was afterward, as far as it could be, restored on the return of the captives from Babylon, its existence and observance, we say, before the eighth century B.C., are facts which cannot be gainsaid. How does the Professor meet this? With the utmost complacency, and, we suppose, lest his assertion should shock weak nerves, he would quiet all alarm by assuring us all, that though the prophets taught " Jehovah had not enjoined sacrifice, this does not imply that He has never accepted sacrifice, or that ritual service is absolutely wrong. But it is at best mere form (!!) which does not purchase any favor from Jehovah, and might be given up without offense " (p. 288). Indeed! This dictum from one occupying the professorial chair may be to some very consoling. For ourselves, who can only occupy seats on the scholar’s bench, we prefer to follow on this point what Samuel, David, and Solomon plainly teach us, and what the law itself declares about it. Now in Exodus 29:38-42 we read that God gave Moses, on the first occasion of his sojourn on Mount Sinai for forty days and forty nights, the ordinance about the daily sacrifice, to be offered on that altar on which the fire was to be always burning (Leviticus 6:12). In Leviticus 7:35-38, the law of sacrifice is said to have been commanded Moses on Mount Sinai. The ritual for the day of atonement was given by God to Moses to be made known to Aaron (Leviticus 16:1). And in flat contradiction to Mr. Smith’s assertion, that ritual could be given up without offense, we are told that the person who did riot perform the necessary purifications, or who eat of the peace-offering with his uncleanness upon him, or refused to afflict himself on the day of atonement, such an one, should be cut off from among his people (Leviticus 7:20-21; Leviticus 7:28-29; Numbers 9:13; Numbers 19:13-20). But we need not multiply proofs of the existence of the laws relating to sacrifice. The attempt to controvert it by dwelling on the teaching of the prophets is a mere artifice, which can only deceive those who are willing to accept the statements of men without testing them by the unerring standard, the Word ’of God. If the observance of ritual without the practice of righteousness was’ all that Jehovah desired, the people could have deluged His altar with blood, and yet continued to practice unrighteousness, and to smite with the fist of wickedness at the same time.. But Jehovah is holy. So the prophets rightly insisted on reality, and not on mere lip-service, or the mere outward observance ’of the ritual, though without ’sacrifices forgiveness of sins could not be enjoyed. What set Isaiah at rest in the presence of Jehovah of Hosts but the live coal from off the altar? Nothing but the benefits of the sacrifice of One who could bear divine judgment on his behalf would meet his case. He, a prophet, knew that well, and proclaims by his recital of that which took place, as well as by his subsequent readiness to serve Jehovah, that nothing availed for him apart from the sacrifice which makes atonement. But in various ways are artifices resorted to in this book to mislead the unstable. We are told (pp. 293, 305) that there is a priestly Torah, a prophetic Torah, a Mosaic Torah, all distinct; and also we are gravely told of a Torah of good husbandry (p. 335), which the reader is given to understand he will find in Isaiah 28:23-29. Now this wonderful word Torah is derived from the Hebrew verb Yarah, to teach, and means primarily instruction. It is used as the title of that part of the Old Testament revelation called the law-Torah in Hebrew, νόμος in Greek. When we read of the law, Torah, the term, as in Romans 3:19, may be used of the whole Old Testament teaching, or be restricted to that part commonly called the Pentateuch. But we have not several Torahs, as Mr. Smith would make out, nor could we say that wherever we read of Jehovah teaching, or any one teaching, that we have a new Torah, as he would persuade us from his reference to Isaiah 28:1-29 Such statements are like conjuror’s tricks, occupying the attention of his audience with one thing whilst he is really doing another. How rich we must be in Torahs if this way of reckoning them could be accepted! We have-does the reader know it? of course the Professor must-on that hypothesis a Torah from the beasts and a Torah from the earth, for both can teach us, as Job (12: 7, 8) declares. But all this about different Torahs is mere trifling. The law (Torah) of the Lord is perfect, converting the soul. Does Jehovah’s Torah of good husbandry convert the soul? In truth there is neither reverence for God nor for His Word in this volume. But these are serious charges to make. We must substantiate them. The chronicler, we are told, was a very ignorant man on points on which he wrote. "He had no complete knowledge of the greatly different praxis of Israel before the exile" (p. 219). He writes of Gibeon in Solomon’s days in a way the author of 1 Kings would never have done (p. 266); and he is accused of ignorance of his nation’s history and of his own tongue (pp. 420,421). How could he state that Abijah called Rehoboam, his father, young, נַעַר, when he was forty-one years old? Into the question of Rehoboam’s age at his accession we need not here enter. It is enough to reply to the objection, How could Joshua have been described by the same term when he was about that same age? (Exodus 33:11). Then, ignorant man that he was, how came he, in reporting the same speech, to speak of the evening sacrifice as an animal sacrifice, when it is said to be well known that it was wholly cereal in its composition, being called מִנְחׇח, Minchah., in1 Kings 18:36, 2 Kings 16:15, Ezra 9:4, the term used for a meat-offering in the law? But the tables are turned when it is seen that Minchah is used in Genesis 4:1-26 of Abel’s offering, which certainly was not cereal in its character; and the chronicler is justified in the way he writes, since, ’in 2 Kings 3:20,Minchah, is used of the morning burnt-offering as well. Hence the question is not as to the capability of the chronicler for his office, but as to the propriety of the Professor of Hebrew in the Free Church College of Aberdeen basing such charges on grounds which cannot be defended. Is it the chronicler that should be convicted of ignorance of the Hebrew language, or who? And why should not Rehoboam, whatever might be his age, be spoken of as 345 In, which in the only other place in which the phrase occurs (Deuteronomy 20:8) is translated in the Authorized Version "faint-hearted"? That suits the context in 1 Chronicles 13:1-14 very well, and is so rendered in this place in the LXX., of which the Professor has expressed so high an opinion. as well as in the Vulgate. And what irreverence, to use no stronger term, to charge the writer, selected by the Holy Ghost for His work, with ignorance of his nation’s history and language. Any charge of the chronicler’s unfitness for his task is really a reflection on Him who appointed him to write, and directed him in his service. Corruptions of the text there might be, for what is there which has been committed to man in which he has not failed? But to charge the writer with incompetence, is to impugn the competency of the Divine Author of the Scriptures to select suited instruments for His work. Had we not read it, we should have thought that even Mr. Smith would have recoiled from suggesting such a thought. None, then, need wonder that there is no reverence for God. " The people, whose worship of Jehovah was hardly to be distinguished from a gross polytheism, could not be averse to worship other gods side by side with the national deity " (p. 229). " The Old Testament takes it for granted that Jehovah acknowledges and supplies in Israel the want which in other nations is met by the practice of divination. The place of the soothsayer is supplied by the prophet’ of Jehovah (Deuteronomy 18:14)" (p. 278). Is it the proper way to speak of the only true God as the national deity of Israel? Did His prophets supply for Israel the want elsewhere met by the soothsayers? But worse still (p. 271): " Jehovah Himself, according to Deuteronomy 4:19, has appointed the heavenly host and other false deities to the heathen nations (!!), while He conversely Himself is the portion of Jacob (Jeremiah 10:16; comp. Deuteronomy 29:26)." Has the High and the Holy One sanctioned idolatry and provided the nations with their false gods? Here we must stop. His book is indeed a saddening one. It is also profane. God uses, we are given to understand, language which reads very awkwardly. He has selected writers incompetent for the work. He has appointed false deities to the nations. With a great parade of learning, and very probably acquaintance with the writings of men, one thing is evident, the book which the Professor has studied the least is the one about which he writes-the volume of Old Testament revelation. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 188: VOL 03 - THE POST-CAPTIVITY PROPHETS: THE EFFECT OF THE WORD OF GOD ======================================================================== The Post-Captivity Prophets: The Effect of the Word of God THREE in number, and named Haggai, Zechariah, Malachi, the post-captivity prophets differ markedly from their brethren who prophesied before the destruction of Jerusalem by the armies of Nebuchadnezzar. The former prophets dwell on the past history of the people; these chiefly on their then present and future. The judgments announced by the earlier messengers having been executed, the chastisement richly deserved had been endured; so the black catalog of crimes, which formed so heavy an indictment, is no longer dwelt upon, and the sins of their fathers are only alluded to to advise their descendants of the certain fulfillment of God’s word. Words of encouragement the remnant hear from Haggai and Zechariah, instead of predictions of coming judgment; and we witness, as it were, a fresh start of the people, to see if those, who were a standing memorial of the nation’s unfaithfulness and of God’s truth, would act better than their fathers, profiting by the lesson the captivity ought surely to have taught them. The glory connected with the king’s throne in Jerusalem had long departed, and the house which Solomon had built " exceeding magnifical," had been defiled by the tread of uncircumcised feet, pillaged, and finally burnt. The wealth which characterized the reigns of David and Solomon had gone to swell the coffers of Gentile monarchs, and a poor and feeble remnant were now the representatives in the land of Canaan of a nation which had once been illustrious, victorious, and prosperous. Shorn as they were of earthly wealth and temporal power, they were lacking in yet higher things, which their fathers could bear witness had been among them. In common with other nations they might have mourned over the loss of wealth and power, but they had to acknowledge greater losses in the absence of those favors which had been peculiar to Israel. No sacred fire burned on their newly-erected altar, nor was the Shechinah with them any longer, that cloud of glory betokening the divine presence, which had accompanied them from Egypt, and abode on the mercy-seat till the days of Nebuchadnezzar (Exodus 13:21-22; Ezekiel 10:18; Ezekiel 11:23). Miracles, too, attestations of the divine commission which prophets of old had received, were worked no longer; and the Urim and Thummim connected with the high priest’s breastplate were confessedly absent from that which was worn by Joshua the son of Josedech (Ezra 2:63). All that man could make, the ark excepted, they might possess; but those peculiar tokens of God’s acceptance of the house and of the High Priest they found themselves without. Yet, though deprived of the manifestations of the divine presence, and the proofs of divine power, they were not bereft of that which could guide them in darkness and cheer them in sorrow - the word of God. Their return, and the rebuilding of the temple and city, were proofs that God had not forsaken them; the presence of the prophets Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi were tokens that God would still instruct them. From the days of Jeremiah the godly ones of Israel in the land of. Babylon had been cast upon God’s word as to the duration of their captivity, which, beginning with Jehoiakim was to end with Cyrus (Jeremiah 29:10; Daniel 9:1). Now the returned remnant were to find how the prophetic word, which could sustain hope in captivity, could stimulate and teach them, being their only light in the days of sorrow and oppression in which their lot was cast. For, having been constrained by power from without to cease from building the temple, they rose up to renew the work at the prophesying of Haggai and Zechariah. The effect of the word of God is in this case beautifully exemplified. Difficulties vanished. Their reasoning that the time to build the Lord’s house had not come (Haggai 1:2) was refuted in an instant. Jeremiah’s prediction of seventy years, to which perhaps they referred, it was now seen was to be computed from the captivity which began in the fourth year of Jehoiakim (Jeremiah 25:1-38), and not from the destruction of the temple in the eleventh year of Zechariah. The nation’s captivity, not the temple’s desolation, it was of which the prophet of Anathoth had predicted the duration. Their mistake was now corrected, yet not by the turn of events in their favor, but by the prophesying of Haggai, the Lord’s messenger. The reason of their scanty harvests and unsatisfied appetites was now made plain, the Lord’s house laid waste, whilst they built and dwelt in their own. Obedient to the voice of the Lord their God and the words of Haggai the prophet, as the Lord their God had sent him, activity was again displayed in providing materials for the building of the house, and the tools laid down through fear of man were taken up in the fear of God. The visit of Tatnai, the governor, with Shetharboznai and their companions, did not deter them; the demand for their names did not terrify them. They answered them respectfully but firmly, and whilst they referred to Darius for instructions the Jews went on with their work. The decree issued against them by Artaxerxes the usurper was still in force, but the word of God encouraged their hearts, so, in spite of the opposition from which they had so recently suffered, and the yet unrepealed decree, they came and did the work in the house of the Lord of hosts their Gods The word of God, apart from all manifestations of divine power, emboldened the people to brave the king’s resentment. What a change had come over them. And now, since they had begun the work in faith and obedience, the Lord, ere that six months closed in which Haggai had first addressed them, vouchsafed a second message, saying, " I am with you." His presence and approval, not His power to be openly displayed on their part as before, was that of which God now assured them, and that encouraged them. He had said it they believed it; and the work of the house went forward afresh. Tatnai referred to Darius respecting the existence of the alleged decree of Cyrus, of which the Jews had spoken, and to learn the reigning sovereign’s will. The remnant, now assured of the divine presence, waited not to learn the king’s pleasure, for prophecy had burst out afresh; and since they were obedient, new communications were vouchsafed. When the foundations of the house were laid in the reign of Cyrus, we read of the effect produced on those who had witnessed the former one (Ezra 3:12). Now whilst carrying on their. work anew God would not have the builders discouraged, so, they learn that "the latter glory of this house" (for this it was which Haggai really said) " shall be greater than the former." The magnificence and splendor with which Solomon embellished the house, was to be far surpassed by the glory which shall yet attach to it; and in that place, where they had recently experienced the oppression of the ruling power, the Lord would give peace. How fully God was entering into and taking up the cause of His people! As subjects of Darius it was their part to acknowledge the Persian supremacy; but the throne of kingdoms, that imperial power which dominates over other rulers and vassal states, Haggai assured them should be overthrown by the Lord, for the strength of the kingdom of the heathen will He destroy, the chariots and those that ride in them shall be overthrown, and the horses and their riders shall Come down every one by the sword of his brother. This is still future. Will this be succeeded by anarchy ’? No, for to Zerubbabel, David’s descendant and the Lord’s ancestor, promises are made (Haggai 2:20-23). That throne so ancient, and to outward eyes untenanted for so long, will then be seen to be worthily filled by Him who enjoys the unclouded favor of the Father. The consequences of their forefathers’ sins the returned remnant had still to feel, as they witnessed the house in process of building, and bowed to the Gentile yoke; but these reminders, of the past, they learned, will be obliterated at a future day; since the blessings of fruitful harvests from the day that Haggai thus addressed them, were declared to be the earnest that the future he sketched out should surely come to pass (Haggai 2:18-19). In this prophetic service Haggai did not stand alone. "At the mouth of two or three witnesses shall the matter be established." And though, when God speaks, none should ask for a confirmation of the veracity of the divine communications, He is pleased at times to provide such evidence as shall abundantly confirm what has been previously declared. In this case Zechariah, a priest (Nehemiah 12:16) and prophet, the son of Berechiah, the son of Iddo, was associated with Haggai in the work. Three times had Haggai spoken before any of the prophecies of Zechariah were uttered. In the sixth month Haggai had reproved them for their supineness in the building of the Lord’s house, and cheered them with the assurance of Jehovah’s presence. In the seventh month, during the feast of tabernacles, he predicted the future surpassing glory of the house. Then in the eighth month, after the year’s festivals were over, Zechariah commenced his ministry with an exhortation to the people not to act like their fathers, but to hearken to God. For, at the outset, he reminds them that in nature they are not better than their fathers, and that they are the children of those who had been grievously punished for their idolatry. But what hope could there be for a bright ending to the nation’s history, when, blessed as their fathers had been, the throne had been overturned in judgment, and captivity and subjugation had been righteously their lot? The children remained unchanged in nature, prone to act like their fathers, that was clear, from the admonition at the outset of Zechariah’s prophetic service. To build on national improvement would have been delusive. The hopes for the future must rest elsewhere. The judgments at last poured out on their fathers attested God’s faithfulness to His word, as their fathers had acknowledged (Zechariah 1:6). On God’s faithfulness then they were now to rest, to His word they should hearken. Generations had come and gone, but God’s word had not failed of fulfillment. Generations might come and go, but His word must be accomplished. What a comfort to draw from their afflictions and subjection to a foreign yoke, the sure confidence of future deliverance and blessing. They were nationally, they are still, witnesses to the abiding faithfulness of His word, as displayed in judgment; hence their condition, however sad, could comfort those who were feeling it. Two more communications by Haggai on the twenty-fourth day of the ninth month complete the collection of his prophecies, as far at least as they have been preserved; and the visions of Zechariah, just two months afterward (Zechariah 1:7-21; Zechariah 2:1-13; Zechariah 3:1-10; Zechariah 4:1-14; Zechariah 5:1-11; Zechariah 6:1-15), conclude the series of revelations vouchsafed to the remnant that year. Five months of that eventful year had passed before the spirit of prophecy, last bestowed on Daniel in the third year of Cyrus (about fourteen years back), fell on any others of the seed of Israel. Then seven times during the remainder of that year did the Lord communicate His mind by His servants Haggai and Zechariah. How the hearts of the godly ones must have rejoiced, as they received these repeated tokens of the Lord their God’s abiding interest in their city and nation. " Unto you that hear shall more be given," is a principle enunciated in the New Testament (Mark 4:24), but acted on in the Old. The remnant had heard, and obeyed. The word had effected a lodgment in their heart; and God, acting in grace, which far surpasses what man could expect, in adding to the sacred volume gave them in the visions of Zechariah several glimpses of the marvelous future in store for Jerusalem, the land, and the people. Both by visions and prophecies the remnant were to be instructed; the visions depicting the state of things which shall exist, the prophecies detailing circumstances through which the remnant must pass ere the end arrives-that final blessing and peace in store for the afflicted, despised, yet chosen people of God. Two points connected with the future Haggai had briefly touched on-the house and the throne. On these Zechariah enlarges, and the people, who had shown themselves obedient to the word of reproof by Haggai (1: 2-11), are permitted to gaze upon the distant future, brought within the scope of faith’s horizon by the visions and prophecies of the son of Iddo. At night, when all were asleep, a fit emblem of the world’s unconcern for God’s ancient people and their land, Zechariah had visions of that future which shall dawn upon his country and people, and heard the words of the Lord himself (for the man was Jehovah) announcing His return to the city of His choice (1: 16). Two years roll by before we have another date. Then in the fourth year of Darius, two years before the temple was finished, the question of Sherezer, Regem-melech, and their companions, relative to the continued observance of the days connected with Jerusalem’s past sorrow, called forth in the Lord’s goodness the outline of the remnant’s history, running on to the commencement of the reign of peace (7.-14.) Casting the eye over these prophecies could any one doubt of the Lord’s love for Israel, or of the settled purpose of His heart concerning Jerusalem? The people did not deserve what Zechariah was commissioned to foretell, that all will admit. As a nation they had long before forfeited all claim to God’s favor, or restoration to the place of honor upon earth, which they had once enjoyed; yet Zechariah traces out, not conditionally, for that would have made the case hopeless, but as a certainty, which shall be witnessed, more than restoration to their former condition, even pre-eminence on earth to a degree never yet known (10.-12), whilst the full metropolitan character of Jerusalem is announced, which has never yet been enjoyed (14.) And all this, be it observed, is brought out after the people have hearkened to and obeyed God’s word. Acting in obedience to the word they prospered in their work, and the Lord was then pleased to communicate more of His mind. Years after this passed, during which the political condition of the returned remnant varied. Protected by Darius they were troubled in the early part of the reign of Artaxerxes Longimanus, for the wall of Jerusalem, rebuilt w‘ know not when, had been broken down under circumstances which have not been recorded, and her gates had been burnt with fire (Nehemiah 1:3). This was the dark side of the picture, which serves, however, to bring out in bolder relief the better fortunes of the house and of the wall. The temple, finished under Darius, was beautified under Artaxerxes (Ezra 6:15; Ezra 7:27), who sent Ezra the scribe with offerings for the house of God; and the wall, over whose destruction Nehemiah wept, was repaired and dedicated by this pious man with the full sanction of the Persian king. Exposed as they were to these vicissitudes-at one time protected by the king, at another the sport of some unscrupulous court favorite as Haman, or trampled on by provincial governors-what, it may be asked, during all this time was their moral condition? That, too, varied. Stirred up as one man by the prophecies of Haggai and Zechariah to complete the house of God, we learn that ere Ezra reached the land in the seventhyear of Artaxerxes, the people of Israel, the priests and the Levites, were again mixed up with the people of the lands, doing according to their abominations, even of the Canaanites, the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Jebusites, the Ammonites, the Moabites, the Egyptians, and the Amorites, taking of their daughters for themselves and for their sons, the hand of the princes and rulers being chief in this trespass (Ezra 9:1-2).. The matter was investigated. Separation from the people of the land and from the strange wives was insisted on, and offerings were brought by those who were concerned in this trespass. Thirteen years later Nehemiah reached the holy city, and during his tenure of office had to reprove the people for usury; separation too from the mixed multitude had to be effected, and the profanation of the Sabbath corrected. Besides this, the question of mixed marriages had again to be dealt with; the family of Eliashib the high priest, as that of Jeshua’s in the days of Ezra, having joined in this trespass (Ezra 10:18; Nehemiah 13:28). How crafty was the enemy. Faithfulness, however, to God triumphed over all fear of man. For a time these efforts of Ezra and Nehemiah appeared to be successful, but the people soon relapsed into carelessness; and indifference to God’s house and to God’s honor was unblushingly manifested; so that when Malachi commenced his ministry the reproof of both priests and people was urgently required, and occupies the chief part of his book. The Lord’s love for Israel was openly questioned, notwithstanding all He had done and all He had foretold (Malachi 1:2). The priests despised His name, and when accused of it by the Lord; demanded proofs of the charge. The people wearied Him with their words; and when told of it seemed unconscious of what they were doing (1: 6, 7; 2: 17). The sin denounced by Ezra and Nehemiah Judah had again given way to, having married strange wives, and for no just cause sanctioned the divorce of the wife of their youth. A ministry of reproof was needed for this; a ministry to awaken slumbering consciences, and to make souls bestir themselves to depart from uncleanness and iniquity. Malachi’s ministry partially accomplished this. The effect of the word of God on the people in the days of Haggai we have seen, the effect of the word by Malachi is also recorded. " Then they that feared the Lord, spake often one to another" (3: 16). Infidelity and self-interest had penetrated deep into the ranks of the remnant, yet some were found who feared the Lord. Malachi’s testimony acted on these, for, after his reproofs had been uttered, they spake often one to another. A remnant of the returned remnant were still true to God, and proved it. Hearts exercised by the word found each other out. They spake often one to another. What they said is not recorded; it is their attitude at this crisis which is described. Often perhaps they communed in secret, for it does not appear that these took a place of public witness for God. Malachi filled that post; then these, fearing the Lord, held intercourse one with another. A movement, doubtless, was in progress of which many around were ignorant; and, though perhaps they heard not what these godly ones said in their communings one with another, there was One who overheard all, however gently whispered; and witnessed all, however unobtrusively done. "The Lord hearkened, and heard." God’s word had met with a response in their hearts, and the Lord took note of it. To their contemporaries perhaps but little known, to posterity quite unknown, to God each one was well known, and their names are recorded in His book. " A book of remembrance was written before Him, for them that feared the Lord, and that thought upon His name." How graciously does the Lord act to His people! We record names and deeds in books, that, however treacherous our memories may be, the persons or their acts should never be forgotten by us. In history lie embalmed, as in a catacomb, the actions of the great and good, preserved to: future ages, though all eye-witnesses to them have long ceased to exist. Our failing memories and transient lives call for this means of perpetuating what once was deemed worthy of notice and of approval. But He, who is the beginning and the end, who is, who was, and is to come, from whom no secrets are hid, "who ne’er forgets," as we sing, "though oft forgot," needs not a written record to preserve before Him the remembrance of actions and conduct of which He once approved; yet He would assure His people that all is recorded, and not one thing, however small, has escaped His notice, or will remain unrewarded. To attend to the prayer of the afflicted is, we know, the Lord’s wont. But here was no cry that we read of; here was no prayer for deliverance breathed forth. They were not speaking to God, but to one another; exercised in heart about the things of God. It was to catch these utterances that He was attentive. "The Lord hearkened, and heard." As the Lord Jesus joined Himself to the company of those two who communed together and reasoned on their way from Jerusalem to Emmaus, so, at an earlier epoch, the Lord Jehovah was an unseen but attentive listener to the exchange of thoughts between these godly ones in Israel. From Haggai’s ministry outward activity resulted. In the days of Malachi communing together about the things of God was the right effect produced by the word. By the labors of Haggai and Zechariah the people were stirred up to work; through the ministry of Malachi the faithful took heed to their walk. And, as at the former period new communications of God’s mind were vouchsafed, as soon as obedience to the word had been manifested, so now the Lord’s appreciation of these faithful ones is revealed, and their future set before them. " They shall be mine, saith the Lord of hosts, in the day when I make up my jewels; and I will spare them as a man spareth his own son that serveth him." To be a peculiar treasure unto God was held out to Israel at Sinai on condition of obedience (Exodus 19:5). Here these faithful ones are assured of this distinction, for they shall be enumerated amongst His treasures. To do great things was not their work, but faithfulness to God is ever valued by Him; and true service He reckoned it to be when these consorted together, separated by the word from the iniquity prevalent around them. To a future day. He pointed them, and as the representatives of His earthly people He foretold by Malachi their portion, who will have feared Him and have thought on His name. The day when He will count up His jewels will be a day of wrath for the wicked, and His people shall then discern between the righteous and the wicked, between him that serveth God and him that serveth Him not. What Asaph, speaking by the spirit of prophecy, presents as a difficulty for God’s saints, in a time perhaps not far off (Psalms 73:1-17), to be. solved ere the day of the Lord comes only by acquaintance with His unfulfilled designs, will, when that day dawns, as Malachi predicts, be patent to all the living saints. For the day of their acknowledgment by God is the day when the wicked shall be burnt up root and branch. Zechariah had brought out the future of the people of Israel, and of all the families of the earth, as well as the complete overthrow and judgment of the nations who shall burden themselves with settling the final destiny of Jerusalem (14:, 12: 3). Malachi is concerned with the final scene on this world’s stage in the history of the two great classes in Israel-the righteous and the wicked. In Zechariah we behold more of the political, and in Malachi of the moral aspect, of matters concerning the people at the commencement of the day of the Lord. So by the son of Iddo is detailed what Judah and the inhabitants of Jerusalem will do against their enemies at that time; whilst Malachi restricts himself to apprising the faithful of the complete reversal of the general lot of the righteous and the wicked. The period for patient endurance of evil will have passed away, and those who shall have known oppression shall tread down the wicked, they shall be ashes under the soles of their feet (4: 3). The first dawning of that day it was not given to Malachi to write about, for the rise of the morning star is outside that range of prophetic truth in which the prophets of old moved. St. John speaks of it, for it concerns the church of God (Revelation 2:28; Revelation 22:16). Malachi speaks of the sunrise in which the earthly saints will be interested. And what a sunrise he can speak of, such a sun as never has risen upon earth-the Sun of Righteousness with healing in his wings. The wicked will experience its scorching heat burning them up most effectually, those who fear the Lord’s name will bask in that Sun’s rays, and flourish as calves of the stall. Now God makes the sun to rise on the evil and on the good; then for the wicked there will be devouring fire, but for the righteous the gladdening influence, undimmed by mists or clouds, of the beams of the Sun of Righteousness. The day of the ungodly’s prosperity will end when the day of the righteous begins. Here the prophet stops. But since he deals with moral classes, not nations or families, he closes his book in a fitting way, admonishing the godly to remember and obey the word, and to wait for the forerunner, the prophet Elijah. The effect of the word of God on hearts in the days of the post-captivity prophets, with their corresponding results, it has been attempted here to trace out. The proofs of faithfulness on these occasions we have seen differed widely; but the future placed before the people, whilst differing in many of its features, is in perfect keeping with the service each obediently rendered; and there is a principle, common to them all, a rule of general application, viz., that to souls subject to the divine word God’s mind can be more fully disclosed (Colossians 1:9). ======================================================================== CHAPTER 189: VOL 03 - THE WRITTEN WORD OF GOD ======================================================================== The Written Word of God GOD has spoken. As a fact, this is easily stated. As a truth, it is one of immense importance, and we learn from it that He willed not to abide in the solitude of His being without creatures to whom He might communicate of His thoughts, for all intelligent creatures, as well as all created things, owe their existence to His word. " By the word of the Lord were the heavens made, and all the host of them- by the breath of His mouth." " He spake, and it was. done. He commanded, and it stood fast" (Psalms 33:6-9). A graphic description of the power of that word-" He spake, and it was done." For who hath resisted His will? All, then, that we see around us was called into existence and order by His word, and we learn, as we survey the heavens above and the earth beneath, something of what were the conceptions in the mind of Jehovah, which in obedience to His mighty word took shape and form. But when did He first speak, and call creation into being? Who can tell us but Himself; and to Him are we indebted for all that we know, or can know about it. " In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth" (Genesis 1:1), is the simple statement of the Almighty One, made thousands of years ago for the instruction of His earthly people, called out from the nations to own and to maintain the truth of the unity of God (Deuteronomy 6:4). " He spake, and it was done." We look around, and see some of the results of that speaking in the heavenly bodies, created before the earth, and the atmosphere which surrounds us, were made for man, whom the Lord God intended to bring on the scene when the time should arrive in accordance with His purpose for the display of His glory, greatness, goodness, and love. This earth having, however, been reduced to chaos (for He formed it not empty, as Isaiah 45:18 really wrote; that is, not in the condition in which it was as described in Genesis 1:2), God spake again, and brought it into order, ready for His counsels to begin their accomplishment by the bringing in of man upon the scene. When God spake at the beginning no angel had been created. When He spake to bring this earth out of its chaotic state, the angelic hosts, eye-witnesses of what He did,, shouted for joy (Job 38:7). The power of His word was displayed as created things assumed their form, created beings appeared in all the activity of life, and at last the head of this creation, formed out of the dust of the ground, with the breath of life breathed into him by God, and so becoming a living soul, was seen in the garden of Eden, with his helpmeet by his side. Thus created things, animate and inanimate, brought into existence by God’s word, the earth prepared for man, with man himself and his partner on the scene, the invisible things of God were clearly seen, being understood by the things that were made, even His eternal power and Godhead (Romans 1:20). By His word of power God had so far revealed Himself. A Being at once absolute in power and excellent in working willed not to abide forever alone, but surrounded Himself with creatures animate and inanimate, with orders and ranks of intelligent creatures who could take delight in what He had done, finding their proper object of worship in Him, the Creator and the Holy One, and whose command it should be their freedom and their delight to obey. But rebellion wrought its dire work among the angelic hosts, and disobedience displayed itself in man, who was made in the image and likeness of God. Ere man was created the devil had fallen (Ezekiel 28:13-15), and ere the flood took place, apostasy had developed itself among the angels of God (Genesis 6:2; Jude 1:6). Divine power to deal with evil was therefore of necessity called forth, and men and angels experienced it. The apostate angels were cast into dens σιροῖς (not chains σειραῖς) of darkness (2 Peter 2:4); and the ungodly amongst men were cut off by the flood, and imprisoned in the other world (1 Peter 3:19) to await their righteous doom. Was this, then, all that was to be known of God? A Being almighty, beneficent, gracious, merciful, and yet just, and dealing in unsparing judgment with those who rebelled against Him? No. He was minded to make Himself known in another way, so in due time He sent His only-begotten Son, who is the Word of God (John 1:1), by whom He is declared to us (John 1:18), and seeing whom, men saw the Father; and knowing whom, they could know the Father (John 14:7-9). He is the Word of God, for by Him God has been declared to us. But there is a third way in which God has spoken to us, viz. by the written word, placing on record not only what He has done, and declaring to us what He is, as revealed by the Son, -the Word; but acquainting us also with that which He desires, and will do, for the instruction of all that shall hearken to Him. God’s works tell us something of what He is, but they cannot make known to us His purposes in the future. In the person of the Lord Jesus Christ God’s heart was opened up to us, and in His words the Father’s thoughts were expressed. None of us, how- ever, have seen God, or heard Him. Hence, for the abiding instruction of souls, God is pleased to communicate His thoughts in words which men may understand, and in such a way that they may trust implicitly to that which has been written. For the Scriptures are inspired, θεόπνευ??James 1:1-27:e. God-breathed. By revelation God’s mind is communicated to them to whom the revelation is made. By inspiration the person selected by God is enabled to express the truth in words chosen of the Holy Ghost, God thus providing for His truth to be transmitted without error or misconception on the part of the one chosen to communicate it; for the words in which it is expressed are the words selected by God. This David in the Old Testament, and Paul in the New Testament, have taught us. David tells us (2 Samuel 23:2), " The Spirit of the Lord spake by me, and His word was in, or on, my tongue;" and His tongue, he elsewhere states, was the pen of a ready writer (Psalms 45:1). What the Psalmist affirmed, Paul endorsed, and explained more at length (1 Corinthians 2:10-13). The truth, the Apostle tells us, was revealed to the writers by the Holy Ghost, and they understood it by the same Spirit given to them, and were guided to communicate it in words chosen of the Holy Ghost, " communicating," as we should probably better translate the Apostle’s statement, " spiritual things by spiritual means." That done, it was for the hearer or the reader to receive the truth. The Apostle then distinguishes between revelation, inspiration, and the inspired word being received by the hearer, and tells us that, differing from God’s servants of old (1 Peter 1:11-12), who had not always full understanding of that which they set forth, the person in Christian times was the intelligent communicator of that which he had received, and authoritatively set forth. How all this witnesses of God’s real desire for His intelligent creature man to become acquainted with the Divine communications! God has taken great pains, we may say it with reverence, that His mind should be correctly made known; but His mind cannot be apprehended by mere human intellect. " The natural man understandeth not the things of the Spirit of God, neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned" (1 Corinthians 2:14). Hence, with such a statement from God before us, we need not be surprised to learn that man steps in, and challenges the word of the Divine Being by His servants in denying the inspiration claimed for the Scriptures. Now, it should be remembered that it is from such as were guided of God to set forth the truth that we learn anything at all about inspiration. And the two witnesses whom we have adduced both assert that they expressed what they did in words chosen. of God. But if such be the case, says an objector, why have we different accounts of the inscription on the Cross? If the words of the sacred writers were taught them by the Holy Ghost, why do they not verbally agree in their statement of that which was placed by Pilate over the head of the Lord Jesus Christ? An answer to this objection is furnished by the Evangelists themselves. It was a trilingual inscription, and therefore probably not meant to be word for word the same in each language. What it actually was Luke and John profess to give us, whereas Matthew only professes to furnish his readers with the accusation made against the Lord. And they " set up over His head this accusation (αὀτία), written, This is Jesus, the king of the Jews;" so wrote the son of Alpheus (Matthew 27:37). Luke writes, " A superscription (έπιγραφὴ) also was written over Him in letters of Greek, Latin, and Hebrew, This is the King of the Jews " (23: 38). By John we are told that " Pilate wrote a title (τίτλος), and put it on the cross, and the writing was, Jesus the Nazoraean, the King of the Jews. This title then read many of the Jews, for the place where Jesus was crucified was nigh unto the city, and it was written in Hebrew, Greek, and Latin" (19: 19-20), or, according to some of the best uncial MSS. "in Hebrew, Latin, and Greek." Of this trilingual inscription Luke probably gives his readers the Greek one and John the Hebrew, since he mentions that first. For a Greek it would be enough to know that the crucified one laid claim to the throne of David. But to a Jew, and that a Palestinian one, the addition of Nazoraean would have a marked significance. The derision of a Greek would be excited as he thought of the king of the Jews ending His life on the cross (1 Corinthians 1:23). The contempt of the Jew would be stimulated as he was reminded of the connection of the crucified one with Nazareth. For the words of Nathaniel, recorded by John, tell us in what light that Galilean city was generally viewed (1: 46). This explanation, as it affects Luke and John, would be further strengthened could we build unhesitatingly on the clause in the former Gospel, " in letters of Greek, Latin, and Hebrew " (23: 38),. which is omitted by the uncial MSS. BC IL with sonic versions, and was struck out from the Codex Sinaiticus by a late corrector of that ancient copy. If we agree to omit the clause, we are of course deprived of its support to the view just expressed, but its omission in no way controverts it. There remains, then, only the Gospel of Mark, to which we have not referred. He tells us, " The superscription of his accusation (ἡ ἐπιγραφὴ τῆς αἰτίας αἠτοῦ was written over, The King of the Jews" (15: 26). Does Mark profess to give us the full inscription like Luke and John, or only the statement of the accusation like his brother Evangelist Matthew? If the former supposition be correct, it may well be the Latin one which he has recorded, and that would be quite in harmony with his habit of using so many Latin terms in his narrative. But without pronouncing definitely about Mark, since Matthew clearly does not profess to give us more than the charge against the Lord, there is nothing in what any of the Evangelists state to militate against the truth of inspiration as taught us by the Apostle of the Gentiles. Mark may well have given us the Latin inscription, Luke that which was in Greek, and John the Hebrew one. Another objection to the verbal inspiration of the Scriptures is based on the different accounts of Peter’s denial of the Lord Jesus. Here, again, attention to details and patient investigation helps to the unraveling of that which, to some, is a real difficulty. The history of the Apostle’s denial is given us by all four Evangelists (Matthew 26:34; Matthew 26:69-75; Mark 14:30; Mark 14:66-72; Luke 22:34; Luke 22:54-60; John 13:38; John 18:18-27). Now Matthew, Luke, and John wrote of one cockcrowing; Mark, on the other hand, tells us the Lord spoke of the cock crowing twice, which really did take place. Are these different statements irreconcilable? We think not. It may very possibly be that the three Evangelists above named give us the Lord’s rejoinder to Peter in a general way, whereas Mark, with his usual accuracy, has doubtless given us the exact answer made by the Master on this occasion; and if there be any truth in the tradition that Mark learned many things which he recounts from Peter, it would be only in keeping with it that he should have given us the exact words of Christ on this occasion, words which we may well believe were ever after indelibly fixed in Peter’s mind. Besides this, Mark gives us a clue to the meaning of the Lord’s answer as stated by the three Evangelists, in that he acquaints his readers with the special time of night called cockcrowing, a period between midnight and the early dawn (13: 35). The three Evangelists then turn our attention to that period of the night known as the cockcrowing, before which Peter would thrice deny the Lord, which really came true; but Mark, with his attention to details, gives us the full text of the Lord’s answer to Peter, and points out how accurately (14: 68, 72) all was fulfilled. And we learn from Luke that between the second and third denial nearly one hour elapsed. Hence the first crowing must have taken place some time before that period of the night called cockcrowing. Turning now to the actual denials of the Lord by Peter, is there anything in the different accounts to militate against the truth of the full inspiration of the Scriptures? From Matthew we learn that a damsel in the palace-court first addressed him, and he denied that he understood what she said. Another damsel subsequently addressed the bystanders, not Peter, and he denied, but Matthew does not say to whom, that he knew the Lord. Then the bystanders challenged him, and he denied again that he knew Christ. In Mark we read a damsel of the high priest’s house first challenged Peter in the court, when he assured her that he knew not what she said, but, evidently afraid of recognition, he went out into the vestibule, and the cock crew. Then a damsel addressed the bystanders, not Peter, and he denied that he was one of the disciples of Christ. At length, challenged by the bystanders, he denied again. Luke’s account is very different, but perfectly consistent. Sitting with the servants round the fire, by the light of it a damsel recognized him as a disciple of the Lord, but he denied it. Again challenged personally, but this time by a man, he denied his association with Christ. A third time challenged, and again by a man, he affirmed that he knew not what he said. According to John, the damsel doorkeeper first affirmed that he was of Christ’s disciples. Next those standing by repeated the question, but he would not acknowledge it. At last a kinsman of Malchus, whose ear Peter had cut off, averred that he had seen him in the garden with the Lord, but he stoutly again denied any association with Him. According, then, to Luke’s account and John’s, Peter was personally addressed three times, whereas from those of Matthew and Mark, we should only have known that he was directly spoken to twice. Do the Evangelists contradict each other? We think not. All agree that a woman first spoke to Peter. Then, whilst Matthew and Mark tell us of a woman addressing the bystanders, which elicited a second denial, Luke says that one of the men directly challenged him, and John states that the general company did. Doubtless the whole company, when told by the damsel, did accuse him; but Luke gives us only the direct charge of one of them. Then as to the third denial, Matthew and Mark tell us the general accusations of the company. Luke makes us acquainted with the fact that one man in particular challenged him, and John tells us who it was. All this seems natural, and the accounts do not really contradict one another. We can understand the general company receiving the damsel’s affirmation, and one of their number being prominent in taxing Peter with it, on which all joined in. it. Luke never asserts that only one man accosted him, nor do the other Evangelists affirm that it was merely a chorus of voices to which the Apostle replied. How helpful, too, the different accounts are for the full understanding of all that took place. Peter’s change of place between the first and second challenge Matthew and Mark have noticed, but Luke it is who gives us the explanation of it, in that the firelight had evidently betrayed him to the damsel, and he was aware of it. They had lit a fire in the court. And a certain maid having seen him sitting by the light, πρὸς τὸ φῶς, as the Evangelist mentions, and having earnestly looked at him, said, " This man was also with Him." How naturally all is related! No apparent attempt is made to harmonize the accounts, yet they can, we believe, be harmonized. Then John, the only disciple who was present as a looker-on, tells us who was the damsel who first spoke to Peter, viz. the porteress, and who was the man who personally elicited the third denial from the failing Apostle. And as Luke acquaints us with the lapse of nearly an hour between the second and third denial, John in his narrative interposes severalverses (18: 19-24) between them, recounting all that he gives us of the Lord’s examination before Caiaphas. We submit then that there is nothing really in the four different accounts of Peter’s denial to show that the words of Paul, already referred to, are not applicable to the writings of the Evangelists. Another class of objections against the true doctrine of inspiration is grounded on what are called the needless and unmeaning repetitions met with in the Scriptures, and we are pointed to Levit. 19: 9, 10, compared with chapter 23: 22, for an illustration in point. Why, it is asked, if the writer was guided in his words by the Holy Ghost, did he repeat himself, and on this occasion in such close proximity to the previous command? Such an objection betrays the ignorance of the objector as to the teaching of that twenty-third chapter of Leviticus, which may be called the sacred calendar of the people of Israel. The lawgiver has, it is true, repeated himself, but why? In Levit. 19: 9, 10, consideration for the poor and the needy in the time of harvest and vintage is pressed on all the children of Israel. In chapter 23. we have the outline of Israel’s history from Exodus to millennial rest, the chief features of which may be thus summed up:-Sheltered by blood from divine judgment, and redeemed out of Egypt, of which the Passover and the feast of unleavened bread reminded them; the wave sheaf was next to be offered, and the feast of weeks was to be kept. Thus far, the festivals of that sacred calendar have had their accomplishment in the death of the Lord Jesus Christ, the true paschal Lamb; in His resurrection on the first day of the week, the morrow after the Sabbath; and in the coming of the Holy Ghost in Pentecostal blessing. By and by, after the Church has been caught up (1 Thessalonians 4:15-17), but ere the Lord returns to reign, there will be found on earth souls converted by the testimony of God. To this Revelation 6:9; Revelation 6:7. refer; and of this Levit. 23: 22 typically treats. Then, Israel brought back to their land, the Feast of Trumpets will have received its accomplishment, and, atonement known by them, they will keep the real Feast of Tabernacles by enjoying millennial rest. We have thus sketched out, as we have said, the nation’s history from its commencement at the Exodus to its entrance into full and final blessing under the reign of their Messiah the Lord Jesus Christ. Now, if the lawgiver merely repeated what he had previously written, apart from divine guidance in the matter, why did he recapitulate the command in Levit. 19: 9 with the concluding clause of the following verse, and omit all notice here of the vintage? The omission of that points to method in his writing, and a sketching out of Israel’s history, which by no possibility could he have known by mere intuition. For the mention of the unreaped corners in the field teaches us that God was referring to that work of blessing on earth, which will take place after the Church’s departure, when souls will be in great numbers converted and owned as saints. Had the lawgiver brought in of his own accord the mention of the vintage there would have been confusion. Saints of God are likened to wheat, the produce of the harvest (Matthew 3:12; Matthew 13:38), but the vintage is only used as an emblem of unsparing judgment on the ungodly (Isaiah 3:1-26; Revelation 14:18-19). There was method and meaning in this repetition. And as none but God then knew the future, the lawgiver was really guided by the Spirit as to how much of what he had previously written in Levit. 19 should be incorporated in chapter 23. Had there, been no mention of the harvest field in the connection in which it appears, an important part of God’s ways with Israel, and Gentiles would have been, we can see, wholly passed over, causing thereby a real gap in the history of God’s ways on earth. That verse, however, just fills in what is wanted to complete the sketch, and surely tends to confirm the intelligent student of Scripture in the conviction that the lawgiver was guided of God in that which he wrote. But why should not God be at liberty to repeat Himself when and where He pleases? Are men to be allowed a freedom which is to be denied to the Almighty? He does repeat Himself in His Word, but for purposes which, when understood, only deepen the sense in the heart that the Scriptures are from God. Compare for instance Psalms 14:1-7 with Psalms 53:1-6; Psalms 40:13-17 with Psalms 70:1-5; Psalms 57:7-11; Psalms 60:5-12 with Psalms 108:1-13 Patient study of the word may be required to understand the reason of any repetition in the sacred pages; but where the soul reverently waits on God, light in due time, if it be His will, is accorded. But there are some true-hearted souls who may ask with a real desire to learn, How may we be assured that the Scriptures are the word of God? To this let us now turn. It would be strange, certainly, if God had spoken in language man could understand, and for man’s everlasting blessing, and yet had left him in real doubt as to whether or not he did possess a revelation from his Creator. God does not thus mock His creatures. He desires too that His children should have fellowship with Himself. But how can that be if we know not, cannot know for certain, what is His mind? No man knoweth the things of a man save the spirit of a man which is in him, even so the things of God knoweth no one, οὐδεὶς (not merely, no man), but the Spirit of God" (1 Corinthians 11:1-34). A revelation, therefore, is requisite, if any creature is to know them. Now God has chosen man, His people, amongst men, to have understanding of His mind. Wonderful privilege! Immense blessing! The thoughts and purposes of God hidden from ages and generations (1 Corinthians 2:9-10; Colossians 1:26) are now made manifest. But are those so deeply concerned in them to remain in uncertainty regarding God’s revelation of them? Oh no. How then, some may ask, shall we be sure about this? If we turn to Deuteronomy 18:21-22, we shall find a principle there enunciated of use to us. " If thou shalt say in thine heart, How shall we know the word which the Lord hath not spoken? When a prophet speaketh in the name of the Lord, if the thing follow not, nor come to pass, that is the thing which the Lord hath not spoken." Thus God guarded His people of old from being led away by pretended revelation. They were to judge of the word by the results. Now we can judge of it in a similar way. But for Israel it was the prophetic word of which they were thus to judge. With us it is the revelation God has given for our instruction and encouragemen’6 which we can test by this principle. For the word of God professes to act on souls in ways which are characteristic either of what God is, or of what He does, and these characteristic actings of the word are proofs that it is God’s word. First, God is the source of life. If we speak of the Father, He is called the living Father (John 6:57), having life in Himself (John 5:26), deriving His being from no one. If we think of the Son of God, we read, " In Him was life" (John 1:4), and He is the life of all who believe on Him. For " He that hath the Son hath life, and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life " (1 John 5:12). In keeping with this the word of God quickens. " Of His own will begat He us with the word of truth," wrote James (1: 18). " Being born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the word of God, which liveth and abideth forever," writes Peter (1 Peter 1:23). Now these two, themselves subjects of the quickening power of the word, have placed on record how it acts; and the Master Himself, who came from heaven, also declared this when He told Nicodemus that "Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God" (John 3:5); for water here is the emblem of the word of God. But this leads us to another acting of the word. It not only quickens, but it cleanses, acting on the soul as water does on the body. Hence we read, "Wherewithal shall a young man cleanse his way? By taking heed thereto, according to thy word" (Psalms 119:9). God is holy, and the man who is subject to the word is thereby cleansed from his old evil ways. And this the Lord Jesus fully corroborated, when he said to the eleven, " Now ye are clean through the word which I have spoken unto you" (John 15:3). Thus the Holy Ghost in the Old Testament affirmed how the word could act, and the Lord Jesus, speaking of the eleven after Judas had gone out, declared that it had really acted in this way on them. They were examples of the cleansing action of the divine word. But, thank God, they stand not alone in this, for the Lord Jesus Christ, the Head of His body, the Church, has cleansed (or cleanses) καθαρίσας it by the washing of water by the word (Ephesians 5:26). With this passage then before us we can understand the meaning of the figure used in John 3:5, where water is a symbol for the divine word. For the word showing the person what he ought to be, and in consequence manifesting to him what in himself and in his ways is contrary to God, he, if subject to its teaching, separates himself from that which by the word he learns is inconsistent with Christian life and practice. Thus the word cleanses. How it could act the Psalmist, as we have seen, long ago declared. How it acted on the eleven the Lord affirmed. And that it can effectually cleanse every soul which is subject to it, the ministry of the Lord Jesus Christ, described in Ephesians 5:1-33, plainly intimates. Further, the divine word enlightens, as the Psalmist also found, who has placed on record what it was to him. " Thy word," he wrote, " is a lamp unto my feet, and a light unto my path: " and again, " The entrance, or opening up, of thy words gives light: it gives understanding to the simple" (Psalms 119:105; Psalms 119:130). " God is light, and in Him is no darkness at all " (1 John 1:5). To that which He is the written word corresponds, and by its entrance into man’s heart enlightens him, and dwelling in the saint of God sheds light on his way. Nor is this all, for it can do what no word of man ever did, being " quick and powerful, and sharper than any two-edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart " (Hebrews 4:12). No instrument is like it, no weapon so sharp, no edge so fine, detecting as it does, for the instruction of him who is subject to it, that which comes from the soul, the emotional part of man, in contradistinction to that which comes from his spirit, and discerns the thoughts and intents of the heart. Nothing then is there in man’s innermost being which the word cannot search out and lay bare. And this is its action on the heart of a saint, who needs this application of it, as he pursues his path across the scene of this world. It is part of God’s provision for His people in the wilderness. What care on the part of God for His people! It is God’s prerogative to search the heart and try the reins. "Deceitful above all things and desperately wicked," as man’s heart is, who can know it? Man knows it not. How often has that been illustrated, as crimes, which at one time would have been abhorred as too bad to be committed, have afterward been registered against the memory on earth of such as have been left to carry out the desires of their nature (2 Kings 8:13). What, however, man does not know, God does; for it is His prerogative to search the heart (Jerem. 17: 9, 10). So His word acts in accordance with what He is and does, and thus proves whose word it really is. One other of its ’characteristics must be noticed ere we pass on. Born of the word, it is also the means by which the soul is instructed, and by which the believer grows unto salvation, as Peter most probably wrote (1 Peter 2:2). Arid to this Paul bore witness, as writing to Timothy he reminded him of the value of that inspired word, which was able to make souls wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus. Thus the word of God acts. It quickens, it cleanses, it enlightens, it discerns the thoughts and intents of the heart, and by it the saint, the child of God, becomes wise unto salvation. Its characteristic actings show whose word it is, for it acts in accordance with the nature and ways of God towards sinners and towards saints. Hence, each one who hears the gospel of the grace of God, and receives it, has proof in himself whose word it really is. The question then for the soul is not one for argument or intellectual apprehension, for the man himself who receives the truth is a living witness that the revelation is from God. And by and by those who now reject it will learn whose word they slighted on earth, when the prophetic announcement of the Savior is fulfilled, " He that rejecteth me, and receiveth not my words, hath one that judgeth him: for the word that I have spoken, the same shall judge him in the last day " (John 12:48). But, thank God, the person who learns that the word is of God through being quickened, cleansed, enlightened, and instructed by it, will never know that it is from God in the manner the Lord has described in His last appeal to the world in the Gospel by John. For it is from His last appeal, as given us in that Gospel that we have quoted, when, in the urgency of desire that souls should hear Him and live, He " cried and said, He that believeth on me, believeth not on me, but on Him that sent me. And he that seeth me seeth Him that sent me. I am come a light into the world, that whosoever believeth on me should not abide in darkness " (John 12:44-46). But what a solemn thought, that in the other world there will be no difference of opinion as to whether or not the written word is from God. The saints will know it, and be forever the proofs of it. The lost, who have heard it, will then know it, and will suffer forever because they rejected it. There is no real difficulty, then, for any one who desires now to know whether or not the word is of God. Its action on the heart which believes it, evidences from whom it comes. And since it is part of God’s provision for our wilderness journey, we may further inquire how we should make use of it? What answer can the Scriptures give us as to this? What principles are there that we should keep in mind when we study it? Now there is an incident related by Luke (10: 25) of a certain lawyer (his name is unknown to us), who, tempting the Lord Jesus, asked Him, " Master, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?" The Lord’s answer is instructive, and illustrates one important principle needed to be remembered in the study of the divine word. " What is written in the law-How readest thou? " was His reply. Had God spoken on that subject? Then there was no room for opinion. God had spoken, as the lawyer proved by quoting what the law had said, and the Lord intimated that it was enough. It answered his question. Impossible, morally impossible was it, that God had given a revelation to man, and for man, and omitted that which it was of the first importance for him to ’know. Now God had spoken, and what was wanted for that time the word of God contained. But more. If the Word has spoken, man has only to hear. Opinions of men can have no place where God’s mind for the creature has been declared. How much surely the Lord could have revealed, for He came from heaven. But He would not. And He made the lawyer own two important things, first, that if God gives a revelation, He does not omit what man has need to know for his real blessing; and secondly-and this is the reason that we especially turn to it--that when God has spoken, man cannot be allowed to have opinions or thoughts which are divergent from that which the Almighty has declared. The authority of the word is to be paramount. Another thing we must also bear in mind, and in that too the Lord instructs us. Dispensational teaching cannot be ignored, if we would rightly apprehend the bearing of the divine word. Judaism and Christianity are very different. Principles and practices in harmony with the one are not of necessity in harmony with the other. Law and grace must not be confounded. Kingdom truth, too, and Church truth must be kept distinct. For illustrations of dispensational differences we would point to the Lord’s instruction about divorces (Matthew 19:8), and to His teaching at the well of Sychar about acceptable worship (John 4:21-24). Dispensational differences then there are, and the teaching for those under law will not always do for those under grace. The want of seeing this has caused widespread confusion in Christendom, and the loss really to souls of what is proper Christian truth. Hence all that Judaizing, so rife in apostolic times, and so rife still, and which is based on the assumption that what God once revealed must be His mind for His people at all times and in all ages. One great evil of it the Epistle to the Galatians exposed. Turning to the observance of days, months, times, and years, the Galatian Christians were in principle going back to the idolatry out of which they had been brought, for they were turning again to weak and beggarly elements to which they desired again to be in bondage (Galatians 4:9); and if Judaizing was right, Christ, said the Apostle, is become the minister of sin (2: 17). In language clear, decided, but startling, does He expose it. For; teaching then against Judaizing we may turn to the Galatians. For that which guards against Ritualism we would point to the Hebrews. God’s mind therefore for His people in their own day is what souls have to seek after, and those Epistles just named, in common with the New Testament revelation, will furnish us with all that is wanted. The paramount authority of the word of God accepted, and the importance of dispensational teaching being admitted, another thing must be carefully borne in mind, viz. that the teaching of the word is that for which we are to search, and not merely to hunt for a text. Where God has definitely pronounced what is His mind in any text, of course every one should bow to it at once. But there are important points for which we may not be able to find a text, though we may, as taught of God, discern what is the truth about them from the teaching of a passage of the word. An instance in point we are furnished with in the Lord’s answer to the Sadducees, who denied the resurrection of the dead and the existence of angels and spirits. Coming to Him with a case, to their minds conclusive against it, He told them that they erred, not knowing the Scriptures, nor the power of God. Fools they were in limiting God’s power to the illustrations of it with which they were acquainted; arguing that man’s condition could never differ from that of which they had experience. But, further, they knew not the Scriptures. Often, doubtless, had its pages been searched by them and their opponents for proofs in support of their doctrine or against it. Had they overlooked a text which openly declared it? A text about it the law did not contain; but teaching about it was really to be found in a section of it, and the Lord drew it forth. "Now that the dead are raised even Moses showed at the bush (or perhaps in the section on the bush), when he called the Lord the God of Abraham, and the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. For He is not a God of the dead but of the living; for all live unto Him" (Luke 20:37-38). The effect of this answer on His questioners Matthew has related, for he tells us the Pharisees heard that the Lord Jesus had put the Sadducees to silence. In truth what could they say in answer? The Scriptures taught unhesitatingly the doctrine of the resurrection, though Moses had not formulated that truth in a text. What results beyond silencing them at the moment arose from the Lord’s answer we have no means of ascertaining, but the record of that incident will not be destitute of real results if we gather from it this principle, that to the teaching of Scripture we have to bow, though the doctrine in question may not be expressly stated in plain words in any one passage. Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob could not have ceased to exist, for the Lord declared He was, not He had been, their God, two centuries almost after Jacob had been laid in the patriarchal burying-place at Hebron. These three leading principles kept in view, we would now call our reader’s attention to the way God’s saints of old made use of His written word. The Old Testament saints studied it as well as those who lived in Christian times. Of this Jeremiah and Daniel are examples. Jeremiah evidently studied what had been written before him, and fed on the inspired word. Compare Jeremiah 4:2 with Psalms 72:17; Psalms 4:3 with Hos. 10:12; 7: 23 with Levit. 26:12; 10: 25 with Psalms 79:6-7; Psalms 11:5 with Exodus 3:8, Levit.20:24; 12: 4 with Psa. 107:34; 15: 14 with Deuteronomy 32:22; Deuteronomy 17:8 with Psa. 1:3; 20:10 with Psa. 20: 11,13; 48: 34 with Isa. 15:6; 48:44 with Isa. 24:17,18; 48:45, 46, with Numb. 21: 28, 29; 49:3 with Amos 1:15; 49: 27 with Amos 1: 4; 51: 58 with Habakkuk 2:13; Lament. 2: 15 with Psalms 1:2; Psalms 3:6 with Psa. 143:3; 5:19 with Psalms 102:12. How he delighted too in God’s word we gather from the manner in which he expressed himself to God when suffering for the truth, and feeling keenly his isolation in consequence. " 0 Lord, Thou knowest, remember me and visit me, and revenge me of my persecutors; take me not away in Thy longsuffering; know that for Thy sake I have suffered rebuke. Thy words were found, and I did eat them, and Thy word was unto me the joy and rejoicing of mine heart; for I am called by Thy name, 0 Lord God of hosts. I sat not in the assembly of the mockers, nor rejoiced; I sat alone because of Thy hand: for Thou hast filled me with indignation" (Jeremiah 15:15-17). What the divine word was in the Psalmist’s eyes he too tells the Lord. "Thy word is very pure, therefore Thy servant loveth it. I am small and greatly despised, yet do I not forget Thy precepts" (Psalms 119:140-141). These holy men were in the land of Israel’s possession, yet found support in their trials from what God had declared to them. So too Daniel, an exile, a captive, the witness by his condition of the nation’s sin, studied the Scriptures, and put implicit confidence in the divine statements. The authority of the written word he fully accepted, and awaited in the province of Babylon the fulfillment of God’s announcement by Jeremiah (Jeremiah 25:11; Jeremiah 27:6-7; Jeremiah 29:10) of the duration and termination of the captivity by Nebuchadnezzar. His condition in Babylon was a proof that the word by that prophet was of God; and understanding by books that the termination of the captivity was at hand, he prayed to God about the people, the city, and the sanctuary. Evidently the predictions by Jeremiah had been a light and comfort to him, and he reckoned on Jehovah’s faithfulness to that which had been declared. What grace on the part of God to give that word before the captivity began! What comfort and hope it must have afforded Daniel as he knew that which had been predicted! So he turned to speak to God about it, assured by the prophetic word of the favor for his people which then was close at hand. What had the people done to deserve such goodness?-nothing. But God had promised it, so Daniel expected it, and counted on it; and became in his turn the channel of divine communications for his people at a future day, who will learn, as he proved, the help the Scriptures can give when suffering righteously for their fathers’ sins (Daniel 9:24-27; Daniel 12:10). Turning to New Testament times, we are favored in Acts 15:1-41 with instruction most helpful to us of the way the apostles and elders assembled in council at Jerusalem received the written word, and got the required guidance from it. A question had been raised which really struck at the root of dispensational teaching. Converts from among the Gentiles were now numerous, for the. Lord had blessed amazingly the preaching of His word among them. Those ignorant of dispensational changes, and of the essential difference between Christianity and Judaism, were urging on those converts circumcision and the keeping of the law for salvation. To settle this question Paul and Barnabas went up, at the request, it would seem, of those gathered out at Antioch (Acts 15:2); though Paul’s visit to Jerusalem on this occasion and for this purpose was in consequence of a divine revelation (Galatians 2:2). The question was debated by the apostles and elders. It was a new one, an important one, and, as we learn from the Epistle to the Galatians, a vital one. A new revelation from God at that moment when gathered in council would of course have determined the controversy. But none was vouchsafed. No prophet on that occasion, speaking by the Spirit, communicated the mind of the Lord. But they had the written word, and that was to be sufficient, and that was found to be enough. To it James turned, quoting the prophet (Amos 9:11-12), who had already foretold that Gentiles would be converted, as he wrote, " And all the Gentiles upon whom My name is called" (Acts 15:17). Their conversion then was no afterthought of the divine mind, for the words of Amos were the words of the Lord, who " doeth these things known from the beginning," as James most likely really said.* (*This is the reading of BC. and of the Codex Sinaiticus.) But as to circumcising them, or putting them under the law of Moses, the written word was silent, though it was plain God intended that some from among Gentiles should be converted, and stand out as His people, His name being called on them. Then they accepted the silence of the word on the question raised as a settlement of it. What it did not enjoin, that they would not impose on the converts from the nations. Dispensational teaching therefore they quite accepted, and though no text could be quoted which treated of the matter on hand dogmatically, the tenor of the word they gathered from that to which James referred. So if Daniel rested on the faithfulness of God to His word, the apostles and elders owned its paramount authority, acknowledged dispensational teaching, and correctly discerned what it taught, though no formal text could be quoted to settle the controversy. The three principles, then, to which we have called attention above, the acts of the council at Jerusalem fully illustrate and endorse. But a further point comes out, and it is one to which all do well to take heed. Dispensational differences may necessitate changes in practice, and even call forth fresh revelations. God may alter His word, or it may for a time fall into abeyance should He be pleased to introduce any changes on earth; but unless He does cancel it, or announce such changes, that which He has once declared never becomes obsolete. He canceled His word to Adam in the garden with reference to the food of which he was to eat, when he had sinned and was driven out of Paradise (compare Genesis 1:29 with 3:18). Again God changed His ordinance about man’s food after the sweet savor of Noah’s burnt-offering had ascended up heavenward (Genesis 9:3-4). But the injunction against eating blood, given then to Noah and his sons, and through them really to all mankind, God has never canceled, nor modified. Hence that is binding on all men, and to be obeyed by those who are God’s children. To that the council at Jerusalem directed the attention of the Christians gathered out from amongst the nations. God’s word does not become obsolete by age, nor from lack of observance. But we can turn from examples furnished us by saints in the Old Testament and by saints in the New, to one of whom it was written, "Thy law is within my heart" (Psalms 40:8), and whose ear God wakened morning by morning to hear as the learned, 1:e. taught ones (Isaiah 1:4). Maintaining the paramount authority of God’s word by his answer to the lawyer, He wielded it as the sword of the Spirit in His conflict with Satan in the wilderness (Matthew 4:1-17). There hungry, His wants as yet unsupplied, the enemy suggested to Him to use His power, if the Son of God, to turn the stones into bread. Should the Son of God want for food in the wilderness? If He was the Son, why not minister to His own need. This was in principle the same snare as that by which the arch tempter had caught our first parents-viz, that God had not furnished those dependent on Him with all that they needed, and therefore they would be justified in caring for themselves. The Lord’s answer to this temptation was drawn from the armory of God’s word. " It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God." God had not spoken to Him to turn stones into bread, therefore He would not do it. When God was silent, He would not act. How fully was the Lord vindicated in this; for when the temptation was ended, and the devil had departed, foiled in all his efforts, angels came and minister d unto Him. God had not forgotten Him, nor was He left to care for Himself. Dependent, obedient, in due time His wants were supplied. But a second time the tempter assailed Him. The Lord had quoted Scripture (Deuteronomy 5:3), the devil would quote it also (Psalms 91:11-12). But one Scripture is not to be used to overturn another. What the devil had quoted was God’s word, but there was another Scripture with which the Lord would have come in conflict had he done that in support of which the Psalm was quoted. So the Lord replied to the enemy’s suggestion by the simple but forcible words, " It is written again, Thou shalt not tempt the Lord thy God " (Deuteronomy 6:16). The command addressed to Israel by Moses was binding still. A third time the devil tempted Him by the promise of all the kingdoms of the world, and their glory, if only He would worship him. Again the Lord answered him from the word (Deuteronomy 6:13). A positive command from God was not to be disobeyed." It is written; Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and Him only shalt thou serve." So where God had not spoken He would not act. One Scripture, He teaches us, is not to override another, unless God has distinctly intimated that the former one is no longer to be observed. And lastly, where God has spoken definitely there is an end of all controversy. How fully were those words of the Psalmist exemplified in the Lord Jesus in the wilderness, " By the word of Thy lips I have kept me from the paths of the destroyer" (Psalms 17:4). By that same word are saints to keep themselves still. Of this we are reminded in the valedictory address of Paul to the elders of Ephesus, in the writings of John and Jude, and in the Lord’s own address to the angel of the church in Sardis. At Ephesus Paul had labored, God had wrought by him in a marked way; but after his departure grievous wolves would come in, not sparing the flock, and from among themselves would men arise speaking perverse things, to draw away disciples after them. What ravages would be committed in the flock! Wolves from without, men speaking perverted things from within What were the elders to do under such circumstances? What was their resource? The Apostle tells them: " I commend you to God, and to the word of His grace, which is able to build you up, and to give you an inheritance among all them which are sanctified " (Acts 20:32). Paul was leaving them, but God would not pass away. Apostolic counsel and labors they might enjoy and witness no more; but the word of God remained the same. To that and to God he commended them, as all that was needed to build up their souls. Of God he had taught them, and that fully (20: 21, 24, 25, 27, 28); of repentance towards God he had witnessed both in public and private; to the gospel of God’s grace he had borne a full and clear testimony. Further, he had preached among them the kingdom, declared to them all the counsel of God, and taught them about His church purchased by the blood of Christ. Now no more to be with them as once he had been, he commends them to God, and the word of His grace, as all-sufficient under all circumstances. Development of truth he does not hint at. To God’s word he commended them. In the same spirit John, addressing the babes in Christ, conscious that it is the last hour, and with many antichrists around, exhorts, them to let that abide in them that they had heard from the beginning (1 John 2:24); for it was enough, and it was that which he, writing by the Spirit of God, was authorized to press on them; and, in truth, as he tells them, those who did not hear the apostles were not of God, whatever pretensions they might put forth to be teachers and leaders among the saints. " Hereby," he writes, " know we the spirit of truth, and the spirit of error" (1 John 4:6). Similarly Jude, in view of the apostasy, the elements of which he could discern already at work, warns Christians of it, and exhorts them to contend earnestly for the faith once delivered unto the saints (Jude 1:3). What had been delivered, that they were to contend for, and to build themselves up in it. The apostasy was coming on. God’s word, God’s truth, would be sufficient for them all. The apostates would turn from the truth. They were to keep by it; for the Divine word was a faithful one, and would surely be fulfilled; and of this he gives a striking and unique illustration, by quoting the prophecy of Enoch. Those who had heard that prophecy, and to whom it was primarily addressed, had all passed away. The flood had come on the world of the ungodly; but Enoch’s prophecy, hitherto unrecorded in the word, God had not forgotten, and from henceforth it would have a place in the sacred volume. For, as Jehovah was not now dealing in goodness with one nation to the exclusion of other nations from the enjoyment of the privileges and favors which He deigned to bestow, but was dealing in grace with man, and would come to judge the ungodly, the terms of Enoch’s prophecy were in harmony with the present ways and warnings of God. So that which Moses had not been commissioned to record, Jude was chosen to write down for the instruction of saints and for the warning of the ungodly. And now, for a moment, we would once more direct the reader’s attention to the instruction furnished us by the ways of the Lord Jesus Christ. We have seen how He used the word, and turned to it when he sojourned amongst men. We learn from His address to the angel of the church in Sardis what He thinks of it now that He is in glory. Deadness had come over that assembly, but He would minister to it to arouse it if possible. Had God failed in providing all that they required, that a state of deadness characterized them? Could they blame God for that condition for which the Lord rebuked them? No; all that was requisite they already possessed, but they had forgotten to make use of it. Hence His word to the angel, " Remember how thou hast received, and heard; and hold fast, and repent." That was all. He adds nothing to that which they already possessed, save His commendation of the faithful amongst them, His promise to the overcomer, and His word of warning for the impenitent. How persistently does God keep before His people the sufficiency of the written word, and the value of it! In it there is already provided all that individuals or assemblies need to walk by, and to be fruitful for God through the power of the Holy Ghost. We cannot do without it, but in it we can find all that we need to know of God’s mind for us, as Peter writes, " that we may grow thereby unto salvation" (1 Peter 2:2). If false teachers arise, we are to test them by the word. Since the apostasy is fast approaching, our resource is to keep close to the word. If a state of deadness characterizes those who profess to be Christians, minister to them the simple word of God. These are the lessons the apostles and the Lord Jesus Himself would impress on each one of us. In the spirit of this teaching Paul wrote his second letter to Timothy, his son in the faith, who, filling a position such as none but Titus, that we read of, ever occupied, viz. that of apostolic delegate, was, nevertheless, placed in circumstances very similar to those in which all God’s servants since his day have found themselves. He was not a channel made use of by the Spirit for the revelation of truth, but he heard what had been communicated through others; he received it, and was to keep it. Paul was shortly to leave earth, but Timothy would survive him. Thus the canon of Scripture comes down to that time when servants of Christ would be on earth, who had been taught indeed by apostles and prophets, but who were not themselves prophets in that sense of the word, and it views such as continuing on earth, and in service, when the apostles should have passed away. God’s wisdom is thus seen in not closing, the canon till such should be called out, and put into their respective spheres of service, and authoritatively addressed by one competent to do it, to tell them how they were to work, and from what sources they were to draw the instructions of which they had need. Of all this Timothy is an illustration for God’s saints as long as the church shall continue upon earth; for what was sufficient for him will also be sufficient for us. The freshness, devotedness, and life, depicted in the Acts as characterizing the early converts to Christianity, had begun to decline ere the apostles were removed (Revelation 2:4; Php 2:21). Peter, John, Jude, and Paul, all warn believers of that which was coming on the professing church, the seeds of which had already begun to germinate. Defection, desertion, declension, both John and Paul witnessed, and experienced from some who had been reckoned amongst the saints (3 John 1:9; 2 Timothy 1:15; 2 Timothy 4:10). The brightest, the unclouded days of the Church’s earthly history were already past, to be seen no longer. Faithful souls there still were, but amongst a mass of profession in which there were many who had life, but who lacked Christian firmness, faithfulness, and devotedness. Was Timothy then, when deprived of the Apostle’s counsel. and presence, to sink down to the level of the declension which was rife around him? That would not become -a true servant of Christ. So he was exhorted in Paul’s second letter to him, and the latest in the sacred canon that came from the aged Apostle, to stand his ground, and if need be even alone, though, thank God, he never could be, nor can any one of us ever be the only faithful soul upon earth. There will always be some who call on the Lord out of a pure heart (2 Timothy 2:22). What thoughts must have crowded into his mind if he looked on to the future. Weak in body, probably timid in character, and surely a man of warm affections (1 Timothy 5:23; 2 Timothy 1:4), the departure of the Apostle to be with Christ must have been to him a prospect, as far as he was concerned, anything but cheering. To him, -then, the Apostle writes exhorting him to maintain his ground, and to keep hold of the revealed mind of God. And how pointed are the exhortations! Evil men and seducers would wax worse and worse, deceiving and being deceived (2 Timothy 3:13). A prospect that was anything but cheering, and one not calculated to encourage a person of Timothy’s disposition. Men, too, would turn away their ears from the truth, and be turned unto fables (2 Timothy 4:4). From the outward aspect of things in the Church of God, what comfort indeed could he get? Should he become faint hearted and despairing? That would not befit the servant of Christ. Whatever others might do, "continue thou," writes the Apostle, " in the things which thou hast learned and hast been assured of, knowing of whom thou hast learned them" (2 Timothy 3:14). And again, " But watch thou in all things, endure afflictions, do the work of an evangelist, make full proof of thy ministry" (2 Timothy 4:5). Nothing was to shake him, or seduce him from the path of obedience. But who goeth to warfare at his own charges? or who enlists a soldier without providing him also with arms and ammunition? The weapon of Timothy’s warfare was the word of God. Of this he is reminded, and the importance of the divine revelation comes out in every chapter of this epistle. Paul was looking forward to his death, so he turns to Timothy to maintain the testimony (2 Timothy 4:1-6). " Have " or "hold fast," he writes " a form (or outline) of sound words which thou hast heard of me, in faith and love which is in Christ Jesus " (2 Timothy 1:13). Taught by Paul, he was to keep hold of that which he had been taught. Sound words he had heard of Paul. An outline of them he was to keep in faith and love which is in Christ Jesus. Apostolic teaching he was to remember, having a form, or outline, of the sound words which he had heard from Paul. The wisdom of such an injunction we can all understand, and the value of such a summary Christians in all ages have endorsed in principle. Creeds, articles of faith, confessions, are all admissions of the wisdom of the apostolic word, though all fall short of that full teaching of which Timothy was to have an outline. For it was not to be limited in scope or extent to that which man had apprehended. The outline was to be of sound words, which Timothy had heard from Paul-a real full summary of apostolic teaching. Such an outline we may boldly assert the church has not held from Timothy’s time to our own. The recovery of truths at different epochs in her history, and especially those brought out afresh from the word in our own time respecting the Holy Ghost, the Church of God, and even the full preaching of the gospel, warrant us fully in making that statement. But besides having an outline of apostolic teaching, the good deposit of the faith entrusted to him he was to keep by the Holy Ghost which dwelt in him. His responsibility is here pressed on him. The faith once delivered is to be kept. What we have is to be held fast (Revelation 3:11). Thus saints are held responsible to maintain the truth which they have received. So Timothy was to prove that he profited by intercourse with Paul. He was to keep the deposit entrusted to him Thus far we have what concerned himself. But what about others? Provision is next made for the transmission of sound teaching to them. " Thou therefore, my son, be strong in the- grace which is in Christ Jesus; and the things which thou hast heard of me among many witnesses, the same commit thou to faithful men, who shall be able to teach others also" (2 Timothy 2:1-2). Again, we may remark, there is no hint of development, or of further revelation. The things which he had heard of Paul among many witnesses, those he was to commit to faithful men, who in their turn would be able to teach others also. Thus God provided for the work to spread, but also for the preservation intact, if men continued faithful, of that teaching which had produced such marked effects. What Timothy had heard, and that among many witnesses, he was to hand on. So, if development is excluded, tradition also is shut out. What Timothy had heard from Paul he was to hand on, being attested as apostolic teaching by many witnesses. What care for the correct transmission of the truth have we here, coupled, however, with his responsibility and that of the attesting witnesses. Timothy was a recipient and a transmitter of true doctrine. He was not the originator of it, nor was it revealed to him. As such, then, he was to be careful. But the doctrine had not been hidden in a corner, nor under a bushel. Many witnesses could attest it. It had been openly, fully, and doubtless frequently set forth. When the Lord was going away, He told His disciples that the Holy Ghost would bring to their remembrance all that. He had said unto them (John 14:26). To Timothy no such promise was made. Then God intended to provide for the infallible setting forth of true Christian teaching. Having been once thus set forth, God’s servants are to keep it and hand it on. As a transmitter of truth care was to be exercised and pains taken, committing it to faithful men, who, in their turn, were to teach others also. For it is not authority but truth which Timothy was commissioned to hand on: what he had heard. One hears truth, one receives authority. Further, as a teacher of the truth he was to cut it in a straight line, ὀρθοτομεῖν (2 Timothy 2:15), a much needed and wise admonition. Quirks and fancies were to have no place where the truth was concerned. And surely he cut the word in a straight line when he took it simply as he found it, got from it what really was in it, and refrained from importing man’s ideas into the exposition of God’s truth. In so doing he would be a workman that needed not to be ashamed. How important is this injunction as to the right way of dealing with the word! It is the word of truth, and we can only learn the truth as we bow to the word in which it is expressed to us in words taught the sacred writer by the Holy Ghost. Hence there is no other source to which we can turn for the unfolding of the mind of God. But more: we have in the Scriptures all that is requisite to make us wise unto salvation, and that the man of God should be perfect, thoroughly furnished, or fitted, unto all good works (2 Timothy 3:15; 2 Timothy 3:17). Hence Timothy is told to preach it: " I charge thee before God, and the Lord Jesus Christ, who shall judge the quick and dead, and by His appearing and His kingdom; preach the word; be instant in season, out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort, with all long- suffering and doctrine " (4: 1, 2). The door was then open. It would not always remain open. Keeping the truth, handing it on, remembering the sufficiency of the written word, and preaching it, such were the Apostle’s exhortations to his child in the faith. Development the word knows nothing of. When God gave the law, He gave it all ere Moses died. When God revealed Christian truth, He revealed it all whilst the Apostles continued on earth. Going forward, as. John wrote to the elect lady, and abiding not in the doctrine of Christ, is not advancing in revelation, but pursuing the road which ends in perdition. It is apostasy (2 John 1:9). The doctrine of Christ has been fully revealed, though one may have much to learn about it from the word in which it has been unfolded. And we shall miss full instruction, and the full profit for our souls, if we study one part only of the Scriptures and neglect the rest. The Old Testament, Peter reminds us, is profitable, and should be kept hold of as much as the New. In the Old we read of the coming kingdom and glory. In the New we have in addition the Church’s hope (2 Peter 1:19). The one must not displace the other in our minds. Both are to be held fast. And when scoffers rise up in their scoffing to deny the promise of the Lord, their very reasoning, he tells us, evidences their willing ignorance of Scripture, the Old Testament part of which refutes their arguments, and opens up to us the future of this earth beyond the millennial reign of the Lord Jesus Christ, when the eternal state shall have begun (2 Peter 3:1-18) Man’s history from first to last, God’s counsels about His Son in connection with man, this earth, the universe, and above all for the display of His own glory, and of His ways in grace, with the triumph of His Son, and the final and abiding condition of men, both of the righteous and of the impenitent; these are subjects of divine revelation. So with man’s final destiny unfolded, and God’s supremacy re-established forever, the volume of inspiration brings to a close the history of time in relation to man, as far as God has opened it up to us. All then that man has need to know of his origin, his future, and his salvation, this book can tell him, and in this alone is it revealed to him. We have, therefore, attempted in this article to make it speak for itself, calling attention to the claim it puts forth as the inspired word of God, the proofs it affords that it is the Divine word, the way to use it as illustrated from its pages, and its all-sufficiency to guide the soul that will submit to it in the days of declension and of the denial of truth in which our lot is cast. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 190: VOL 03 - THOUGHTS ON JAS_1:1-27 ======================================================================== Thoughts onJames 1:1-27 THE epistle is addressed to the twelve tribes. The nation is seen as not yet finally rejected by God. James writes to those of the dispersion, that is, to the Jews scattered abroad among the Gentiles. Faith recognized the whole nation, as Elijah (1 Kings 18:31), and as Paul (Acts 26:7) did. Faith recognized it until the judgment of God should be accomplished. In order to understand the counsels and intentions of God, His assembly, the glory of Christ, and our position now in Him, we must read the writings of Paul. Here the patience of God towards His ancient people manifests itself, although James warns them that the Judge stands before the door. He makes a distinction, too, in the case of believers (2: 1), although not yet separated from the people; but their privileges are not mentioned. These they could not enjoy in the company of unbelieving Jews. But they could display in their midst the difference of the Christian life; and it is of this that James speaks. He does not call himself an apostle, though practically-not established as an elder, but in virtue of his personal influence-the head of those Christians who had not separated from Judaism. His thoughts are ever of them, and of the walk that becomes them in the midst of the nation. Peter, who writes to a part of the scattered Jews, does not speak of the nation, but calls believers the nation, and that in the midst of Gentiles (1 Peter 2:10-11). But James portrays the Christian walk as one that does not surpass what ought to have been found in the faithful of the old dispensation. It is apparent that he thought of Christians, but of Christians on the lowest step of the ladder that reaches up to heaven. But since as a fact we are on the earth, this epistle is most useful in marking the path and the spirit that ought to characterize our walk, no matter how great our heavenly privileges may be. If the light of our hearts be above, a lantern for our feet is not to be despised, and the more so because we are in the midst of a people professing Christianity, and calling themselves believers. The epistle puts the truth of this profession to the test. Whatever might be the association of these Christians with the people, the author of the epistle supposes faith in those whom he addresses; a faith, however, that might practically have been found in a Jew before believing in Jesus; still, with the addition of this belief, a true faith, produced by the work of God in the heart. As Paul himself, after descending from the height of the revelations accorded to him by God, recognizes the faith of Lois and Eunice, and likens the faith of Timothy to that of these women. But to examine the Epistle itself. Already at the outset, " temptations " were the proof of faith, the discipline of God in favor of believers (vers. 2, 12). As to position, they were associated with the people; and the object the writer had in view was the profession of the faith and knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ. We shall see that he apostrophizes those with whom they were united, warning believers against the spirit in which they walked. The Christian Jews were proved, persecuted. This also is what Peter speaks of in his epistle, encouraging them to endure with patience. James (like Paul, in Romans 5:1-21) exhorts them to count it all joy when they fall into divers temptations, and this for the same reason as that given by Paul. The trial of faith works patience. The will of man is broken; he has to await the operation of God; and learns his dependence on Him, and that he lives amid a scene where God only can produce the effect he desires, the conquest of the power of Satan. We may frequently desire (even when doing what is right) that the work might be hastened, that difficulties might disappear, and that we might be delivered from persecution; but it is God’s will that is good and wise, and not ours. The works that are done on the earth are wrought by Him.. Patience is the perfect fruit of obedience. Turn to what is said in Colossians 1:11 : " Strengthened with all might, according to His glorious power (what noble work should such power accomplish!), unto all patience and long-suffering with joyfulness." This is what is necessary to endure all without murmuring, and even with joy, since all comes from the hand of God. It is His will that sustains the heart, not our own. When the love of God is known, and the will broken, there is confidence in God; we know that all comes from Him, and that He makes all things work together for our greatest blessing. Thus the trial of faith works patience; but patience must have her perfect work, or self-will and confidence in self instead of in God, will be manifested. These work without God, and apart from His will; we cannot wait on Him; or in any case, impatience and the flesh show themselves in us. Job submitted for a long time, but patience had not her perfect work in him. Saul waited a long time for Samuel, but, not resting quietly till he came, lost the kingdom. He did not wait on the Lord with the feeling that he could do nothing without Him, and with his own will. Patience had not her perfect work. Now affliction is the trial of patience, the operation of God that acts for us outwardly, and in us by His grace; and when this work is accomplished, and we are perfectly submissive to God, and desire nothing apart from His will, we are perfect and entire, wanting nothing. Not that we have not to learn as to the knowledge of His will; the contrary is stated in the following verse (5); but the state of soul is perfect as to the will, as to our relationship with God; and He can then reveal His will, the only thing that we desire (see 1 Peter 1:6-7). In the Lord patience had her perfect work. The afflictions which He experienced in the world, He felt profoundly, and that more so than we do. He could weep over Jerusalem, and in view of the power of death, over the hearts of men; and the rejection of His love was a perpetual cause of sorrow to Him. He upbraids the cities wherein most of His mighty works had been done, but is perfect in His patience. " At that time Jesus answered and said, I thank Thee, 0 Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because Thou hast hid these things from the wise and prudent, and hast revealed them unto babes. Even so, Father, for so it seemed good in Thy sight" (Matthew 11:1-30) He upbraids, but at the same time gives thanks. The same thing may be seen in John 12:1-50 In both cases, His soul being perfectly in subjection to the will of His Father, expands with joy in the view of all that was the effect of His submission. Christ never failed of the wisdom of God. In us it is very possible that this may be wanting, even when the will is in subjection, and we desire to do the will of God. The promise then follows that, " if any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not, and it shall be given him" The absence of will, obedience, and the spirit of confidence in depending on and looking to God, characterize the new life. In the world we pass through tribulations; but this life is manifested in these qualities. But confidence must be exercised, or we can receive nothing. To distrust God is to dishonor Him. Such a man is double-minded, and like a wave of the sea, driven of the wind and tossed. He is unstable, because his heart is not in communion with the Lord; he does not live in a way to be able to know Him; and naturally, such an one is unstable. If a believer dwells with God, in nearness to Him, he knows Him, and understands His will; he will have none of his own; and will not desire to have any, not only from obedience, but because he has more confidence in the thoughts of God about him than he has in his own will. Faith in the goodness of God gives courage to seek and to do His will. In Christ Himself we have a perfect and lovely example of the principles of divine life. Tempted by Satan, He has no will of His own, and is not moved; but declares that "man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God." This is absolute and perfect obedience. The will of God was for Him not only the rule, but the only spring of action. Then, when the tempter desires Him to throw Himself from the temple in order to see if God would be true to His promises, Jesus will not consent. He is certain about it already, and waits quietly for the strength of God, when the opportunity shall present itself in the way of His will. This faith and this confidence, is the proof that the soul is in nearness to God, and that it dwells in intimacy and communion with Him. Such an one will know what it is to have the assurance that God hears his requests. This is what fashions the soul in the difficulties and trials of the present life, so that it can exclaim, "Blessed is the man that endureth temptation." Verses 9-11 are a kind of parenthesis. Though the new man belongs to the new creation, and is the first-fruits of it, yet here below he is in a world the glory of which passes away as the flower of the grass. Thus the brother of low estate is raised to communion with Christ, to the participation of His glory. And also in the world, no matter, how obscure his origin, he becomes the companion of all the brethren. "God hath chosen the poor of this world, rich in faith, and heirs of the kingdom which He hath promised to them that love Him." The rich own them as brothers, and meet at the Lord’s table, as possessors of the same privileges. On the other hand, the rich man, if faithful, cannot walk in the greatness and splendor of a world that has rejected the Lord. He becomes-for God has made him so-brother to the poor one who loves the Lord; together they enjoy the communion of the Spirit, and share the most precious things of life. They rejoice together, and the poor in his exaltation. Christ is not ashamed to call him brother. And in this title the rich glories far more than in all those that belong to him in the world. In the world this title is despised and counted as nothing. But he knows that the honor of this world passes away as the flower of the grass, and he rejoices in being the companion of those whom the Lord of glory owns as His. The world will fade away, and the spirit of the world is already gone for the heart of the spiritual Christian. He who takes the lowest place shall be great in the kingdom of God. All this is very far from the spirit of jealousy and envy that would pull down all that is above us. It is not selfishness, but the spirit of love that comes down to walk with the lowly, who are not of small esteem in God’s eyes, as Christ, who certainly had the right to govern, and be the first, came down to be with us, and made Himself a servant among His disciples. For us the glory of this world is nothing but vanity and mockery. Love delights to serve, selfishness to be served. The apostle returns to the character of the new man, for whom the life here below is a time of trial. He is happy when he passes through temptations, enduring them with patience. This is the normal state of’ the Christian (1 Peter 4:12). The desert is his pathway; patience here and glory afterward, his vocation. Tempted here, he remains faithful and steadfast by grace in tribulation and trial, afterward to inherit the crown of life that God bath promised to all them that love Him. Life that has not trials is not life; but he who is tried is blessed. Our life is not here below, though we are traversing the desert. We are on the journey, not entered into the rest, the promised life in Christ. In order that this life may be manifested, the affections must be set on the crown and the promised blessings. When we have the life of Christ in us, we ought to be exercised to have the heart detached from the things that surround us, and perpetually attract the attention of the flesh; so that we may not yield to them, but, ever resisting, the heart may be preserved by grace habitually in the way of holiness, enjoying heavenly things and communion with God. Now, trials endured with patience aid much in this object. A heart weaned from vanity is an. immense gain for the soul. If the world is dry and barren to it it turns the more readily to the fountain of living waters. There is another sense in which the word "temptation" is used. It is true that it always means trial; but that other kind of trial which springs from within-lust-is an entirely different thing. God may try us from without, in order to bless us; and He does so, as in the case of Abraham; but He is not in any wise the author of lust. When it is a case of sin, not of putting obedience and patience to the test, it is still on account of the state of the soul, so that it may be corrected, and enabled to make progress; but when lust is stirred up, we cannot say that it is God who tempts us. "For God cannot be tempted with evil, neither tempteth He any man; but every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust, and enticed." Christ Himself was tried by God in all His path, but the only result was a sweet smelling savor. Being come to do the will of His Father, He learned what obedience meant in this world of sin and enmity against God. Satan desired that his own will might be manifested in Him; but in vain. It is true that He was led by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted of the devil; but it was to conquer for us who were subjected by sin to his power. There was no lust in Him; but He could be, and was, hungry Jesus having been declared the Son of God by the voice from the Father, Satan in proposing to Him to command the stones to become bread, desires Him to abandon the position of a servant, which He had taken on Him in becoming man, and do His own will. Here we have a temptation of the enemy. The Lord remains in His perfection, and lives by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God. He is put to the test by God through sufferings; but no lust existed in Him. When Satan seeks to take advantage of His hunger-a need without sin, which even Christ had-He remains firm in perfect obedience, knowing no motive of action save His Father’s will. With us there are temptations that come from within, from lust; but these are altogether distinct from the trials that come from without, which prove the state of the heart, and subdue self- will when we are not perfectly subject to the will of God, when other motives direct the heart. James is always practical, and does not investigate the root of everything in the heart, as Paul does. He gives lust as the source from which actual sin springs. Paul shows that the sin of nature is the source of lust; an important distinction, which illustrates the object of the Holy Ghost in the Epistle of James, namely, the outward and practical life, as the evidence of the character of the life which owes its origin to the Word of God working, by faith. For James, lust-the first movement of a sinful nature, discovering its character-having conceived, brings forth sin, and sin, when it is finished, brings forth death. Such is the history of the operation of natural evil. James takes up its effect, Paul its source, so that we may know ourselves (Romans 7:8). Then, in opposition to lust, and showing the action of God, not to tempt, but on the contrary to produce good, James tells us that " every good gift, and every perfect gift is from above, and cometh down from the Father of lights, with whom is no variableness, neither shadow of turning. Of His own will begat He us (believers) with the word of truth, that we should be a kind of first-fruits of His creatures" (vers. 17, 18). He owns, as I have said, grace as the alone and divine spring of good in us; and that as born of God through faith, because it is by the word of truth. By this we are regenerated, and receive a new life, and that by the will of God. We belong to the new creation, and are the first-fruits of it. This is deepest blessing, true not only of a new position, though it is such, but of a new nature, which renders us capable of enjoying God. It does not speak of justice by grace, but of a nature altogether new, and that comes from God. Thus we are exhorted-self-will being broken, and confidence in the flesh being destroyed-to take the place of receiving everything by grace; to listen rather than to speak; to be slow to wrath, which is only the impatience of the old man, for the wrath of man worketh not the righteousness of God. The man taught of God is subject to Him. Laying aside all filthiness and superfluity of naughtiness, he receives with meekness the engrafted word. This is an important step, for it reveals the state of the man of God, and what influences him. The will of the flesh does not work in him, neither self-will; he listens to what God says, receives His word with meekness, and submits to it; then God engrafts the word into his heart. It is not purely knowledge, but the truth of God, His word, that can save the soul; it is the seed of divine life, and forms it. The word that sanctifies is engrafted in him, the plant is introduced by Him, the new man that can produce fruit for God. But it is necessary that this should be put in practice, that a man should be a doer, and not only a hearer of the word; otherwise he is like a man who beholds his natural face in a glass, and then, going away, forgets what manner of man he was. " But whoso looketh into the perfect law of liberty, and continueth therein, he being not a forgetful hearer, but a doer of the work, this man shall be blessed in his deed." Here we find an important expression, "the law of liberty." If I tell my child to stay quietly at home when he wants to go out, he may obey; but it is not a law of liberty; he gives up his will. But, if afterward, I say to him, " Go out where you like," he obeys; but this is a law of liberty, because his will and the law are at one, and go together. For Jesus the law of God was a law of liberty. He came to do His Father’s will, and desired nothing else. Blessed state! In Him was perfection, for us a blessed example. The law is a law of liberty when the will, the heart of man, all his desires, are perfectly in unison with the law imposed on him. In our case it is a law imposed by God, written on the heart. Thus with the new man it is as with the heart of Christ; he loves obedience and the will of God, because it is His will, and because he has a nature corresponding to what this will expresses. Since he is a partaker of the divine nature, he loves what God wills. Verse 26, etc. But there is a sign of what exists in the heart which betrays more than anything else what is in us. This is the tongue. He who is able to govern his tongue is a perfect man, and is able to bridle the whole body. The appearance of religion, if the tongue be not bridled, is but a vain show; and the man professing it deceives his own heart. True religion shows itself by love in the heart, and by purity, keeping it unspotted from the world. It thinks of others, of those in distress, in need of protection, of care and of the support of love, such as orphans and widows. The heart truly religious, full of the love of God, thinks as He does who moves it, of misery, of weakness, and of need. This is the true Christian character. The second feature of Christian life given by James is to be " unspotted from the world." The world is corrupted, lies in sin, has rejected the Savior, that is, God come in grace. It is not all that man was put out of the garden of Eden, because he was a sinner, that is true, and is sufficient for his condemnation. But there is yet more. God did much to restore him; He gave the promises to Abraham; called Israel to be His people; sent the prophets, and at last His only begotten Son. God Himself came in grace; but on the part of man, He was driven from the world. Therefore, God had to say, "Now is the judgment of this world." The last thing He could do was to send His Son, and this He did. " Having yet, therefore, one son, His well-beloved, He sent Him also last unto them, saying, They will reverence my Son. But those husbandmen said among themselves, This is the heir; come let us kill him, and the inheritance shall be ours. And they took him, and killed him, and cast him out of the vineyard." (Mark 12:1-44) The world is a world that has already rejected the Son of God. And where does it find its joy? In God or in Christ? No. In the pleasures of the flesh, in greatness, in riches, it seeks happiness without God, in order to avoid feeling His displeasure. It would not require to seek happiness in pleasure if it were really happy. Formed by God for Himself with the breath of life, man cannot be content with anything less than God. Read the history of Cain. He went out from the presence of the Lord, and dwelt in the land of the Nod.* Then he built a city, and called it after his son Enoch. Then Jabal was father of such as dwell in tents, and had cattle, the wealth of that time. And the name of his brother was Jubal, the father of all such as handle the harp and organ; and Zillah bore also Tubal-cain, an instructor of every artificer of brass and iron. (*Nod is the same word as vagabond in Genesis 4:14. Cain built a city where God had made him a vagabond. This is what man has done.) Such is the world and all its civilization. Without God, the need is felt to make it pleasant and beautiful. One may say, " But where is the harm in harps and organs?" There is none, certainly; the evil is in the heart of man who uses these things for his enjoyment without God, in order to forget Him, to flee from Him, to seek contentment in a world of sin, so that he may not feel his misery, his distance from God, and to hide himself in the corruption that reigns there. The refinement with which man surrounds himself too often only makes him glide insensibly into the corruption, which he even endeavors to conceal beneath a cloak of gladness. But the new man, born of God, and participating the divine nature, cannot find his delight in the world; he flees from that which shuts him out from God. Where flesh rejoices, and finds its pleasures, the spiritual life cannot find them. James speaks of corruption itself, but not as though a part were corrupt, and another pure. Corruption is there, and the Christian must keep himself unspotted from the world. The world is not pure; on the contrary, it is impure in its principles and in all its ways. He who is conformed to it is corrupt in his walk; the friendship of the world is enmity against God; and he who is the friend of the world is the enemy of God. It is necessary to keep unspotted from the world itself, and to go through it as epistles of Christ among men, pure from what surrounds us, as Christ was pure from the world that would not receive Him. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 191: VOL 03 - THOUGHTS ON JAS_2:1-26 ======================================================================== Thoughts onJames 2:1-26 IN the second chapter believers in the Lord Jesus Christ are clearly distinguished from other Jews. They must not have the faith of Christ, the Lord of glory, with respect of persons. To despise the poor was contrary to the law, which regarded all Israelites as the objects of God’s favor, the nation one before Him, and each as a member of the same race. It is, moreover, entirely contrary to the spirit of Christianity, which is characterized by humility, calls the poor happy, seeks greatness in heaven, and shows how the cross below answers to glory above. Faith has seen this Lord of glory in humiliation not having where to lay His head. The rich for the most part remained adverse to Christianity. They blasphemed the good name by which Christians were called, and brought its professors before the courts. God had chosen the poor of this world, rich in faith, the heirs of the kingdom. The same testimony is borne by Paul also " Not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called " (1 Corinthians 1:26). These three things are chains that bind the soul to this world. Grace can indeed break these chains, but that does not often happen. " It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God." These bonds are too strong; though with God all things are possible. James contrasts the Lord’s glory with the false glory of man in the world; for the fashion of it fadeth away. He dwells much on this point, as also does Peter. If in the assembly a difference be made between rich and poor, those who do so become judges of evil thoughts. Let us give God thanks, that at least in the church we can live together for heaven amid heavenly things, where the only true difference lies in the degree of spirituality, and not in the vanity of this world. We may remark here that the gathering is styled the " synagogue;" and this tells us how the thoughts of James still ran in the way of Jewish habits. But the fact that there was a distinction made between rich and poor, by which they were convinced of the law as transgressors, leads James to speak of the law. He mentions three laws: that of liberty, of which we have already spoken, the royal law, and law in the ordinary sense of the word. The royal law is, " Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself." He who does this does well. Then a much more important principle is added: that if we keep the whole law, and yet offend in one point, we are guilty of all. The reason of this is simple. When lust has moved us, we have transgressed the law, and despised the authority of Him who established it. We cannot suppose a man to have violated all the commandments. He who gave one gave all; and wherever the flesh and the will have been active, we have followed our own inclination, and despised the will of God. His law has been broken. Christianity requires that we should both speak and work as being free from the power of sin, to do the will of God in everything, and that His will should be ours also. We have been delivered from its yoke, we are truly free to walk in the footsteps of Jesus. Precious and holy liberty 1 It is liberty of a nature that finds its pleasure and joy in the will of God, and in obedience to Him. Now the Christian is free to do always the will of God, but he may wander from Him, and lose power and desire; but that only happens through negligence and unfaithfulness, and then all that he does and says will be judged according to law. This is an important truth. We may grow in the knowledge of the will of God, and be free to perform what we know; and the strength to do so is found in Christ. To this thought is added that of judgment, and the necessity of walking in grace. If we do not show mercy, judgment shall be without mercy. The same principle had been already laid down by the Lord, that the transgressions of those who forgive shall be pardoned. Unless the spirit of grace be in the heart, we cannot share in the grace that God has manifested towards men; and in the details of life, he who does not show mercy, may experience the chastisement of God; for it is in goodness and in love that God takes pleasure. Here works are insisted upon; and this is an important part of the epistle; not that it is of greater value than the other parts, but on account of the many arguments of men. This principle introduces the question of works. Love must be displayed not only in words but also in deeds. The spirit of James was practical, and yet full of the evil arising from the profession of Christianity, without the practical life corresponding to it; and he therefore blends the two principles in his observations, saying that love should be real, and that faith should be shown by the works which it produces. "If one of you say unto them, Depart in peace, be ye warmed and filled; notwithstanding ye give them not those things which are needful to the body; what doth it profit? Even so faith, if it hath not works, is dead, being alone." It certainly is not Christian faith, which is a mighty principle, the effect of the operation of the Holy Ghost in the heart, the spring which puts all the wheels in motion, which raises the heart above selfishness and all the base motives bf this world, and fixes the affections on Christ. He becomes the true motive of the heart; and, dwelling in us, is the source from which all our actions flow, so that we walk as He walked. Doubtless we are behind what He did; but the principle of our life is the same, and He is the same who dwells in us. It is obvious then, that true faith works by love, which produces good works; and this cannot be otherwise. But there is still another principle in this passage, which expresses itself in the words, " Show me." Faith is evidently a principle hidden in the heart. It cannot be seen, as the root cannot be seen from which the plants grow and produce fruit, drawing nourishment from the soil, as faith does from. Christ. But as without the root the plant cannot bring forth fruit, so without faith, good works cannot be produced. Some may be shown outwardly, however, which have no real value. Much may be given, and many may labor, without true love, without faith; but a life of love, that follows Christ, and does His will, that will being yet its own, cannot exist without faith. Now he who glories in faith, owns that it alone is good, and produces what is good. James says then, " Show me thy faith without thy works." But that is impossible. It is evident that it is a principle hidden in the heart, a simple profession without any reality. Sometimes we add hypocrisy, because education, and the influence of what surrounds us, as well as external proofs, may produce the mental habit of believing in Christianity and in its fundamental doctrines. But in such faith there is no bond with Christ, no spring of life eternal; though a man may not be openly an unbeliever, and may respect the name of Christ, yet this faith does not produce anything in the heart. Christ cannot trust him (John 2:23-25). As soon as true faith-that which is produced in the heart by grace through the action of the Holy Ghost-is known, a personal need of Christ, of possessing Him for one’s self, of hearing His voice, is experienced. This was what happened to Nicodemus, and led him to go in search of Christ; and observe that he felt that the world was against him, because we read that he went by night. Now as faith cannot itself be seen, he who boasts of it can reply nothing to him who says, " Show me thy faith." But he who has true works of love, cannot have them without faith, which is the divine instrument of Christian life in the heart, and is displayed in deeds of patience, purity, charity, and in separation from the world, although he is in it. He cannot move without the spring. Faith that looks only to Christ, and finds all in Him, manifests itself in this life, the life of faith. It is necessary to show our faith. To whom? To God? Certainly not. " Show me." It is to man, who cannot look into the heart as God can. All the reasoning of James, all his power, all his meaning, are centered in these two words, " Show me." He does not tell us of peace of conscience when justified by faith, since the Lord, the precious and beloved Savior, has borne all our sins, and was delivered for our offenses. Faith trusts to the efficacy of the work of Christ, and believes that God has received and accepted it as perfect satisfaction for the sins of believers; that it is a work which will never lose its value in His eyes, into whose presence Christ has entered, not without blood, that is His own, there to appear for us continually, being set down at the right hand of God, since all has been accomplished according to His glory, with regard to our sins, on the cross. Here, instead of vain and empty faith, it is a question of the profession of the name of Christ, of calling one’s self a Christian without having Christ in the heart. This is shown by works, by fruit. From the fruit it is seen that the tree is living, that the root is there, and that it draws its sap from Christ. Thus profession is justified before men, to whom it must be displayed by the fruit it produces. If we examine closely the examples given here, we shall find that it is not so much a question of good works in the ordinary sense, as of the trial of faith. The works here referred to as demonstrating faith are those of the same persons whom Paul cites; namely, Abraham, who was ready to offer up his only son when God required him to do so; and Rahab, who hid the spies, and sent them away in peace. Nothing could be stronger. Not only was Isaac an only son, but all the promises of God were centered in him; so that there must have been absolute confidence in God (see Hebrews 11:17-19). As a work of man, there was nothing good in slaying his son. If we consider Rahab’s act from a human point of view, she was faithless to her country, a traitress; but she joined the people of God when His enemies were yet in the fullness of their power, before the chosen race had gained a single victory, and when they had not even crossed the Jordan. Such was the faith that could count on God at whatever cost, and unite with His people when everything was against them. The faith of Abraham was simply faith in God, in His word; but it was shown to be absolute and without hesitation, when he offered up his beloved son, the subject of all the promises of God. The faith of Rahab was also a simple faith in God, but was displayed in identifying itself with the cause of God, when all the power was apparently on the other side, since God was not seen. In fact, to call oneself a believer and yet produce nothing, is not really faith. Faith realizes its object, and this object produces its effect in becoming the motive of the heart. He who receives the word is born again of incorruptible seed, and shares in the divine nature; and obedience, purity, and love are produced. It is true that we have still to overcome temptations and obstacles, and we are not all that we would be, neither all that we might be; but the life produces its fruits more or less. Though the heart be unfaithful in the Christian walk, through carelessness it may be, yet faith always produces its own fruits; and the Christian knows well that the faith that produces nothing is not true faith. Faith realizes the presence and the love of God known in a new nature, and enjoys both; and reflects, feebly is may be, the character of Him whom it enjoys. We are sons born of God, through faith in Jesus Christ. It is by faith, even though it be merely human, and not that of the divine life in us, that everything is done which is not purely instinctive. Why does the husbandman sow? Because he believes that he will reap. And thus it is with everything, except eating and drinking. For divine faith divine things have to be revealed to the soul; it is the work of the Spirit of God. Faith in God is what is acceptable to Him; but this faith-we being made alive by Him through His word-produces the fruits of the divine life. By means of this faith we have communion with God, with the Father, and with His Son, Jesus Christ our Lord; and He is not ashamed to call us His friends (John 15:1-27). Abraham was called the friend of God. In our relationships with the world we say only what is called for by the necessity of the moment; but that said, all is finished. But with an intimate friend we speak of things that have nothing to do with mere business, of all that concerns the heart. God did not speak to Abraham about the promises made to him when he is called the friend of God, but communicated to him all that He thought of doing, and the judgment of Sodom and Gomorrah. "The secret of the Lord is with them that fear Him." It is beautiful to see the intimacy into which one can enter with God when walking faithfully with Him (see Genesis 8:17-20). In Sodom the believer was saved, losing all, and living in uncertainty and misery, fearing the mountain (where Abraham dwelt, for the position of faith is always feared by unbelief), the mountain of Zoar, when he saw the terrible fate of the others. Then he finished by taking refuge in the mountain he had at first feared, and lived there in misery and shame. In Abraham we have the portrait of a believer who lives by faith; in Lot, that of a believer who takes the world, fair to look upon, as his portion. He inherited judgment, though he may be spared; while, after Lot’s departure, God bade Abraham lift up his eyes and behold the promised land, realize all its extent, and know, that all was his. Faith gives communion with the Father, and with His Son Jesus Christ, and the realization of all that belongs to us. It is not to be wondered at if it produces fruits desired by God. God gives us to live in nearness to Him, so that things not seen may work in our hearts; and that we may live in patience and in joy till the Lord shall come and introduce us to the place where there shall be no more need of faith, into the enjoyment of what faith believed in when yet unseen. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 192: VOL 03 - THOUGHTS ON JAS_3:1-18 ======================================================================== Thoughts onJames 3:1-18 JAMES recommends modesty in word, that we should not be many masters. When we do not know ourselves, it is much easier to teach others than to govern ourselves. Now the tongue is the surest token of what is in the heart. All of us fail in many things; but if we pretend to teach others, all our offenses become more serious, and deserve the greater condemnation. Lowliness of heart makes us slow to speak, waiting rather to be taught, and that others should express their thoughts. We should be more willing to learn than to teach. With this admonition, James begins a serious dissertation on the perils of the tongue. No man can tame it. As we have already remarked, it is the surest index to the heart. " Out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaketh." Many do more by hard words than they could by the hand. They often utter, moreover, light and vain words. James insists on having the will kept in check, that there should be no confidence in self, and that the carelessness of the flesh should be corrected by the fear of God. First, the Christian must not be too ready to teach. We must not be many masters, knowing that we shall receive the greater condemnation. Love seeks to edify the brethren, and the Spirit leads the humble to the exercise of their gifts. But it may be that a Christian likes to make himself heard, that he is not humble, and that he speaks because he has confidence in himself. Now this is not love, but rather self-love. We all fail in many things, and naturally, when we teach others, or at least pretend to do so, we are the more responsible, and our faults become the more grave. How can we teach others if we do not know how to walk faithfully ourselves? This is not the fear of God. If the conscience be not pure before God, it is impossible to set forth His grace and truth with His power, because we are not in His presence, and He is not with us. The first effect of His presence would be to stir up our conscience. He who teaches ought to keep himself in deepest humility, and watch so as not to stumble in his walk. This spirit of humility is not a want of confidence in God; on the contrary, it is united to confidence. A man in possession of such a spirit will not say of the Lord, " I knew Thou wert an hard man; " but self-confidence is absent, and he only speaks when it is the will of God. Then he does so in the power of His Spirit He is slow to speak, and waits on God, in order to do so with Him, But other important truths are contained in these words. First, we all fail in many ways. He who calls himself perfect deceives himself. It is not, necessarily, that we commit open sin, but that we do and say what is wrong in God’s sight. Our speech is not always according to grace seasoned with salt. There are failures. We cannot excuse ourselves because the Lord has said, " My grace is sufficient for you," and " My strength is made perfect in weakness." We do fail, however sad it may be to say so; and we have to own it. Walking with God, grace leads us to feel and confess it; and thus we shall walk in greater nearness to God, with more watchfulness and humility. and more in felt dependence on Him. There is yet another truth revealed in these words. This exhortation would not have been necessary if liberty to speak, according to, God’s direction, had not been possessed by all the brethren, in accordance with their gifts and the rules given in the word-for there are such. If one person had been appointed to speak, the exhortation would have been useless. This then is an exhortation to modesty, to quietness, to distrust of self, and to the fear of God. The question is one of the danger of failure, and of responsibility; but the thought of single ministry in the assembly is excluded. It is not asserted that a single individual cannot exercise a ministry that God may have confided to him; such ministry by one is permitted to each, if the Lord has supplied the necessary gift, but this must be according to the directions of the word. The activity of the flesh is reproved, and the liberty of the Holy Ghost demonstrated. The Lord makes use of each as He sees fit, whether by means of the permanent gifts of teachers, pastors, and evangelists, which will remain with us till the end, or by the ministry of each member in the place he has assigned to it. What is said regarding failure is in continuation of the discourse on the tongue, the best index to the heart, easily put in action, and following every impulse of the heart. Everything has been tamed, even wild beasts and reptiles; but no man has been able to tame the tongue; it is full of deadly poison. What James says is very strong, but, alas, very true. But if, in a practical way, we remember that the flesh is counted as dead, and we live by the Spirit, the tongue will be the expression of new impulses, or it may keep silence when grace ought to have nothing to say. There are many who, according to the flesh, would avoid inflicting a blow, who could not restrain a passionate or hard word against their neighbor; but if man cannot restrain the tongue, the grace of Christ can do it, because the inward man is under the Lord’s yoke, and is meek and humble. Christ fills his heart, and then, just because the tongue follows the impulses of the heart, his words express meekness and humility. But it is necessary that Christ only should fill the heart, and the flesh be held in check, so that when temptation comes, we may not be moved. It is difficult to avoid failure; but it is very useful to see how the tongue indicates what goes on inwardly, as the hands of a clock show the movement of the hidden works. It is good to observe the true character of the tongue as here defined. When James says, " Doth a fountain send forth at the same place sweet water and bitter?" he does not mean that it is not what happens in the case of the tongue, because it is this that he laments (vers. 9, 10), but that such an evil ought not to exist; it is contrary to nature itself. Then he goes on to show the character of the wise man endued with knowledge. He must show out of a good conversation his works with meekness and wisdom. Wisdom, or at least knowledge, that manifests itself in a spirit of envy and contention, is not divine wisdom. Divine wisdom cannot exist apart from the state of the heart, and meekness produced by grace, the consciousness of the presence of God, a broken will, and that which learns with Jesus meekness and humility of heart. " The wrath of man worketh not the righteousness of God." Wisdom that boasts and strives is earthly, sensual, devilish. It does not come from above, but shows itself in envy and strife, springs full of confusion and every evil work. The wisdom that comes from above depends on the consciousness of the presence of God, and on communion with Him, where the energy of nature is of no value, and where the spirit of dependence on God is shown. It knows that without Christ it can do nothing. The realization of God’s presence makes this wisdom first pure; and it cannot be otherwise if communion with God be known. This communion, which gives wisdom, is necessarily pure. The divine nature in us, realizing the presence of God, and dwelling in Him, discerns what suits God, and has the senses exercised to know good and evil. It is not precisely that good desires violence, but it does not dare to admit evil because it draws us away from God. " The wisdom that is from above is first pure, then peaceable," for the spirit of peace dwells in the heart. It is " gentle, easy to be entreated," subject, as to self-will, not seeking its own satisfaction, but ready to do the will of others, when this is not opposed to that of God. Then the activity of good unfolds itself in the heart; it is "full of mercy," and free from selfishness, because happy in God; feeling the misery of others, it produces the good fruits that flow from such sympathy. It is not disposed to strive, nor to find faults, defects, and failure in others or in their work, neither to criticize nor judge as though superior and capable of doing better. It walks, moreover, in simplicity and integrity of heart, not seeking the approbation of men, nor to appear anything but what it really is; it thinks not of itself, but simply of doing the will of God, and of pleasing others as its own greatest pleasure. Such is the lovely character of divine wisdom. It is well to remark how James always seeks to have self-will in the place of silence, so that it may be capable of doing that of God, and of manifesting the character that partakes of the divine nature-the character of Christ, God manifest in the flesh. He came not to do His own will, but the will of Him who had sent Him; and always submitted even to injustice and wrongs, doing good, and walking in quietness and in love. To do good, to suffer, and to have patience, is, says Peter, acceptable to God. Then love is free when self is dead. It walks in peace, and makes peace, and " the fruit of righteousness is sown in peace of them that make peace." Thus I understand these few words. " Blessed are the peacemakers (the procurers of peace) for they shall be called the sons of God." It is the reproduction of the peace and love of God in human walk, as those do in whom Christ is manifested here below. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 193: VOL 03 - THOUGHTS ON JAS_4:1-17 ======================================================================== Thoughts onJames 4:1-17 HAVING recommended the spirit of peace in the ways of Christians, James now inquires, "From whence come wars and fightings among you?" Here we must ask ourselves what " among you" means. It is not necessarily among Christians. Meekness and wisdom, a wisdom gentle and easy to be entreated, characterized the Christian (chap. 3:17). But, as we have already seen, these were still in the midst of the twelve tribes; and the latter are no doubt included in the words " among you." Christians, however, might become implicated in these contests; so that the exhortation applies to them also. This striving was the result of lust. The will was not broken, concupiscence tormented the heart, desiring to possess what it could not obtain; conscience silenced by the oppression of lust, the desires left free by the will, free rein was given to the passions. They killed, and desired to have, yet could not obtain; they fought and strove, but were not satisfied. Dependence on God was forgotten, and the will worked in its own way; they did not ask of God, or if they asked, it was only with the desire of making God subservient to their lusts. God does not answer such prayers. Sad state of man God was forgotten, and, still worse, the heart was enslaved by lust and under the yoke of concupiscence, far from peace and rest; war within, open sin without; without God in the world-the morning scene where these desires are enacted-or if God was known, He was forgotten by the rebellious heart. "For the friendship of the world is enmity against God." The Christian who is conformed to the world forgets that he has been purged from his old sins. He walks in forgetfulness of God in the ways of unbelievers, and conscience is deadened by the restraint of lust. When he asks of God, he does not receive, because he does so as a man of the world for the increase of Ails pleasures. It is not necessary to believe that all whom he calls " adulterers and adulteresses" were so in reality. There were many such sinners in the world, and others, though Christians, were walking in the same spirit of faithlessness to God, and so gave free rein to lust. This truly is not Christian walk; but when a Christian leaves the ways of God, and mixes with the world, he often becomes ashamed of his Christianity; he does not dare to confess the Lord’s name; then, conscience becoming hardened, he is soon as bad as, or worse than the world, having leapt over every barrier. Satan rejoices to see the name of Christ dishonored by those who bear it. But a principle of much importance is contained in this passage, "The friendship of the world is enmity with God, and whosoever will be the friend of the world is the enemy of God." This is a powerful testimony which judges our ways, and lays bare the heart. The world has proved its true character by rejecting and crucifying the Son of God. Man had already been tried without law, and under law; but when he had shown himself utterly bad without law, and had violated the law when he received it, then God Himself came in grace, making Himself man, in order to bring His love directly to the heart of man, by taking his nature. This was the last opportunity for the human heart. He came not to impute sin, but to reconcile the world with Himself. But the world would not receive Him, but showed itself to be under the power of Satan and of darkness. It saw and hated both Christ and His Father. The world is always the same; Satan is the prince of it; and all that goes on in it, the lust of the flesh, the lust of the eye, and the pride of life, are not of the Father, but of the world. The human heart, the flesh, is what it has always been since the fall, enmity against God. It is often thought and said that after the death of Christ, Satan was no longer the prince of the world, but it was precisely then that he showed himself to be the prince of it, by leading all men, Jews and Gentiles, to crucify the Savior. Though men may bear the name of Christ, yet the opposition of the world to His authority still remains unchanged. Only try, and you will see if the name of Christ is not dishonored. People may be taught to honor it, but it is not the less true that when in the enjoyment of the freedom of their will, they resist Christ, for fear of their pleasures being interfered with. If left to himself, man does think of Him; he does not wish to speak of the Savior, for he sees no beauty in Him that he should desire Him. He loves to do his own will, and does not wish the Lord to come and hinder him. He prefers vanity and pleasure. We have the true history of the world, and its practical principle in that of Cain. Having killed his brother, he was driven from the presence of God, despairing of grace, and refusing to humble himself. Through the judgment of God, he became a vagabond on the earth. But such a position was not pleasing to him. He therefore built a city in the land of Nod. Now " Nod " is only the Hebrew word for "vagabond." He established himself where God had made him a vagabond, and called the city by the name of his son, in order to perpetuate the greatness of his family. But it would have been insupportable for his city to be deprived of all the delights of life. He therefore added wealth to his son; then another member of the family invented musical instruments; and another was an instructor of every artificer in brass and iron. Such was the world, driven out by God, and seeking to render its position more agreeable without Him, and to find contentment at a distance from Him. Now by the coming of Christ, the state of man’s heart is brought to light, not only as seeking the pleasures of the flesh, but as enmity against God. Whatever might be the goodness of God, he would not be disturbed in the enjoyment of the pleasures of the world, nor submit to the authority of another, but insisted on possessing the world for himself, striving for its acquirement, and rending it out of the hands of those to whom it belonged. Now it is evident that "the friendship of the world is enmity against God." As far as possible, it has cast God out of the world. Man desires to be great in this world. We know that the world has crucified the Son of God, that it has found no beauty in the One in whom was all God’s delight. Not in vain the Scripture says, "The spirit that dwelleth in us lusteth only to envy." But on the other hand (and here we find the means of conquering it), " God resisteth the proud, but giveth more grace to the humble." This is the true secret of power and victory in the midst of the difficulties and opposition of the world. James again insists on humility, and that the will of man should be broken, and he himself in subjection to God. For obedience and absence of self-will is true humility; and to this the goodness and grace of God lead man. Confidence in God leads the soul to submit to Him. It is a duty and a necessity that this should be the case; but when confidence exists, it is done with willingness of heart. It is the truth of our relationship with God, and in this the soul finds happiness. We do not need a will of our own, when God, who loves us, has a will for us in all things. We ought to trust in Him. What grace that the all-powerful God should think always of us in every circumstance of our life! The devil is an enemy, who seeks to deceive us, raise up envy, and endeavors to get the better of us by means of our lusts. He may often stir up persecution in order to hinder us in the way of faithfulness; but in every day life he deceives us by things adapted to the flesh. If we suffer persecution, we should glory in it. " For unto you it is given," says the apostle Paul, "not only to believe on Him, but also to suffer for His sake." But the danger of Satan’s deceit always exists; it surrounds us continually. The important thing is that we should so live in communion with God, and according to the new man, that we may be able to detect the wiles of the devil, which are opposed to obedience to the will of God. It may be said that evil is only too apparent. When Satan proposed to the Lord to make bread of stones and eat, that was not an apparent evil. To eat when we are hungry does not seem wrong; but in that case it would have been disobedience. Satan could do nothing. To eat simply because we are hungry is an instinctive action, and has no reference to God. But we ought to do everything, even eating, in the name of Christ, giving God thanks. All is holy for us, if we realize the presence of God. Satan then cannot be hid when he resists obedience; and when discovered, he departs, knowing that he has met Him who has conquered him-Christ in us. The word of God is enough to enable us to walk in a path where Satan is powerless, where he is obliged to leave us, for there we discover his deceit, and learn that he is our enemy. This was the case with the Savior. He quoted the word of God, and the devil was silenced, but then sought to deceive Him by other means. He did not show himself openly; but the perfect obedience of Jesus deprived his snares of all power. But when Satan manifested his real character by offering Him worldly glory, He sent him away, and he departed. The Lord’s path is ours; His strength is ours; and if we walk with Him in obedience, His wisdom will be ours too. Only He has already vanquished the tempter. The difficulty is to walk sufficiently in communion with Him to be able to discern the snares. We need the whole armor of God. If the presence of. God is realized by the heart, and His Spirit governs it, if the feeling of dependence is active, we shall be conscious that what the enemy presents to us is not of God, and the will of the new man will refuse it. Once discovered and resisted, he has no more power; Jesus has conquered him for us. We learn that if we resist him, he will flee from us. He understands that he has met with the Spirit of Christ, and flees. The trouble is that we do not always resist. We accept his snares, because the will of God is not everything to us, and because we desire to please ourselves. If grace is known, obedience and dependence guard us from the attacks of the devil. Against the resistance of faith he has no power; he is manifested as Satan-the adversary-as when Jesus allowed Himself to be tempted for us, he fled before resistance. And he knows that it is the same that he meets in us. This is not the place to speak of the armor of God, but a few words may be useful. Everything in it, up to the sword, is connected with the state of the soul-the effect of truth in keeping it in good order and regulating its affections, and the conscience possessing all its strength according to the will of God; the breastplate of practical righteousness, so that the conscience may be pure; and in the walk, the feet shod with the preparation of the gospel of peace-this is conduct-bearing the stamp of the peace we enjoy in Christ. Then there is the confidence in God that produces these things, and that prevents the fiery darts of the wicked from harming us. " If God be for us, who can be against us?" Doubts and evil thoughts of God will not find entrance to the heart. The assurance of salvation enables us to lift up the head in battle with the enemy. Then we can take up the sword of the Spirit, the word of God, and use it in the conflict. Protected by the armor of God from the assaults of the enemy, we can be active in employing the word in the Lord’s service, always, however, in dependence on Him for aid. This dependence expresses itself in prayers and supplication. Let us then resist the devil, and he will flee from us. Verse 8. " Draw nigh to God, and He will draw nigh to you." Here the activity of the heart is shown in dependence. Thanks be to God we can draw near to Him His throne is for us a throne of grace. We can come before His face without fear, through His love, and, by the precious blood of Christ, enter into the holiest. In His presence we learn holiness, we discern His will; the eye sees clearly in this pure air, and submission is found in the heart. " The secret of the Lord is with them that fear Him." These walk with God, are taught of Him, and their whole body is full of light. Then He is with us, near to us, inspiring us with confidence. " If God be for us, who can be against us?" says the apostle. Not only is God’s power with us, but His presence produces liberty and confidence in the heart, since we feel that we possess the knowledge of His will, because He is with us. The consciousness of His presence produces joy, calmness, and courage in the presence of the enemy, and amid the difficulties of the way, we rest in Him. " Thou shalt hide them in the secret of Thy presence from the pride of man; Thou shalt keep them secretly in a pavilion from the strife of tongues." The presence of God, a true and real thing for the heart, keeps the conscience wakeful, and the heart full of quiet confidence. " Draw nigh to God." But in order to do so, the hands must be cleansed, and the heart purified, that we may not be double-minded. God is light, and must have purity and uprightness in the inward man. Full of goodness and condescension, He is ready to help the weak; but to the double-minded He turns a deaf ear. He must have a pure walk and a true heart in those who seek to be near Him. This cannot be otherwise; He keeps at a distance from those whose hearts are not open in His presence. He sees all, whatever it may be; but He desires a true heart, in order to listen to it. James, too, when he thinks of the foolish joy of this world, which leads to eternal ruin, calls upon those who have ears to hear, to be afflicted, and mourn, and weep; to turn their laughter into mourning, and their joy into heaviness. The intelligent soul of those who think of others, and have a heart moved by love-the Christian who shares in the Spirit, and therefore in the feelings of Christ, will be alive to the moral and actual misery which surrounds him; he will have joy in Christ, but sorrow with regard to the state of the men of the world. Sin has rendered the world unhappy and wretched, and on every hand the ills it has introduced are apparent; but nevertheless, the heart feels the goodness of God in the midst of everything, and rejoices in eternal salvation, and in the goodness that has secured it. It rejoices, too, in the daily blessings of God, but knows nothing of the foolish joy of the world, that seeks to conceal the void that is in the heart, or avoid by laughter the consciousness of its misery. But when the man of the world is alone, this void and frequently sorrow, make themselves felt; with his companions he forgets them in laughter; it does not suit them to recognize sorrow, or to concern themselves about it in others; they must make people think they are happy. The world cannot be truthful in public; sorrow and affliction are too true. The Lord could weep, but could not laugh. Love and Christian sense follow His example from the heart, and from the same feeling. James desires that the foolishness of the world should be exchanged for Christian feelings of love and of wisdom. In the following chapter, too, we shall see that judgment will shortly put an end to the false joy of the world. Here the exhortation is moral, there it is in connection with the close of this joy by the hand of the Lord. Ver. 10. " Humble yourselves in the sight of the Lord, and He shall lift you up." This is what Christ did (Php 2:1-30), and what He said. He who humbleth himself, the same shall be exalted. " God resisteth the proud, but giveth grace to the humble." Humility is becoming to man, to his littleness in God’s sight, in the consciousness of the greatness of His grace, and in that of all that he is in himself. The glory that awaits the Christian is also a source of humility to him, for he knows how unworthy of it he is; he knows that he can do nothing in divine things without God. But James speaks, thinking of the pride of the spirit of the world, which was found also in Christians, exhortingly, and desires not merely humility, but that they should humble themselves. The spirit of man springs up so easily, that it is necessary to humble ourselves, and realize the presence of God. Here we "shall be ever humble, have the consciousness of our own littleness, and think of God and not of ourselves. To exalt the proud would be only to encourage pride, which does not become sinful man, neither the pious man, for piety and pride cannot go together. But God takes pleasure in exalting the humble; and the elevation that comes from God is a source of gratitude and joy, and not of pride. It is found in God in the feeling of His goodness. When one humbles himself, it is in the sight of God, not of men-it is a true inward work that destroys his good opinion of himself, realizes the presence and greatness of God, gives Him His true place in the heart, and to Himself His own. Then all is true, and it is only then that he can work for God according to the truth. These verses (9 and 10) are the effect of the realization of the presence of God in a. world of sin and misery, in a heart that dwells there, and feels the two things. James sees that the world is full of evil, that it lies in wickedness, under the power of Satan, has rejected the Lord Jesus, that the friendship of it is enmity against God, and that he who will be its friend is the enemy of God. In the world lust finds that which nourishes it, and it desires to possess what it envies, or to appropriate what belongs to others. Self-will is lust; I governs this world. But God, working by grace in the heart of the Christian, can enable him to subdue both the world and lust. The proud who trusts in his own strength, and does only his own will, God resists; and He knows, too, how to humble such; but in His perfect goodness He gives grace to the humble. Precious gift, which by the feeling that divine strength is with us, and the knowledge of God’s favor and love, encourages hearts that may be cast down in view of all that surrounds them. A humble man is a happy man, and rejoices in the knowledge of the love of God resting on Him. One must also be subject to God. His will is not always pleasing to the heart, and does not agree with its desires; but it becomes the creature to submit.; and God is wise, and makes all things work together for good to them that love Him. His ways too are always the effect of grace towards us, so that it is our wisdom to submit to His hand. We have yet another great consolation; and this is that the adversary, the devil, has no power against us. If we resist him, he flees from us. If we listen to his wiles, he can and does deceive us; but Christ has vanquished him; and if we resist him simply and faithfully with an upright heart, he discovers that he has met with Christ, and so flees, unable to accomplish anything-unable to enter into the sanctuary of the heart where Christ dwells. How great this consolation and blessing, beyond all telling! Though feeble, yet if we have Christ as our support, we can conquer all our enemies; and God gives all the grace that is needful to us. His strength is enough against the power of the enemy. Moreover, we must draw nigh to God. Little by little, we learn our dependence on Him; but the danger of going on independently always exists; and God desires that we should feel the necessity of seeking Him, and that the heart should be active in doing so. This, no doubt, is the effect of grace; but grace works in us to produce the will; and dependence on, and trust in, God are expressed in our drawing nigh to Him. These things form the link between the heart and God, and. He never fails to respond to them. As confidence grows, one loves increasingly the dependence that recognizes the perfect love of God, and the precious truth that He withdraws not His eyes from the righteous; that in His great goodness, full of condescension, He is occupied with every circumstance of our life, our individual character, and our difficulties, and that He does not consider it beneath Him to think of us, no matter how insignificant we may be, nor of all that concerns us. Though He may make us wait, in order that faith may be exercised, yet He never fails to answer. Daniel had to wait three weeks; but the answer came, and his heart was satisfied by the communication of the perfect goodness of God towards His people, and by the promise of the coming of Christ. God draws nigh to us-what great and precious grace! The heart adores and loses itself in the love of God in which now it dwells; and which is an unfailing support of its confidence. That which follows contains particular precepts, rather than a continued argument. Sinners are to cleanse their hands, and those that are double-minded to purify their hearts; their conduct is to be simple and pure, so that they may be blessed of God. The conduct must not be unjust nor crooked, nor must the heart be vacillating between the world and the Lord, for then we can expect neither happiness in the heart nor blessing from God. In a corrupt and evil world the Christian walk is not suited to the laughter and joy of the flesh. Judgment was ready to fall on the Jewish nation and on the world. It was needful, therefore, that laughter should be turned into mourning and joy into heaviness. James then exhorts those to whom he writes to humble themselves in the sight of the Lord, and He shall lift them up. He feels deeply the worldly folly of men, and even of Christians, who walk in the spirit of the world, mixed up with it, not only as to the body, but in heart and ways. Such a walk does not become a Christian. The fear of God, and the fact that the world has crucified the Lord, makes the judgment that awaits it present to him, although he does not know at what moment it will be executed. It is better, far better, that his heart should be attracted by a glorified Lord-the bright and morning star-and by the things which are above; but if he be inclined to walk with and as the world, then the world gains power over him, and he has to be brought to feel that the end of it and the judgment of God are approaching, and to listen to the voice and warnings of God which announce that "the day shall come as a thief in the night." If he listen, the Lord will lift him up and bless him. But who, that has not listened, shall be able to endure the day when He comes to judge? To the Christian, however, the coming of the Lord is another thing. He will come, He tells us Himself, to take us, to catch us up in the air, to receive us into His Father’s house, whither He is gone to prepare our heavenly and eternal abode. " Speak not evil," says our Epistle, " one of another." This is a precept that would restrain many tongues if they were obedient, and would put an end to much evil. Love could not do so; but the tongue, as we have seen, is an unruly evil, full of deadly poison, and can kindle a very great matter. But further, he who speaks evil of his brother, and judges his brother, speaks evil of the law, and judges the law; because the law gives us the brother as the object of the love of God, and not that he may be persecuted, evilly spoken of, and degraded in the sight of others. Such an one forgets the position in which the law has placed the brother. If we take the place of judges and legislators, we place ourselves above the law; we transgress it, and do not obey it, nor follow its precepts. "There is one Lawgiver, who is able to save and to destroy." Who are we to judge others? The word also condemns false trust in the purposes of our own hearts. The human heart, at a distance from God, thinks that it can direct its own steps, and decide, without thinking either of His will or of Himself, what it will do. Perhaps the thing may not be evil, and does not make the conscience uneasy; but God is totally forgotten. Man acts ’without God, as though the world were given up to him, as though God had retired from the scene, and His will went for nothing. Such a man, as to religion, as to his duty in practical things of every-day life, lives in atheism. God does not enter into his thoughts. Riches, worldly ambition, though he may not be living in evil pleasures, are what govern his heart. He does not realize that he belongs to God, bought, if he be a Christian, with the precious blood of Christ; he lays his plans according to his own will, his own wisdom, and his own worldly interest. God is unthought of; and without God in the world, he seeks earthly things, and in fact is not where God dwells. If we labor to obtain what is necessary, this is according to the will of God, and we can ask His blessing. Here, however, it is not a question of this, but of the man who disposes of his time, and seeks gain for himself, without looking to God, or waiting for His direction, or the manifestation of His will. ’ But man does not know what the morrow may bring forth; he does not know that his life will continue for another day. " It is a vapor that appeareth for a little while, and then vanisheth away." Such is life here below. We ought to say, " If the Lord will, we shall live, and do this, or that." All this boasting is evil. James, always and everywhere, opposes the pretensions of the will of man; he insists that it should be broken, and that man should take his true place of obedience and submission. God must have His place, and man be dependent and obedient. All the activity, and all the pretensions of man’s own will are evil. There is another important principle at the close of this chapter. The will of man is always evil. Where understanding to do good exists, and yet is not done, the heart, or at least the state of the man, is evil. Grace and love are wanting. Self- interest, self-will, and the satisfaction of his own will, characterize the natural man; doing of good, desire for the well-being of others, and the service of others, are the fruits of love. When the understanding of what is good exists, and the opportunity of doing it presents itself, if a man does not do it, it is a sign that his heart is evil; the love of others and the desire of doing good are wanting. Not to do good is evil; it shows the absence of grace, and the activity of self-will. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 194: VOL 03 - THOUGHTS ON JAS_5:1-20 ======================================================================== Thoughts onJames 5:1-20 THE portion of the faithful is not in this world. Christ has acquired them for Himself, that they might be fashioned like unto His glorious body, and be co-heirs with Him; for His love desires that they should enjoy all that He Himself enjoys. His love is perfect. It is a great privilege to be called to suffer for Him; but this is not the portion of all. Still, " all that will live godly in Christ Jesus shall suffer persecution" (2 Timothy 3:12). It is not possible to avoid suffering with Him; for if we have the Spirit of Christ, we feel as He did. Holiness suffers in view of the sin that exists everywhere, and also of the state of the Church of God and His own, as well as from the misery that surrounds us, and the blindness of souls that will have neither Christ nor salvation. Each must bear his cross; and God allows us to suffer, for by this means we learn patience, and that our inheritance is not below. Experience, the realization of practical truth, is established in the heart, and hope becomes brighter and stronger. This of course supposes that the love of God is shed abroad in the heart by the Holy Ghost. If this be not the case, God allows sufferings to come, and even sends them, in order to restore the heart. Those whom He loves He rebukes and chastens. James denounces the rich who possess this world’s goods, but give no thought to the poor; while " blessed is he that considereth the poor; the Lord will deliver him in time of trouble " (Psalms 41:1). He who despises the poor because of their poverty, despises the Lord Himself. " I am poor and needy," says the Lord in the Psalm preceding that from which the words above are quoted. The Lord pronounced His blessing on the poor to whom the gospel had been preached. It was a sign of the Messiah. We all know that a poor man may be just as bad as a rich man; but riches are a positive danger for us, because they encourage pride, and tend to keep us apart from the poor, with whom the Lord associated in the world. " Though He was rich, yet for our sakes He became poor, that we through His poverty might be made rich." But here the rich went to still greater lengths in evil; they oppressed the poor, they had not paid the hire of those who labored for them. This brings us into the presence of the last days. But the cries of the poor had entered into the ears of the Lord of Sabbaoth. The rich are bidden to weep and howl for the miseries coming upon them. They had lived on the earth in pleasure and in wantonness. And not only this; but when living in pleasure, man does not like any one to come in and disturb his contentment. And this was why he condemned and slew the Just One. He had not resisted them; but they desired to secure the enjoyment of this world, amid that false peace that thinks neither of God, nor of judgment, nor yet of death. When conscience is stirred up, then men are disturbed; but these had hardened their hearts that they might not be awakened. For a moment God does not change the course of the world. If He were to do so, He would have to execute judgment, instead of laboring in love for the wicked and for sinners. Though He will not yet strike, yet the accomplishment of His promise is not delayed; but He is longsuffering, not willing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance. Christians, therefore, must not let their hearts be discouraged, but continue patient and submissive to the evil around them, till the Lord come. As Christ Himself suffered, doing good, and yet was patient, so must the Christian follow in His footsteps. Our portion is not in this world; if we suffer doing good, this is acceptable to God, and still more so, if it be for Christ’s sake. The Savior’s life was nothing but suffering and patience; but now He is glorified at the right hand of God. Soon He will come again to this world in the glory of the Father, in His own, and in that of the angels; and then He shall be " glorified in His saints, and admired in all them that believe." At that glorious day, when the poorest of His people, those who have been oppressed by the enemies of the truth, shall be like the Lord Himself in glory, we shall rejoice in having been able to suffer for Him, and in having been patient and silent in the unjust sorrows of the Christian life. Then blessed are they whom He shall find watching, for " He shall gird Himself, and make them sit down to meat, and will come forth and serve them." What joy! what grace! It will be the glory of the Savior to bring us into the enjoyment of the blessings of the Father’s house, and to make us receive them from His own hand. It is worth suffering a little, and for a little while, for Him, and then to possess heavenly blessings, communicated to us by the hand and from the heart of Jesus Himself. We shall reign with Him-our prize for the work given us to do for Him here; if it were only a cup of water given in the name of Jesus, it shall in no wise lose its reward. But much better will it be to sit in peaceful enjoyment of the eternal blessings of the Father’s house, which Christ will minister to us abundantly, in precious token of His approval and of His love. Here let us notice that the coming of the Lord was a present hope. Those who were oppressed were to be patient till this coming. " Be ye also patient," says James; " stablish your hearts, for the coming of the Lord draweth nigh." " They were then deceived," some one will say. Certainly not. It is quite possible that we may die before His coming, and this was the case with them. But they will reap the fruit of their patience when the Lord does come. Already, at this moment, they are with Him, absent from the body, present with the Lord; and then they shall enjoy the fruit of the sufferings they endured with patience for His name’s sake, seeking to glorify Him here below. But this exhortation clearly shows that this hope was a present thing, entering into all the thread of the Christian life. It was not merely an idea in the mind, a matter of knowledge, or a dogma of faith only. They were personally expecting the Lord; and what a comfort this was to the poor and the oppressed! What a check to the rich to be always expecting the Lord-to know that He is coming soon, that then sorrows shall cease, and we shall be forever with Him who has loved us. Nothing effects detachment from the world like the expectation of the Lord. I do not say the doctrine of His coming, but the true expectation of the Lord. His coming detaches us from it forever; and the heart waits till He comes. The Lord’s supper expresses the Christian position-the Lord’s death when He came the first time, which we celebrate with thanksgiving, remembering Him who has loved us, and feeding on His love, till He shall come to take is to be with Himself. It is the outward expression of the practical state of the Christian as a Christian, of Christianity itself; but it is only by the Holy Ghost that we can show forth His death in truth. There is still another point worthy of notice in this exhortation. " Be patient therefore, brethren." We are always waiting, if we have really understood our position; but whatever our desires may be, we cannot command the Lord to come, neither can we know when He will come. All His body, His bride, must be formed, every member must be present, converted and sealed by the Holy Ghost. Then He will come to take us. Christ Himself is now seated on the Father’s throne, not yet on His own. He also is waiting at this moment, and certainly with greater love than we do. This is why the "patience of Christ" is spoken of. This is the true meaning of the words in Revelation 1:9, and also in chapter 3:10, " Because thou hast kept the word of My patience;" and again in 2 Thessalonians 3:5, " Into the patience of Christ." The word is the same in these three passages. We learn also, in the Epistle to the Hebrews (10:12), that Christ is set down at the right hand of God; and, moreover, that He is expecting till His enemies be made His footstool. We may well expect, if Christ expects; though for us it may be in suffering and conflict. He awaits the moment when He will come to reign, and bring full blessing to His own, whether in heaven or whether on the earth, and banish evil from both places. It is needful then to have patience, so that neither will, nor weariness in the conflict may take possession of the soul. It is certain that God’s time is the best, that which divine wisdom and love may appoint. We have the affections set on the Lord and on things above, so that we may look for Him with desire, yet with broken will and firm faith, leaving His return to the decision of God. We cannot hasten Him; but the heart must have perfect trust in His love. Sure it is that the Lord waits with more love than that with which we expect Him, calm in trust, and patient in our walk through the wilderness. It is sweet to wait for Christ, for fullness of joy with Him. Thanks be to God, He " draweth nigh." Two practical consequences are drawn by James from this expectation of the Lord. First, the Christian must not resist evil. The Just One did not do so. He must wait with patience, as the husbandman waits for the precious fruit of the earth, and has long patience for the early and the latter rain-the Lord’s means of bringing the fruit of His harvest to perfection. The Christian must stablish his heart amid the vicissitudes of life and the persecutions of the world, the constant enemy of the Lord, thinking ever of his expectation. James then exhorts the disciples not to walk in a spirit of complaint and strife one against another. If we expect the Lord, the spirit is quiet and contented; persecution does not irritate us; and we sustain with patience the ills of the desert, resisting as Christ resisted, suffering and enduring wrong, ever trustful in God. We are content and calm with a happy and benevolent spirit, for it is easy for a happy heart to be benevolent. The coming of the Lord will put everything in order, and our happiness is elsewhere. Paul says, " Let your moderation be known unto all men. The Lord is at hand" (Php 4:5). What a real, powerful, and actual thing was the expectation of the Lord! What power it exercised over the heart! " The judge standeth before the door." Then examples are given. The prophets were examples of affliction and of patience. They loved and counted happy them that endured. They were not alone. Others had suffered patiently, and were counted happy. For example, if we see one suffer for the name of Jesus in this world unjustly, if he is patient, meek, his heart forgiving those who persecute him, rather than irritated against them, we see then the power of faith and confidence in the love and faithfulness of the Lord. Beholding him calm and full of joy, we exclaim, " How happy grace makes him!" And we ourselves are happy when we suffer; at least we ought to be. But it is one thing to admire others, who are sustained by the Spirit of Christ, and another to glory in tribulation ourselves. A broken will, confidence in God, communion with Him who has suffered for us-this is what is necessary to enable us to glory in tribulation. Job also is an example; but he is introduced here to show the end of the Lord, that He is very pitiful and of tender mercy. But the example is very instructive. Job was a man, perfect and upright, fearing the Lord, and eschewing evil. But he began to be self-satisfied; he did right, but thought of his own uprightness; it was hidden self-righteousness, and this destroyed his godliness. God does not withdraw His eyes from the righteous. He saw Job’s danger, and directed the attention of Satan to him. It was God who began. Satan, the accuser of the saints, insists that Job should be tried and he would prove a hypocrite. God permits him to tempt him, to do to him what he would, putting a limit, however, to his malice. He does, accordingly, all he is allowed to do; yet Job remains submissive, and does not sin with his lips. Satan persists in his accusations, insinuating that if the temptation were increased, he would curse God to His face. God gives him all power, except over his life. But Job still remains faithful, and sins not; he had received good at the Lord’s hand, and should he not receive evil? His wife tempts him in vain. Through grace Job triumphed over Satan, who was unable to shake him. By the grace of God, the efforts of the enemy are conquered. "Ye have heard of the patience of Job." From Satan’s accusation of hypocrisy Job is fully justified. But the work of God for his blessing was not yet complete. By His grace, He had sustained His servant’s heart against the enemy, and Job had showed himself faithful. Satan had done much as the instrument of the ways of God in bringing misery on him; but his heart was yet untouched; he did not know himself. Quite the contrary. Although the preparation had been made by means of Satan, yet Job was practically justified from his accusations by the grace of God; but if he had been allowed to remain thus, his state would have been still worse; he would at least have been in greater danger than ever. He would have been able to say, " I was meek and upright in prosperity, and now patient in adversity." It was necessary that God should finish His work, and that Job should know his own heart. Job’s friends come to see him, and remain seated, stupefied by the condition in which they find him. Alas! pride is often awakened before men, and being wounded, irritates the heart; and fortitude fails in presence of sympathy. However this was the bottom of Job’s heart shows itself when his friends are present. He curses the day of his birth. Job is naked, not only before God-which we all are-but, what is equally painful, before himself. Where now is his gracious meekness? He fights against God, calling himself more just than He. Still it is beautiful to see that at the bottom of his heart there were just and true thoughts of God. His friends pretended that the world was a perfect demonstration of the government of God; in consequence of which Job, since he professed godliness, was a hypocrite. This unjust judgment, however, he resists; declaring that, though the hand of God may be often manifested, yet He allows evil to run its course without interfering; because the wicked prosper. But he allows the bitterness of his heart to appear. And though Job may be accused of making himself more righteous than God, yet God still governs; He does not withdraw His eyes from the righteous, and chastens them in love. Then God manifests Himself to Job, and shows him the folly of contending with Him And now he owns his error and his nothingness. Instead of saying, " When the eye saw me, it gave witness of me," he says, " Now mine eye seeth Thee; wherefore I abhor myself,* and repent in dust and ashes." (*In the Hebrew the word is still more emphatic. It signifies to detest, to abominate, to despise.) He knows himself before God. Then God can bless him, even more than at the beginning. Such is the end of the Lord! Job was patient in the greatest misery and trial; God sounded his heart, and then blessed him abundantly. Verse 12. James continues the subject that is the scope of his teaching. The will must not work, nor the flesh manifest itself. The motions of nature must be held in check, and the heart kept from following these motions of impatience, which are only too natural to the carnal mind. If a man swears, he allows this impatience of the heart to work, forgets the glory and majesty of God, and associates Him with unsubdued flesh in order to strengthen an assertion or support a vow without reverence; or, instead of God, he invokes some creature whom he invests with the authority and power that belong to God alone. The root of this is an unsubdued will, the unrestrained passion of the heart. Intuitively conscious of his inability to assure the effect of his thoughts, man introduces God irreverently, just as a heathen would a deified creature, as the occasion presented itself. This is not lust, but the unchecked impulse of the flesh (Colossians 3:8). It is irreverence, the presumption and independence of the human spirit, roused to the highest pitch. This is why James says, " But above all things " he desired that, in peace and quietness, our communication may be yea and nay, calmly in the fear of God. It is all-important to keep the motions of nature in check. We should do so if we saw God before us. We should certainly do so in the presence of a man whom we desired to please; but God is always present, and to fail in this quietness and moderation is a proof that we forget His presence. Verse 13. James sets the soul free from the customs of the world. Man seeks to deceive himself, forgetting his thoughts in folly, and thus to find relief from the cares and troubles he cannot escape from; but, thanks be to God, He gives help and refuge to the heart in His love, and carries our cares for us. He is not willing that we should be ignorant of the trials of life; He who withdraws not His eyes from the righteous sends them for our good. Not a sparrow falls to the ground without our Father - not only without the will of God, but without Him who loves us as a tender Father. He may indeed chasten us; but He remembers us; and it is in order to sanctify us, and draw our hearts near to His. In drawing nigh to God in afflictions the will is subdued, and the heart comforted and encouraged. God Himself is revealed to the soul, and works in it by His grace; and consciously in His presence, it can say, " It is good to have been afflicted." And not only are we brought nigh to God, but we open our heart to Him who is full of grace, and who desires that we should do so. Not only are we subject to His will, but we present our anxieties before Him. " Be careful for nothing; but in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which passeth all understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus " (Phil. 4: 67). Here it is a question of care; but in affliction we find the same consolation and rest. " Who comforteth us in all our tribulation," says the apostle Paul, appealing to the Father of mercies, and the God of all comfort. The hearts of the Philippians were filled with peace through the consolation poured into them. This may happen through circumstances; but the Spirit of God says, " God that comforteth those that are cast down, comforted us by the coming of Titus." Paul was altogether cast down because he had not found Titus, whom he had sent to the Corinthians, who were walking in much evil. He had left an open door for the gospel at Troas, and now his heart had reached the point of even regretting that he had written his first inspired epistle. His faith had got below the power of God, who had led him to write it. Arrived in Macedonia, still in search of Titus, but bearing testimony to Christ, however, the apostle had no rest in the flesh, but was troubled on every side; without were fightings, within were fears. God allowed him to feel his weakness; but it is worth while being afflicted, if God Himself becomes our comforter. Titus arrives, bringing good news of the effect of his first epistle, and the apostle is filled with joy. God often takes away the affliction itself, fills the heart with gladness, and pours His consolation into it; and then it becomes riper by communion with Him. In every affliction prayer is our refuge; thus we acknowledge our dependence, and trust to the goodness of God. The heart draws nigh to Him. It tells Him its need and its conflict, placing them before the throne and on the heart of God, who replies either by rendering our circumstances happy, or by pouring His own consolations into our hearts-an answer yet more precious than outward happiness -but always by what is best for us, working in perfect love. The godly soul, under the influence of grace, approaches God also in gladness; if it confine itself to that which is the occasion of happiness only, and reposes in it alone, this is a danger for it. But as God is a refuge in trouble, so also He is the portion of the soul in happiness. If I have an occasion of joy, I communicate it to my friend, so that he may rejoice with me, and thus the joy is redoubled. But to the Christian there is more than this; his heart feels that God is the source of blessing and the cause of happiness. Even though there be no special reason for gladness, yet his heart is joyous, and the godly soul that lives in communion with God, seeks to have God with it in happiness. But if the soul be given up to the joy, this becomes vain and light; the heart wanders from God, and folly enters into it. In trial, dependence on God makes itself felt, but in happiness there is, a danger of forgetting this dependence, and the joy often ends in a fall. In any case, the flesh is active, and God is forgotten. James desires then-and this is very important for the Christian-that gladness should be tempered with godliness. When thoughts of God exist, they are to be expressed in psalms and in thanksgiving. God is present in joy and faith, and communion and spiritual power are increased by the sense of His goodness. Thus one engaged in the business of life is encouraged and strengthened amid the toils of the wilderness by a more profound sense that God is for him. Verse 14. Affliction and happiness lead James to another matter which arose among the Christians-sickness, often, though not always, the effect of chastisement from the Lord. Disease like death, entered through sin, and now is found in all the course of human history. But not even a sparrow falls to the ground without the hand of God our Father, as the Lord tells us. And ills belong to the natural state of mankind; God makes use of them to correct His children. " He withdraweth not His eyes from the righteous." In either case-whether the ills natural to man, or the chastisement of God-He makes use of them, when the heart, instead of receiving all that happens with indifference, draws nigh to God, who thinks of the trials of His people, and considers the submission and the cry of those whom He chastens. The prayer of faith saves the sick, and if the malady be the fruit of sin, that which has caused it shall be forgiven. The sufferer owns the hand of God in his sickness, and He responds to the faith of him who prays to Him. In the ways of God there are two kinds of forgiveness-justification for eternity, according to chapter 4. of the Epistle to the Romans 10:1-21. of that to the Hebrews, is the blessing that belongs to those who trust to the efficacy of the blood of Christ-that is, that their sins are no longer imputed to them. " Whom He called, them He also justified, and whom He justified, them He also glorified." God has been occupied with their sins on the cross, has canceled them forever, and remembers them no more. There is, however, the government of God, of a Father, but of a holy Father, who loves His children too much to allow them to walk in evil. In the book of Job, when Elihu says that God withdraws not His eyes from the righteous, while indicating the blessing that flows naturally from the favor of God, the effect of His grace, he speaks immediately of chastisement, thus clearly explaining Job’s case. Here the Spirit of God supposes the possibility of a case of actual failure, speaking of actions. But this is not always the ground of chastisement. In Job 33:1-33 it is said that God seals His instruction by chastisement, that He may withdraw man from his purpose, and hide pride from man. He hinders evil, as in the case of Paul (2 Corinthians 12:1-21) He humbles man in order to prepare him for blessing. In every case He makes all things work together for good to those that love Him (Romans 8:28). Now if the will be not broken, we lament, murmur, and rebel against God; but if the soul looks to Him, owning His hand, whether in the ills natural to sinful man, and to which he is heir (though never without the hand of God), or in positive chastisement, even though he may be ignorant why it is sent, he can turn to God, own his state as the effect of His will, and seek the remedy in His grace, submissive to and depending on His power and will. But it is only the faith of true Christians that can draw down the answer and the blessing from above. James now speaks no longer of the synagogue, but of the assembly. In order to receive blessing, we must possess true faith; and God has placed blessing in the assembly, in true believers. There it is found by faith in His government and discipline. When sin is manifested openly, so that a man who is known as a brother may be called wicked, it is the duty of the assembly to put- him away from among them. Then the sins are bound on him who is excluded, and if he humble himself, and recognizes his sin from the bottom of his heart, then the assembly ought to receive him again (2 Corinthians 2:1-17) In this sense, of administration, the sinner is forgiven (vers. 7, 8): his bands are loosed. And this holds good for two or three, if gathered in the name of Christ, in the unity and power of. the Holy Ghost (Matthew 18:1-35.): for it is only by the Spirit that this can be done in truth. It is necessary, moreover, that it should be the action of the assembly as such, not only because the promise belongs to it, but in order that it may purify itself. It is to the assembly that the exhortation of 2 Corinthians 2:7-8, is addressed. And this solemn act is bound in the presence of Jesus, according to His promise. Here it is not a question of the sins that bring the judgment of the assembly on an individual, but of the ways of God Himself in the every-day circumstances of life, or, it may be in more direct chastisement on His part. Now the individual who recognizes the hand of God, not thinking of what happens to him as the result of accident, seeks the intervention of God according to His grace. But the assembly is now the place where He has placed His name and His blessing, and it is the ordinary administrator of His grace. Christ is there; and when the assembly was in order, the elders who watched over it were sought for by the sufferer, in order to receive this grace and blessing of God. Yet it was personal faith which, through prayer, brought the special blessing from heaven-" the prayer of faith," as it is said. The elders were merely a sign of this special intervention of God, as we see in Mark 6:13. There miracles were wrought by those specially sent by Christ, with power given them for this purpose; here it is the blessing of God in the bosom of the assembly, administered by its chiefs, provided faith there existed. Now order no longer exists, but Christ does not forget His assembly. The promise to two or three gathered in His name, in the unity of His people, remains ever sure; and, if there be faith in those who watch over them, the answer from God will be the same. One cannot expect blessing to flow in its natural current if the channels be broken and destroyed. But the case is the same now as then, and His power remains unchangeable. How precious to know it! When the Lord chides the disciples for their unbelief, He says also, " Bring him unto me; " and the child was healed (Mark 9:19). Hence James recalls the case of Elijah, who was a man subject to like passions as we are; yet, in answer to his prayer, it rained not for three years and six months. The outward order of the assembly is gone; but the power, the love, and the faithfulness of the Lord remain without change. He may make us sensible that, on account of the sin of the assembly, we ’are no longer as we were at the beginning; nevertheless, where God gives faith, the answer on His part will never fail. That is not godliness which is insensible to the loss sustained after the time of the apostles through the unfaithfulness of the assembly; but neither is that godliness which doubts the power of Christ, if God give faith to make use of it. When it is said that sins shall be forgiven, the meaning is that, when the brother comes to himself, and owns the hand of God (if it be his sins that have brought chastisement on him, and that hinder his disease from being cured), they shall be forgiven him as to the discipline of God in His government. This discipline is shown in chastisement, that is, in the sickness; but if this be removed, discipline is at an end, and the sins are remitted. There is here yet another more general direction, depending, however, on the state of the church. We have seen that when things were in order, the sufferer was to call for the elders; and this can still be done by sending for those who are practically elders. But faith given by God, and therefore working on His part, must be in these. But whatever may be the state of ruin into which the assembly of God have fallen, we can always confess our faults to each other, and pray for each other, so that they may be cured. This does not require the existence of official order, but supposes humility, confidence, and love among the brethren. We cannot confess our faults if confidence in the love of a brother do not exist. We may choose a wise and discreet brother (instead of revealing all to the indiscreet), but as to the disposition of the guilty soul, this choice cannot change anything. Not hiding the evil, but opening the heart, we relieve the burdened conscience, and therefore the body also. Truth asserts itself in the heart, and the guilty soul seeks not a fair reputation, since that would only be false, but a pure conscience before God. God takes pleasure in setting the conscience, and also the body, free from suffering, if it be necessary; and then the heart becomes happy in the sense of His favor. A pure and true conscience is a source of joy before God. It is very important to remember that there is a government of God over His children. It is not a question of their justification or forgiveness in that sense. It supposes that we are righteous in His eyes as to salvation (Job 36:1-33) Then the Lord keeps His eye on us, blesses us, and makes us alive to His favor, if we walk well and enjoy God. But if we do not walk well, He warns us, and if we do not listen to His voice, chastises us, in order to awaken the slumbering soul that is beginning to forget Him. It is His goodness, His wonderful long-suffering, His love for us, that never grows weary. Verse 19. Finally, James adds a promise in order to encourage our souls to seek the blessing of others. He who converts a soul from the error of his ways, is not only the means of saving it, if it be a sinner who is walking in his sins, or a Christian who is walking in evil, but he shall hide a multitude of sins. Whether it be the case of an unconverted soul, it is saved, or that of a Christian walking in evil, he is at least arrested in the way of perdition. The second case requires a little explanation. Sin is hateful in the eyes of God, and He sees everything. When we think of the state of the world, we understand how wonderful His patience is. Now the conversion of a sinner takes away all his sins from before these eyes. He sees them no more, as though they were at the bottom of the sea, as it is written. Now they are canceled. It is in this sense that it is said, " Charity shall cover a multitude of sins." They exist no longer as an offensive object to the eyes of God. If we do not forgive the faults of a brother, enmity remains as a wound in the body before God, and one which cannot be healed. But when he is forgiven, love is the object that presents itself to God, an object well-pleasing to His heart. Thus when a sinner is converted-restored, the love of God finds its pleasure in him, and the offensive object is removed from His eyes. In the Epistle of James we find but little doctrine, but rather the breastplate of righteousness, the manifestation of faith by works in the Christian walk; and submission to the hand of God, and patience under His government, are unfolded in a way of great service to the Christian. ======================================================================== CHAPTER 195: VOL 03 - THOUGHTS ON MICAH ======================================================================== Thoughts on Micah THERE is a significance often in a name in Scripture, attracting attention to something to be remembered, or witnessing of some gracious act of God either to His people as a whole or to individuals among them. Abraham and Sarah, Moses and Joshua, are instances of this. Nor are these names, so significant, confined to early days. In the time of the kingdom, as in that of the patriarchs and wilderness journey, we meet with examples of the name illustrating something connected with the one who bore it. In the days of Ahab and Jehoshaphat we find it, and in the reign of Jotham we again meet with it. Elijah, raised up to recall Israel to the confession of the true God, bore witness, as his name imports, that Jehovah is God. The heathen widow of Zarephath learned it to her joy; the people of Israel acknowledged it at Carmel; and the two captains of fifty with their companies discovered it to their confusion and destruction. The ministry of Elisha was of a different character, and his name would teach it. Elijah vindicated the divinity of Jehovah, Elisha exhibited His saving and healing power. At a date subsequent to these devoted men, in the south of the land, at Moresheth, was born the prophet Micah, an abridged form of the name Micaiah, by which he is spoken: of in Jeremiah 26:18, in the Hebrew text, which means Who is like Jehovah; and his writings seem intended to illustrate what his name challenges all to disprove, that there is none like Jehovah of Hosts, the mighty God of Israel. Called to the prophetic office when Hosea was ministering in Israel, ’and before Isaiah bad announced to Ahaz the, miraculous conception of Immanuel, ere Samaria had received within her gates for the first time since she became the capital of the kingdom of Israel, a conquering army, he appears designed by the Lord Jehovah to direct the nation, if they would attend to him, to their only stay in the times of calamity which were fast approaching. By Hosea God taught the people the only way of restoration for those who have sinned against Him. In the pages of Isaiah He described the King yet to be on the earth in power, and the blessings to be enjoyed under His reign; and in Micah, whilst taking up in some degree the moral condition of the remnant, and the future blessings under the Shepherd of the sheep, the Lord shows the apostate people of the prophet’s day that there is none like Himself, Jehovah their God. Opening, as has been observed, with the closing words of his namesake who stood before Ahab and Jehoshaphat (1 Kings 22:28), as a summons to all the nations to hear what Jehovah has to witness against them-Jehovah from His holy temple, Micah speaks at once of the destruction of Samaria, and depicts the march of the Assyrian army to Jerusalem through Judah, in which, places hitherto unmentioned in Scripture, would be witnesses as long as time should last of God’s visitation on account of sin. " Pass ye away, thou inhabitant of Saphir, in nakedness and shame: the inhabitant of Zaanan came not forth; the mourning of Beth-ezel shall take from you its standing " (1: 11). Saphir would experience captivity, whilst Zaanan ’would be afraid to venture forth on its behalf, and Beth-ezel be too much occupied with her own sorrow to help a neighbor city in distress. Places known, tenanted, and beloved by those who dwelt in them, too small, probably, to be noticed in the day of Israel’s greatness, are thus connected for over with the nation’s calamity. Right well did they deserve this infliction, as the prophet proceeds to declare. The sorrow occasioned by an invading army is grievous, but that was not the first occasion when oppression and violence, and insecurity of possessions had been experienced. Often must the cry of the oppressed and defenseless have ascended up to heaven ere Sennacherib’s armed hosts Overran Judah. Neither rank, nor that which so often appeals to man’s, heart with success, the helplessness of women and children, was suffered to stand in the way as a barrier against lawlessness and covetous desires (2: 1, 2, 8, 9). Of reproofs they were impatient; to the prophets of God they would not hearken, but desired them to keep silence. " Prophesy ye not, say they to them that prophesy " (2: 6). Yet the people believed in the existence of a prophetic Spirit. It was not the ignorance of those who thought there could be no revelation that Micah reproves, but the determined spirit of opposition to all that came from God, whilst ready to receive what a lying spirit might enunciate. " If a man walking in spirit (or vanity) and falsehood do lie, saying, I will prophesy unto thee of wine and of strong drink; he shall even be the prophet of this people " (ver. 11). A time of enjoyment was what they wanted, present ease and the indulgence of the appetite, without reference to the future, was enough for them. Wine and strong drink was all they cared to hear about. What did such people deserve but rooting out, and that forever? All the nations assembled to hear the Lord’s controversy must own that punishment was justly the due of such a generation as this; but all are called on to hearken, and to learn that there was none like God, as the prophet, unable because of Israel’s sin, to promise present ease, can yet speak of future triumph. Desolation and captivity were near at hand; but restoration and prosperity is the future in store for them. " I will surely assemble, 0 Jacob, all of thee: I will surely gather the remnant of Israel: I will put them together as the sheep of Bozrah, as the flock in the midst of their fold; they shall make a great noise by reason of the multitude of men." Security, plenty, and increase shall be theirs when this takes place, Different had been, and were in the prophet’s day, the fortunes of Israel and Judah, but at the time of which Micah prophesies they will be united. Together will Jehovah set them as the sheep of Bozrah. Exposed to the ravages of the Assyrian they both were, they shall be " as a flock in the midst of their fold," or rather " pasture." Besides this, there was something which directly concerned the nations. The breaker shall go before Israel, even their king, the Lord at their head; and whilst to Israel He will act as a shepherd, the nations will find Him to be the breaker who will remove every barrier raised up to oppose the return of His people, and to keep them still in subjection to a foreign yoke. Amos had predicted the captivity of Samaria. " And ye shall go out at the breaches, every cow at that which is before her" (4: 3). Micah predicts their return when they shall safely and without hindrance pass out through the gates of the cities of those who have ruled over them. Far better than present ease and strong drink was this. If the false prophet would predict, but in vain, a time of self-indulgence and fleshly gratification, the true prophet could speak with certainty of something, though distant, yet far more cheering; not alleviation in the midst of adverse circumstances, nor present indulgence in the face of a victorious invader, but a bright future of complete deliverance from a foreign yoke, and peace and plenty with the Lord as their Shepherd in their midst. Polluted was the land in the prophet’s day; it was no fit resting-place for the people of the Lord then; there will come a time when it shall be clean, manifested by the Lord’s presence afresh, and. He will be actively engaged in restoring His people to their land, never more to be dispossessed of it. How short-sighted were the people of Micah’s day! What a vista of coming blessing does he present! Again, the prophet summons people to hearken. This time it is to the heads of Jacob and to the princes of the house of Israel that he speaks. Their sins and those of the false prophets are stated. The rulers shall cry to the Lord, but He will not hear them; He will even hide His face from them at that time, as they have behaved themselves ill in their doings. The prophets shall find it night to them, they shall not have a vision; it will be dark with them that they shall not divine; "the sun shall go down over the prophets, and the day shall be dark over them. Then shall the seers be ashamed and the diviners confounded, yea, they shall cover their lips, for there is no answer of God" (3: 4-7). What should they do then? Where should they turn? Their prayer shut out from God’s presence; the future, as far as they can foresee it, pitch darkness, with nothing, unless God should intervene, but despair to overwhelm them; this is a pitiable condition indeed. Their deserts are clear, but there is none like God; so, whilst He will make the false prophets conscious of the darkness, His own messenger can penetrate the gloom and map out the future of the people. This he does. Judgment must be executed, and that on Jerusalem. In chapter 1: the prophet had spoken of Samaria’s overthrow, here he announces the overturn of Jerusalem. David’s city must be plowed as a field, and Jerusalem which Solomon enriched become heaps, and the mountain of the house, where the Shechinah had been, should be as the high places of the (rather, a) forest, 1:e. what it was in Abraham’s day (Genesis 22:13). Of Samaria we read of nothing but destruction; the stones were to be poured down into the valley, and the foundations to be discovered. The ivory house, one of the glories of Ahab’s reign (1 Kings 22:39), must perish; and to Samaria, so beautiful in situation, fitted for a metropolis, Micah holds out no prospect of returning prosperity and beauty. Of Jerusalem it is otherwise, and in language, found also in Isaiah, he predicts its exaltation and metropolitan character, as the habitation of the God of Jacob would be again within it, to which not the tribes only, but many nations in the last days, shall go up. The Lord Jehovah at Jerusalem, His rule shall be obeyed among the Gentiles, peace and plenty be the portion of all nations, and the long-exiled people, afflicted of God for their sins, shall return and become a strong nation, and the Lord shall reign over them in Mount Zion from henceforth even forever. There had been a season of prosperity and power under David and Solomon; that shall return, for unto Zion shall come the first dominion, the kingdom shall come to the daughter of Jerusalem. No room will there be for contrasting the future blessing, when enjoyed (as in Ezra 3:12), with what their fathers had known in the palmiest days of the kingdom, for the first dominion shall come to Zion, and the final issue of the Babylonish captivity shall be redemption from the power of their enemies, and their overthrow by the people they have so trampled on and despised. Very clear is this outline, and very decided is the language. It could not be otherwise, for the plan is of God, and the words have been selected by the Spirit of God. In common with Isaiah, Micah speaks of the future of the temple, yet he does not simply travel over ground which others before him have trod. He shows his competency to declare by the Spirit of the Lord what shall be in the future, as he speaks of the birthplace of the Messiah, not elsewhere predicted, and tells of the returned remnant’s rejection in consequence of their treatment of the Eternal One. Living after the fulfillment of part of his prophecy, we can mark the exactness of his predictions and understand the statement concerning things yet future. Rejected of Jehovah for their rejection of the Christ until Jerusalem shall travail in birth with child, the prophet marks the difference between that which characterizes the epoch in which we live and that which will come after it, "the remnant of His brethren shall return unto the children of Israel." Now they form part of the church, then they will be reckoned with the nation. "And He shall stand and feed (1:e. as a shepherd his flock) in the strength of the Lord, in the majesty of the name of the Lord His God; and they shall abide: for now shall He be great unto the ends of the earth." And, as the prophet has told out what the people of Zion will do to the enemies gathered together against them at Jerusalem (4: 12, 13), he also tells us, what none beside him predict, the victorious march of the once oppressed and captive people into the very region of the earth from whence the conqueror of the ten tribes had come forth (5: 6). Then, turning back to the land, his home, and the home of the nation when restored, he advertises all of the changes that will be witnessed. He knew it as a land of chariots, and horses, and strongholds, and witchcrafts, and groves. The chariots and horses forbidden to Israel (Deuteronomy 17:16), and witchcrafts shall cease, and the groves be cut down, and the fenced cities, those silent but impressive witnesses of lawlessness and violence and weakness, shall be needed no longer. Vengeance, too, will be executed in anger and fury, not upon Israel, but on the heathen, such as they have not heard. Who but God could trace out such an outline, now partly fulfilled? And who but He would address a confessedly guilty nation in such language as this? A third time the prophet summons witnesses to hearken to what the Lord saith. The nations, and the leaders of Israel have been respectively addressed; now he speaks before the mountains, and the hills are to hear his voice, " for the Lord hath a controversy with His people, He will plead with Israel" (6. 7.) His dealings with them at the outset of their national existence are referred to. How had He wearied them that they had turned from Him? Had He not brought them up out of Egypt, redeemed them out of the house of servants, and provided them with all that they wanted-Moses, Aaron, and Miriam, the king and lawgiver, the priest, and the prophetess? Had He not also withstood Balaam at the close of their wilderness career? These acts proclaimed His righteousnesses (so Micah wrote). But of what could they speak? The remnant confess their sin, the wickedness of the rest God exposes. But if the best of them could only take the ground of confession, what could they, standing on the ground of law, look for but judgment? Where then should they turn? There was but One to whom they could look-Jehovah, against whom they had sinned. For Him they must wait as the God of their salvation, knowing that He would bear them, This the remnant declare they will do, and the prophet can assure them that their confidence will not be misplaced. " I will bear the indignation of the Lord, because I have sinned against Him, until He plead my cause and execute judgment for me: He will bring me forth to the light, and I shall behold His righteousness," are the words provided by the Spirit of God for the daughter of Zion to use. "In the day that thy walls are to be built, in that day shall the decree be far removed," is God’s immediate answer by the prophet, speaking of the certainty of Zion being rebuilt. When that takes place, they will assemble to her from Assyria, and from the cities of Egypt (not the fortified cities), and from Egypt (not the fortress) to the river,* and from sea to sea, and from mountain to mountain. The flock of God’s heritage shall feed in Bashan and Carmel as in days of old, and Israel, the prey and sport of nations, shall prosper, whilst abject fear shall take possession of the Gentiles, because of the Lord and of His people (7: 9-17). (*i.e. the Euphrates.) Recording this bright ending to so dark a beginning, well might the prophet break out at the close in words expressive of wonder at the God whose servant he was, and whose purposes of mercy toward Israel he was commissioned to declare. " Who is a God like unto Thee, that pardoneth iniquity, and passeth by the transgression of the remnant of His heritage? He retaineth not His anger forever, because He delighteth in mercy. He will turn again, He will have compassion on us; He will subdue our iniquities; and Thou wilt cast all their sins into the depths of the sea. Thou wilt perform the truth to Jacob, and the mercy to Abraham, which Thou hast sworn unto our fathers from the days of old." His character, His faithfulness, are the stay of His people. Sinned they have, and that grievously, but God delighteth in mercy. Judgment is His strange work, but mercy is His delight. What a character of their God, and ours too, will that be for them to meditate upon! Unworthy of any favor they are, but God’s word is pledged to Jacob (Genesis 35:12), and the origin of every promise He gave them as His earthly people was His kindness to Abraham. The grounds on which He could thus act must be sought for elsewhere. What God is, and will be to His people is what Micah was charged to declare. And surely it will be found at the close of the nation’s long night of darkness and bitterness, when the remnant of Messiah’s brethren shall have returned to the children of Israel (as the faithful in the prophet’s day which preceded the Babylonish captivity, and the faithful during its continuance, and the returned remnant of Ezra’s and Nehemiah’s time, in the midst of the alternations of hope and fear in which they lived, severally proved), that God’s faithfulness and truth are the stay of His people. To show mercy is His prerogative (Psalms 62:12). So, though the nation turned from Him in Micah’s day, He will surely bring back His people in power. When all was dark, He alone could, and did, shed light on the scene. And when all is fulfilled, the closing words of Micah’s prophecy will be the language just suited for His finally ransomed people. We, too, know what it is to find comfort in the knowledge of His character and of His faithfulness to that which He has announced (Ephesians 2:4-6; 1 Thessalonians 5:24). ======================================================================== CHAPTER 196: VOL 03 - THOUGHTS ON THE EPISTLE OF JAMES: INTRODUCTION ======================================================================== Thoughts on the Epistle of James: Introduction THE Epistle of James is not one in which the doctrines of grace are unfolded, although sovereign grace is there recognized (1: 18); but these are given us under the form of God’s work in us, not for us, which is redemption through the precious blood of Christ. It is a practical epistle, a holy girdle for our loins, given in order that the practical and outward life of the Christian may respond to his divine and inward life; and that the law of God may become for him a law of liberty. Redemption is not spoken of, nor faith, as a means of participating in the fruit of accomplished redemption; but many having already professed the name of Christ, the apostle desires that the truth of their profession may be expressed by works, the only, witness to others that true faith is working in the heart, since faith works by love (Galatians 5:6), or in the new creature (6: 15). This new creation, its character and manifestation to others in actual and visible life, is what is depicted by James. James remained at Jerusalem to feed the flock there, and more particularly the Jewish section of the church. He is frequently mentioned in the Gospel narrative, but always as governing the Jewish flock, and that before its separation from the Jewish nation. In the Epistle to the Hebrews the Spirit of God commands them to go outside the camp, that is, to separate from unbelieving Jews (Hebrews 13:10-13); but hitherto they had remained together, the Christians still offering sacrifices according to the law. There were even many of the priests who were obedient to the faith (Acts 6:7). Though incredible to us, yet it is a fact clearly stated in the Word; and yet all these were zealous for the law. Let us follow the traces of James, as we read his history in the Acts. The first time we find him, however, is in the Epistle to the Galatians (1: 19), where he is specially mentioned as seen by Paul, when, with the exception of Peter, he had seen none of the other apostles. Then we find him in Acts 15:1-41, presiding, so to speak, at the meeting of the apostles and elders held to decide whether the Gentiles should be subjected to the law of Moses. His sentence on that occasion was final, although the apostles Peter and Paul were present, as well as all the other apostles, except James the brother of John, whom Herod had put to death. Still, the laws determined on by the apostles and elders were the testimony of the Jewish church. God did not permit Paul and Barnabas to decide the question at Antioch. Such a decision would not have terminated the controversy, but would have made two assemblies; but as soon as the Christians among the Jews and the assembly at Jerusalem liberated the Gentiles, no one could any longer oppose their freedom from the law. It was not a point determined by the apostles on their apostolical authority, although that confirmed the statute. After much disputing in the assembly, the decision was sent in the name of the apostles, of the elders, and of the whole church. Judaism set the Gentiles free from the Jewish yoke. Here again we find James. He brings the discussion to a close by saying, " Wherefore my sentence is, that we trouble not them which from among the Gentiles are turned to God." It is not certain that he was an apostle; probably he was not one. He was the chief of the Jewish church at Jerusalem. This was why, when the angel of the Lord led Peter out of prison, giving him his liberty, the latter said to those who had gathered together to pray for him, " Go, show these things unto James, and to the brethren" (Acts 12:17). Again at Antioch, before the coming of certain from James, Peter ate with the Gentiles; but when they were come, he withdrew (Galatians 2:12). It is apparent that James shared in the thoughts of many Christians, and also of Peter, though he was an apostle, touching the Jewish idea that still reigned in the hearts of the Christians of that nation, especially at Jerusalem. Again, when Paul went up for the last time to Jerusalem (Acts 21:18), he " went in," it is said, " with us unto James, and all the elders were present." He was evidently the head of the gathering at Jerusalem, and represented in his person the power of the Jewish principle which still ruled in the church there, and which God in His patience still endured. They believed in Jesus, and broke bread at home, but they were all zealous for the law. They offered sacrifices in the temple, and even persuaded Paul to do so also (Acts 21:1-40); and were in nowise separate from the nation. All this is prohibited in the Epistle to the Hebrews, but it was practiced until the last days of Judaism. This principle is the basis of the Epistle of James, the true presentation of the state of Jewish Christians, James himself being in his own person the representative and the life of this system. As long as God bore with it, His Spirit was able to work. We learn from profane history that James was killed by the Jews, among whom he bore the name of the Just; and Josephus, the Jewish historian, tells us that it was for this crime that Jerusalem was destroyed. After its fall the system disappeared. We can easily conceive that true Christians would follow the testimony given in the Epistle to the Hebrews. However that may be, there only remained a little heretical sect or two, which upheld formal Judaism; but these soon disappeared. They were called Nazarenes and Ebionites.* (*"Ebionites, from the Hebrew Ebionim. This contemptuous epithet they received from the supposed poverty of their understanding, as well as of their condition."-Gibbon, Bony. Emp., vol. 2: p. 231. This is a question, though Origen says so. It means merely poor.) But it is unnecessary to investigate these matters. This position of James, and the state of the assembly at Jerusalem, that is, of believers outwardly united to the unbelieving Jews, notwithstanding the fact that they broke bread and worshipped apart, simplifies the interpretation of this epistle. It is not a question of its divine inspiration, but of its character. God, in His goodness, has seen fit to present us with all the forms that Christianity has taken; and among others, this first Jewish form, when Christians were not separated from the nation. We do not here find, therefore, the mysteries of the counsels of God, as in Paul; nor redemption, as in him and in Peter; nor the divine life of the Son of God in Christ, and then in us, as recorded in the writings of the apostle John; but the subject is the practical walk of the poor of the flock, who still frequented the synagogue, and the denunciation of wealthy unbelievers who oppressed the poor, and blasphemed the name of the Lord. ======================================================================== Source: https://sermonindex.net/books/bible-witness-and-review-magazine-3-volumes/ ========================================================================