J/— ^ 5 THEOLOGICAL SEMINARY % Princetpn, N. J. . J From the Rev) W. B. SPRAGUE, D.D. Sept. 1839 . - ^ ^ -~^ - -^ -»--«- -n. .n. JV vlV >lViD>.;»Qi (, Ctise, Dlvisiorv£j.*S:4.:2>(1^ • Bool., . __/^;,;;y-r- REMARKS O N T H E VERSION OF THE NEW TESTAMENT, EDITED BY THE UNITARIANS, WITH THE TITLE OF " AN IMPROVED VERSION UPON THE BASIS OF ARCHBISHOP NEWCOME'S NEW TRANSLATION, WITH A CORRECTED TEXT, AND NOTES CRITICAL AND EXPLANATORY. LONDON, 1808;" BEING A DISPASSIONATE APPEAL TO CHRISTIANS OF VARIOUS DENOMINATIONS ON SOME OF THE FIRST AND MOST GENERALLY RECEIVED DOCTRINES OF THE BIBLE. IVITH A LETTER (ORlGINALLy WRITTEN AND PUBLISHED IN THE YEAR 1807) TO THE REV. FRANCIS STONE, In Reply to His Sermon preached at the Visitation at Danbury, on the 8th July 1806. * BY THE REV. EDWARD NARES, D.D. RECTOR OF BIDDENDEN, KENT ; AND REGIUS PROFESSOR OF MODERN HISTORY IN THE UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD. THE SECOND EDITION. LONDON: PRINTED FOR T. CADELL AND W. DAVXES, STRAND. 1814. Strahan and Predon, Printers.Street, London. THE RIGHT HONOURABLE THE EARL OF LIVERPOOL, TIRST LORD COMMISSIONER OF THE TRSASURT, Sfc, Sfc. Sfc, My Loud, 1 HAVE scrupulously forborne to ask Your Lordship's permission to dedicate this book to you, because it is in a great degree controversial; for though I have not the smallest doubt of Your Lordship's perfect attachment to the Church whose doctrines I defend, I can have no right to make you a party in the dispute. The DEDICATION. The First Edition of the work, I hope I may now be allowed to tell Your Lordship, without incurring the imputation of vanity, has been noticed and approved by learned persons, far beyond my expectations; and therefore I trust, as a mere testimony of respect and gratitude, which is all that I intend by prefixing Your Lordship's Name to it, this Second Edition may not be alto- gether unworthy your acceptance. The Appointment conferred on me by His Royal Highness the Prince Regent, through Your Lordship's particular interposition, w.hile the work was passing through the press, in renewing my connection with the University of Oxford, is highly gratifying to my feelings. Not being personally known to Your Lord- ship at the time, I can only refer what has taken place to considerations of a public nature, DEDICATION. nature, and shall therefore hope, that this mode of acknowledging your kindness, may appear to the world in general, the most appropriate return I could make, as being connected at all events with those st\idies and pursuits, which can alone have thus recom- mended me to Your Lordship's Notice. I have the Honor to be. My Lord, With great respect and gi'atitude, Your Lordship's Most obliged and obedient Servant, Edward Nares. Rectory, Biddenden, Kent, May 11, 1814. INTRODUCTION TO THE SECOND EDITION. nPHE first Edition of this work appeared in the year 1 8 1 o. The Introduction to that Edition, now re- published with very few alterations, gives a true state- ment of the motives by which I was then actuated, as well as of the particular circumstances under which it was first sent to the Press. At that time the hnproved Version had been but little noticed ; the strictures upon it in the Quart eriy and Eclectic Reviews, being, to the best of my belief, all that had previously appeared upon the subject. As my present Title Page and Dedication will an- nounce some change in my circumstances since the first edition was published, in order to obviate mistakes, it may be proper to observe, that it has so recently happened, that whatever appears in my former intro- duction, or in the work itself, of the local disadvan- tages under which I have laboured In preparing for the press what I have made public, may well remain a 4 as viii Introduction to the Second Edition. as it Is. My constant residence has been to this day in a most retired country village, far from all public libraries, or other literary assistances ; my book is still, therefore, merely the fruit of very limited researches and casual reading. It is true, I have been careful to examine, in the interval that has passed since my book first went ta the press, every subsequent work that it has been in my power to procure, and which seemed to bear par- ticularly on the question. To several of the learned authors I am much indebted for the present of their works, and to all of them for the honourable men- tion made of my own labours in . the same line. That such references as I have had occasion to make to some of these writings in the present Edition may be the better understood ; and as it cannot fail to be of importance to note what has been expressly written upon the subject in the course of the last four years, I shall briefly mention the principal works of this nature which have come to my liiiow- ledge. The first work that appeared after the publication of my own book, was one of great importance, and which attracted considerable notice, under the title of " Animadversions on the Unitarian Translation or Improved Version of the New Testament, by a Student in Divinity," now known, I believe, gene- rally to have been the Reverend Mr. Rennell ; the learned son of a learned father, the very Reverend the Dean of Winchester. This appeared early in the year Introduction to the Second Edition. ix year 1811, and was soon followed by the " Critical Reflections upon some important Misrepresentations contained in the Unitarian Version of the New Testa- ment, by the learned Dr. Laurence, Rector of Mersham, Kent ;'* a publication deserving the greatest attention. In 1812 the third Edition of the celebrated work on Atonement by Professor Magee^ of Trinity Col- lege, Dublin, now Dean of Cork, was published in 2 vols, in which thd corrections of the Improved Version are particularly considered, and at some length, and very ably discussed. It is probable that a fourth edition of this important work will very soon appear ; nor can I resist the opportunity of adding, that from the notoriously intrinsic value of it, a large impression has lately been taken off in America ; a sure proof, I hope I may have leave to say, that the doctrines of the Church of England are not, as some would insinuate, the mere doctrines of a party here, or at all dependent as doctrines upon the support they receive from the spiritual hierarchy of this country. To the third Edition, the learned author has added a very curious critique on " Williafns's Free Enquiry into the Authenticity of " the Two First Chapters of Matthew ;" a subject inti- mately connected with the peculiar sentiments of the Editors of the Improved Version. This portion of holy Scripture, -as well as the correspondent narrative of St. Luke, both marked as suspicious in the Unitarian Version, has also received considerable support from the very able " arguments " of X Introduction to the Second Edition. of the excellent and venerable Dr. Belly Prebendary of Weilminfter, prefixed to the last Edition of his learned " Enquiry into the missions of John the Bap- tist and Jesus Christ,*' i8io. Mr. Falconer's Bampton Lecture for the year 1 8 1 o, is a work to which I have had occasion to refer upon one point of considerable importance ; but the whole work is of great moment, as immediately direfted against the late Mr. Evanson^s extraordinary book on the Gospels, and involving many questions closely connected with the Unitarian Controversy. I do not know that I have cited, though I have certainly been much gratified by the perusal of, Mr. Doyley^ the Christian Advocate's Discourse on " Mo- dern Unitarianism," preached before the University of Cajiibridge in the year 1 8 1 1 ; as well as by Mr. Arch- deacon Vince*s Primary Charge to the Clergy of the Archdeaconry of Bedford, delivered in the year 1 8 1 o. The annexed " Cautions against being misled by the Unitarian Interpretations of Scripture," are certainly very just and good. I should be glad if I could have added to these a Charge lately delivered by the very learned the Lord Bishop of Gloucester, upon the same subject, of which I have heard much, but am appre- hensive it is not in the way to be published. A very small tract by Mr. Joseph Kinghorn, under the title of " Scriptural Arguments for the Divinity of Christ, addressed to the serious Professors of Chris- tianity,** is well deserving of the notice of the public ; and Introduction to the Second Edition. xi and on the subject of the " Sacrifice of Christ ; its Nature, Value, and Efficacy;'* I have been much interested by many able remarks in a Sermon of Dr. John Pye Smith, preached at Mr. Burder's Meeting House, March ii, 1813. I should here conclude my list of such works as may be said to bear immediate reference to the Im- proved Version ; but that while this Edition was passing through the press, another most learned and curious tract by my friend Dr. Laurence, made its appearance, which may certainly be said to affect the Editors of that Version through their great and justly celebrated authority, Griesbach. In noticing, however, Dr. Lau- rence*^ work, I am equally compelled to mention the very laborious Review of his publication in the Bri- tish Critic, New Series, Vol. i., concluded only in the Number for the month of April of the present year, and after the last sheet of my book was printed off. I should pay but an ill compliment to these learned and profound critics, were I to presume to speak of the exact amount of their labours, as in either case decisive in regard to the points they handle. It must require much more time than I have been able to command, and very many more books than I at pre- sent possess, to follow them critically through their laboured and curious deductions ; but I am quite pre- pared to say, that I have been extremely interested by both. That they have combined to confirm my own strong suspicions, that the received text may still be the most genuine and authentic in regard to those few doctrinal passages which continue to be questioned and xii Introduction to the Second Edition. and disputed. That, for instance, the Recensio Alex-' andrindy to speak technically, has probably acquired too great credit, at the particular expence of the By- "zantine ; that its originality or actual existence is either doubtful according to Dr. Laurence, or its purity moi*e than suspicious according to the learned Reviewer ; and that in either case, of course, the mischief it may have occasioned is more than problematical. That new modes of classijication may not only yet enable us to detect the true causes that have operated to produce such an apparent weight of existing evidences against us, but that even out of the very materials collected and accumulated by the indefatigable Griesbach, strong support may yet be given to those particular authorities, which have appeared to be depreciated by the parti- cular results of the classification of that great German collator and critic ; a collator and critic, however, whose name and reputation, I cannot forbear to add, will not be lost or lowered by a?iy objections to his system in general. For it would appear, that he will ever retain, by the consent of all parties, the just fame of most extraordinary application, and very superior talents ; of a most strict integrity, and amiable libe- rahty of mind, in a course of research and enquiry, stupendously intricate and fatiguing, and seldom to be prosecuted without some leaning or bias of passion or prejudice. It may be expected, perhaps, that I should notice Mr. Belsham\ book on " The Person of Christ,'* as published since my own remarks, and repeating all the criticisms and corrections of the Improved Ver- sion ; Introduction to the Second Edition. xiii sion ; of which also, he has commonly been reputed the principal Editor ; but as the public must have been expected to understand by the very circumstance of these criticisms and corrections being repeated in the face of my Remarks, (of which Mr. Belsham must have known, because they are mentioned in a book he cites continually,) that Mr. Belsham was not affected by my observations ; so I hope, this r^-pub- lication of my own book will be considered as a proof equally strong, that ?ny opinions have not been affec- ed by any thing I have found in his " Calm Inquiry ;'* for such is entirely the fact : besides, I feel com- pelled to observe, that I am not so fond of contro- versy as to go a step out of my way, to answer an opponent who will not meet me on fair, and honour- able, and equal terms. Mr. B.'s book has been an- swered by a powerful and acute writer in the British Critic^ vol. xxxviii, and I have read with pleasure, some excellent remarks on it, in the Monthly Review^ New Series, vol. Ixviii, and indeed within these few hours, the very learned reply of the Lord Bishop of St. David's, just published in his Memorial on the Repeal of Statutes 9 & lo of Wm. Illd. — 18 14. I have also read, with considerable interest, some Letters to Mr. B. by Mr. William Wright formerly of St. John's College, Cambridge, written with the ex- press purpose of drawing his attention to a prior work of his fellow Collegian Mr. Wilson, who died in 1797. This small pamphlet is really of great importance, as tending much to invalidate the authorities on which Dr. Priestley rested for his proof of the prevalence and popularity xiv Introduction to the Second Edition. popularity of Unitarianism in the early ages ; as well as to support the credit of other authorities which he chose to dispute. Mr.Wilson and Mr. Wright conspire to rob him entirely even of those " simpHces '* and *' idiot^e,^' whatever they were, whom Tertullian cer- tainly speaks of, as the *' major pars credentium ;'* though the same has certainly been hinted at before, I do not remember to have seen it placed in so strong a point of view. It seems, that so far from being Unitarianst they must have held and believed the doctrine of the full divinity of Christ : in fact, they were only Monarchists, -diffident in regard to the ceco?iomy, but so assured of the proper Deity of Christ, as on this very account to confound the persons, even of the Father and the Son ; which, as Tertullian contends, must imply sonie personal distinction. Mr. B. would have done better to answer Mr. Wright, than Mr. Horsley, inasmuch as Dr. Priestley's credit is more at stake upon these points, (as Mr. Wright himself tells him,) than in regard to the Church at Jilia. It is the answer to Mr. Horsley, however, which has come to my hands, almost wet from the press, while engaged on this Introduction, that has induced me to speak of Mr. Belsham as an opponent who will not meet me on fair and honorable and equal terms. I am the last man in the world to call ill names, or to stop any person's mouth merely because he thinks differently from myself; and I know that I have credit for this among Dissenters in general. I have not now indeed individually, or rather perhaps I should Introduction to the Second Edition. xv I should say, singly, any cause of complaint against Mr. B. If he think me a fool for differing from hi?iu I cannot help it ; but as I do not know that he has said so, I have no such cause of resentment. If he esteem me comparatively with himself, unlearned, dull, and ignorant, I am bound to bear it and forgive it ; but I will contend with no man, who is for cutting matters short by insulting the honourable calling to which I belong, and who has the audacity much more than to insinuate, as an express reason for his con- tempt of our arguments, that we are all knaves upon principle, and liars by profession. And what is our offence ? merely that, not having his eyes, and his in- tellects, we cannot see and understand just as he does ; but preach, and defend against him, certain doctrines, not more dear and precious to the members of the Established Church than to very many other denomi- nations of respectable Christians, who hold separate meetings, and never, except on great occasions of charity, publicly communicate with us. That I may not appear to be angry without a cause, I confidently refer my readers (that is, every ( truly honourable reader, by no means excepting Mr. Belsham's own friends) to pp. 2, 4, 5, and 100, of Mr. BeUham's most illiberal insinuations against us in his reply to the Reverend Heneage Horsley. No crff^ectation of tenderness for the " situation of the established clergy,*' at the conclusion of such a pam- phlet, can ever do away the foul slander and impu- tation he has cast on us ally of *' necessarily holding the TRUTH in aversion and abhorrence !'* Before xvi Introduction to the Second Edition. Before I conclude an Introduction, which the cir- cumstance above has alone rendered irksome and un- pleasant to me, I feel that I ought to mention, that I consider myself much obliged to many friends, (and to some correspondents, indeed, to whom I have not the honour of being known), for their suggestions in regard to a new and better arrangement of my original Remarks. In the present edition, this has been in part attempted ; but living far from the press, and for other reasons upon which I need not dwell, I have found it absolutely impracticable to accomplish all I wished to do towards carrying their proposals into execution. To remedy, however, the principal in- conveniences complained of, as far as possible, I have been careful to provide such Indexes of Texts and particular passages, as may, I hope, be a considerable assistance. As I concluded my first Introduction with a quotation from the venerable Hooker, most truly expressive of the real feelings of my heart, I shall borrow, for a con- clusion to my present Introduction, a passage from a contemporary writer, which will as amply and com- pletely express the only object I have in view, in all works of this nature. " Others may think them- selves right as well as we ; but the only way to talk to the purpose is, to examine the evidence in any controversy ; to consider not who says he is right, but who proves it." See Barivick's last Appendix to his Treatise on the Church, second Edit. p. 246. INTRODUCTION TO THE FIRST EDITION. T AM very ready to confess, that I send this Book into the world with extreme reluctance and concern. Controversy is far from being the de- light of my heart: but I l^:now not how I could with credit refrain from the publication of the present work. Friends have been led to expect it of me in consequence of a hasty notice which I gave long ago of my intentions to come for- ward, and adversaries have attacked me, before they heard what I have to say. My Remarks upon the Improved Version, formerly announced, may, it seems, be or not be, published. Those against whom they might be supposed to be directed, refer to them already, as a Work that may or may not be extant. They care not about them. I verily believe they do not ; and perhaps I am no antagonist whom they need to fear, however good the cause may be, that I may presume to advocate ; but I mean to be honest and sincere, and of all the b use xviii Introduction to the First Editioii. use I can be, to my fellow Christians ; therefore, what- ever I at any time happen to know, the disclosure of which may appear to me to be of any public im- portance, assuredly the world shall know also, as far as my means extend. In the month of May, 1809, the Improved Ver- sion first came into my possession. I had perused but httle of it, before I found jnuch to object to, and yet nothing but what appeared to me easy to answer. In some haste, I authorised the Editors of the British Critic to announce to the pubHc, that I was preparing Remarks on the New Ver- sion for the PreJ?s. This notice was accordingly p-iven, among their other articles of Literary Intel- ligence in the Review for June, 1809. I did not then foresee, what has happened since, that it would so soon engage the attention of other Critics more able and eminent than myself, or that they v/ould go so largely into the subject. It was not till after I had announced the publication of my own Remarks, that I had an opportunity of seeing what appeared upon the subject in the Quarterly and Eclectic Reviews, and other periodi- cal works. I felt that the necessity for my own interference was in a great degree superseded, and that much of what I was prepared to say had already been better said by others. This naturally excited in my mind many doubts as to the expediency of a separate publication, and I did not hesitate to transmit all that I had then written to the Editors of the British Critic, partly intending to adopt no othcj. Introduction to the First Edition. xix other method of communicating my sentiments to the public. What I then sent exceeded the ordi- nary limits of their Review, and they therefore con- cluded the second article with a statement to this effect, adding my initials, which became as it were a second pledge by which I stood committed to adventure farther : from the circumstances men- tioned above, however, my anxiety upon the subject was greatly abated, and a long time elapsed before I judged it necessary to get back the papers transmitted to the Editors of the British Critic. It has fallen in my way of late to know more than I knew some time ago, of the extraordinary zeal and industry with which the Unitarians are endeavouring to bring the Improved Version into nodce ; recommending it from their pulpits, and in ail periodical works with v/hich they are connected, in the strongest manner, not only as a more cor- real translation of the written word of God, but as tending to do away " many sources of error,'* and to enable the world to " form just ideas of true and imcorrupted Christianity.'* Constantly engaged as I am in my ministerial capacity, in expounding the great truths of Christ's Gospel, to a large congregation of my fellow Chris- tians, how could I be expected to see, without some uneasiness, the publication of a book, in three Editions at once, and the circulation of it in my immediate neighbourhood, in which the lead- ing doctrines of the church were peremptorily con- tradicted 'y doctrines which I had most confidently b 2 believed xxii Introduction fo the First Edition. against the cry, or even the insinuation^ of hypocrisy^ ignorance^ bigotry, deceit^ want of candor^ liberality^ &c. without some glow of honest resentment ? In my own estimation, it is an act of rudeness to ac- cuse any man or body of men of a deUberate trick or design to impose., and yet there is a course of conduct adopted by many which cannot be exposed and made known, with proper advantage to the world in general, but by such a representation of matters as must seem to amount to such a charge. It is a wise provision of the Law, to oblige every witness to tell not only the truths but the whole truth, and not only the whole truth, but nothing but the truth. There are many shades of difference between these several degrees of tesdmony. It cannot be thought in general to be any trick to lay the truth before the public ; but yet the world may be misled even by such a measure, if by any pardal suppression of matters of fact, the whole truth fhall be withheld from it. I will give an instance of what I mean. It has of late been proposed by a learned, and generally a very ingenuous writer, of the Unitarian paity, for the express purpose of propagating their Anti -Trinitarian notions, to publish selections from the works of eminent Trinitarians, such as Law's " Serious Call,'* and Bishop Jeremy Taylor's " Rule cf Holy Living and Dying,'* " unmixed with those senti?nents which the Unitarians deem unfounded in the Gospel." Now without attempting to dispute the right which the Unitarians may freely enjoy of propagadng Introduction to the First Edition. xxiii propagating their own tenets in distinct works, surely it would be dealing very unfairly by Trinitarian writers, and indeed misleading the pubHc greatly, to publish such works, as theirs ^ subject to a studied curtailment of the most effential doctrines of their creed. I have ventured to say In my book that it looks like a trick to have put the names of two Archbishops into the title page of this Version. I proteft, I mean to say this also in the way of caution, because if the Version were quite conformable to archbishop Newcome's, (which is by no means the case, nor are the deviations from it by any means so care- fully noticed as the Introduction would lead us to suppose,) some of the notes annexed are directly in opposition to him. An Edition of a New Text and Version of the New Testament, was many years ago dedicated to a noble Lord, distinguished by his learning In theological matters j from which circum- stance that great person was in danger of being wrongfully supposed to be an encourager of the work ; had he not taken timely care to make it known among his friends, that he neither knew the Editor, nor approved his performance. And it was certainly fortunate that he was still alive to vindicate his own fame. There is something going forward also among the Unitarians which I can scarcely bring myself to mention, because they certainly have a perfect right in this instance to act exactly as they please, and b 4 as xxiv Introduction to the First Edition. as they do, and yet I think the public should be made aware of it. I see in the Obituary of the Monthly Repository^ more notice taken of the death of any Femaky who happens, in ever so remote a part of the kingdom, to have espoused the Unita- rian doctrines, than would probably be taken of the decease of the French Einpcror. I would not de- prive that amiable sex of the privilege of thinking for themselves ; but I conceive them to be, from the common ctmrse of their education, by no means com.petent judges of the question, as a matter of Biblical Criticism, which the Unitarians make it, and therefore very liable to be milled, and conse- quently to mislead others ; and it happens that, Mis- tresses of Schools and Seminaries, are particularly among the number. To confer unexampled public honours and distinctions upon them therefore, merely for their deviations from and opposition to the Trinitarian doctrines, is surely a trap laid for the sex in general, and not a very complimentary one. I grieve to descend to such particulars, but since it is now the avowed purpose of the Society to propagate their doctrines by all possible means, as established funds, distribution of books, itinerant ministers, reviews, New Versions, kc, * ; I cannot avoid * The following is the authorised account of the articles of the Unitarian Fund, instituted March 4, i8o6, Chapel, Par- liament Court, Artillery Lane ; Article I. This Society shall be denominated The Unitarian Fund for promoting Unitarian- ifm by means of popular preaching. Article 11. The uses to which Introduction to the First Edition, xxv avoid putting the question upon as fair a footing as I can, by this timely notice to Trinitarians of all descriptions. Any asperity of language that might be avoided is very unbecoming, and I hope I may safely say, it is very contrary to my natural disposition, to have recourse to it. No conscientious dissenter, I truft, will ever have to accuse me of any failure in per- sonal respect ; but we all know ourselves imper- fectly, and should therefore be ready to make allow- ances for each other. An Unitarian writer in the Monthly Repository, speaking of Bishop Warburton's Letters, says, if they have the effect of teaching how Christianity ought not to be defended, by showing that contempt and arrogance are insufferable in the mightiest minds, they will have done great good. Now, as a gene- ral remark, I cordially agree with this writer. Con- tempt and arrogance should be sedulously avoided : and yet in the very same Volume of the Repository, thus does an Unitarian writer, begin his defence of the hnproved Version, against the Quarterly Reviewers in particular, but generally also, (as the expressions which the fund raised by this Society shall be applied, shall be, 1st, To enable poor Unitarian congregations to carry on religious worship ; 2d, To reimburse the travelling and other expences of Teachers who may contribute their labours to the preaching of the Gospel on the Unitarian principles ; 3d, To relieve those Christian ministers who, by embracing Unitarianisni, aubject themselves to Poverty. imply) xxvi Introduction to the First Editien. imply) againfl all who hold the Trinitarian and other doctrines. " It is not at all surprising that the interested or prejudiced advocates for popular creeds, have taken the alarm, and that as usual in such cases, they are ope?iing in full cry to run the obnoxious victim down. The Editors could expect * no other treatment as the work came to be more generally known, and the alarm to spread. Well may the old serpent hiss and writhe and struggle^ ivhen truth, ever victorious^ is trampling upoji his head. If ignorance, calumnyy and hardihood of assertion can produce the effect, they, (the Quarterly Reviewers,) intend, they will indeed put an extinguisher over this newly kindled lamp." Now surely this is not only ample apology for any asperity of language on the part of the Quar- terly Reviewers, but would justify them even if they had descended (which I think them incapable of doing) to the utmost violence and vulgarity of style. In the Improved Version itself, however, and ge- nerally in the notes, there is certainly nothing of this kind to complain of; no vulgar or abusive language at all, and much in the regular way of cri- ticism. There are, indeed, in the introduction, (which * As this paper is signed B, and dated from Hackney, and Mr. Belsham's picture has been engraved by Schiavonetti, at the expence of the Unitarian Book Society, for hia labours in prepar- ing the Improved Version, surely he must be the vrriter. Is Introduction to the First Edition. xxvii is a valuable piece in itself) insinuations conveyed by certain terms which I have judged it not amiss to notice in my book ; though perhaps we are all liable occasionally to trespass in this particular. I am sorry to make this introduction so long, but I have still something to say on the general effect of the publication in question. An improved version, and a corrected text, necessarily imply a previous capability of improvement and need of correction. It is fit, therefore, that the real state of the case should be fairly and impartially repre- sented ; and here I am happy to be able to give the Editors praise. The Introduction to this Version, for the most part, is very good, as an historical me- moir ; it brings into a small compass a large mass of important information ; it is chiefly, indeed, an abridgement of the Prolegomena of Griesbach^ and consequently must contain most of what we want to know, of the exact state aud circumstances of the text of the New Testament : still, however, I have some few observations to make upon the subjeft *. Biblical Criticism is a branch of study little thought of by the generality of people ; what is put before them they are able to read, and from that to form their ideas ; but how that which is put before them has been prepared and compiled, they are very little able to judge. The present edition is set forth as an Improved Version of the New Testament, formed on % particularly correct text, with an intent to get rid * The Ijclectic Review should be consulted. xxviii Introduction to the First Edition. of certain doctrines^ as palpable corruptions of Chri3» tianity ; implying certainly, that an improved Version and corrected text, were wanting for these purposes ; and consequently that all other texts and transla- tions were not only faulty and defective, but calcu- lated to ?niskad the public in points of great impor- tance ; especially the received text and common version^ which the Editors more immediately profess to have improved upon and amended. They adopt, we are told, Archbishop Newcomers version and Griesbach's text. This is well, and I do not wish to object to it, because both Newcome and Griesbach were great critics, and have shown themselves by 710 ?neans in- dined to deprive the Unitarians of any tolerably fair advantages. I must, however, have leave to enquire what is the full amount and exact value of their labours, with a view to the disputes between Trinitarians and Unitarians? I declare that it appears to me to be perfectly trifling, or rather of no serious ac- count at all. This can only be said upon the authority of some examination and scrutiny of matters ; I really think then, that the amendments and alterations resulting from the labours of all the modern critics, are exceedingly insignificant, as to the real contents of the sacred writings, though extremely valuable in many respects, per- haps I may reasonably add, on this very account. I would not be thought inclined to withhold the praise that is justly due to the extraordinary exer- tions of the German critics, Wctsteiny Semlcry Cries- bachi Introduction io the First Edition. xxix bachy &c. ; they have certainly great claims to our admiration, they have studied hard and done much ; so much, that I am frequently as much astonished at their labours, as any of those can be, who are most sanguine about the general result of their pains ; still I must declare that I think much of their time has, as it turns out, been spent in vain, but cer- tainly so, with respect to all that relates to the doctrine of the Trinity, &c. I will explain as well as I can what I wish to say. It is well known that when Dr. Mill first pub- lished his various readings, to the amount as it was calculated, of 30,000, infidels began to triumph, and some over-timid Christians were panic-struck ; there ?nay be infidels, and there may be tender- minded Christians at this moment, to whom the sound of 150,000 various readings may be alike acceptable or unacceptable, only in a much greater degree. I would not do the Editors any injustice ; they themselves certainly state the case perfectly well in one part of their introduction ; they ob- serve, p. xxvii. that " these various readings, though very numerous, do not in any degree affect the general credit and integrity of the text. The general uniformity of which, in so many copies, scattered through all countries in the known world, and in so great a variety of languages, is truly astonishing, and demonstrates both the veneration in which the Scriptures were held, and the great care which was taken in transcribing them. Of the hundred and fifty thousand various readings. XXX Introduction to the First Edition. readings, which have been discovered by the saga- city and diHgence of Collators, not one-tenth, nor one-hundredth part, make any perceptible, or at least any material alteration in the sense. This will appear credible, if we consider that every, the minutest deviation, from the received text, has been carefully noted, so that the insertion or omis- sion of an article, the substitution of a word for its equivalent, the transposition of a word or two in a sentence, and even variations in orthogra- phy, have been added to the catalogue of various readings.'* This representation of matters is exceedingly just, and tends to show what is the exact amount of the assistance derived from the labours of modern col- lators. They have with infinite pains most certainly, amassed an immense quantity of information, to this end only as it appears to me, namely, to prove that we could either have done without the information, or that the acquisition only tends to fix us all exactly where we were before. The Editors in their introduction lay a stress on three passages only, as of great importance to their cause, viz. Acts, xx. 28. ; i Tim. iii. 16. j i John, V. 7. But Dr. Carpenter^ in his sermon at Bristol, June 1808, in vv'hich he recommends the Improved Version in the strongest terms, selects twenty pas- sages, which, as he says, have, " cmiicctlon luith the Unitarian tenets i"*' and which the Improved Version has properly corrected^ to the great benefit, as is implied, of the public in general. Let every one of these hitroduction to the First Edition. xxxi these passages be turned against us, if I can prove that Trinitarians have heretofore feh strong enough without them, I think I shall show at once that the improvements and corrections of the present Edi- tors, are really of no account at all, as to the ques- tions betM^een us and them. The Eclectic Reviewers^ who have given us a critique on the Improved Ver- sion, that abounds in learning and information, in- cline to give up all the three passages, Acts, xx. 28. ; I Tim. iii. 16. ; i John, v. 7. I have said what I think of them in my book, to which I must now refer ; but I shall here beg leave to observe, that in regard to two of the three, viz. i Tim. iii. 1 6., and I John, V. 7. ; the Unitarians themselves seem to me to admit the fact, viz. that Trinitarians can do quite as well without them, for one of their arguments (and no weak one certainly) to prove them spurious, is, that they were never cited in the difputes between the Athanasians and Arians. Now when we consider the exact nature of these disputes, whichenjer side ive take, it is certainly a plain proof, that (against Unita- rians) neither party thought the canon without these texts as now read, deficient in proper evidences that Christ was a super-angelic pre-existent Being, nay even GOD. I say, whichever side we take, because I must confess ih2l Arians (and I might add Soci- nians) seem to me by their interpretations, to prove the point more strongly against the Unita?iaj2s than the orthodox Trinitarians ; for if the Scriptural expres- sions are really such as to induce Arians and Soci- nians to acknowledge Christ to be a fuhordinate or i o factitious xxxli Introduction to the First Edition^ factitious God, rather than believe him to be mere tnan, surely the dilemma to which they reduce them- selves is a striking proof, that they would never run so much greater a risk than the proper Trinitarians, of trenching upon the Unity, except that his mere humanity appears at all events, irreconcileable to the language of Scripture. The Negative testimony therefore of Athanasians and Arians in their disputes, against these passages, is to me, as far as it is valid, a plain proof that as to the main question, they are really of no account at all ; we may retain them or give them up as we please ; all that they have been supposed to con- tain is to be found elsewhere, in the most newly corrected text of Scripture, and the most modern versions, not excepting the present improved one ; besides it appears from the Editor's own note, that in regard to i John, v. 7., Erasmus, Zuinglius, Luther, did without it, and more recently, as Mr. Porson observes, Sinmi, La Croze, Michaelis, and Criesbach, whom Dr. Carpenter particularly calls, a " liberal Trinitarian*,^^ But * [Griesbach's own observations on the three passages in ques- tion should not be omitted ; they occur in his Preface to the Apostolical Writings, piiblished in the year 1775. *' Interim uni tamen dogmati eiq' palmario, doctrinae scilicet de vera Jesu Christi divinitate, non nihil a me detractum esse videri posset non- nuUis, qui non solum locum istum celebratlssimum, i John, v. 7. e textu ejectum, verum etiam lectioncm vulgarcm loci, 1 Tim. iii. 16. (ut et Act. XX. 28.) dubitationi subjectam ct lectorum arbi- trio Introduction to the First Edition. xxxlii But Dr. Carpenter himself produces twenty pas- r-ages, the three above being included ; I have shown that of those three, Trinitarians of old have been sup- posed to defend their cause strongly enough without two of them, and I shall now proceed to examine those which Dr. Carpenter dwells upon. It is at least implied^ both by the Editors and their supporters, if not expressly insisted upon, that the public were ne'ver before provided with so cor- rect a text, or so impartial a Version, as in the present instance ; bat what if I produce a Greek text and an English Version, nearly an hundred years old, that is, all printed and published before the Wetsteins (the younger at least) or Griesbachs were heard of or known ; agreeing in most points with even the second Edition of Griesbach, Newcome, and even the Impro'ued Version itself? I have now lying before me, then, an Edition of the New Testament in Greek and English, publiftied in two volumes in the years 1715 and 1718. I have been careful to collate more than once this very Edition trio permissam, invenient. Quare ut iniquas suspiciones omnes quantum in me est, amoliar et hominibus malevolis calumniandi ansam praeripiam, ^rimnm public e prof teor at que D^um tester, neuti quam mede veritate istius dogmatis dubitare ; atquesunt profecto tam muUa et luculenta argwnenta et Scriptura loca, quibus vera Deltas Christo vindicatur, ut ego quidem intelligere vix possem, quomodo, concessa Scripturae facrae divina auctoritate, et admissis justis interpretandi regulis, dogma hoc in dubium a quoquam vocan possit. In primis, locus iUe, Joh. i. T, 2, 3, tarn perspicuus est atque omnibus CKCeptlonlbus major, ut neque interpretum neque criticorum audacibus conatibus unquam everti atque veritatia defensoribus eripi possit." — ] c word xxxiv Introduction to the First Edition. word for word with Griesbach's second Editiofl 5' and I must protest that the variations in general are so frivolous, that if a correct text were all 1 wanted, I could freely commit to the flames nearly the whole that I have acquired from Griesbach' In the Edition that I speak of, (which the learned in general will know to be Dr. Weils^s,) there are many variations and deviations from the received text J but it so happens that scarcely any of impor- tance occur, that are not particularly approved by Griesbach. Even the English Version and para- phrase have the sanction of Archbishop Newcome in many points of great importance ; so that for 7ny own studies, I have really gained Httle from the most minute examination of Griesbach*s numerous references, Newcofne's translation, or the Version before us, except the satisfaction of being assured that I was quite safe long ago, and that the public might have been so 95 or 92 years at least, before the appearance of the present hnproved Version. I do not however mean to deny, that the passages spoken of above are to be found in this edition as- they stand in the received text : I have therefore judged it to be the more necessary to treat of them both in this Introduction, and the book itself ; but I can safely assure Dr. Carpenter, that exclusive of these three passages, out of seventeen that remain, of those he has selected, in no less than sixteen instances, Wells, perfectly agrees with Griesbach and the Editors, both in the correction of the Greek text, and the rendering of the passages ; and in J. . regard Intrcdiictlon to the First Edition. xxxv regard to the only place where they differ, viz. Rev. ii. 7. though the pronoun fMs may there be acci- dentally omitted after 0fH, ii is as carefully inserted under similar circumstances, ch. iii. 2. ; so that this scarcely amounts to any real difference *. It is certainly both curious and satisfactory to observe how very little of the sacred text requires to be changed^ though no less than an hundred years ago 30,000 various readings were discovered, and now the number is increased to 150,600. Having, as I stated, diligently collated the Greek text of the learned Wells with Griesbach's second Edition, 1 shall here give a specimen of the exact amount of the later discoveries as far as it respects one book of the New Testament, namely, the Gos- pel of St. John. Great suspicions seem to exist in regard to the particles aj» and cTe, which are contir * Many other circumstances deserving of notice have struck me in the collation of the feveral Editions before me. Some- times Wells ventures to reject what Griesbach marks as pribably to he omitted; sometimes he does this where he is supported against GriesbacFlij Neiucome and JVakeJield, and even the Editors of the Improved Fersio?i. Sometimes he adopts a conjectural reading, which, though approved by Griesbach, could not with propriety be taken into his text ; this is the case Heb. xii. 15* Sometimes (as in the reading of Jude, 25,) Wells agrees with the Editors and Griesbach, against the received text and Ncujcome ; sometimes IVells agrees with Griesbach against the Editors, Netucome, and Pearctf as Afts, xi. 20. Often he avails himself of readings approved by Griesbach to clear up difficulties which have heretofore perplexed all commentators, and generally with good effect. — Philipp. i. $' Wells renders Kowuna. contribution, which the Editors adopt against Newcome, giving Mr, Wakefield the credit of it. c 2 nually xxxvi Introduction to the first Edition. nually rejected by Griesbach, or marked as doubt- ful; so that a *'but" and a *' then" and " there* fore" are rendered very questionable wherever they occur in the writings of this Apostle. It is doubt- ful whether John, i. 26. should be read, BUT there standeth one among you, or, THERE standeth one among you, without BUT ; it is doubtful whe- ther John, iv. 9. should be read, " THEN saith the woman of Samaria ;** or, " saith the woman of Sa- maria." The amount of the suspicions concerning the particle ^t, is as 18 or 19. of the particle hv. as 32 ; the copulative xat, and^ is doubtful to the amount of 2 1 ; the article before ©so? or Irra?, is doubtful to the amount of 33 ; tw, and t«, to*?, &c. before nouns and proper names, are liable to some suspicion ; Atywv and Xiyovln; might it seems without hazard be omitted, the subjunctive be changed with effect for the indicative, and vice versa ; the authorities for Mto-o-ia? and Mso-ta?, and for Na^aptJ and Na^a^sT, seem to be equal. I do not mean to infer that particles, &c. be- cause they are small w^ords, are therefore unim- portant ; I am quite aware that, " 7ion sunt ubique adeo exigua ut contemni dcbeant^ inde enim pendet aliquando 'valde utilis sensus ;" but, I have diligently examined every passage in which the above various readings occur in the Gospel of St. John, and can safely pronounce them to be of no moment *. The following * According to Griesbach himself the number might have been increased, but as he justly observes, " in panderandi: atqve Introduction to the First Edition. xxxvii following is a fair and exact statement of the result of my examination of the two Greek texts of this book in Griesbach and Wells, (occasionally consult- ing an Elzevir edition,) and the English Versions of Welist Newcomey and the Editors. I shall put down first the total of various readings in each chapter, and secondly, the number of those that affect the text, that is, which have the Jiglcs prefixed in Griesbach's text and margin. Chap. I. Number of various readings, in all LXXXVII, of those that affect the text XXII ; one only of any importance, viz. yer. 28. B>i6avi« for B*!6«gajp«, and this is noticed in the margin of my Elzevir Edition, 1658. Chap. II. Various readings, in all LIV,alTecting the text VII ; all unimportant ; xola^ay/lat for noclitpxyt, ver. 1 7 ; noticed in my Elzevir Edition. The received text, and Wells more conformable to the LXX. Chap. III. various readings, in all LXX, affecting the text XII ; two only of any importance ; ver. 1 3, .m IV spoivic marked by Griesbach as somewhat doubt- ful, by the Editors inclofed in brackets, which with them is the mark of probable omission, and therefore tends to confound matters ; they note that the clause is wanting in some of the best copies, but Griesbach produces only five authorities for the omission of the whole, viz. two Uncial. 33. The Mthiopic Version and Gregory Nazianzen. ■ cum pulvisculo excutlendis talthus minutns, sensum orathnh vullo modo attingentihus, diligent'ta editorit, iametsi ferreOf tandem frangiturV Proleg. Sect.zi. XL IV. c 3 Ver, xxxviii Introduction to the First Edition. Ver. 25 ; for J Griesbach has la^cciny which is noted in the margin of my Elzevir, and taken into the text by We/'s. Chap. IV. various readings, in all CII, affecting the text XXIII ; not one of any importance ; most of them noticed in the margin of my Elzevir. Chap. V. various readings, in all XCIX, affecting the text X ; one only of importance, ver. 4, marked as probably to be om.itted by Griesbach, printed in italics by the Editors ; the doubts in regard to this verse are not new. See Whitby's Examen Alillii, and the Prolegomena of the latter. See also Trapp on the Gospels, and Doddridge on the place. Chap. VI. various readings, in all CXL, affecting the text XXXVI ; not one of importance; ver. 11, Wells discards toi? ju,aO-/iTa;? 01 J'f fxa^nrcci, v/hich Griesbach marks as probably to be omitted, their absence from ancient MSS. is noticed in my Elzevir, 1658. Chap. VII. various readings, in all CII, affecting the text XX ; most of them quite unimportant ; ver. 8, Griesbach rejects ^ttw, and takes ax before ai^i^aji/w ; Wells had done exactly the same before him, admi- rably, and very honestly explaining in his note the probable ground of the corruption, as intended to set aside Porphyry^s objections. He does not scruple however to render it, *' not yet,''* in which sense New- come and the Editors seem to agree, who render it " not noiu.'* Griesbach discards aAtjOwffrom ver. iG ; Wells does the same J the latter also notices the punctuation adopted Introduction to the First Edition. xxxix adopted by Griesbach, ver. 21, 22 ; though he does not follow it himself. Chap. VIII. 'various readings, in all CLXVI, affect- ing the text XXIV ; all of them unimportant except the first, beginning Chap. VU. ver. 53, from whence to the end of ver. 11. Chap. VIII. Griesbach marks the v/hole as probably to be omitted, and the Editors print it m itahcs. Wells does not express any doubts of its authenticity, but its absence from ancient MSS. and from the Syriac Version is noticed in the margin of my Elzevir, 1658. Archbishop Newcome strongly inchnes to admit it ; he thinks ver. 1 2 tends to prove it genuine, and he assigns reasons for its omission in some MSS. See Michaelis on the passage, and Middleton's remarks on tqv AiOo^, in his Doctrine of the Greek Aiticle *. The Primate and the Editors render ver. 56. ryaXA.«(7«1e, " h£ earnestly desired,'' which (though they do not cite him, is strongly recommended by Blackwall in his sacred Classics, p. 34* published 1725. Wells however was before Blackivall, whoren- * As I have not noticed this gentleman's Doctrine of the Greek Article, in some parts of the following remarks, where it might naturally be expefted ; I beg leave to observe, that it was not till after much of the work was printed that I had an oppor- tunity of reading the whole of his book ; which however was not altogether accidental, for knowing that his Doctrine had already been disputed by some of the party against whom my Strictures are directed, particularly by Mr. Jones, in the Appendix to his Illustrations of the Gospel, and by Dr. Carpenter, I was deter- mined to keep myself free from any bias that might arise from a doctrine so recently submitted to the public. . c 4 "ders xl hitroduction to the First Editmi. ders it, your Father Abraham longed to see my day.** See also Trapp on the Gospels, and Whitby in loc. Chap IX. various readings y in all LXXXIX, affect- ing the text XVIII ; not one of the least importance j most of them noticed in the margin of my Elzevir. Chap. X. various readings^ in all LXXX, affecting the text XIV ; all unimportant. The Primate and the Editors render 7roi,u!/>i, ver. i6; Flock instead of Fold, which as giving a larger sense to the passage is preferable, and is in fact the true meaning of the term. Chap. XL various readings, in all XCIX, affecting the text XVI ; not one of importance. Chap. XII. various readings, in all CVI, affecting the text XVII ; all perfectly unimportant. Chap. XIII. various readings, in all LXXIV, affect- ing the text XVIII ; unimportant. Chap. XIV. various readings, in all LXIX, affecting the text X ; not one of importance. Chap. XV. various readings ^ in all XLIV, affecting the text VII ; ibid. Chap. XVI. various readings, in all LXIII, affecting the text XV ; ibid. Chap. XVII. various readings, in all LXVI, affect- ing the text XI. Griesbach has Z instead of »'?, ver. II, upon vi^hich I have made some remarks else- where ; the rest quite immaterial. Chap. XVIII. various readings, in all XLVI, affect- ing the text XVI. Ver. i, -r« ya^puiv for Tw^. See Middleton on the Article, 373. Ver. 15, «AAt>? p.ae>iTnf J see Middleton ; the Improved Version fol- lows Introduction to the First Edition. xli lows the received text, another disciple ; "Wells doeP ihe same. Ver. 20, otth Trxurohv oi laSxioi : Griesbach .discards zjavTcOfi* and reads zjavVq : Weils does the same : zrccvli? also occurs in the margin of rny Elzevir. Chap. XIX. various readings, in all XCVI, affects ing the te?ct %Xlll ; generally quite unimportant, Ver. 31, for viJ^epa, mat^Yi TH S^^gg^TH, Griesbach reads txEita -y see Middleton : WeUs, who reads £X£*j/}i, acr counts for the high day in his paraphrase. Chap. XX. various readings, in all LXVII, affecting the text XIV. Ver. 8, Newcome, and the Editors of the Improved Version, have taken advantage of a reading in this verse, on the sole authority of the jGreek of the Camb. MSS. «« imr^vfTEv, and believed not ; to assign a reason for John's z//z-belief : see however Doddridge : Griesbach does not take an into his text. The other readings quite unimportant. Chap. XXI. various read'mgs, in all LXVII, affect- ing the text IX ; none of the smallest importance. The total of the various Readings in this Gospel then amounts to one thousand seven hundred and eighty-seven ; and of those affeding the text, and which therefore I have had occasion to mark, to three hundred and forty-two, not one-fifth of the whole ; and of these three btindred and forty-tzvo the very utmost that can be said to be of any im- portance, as far as I am a judge, do not exceed seven or ten at furthest * ; and of these, more than half at the least appear to have been noticed an. f The three, noticed by Mr. Middletqn^ have been added. hundred xlii Introduction to the First Edition. hundred or an hundred and fifty years ago. I must again declare, that I do -not bring these facts for- ward to depreciate the merit of those indefatigable collators and critics who have supplied us with this information, and which extends to many other most important objects, — ^but merely to prevent any fresh alarms, from the large increase of various readings, and the revived report of irnprovements and corrections of the sacred text. I have now nearly brought this long Introduction to a conclusion ; but I cannot yet dismiss it, without expressing a hope that the cause I plead, will be found to be not that of the Estabhshed Church only, but of many denominations of Dissenters. I would even flatter myself that much which I have advanced may be judged nearly to concern the Jews^ that an- cient and most extraordinary people ; to whom were committed those " Oracles of Gody" on which the faith of every Christian should be built ; "to whom pertains the adoption^ and the glory^ and the covenants^ and the giving of the law, and the service of God, and the promises, whose are the Fathers, and of ivhom as to the Flesh Christ came, who is over all God blessed for ever." I should have been happy if I could have adapted my book more immediately to the use and service of the unlearned, whom it is my ultimate desire to pre- serve harmless in this new trial to which they are about to be exposed ; but the nature of the publi- cation against which I have directed my Remarks, prevented this, and compelled me to discuss the matter Introduction to the First Edition, xliii inatter in the way of criticism \ in which, if I should have done but Httle or even fallen into mistakes, I pught to be excused if I have done enough to satisfy myself ; because this is the Hberty and privi- lege so much insisted upon by our opponents, that (very man may think for himself, and propagate for the behoof of others, whatever he thinks and be* lieves. I am confident that if I should have fallen into any gross error, it will be soon sufficiently de- tected and pointed out, which has the more embol- dened me to make free with what I conceive to be the errors of others ; for though I am always sorry to find that I am wrong, I wish to meet my opponents upon the most equal terms. As I began this Introduction by expressing my dislike of controversy, I shall conclude it with the pathetic words of the admirable Hooker^ which I would willingly address to those whom these Remarks most concern. " Far more comfort It w^re for us (so small is the joy we take in these strifes) to labour under the same yoke, as men that look for the same eternal reward of their labours ; to be enjoined with you in bands of indissoluble love and amity, to live as if our persons being many, our souls were but one, rather than In such dismembered sort, to spend our few and wretched days in a tedious prosecuting of wearisome contentions,^* INDEX of CHAPTERS and TEXTS, referred to or explzuned. GENESIS. LEVITICU S— continued. Chap. ver. Page Chap. ver. Page i. I. - - 224 viii. — 171 Hi. ... 18 ix. 7. 169 — 8. 86 xvi. — 156, 157 iv. I. - - 240 xvii. 2 . - 156 vi. _ 232 XX. 23. 93 xii. 7. 231 xxii. — 170 XV. I. -* 231 xxvi. 46. 43 xvi. 13. 43 — 7- -13. - 87,2.^1 1 XX. 3- 78 NUMBERS. xxii. 2. - - 178 XXV. 10. 242 vii. 8, 9. . 156 xxxi. 11. 74 xii. 2, 6. 79 xxxvii II. 18 xviii. — 144 xlvii. 23. 242 xxii. 8, 9. 127 xlviii. 16. 74 xlix. 30. 242 DEUTERONOMY. EXODUS. viii. 19. - . 89 125 iii. 6. 87 xxvi. 5. - . 22 — 14. 233 18. 93 — 15. 87 XX viii. 10. 192 XV. 16. - 240,24.1,244 xxxii. 6. 240, 241, 2-f4 xxiii. 14,20,22. 74,85,86 15, 16. - 124 xxiv. 8. 166 XXV. 23. 156 xxix. — . - 171 JOSHUA. xxxiv LEVITICUS. 95»98 xxiv. 32. z 243 SAMUEL. iv. 3- 170 T. 19. 87 XXV. 39. 79 Index of Chapters and Texts, 2 SAMUEL. Chap, vcr, xii. 3. xvii, II. xix. 43. Page 86 213 -.nil. xix. xvju. 1 KINGS. 39- g, 11,14. 2 KINGS. I CHRONICLES. xxix. I. PSALMS. XII. 2 xlix. 7 Ixviii. 8 Ixxxii. 6. Ixxxiii. 18. cii. 25. 195 77 263 178 184 172 86 109 54 103 123 ex. I. 77,91, 94,118, 208 cxvi. 13. - - 198 PROVERBS. iv. 3. - - 178 viii. 21, 22, 5:c. 45, 114, 115 ISAIAH--ron//n«^'^. Chap. vcr. P^ge xxxiv. 16 - - 243 xl. 3. 42, 64, 94, 103 — 5' xli. 4. xliii. II. xliv. 6. xlv. 20, 21 — : ^•^• xlvii. 4. xlviii. 12. Jiii. 4, 5. — 6. — 7- — 12. Ivii. 15. Ixiii. I — 6. — .8.9- 62 88 - 88, 221 5, 256, 257 91, 221 41 9+ 88 142 149 163 148 265 91 86 JEREMIAH. X, xxiil 1 1. 6. xxxi. 29. xxxiii. 16. 124 - 47^ 50 146 - 47>50 LAMENTATIONS. iv. 16. V. 7. — 19. xviij. 2. EZEKIEL. 86 146 i27 J4^ ISAIAH. V. I. «fi. — III III DANIEL. vii. 13,14. 57 Index of Chapters and Texts* HOSEA. MATTHEW. Chap. ver. Page Chap. ver. Page i. 2. - 79 i. 16. • 4 xiii. 4- - 221 — 21. - 91 — 23- - 184 ii. 5- - 24 JOEL. — 18. - 14 ii. 32. - - 193 198 iii. 23. 17. ~ 23 176 vi. 13- - 174 MICAH. \iii. 7- - 142 xi. 10. - 94 V. 2. - - 22,45 xiii. 55- - 24 xiv. 33- - ^J HABAKKUK. xvi,^ 5- - - 176 -~- 18. « 221 ji. I. - - 79 — 24. - 145 xvii. 54- - 58 XX. 28. 1 3^. 139, 242,244 ZECHARIAH. xxi. 25. . - 104 xxii. 42. - - 208 \. 4,9,13,14. - 79 44. . 43 » 77»9» ii. 10. - 125 xxvi. 63, 64 • 5S xii. I. - 243 xxvii. 43- - - 5S ~-* '4. - - 242 ,244 xxviii .18. - - 184 8. 10. 125 242, 244 MALACHI. I. 93,94,103,243 ECCLESIASTICUS. 1. xxiv. 9. 116 45 1. vii. BARUCH. 12. - - 116 2 MACCABEES. 24. - - 167 3ti. •• - 229 2 II 24 37 38 IX. X. xi. xii. xiv. XV. xvi. 45 3° 6. 36 61, 62 39- 19, MARK. 94 176 265 208 l6 176 136, I39» 242,244 104 LUKE. X. 4. — 26. 176 43> 77 10,54 55 4 27 Index of Chiipten and Texts. LUKE — c out in ucd. JOHN- -continued. Chap.ver. Paj^e Cha p. VLM •. Pag*- i. 31- - 91 V. 1 8. - • 6a — 39.65. - - 34 — 26. - - 102 — 6i. - - 192 — 27. - - 56 — 80. - • 3? — 38. - - 104 ii. I. - 34 vi. 33. - - 109 — 25. - - 15 — 40. - - 104 — 49. - - 10 — 42. - -■ 24 iii. I. - J3 — 46. - - 104 — 2. - 31 — 62. - - !08 — 4. - - 42 — 68. - . 102 — 21. - 104 — 69. - .. 265 — 22. - 176 vii. 42. - - 9, 22 -r- 23. 12 >24, 25,27.29 viii. 23- - - 106 iv. 3*9- - - 56 — 42.- - - 104 — 16. - 33 — 58. - - 72, 233 — 22. - 24 , 25 X. 20. - - loS — 34- - 265 — 55- - - 99 vii. 27. - 94 xii. 41. - - 109 ix. 35- - - .76 xiv. 9- - - ]04 XX. 41. - - 208 — 16. - - 153 — 42. - - 43 . 77 — 18. - - 176 xxii. 70,71. - - 54 _ 26. - - 104 xvi. 7- - - 104 — 28. - • 107,207 JOHN. — 3°- - . 195 xvii. 5- - - 67 i. I- 45' IS' 91 , r25, i«4 - n. - - J79 — 2, - 75 xviii .19. - - 171 — 3- 207, 231 xix. 7- • - 55 — 6. IC3 , 104, 107 - 37. - - 242 — 10. - 82 XX. 28. - - 180 — 12. - 54 — -31. - - 104 —" 14. 109, 177 116 178, 175. 212 — 15. - '75 ACTS . — 18. 72 , 125' .87 — 29. - 145 i. I. - - 31 — 31.34- - 34.35 1 — 24. - - ^95 — 33' 34- - - 72 ii. 36. - - 13d — 45- - 24 V. 3I' - - 150 — 50. - 72 vii. 30- - - '^^ ii. 24. - ^9S — 32- - - 87, 125 iii. '3- 109, 207 — 59- - - 194 — 16, 18. - - 176 ix. H. 21. 1 93» '94 iv. 42. - 8S, 221 X. 25^ 26. - - 65 Index of Chapters and Texts. AC TS — continued. GAL. Al TANS. Chap. ver. Page Chap. ver. Page xi. 26. - - 194 i. 4- - 62, 140 XV. 17. - - 192 ii. 14. - 162 XX. 4. - . 21 — 15- - 182 — 28. - 219, 221, 241, iii. ^3- - 140, 244, 245 242, 257 — 15- - 166 xxii .16. - - 192 — 16. - ■ 58 — 19. - 130 ROMANS. iv. 4- - 2i>44>59 — 5' 6, 7 .■59 i. 3. - - 182 — 23- * 182 — 25. - - 187 iii. ^5- i54> 159. 160, 163 — 26. - 154, 159, 160 EPHES [ANS. - — 29, 30. - - 191 iv. 25. - 140, 159 i. 10. - 202 V. I* - - 159 — 19, 20. 180 ' — 6. - - 140 — 22, 23. 184. vi. 10. - - 170 ii. 17- - 232 viii. 3. - 141, 165, 247 iii. 9- - - 258 — 15. - - 120 — 14. - 194 — 16. - - 58 — 19. - 216 — 34- - - 154 iv. 5- - 221 ix. 5. - 103, 181—191,235 — 9» lo- 109 X. 12. - 192, 195, 198 V. 5- -- 63 — 13. - - 193, 198 — 19. - 218 xi. 24. * - 182 — 20. - 62 vi. 12. - 202, 205 1 CORINTHIANS. i. 2. - - 192 PHILIPPIANS. ii. 8. - - 103 vi. 20. - 240, 241, 242, 244 ii. 6, 7. 8, 9- 206 vii. 23. - - 244 —^~ 7.8. 2O9, 210 — 33. - - 136 ~~ 9- - J84 viii. 0. - 122, 221 "■"■ 9, 10. 91 XV. 3. - - 140 — 10. - 4t -- 21, 22. - 200, 201 47. 103, 200, 201 48, 49. - 200, 201 iv. 20. 62 COLOSSIANS. 2 CORINTHIANS. i. 15- - 124 ▼. 21. - 165, &c. — 15,16,18. - 211, 212, 213 xi. 31. - - 187 — 17. " 207 xii. 8; 9, - 196 — 19. JB 213 Index of Chapters and Texts. COLOSSIANS— <:o«//««^J. Chap. ver. i. 20. — 27. ii. 2. T 9- iii. 16. Page 204 62 217 214, 215 217 THESSALONTANS. I. 3 iii. II — 13 V. vi. 62 196 62 THESSALONIANS. 63 I TIMOTHY. II. 15- 17- 4. 6. 15- 16. 21. I. 14. 223 224 224 219, 220, 221 139 257 - 220^ 221, 246^ 248 224 10. - 219, 220, 221 63- 223 223 2 TIMOTHY, 1. 10. ii. 22. iv. 18. TITUS. 1- 3. -" 4- ii. iij 13- 222, 223 192 223 221,223 223 TITUS— coK/i«W, Chap. ver. ii. 13 111. iv. Page 60, 220, 222, 223, 234, 236, 237 4. - - 223 6. - - 222 7, 10, II. - 223 HEBREWS. 1. &c. - 117, 127 2. - 59, 74»9i' 121, &c. 224 3. - 91, 125, 126, 133 4. - 59, 125, 126, 131 5. - S9' 125, 126 6. - - 95 7. - - 128 7, 8. - - 124 227 95 119, 124 228 - 119, 124. 1 9 10 1 1 14 2 5 10, H> 19. 3* 3- i4» 4— 9' 1. 3- II. 15. 20, 25. 26, 28. 6. 18. 5- 7- 14. 15- II. 10. 16. 21. — 26, 27 127 126 128 171 202 159 125 III 168 169 172 129 169 169 172 169 15I' ^53 168, 169 169 130 163 130, 156 150 170 Index of Chapters and Texts. HEBREWS Chap. ver. ix. X. XI. 2». 14. 19. 3- - 17- 24. 25, 26. 12. -continued. Page 141 168 - - 158 III, 122, 229 176 130, 158 230 - - 158 1. ii. iii. 11. JAMES. 27. 7- 9- 170 192 III I PETER. 18. 19, 9- 24. 18. 19. 140, 244 140 242 142 140, 232 232 2 PETER. 20. 5- 64, 234, 235, 236, 244 170 239, 242, 244 62 122 62 JOHN. i. I. — 14. ii. I. ** 45.80 222, 247 151 — 2. — 24. "■ 157. 159 80 I JOHN — continued. Chap. ver. iii. 5. 7- 8. iv. 2. — 9. — 10. V. 7. '3 JOHN. JUDE. V. VI. vii. XX. xxi. Page 247 So, 247 247 176 ^5h 159 246, 248 [79 — 4. 64, 236, 237, 238, 239, 345 REVELATION. I. — 5. II. 17. 18. 8. 23. 9- 12, 10. 10. 14. 10. II. 15- 16. II. 88 243 255> 256 255, 256, 257 88 252, 256, 257 242, 13- 5- 6. 195 244 184 245 222 254 65 38 91 3S 255 255 257 XXII. — 12, 13 255 6, 7, 8, &c. - 2JO, 25^ 8,9- - - 65 - 88, 249, 255, 257 Remarks, &c. nPHIS Version of the New Testament, published as the title-page sets forth, " By a Society for pro- moting Christian Knowledge, and the practice of virtue by the Distribution of Books,'* demands particular con- sideradon. If it be really so improved a version as is pretended ; if the text be so carefully corrected as we are bidden to conclude ; but above all, if the accom- panying notes be properly illustrative of the Chrisdan doctrines, then not only all the members of the esta- blished church of these realms, but almost every deno- mination of Dissenters from the establishment are ex- travagantly wrong. Calvinists, Arminians, Baptists, Anabaptists, Quakers, Papists, nay, even Arians, Semi-Arians, and Socinians, all are in a gross error ; those only may be held to be right who are the imme- diate disciples of the following contemporary autho- rities : Dr. Priestley, Mr. Wakefield, Mr. Lindsey, Mr. Evanson, Mr. Jones, and the several unitarian contributors to the Theological Repository.* For * Some distinctions seem necessary here, which I cannot take upon me to settle. The ^^fn^ra/ Baptists are, I believe, regarded as Unitarians ; and from a note in the Monthly Repository for July last, we learn that low Arianism is considered as entitled to that distinction, though, •< in strictness of speech, the latter ought to be confined entirely to the belief of the simple huma- nity of our Lord." The authors, besides, upon whose authority they chiefly rely, are by no means to be considered as in perfect agreement upon all points — many things are to be found in B Dr, Remarks on the impro've0 P'or though Archbishop Newcome is held out as a sort of model in the title-page, his authority is slighted, whenever it appears to be much against them ; and we are expressly told in a note on the first Epistle of St. John, that nothing but " the clear and discri- minating light diffused over the obscurities of the sacred Scriptures by the venerable Theophilus Lind- sey, and his coadjutors Jebb, Priestley, Wakefield, and others," could " purify the Christian Religion from those numerous and enormous corruptions which have so long disfigured its doctrines and impeded its progress." This is speaking out plainly, though it rather surprises me that none of these names ap- pear in ttie title-page to recommend the book, while two Archbishops are selected for this purpose ; for besides the learned Primate of Ireland, a motto is adopted from Archbishop Parker*s Preface to the Bi- shop's Bible, by way surely of a second decoy, to the unwary members of the Church ; I can hardly bring myself to consider this circumstance in any other light. In their Introduction, the Editors boast of the en- couragement they have received, from the liberal and enlizhtened. How much could I wish that all such terms could be avoided. It is thus that a noun adjec- tive is often made to contain an argument. If those Dr. Priestley's writings, especially in his Posthumous Notes on the Bible, not by any means accordant with the general spirit of this edition ; and so much at variance do Mr, Jcncs and Mr. Evanson appear to be, that in a work lately published by the former, he with considerable reason, in my opinion^ speaks of the " surprising ignorance and temerity displayed by tha latter in some of his Scripture Comments." Many circum- stances indeed concur to induce me to think that a considerable variety of opinions prevails among the Unitarians, in regard to the conduct and management of this new Version ; for further improvements of this improved translation, and further correc- tions of this newly correeied text are already called for, by their own friends.— See Monthly Repository 1809, and Kinghorn's Scriptural Argyments for the Divinity of Christ, sold by Button. are Version of the New Testament. 3 are the only enlightened who would encourage the sale and distribution of this edition, all criticism is super- seded — I must incur the charge of dulness and igno- rance for merely attempting it, and certainly of illibe- rality for presuming to undeceive the public. The title-page contains many bold assumptions of this na- ture. The Version is declared to be an improved one, the Text a correded one, and the object of the Society is stated to be, the Promotion of Christian Knowledge. I am not boand to bow down to authorities any more than the Editors themselves, and shall therefore freely declare, I deny all these assumptions ; I think the Version not din i??iJ)roved one, the Text not correal*, and the knowledge it would promote, not truly Chris- tian, 1 must take my chance of being expelled from the society of inquisitive, liberal, and judicious scho- lars ; of candid and discerning readers ; of learned, acute, and even honest critics ; of serious and enlight- ened Christians ; this I cannot help. I shall endeavour to hold fast the form of sound words, delivered to us by the sacred writers, in hopes of saving both myself and those who will honour me with their attention. It is not my design, however, to enter upon a minute examination of the version merely as such, but rather to dwell upon those doctrines attempted to be set aside as vulgar errors ; such as the pre* existence and miraculous conception of Christ — the divi- nity and personality of the So7i and Holy G>6w/— the * It has in fact no determinate basis or standard. Its devi- ations from Nowcome (which in all are calculated to amount to 75'o) from the received text, and from Griesbach's 2d edition {not duly noticed or pointed out to the reader as they ought to be), are with much pains and great candor exhibited at length by an Unitarian Reviewer, in the Monthly Repository for March, April, July, and October, 1809. This learned writer regrets, that no standard text has been adhered to, '* because," says he, " it v.ould do away one of the most powerful charges brought against us, namely, that we alter the Scriptures to suit our own system.'' B 2 existence 4 Remarks on the hnproved existence of evil spirits and angels — and the atone- ment by the hlood of Christ. I do not propose to be equally diffuse on all these points, but upon some I cannot avoid having much to say ; I shall begin with what happens to occur the earliest in this book of God ; namely, the birth of our Lord Jesus Christ. The accounts of the miraculous conception and birth of our Saviour have a strong mark of suspi- cion put upon them. The whole of the narratives from verse 16 of the first chapter of St. Matthew to the end of the second chapter, and from verse 4 of the first chapter to the end of the second of St. Luke, is printed in italics, *' to sheiu that it is of doubtful authority.^^ The reasons for this are given in the notes at the foot of the pages. I shall endeavour to bring them all together, that a full view of the subject may be taken at once. The references in these notes point out to us the sources whence the editors have deduced their arguments, and I may reasonably conclude that they have of course selected the strongest proofs in vindication of their own suspicions. The first note on St. Matthew begins with telling us, that " Epiphanius says, that Cerinthus and Carpo- crates, who used the Gospel of the Ebionites, which was probably the original Gospel of St. Matthew, written in the Hebrew language for the use of the Jewish 1 believers, argued from the genealogy at the begin- ning of the Gospel, that Christ was the son of Joseph and Mary : but that the Ebionites had taken av:ay even the genealogy, beginning the Gospel with these words, * And it came to pass in the days of Herod the king,' &c. " It is probable, therefore,*' say the editors, " that the first sixteen verses of this chapter are ge- nuine, and that they were found at least in the copies of Cerinthus and Carpocrates. And, indeed, it can hardly be supposed that an author writing for the instruction of Hebrew Christians, would have omitted to Version of the New Testament. 5 to trace the descent of Christ from Abraham and David, upon which they justly laid so great a stress.'* Here must surely be some mistake ; the genealogy is probably genuine, because Cerinthus and Carpo- crates argued from it that Christ was the son of Joseph and Mary, and must therefore have had it in their copies, though it appears they used the Gospel of the Ebionites, who had expressly taketi the gene- alogy away ! Nay, " even the genealogy ;" there- fore, probably, in Epiphanius's opinion, something else ; and what could this be, that should intervene between the genealogy and the words " and it came to pass in the days of Herod," but the account of the miraculous conception and birth of Jesus ?* Whatever * (^Dr. Laurence and Professor Magee have severally taken notice of the strange inconsistency of which the Editors are guilty, in pretending that Christ " must have been born two years after the death of Herod," and yet relying upon the Ebionite Gospel as authority, which, as we are told, began, ** Now it came to pass in the days of Herod King of Judea, that John came baptizing, &c." 1 have seen a reply to this, as far as regards my learned friend, Professor Magee, in the Monthly Re- pository for 1813. It is there pretty broadly stated, that " no Child could have made the mistake" into which Dr. Laurence and Dr. Magee have fallen ; that is, as they would insinuate, ho Child could have confounded Herod the King of Judea, who lived in the reign of Augustus, with Herod his Son, Tetrarch of Galilee, who lived and ruled there when John the Baptist ap- peared ; but this is very little to the purpose. Dr. Laurence and Dr. Magee might reasonably be tempted to be playful on this occasion with such Critics as the Editors of the Improved Version, though not childish. The Editors themselves, probably, are not Children, and yet they have suffered this great blunder to pass without notice in their new Version. They have not gone a step out of their way to correct or defend their favourite authority Epiphanius, who, though no Child, expressly states, that the Ebionite Gospel began with these words, jy t««j »i/xfpa»? HpwJa ^»(7i\tu; Tn; I^Jonaj x. t. X. And the Editors repeat what he states. The faft is, the whole circumstance tends greatly to throw a suspi- cion on the Ebionite Gospel, and on that alone ; — and nothing, I think, cjould prove it more than the very defence set up by the B 3 - Unitarian 6 Remarks on the impro'ued "Whatever had been taken away should in propriety be carefully restored, and though I am not prepared to say that the Editors have given an exact account of Unitarian Writer in the Monthly Repository ; " because," says he, *' some early transcriber has erroneously written Judea for Ga- lilee, Dr. Magee contends tliat the Ebionite Gospel taught that Herod the Great, who died, &rc. was living thirty years after- wards." — " The Ebionite Gospel began," says Epiphanius, " In the days of Herod King of Judea, John came baptising, &c." — The Editors say not a word of this being a blunder ; they pass it over, confident, as they noiu pretend, that " any child would know it ought to be Galilee, znd not Judea;" (and of course Tetrarch and not King, but which they have not provided for, even yet.) Let us however see if we cannot trace this odd blun- der to its source, and then let the reader determine whether it does not eminently conduce to prove the very fa6l of a gross cor- ruption of the original text on the part of the Ebionites. In that portion of Matthew's Gospel omitted by the Ebionites we have frequent mention of Herod the King, Matt. ii. 1.3. 9. &c. — In the received text, the 2d and 3d chapters connect thus ; In the last verse of chapter ii. it is stated, that Christ with his parents, " came and dwelt" at Nazareth. — And then the history proceeds, ** In those days" ; that is, while he yet abode in Naza- reth — but " in those days," must have made an odd begujning of any history. There was an antecedent wanting for such relative terms, and perhaps we might add, rather a remote one ; possibly then the bungling transcriber, on whom the Unitarians would now throw all the blame, aware of the necessity of a netu beginning, and happening to know something of a more complete copy, borrowed the words, iv rai? ji/zspatr Kp^^y BaTiXtu^ "vnc, I&'^ata?; but whence could he borrow them ? — why, in fact, either from the exploded 2d chapter of Matthew, or the equally condemned first chapter of Luke ; for there the very words were to be found, not however without some difference. In Luke they follow in exact order; but as to Luke they would have been secure, for though he also connects the preaching of John the Baptist with our Lord's abode at Nazareth, he uses no relative terms at the beginning of ch. iii. but expressly mentions Herod the Tetrarch of Galilee ; but with St. Matthew's Gospel, the case stood thus: — Jiidea is there ap- plied not to the King, but to Bethlehem, where Jesus is said to have been horn, tv /SifiXESjU th; IsJaia? iv >i^fpa»s Hfw^a ts fix^tXiu^ ; but the Ebionites would not admit the fact of his birth at Beth« Irhem. This then being to be expunged, rti? laJataj could only follow Herod the King, and 1 must confess, seems to me to have been Version of the New Testament. 7 of matters (for if they have, they have strangely confounded their own argument), yet I am very sure that Epiphanius does talk about things taken away and erased* by the Ebionites, if not by the Nazarenes also. If the genealogy was by any taken away, it is plain that, in the Editors* opinion, Cerin- thus and Carpocrates were ill used, who had made use of it, to prove that Jesus was the offspring of Joseph and Mary, and of course a mere man ; and we shall venture to surmise, that those who would argue from the account of the miraculous conception that he was ?nore than man^ are quite as ill used by those, who would, in these days, attempt to take away those parts of Scripture in which this Is related. It is impossible not to be struck with the little credit due to the' authorities cited.- By the statement of the Editors, the Ebionites seem to be clearly con- been particularly preserved out of the general plunder for thiis especial purpose. — Thus then, from the account admitted by the Unitarians themselves, it would appear after all, that verily, the Ebionite Gospel began, with a portion of the exploded originals, Ihe blunder may have been very great, and almost childish un- do^lbtedly ; but it must have been owning, in a great degree, to the awkward predicament they had reduced themselves to, by erasing all that properly preceded, T«ij ij/xspan; EKEINAI2, THOSE Days. This answerer of Dr. Magee objects also to the demand made on the Editors by the Professor and Dr. Laurence, to admit all or none of Marcion's errors ; but here also he mistakes the point. It was fit they should remind the Editors of Marcion's general character as a Teacher of Christianity : but what principally affects the Editors is this, why adopt the authority of Marcion for tlue rejection of part of Luke's Gospel, and yet allow him no credit for the rejection of any other parts of Scripture ? Irenaeus seems to have thought his credit upon a par as to these circum- stances ; " Evangelium secundum Lucam c'lrcumcidit, et Apostoli Pauli Epistolas ahscidity He mutilated St. Luke's Gospel, says he, and quite cut off St. Paul's Epistles from the Canon ; but, say the Editors, lie hnpro'ved and corrected St. Luke's Gospel, but was an ideot as to the rejection of St. Paul's Epistles.] * IlEpiKijjsv and TO-apx;t57rlEiv are the words used by Epiphanius. B 4 victed 8 Remarks on the unproved victed of taking away one portion at least oi genuint Scripture. If not so, then their other authorities, Cerinthus and Carpocrates, must be account^^d guilty of drawing their arguments in proof of the mere humanity of Jesus from a forged genealogy. Either way their authorities are to be suspected ; the Ebionites of a fraudulent erasure, or the Cerinthians and Carpocratians of an unwarrantable insertion. To bring these forward as joint evidences, in a case where they appear to have differed so remarkably, would look hke a sad oversight, were it possible for us to be blind to the policy of such a step in persons of the Editors sentiments. The Ebionites are right in the eyes of all Unitarians for rejecting the account of the miraculous conception, which makes Jesus the Son of God, but not right in rejecting the genealogy, because it helps to prove, among the Cerinthians and Carpocratians of the present day, that Jesus was only the son of Joseph. That the narratives are severally to be found in all the manuscripts and versions now extant, the Editors acknowledge*, only they happen to know that they were wanting in the copies used by the Nazarenes and Ebionites, that is {say they) by the * I find an admirable remark in the Review of the Im- proved Version in the Monthly Repositoiy, for March 1809^, on the inconsistency of the Editors in venturing to mark these parts of Scripture as doubtful against the preponderating evi- dence of manuscripts, versions, and quotations ; " we see in this," says the learned Reviewer, " a tendency to conjeftural emendation, the traces of which we would wish to have been confined to the notes." It should also be here observed, that Newcomty in referring to Dr. Campbell's note on the authenticity of the two first chapters of Matthew, adds, " which appears to me to be established beyond reasonable doubt." The learned writer in the Repository, has also some very just remarks on the ambiguity of the Editor's italics, as not properly indicative of the degree of doubt attending the passages so marked, and which must therefore have a great tendency to mislead. antient Version of the New Testament, 9 aniient Hebrew christians. The Nazarenes and Ebion- ites of Epiphanius happen not to have been the antient Hebrew christians, a point so fully proved by Bishop Horsley against Dr. Priestley, that we need merely refer the reader to his tracts and disquisitions upon the subject, and pass on to other parts of the note before us. " It is hardly to be supposed, that an author writing for the instruction of Hebrew christians, would have omitted to trace the descent of Christ from Abraham and David." This I freely grant ; it is not likely. The genealogy is in its proper place, and indispensably necessary to the gos- pel of which it forms a part. But, I must have leave to add, that it is quite as hardly to be supposed that an author writing for the instruction of Hebrew chris- tians should omit to show that the Messiah was born at Bethlehem in Judea, I say not, ''^ of a virgin,^' though this might well be added, but at present I shall only insist upon the former circumstance. This to Hebrew christians was quite as necessary as the genealogy ; for we find by reference to John, vii. 42, (a passage not disputed by the Editors) that even those who judged our Saviour to be a Galilean by birth as well as residence, knew that the Messiah, the Christ, ought to be born at Bethlehem. Therefore, all things considered, the Hebrew Gospel of Saint Matthew would have been grievously and essentially defective without some testimony of this sort, the Hebrews themselves being judges — But to return again to the note. All the evidence adduced from Epiphanius, about the Gospels of the Nazarenes, Ebionites, Cerinthians, and Carpocratians, as defective in these particulars, is nothing in comparison with the argument that follows, and which, if admissible, must needs settle the question. " The i8th verse begins," say the Editors, " a new story, which continues to the end of JO Remarks on the i?nproved of the second chapter. This could not have been writ- ten (this is certainly coming to the point), this could not have been written by the Author of the genealogy, for ii contradicts his design, which was to prove that Jesus, being the son of Joseph, was the descendant of Abraham and David ; whereas the design of this narrative is to shew that Joseph was not his real father. — This account therefore of the miraculous conception of Jesus, must have been wanting in the copies of Cerinthus and Carpocrates, as well as in those of the Ebionites : and if the Genealogy be ge- nuine, this narrative inust be spurious." This is de- cisive : nothing surely can be advanced against such a discovery. And yet to overset the whole of it, we need not go far, the Editors themselves have amply supplied us with dn answer to all this, in Mark, ch. viii. 38. The Editors, without hesitation, admit the following reading: " Of him the son of ?nan also shall be ashamed, when he cometh in the glory of his father, with the holy angels." Whom do they here account the father of the son of man ? — They also freely admit the following passage : Mark, xiv. 61, 62. *' Again the High Priest asked him, and saith unto him, Art thou the Christ, the son of the blessed God ? And Jesus said, / a?n ; and ye will see the son of man sitting at the right hand of power, and coming with the clouds of Heaven.'*— Could these things have been written, let us ask, by those who really judged our Lord to be only the son of man* ? Is not the con- tradiction * [Other cases as strong, or even stroiijTer miglit he adduced ; most particularly, the one selected by the leariiL-d Reviewer of Mr. Belsham's book on the person of Christ, in the British Critic, Vol. xxxix. 30. (Luke, ii. 49.) — " How is it that ye sought me? Wist ye not that I must be about my Father's business." Was ihis any business of Joseph's ? or if so, why sliould they seek him "sorrowing?" or how came they ''not'" to "understand" what he '.v:i3 about ? or, Why should his Mother be careful to keep luG sayir.gs about any such business in her heart ? or, finally, What Version of the New Testament, 1 1 tradiction as glaring in one instance as the other ? The Editors will say no. — One is literal and the other figurative. — One speaks of a son of God, the other of a person born of the Holy Ghost. This I shall not stop to settle. It is sufficient for our purposes to turn over only one leaf, with the Editors, and take their own words. For there we are actually told, fand it is urged upon us as a forcible argument), that had the account of the miraculous conception been a genuine narrative^ it could not have been unac- ceptable to the Ebionites, nor would it at all have mili- tated against the doctrine of the proper humanity of Christ, which was universally held by the Jewish christians, (see before,) it being a fact analogous to the miraculous birth of Isaac, Samuel, and other emi- nent persons of the Hebrew nation." This analogy, in all its bearing, I entirely deny ; but shall not dwell on it. It is enough to point out the inconsistency alluded to. We are told on one pide of the leaf, that if the account of the descent from Joseph be true, the account of the miraculous conception by the Holy Spirit must be spurious, and yet on the other side only of the very same leaf we are told that such miraculous conception does not interfere with his proper humanity. With such critics and such reasoners, how can we stir a step ? In the last place, however, I agree with them, — for I do not think that the miraculous conception does interfere with the proper humanity of Christ. I fully think What business could Joseph have for him to do, among the Doctors of the Temple ? But some are for rendering the passage, " Wist ye not that I must be in my Father's House ?" — This would only make the case stronger. Was the Temple the House of Joseph P — Tkus Bostrens'ts, one of the writers cited by Hammond and Whitby, in support of this rendering, expressly says, Et; top v«ov uiv m ©m, (

iy s-c jj^EiTE on sv T015 TH 7r«7po<; jua ou wot-t fxi ; — Being in the Temple of GOD, he said. Knew ye not that 1 must be in my FATHER'S House ?3 he 1 2 Remarks on the improved he was man, and the son of man, though born by the immediate influence of the Holy Spirit. I think his genealogy quite as applicable to his mother as to his reputed father. The laws of the Jews made these matters identical and reciprocal. If Joseph was the husband of Mary, it has always been pretty generally allowed, that he could not have been so, had he not been exactly of the same tribe and family as herself, and if so, the genealogy applies to both : and of Mary he was most indisputably born. There is no commentator of any repute, antient or modern, to whom we might not refer to settle this point. Mary's pedigree and descent was involved in that of her husband Joseph ; and " an Author writing for the instruction of Hebrew christians,'* must have known this. The note next proceeds to say, that if it be true as Luke relates, Chap. iii. 23, that Jesus was en- tering upon his thirtieth year (see Wakefield's Trans- lation) in the fifteenth year of Tiberius, he must have been born two years at least after the death of Herod, *' a circumstance which alone invalidates the whole story.** See I^ardner*s Works, Vol. I. p. 432. Here again they come most decisively to the point. We should at least suppose that this " ?)mst have been *' has the sanction of the great authority they cite, and yet, Lardner (to whom they so very confidently refer) actually enters upon this very difficulty, with the fol- lowing remark ; " It may be made appear several ^'ays, that Jesus was born above a yea?; probably above two years, before Herod died !" So that I here shall beg leave to join in the reference, and intreat the reader to turn to Lardner, and see how ably and satisfactorily he combats the difficulty, and in how many ways he unravels tlie mystery.* I make ♦ [In the Reply to Dr. Magec in the Monthly Repository, already noticed, this strange appeal to Lardner is still defended. It Version of the New Testament, 13 i make this reference with the less scruple because their own model, Archbishop Newcome, does so too. He expressly sends us to Lardner, not to confirm the difficulty, but to solve it. See his note on Luke, iii. i . We are next told in these notes on St. Matthew, (for those on St. Luke are still to come) that " it is indeed highly improbable that no notice should have been taken of these extraordinary events by any contemporary writer ; that no expectation should have been excited by them ; and that no allusion should have been made to them in any other passage of Scripture. I would ask what contemporary writer was there to notice them ? Josephus was not born till many years after, and It is there said, that " Dr. Lardner has shown, to the sahsfacllon of all leanieJ men, that Herod died at least 1 7 years and 9 months before the decease of Augustus.'' It is certainly very odd that having done as these Editors pre- tend, Dr. Lordlier himself, though undoubtedly not only a learned, but a "jery learned man, should not be one of those who were so fully satisfied with his own account of matters ; fur, in my copy of his works, at least, 1 find, that after comparing three several eora- putations of Herod's death, he concludes with these very words, •* which is the truth, I dare not determine." This, added to the remark above, plainly shews, as far as I can judge, that Dr. Lardner neither agreed in the opinion that Jesus was born after the death of Herod, nor pretended to have attained to any cer- tainty as to the precise date of the latter event. The " calm Inquirer.,'^ who is the Answerer of Dr. Magee in the Monthly Repository, has more upon the subjed, but it is really beneath the notice of any grave and candid critic, nor is it of much importance, on /AjV account ; that Mr. Behhavh the prin- cipal Editor of the improved Version, in a work, entitled a '< Calm Inquiry"'' into the Scripture Doctrine concerning the Per- son of Christ, though he has repeated the objection, has prudently dropped and omitted the reference to Lardner. His book was pub- lished one year after my own remarks, and therefore I have a reasonable ground to hope, that, in this instance, he stood cor- rected by my animadversions, though he certainly makes no ac- knowledgment of it. See the Review of his Book in the British Critic, Vol. xxxviii, 459] he jt4 Remarks on the improved he had great reason for suppressing such relations. See Archbishop Newcome's note and references on Matthew, ii. 18. Could any author be particularly named that was so situated and circumstanced as to be likely to record such transactions, the Evangelists excepted ? Though indeed it should be noticed that the Unitarians often intimate that these accounts were borrowed from the spurious Gospels and narratives relating to Jesus particularly, and his Virgin Mother. Such histories were cer- tainly written, and by contemporary authors ; but it remains to be proved that, extravagant as they were, they had yet no foundation whatever in truth. The " Gospel of the infancy of Jesus,'* and the '^' Gospel of the birth of Mary^* are titles that rather imply the actual truth of the accounts in Matthew and Luke *. Why take the trouble of i^oing back to the very infancy of Jesus, or why dwell upon the birth of Mary, if as an infant Jesus was generally held to have been merely such, and Mary but a common mother ? Why not write a Gospel of the birth of Joseph as well as Mary, or of the infancy of John the Baptist ? It cannot how- ever be pretended that no contemporary writer noticed these events. The censual tables and pub- he records of the Empire may be said to have borne some testimony to them. The temporary sojournment of the parents of Jesus at Bethlehem, accords so particularly and so remarkably with the * See my Letter to Mr. Stone, Dr. Priestley, in his Post, humous Work, (Notes on the Bible), observes, that the spurious Gospels were written after the genuine ones, and •' in imitation of the four generally received." See Vol. 111. p. lo. It would seem then that my conjecture is not unreasonable. The genuine narratives of the miraculous conception, might naturally lead to the publication of the Gospels of the infancy of Jesus, the birth of Mary, &c. But if not genuine, why attempt to aoccnd higher than the inspired Evangelists > 4 Prophecies Version of the New Testament. 15 Prophecies relating to the birth of the Messiah, that this event alone is as extraordinary and providen- tial as any, and this appears to have been express- ly registered. I must confess that the appeals made by Justin Martyr and Tertullian to the public registers of the Empire, and the particular mention of these evidences by St. Chrysostom, fully satisfy me that something of the kind notoriously existed. As for the expectations excited, if the account be but true, there -were many such. The visi<" of the Magi, the alarm of Herod, the astonishment of the Shepherds, the Prophecies of Simeon and Anna, are surely remarkable enougli. I'hat great opponent of Christianity, Mr. Collins, in his Scheme of literal Prophecy, admits that very extraordinary expectations were raised by the birth of Jesus*. He expressly mentions, the opinion of the Virgin Mary, that the child with which she was big should help Israel. He mentions and dwells upon the Prophecy of Zacharias", who declares that that child was the person spoken of by the Prophets, who should ''^ save Israel from their enemies, and from the hand of all that hated them." He speaks also of the insurrec- tions of the Jews in consequence of such expectations and other matters. But in my opinion St. Luke's account is at once a sufficient answer to all such objections. The con- duct of the Virgin mother is described in a very striking manner, and is exactly such as we might expect and suppose, if we consider that it v/as mani- festly among the purposes of God, not fully to reveal the Messiah, till a long time afterwards. She is represented as doubtful in some degree, and yet by no means disposed to question the interpo- sition of Providence. Upon the report made by the * See also Newcome's note on Luke, ii, 25. shepherds 1 6 Remarks on the impro'ved shepherds that they had been favoured with an an* gelic vision concerning the child, *' all that heard it,** we are informed, " wondered at those things which were told them by the shepherds.'* " But/* it is added, " Mary kept all these things in memory, considering them in her heart,'* a circumstance par- ticularly repeated upon the extraordinary occasion of his being found, when only 1 2 years of age, among the teachers in the Temple. Were such events to occur in our days at the birth of any child, no doubt we should be inclined to think, the story would spread rapidly, and not be easily forgotten. But the miraculous occurrences, the signs and visions vouchsafed under the Jewish polity, had made such matters too familiar, to admit of so general a surprise, as we might apprehend would be the case. The Jews of those days were particularly disposed to dispute all miracles ; those that they even saw our Saviour perform, they referred to magic. " Nihil non nugacissimi fingunt,** (says Vorstius, of the Jews in after times ; and the same might have been applied to many of those who lived during our Saviour's appearance in the flesh,) " These egregious triflers invent any thing to avoid being obliged to confess that our Jesus performed his miracles by the power, and as it were, the finger of God." So far from attending much to the circum- stances that accompanied our Lord's birth, most of his contemporaries were more likely to have turned away from the persons who testified of such matters, while his low birth and early sufferings must even have been offensive to those whose expectations of a tem- poral deliverer had been excited by the Prophets. To Abraham and Sarah, as well as to Joseph and Mary, much was revealed of the future fortuiies of their son ; much that was quite out of the course of nature, (as these Editors admit}, attended the birth Version of the New Testament, 1 7 birth of Isaac ; yet we do not find that the eyes of the world in general were fixed upon him, or that even his own parents fully understood the whole purport of the promises and signs vouchsafed them. Herod does not appear to have been ever certified whether Jesus was cut off among the infants slaughtered at Bethlehem. The angel that warned his parents to flee with him into Egypt, we may be very certain, did not appear or make known his errand to Herod, or any others at Jerusalem. This was evidently done secretly, and whatever construction we may be disposed to put upon the vision, it plainly shows that, in the opinion of the writer, an open and general manifestation of the Messiah, was at that ti?ne by no means intended. It appears from the history of our Lord, that thirty years were to elapse before he entered upon his ministry. During this period, it seems to have been requisite, that so far from his being generally made known, God should even " exert his divine power,'* (as the Editors remark upon another occa- sion) " to restrain men fro7n so beholdi?ig him as to know him." We are reminded by the Editors them- selves, that there was a tradition among the Jev/s, that after the Messiah should be born, he would be conveyed away and miraculously concealed 'till Elias came to reveal and anoint him. The Jews would refer this to some future coming of the real Elias ; but if we apply it to the Baptist, as we are jus* tified in doing, it comes nigh to the truth. Though, however, a temporary concealment and obscurity seem to have been thus entirely consistent with the purposes of God, yet in order that all the Prophecies should meet in him, and him alone, such occurrences as are related to have taken place, were indispensable to the grand scheme of the Christian C dispensation. i8 Remarks on the 'unproved dispensation. His birth and birth-place, required to be marked and distinguished by peculiar evidences : all which, as I obferved before, is remarkably confirmedj by the reprefentation given us of Mary's conduct. She, we are told, noticed and regarded all that passed with wonder and astonishment, by no means fo care- lessly, as to suffer any thing to escape her observation. She kept every thing in her memory, " pondering them in her heart." Mary survived her Son, and must needs have been questioned about hisb irth and child- hood, when his ministry and miracles, sufferings, death and resurrection, became matters of so great interest to his followers. Now the account given by the Evangelists seems to be exactly such an account as the mother of our Lord would have given, and St. Matthev/ and St. John, at least, must have known the Virgin Mary well. All the extraordinary events, as they occurred, are mentioned, as matters which at the time excited wonder and amazement, mixed with a becoming resignation to the will of God, and submis- sion to his dispensations. She praised God, it seems, for the appearances vouchsafed, and pondered every thing in her heart, but still waited for further reve- lations. One incident occurred during his childhood which particularly drew her attention : at twelve years of age, she found him sitting among the teachers in the Temple, both hearing them, and asking them questions ; every one being astonished at his understanding and ansv\^ers. This then set her again considering. "She kept," we are told, " all these things also in her heart * :" nor should it be omitted, that our Saviour's * Grotuis upon this fays, " Quod ideo videtur a Luci ex- pressum quia ipfam habebat haruni narrationum auctorem.** [Compare tlic conduct of Jacob, Gen. xxxvii. li. and sec the notes on Gen. iii. in Goadby's Bible. J reply version of the New Testanmit. 1 9 reply to her on this occasion seems to carry in it an allusion to the miraculous conception, " Knew ye not that I m.ust needs be in my Father's house." It is added, indeed, that his parents understood not the things which he spake unto them. But the force of the Greek term o-uvri5tav, as well as of the correspon- dent Latin term intellexerunty is, that they did not perfectly and entirely apprehend all that he intended by the speech, (see Leigh's Critica Sacra, Doddridge, &c.) And this agrees therefore with the imperfect knowledge they then had of God's designs. That they might have understood it in part, our Lord's own words expressly imply. That Mary attained to a full under- standing of his divine powers, even before they were openly exerted, is evident from her behaviour at the marriage feast at Cana, and the directions she gave as preparatory to his first miracle. During his mi- nority, and private conversation, as he wrought no miracles, his conduct and character must needs have been less noticeable : but when the events of his life and ministry were to be recorded, who could more exactly supply the materials relating to his birth, in- fancy, and childhood, than his mother, and who could doubt her testimony after the resurrection and ascension of her crucified son? I have dwelt the longer on this, because to those who have not time or disposition to examine thoroughly into matters, the objection may appear to have some degree of plausibility 5 whereas the slight expectation excited, and the little notice taken of Jesus before his baptism, were particularly consistent with the views of Providence^ That no allusion is made to these extraordinary events in any other passage of the sacred writings, (the next objection of the Editors) and that the reasoning from the prophecies of the Old Testament C 2 are ao Remarks on the improved are inconclusive, are mere pretences, llie reasoning from the prophecies oi' the Old Testament must have been conclusive to the extent that the writer intended, whether he was an impostor or inspired ; and though expositors should differ for ever as to the precise manner in which the events and the prophecies are to be accommodated to each other, no difficulty of this kind can tend to prove the narrative not genuine. But the fact is, that to many wise men, and most profound scholars, the reasoning has been held to be most strikingly conclusive, and therefore no bare assertion to the contrary can be any subject of criticism. (See, among other writers. Bishop Kidder's De77wn' stration of the Messiah ; Jenkins Reasonableness of the Christian Religion ; Leslie's Method with the Jeu's and Deists ; Leland's Deistical Writers, &c. &c. Sec.) The other objection, that no allusion is made to the miraculous conception and birth of Jesus in any ether paffages of Scripture, depends entirely upon the con- struction put upon various passages which might be selected. To an Unitarian, such expressions as " God sent his own Son in the likeness of sinful flesh;'- " The Word was made flesh, and dv/elt among us ;" *' God sent forth his Son made of a woman, made under the law ;" may seem to carry in them no allu- sion to any thing out of the common course of things; but to those who believe the accounts of the miracu- lous conception of Jesus, nothing can be more direct and conclusive than such references. It is a mere begging of the question then to pretend that no such allusions exist *. If the narrative be true, all these * Unitarians tliems-lvcs seem to admit this ; in the most recent publications uf Mr. Belshum and Dr. Carpenter, I find it very justly . acknowledged, that supposing the dodlrines of Chrift's pre-existence and superior nature to be true, the Scriptures un- doubtedly contain expressions that may fairly be held to counte. nance sucii opinions. expressions Versicn of the Neiu Testameni. 1 1 expressions are the strongest allusions possible ; if it be not true, they are as near as can be totally unintel- ligible. The Editors are careful enough to prevent, if they can, any such impressions. They add a note on Gal. iv. 4. expressly to inform the world, that " born of a woman," bears no allusion to the supposed miraculous conception of Christ. It is a common Jewish phrase to express a proper human being ; and they refer us to many passages in Job to prove this. Now a com.mon Jev/ish phrase must have been too general to express that person who was to be, in a most peculiar manner, the seed of the woman w^ho was to bruise the serpent's head. This prophecy can never be done away, nor its application to him about whom Paul was writing : but Tertullian would have accused the Editors of a trick in rendering it " born of a woman ;" the received text is " ?nade of a woman ;" — " Paulus grammaticis istis," says Tertul- lian, " silentium imponit, inquiens, misit Deus filium suum FACTUM EX MULIERE. Nuuquid per mulierem vel in mulierem ? Hoc quidem impressiils, quod FACTUM potius dicit quam natum. Factum autem dicendo, et verbum caro factum est, consignavit ; et carnis veritatem ex virgine factam asseveravit." The Editors may cite against this, we are aware, both Cyprian and Augustine, who read it *' born," natum : but the Syr'iac Version and the Vulgate, support the common reading ; and Beza declares, that in his opinion *' certe expositio vera est." But to return from this digression. It is next insisted upon, that " if the account be true, the proper name of Jesus, according to the uniform custom of the Jews *, would have been " Jesus *■ This is very questionable. See Newcome's Note on Acts %,i;. 4. vvhere he particularly instances the cace of our Lord's C 3 being 21 Remarks on the improved " Jeius of Bethlehem,'* not " Jesus of Nazareth." This then, I am sorry to say, can only be considered as a plain declaration on the part of the Editors, that our Saviour was not born at Bethlehem, and therefore to all intents and purposes not the Messiah. For it appears to have been generally held that the Messiah should not only " come of the seed of David, but out of the to\vn of Bethlehem where David was," as it is expressed, John, vii. 42, with reference, no doubt, to Micah, v. 2, which the Chaldee Paraphrast expressly applies also to the Messiah. And this alone is a great proof of the authenticity of St. Matthew's account ; for what other record is there to be produced to show that he answered this criterion ? The censual tables, if they existed to the time of Chrysostom, as has been alleged, are certainly not now to be appealed to. The Editors conjecture some early Gentile convert might be the author of the fiction, who hoped, by elevating the dignity of the founder, to abate the popular prejudice against the sect. They might much more reasonably suspect some Jewish convert : the fact being absolutely neces- sary to the proof of his being the Messiah. Indeed such a proof and testimony is so necessary^ that the Scripture would not be fulfilled without it. There is nothing Unitarians are more ready to do than to send the Trinitarians to the Jews, in order to try upon them the effect of their opinions : and it was but the other day that the world was, in a most strange manner, called upon to acknowledge the principle, that Jewish prophecy is the sole criterion being called Jesus of Nazareth, to prove that Gaius might, from residence, reasonably be called a Macedonian, though he was born at Derbe in Lycaonia. [See also Patrick on Deut. xxvi. 5. and the cases cited by the learned author of the Animadversions on the improved Version, p. 9.] •f Version of the New Testament. I3 of genuine Christian Scripture. Let us then, in this case, have leave to refer the Editors and encouragers of this improved version, to the Jews : let them tell them that the Messiah was not born at Bethlehem. If any modern Jews give up this criterion, we will venture to say they are not proper Jevv^s ; and if any Christians abandon the history, they are not proper Christians. The Chief Priests and Pharisees confirmed the matter also negatively, declaring it to be contrary to their history or traditions that the Messiah should be a Galilean. Therefore if Jesus was not born at Bethlehem^ we have the testimony of the contemporary Jews that he could not be the Messiah ; and we have also the testimony of the Chief Priests and Pharisees, that if he was born at Nazareth^ it would be contrary at least to their history and traditions, (if not expressly to their prophecies *) to * The expression " search and look,** seems as if they referred to the prophecies upon this point, which, indeed is scarcely to be qweilioned, when prophecies relative to the birth-place of Christ were plainly supposed to exist, as that of Micah. They overlooked one thing, namely, that the Prophets in general had intimated that he should be called in contempt and scorn a Naxarene, as many able commentators explain. Matt ii. 23. The taunt against him, therefore, for being a Nazarene, was consistent with this intimatton of the prophets, for that this was no express prophecy, but an intimation rather, seems plain from the Evangelist's terms ; *' Hsec verba on N>^.vpaio? *\»i6wela» non sunt alicujus veteris prophetse verba, sed Evan^ gelistse Matthaei ; referri eiaim debent non ad to fr,0=t, sed ad TO ro/?ipw9^. Quomodo quod per prophetas prjedictum est de CO, propterea implebitur quod habitavit in Nazareth ? Quia Nazarenus, inde accepta occasione vocabitur : quo nomine varia variorum prophetarum vaticinia implentur ac typi." Vid. Alex. Mori. Not. ad Quxdam Loca Novi Foederis. Paris. 1668. I am reminded by a learned correspondent, that Jerome trans- lating from the Nazarene Gospel has " Quoniam Nazarsus vo- cabitur." See Michaelis, vol. 3, p. 167, edit. 1801. C 4 A circum. 24 ■ Remarks on the mproved to receive him as such. I have of course not msisted upon the answer given to Herod by the Chief Priests and Scribes, (Matth. ii. 5.) as not being of sufficient authority in the estimation of the Editors. But it seems, our Lord is repeatedly spoken of in the Gospels, as *' the son of Joseph," without any intimation on the part of the historian, that this language is incorrect. And here we have the usual Unitarian references, viz. Matth. xiii. c,^,. Luke,iv. 22.- John, i. 45. vi. 42. In every one of which passages, though indeed no parenthesis tells us, on the part of the historian, that the language is incorrect, the con- text intimates, as plainly, as possible, that he was something far higher than the mere " son of Joseph.'* One historian, however, whose particular testimony is not among the foregoing references, though it is only a few verses above v/hat they do cite, has always been held to intimate, (by a certain parenthesis) that the title of " son of Joseph," was not altogether correct. ITie Unitai'ians have always been in the habit of expunging or altering this text. The present Editors adopt the latter method. Instead of the received reading of Luke, iii. 23. " being (as was supposed) the son of Joseph, they read, being (as was allowed by law) the son of Joseph, i. e. say they, entered in the public register? ;" and Pearce is cited in proof of this. If those public registers stated that Jesus was the son of Joseph, . they probably stated also that he was born at Bethlehem, and were in fact those very A circumstance more particularly to be noticed, because, as Dr. Marsh ably observes, it amounts to a proof that Jerome, iVho transcribed the Nazarene Gospel, actually quoted from it the 2d ch. of Matthew, and yet he is expressly cited by the Editors as a joint evidence with Epiphanius, that these chapters were wanting in the Gospels of the Nazarenes and Ebionites. registers Version of the New Testament. 25 Registers or censual tables referred to by Justin and Tertullian, in proof of the very point in dispute. That these tables or registers should describe him as the son of Joseph is quite regular, he being the hus- band of his mother Mary, though his birth and con- ception might nevertheless be miraculous ; but at all events, and let either rendering be received, one may as fairly be understood as a qualification of the expression as the other. By the Unitarians own account, the notoriety of his connection with Joseph was such as to need no appeal to the register for such a simple fact. If then the account of the miraculous conception be but true, the parenthesis even as the Editors render it, is just as strong. It would then run thus, " and Jesus himself began to be about thirty years of age, being (not actually but as he is described in the registers) the son of Joseph, who was the son of HeH." The latter member of which clause deserves particular notice, because it tends to show, (in the estimation of most commentators), that the pedigree is immediately carried from the imputed or " supposed^'' father, into his mother's family. The endeavour to do away the received rendering *, is a tacit acknowledg- * See Greisbach's note on Luke., iii. 23, where the common rendering, " as was supposed," receives great support. Both Newcome and Wakefield adopted it, as the Editors admit. In the Monthly Repository for Oclober, 1809, a correspondent, who signs himself Theologus, contends that to^ u; ski^i^ito vioq lac-n for that it implies a doubt is evident, and indeed the writer himself admits it, when he says it al-* ludes to ihe narrative, ch. iv. 22. The observation there re- corded, " Is not this Joseph's son?" is surely as much as to say, How comes this man, if he be merely Joseph's son, to utter such gracious words, so much above our expectations, and so wonder- Jul >* Set the place. ment 26 ■ Remarks on the improved ment of the strong sense it conveys, and as it has the sanction of ancient versions, and the consent of most able critics, it may be still not only defended, but in- sisted upon. The rendering of the Editors ("as was allowed by law"), happens particularly td militate against Grotius's argument in refutation of Africanus, who supposed that Luke gave the legal, Matthew the natural genea- logy. Grotius contends that the case is exactly the reverse. That Matthew gives the legal, Luke the natural pedigree ; and therefore that £^o/ai^cto, if it signified any reference to the registers, should have been adopted by Matthew, and Matthew's term tyiv^r[(n been transferred to Luke ; but as he justly remarks, *' Quod vim vocum attinent, primum illud £1/01X1 ^iro non ad totum stemmatis contextum pertinet, sed ad Jesum solum, qui Josephi hlius ?2o?i erat, sed vulgo putabatur." There has been another parenthesis proposed,which deserves consideration. " Jesus (being as was sup- posed the son of Joseph) of Hcli," i. e. " Jesus (who was supposed to be the son of Joseph) was the son (or grandson) of Ileli." This would particularly accord with the original, l I/io-Fr — -.^v, w? [vcf/.i^£To, u»os Icdo->;^, T8 Hai. As there are no parentheses expressed in ancient MSS. it must be left to the judgment of every reader hov/ he places them ; but, according to the common reading, Joseph and Heli are so conjoined as to appear to be son and father, which was not the very fact, except as son-in-law and father-in-law, which hov/ever would do. But the term viog is not repeated before HAi in the Greek, as the common version has it, and as the Editors read it ; and as neither Joseph nor Jesus were directly the sons of Heli, the truth v/ould be best expressed by marking only the descent of Jesus from Heli. (See Kidder's Demon' Versicn of the New Testament, 37 Demonstration, and Trapp on the Gospels.) Luke as a Gentile, writing for the instruction of Gentiles, might with propriety go into the mother's family, which Matthew was precluded doing, as not custo- mary with the Jews. With them it was a rule, that *' the family of the mother is not called a family ;" but it should be noticed, as Bishop Kidder suggests, that on this very account, possibly, Jesus was ordained to be conceived, not of a free, but of an espoused virgin, that by the family of Joseph, the family of Mary might be known ; •; and he cites Cotelerius in Epist. Ignatii ad Ephes. who hath collected several places to this purpose *. I have now regularly considered the reasons stated in the two notes on St. Matthew, for printing his account of the miraculous conception in Italic charac- ters, as being of doubtful authority. It remains to examine those in the same manner, which accompany the correspondent narrative in St. Luke. Upon these however I need not be so long, as most of them are answered in the replies already given. St. Luke's narrative is equally allowed to be extant in all the MSS. and versions at present known. It is again confidently stated that Herod 7nust have been dead two years before our Saviour v/as born t, and Lardner is * Having just treated of parentheses, we cannot avoid giving a reading ot Luke, i, 26, suggested by the Bishop, and which happens to be supported by the express teflimony of Chryso- stom and Nicetas. Instead of " Gabriel was sent to a viro-in espoused to a man, whose name was Joseph, of the house of I>avid, and the virgin's name was Mary/' he proposes to read, " to a virgin (espoused to a man whose name was Joseph) of the house of David," connecting the latter clause with " virgin ;" which the Greek admits, and for which he gives many good reasons. f It is actually a third time insisted on in a note on Luke iii. 23. again 28 Remarks on the improved again quoted, as it were, in proof of this. Here is some parade of dates in confirmation of the matter, all which are so ably discussed b}^ Lardner, that I can only desire again to join in the reference; begging that no reader will take things upon trust, but examine for himself ; for two circumstances are here notori- ously assumed, which cannot in any manner be proved. First, that the fifteenth year of Tiberius's reign is to be dated from the death of Augustus, whereas in all likelihood his proconsular authority is to be included*. Secondly, that the date of the death of Herod is capable of being ascertained, which their own indefatigable referee, the learned Lardner, ac- knowledges he was unable in any manner to deter- mine. The Editors say, the latest period assigned is the spring, A. U. C. 751. Now this is certainly not true. Possinus in his Spicilegium Evangelicum, edited by that great scholar Fabricius, endeavouring to settle as he tells us, " Quo prsecise anno sit de- functus (Herodes)," fixes on the year 754 for the death of Herod, and dates the birth of Christ four years earher. But why do not the Editors tell us what is Lrue, namely, that Dr. Lardner, in the very place where the date of 751 is assigned for the death of Herod, gives two computations of the birth of our Saviour, each of them falling short of the above date. The one September or October A. U. C. 748 ; the * [See the animadversions on the Improved "Version, p. 2. where the adoption of such a mode of computation by Josephus in tiuo instances is very properly adduced as a case in point. See also Dr. Carpenter'^ Geograpliy of the New Testament, (an au- thority perfectly Unitai-ian) where it is expressly stated, that *' John the Baptist received his commission probably about the middle of A. D. 27, in the 15th yenr of the government of Ti- berius, reckonhig from the ccmmenctmciit of his joint fuvert'ignty with ytiiguitus-l other Vets ion of the New Testament. 29 other September or October 749 *. Instead of which and in defiance of their own chosen authority, they an-ain most peremptorily assure the reader, that Herod MUST HAVE BEEN dead two years before Christ was born ! Another reference is here made to GrotiuSf on Luke, iii. 23. who, for all that w^e can fmd, says not a word about it. He endeavours certainly to settle the date of our Saviour's entrance on his Ministry, but without the smallest allusion to the death of Herod. We are next cautioned against trusting to the au-, thenticity of these chapters, on the high authority of Marcion, who, we are told, though a reputed heretic, was a man of learning and integrity, for any thing that appears to the contrary. I shall not stop to dispute either his learning or integrity, because the learned may be mistaken, and the honest may be preju- * This latter date the learned Doddridge prefers, who inclines to adopt Dr. Lardner's calculation, rather than Mr. Manne's, whose elaborate and elegant Dissertation on the Birth of Clirift would alone serve to overset the confident assertion of the Editors. Mr. Manne thinks Christ was born in the spring of 747, and that Herod died about the PafTover, A. U. C. 750, towards ihe end of March. [I had no opportunity, when the firil edition of this work went to the press, of consulting Dr. Hales^?, very curious, elabo- rate, and interesting work on Chronology. I now gladly refer the Reader to his very able Discussion of the Christian Era, vol.i- 188, and to his Table of Gospel Chronology, p. 201. ; it will there be seen how little disposed he must be to grant as the re- sult of his own profound researches, that Herod •' mull have beea dead," two years before Christ was born. It will there also be seen how many learned men in times past had handled this difficulty, and decided againfl the Editors ; but the difficulty happened to be of a nature worth reviving for the purposes of their system — nothing less can be said of it, considering the pe- remptory tone of their decision of matters, in defiance of all tiiat had been advanced to the contrary.] diced. ^o Remarks on the improved diced *. I only know, that, like the Ebionites, he was a most notorious taker-away : as the Ebionites, by the confession of the Editors, " took away " even the genealogy, (they had previously taken away from the Old Testament, as some allege, all but the books of the Pentateuch, nor did they admit the whole of them) Marcion is said to have taken away all the Old Testament, three of the four Gospels, several Epistles, and altered, abridged, or interpolated whatever he chose to retain. The Editors say he did this " like some moderns." It is fit then surely, that we should keep a strict eye upon such takers-away^ for fear their learning and integrity should be of the same preda- tory nature as Marcion's, and tempt them to commit trespasses as little to be justified. But St. Luke does not mendon in his preface to the Acts of the Apostles, that his Gospel contained any * One Unitarian writer docs not seem to hold him in much estimation, " absurd as that man shewed himself to be," says Mr. Jones in his TUustrations of the Gospels. [The odd thing is, that let the character of Marcion have been what it might, the Editors apply his authority against himself ; one of his dogmata being plainly this; that Clirist was noi a tnariy but a S'.n of tlie Supreme God, and probably on this very account it was that he discarded that part of Luke's Gospel which re- presents him as born a man, while the Editors catch at thi'j very emission to prove that he was not oi divine origin. See Mr. Ren- nell's Animadversions, pp. .3. 4. and Dr. Laurence'^ third chapter. As to the Ebionites, 1 am more than ever puzzle.! to under- stand what character they really bear with the Unitarian party ; in ihe reply to Dr. Magee already r-poivcn of, and which, if it pro- ceed not from tlie pen of the principal Editor of the Improved Version, he is much belied, the learned professor is not allowed to raise an argument against the Ebionite omission of the miracu- lous conception, from the notorious blunder they committed in rejecting three ot theGospel5,andall St. Paul'.slilpistlcs. — "It may be so," says the replyer. " Then surely, they would be the more careful of that Gospel which they retained ; and this Gospel •which ulone the Ebionites acknowledged as authentic, this Gospel, which Version of the New I'cstament. j! any thing more than records of the piibhc Ministry of Christ : he does not allude to the incidents con- tained in the two first chapters, " which therefore probably were not written by him." As this objection is allowed to reach no higher than to a bare proba- bility, I shall not spend any time upon it, except to observe, that neither are the incidents contained in the third chapter, included in the short Swnmary ; ActSf i. I. which extends only to what " Jesus began both to do and to teach.'* The third chapter, how- ever, the Editors account genuine. And the learned author of the Animadversions has found in this very third chapter, a pretty plain allusion to the histories contained in the suspected chapters ; I cannot refrain from pointing it out. — St. Luke alone, it is to be observed, gives a detail of the circumstances of the birth of the Baptist, chapter i. in a marked conformity with which, he alone also, of all the Evangelists, in his third chapter, designates John as the " So7i of Zacharias^** v. 2. I am confident that the conclusion drawn by Mr. Rennell is fair and just. They next tell their readers as before, that ** If the account of the miraculous conception of Jesus be true, he could not be the offspring of David and of Abraham, from whom it was predicted, and by the Jews expected that the Messiah should descend." Nozu this is a downright falsehood ! which I may say v,^ithout rudeness, nay rather with some civility ; be- cause the Editors themselves had previously contra- which they would upi^n no account enlarge or cvria'd, this purest Gospel of Matthew wanted the two chapters." — Is it possible that he should have forgotten that they did, according to the Improved Versionists themselves, actually and positively curtail this Go/pel, and that Gofpel, (as he so emphatically calls it), of the Genealogy, which the Cerinthian and Carpocratian gospel, purer than ihc purest of the Ebionites, retained ?] dieted 3 2 Remarks oji the improved dieted it in their note on St. Matthew, where we read, that the account of the miraculous conception does *' not at all militate against the doctrme of the proper h umaniiy of Christ * . * * They go on to repeat, that *' there is no allusion to any of these extraordinary facts in either of the * [This eontradifliion, which, since the first publication of my Remarks, has been noticed by Dr, Magee as well as myself, is not, I find, admitted by the Editors, or at least by the Replier to Dr. M. in the i\'. Repository (which I have before said I lock upon as the same thing). In the Reply, it is contended, that in the first instance (referring to the note on Matthew) the Editors only say, that the account of the miraculous conception is contradiftory to the purport of the genealogy, tlie sole objeft of which is to shew that Christ was the depcendant of Abraham and David, in being they&H of Jofeph. The account of the miraculous conception, therefore, whjch shews him not to have been the sen of Joseph, could not hai-e proceeded from the same pen. In the second in- stance what they assert is, that the account of the miraculous conception could not have been unacceptable to theEbicnites^being comipatible with his proper humanity ; but his proper humanity we rnnintair, v/as derived from his mother Mary, who according to the Jewish customs and institutions, must have been, as is gene- rally allowed, of the same hneage as her husband, that is, a de- scendant, in her own person, of Abraham and David ; and with Mary, in fact, the genealogy of St. iVIatthew terminates ; " and Jacob begat Joseph," not the father of Jesus, but " the husband of Jidnry,'' of if/jo?;? Jesus was born, who is called Christ." Ihis evidently cctir.ects the genealogy with the account of the miraculous conception, and the i8th verse does by no means " begin a neiu £tory," as ti'.e Editors pretend. And thus the contradiction in efFeft remains as strong as CDcr. If the miraculous conception, that is to say, do not interfere with the proper humanity of Jesus, it does not interfere with his descent from Abraliam and David, nor conseouently with what the Editors admit to be, the " sole objedl" of the genealogy; both might admii-ablywell proceed from exactly the same pen. — VoJkeiius even would tell them that Jesus was sufficiently the Son of Joseph in virtue of his adoption, to be the descendant*of Abraham and David ; nor do their own choice friends, the Cerinthiaus and Carpocratians, omit the mention of il/^rj in addition to the name ofjofeph, in proving his descent from Abraham and David. They maintained^ says Epiphanius, suku tio Xptftf, that Christ came, ix sTn^^dm Ito-n^ «^i MAP.Al.] 4 succeeding Version of the New Testament, 3^ succeeding histories of Luke, (see however above;) or in any other books of the New Testament. Jesus is uniformly spoken of as the Son of Joseph and Mary, and as a native of Nazareth, and no expectation whatever appears to have been excited in the public mind by these ivonderfid and notorious events." Having rephed to these objections before, I shall not dwell upon them here, except to notice a few incorrect expressions. Jesus is not uniformly spoken of as the Son of Joseph and Mary ; he is continually spoken of as " the Son of God ;" *' the Son of the most High ;'* " theSon of the livingGod;" the Son of "theBIessed;" " the only-begotten of God." He is not uniformly spoken of as a native of Nazareth ; the Evangelists do not themselves declare him to be so in anv one instance ; St. Luke in particular lays a stress ' upon his being brought up at Nazareth. See Chap. iv. 1 6. Imp. Version. His Opponents accuse him of being such, as a reason for rejecting him, alleging particularly that if he were the Christ, he must have been born at Bethlehem ; that he was educated and dwelt at Nazareth, is granted ; but though by residence and connections a Galilean, God's especial interposition appears to have been directed, to make him by birth a Bethlemite, of the city of David. Lastly, though the events attending his birth were wonderful enough to excite the awe and attention of all who witnessed them, yet they were not public and notorious. Herod himself, nay, all Jerusalem, including the Chief Priests and scribes of the people, were not let into the secret. Those who cculd very well tell, where the Messiah ought to be born, did not know where he was born ; a circumstance however duly discovered to others for the highest purposes, namely, that sortie witnesses at least might be forthcoming to D establish. 34 Remarks on the impronxed establish, T^hen 7iccessary, that criterion of his Messiaii- ship, his birth at Bethlehem in Judea. The date of the enrolment, Chap. ii. i. is mentioned as a great historical dilliculty, without however the usual reference to Lardner, who, though he certainly treats it as a difficulty, so unravels the mystery as to leave it no longer such. *' That St. John the Baptist should be ignorant of the person of Christ is not probable if this narrative be true ;" this is another objection of the Editors. Though it has been pretty generally supposed that John knew not the person of Jesus before his baptism, we are not quite certain that this was actually the case. In two mstances John does certainly declare that he *' knew him not," and these cases are cited by the Editors, John, i. 31 — 34. But I should much ques- tion if more were implied by these terms than that he knew him not as the Messiah *, till it was epecialiy revealed to him on his approach to be baptized. Grotius is disposed to adopt this interpretation ; but those who do not adopt it, very rationally attribute his ignorance, to the providential interposition of God, to take off all suspicion of conspiracy. See Beza and Doddridge. At all events no argument can be drawn from a circumstance which for any thing we know, might be accidental, ^iwdi from what we know, would appear to be providential : That it might even be accidental, the following circumstances may serve to show. John was born in the hill country, probably about Hebron, seventy miles from Nazareth (see Luke, i. 39. •■* When this part of the Remarks was first published I had forgotten that Dr. Priestley was of the same opinion. See -the third Vokime of his Notes on the Bible, p. 36, where the point is well argued. 6^, and Verswi of the New Testament. 35 6^. and Bell on the Missions of the Baptist and Jesus Christ, pp. 116, 1 17.)* ^^^ he abode in the deserts till his preaching, Luke, i. 80. Jordan, where he baptized, was also far from Nazareth, whence our Saviour is represented as coming to him. Their habits of life were different ; fee Bell as before, 245. 247. and note 254. See alfo particularly Doddridge's Family Expositor on John, i. 3 1 . where are arguments to shew, that either accidentally or providentially y they might very possibly have been personally unknown to each other. See alfo Hohnes^s Bampton Lecture, 1782, Serm. iii. The last remark of the Editors relates to the pro- bability of interpolation ; in anfwer to thofe who think so large and gross an interpolation would never have escaped detection, or been so early and so gene- rally received, we are reminded that it was not ad- mitted into the Hebrew copies of Matthew's Gospel, nor into Marcion's copies of St. Luke. That is, in fact, it was not to be found in that Canon of Scripture which Marcion and the Ebionites severally chose to adopt, but which was the case with very much more that is now universally allowed to be genuine Scrip- ture ', with most of the historical, prophetical, and ha- giqgraphical books of the Old Testament, and (in the case of Marcion particularly) with three of the four Gospels, many of the Apostolical Epistles, and the Apocalypse. Thus discarded, it must at least be al- lowed, it had honourable company, to keep it in coun- tenance, in its rejection and banishment ; and has just as much right, probably, to be restored to its proper place in the Canon of Scripture. But, it is added, " it is notorious that forged writ- ings, under the names of the Apostles, were in circu- lation almost from the Apostolic age.'* It is surely equally notorious, that when the Canon was compiled, D 2 these 36 Renmrks 07i the improved these forgeries were quite as well known to the com- pilers as to the Unitarians of the present day, and that so much has been set aside of these forgeries, and re- jected among the rl^iv^i^iypx(pa^ is in itself sufficient proof that all that has been retained underwent due examination. " If the orthodox charge the heretics, the heretics, we are told, equally charge the orthodox with corrupting the text." How could it be other- wise * ? And yet the orthodox may be quite right after * I confess I was at the first much surprized at so strange a remark ; but have been the more so since, upon reading the fol- lowing citation from TertuUian in a letter in the Monthly Re- pository signed B . (probably Mr. Belsham the principal Editor of the Improved Version.) Ego meum dico verum, (says the honest Tertullian,) Marcion suuni. Ego Marcioni? adfirmo ad- ulteratum, Marcion meum. Ouis inter nos determinabit ? Adv. Marcion : 1. 4. c. 3. It is plain that such recriminations prove nothing, the " Quis determinabit" is the main question still. [Thus stood the note in the first Edition, but it is now proper to observe, that having had no farther view in my remarks at that time than to point out the inconclufive effect of such mutual recriminations, I did not follow up the remark of Tertullian, which would have thrown more light on the subjeft. It has since however been admirably done by Mr. Falconer of C.C. C. Oxford, in his Biimpton Lecture for 1810, sermon v. It will there be seen plainlv enough, that there was some art in stopping at the word detcrminabitx for that in fact Tertullian appealed directly fromMar- cion's copy to such as were older, and generally received in the Catholic Church. See this also exceedingly well proved by Dr. Bell, in the arguments on the authenticity of tlic two first chapters ot Luke's Gospel prefixed to the third Edition of his Enquiry into the Missions of John the Baptist and Jesus Chrilt, 1810: both these learned authors have shewn with great effect, that let the antiquiiy of Marcion'^ (jospel be what it might, and his own con- fident assertions of its genuine''ess ever so bold, Tertullian with equal confidence appealed to copies more antient, as well as to the traditions of the Apostolical and Catholic Churches. This is of the more importance, because tl;e " calm Enquirer" is any thing but calm in his severe StriAurcs on "Dx.Magee for censuring the Editors on account of their over-confidence in Marcion. He insists thut Version of the Netu Testanie77t. 37 after ail. The Unitarians declare that the Ebionites improperly took aivay the genuine genealogy of Mat- thew. Vfould not the Ebionites, it they could speak for themselves, retort, that the Unitarians very impro- perly receive it as genuine Scripture, and yet are not the Unitarians quite right in giving it a place in their Canon ? I ought indeed to say the Editors of this Version, rather than the Unitarians in general, for there are some of the latter, who, like the Ebionites of old, are for taking away " even the genealogy •," but with these I have little to do at present. It was easier, say the Editors, to introduce interpo- lations when copies were few and scarce, th?n since they have been multiplied to so great a degree by means of the press. This we must have leave to deny. The press might now indeed give ample currency to any adopted interpolation; but every manuscript must have constituted an individual and distinct copy in those days, and an interpolation in one could scarcely find its way so correctly into every other, and be transferred into every version, so dispersed as they were, and so variously circumstanced ; and yet as it happens, these narratives (as the Editors tell us) are to be found in every known manuscript and every known version. Lastly, we are taught to notice that the interpolation in question, would to the generality of Christians be extremely gratifying, as it would lessen the odium attached to Christianity from its founder being a crucified Jew, and would elevate him to the dignity that they only rely upon Marcion's copy, in opposition to all exisU ing MoS. and Version!, as evidently older ; but TertuUian ap- pealed from Marcion on the same ground, to copies olJer than his, and generally known and received in his time. This appeal is kept out of sight by the device of stopping at the word determi' nabit in the reference above. Consult also on the same subject Simon's Critical History of the N. T. chap.ii.] D 3 of 38 Remarks on the improved of the HEROES and demi-gods of the heathen my- thology ! ! , Gracious Heaven ! elevate the Saviour of the v/orld to the dignity of the heroes and demi-gods of the heathen mythology ! ! Need any persons who had the Apocalypse in their hands (a part of Scripture which the Editors will- ingly account genuine), to have forged such an ac- count of the birth of Christ, as we have in Matthew and Luke ; to have given him a poor Virgin for his mother, a small village for his birth-place, a stable for his nursery, and a ?nanger for his cradle, in order to lessen the Jev/ish prejudices, and raise him to the rank of a heathen demi-god? He who declares himself, in another part of Scripture, to be " the alpha and omega, the beginning and the end, unto whom every creature that is in Heaven, and on earth, and under the earth, and in the sea, and all things in them, ascribe blessing, and glory, and dominion for ever and ever!" What mythological idol could ever be compared to the Lamb of the Apoca- lypse, the Lord of lords, and King of kings ? What demi-god of Paganism ever made such an appearance as the Word of God in the Revelations ? I shall take the Editors own Version. " And I saw Heaven opened, and behold a white horse, and he who sat upon him was called faithful and true, and with righteousness he judgeth and maketh war. And his eyes were as a flame of fire, and on his head were many crowns. And he had a name written which none knoweth but himself : and he was clothed with a mantle dipt in blood : and his name is called the Word of God : and the armies which were in Heaven followed him on white horses, clothed in fine linen, white and pure : and out of his mouth went a sharp two-edged sword, that with it he might smite the nations : and he shall rule Version of the New Testa7nent. 39 rule them with, a rod of iron : and he shall tread the wine-press of the fierce anger of Almighty God : and he had on his mantle and on his thigh, a name written, King of kings and Lord of LORDS !" What can be said to those who talk of elevating such a personage to the rank of a heathen demi- god ! Thus far our attention has been directed particu- larly to the suspicions entertained of the genuineness and authenticity of those paits of the Gospels of St. Matthew and St. Luke, which give an account of the miraculous conception and birth of Jesus Christ. Closely connected with this are the doctrines com- monly entertained of the pre-existence and divinity of our Saviour, which doctrines it is the professed object of the present Version to do away, by an abandonment of what the Editors call those " tech- nical phrases of a systematic theology, which has no foundation in the Scriptures themselves.'* I can- not quite understand what they mean jn this place by the " technical phrases of a systematic theology.'* Technical phrases must surely imply appropriate phrases, whether they relate to the arts or sciences ; and as to a systematic theology, any theology without a system, must surely be no better than " the baseless fabric of a vision.'* Assuredly this Unitarian theology is systematic, and nothmg can more strongly prove it than the Ver- sion now edited. Not a word or phrase, or various reading, that at all breaks in upon that system, is fuf- fered to efcape without some hint of a corruption of the text, some alteration, or some comment to ex- plain away its most obvious and literal meaning : and as to technical phrases, they may be just as technical in the way of negation as in the way of assertion. " If D 4 the 40 Remarks on the improved the Improved Version,'* says an Unitarian in the Monthly Repository, " be regarded as a party produc- tion, it must be principally from the complexion of the doctrinal notes." It may be just as technical to call the only-begotten of God a mere attribute, as to call him a person ; and it is evidently much more technical to evade the most approved interpretations, than to abide by the obvious and plain language of Holy Writ. In regard to those two great doctrines of our Savi- our's pre-cxistence and divinity, we find nothing but evasion : evasion the most systematic^ and a choice of terms the most invariably technical, as appropriate ex- clusively to their own system of belief. Thus it is that Ku'pif, as addressd to our Lord, is too commonly rendered Sir, or Master, or Teacher, and the term irpoo-xuvfu/, under the same circumstances, never allowed to stand for more than the mere aft of obeisance. The Logos, or Word of God, is (we had almost said) accounted no more than a mere nick-name of the Prophet Jesus ; and the " Creation of all things," is represented to be the Creation of nothing. Not that we are at all disposed to deny that Kipis may with much propriety in some places of Scripture be ren- dered Sir, or Master ; that zTpoa-KwiTv has the mean- ing of obeisance ; that Jesus may be termed " the I^ogos, because God revealed himself or his word by him," (as we are reminded that Archbishop New- come explains it), or that there is no 7iew Creation ever spoken of, that is spiritual and strictly evan- gelical. But invariably to regard the expres- sions alluded to, as comprehending under them nothing more, no higher doctrines than are con- veyed by the renderings and commentaries of the Editors, is to suppress many real matters of fact, which tend to fix the true and undoubted meaning of Version of the New Testament. 41 of the sacred writers. So far from enabling- the judicious and attentive reader (as the Editors pro- fer,s) to understand Scripture phraseology, it is really to take from them the very best means of doing so. Nothing can be more true, than the remark of that eloquent writer Bishop Jeremy Taylor, " That though every man may soon span his own know- ledge, our ignorance v\'e can never fathom," In publi- cations of the nature of the one before us, the world in general would be utterly astonished to know, what a mass of ancient learning, including much matter of positive fact, is wholly kept out of sight, though of the utmost importance to the full understanding of the doctrines of Scripture. How should it be possible for any unlearned Christian to understand, where such information is studiously suppressed, that the very name of God is often given to Christ, where the re- ceived translation only renders it Lord^ and this im- proved Version Sir or Master ? and yet this seems to me as capable of demonstration, as any proposition in Euclid *. For * Mr. Lindsey has a curious way of getting over this diffi'ulty. ** The Apostles," he tell us, " were not so exa6t in the use of the words Lord and Sainour which they gave indifferently both to Goi-Zand Christ, LiQyer supposing that any would mistake their Lord and master, so lately born and living among men, to be the Supreme God and object of worship." Apology, p, 147. But how shall we account for its being spoken of as j\c peculiar glory both of God and Christ, to be the universal Saviour of mankind ; the only Saviour of the world ? How shall we account for St. Paul's expressly applying to Christ, Phil. ii. 10. what Isaiah applies in the most peculiar manner to God, xlv. 33. as the just God and Saviour of man, than whom there is none else, none beside Plim of whom he was speaking? — See President Edwards's Works. [Mr. Lindsey in real truth might more reasonably have con- tended that it was a matter of indifference whetiier his followers should speak of him as Mr.LindaeVj or as the Bifhop oi London; for 42 Remarks on the improved For instance, that the name Jehovah was by the Jews invariably understood to be so exclusively appropriated to God, as to be perfectly incommuni- cable to any creature, is a truth entirely indisputable : and any application of this title to a creature would always have been esteemed the most rank idolatry, the basest dereliction of the hrst great principle of their faith. Nevertheless, all the Evangelists begin their Gospels with the account of the preaching of St. John the Baptist, declaring that " this was he that was spoken of by the prophet Isaias, saying, *' The voice of one crying in the wilderness, prepare ye the way of the LORD, make his paths straight." Now in the original prophecy of Isaiah, xl. 3. the words are these, *' Prepare ye the way of JEHOVAH ;" and as every body knows that the LXXII Jews, who made the Greek translation of the Bible, had no other term to express JEHOVAH but the term Kuptor, a translation in fact of the substituted Adonai of the Jews, it should certainly be so rendered in the above paiTages of the Gospels ; for " here,'* as a very learned author says, " we find all the four Evangelists, three of whom at least were Jews, bear- ing witness to the same thing, that Jesus is the JE- HOVAH prophesied of by Isaiah, whose way the Baptist was to prepare*." for what ideot, had they chosen to call him so, would ever have really fancied that the minister of the Unitarian C\\2i^z\ in Effex- street could actually have been Bishop of London I There was nothing concerning which the Jews were less indifferent, than that of the application of the term Jehoi'ah. This matter of fact is all that we require the Unitarians to grant — the consequences follow of course, and in some cases are, in my estimation, irre- sistible.] * In the Syriac the reading is. Prepare ye the way for our God, Lnle iii. 4. See Ludov. de Dieu, and Griesbach's Various Read- ings. See, on Krrior as expressive of Jehovah, Pearson, 150; and Sharp's Law of Nature, p, 2^6. Version of the New Testa?nent. 43 If any should be disposed to doubt whether Kupiof is equivalent to JEHOVAH, the Editors of this work supply us with three instances of it m their rendering of Matth. xxii. 44. — Mark xii. 36. — Luke, XX. 42. Elere they themselves with great propriety render Kupjoc, Jehovah. And a Jewish Targum helps us to another remarkable fa6t upon this very passage. " The Lord said unto my Lord," is, in the T. of Jonathan, " Jehovah said unto his WORD *•" This opens to us a new sub- jed ; for here is the WORD of JEHOVAH, the AOros or WORD of God, fully acknowledged by a Jew, in a passage particularly appropriated to himself h^ own blessed Saviour^ and evidently implying a personal distinction. These are all positive facts^ which apply to every part of the Christian Scriptures, and the bare mention of which is sufficient to show us, that a new version, in which such matters are totally supprsesed or disregarded^ cannot be a fair inter- pretation of the real sentiments of Jewish writers. None can be ignorant how much is said about the WORD of GOD in the first chapter of St. John's Gospel. All that the world in general will learn from this Version, of this remarkable term, is, that it either means the wisdom of God, (according to our contemporary Mr. Lindsey,) or that it is a name given to our Saviour, because by H/w, as one of his Messengers or Prophets^ God revealed himself or his Word in the Gospel — given to him " in the be- * See nwre upon this paraphrase below. [Confult alfo Bishop Patrick on Leviticus, xxvi. 46. and Dr. Gill's note on Gen. xvi. ;•] ginning," 13.1 44 Remarks on the improved ginning,'* that is, from the commencement of the Gospel dispensation, and fwt before. This is what the Editors tell us; but undoubtedly the main ques- tion is, what must St. John have thought or known of the term ? The Editors certainly cite a passage from one of his Epistles, in order to make the Evange- list explain himself \ but, as it often happens, what ap- pears to them to confirm their apprehension of mat- ters, appears to us most strongly to confirm our sense of things. This must unavoidably happen ; any ex- pression, by a positive denial of the fact to which it is thought to allude, m.ust of course appear to in- fer something else. So it is, that what is predicated of our Saviour, Gal. iv. 4. that he *' was made of a woman," is perfeftly understood by those who be- lieve in his incarnation, to have an allusion to that peculiar doctrine ; but take away the doctrine, and it must needs seem to allude to some different event. But the question must still remain ; Was there any actual incarnation of a superior being to which it might bear allusion ? and so stand the questions that relate to the sense of Kbpc,- and hoUc^ in the evangelical and apostolic writings. They may seem to many to allude to nothing higher than what the Version and Commentaries of these Edi- tors imply ; but it must remain a question, whether there is any thing more, any higher dodrines, to which they m.ay allude. If K-Jpio? be the only Greek term used by Jewish writers for Jehovah, a question must naturally arise, whether it appears to have been ever so used by the Jewish writers of the New TcvStament, as necessarily to have conveyed to their minds the sense of Je- hovah. If the AoTof, or Word, of God, was a title at all known to the Jews before the commencement of the Version of the New 2'estatncnt. 45 the Gcspel dispensation *, and before Christ was born into the world, a question must naturally arise, * If Ir cifx'nw Aofo? mean ''in the beginning" in the fulleft extent, that is, as the Jews interpret the prophecy of Micah, " Egressiones ejus funt ab Initio. Quum mundus nondum esset conditus." Prov, viii. 22, (See the Pirke of R. Eleazer, and the Greek of this in the Septuagint.) What could better express the same, than the terms used in the first chap, of St. John's firil Epistle : 'O -nv aw' ap%>)? (>£«* i^ol'oi ccvm «7r '^px'^'^ ^^ the LXX rendering of Micah.) O Iw^^axa/xj^, Ka] a.1 %£rps rj(Ji-uy l-^io^Citpno-xv Vefi rn Aoja Tr}c ^aiini;——K.ixi r, Cojyi ((pampuid-^' ■ •Y,rn; vv wfoj rov TTxlipccf xai iipan^'x^-zt it/xu — Is not this perfe6lly analo- gous to the terms of the Gospel ? 'Lv a^yjo ■n^ o Aofo^ )ca.l 5 Ad/o? ■>j» Wfioj TOO Qiotf ev atitu y>:n rjv xai Ta f «-: In Ta Kocrfj-u rv. K.act o Ao/»; I must confess the expressions convey to me (zs they do to the Editors) exaftly the same sense, though we differ as to the obje6t of both passages. They think all these terms merely al- lude to the ministry of a prophet, who had a word to deliver, and eternal life to preach, and spiritual light to bestow upon his followers and disciples. I think they allude to a pre- existent being, who had all these things in himself, as subsisting in unity with the Father, before all ages, and before all worlda, and who became manifest in the flesh folely for our redemp- tion. That such great stress should be laid upon the mere manifestation, or rather mission of a prophet, or that such sin- gular terms should be requisite to prove against the Gnostics or Docetes that he was actually a man, and no more than a mere man, I confess I see no reason ; on the contrary, I see great reafon why the Apostle fliould expressly have avoided such terms, had this been the utmost of his pretensions. I know Pearson and Whitby, and other great critics, do TiOt in- terpret a-n^ «fx;i' '"" ^^^s way ; but I have many eminent com- mentators on my side, and I confess, i mean to lay the greatest stress on the manifestation In the JJesh of the WORD of Life, &c. [I cannot conclude, however, without noticing that the learned Witsius in his Economia Fadentm, lib, iii. c. 4. § xxi. net only contends earnestly for the close correspondence between all the texts insisted upon above, but considers the Hellenists use of «7r' cfyr? to denote eternity, to be proved by the passage in Ec- clesiasticus, xxiv. 9, where ttco t« aia^ioc occurs a? synonimous. It may be added that the/Jralic Version oi Micah renders x-n' oi?_yy>c ab jeternis diebus ; the Syriac a principio, a diebus scternis, and the 46 Remarks on the improved arise, whether a Jewish writer, calling him the AoTo?, or WORD, could only intend it as an apt de- scription of that prophet who was ordained to re- veal to man the Gospel covenant. Ancient learn- ing may come to be despised by all those wlio think modern philosophy far superior to it, but we cannot get rid of facts. AVe cannot with all our philoso- phy do more than object to the terms ; we cannot possibly insist upon it, that a Jewish writer had not Jewish notions of the terms he used : nor can we with any decency pretend, that God would countenance the delivery of heavenly truths, in terms that must have conveyed one meaning at one time, and another at another. If it can be proved by fair argument, that the sense put upon certain expres- sions by the Unitarians could not possibly be the sense intended by Jewish writers of the first cen- turies, we cannot believe that sense to be the true one. The most ordinary understanding, I would hope, might be brought to apprehend what I mean ; though while I wish to be quite as generally intel- ligible as the Editors of this new Version, I must have leave to premise, that it is somewhat a harder task to bring forv/ard ancient facts and ancient records, in support of the venerable writings in question, than to modernize them for common read- ing by a suppression of ail the testimony to be drawn from the records of antiquity. And here I find myself under the disagreeable necessity of adverting to a circumstance, which the Chaldee paraphrase of Jonathan, cujus nomen dictum est ab seternitate, both -irfo in amivoc and aw' c.igx.'>'-<; ^re unquestionably apphed by the LXX., to denote the eternity of the Fcither, ^vhich makes the cafe stronger. In short, I cannot avoid thinkinjr that the divinity and eternity of the Logos are equally asserted in all the three passages, though I have a few great authorities ugainst me ] 4 has Version of the New Testament. 47 has occurred since the first publication of this part of my Remarks. In the Brit. Crit. vol. xxxiv. p. 165. I had referred to Jeremiah, xxiii. 6. to prove that the Messiah had been expressly foretold under the name of " JEHOVAH our Righteousness ;'* for which rash act I have received the following severe castigation, in Dr. Carpenter's Letters to Mr. Vey- sie, lately published. Dr. Carpenter is an oppo- nent, who generally wi'ites with good temiper and courtesy ; and I have often gone out of my way to commend him for it, and to speak of him ■vsdth respeft ; and had even done so, in the following remarks, before this reproof met my eye ; which expressions I shall now most willingly leave un- touched, only observing, that on these accounts, the severity of his expressions, on this particular occasion, must naturally be the more ungrateful to my feelings. Dr. C. refers to Dr. Blayney's cor- rection of the passage, Jeremiah, xxiii. 6. *' Blay- ney," he says, thus translates the passage, " and this is the Name by which Jehovah shall call hiniy Our Righteousness ;" and this learned Critic, he adds, has the ' following remark in his note : " I doubt not but some persons will be offended with me, for depriving them, by this translation, of a fa- vourite argument, for proving the divinity of our Saviour from the Old Testament. But I cannot help it : / have done it with no ill design, but merely because I think, and a?n fnorally sure, that the text, as it stands, tuill not properly admit of any other con- struction. The LXX have so translated it before me, in an age when there could not possibly be any bias of -prejudice, either for or against the fore- mentioned doctrine ; a doctrine which draws its de- cisive proofs from the New Testament only. In the parallel passage, ch. xxxiii. 16, the expression is a little 48 Remarks on the ijnproved little varied, but the sense, according to a just and literal translation, is precisely the same ; and this is be whom Jehovah shall call our Righteousness,''* To this citation from Dr. Blayney, Dr. Carpen- ter subjoins the following note : *' Is it possible that Mr. Nares could be ignorant of the true rendering of this passage ? See Brit. Crit. Aug. 1809, p. 165, and probably his remarks on the improved Version, there and elsewhere announced. That gentleman obviously is as unacquainted with the amount of the phraseology of the Targumim^ and its weight in the argument, as he appears to be with general can- dour ; I am not surprised to find him also dwelling on Mr. Sharp's canon ; I regard it as a corrobora- tive proof of the weakness of his cause." Before I proceed to enter into the particulars of this severe note, I shall first observe, that I appre- hend Dr. C. confounds me (as has often been the case) with a much more eminent and learned Critic, my namesake and relation, the Rev. Arch- deacon Nares ; this gentleman, whom I am proud to call my particular friend, as well as my relation, ought not to be made answerable for my ignorance and stupidity ; I therefore beg to take the full>^ weight of the charge upon myself, observing only that my friend knows, better than Dr. Carpenter, what fair excuses I have to plead for any accidental i'^norance, of the nature alluded to. He knows, that my constant residence is in a most retired country village, wholly out of the reach of any books whatsoever, but such as my own private library supplies : Dr. Blayney's edition of Jere- miah, is not at 7ny command ; yet to say I knew not of his correction, and his remarks, would be wrong ; I knew he read the passage differently, but 1 could not cite his exa6t words ; I knew he had made l^ersion of the Neio Testament. 49 made particular remarks upon it, but they were not immediately in my recolleftion. They are certainly strong, and I am confident, sincere and honest ; for I had the happiness of being personally well known to that learned professor, and I venerated him highly. Some of my early writings, upon the par- ticular subject of the Trinity, underwent his im- mediate inspection, and, as is well known to others besides myself, were honoured with his approbation ; upon no grounds whatsoever, therefore, ' would I be supposed, wantonly, to slight his opinions. But (not to obtrude my own opinion upon the case) it happens to be also in my recollection, that Dr. B.'s amendment of the passage in Jeremiah, soon after its appearance, was disputed by another most eminent biblical Critic, Dr. Eveleigh, now Provost of Oriel College, Oxford, and the impression made upon my mind at the very time by the learned Pro- vost's remarks, was, that the true reading had not been so decisively settled by Dr. Blayney, as Dr. C. asserts. I had also ,read with attention a more re- cent critique upon the subjeft, in which Dr. Blay- ney's version is declared to be so unwarrantable, as to be quite unbecoming a Hebrew professor, and though out of respect, and regard for his memory, I forbear to repeat all that is there expressed upon the subjeft, yet I must declare, that undoubtedly the case appears to me, to be entirely proved against him, and this, as I conceive, by a n)ery eminent He- brew scholar^ of a neighbouring kingdom. See the Sacred Criticism, by Inspector, in the 2d Vol. of the Orthodox Churchman's Magazine, p. 383 ; see also Mr. Sharp's learned notes on the passage, in his LavvT of Nature. Even the Septuagint ap- pears, from this writer's remarks, (and even from :c. Tlie Editors, however, should at least be consistent, but they are not so t ; they omit or Insert both the definite and indefinite * Matthew, xiv. 33. Our TjOrd'ci Disciples are described as worsliipping, (or doing obeisance to him_, as the Editors have it), saying, (K-KtAw, (P>i>i vic; a, could t/jcy mean truly Thou art A Son of A God ? The Editors have it A Son of God, rejecting Newcome's rendering THE Son of God, When our Saviour was crucified, his enemies reviled him, alleging that he had rdid, oTt esa itp.i vi'j:, Matth. xxvii. 43. but what he haJ said, wa?, that he was 'j v.r,-, tb Qiny see Ch. xxvi. C^, 64. The Editors ren- der the former passage, TFIE Son of God. On the value and importance of the article, Bishop Pearr.on fhould undoubtedly be consulted, fol. Edit. p. i2j. See also on the term Emmanuel, as explained by Matthew, ib. p. 130, •f In one page they expressly render it THE Son of God, where the article is omitted in the original, and A Son of God E 4 %vbere 56 Remarks on the improved indefinite article as they choose, and this both in regard to the title of Son of God and Son of Man, both of which we think designate the Messiah. Thus in regard to the latter they insert the definite article before mo? in that particular passage, John, V. 27 *, which Chrysostom thought of so much moment as to propose a new reading. For, says he, if according to this passage, authority to execute Judgment was given to him merely as man, that is, as A Son of MAN, (for the articles are omitted,) a like authority might be given to any man or all men ; he proposes therefore to make the pause after " judgment," and then to proceed. Because he is A Son of MAN, wonder not : that is, wonder not that such a power should be given to a Son of Man, because he is in fact much more, for " the hour cometh, in the which all that are in the graves shall hear his voice, &c." If this reasoning be right, and it has certainly been approved by very eminent scholars t, and even the Syriac Version favours it, we are bound to conclude, that the Son of Man is as emphatical as the Son of God, and both of them particularly appropriate to the Messiah, who is both the Son of God, ^olX e^o')(7\v in a most peculiar and singular manner, and the Son of Man in the same way, Ka.T i^ox/iVf and where it occurs, L.uke, iv. 3. and 9. Grotins and Beza indeed incline to think it should be read without the article in the last passage, but principally because it is omitted in the former. * And yet in their notes, give the true reading as adopted even by Mr. Wahrfleld, How much has been thought to depend on the omission of the article here, may be seen in Bishop Bull's Prim, ct Apost, Trad. Ch. vi. §§ 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 22, 23. The insertion of the definite and rejeftion of the indefinite article is curious enough. f Sec Erasmus in loco. Beza objefts to Chrysostom.'s emen- dation, but thinks the expression general, and therefore gives no warrant for the insertion of the definite article. singularly Version of the New Testametit. 57 singularly foretold as such by the prophet Daniel *. These things therefore require to be attended to. If the omission of the article be of importance, the insertion of it is of importance also. If the omis- sion of it direct us to interpret the passage generally, the insertion of it must direct us to in- terpret it s[x," says Tivells, " is an expression never applied to the Father (though Grotius affirms it without any proof), but only to the glorious and last coming of the Son ;" and the learned Clemens Streso on Coloss. i. 27. very properly observes, *' Notum praeterea est Deum promisisse Gloriam suam uherlus man'tfestare, et quod area, Columna, Shechinah, ulterioris manifestationis fuere Symbola — hinc Esai xl. 5. Gloria Dei manifestahitur. Hinc Israel, licet Deus suam Glo- riam, illis notificaverat, tamen ulteritis sperare debebat Gloria manifest ationem : hxc autem Christum respexisse, non necesse puto ut demonstrem, quare quisque videt quomodo Apostolus potuit Christum dicere S^em Glorite, jj e^ttic rri^ co^r;-" be Version of the New Testament. 6^ be the Christ, the Messiah. — ^The great God, Jehovah in his utmost, ineffable glory, never did and never will appear in these lower regions ; but the visible Jehovah, the Shechi?iah, the Christ, the Messiah, the only-begotten Son of God, HE has appeared and WILL appear ! w^ith all the power, all the authority, all the glory, all the greatness, of his inseparable Father, who is 'EN— ONE and THE SAME— (after some inexplicable manner,) but yet 'EN — ONE, we know not how, but there is an Unity, and there is a Trinity. The next passage I shall notice is Ephesians, v. 5. ———ax £y£» xXnpovo[j^icx,v iv rvi ^cctriXsnx, TOT XPI2TOT KAI ©EOT. The Editors adopt the received version, which Mr. Sharp long ago corrected, " in the king- dom of Christ and of God.'* — ^It certainly would be more properly rendered " of the Christ and God.'* If articles are of any importance, " of Christ and of God" cannot be grammatically right. KxU -^^v p^apii/ TOT ©EOT ■^y.av KAI KTPIOT In>« This is rendered " I charge thee in the presence of God and of the Lord Jesus Christ.'* The 64 Remarks on the improved The received text is much the same ; but it manifestly should be, '* I charge thee before the God and Lord Jesus Christ." I could select other passages, well known to critics, illustrative of the propriety of these remarks, but as they would be from books, which the Editors have marked as disputed, I forbear to produce them ; I shall therefore only refer to them, with this observa- tion, that in the present version they are rendered so as to be Hable to the correction of Mr. Sharp's rule. They are as follow : 2 Peter i. i . Jude, 4. I have thus far then endeavoured to shew, that the Jewish term Jehovah, the incommunicable name of the One great God, must often be intended in the writings of the New Testament by the term Kup'o?* particularly where the Jewish writers of the Neiv Testament refer to passages of the Old, in which the name of Jehovah, is unquestionably applied to the Messiah. If all the four Evangelists, for instance, in their accounts of the preaching of St. John, refer distinctly to the prophecy of Isaiah, ch. xl. 3. and cite it in the very words of the Jewish translators of the Old Testament, Kupia must needs have the same force in all these places. In the Septuagint it is un- deniably the rendering of JEHOVAH ; in the origi- nal it is plainly predicated of the Messiah to come, that " Glory of the Lord (Jehovah) that shall be re- vealed,'* ver. 5. In the New Testament it is plainly applied to Christ, and what doubt therefore can re- main but that Jewish writers have plainly spoken of him as JEHOVAH, i Ao^« Kup»'a, the Revealed Glory of God, which in Jewish phraseology is but another name for the Visible Jehovah \hQ Word of God. If this be so, v/hy should v.e hesitate to apply Mr. Sharp's rule to the Greek, and to conclude, that according to the plain idiom of that language the term ©fo? is also applied Version of the New Testament, 6£ applied to him in sundry passages, and consequently that we have the double testimony of Hebrew and Greek phraseology in favour of his divinity ? This may be called the " technical phraseology of a syste- matic theology," but I cannot help it. I ought indeed, if I think it right, only to insist upon it the more strongly ; for what would the public desire, but to be put in possession of the real system of Revelation, ex- pressed in terms the most strictly suitable and appro- priate ? It is the desire of doing this alone that could lead me into such discussions. I have also endeavoured to show, though / have not fully entered into this argument, that divine worship may reasonably be held to have been considered as justly rendered to Christ by the Evangelists, though expressed in terms of some ambiguity. The Editors often dwell upon the circumstance of the Evangelists not contradicting the obvious sense of certain terms in their several Gospels, as a proof that such sense must be the proper one. If the Evangelists could be ex- pected to do this, they must be supposed to have been extremely circumspect in the use of terms ; and considering therefore that the claim to divine honours had involved our Saviour in the charge of blasphemy, and that ■s:^(i(Tvxviiy was a suspicious expression, (not to insist again upon the term Ku/>iof), it is scarcely to be supposed credible that they would have hazarded the use of such terms without some qualifying ex- pression, had they not at least bel>.i;v\ d in their own minds, and intended therefore to immaie, that divine worship was due to Christ. If St. John wrote the Apocalypse, and St. Luke the Acts of the Apostles, they must have known and felt the risk they must have run in the application of such terms to the " Son of God ;" see Revelations, xix. i o. and xxii. 8, 9. and Acts, X. 25, 26. Whoever will be at the pains to F examine 66 Remarks on the unproved examine the passages in which these terms are ap- plied to our LORD by the Evangelists, and consider also the particular circumstances of each several case, will, I am confident, be led to conclude, that in the estimation of those sacred writers, wor.f /:?//» in its highest sense was due to the Saviour of the World. I have been led also to notice the attention ap- parently paid (certainly not in any uniform manner) by the Editors to the Greek articles, as prefixed or not so, to personal and descriptive nouns, by which they have not scrupled to describe the sonship of the Messiah in the lev/ and indefinite terms of a Son of a God. The Impropriety of this expression is glaring, and if it were not, could settle no- thing, because the question turns upon this point only, whether our Saviour was y.uX I'^o^w^ per emi- nentiam, and indeed exclusively THE SON OF GOD, which undoubtedly in many strong passages he is declared to be, nay, * asserted to be so by Himself. Such are the points hitherto discussed, (as briefly as 1 could,) and with a view merely to forewarn the public, that a version of ancient Greek and Jewish writings ought not to be generally received without ^ From a note in Dr. Carpenter's Sernion before the Unita- rian Society, I see the title of THE Son of God is supposed to be given to our Lord in the New Testament about thirty times ; Son, implying the same thing, about forty times, and Son of God about twenty times. The other titles are all enumerated in the same note, as leading to conclusions not unfavourable to the Unitarian scheme. I confess I cannot see any such conclusions. Had our Lord been called man one thou- sand times in Scripture, and God but once, yet if the latter instance were unquestionable, it would tell as strongly as the thousand instances in tlie other cafo. Dr. C. refers to Schmid as to the rendering of K.L^i&i JEHOVAH ; but I have no means ef examining his work. some Version of the New Tesfa??ient. 6'/ some inquiry into ancient opinions, and the idioms of the original hmguages; a wilful disregard of which two circumstances may enable any ?}ian, or set of men, to mislead the ilhterate, and give a plausible appearance to the most erroneous tenets. I shall next turn to consider those passages of Scripture, which seem to imply the pre-existence of our Blessed Saviour ; the miraculous conception and birth of the MAN Jesus I have already discussed, but it is plainly to be inferred from the sacred writings, that our Saviour had a previous existence ; that as he came into the ivorld, and took fiesh differently from other men, so he had a being long before this particu- lar event took place. The expressions used by several of the sacred writers so certainly imply this, that the literal sense must be totally abandoned, before we can allowably deny it. When our Saviour is described by the Evangelist St. John, as addressing himself to the supreme and eternal God in these terms : " And now, O Father, glorify thou me with thine own self, with the glory which I had with thee, before the world was," we are coldly told in the notes to the present Version, that this was merely the glory of instructing and convert- ing mankind, existing in the purpose and decree of God : and a number, a great number of passages are referred to, to prove, that it is the idiom of the Scripture language, to describe things existing only in intention, as actually accomplished. Now all this may be really so, in regard to the expressions and passages referred - to, but yet, nothing is determined as to the original question, namely, whether Christ had any previous existence. Again ; if Christ were (though but metonymically) the Logos of St. John, and St. John expressly says the Logos was *' in the beginning," this beginning is peremptorily declared to Fa be 68 Remarks on the improved be the beginning of the GoGpel, and the original question is again put out of sight. But could the Evangelist mean to exclude the " beginning" of " all things *;" was it impossible that the ^.^yrn of the Evangelist should imply so nmch as the beginning of the creation ? The beginning of the OLD Testament in the Greek of ancient Jews is, EN a.p'/y\ iaroimiv o Qiog Tou spocvov itoci rnu yn^. The beginning of St. John's history of the New Testament is, EN apx^ '^^ o Aofo? — crauT« J'j* aiiTS sytviTo, Jtat ;>;^upif aura lyiviTo a^i iv o yi" yo-yif. The Evangelists, according to the Editors, were bound to explain any term.s they used in an unusual or figurative sense, (for so their arguments imply) and yet we are called upon to take up a new and un- heard-of meaning for tv upx"'> when used by the Evangelists, though they give us no intimation of such a design. EN APXH, among the Jewish writers be- fore Christianity, meant in the beginning of, or before the Creation ; but a Jewish Evangelist, though he gives us no notice of the change, is to be supposed to use these terms in a sense far different, when he says tv ecp^n r^ Aofof. If there are however, as they w^ould pre- tend, these difficulties attending the terms tv ocpxr^ we had better turn to o Aofo?, and see if that can afford us any better ground for our enquiries. If the Aofoc, or tuord of God, were quite a new term to the Evangelists, the use of it must needs be referred to the beginning of the Gospel, as the Editors insist, and may be considered as a mere significative title * When St, Paul has occasion to specify the beginning of the Gospel, he docs so expressly, {» «fv;r) t« Evxyyi7.iti. Philipp. iv. 15- -I- See Randolph's Vindication of the Worship of the Son and Holy Ghost ; and Allix's Judgment of the ancient Jewish Church, &;c. suitable Version of the New Testament. 69 suitable to the great prophet or messenger of God, who should come mto the world. But what shall we say, if the term v/as no new term at all ? — ^if it was a term undoubtedly in use both among Jews and Philosophers before St. John wrote or even our Savi- our was born ? What shall we say if we find it to be an undoubted matter offact^ that among the Jews espe- cially, an equivalent term had been adopted to express and describe the efficient and aftive cause of the visible creation ? that such a word of God had, for many iiges preceding, been considered as the visible Jehovah, the appearing God, the Angel of the Cove?ianf, the Shechlnahy or jnanfcsted glory of God ? Should all these remarkable /^z^/i in ancient history, and that particularly the history of God*s select people, be suppressed ? Should the public be kept totally in the dark as to these matters, for fear they should be led to suppose, that the received opinion of Christ's pre- existence is correct, or that ancient history can have any thing to do with the question ? It seems to be pretty generally supposed, that what- ever was the precise date of St. John's Gospel, when he wrote, three opinions were prevalent in the world concerning the divine word or Logos. Among the Platonic philosophers, it was their second principle. With the Gnostics, it was the offspring of the only be- gotten of God. Among the Jews, it was the visible Jehovah, the A?igel of the Covenant, the majiifested Glory of God or Shechinah, the Angel of God*s pre- se?ice. Three conjectures have been started concern- ing the beginning of St. John's Gospel by those who have been disposed to question his testimony con- cerning the pre-existence of our Blessed Lord. One, that he platonized or borrowed his style from the school of Plato ; another, that he borrowed his Logos from the Chaldee paraphrasts ; a third, that he F 3 meant 70 - Remarks on the 'unproved meant solely to allude immediately, or by anticipation *, to the Gnostic heresies, and therefore undertook to show, that our Lord comprehended in himself, all which they are known to have distributed among their several pretended ^ons. These conjectures alone are sufficient to prove, that it was no fanciful term, merely invented by St. John, pro re nata, or even suggested by the Holy Spirit, as a suitable title for a prophet by whom God chose to reveal himself or his word. It v/as a term diversely understood in the world before St. John began his Gospel. Is it possible therefore that he should have used the term without some express allusion to these prevailing opinions ? Had he contradicted them all, it would of course have been a plain proof, that they were all equally fabulous and fanciful ; but by adopt- ing the ter7nj he certainly m.eant to shew, that the error did not consist in believing that there was a J-^ogos or word of God, but in thinking amiss of it. We might indeed have wondered much had he decidedly adoptt^d the Platonic or Gnostic notions in preference to the Jewish ; but that he should harmonize with the latter, is by no means surprising : first, because he was a Jew himself ; and secondly, because Christianity was plainly to be shewn to be connected with, and as it were regularly to have sprung out of Judaism. It is certainly then in the highest degree consistent with all we could reasonably expect, to find St. John and others of the sacred writers, expressing themselves in terms not only familiar to the Jews under the old covenant, but which might tend by a perfect revela- tion of the truth to give satisfaction to all pardes, « See Dr. Laurence's very learned Dissertation on the Logos of St. John, Oxford, 1808. Dr. L. notices a fourth conjecture, which 1 have no occasion to consider at present. correcting Version of the New Testament. 7 1 correcting the errors of the Platonic and oriental systems, and confirming in the clearest manner the hopes and expectations of the Jews. If we suppose that St, John wrote sixty-eight or seventy years after the ascension of our Lojd, we must allow for the prevalence in the intermediate time of much curious enquiry and investigation into the true character of Christ among all parties. The Gnostics, in the true spirit of their fanciful system, might very naturally fall into the enquiries which seem to be ex- pressed in their different theories ; and all which are but so many confirmations of the genuine history of the miraculous circumstances attending the birth and baptism of Jesus. As for instance, whether the Christ and Jesus were different persons ? whether the ma7i Jesus were a real man or only a phartom ? whe- ther the Son of God, and the Christy and the Logos, and the only-begotten, he, were not so many separate iEons, and the like ?* The Platonic philosophers, so far * It has been continually pretended, that what is thoii8;ht to favour the doctrine of the Trinity, and the two natures of our Blessed Lord in the Evangelical and Apostolical writings, was directly pointed ao^ainst the Gnostics, v.ho had interwoven their strange fancies with the simple truths of Christianity. What the Gnostics brought to the Gospel is one thing, v.hat they de- rived from it another. I confess it has for a long time appeared to me capable almost of demonstration, that instead of the Trinitarian terms (if I may so express myself) being opposed to the Gnostic heresies, the latter are a strong confirmation that the Trinitarian doctrines were expressly taught and coufitenanced by our Lord and his Apostles. I agree exceedingly with the learned Macknight, in what he says for instance of the DocetJE and Cerinthians, who fell into opposite extremes in their opinions concerning Jesus Christ. " It is probable," says he, " that the Apostles taught, and that the firft Christians believed Christ to be God and Man, for if the Docels had not been taught the divinity of Christ, they had no temptation to deny his humanity ; and if the Cerinthians had not been taught \.\\c humanity F 4. of \ 72 Remarks on the improved far as we can suppose them at all inquisitive about the matter merely as philosophers, might be expected to enter upon their researches whether the Christ were not of Christ, they would have been under no necessity of denying his divinity." This, I confess, exactly accords with what has long been my own private opinion, as to all the leading features of the Gnostic heresies ; for instance, how came Simon Magus, their great leader, and undoubted contemporary of Christ and his Apostles, to pretend to be the Supreme God thus distin- guished — the Father among the Samaritans, the Son among the Jews, and the Holy Spirit among the Heathens, — if these terms or notions had not been suggested to him by the Apostles of Christianity, whom he meant both to oppose and rival 9 How came he (according to Mr. Jones, who places a confidence in the Homilies of Clement of R.) to lay claim to the v.yu Ei|u» of our Lord, so as to induce even Dositheus to worship him, unless he had well understood the full force of that remarkable expression, though he might dispute, like others, our Lord's own pretensions to it ? Simon, undoubtedly, had personal com- munications both with Peter and John ; and yet the latter, writ- ing long afterwards, not only records ourLord's own claim to the Eyw Ei;*», ch. viii. 58, but in the very outset of his Gospel, speaks of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, as real and distinct subsistences, of the Father^ ch. i. ver. 18 ; of the Son, ver. 18, 34, 50. ; and of the Holy Ghost, Ter. 33. Simon certainly seems to have understood that the Apostles taught that God had ap- peared, quasi Filius inter Judaeos (see Irenaeus) ; and this leads to another point which I thank Mr. Jones for suggesting to me. One of the Gnostic corruptions was, it seems, that Christ, who delivered the ne'zu, was not the same with him who delivered the old covenant ; that the God of the Jews was an inferior evil being, and the Demiurgus or Creator, different from the author of the Gospel, and inferior to him in goodness and power. In op- position to these tenets, Mr. Jones cites Theodoret with great jus- tice and propriety, maintaining that the New and Old Testaments claim the same Divine Author. Why then may we not suppose St. John had the same great object in view, whether he only de- signed to set forth the plain matter of fact, or particularly to op- pose the Gnostic and other heretics ? Why may he not have meant distinctly to show, that the Logos, or Word of God, was not only the Creator and Lord of all things, but the author of both covenants, first as the Angelus Redemptor, and secondly as actually manifested in the flesh ? [I can- Version of the New Testament, 73 not their second principle, incarnate or manifest in the flesh ? But the Jews, whose opinions must natu- rally be considered as of more weight than all the lest, (because they alone had possession of those re- cords and traditions, that had any fair pretensions to be considered as revelations, the genuine " oracles of God/'} had many curious questions to ask, and most particularly concerning the Logos or word of God. Jealous as they must be presumed to have been of any divine messenger, who should claim authority to break down the partition wall" between them and the Gentiles, they would naturally enquire how far it was possible that the communication made by God to the world through his Son could be consistent with his former communications to the Patriarchs and Prophets of their nation *. If then we take an esti- mate of the probable opinion of the Jews, when St. John wrote, from the TargumistSy PhilOf &c. it is not too much to say, that they 7}mst have entertained an idea, that the word of Jehovah, the same person who [I cannot conclude this note without adding-, that the divinity of Christ as an evangehcal doctrine is proved by the very na- ture of the errors which the generality of the early heretics were disposed to maintain. All those who confounded the persons, did so no doubt only from the difficulty of distinguishing the Son as well as the Holy Ghost, from the Father, in regard to the attri' bates ; the Sabellian, Nodian, and Praxean heresies, all tend to show this ; nor is the remark of Novatian inapplicable, " Usque adeo Deus est," says he, He is so truly God, that is, as God of Cod, (sedquaFilius Dei natus ex Deo) that most heretics, " pleri- que hseretici," have thought him not a Son, but the very Father himself. While others, " Alii quoque hasretici," thought him to be be so entirely God, as not in any manner to be Man. " Sub- stracto homine, tantummodo putaverint Deum," c. 17. The Hfe of Pythagoras by Jamblichus, if written, as some suppose, with a view of resembling the one to the other, is a further proof of the general belief of Christ's divinity as a scriptural doctrine.] * The dialogue with Trypho, by Justin Martyr, is a fair illus- tration of such supposed enquiries. made 74 Remarks on the improved made the world, had been the medium of communi- cation in the days of their forefathers * ; that he had actually appeared to the Patriarchs, and in a most peculiar manner presided over the several dispensa- tions under the law t. * To what extent the terms of the Platonic philosophy were adopted by Jews and Christians, is briefly considered in Dr. Lanrtnce's lea^-ned Dissertation, where it will be seen that much more has b-en attributed to this circumstance in both cases, than the history oi facts seems to warrant. See pp. 17, 1 8, 19, and 77. f 1 was very glad to find it admitted in the posthumous works of Dr. Priestley, entitled Notes on the Bible, that in the angelic appearances to the Patriarchs, one in particular as- sumed the character of the Supreme Being, and was called Je- hovah ; lie does net even scruple to say on Gen. xxxi. 1 1 : " The Angel ar.d Divine Being are here, as on former occasions, the same person." And speaking of Jacob's wrestling with \.\ic jingel, he says : " It is evident that Jacob considers the person whom he de^.cminatts an angel, as the same with the Supreme Being him- self, whose representative he must have been," Gen. xlviii. 16. But his note on Exodus,xxiii .20. is still stronger to the point; for Le ther? fairly adduces an argument to show that though the Divine Being spoke of this angel as distinct, he was yet in effect one with liimself. I know, indeed, that in his comments on K;^brews, i. 2, he expressly says, that " it is evident from that verse alone that the notion which has long prevailed among Christiiins, that Christ was the person by whom God spake to the Patriarchs, and who appeared to Moses in the bush, has no foundation in the Scrip- tures, for here the contrary is expressly declared." But the learned Doddridge happens, upon the same passage, to have a note to the following effect : " This is no argument that God did not speak by Christ before ; but only that it was not in so clear and express a manner." And Netucome particularly observes upon ver. 3. that what is asserted of the Son there, is true of him both when he appeared as the Jehovah — u^ngel, and when he assumed the character of the Messiah. [It is a strong expression which the ancient Fathers use in regard to the appearances of the Logos to the Patriarchs ; they style them '' Praludia Incarnal'tonis," Preludes or antici- pations of his actual incarnation. J Though, Version of the New Testament, 75 . Though modern Jews may join with Unitarians in combating these suppositions, our appeal is to facts, to writings m.ore ancient than the records of Christi- anity, to Jewish interpreters of the Old Testament, and to the judgment of the Fathers of the Church. Whether these notions of the Jews were justly de- duced from their Scriptures and from the miracles vouchsafed to them during the Patriarchal and Mo- salcal government, is no question we need stop to decide ; our enquiry has only in view to ascertain whe- ther St. John can be supposed to have used the terms he does use in the beginning of his Gospel con- cerning the Logos, without a particular reference to the notions then prevailing in the Eastern parts of the world. And if this were the case, it could only be in correction of them, and so corrected in conjirma' tion of them ; for the terms so adopted and explained by him, have evidently that tendency. Had all the parties been wrong in taking up the Idea of an active Logos, or wisdom of God, a Divine Being, principle, or emanation, concerned in the production and formation of all things visible, could any thing have tended more to fix them in their error *, than the beginning of St. John's Gospel ? EN «pp^»i w Aofof, v.xi Xoyog r\v Trpog tov Oiovy xxi Qsog nv o Xoyog, OuTOj jjv iv ocp^ri TTpoi; rou 0-Ct'. ' Tlcn/rix. J"; aura lyevsro' HXi x^pi? avrs cyivsro x^s Iv o ysyovcv. What error tbe?i prevalent could possibly have been corrected by these terms, had there been actually no ground whatsoever * " So far is St. John," says the learned Scott, ^' from explain- ing this phrase of the Logos into any different sense from that of the Jewish and Gentile writers, that he all along explains himself in the very same." Scott's Christian Life, Part IL Ch. vii. 339. for 76 Remarks on the improved for conceiving, that there had from eternity existed in the godhead, a distinct hypostasis of this nature ? I grant these are technical terms, appropriate to a system ; but I must use them, only as terms of a certain signification, in case the system can be shown to be rightly deduced from Scripture. I do not mean to prove the system true by these terms, but merely to show that the system of the Evan- gelist seems to call for such terms ; I am not going to define or discuss the exact propriety of the terms, or to show how far they severally apply to the Jewish^ Alexandrian, or Gnostic opinions and traditions, but merely to make use of them as known expressions applicable to a Trinity in Unity. I must then have leave to insist upon it, that " a Logos ex- isting from or in the beginning with God, and be- ing God, by whom also all things were made, and without whom was not any thing made that was made," was more likely to meet the ideas of all the several parties, to a certain extent, than totally to obliterate or eradicate such notions, if erroneous. And the only question to me would be, with which of the prevailing opinions does the text of the Evangelist most evidently agree ? And here, independent of every consideration, by a mere reference to ancient history, I should for myself have no hesitation in giving it as my decided opi- nion, that the terms and expressions applied by the Evangelical and Apostolical writers of the New Testament to the person of Jesus Christ, coincide in a marvellous manner with the Jewish traditions, and (which alone is of principal importance) with the Jewish Scriptures. For I would on no account be understood to rest merely on the conformity of St. John's text to the Chaldee paraphrases, but on the Scripture Version of the New Testament, 77 Scripture itself*. Though I must acknowledge at the same time, that from a comparison of the three on certain points, such strong facts come out, that notwithstanding all objections urged against them, I cannot but consider them as severally illustrative of each other. For instance ; our Saviour, Matt. xxii. 44, Mark, xii. 36, Luke, XX. 42, expressly appropriates to himself the following passage of the cxth Psalm : " The Lord said unto my Lord, Sit thou on my right hand," &c. * In the xixth Ch. of the first book of King«, it is said, the ■^^ord of the LORD (mn* IHI) came toEhjah and said, What dost thou here, Ehjah ? and Elijah said, I have been jealous for the Lord God ofHosts, [in the original, rnj^HV 'ilbs* niH^'^jfor the children of Israel have forsaken THY Covenant, and thrown downTHINE ALTARS. Let us now suppose that St. John's de- scription of the AOroZ, or WORD of GOD, had been adduced in explanation of this matter, would it not be natural to conclude, that the WORD of GOD was a Divine Being, having the attri- butes of JEHOVAH by some ineffable communication and union ? The WORD of GOD came and spake to Elijah, and Elijah addresses him as JEHOVAH SABAOTH the Lord of HOSTS; could any Jew then be surprised to learn that this very AOroi, or WORD of GOD, should afterwards come into the world and be incarnate ? If Christ were not this very IVord of God, this nin* I^^Ij he must appear very inferior in the eyes of any learned Jew. Bishop Patrick seems to regard the WORD of GOD, ver. 9. and the Shechinah, ver. ii — 14, as different, but ver. 10. serves to show, that the WORD of the Lord, ver. 9. was the visible Jehovah, appearing first perhaps as an Angel, and afterwards in Shechinah. Admirably does Bishop Pearson argue that St. John chose to speak of Christ as the Logos, because nei- ther of the names, Jesus or Christ, would reach to the Creation ; " therefore," saith he, " he produceth a name of his, as yet un- known to the nvorld, or rather not taken notice of, though iny>-^- quent use among the Jeivs, which belonged unto him who was made man, but before he was so." fol. 117. [It should be noticed also, in regard to the Scriptural terms, rendered in our Version, the Word of the LORD, and the Angel of the LORD, that the Hebrew might as fairly be rendered, the WORD JEHOVAH, or the ANGEL JEHOVAH ; This, yS Remarks on the improved This, in the Targum of Jonathan, according to Gala- tinus and Fagius^ is thus paraphrased, " And the Lord said to his WORD, Sit thou on my right-hand ;" •which, as is well observed in the Letters of Ben Mordecai, could not be said possibly of any but a person, nor could it be said of the Father. See also Bishop Bull's first chap, of his Defensio Fidei Nic^nae. This must appear to meet that great ob- iection of the learned Hackspan as to the use of N'lJID'D as a reciprocal pronoun ; for, how could it be so construed in the above passage, how could God speak this of and to himself personally, or how could our Saviour claim it unless he were the Adonai of the Psalmist, or Memra dadonai of the Paraphrast ? Should it be objected that Jonathan's Targum on this place is not in existence, let it be recollected that I am only speaking of the Chaldee term of Mejnra dodonai, which occurs sufficiently often in the other Targums, and so as not to admit of being rendered as a reciprocal, as Bishop Bull has shewn on Onkelos's Paraphrase of Gen. xx. 3.* No * M. Souvermn, in his Platomsm unveiled, thinks he has given the death-blow to this reference, and that it should be read in Verbo sue, ^'^u^'!^I3» being so in the original paraphrase, and therefore a mere Hebraism : he however admits the term Memra, IVord. Now, our Saviour's reference evidently implies, tliat God spake to another. All the Evangelists have n-^n 5 KTPiOI' tjj K ci^i iu,j. The LXX have the same : theVulgate, Dixit Domi- iius Domino meo, and the Hebrev/is ^;i"T{<'7 T^^TV u-J^> Besides that the latter clause of the verse implies a personal distinction. The question still concerns the Memra Dadonai ; which expression . as l-r. Laurence has well shown, in its very construction seems to be incapable of passing for a reciprocal. M. Souverain censures Dr. Hammond for citing the Chaldee, n"l/!2\'!D'^' ^""^ thinks it is without authority ; but Bochart produces a Rabbinical reading to this effect. (See Appendix to Merrick's Psalms, No. 6.) Bochart thinks the Chaldee corrupted in many places ; he renders vit " to HIS WORD," and understands it of the Messiah. I must confess, Version of the New Testament, 79 No modern philosophers, no theologians of the pre- sent day, can, upon the pretence of a more enlight- ened reason, do away these evidences : reason may still object and disdain to submit ; but the hand of God is too visible in such co-incidences to be over- looked by persons of deep enquiry, and a sufficient knowledge of antiquity. The notion of a WORD of God, a Aoros, prevailed among Jews and Gentiles, before the writing of St. John's Gospel. His account of matters does not agree with the senti- ments of the Platonists, (not even with the Jewish Platonist Philo, so as to call Christ ^ivV^oq ©fof, though much in agreement with him in other points *), it does 7iot agree with the Gnostic system, except in appropriating to Jesus Christ all those titles they have given to distinct subsistences. But with the Jev/ish notions it docs accord, to the correction of all that was amiss in the other systems. It carries us regularly back to those manifestations of the Deity in the Old Testament, to that angel of the presence, or visible JEHOVAH, who bare by authority that ineffable NAME, who spake as God, appeared as God, was worshipped and adored as God. See some curious references to Jewish writers on this subject in Witsius's CEcono?nia FcederufUj lib. iv. c. 4. § v. confess, I think our Saviour's reference is sufficient authority for this interpretation, if there were no other ; but the Jews both be- fore and since our Saviour's time have so understood it. See Pear- son, p. 276. [M. Souverams Criticism would be very questionable at all events ; the ^ of the Chaldeans often signifying io ; see the cases cited by Dr. y^//;.v in his Judgment of the Ancient Jewish Church, 367. viz. Hosea, i. 2. HaL ii. i. Zech. i. 4, 9, 13, 14. Numb. xii. 2, 6. I Sam. xxv. 39.] * See an admirable summary of Phllo's sentiments and expres- sions in regard to the Trinity in the 3d part of Bishop ATrW^ifr's De- monstration of \.\iQ Messias, p. 106. Whenever So Remarks on the improved Whenever I am engaged in these researches^ I confess (though I would wish to say it without offence) that I feel astonished at the trifling criti- cisms of modern Unitarians ; the low ideas they seem to have of the Scripture phraseology ; and their direct contradiction to plain matters of fact. I can scarcely bring myself to turn to their references, so totally do they seem to carry us away from the real object of discussion. Because, for instance, St. John uses ap;^*?, in some passages of his Gospel, to express the be- ginning of his ministry, it is inferred, that it cmmot possibly imply more in the first verse of the first chapter \ whereas the real and true question is, not what the general meaning of ap'xr\ may be, but whether in this particular passage *, St. John could mean less than that beginning of things^ described in the first chapter of * Beza has well observed, " Quotiescunque fit Principii men- tio, significationem illius ad id de quo accommodare necesse est." It certainly appears to us, that »7r a^X"' ^^ "^^^ '" quite different ienses, in the ist Epistle of John, — in the 24th verse of the ! I th Chapter for instance, as Grotius says, m-rr cef^n', suniendum fst, de tempore praedicati Evangelii ; but in the 1st verse of the 1st Ch. *' idem tempus notari quod in primis verbis Evangelii Jo- hannis, et in Geneseos^' The present Editors take upon them to tell us that it is otherwise ; but I cannot believe them, nor can I help expressing my surprize, that the learned Whitby should think it necessary to interpret a.%* a.txn', uniformly throughout these Epistles ; because in the 3d chap, of the ist Epist. ver, 8, it seems manifestly to be used in the sense of the beginning of the world, oTE oLit ap;^»i? » J'ia?'>Ao< a/iAafrawj, which Ought alone to carry any Christian back to that beginning of things, when the seed of the woman was promised to bruise the serpent's head : I have said so much upon this subject in a former note, that I need not dwell longer upon it at present, than to declare it to be my firm opinion, notwithstanding the decisions of many great scholars may be against me^ that a.ii af);c»);, in the beginning of St. John's Epistles, expresses the actual pre-existence of that Being who was manifested in the flesh for our redemption, that Being whose t^o^o., or goings forth, were uv a^jj^nf, iP, v/jufuf atu>»(, as Micah terms it, 4 Genesis, Version of the New Testa??ie?if. 8i Genesis, when the world was made, according to the Targumists, by the Alenwa Jehovah , or WORD of GOD ? that begimiing, as Grotius insists, " cum primum rerum Universitas ceepit creari ?" What strange, I must say rather, what deceitful criticism, it seems to be to send the unlearned to passages in which the term beginning evidently implies the " beginning " of Christ's ministry, in order to induce them to believe that St. John could not have intended it in any other sense in the first verse of his Gospel, though it had been a tradition of long standing both among Jews and Gentiles, that in the begi?imng of all things, God had created the world by his WORD or Logos ? The learned in the mean while are amused with a critique on the verb yivOjWai, which we are told occurs seven hundred times in the New Testament, but never in the sense of create. To say therefore that all things were rnade (^y£^£To) by the Logos, is wholly inadmissible, as the word tyfj/jro never bears that sense. This also is carrying us away from the question. I shall not quarrel with these interpreters if they compel us to discard the term made, and adopt their own expression, " that all things were done by him," provided they will suffer us to put our own sense upon the other term 7^a^Ia, upon which the question undoubtedly more imme- diately depends. I will show then what ideas prevailed in the world among philosophers, when St. John wrote, concerning the ttmIu, or " all things,'* said to be done or jiiade, Sia. ra Acya. All the philo- sophers, says AmeHus, who spake m^i ra Aoy», spake of it as that principle K«6' 01/ an oy\a, (by WHOM EVER EXISTING,) ra. riNOMENA EFENETO, (all things were made. Here ra, iravra, seems to be expressed, by ra. Vivo^xiva, and Eytttro can scarcely be said to relate merely to the things done by G Christ 82 Remarks on the improved Christ in the Christian dispensation. It has clearly the sense of " 7nade" and is applied to the AOroz *, while the rex. yivofxtvcx. of the Philosopher may serve to explain the ra ttuutcc of the Evangelist, and must serve to convince us, that the expression of the latter is not toa strong, when he adds, that x'^P^^ *^'^* (without the Aofo?) tymiTo ov^i iu yiyoviy which Gen- tile philosophers must have made more of than Chris- tians, even upon the authority of St. John, had he designed merely to limit the term to the Gospel dis- pensation. I add therefore, that references to other passages of the Gospel in which the verb yivojuat t, happens * Tertulliaii says, we teach that the WORD was the artificer of all things, Hunc etiam Zeno determinatFACTITATOREM. Apol. c. 21 [I am now able to refer the reader on this occasion also, as on many others, to Mr. Retnie/ts learned Animadversions, pp. 68, 69. where this point of criticism is ably discussed ; and I think, if we may look elsewhere for the proper force of lytv^rc, as applied to the world in general, expressed by Kiai/M, j^i-'istotle sup- plies us with a strong passage to the purpose. Speaking of the ancient opinion concerning the original of the world, " All, says he, aTravk;, ,1»of*£»ov f vaj (pct-Tn^ confess that it had a beginning ;" that is, was produced, made or created, for it may imply all these things most assuredly.] -{•In the notes on John, i. 10, wc have another curious critique on the term ayivtli — K^i Kaauoi c/ aviv tyiviTf-, is rendered, " and the world was enlightened hy him." The world was ?nade by him, is totally set aside, though adopted by Archbishop Newcome. We are assured that 9rE(pa;TicrM,E»oi is understood after lyii^^,. This must surely be a misprint, but we see no reason whatsoever for its insertion in any form : Mr. Cappe suggells, by way of getting rid of its obvious sense, that the world means the Jewish dispen- sation, and cix with a genitive may express the final cause, and therefore Kvc-f.'0 J/ avm tycHT', means, For him the Jewish dispen- sation was ordained. At this rate the sentence may mean any thing ; for instance, Kotij.:; sometimes signifies female ornaments or accoutrements, and a proper word inserted ad libitum, after sytvf.o, might make a mere mantua-maker of the Logos : I am not trifling, there is really almost as little sense in Mr. Cappe's cmen- lUtion, or the correction proposed in the present text, EyiuTo re- quires Version of the New Testament 83 happens to be used, are not sufficient to give us the exact sense of it, where the EvangeUst applies it to the operations of the Logos. Unless the limi- tation which these Editors insist upon, had been cir- cumstantially expressed by the Evangelist himself, we must suppose that terms so capable of abuse would rather have been avoided than selected : what an en- couragement to the Platonists, to have exalted their Logos far above the great Christian prophet, the ?nan Christ Jesusi How very few words would have ob- viated all mistakes, had the Evangelist intended to eradicate all impressions of this nature, and merely meant to reveal to the world, this simple truth, that Christ was in all things the minister of the Christian dispensation. * What an opportunity of correcting all false notions, of an existing Logos or Word of God, the Maker of the world, in the Synagogue, and the schools of Plato, instead of leaving it to be settled by quires no word after it, nor need there be any puzzle about 5 Kctrpior. The language of the times, both among Jews and Gentile«, was," ^4' a (nempe ra A^yi) a-vu^^oc; I Ko3-|U,o? i^Yifjuafynk^" " By the Word, was the whole woi-ld made." ESy]fA,iiipyeiro can never mean enlightened, nor, tliough it is the language of a Jew, is it possible to suppose, that o-t-pc/ra; Kct/ao? can mean in this place merely the Jewish dispensation : those who are conversant in the writings of Philo will know how often he attributes the formation and arrangement of the visible world, to the Logos of God. The passages just cited from his writings, the Editors themselves tran- scribe in a subsequent note. * [Mr. Belsham,the principal Editor of the Improved Version, in his subsequent publication on the Person of Christ, is disposed to render Ao! oi the Teacher, after Schleiisnsr : there are some ex- cellent remarks upon this in the Monthly Review, vol. Ixviii. 267. applicable to most of the Socinian or Unitarian renderings^ interpreting iv cc^^^r, as they do, by the beginning of the Gospel ; for if the term Aofo? were metonymically applied to Christ, it would amount to almost the same tautology pointed out by the Reviewers, viz. " In the beginning of the preaching of Christ, Christ began to preach,"] G 2 a fev; §4 Remarks on the improved a few dissenting Christians in the eighteenth and nine- teenth centuries of the Church. The selection of such terms under the then circumstances of the world, is evidence enough, that neither Jews nor Philosophers were wrong, as to that one tenet of their creeds ; that, as there was a first principle in the to Qsiov, or Deity, so also was there a second principle (o Aofoc,) Si* H Ko(Tfjt.oq KXTza-AvoATcch which are not the words of a Christian but of a Jew, No doubt I shall be thought a great cabalist or mystic by the rational Christians of our day ; but I cannot forbear to testify, that I do know, and that I do think and believe. It seems impossible not to connect the Evangelical and Apostolical accounts of the Messiah, with the particular dogmata of the Jews, Scriptural and traditional, for the latter evidence is by no means altogether to be despised ; the traditions were not slighted by the writers of the New Testa- ment. My firm opinion then is, that the Logos of St. John, was the Jehovah Adonai of the Jews *, the angel of God's presence, the angel of both cove- nants, the appearing God. It is thus that we can fairly assimilate the terms of the Old and New- Testament, and illustrate the one by the other. When Jehovah appeared in Schechinah to the Patriarchs, it was IV So^x Osa, in the glory of God ; and is not the Son of God described by the Apostle to the He- brews, as the aTrauyacr/xo. th? (To^jj? ©fa ? Was not the angel that was sent to the Patriarchs, above every *Tlienin^1D*lofScnpture,or»n Ji^*1'tD*/!2ofth^Paraphrasts. Dr. Laurence has very candidly touched upon one difficulty that seems to stand in the way of this, but offers, at the fame time, a solution perfectly satisfaftory in my estimation : though the word of the Lord is often decidedly used personally by the Targumists, this is no reason why it should invariably be so, thing Version of the New Testament.- 85 thing distinguished by that most peculiar circum- stance of bearing the very NAME of God or Jeho- vah, a name wholly incommunicable to creatures? ** Behold I send an angel, to keep thee in the way, and to bring thee into the place which I have pre- pared ; beware of hi?n^ and obey his voice ; provoke him not, for he will not pardon your transgressions, for MY NAME is in hiniy* Exodus, xxiii. 20."* This angel * [ Since the first publication of this work, I have found in a treatise written in defence of the doctrine of the Trinity, just an hundred years old (1713), an objecton started to the application of this passage to the visible Jehovah. " He that said, I will send my angel, cannot be the angel whom he said he would send ;" —but to this I cannot assent : — certain difficulties no doubt must occur in the appropriation of such passages ; but it must ever be remembered that it is owing to these very difficulties in the Scrip- ture language, that we feel compelled to entertain the doctrine of the Trinity as the only proper key to them all. The Trinity in Unity is not, as our adversaries represent, a contradiction in terms ; were it so, it would be absurd indeed to receive it. But when our Saviour said, that He and his Father were one, he evi- dently declared it to be a truth, that in some way or other they were two and yet one^ that is, two in one respect and one in another ; which at least constitutes a duality in unity, and with- out any contradiction in terms. If we see reason, or rather if we feel compelled by the language of Scripture, to admit an unity of essence, with a distinction of persons, there is no contradiction in asserting that the sender and the sent, though personally distinct, may essentially be one : and I am happy, since I first sketched out this note, to find this fact insisted upon by Bishop Horsley, in the third vol. of hisSermoHS, pp. 24, 25. The author I cited at the beginning of this note, compares Exodus, xxiii. with Exodus, xxxii. xxxiii., contending that the angel announced in both places was to be a created angel, and that it was under a threat that God's ownpresence (hould be withdrawn. This undoubtedly seems to be the cafe in ch. xxxiii. but by no means as decidedly so in ch. xxiii. The Father is only known through the Son ; but the Son as Jehovah, speaks as Jehovah, though not unseldom with a marked distinction of persons ; and this is precisely the case, 88 it appears to me, in Exodus, xxiii. for in the 22d verse we read, " Tiiou shalt indeed obey HIS voice, and do all that I speak." C 3 Surely 86 Remarks on the improved angel is repeatedly spoken of by Moses as JEHO- VAH, in a manner the most striking and remarkable. See Surely I may be allowed to say, that it is no Trinitarian prejudice that determines me to solve matters in this way ; for 1 have an authority to produce, precious in the eyes of all Unitarians, and not despicable in my own — -I mean Dr. Priestley — for he observes upon this very passage. Exodus, xxiii. i6. that '* though the angel here be spoken of by the Divine Beings as a third person, and distinct from himself, they must nevertheless in effect have been cne." — And admitting all that I have said in regard to ch. xxxiii. he very ably draws a distinction between merely ministerial angels, and the angel of GOD's PRESENCE. After all, what objection could have been raised, had the passage run thus, " I will send my presence ?" Certainly God can be present where he pleases, and surely, personally so, in Heaven and upon Earth. The presence of God was the comfort of Israel, and the LXX render Lamen- tations, iv. i6. DHJ^n mn' *i£3» The presence of JEHOVAH was their portion ; neoaanrov KKpa^sfK- aJiwi ; and no doubt it was so, Moses having strongly solicited it, in place of the threatened angel, ch. xxxiii. 14. and gained his prayer. Bishop Lowth's note on Isaiah, Ixiii. 8, 9. is in exact conformity with all that I have advanced on these texts ; but wliat shall we say, to the very word, Ylfoauj-JTov ? It plainly signifies, as well as its correspondent Hebrew term ^J^, not only presence but personal presence ; when Hushai counsels Absalom, 2 Sam. xvii. 11. most pai-ticularly to go to battle in his oii'n person, the expression in the LXX is, Kai TO Tlfjcru'TToi as 'Trofcuof/.tyo:, and the margin has, *' that thy face or presence go." When then we read, (Gen. iii. 8.) " that the Proto- plasts retired from the prer-ence of God," ano Hfocuiw K.vp» tw Git, we cannot but conceive this to have been a personal prefcnce in fome way or other. Psalm Ixviii. 8, it is faid, " Sinai was moved at the presence of the God of Israel." — Tr^rjc-wna ra ©a lap-.o.. This, surely, was a manifested personal presence, and yet no appearance has been more generally ascribed to the Logos or Angel of God's presence ; and yet, ?ftcr all that has been faid, we iind it expressly declared by God himself, that no man fliall see \nsfcue or presence and live, a yex,f ^rj tav Avft^o-Tro; to irfoawnoii /^/.t. It is not then my English representation of matters that cre- ates this mystery ; the mystery is to be traced back to the Greek and Hebrew ; — and this I say, more particularly, bccaufe it has happened to me, as it did in times past to much greater men than myself, Bishop Patrick and Dr. Waterland particularly, Eightr penny pamphlets have been bfoiight to my very door, containing extracts Version of the New Testament. 87 See Gen. xvi. 7 — 13. Nothing however is more to the purpose than the relation, Exod. iii. The angel of JEHOVAH (or the Lord) appeared to Moses in a flame of fire in a bush. " And Moses said, I will now turn aside and see this great sight, why the bush is not burned ; and when JEHOVAH saw, that he turned aside to see, God called unto him out of the midst of the bush. Moreover, he said / am the God of thy fathers, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob ; and Moses hid his face *.'* It is very observable that this relation is circumstantially preserved in that memorable speech of Stephen, Acts, vii. ; wherein he expressly endea- vours not only to convince the Jews, that the Chris- tian dispensation was foretold by Moses, but to sa- tisfy their minds as to the propriety of the legal oeco- nomy being superseded by the coming of Christ. It cannot possibly be doubted but that the angel of God, extracts from this part of mybook^ and charging me with the very contradiction noticed above. " He that said, I ivtll send my Angels, cannot be the Angel whom he said he would send." Such sort of publications provoked Bishop Patrick to a more full acknowledgment of his belief in the doctrine of a I'lsible Jehovah. See him on Leviticus, v. 19. And Dr. Waterland complains in terms so true and applicable, that I cannot refrain from copying- them : " These pamphleters," says he, " ^pply themselves to the JLngl'uh and unlearned Reader, whom they hope to satibfy ; the rather, I suppose, because the argument is learned, and must lose much of its force and strength on our side, when stripped of its additional advantages from History an,d Antiquity ; besides that the unlearned Reader (especially in this controversy) may be easily imposed upon by little turns 2iXiA fallacies , such as have been tried and examined and despised long ago, by those that have been thoroughly read and conversant in these matters.'" — Introduction to his Lady Moyer's Lecture, p. xxx.] * It is somewhat remarkable, and cannot be made appear in our Enghsh Versions, that this title of the Deity in the 3d Chap- ter of Exodus is thus expressed : " Tell the Children of Isi-ael, says God to Moses, that JEHOVAH, the ELOHIM of the Fathers, the ELOHIM of Abraham, the ELOHixM of Isaac, and the ELOHIM of Jacob, hath sent me unto ycu," G 4 under 88 Remarks on the improved under the patriarchal and legal oeconomy, had the name of God in him, was called JEHOVAH, spake in the first person as JEHOVAH, calling himse/f the GOD of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, appeared in the visible glory of God, was worshipped as God, yet we know and are assured upon testimony the most unexceptionable, that no man has seen the Father at any time. But this great and ineffable name of JE- HOVAH was also by the Prophets given to the Mes- siah ; the prophecy of Jeremiah we have already cited, in which he declares, that the NAME by which the Messiah shall be called, is JEHOVAH cur righ- teousness *. In the xliii'" ch. of Isaiah, JEHOVAH is styled the SAVIOUR, and is said to save and redeem in almost every line. " I, even I, am JEHOVAH, and beside me there is NO SAVIOUR ;" but Jesus Christ is declared to be emphatically, THE SAVIOUR OF THE WORLD, John, iv. 42. But it is the NAME of God on which I lay most stress. The Hebrew NAMES are well known to have been all significant ; so significant, that perhaps there was more of Reve- lation contained in the Hebrew titles of God, than in any thing else. JEHOVAH alone was indicative of many prime attributes ; Elohim and Adonai, also had their several meanings. It is easy to raise the cry of Cabala, Mysticism, &c. against those who refer to such remote matters ; but sacred Scripture is sacred * See before, p. 47. That Christ, as the visible JEHOVAH, was always tlie God of Israel, is evident also from a comparison of Ifaiah, xliv. 6, and Rev.i. i, or Isaiah, xli. 4, and xlviii. 12 with Rev.i. 17, ii. 8, and xxii. 13. In the Prophet, we read, « Thus saith JEHOVAH, the King of Israel, and his Re- deemer, the Lord of Hofts, I am the First, and I am the Last, and besides me there is no God." Now this very character of the God of Israel, Christ assumes to himself, in the Revelations, " I am Alpha and Omega, the First and the Laft." Scripture : Version of the New Testa?nent, S-9 Scripture ; we must not give up the Bible ; and there is much recondite learning to be derived from thence, when all the Rhapsodies of the Talmud, Targumists, and Cabalists, are set aside. It ?nay appear cabalistical to insist much upon the twelve lettered name of Rabbi Hakkadosh, or the forty-two lettered name expository of the Arcana Lc- gis ; but it is not cabalistical, but scriptural, and strictly so, to lay some stress upon that remarkable passage of Deut. vi. 4, " The Lord our God is one Lord." What a difference does it make when we read the original JEHOVAH our ELOHIM, is ONE JEHOVAH *? We cannot get rid of these peculiar expressions. ELOHIM is undoubtedly a very particular expres- sion ; it is applied in Scripture as a plural t noun to the * [How very similar to this mode of expression is the passage in Lucian, so often cited in proof of the early prevalence of the Trinitarian doctrine, where, in banter of the Christian Oath, ^fter saying that they must swear by three persons, One in Three, and Three in One, he adds, TaJla (plural) vof^i^s Zr.na (singular). 3 f Dr. Gecldes has in a most dictatorial manner contradicted the conclusions that have been drawn from this circumstance ; he re- fuses to admit that the word Elohim, when applied to the true God, does necessarily denote any plurality at all, mucli less any plurality of persons : but this decides nothing in the present case, for /contend not merely for the plurality implied by Elohhn^ but for the indissoluble Unity of the ONE JEHOVAH. The pur- port of my remarks is to show that notwithstanding the very em- phatic manner in which that Unity is asserted, the title Jehovah, in its fullest acceptation, appears to be ascribed to more persons than one. This then gives the real strength and weight to the plural form of Elohim, when applied to the true God ; and the Unitarians will blunder greatly if they think they derive any advantage from Dr. Geddes's strange comment, so contrary to the eentiments of other eminent biblical Critics, antient and modern, Christian and Jewish. At all events, it was a word, or form of speaking, to be avoided rather than adopted, from the very cir- cumstance of its having been applied by the Po/)'//^//^^/ heathenj; to ihcir false Gods j and yet we lind it even in the second command- ment 5© Remarks on the improved the false gods of the Heathens ; applied therefore in this emphatic manner to the true God also, it must be considered as remarkably consistent with that doctrine which we conceive to be co-eval with, or rather ante- rior to, the creation, that in the Godhead of JEHO- VAH, there is a plurality, namely, an ELOHIM. It may seem in these days to be a matter of deep research, but truth is thus only to be discovered. Truth still lies in a well ; a deep one ; but not altoi gether unfathomable ; let us only be patient while we draw it thence. Certain it is, that the great NAME of Jehovah, Is by the prophets given to the Messiah, and by im- plication at least, if not directly, ascribed to Jesus Christ by the writers of the New Testament. Can we wonder then, to find the Apostle to the He- brews insisting . so much on the superiority of Christ, above the Prophets of the Old Testament, describing him as the brightness of God's glory, ment so dlreftly pointed against polythe'um and uloJutry : I Jehn-.'ah am thy Eloh'im. See Ben Mordecai, Dr. RandJp/j's admirable v'orks, and Bishop HunthigforJ on the Trinity, note xxxiii. The. plural form seems to be chosen and particularly selected, in order to show that r\o plurality in the true God, infringed the w«%. A modern writer (Mr.Tomlinson) well observes, Why say Elohim is ONE Jehovah, if Elohim be not plural ? It would be indeed, as Waterland well observed a long time ago, as much as to say, "David our King is one David ; or Abraham our Father one Abraham."] And the learned author of Horse Solitaria; remarks, that such a declaration would have been unnecessary, if the word Elohim con- veyed one single and similar idea with the word Jehovah ; while, being directed evidently against all idolatry and polytheism, it must have been intended to express that the plurality in the real Godhead of Jehovah was consistent with the Unity, See the Essay on the Trinity annexed to the first Vol. of the Horx Solitariae, 3d Edit. 1 804, [We may add the following, remark from the notes of Marefius contra Volkelium : " Neque ell de nihilo quod non semel Deus se unum esse Jehovah asseratj nunquam vero se dicat unum Elohim::] and Version of the New Testament. -91 and the express mage of his person, as sitting on the right hand of the Majesty on High ; being- made so much better than the ANGELS, as he hath by inheritance obtained a more EXCELLENT NAME than they ; *' for unto which of the ANGELS said he at any time, Sit thou on my right hand, until I 7nake thine enemies thy footstool ?" Hebrews, L Psahn ex. i . Matt. xxii. 44. And thus does the Apostle to the Philippians speak of the NAME given to the Saviour of the World ; " a NAME, which is above EVERY NAME ;" " that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in Heaven, and things in Earth, and things under the Earth, and that every tongue shall confess that Jesus Christ is LORD, to the Glory of God the Father." The Name Jesus itself, though a common name, among the Jews, was yet peculiarly significant, as given to the Christ of God. " And thou shalt call his name JESUS, for he shall save his People from, their sins." Matth. i. 21. Luke i. 31. Being the Sa- viour of God's people, is every where in the Old Testament mentioned as the peculiar work of the 'Deity. " They pray unto a God that cannot save; there is no God beside me ; a just God and a Saviour, there is none beside me." Isaiah, xlv. 20,* 21. Yet is it said of Christ, that " He is able to save unto the uttermost ;" yea, the Messiah in this very book, is spoken of as mighty to save ; saving by his own arm ; and by the greatness of his strength- Isaiah Ixiii. I — 6. compared with Revelations xix. 15. I am aware that Socinian writers have endea- voured to turn all these passages against us, bringing them forward as proofs, that the name JEHOVAH was given to created Angels, Places, Altars, Tem- ples, &c. Of the latter I shall take no notice, as the cases are totally different ; it is the application of if to ^2 Remarks on the Improved to a person that I am discussing, and there is nothing apparently more capable of actual proof, than that THE AlvIGEL in whom JEHOVAH put his NAME, •was totally different from those, who, to use the very words of one of these objectors Q'olkcliusy lib. 5. de Relig. cap. g.) *■* ministroru?n ipotius 3.ut comitum instdir erant," from which he himself draws the conclusion, that the particular angel, *' qui solus Dei personam gerebat, et idcirco solus ibidetn saspius JEHOV^ nomine nuncupabatur,'* who alone appeared as God, and therefore was addressed by the name of Jehovah, " caeteros authoritate antecebat," had a supereminent authority distinct from that of his retinue. An authority so truly divine, that the Jewish patriarchs did not scruple to render to him divine honours, vows, and sacrifices. Whoever -will consult Scott's Christian Life, Part II. ch. vii. ; Kid- der*s Demonstration of the Messiah, Part III. ; Dr. AlHx's Judgment of the Antient Jewish Church against the Unitarians ; or the Letters of Ben Mor- decai * ; will there find this matter so fully demon- strated, * Tn referring- to the lenrned Author of this work, no doubt, I shall be asked, what I think of his conclusions, both on the subject of the Trinity, and the Atonement ; I think him wrong 23 to both, but I admire his learning and talents. I always rise from the perusal of liis first Letters, more attached than ever to the Trinitarian doctrines, as deducible from both the Jewish and Christian Scriptures ; and as to his Letters on Atonement I have never been at all disturbed by his reasonings, and am now less likcly than ever to be so, since the publication of Professor Mcgce'i able discourses, and very learned notes in reply to his arguments. Whether the Author judged himself to be a perfect j4fioI/iaarian, jirian, or Ssmi-j^rian, I cannot pretend to say, but I think he argues irresistibly in regard to the Messiah being the jingel of the Covenant, the visible Jehovahy &c. in the first part of his book : and if not altogether orthodox, as to the Trinity, yet he undoubt- edly appears to have had strong ideas of the divinity and eternity of the Son or Logos, and that he was Jehovah, and a fit object of divine Version of the New TesUiment. 93 strated, that no further arguments, I should think, could be necessary. The Socinian conceits are more briefly, but quite as satisfaftorily answered in a tract, by the celebrated calvinistical Divine, Nicolaus Ar- noldus, entiled Li/x in Tenebris, Franeker, 1662, See also Mr. Granville Sharp's Law of Nature. This great Name of JEHOVAH, then, is given to the Angel of God's presence, in the Old Testament, and to no other Angel, or visible Being whatsoever, if we except the Messiah, to whom in the prophecies the same great NAME is assigned, as well as other most significant titles, the value and importance of which will soon cease to be enquired into, or re- garded, if the public can once be brought to be satisfied with a version, in which every thing of this •sort is as much as possible suppressed. * Because the Greek term Afytkog admits of being rendered Messenger as well as Angel, great endea- vours are made to confound our Redeemer with all the Messengers or Prophets that preceded him, and the utmost distinction allowed him, is that of being the highest of either order of celestial messengers- But there is one remarkable prophecy of the coming of the Messiah, which may admirably serve to shew the real importance of certain Scriptural terms. In the third ch. of Malachi we read, " Behold I will divine worship. Were I to attempt the conversion of the Jews, which the Unitarians seem to have so much at heart, I should make more ufe of the Letters of Ben A'lorc/ecai, thviw of any book I ever yet read, but particularly from the pen of any writer of the Uni- tarian persuasion. * I may truly say suppressed, for who would suppose that after all, their own model Archbishop Newcome says, in a note part of which the Editors transcribe, that the Son was the Mitnra Jehovah, l^erbum Jehovah, or Jehovah — the Revealer of his Fa- ther's will under the Old Covenant — the E|y,v/il*)f, or declarer of his will, his image and representative. See his note on John, i. I. Sec Patrick also on Levit. xx. 23. and Deut, xxvi. 18. send gjf. Ranafh on the improved send my messenger, and he shall prepare the way before me : and the Lord whom ye seek, shall sud- denly come to his temple, even the messe?}ger ot tlie covenant, zcbom ye delight in *, saith the Lord of Hosts." This is as it stands in the received text. Now the observations to be made upon it are these : First, the person speaking is described to be the Lord of Hosts : it is in the original JE- HOVAH SABiiOTH. t" " Behold, I will send my messenger before ME. Messenger is here proper; it evidently alludes to Elias or his representative rather, John the Baptist, (our Lord himself so applies it, Matth. xi. lo, Mark, i. 2, Luke, vii. 27.) Before ME is consistent with Isaiah, xl. 3. The voice of him that cryeth in the wilderness, " Prepare ye the way of JEHOVAH." t— " And the Lord whom ye seek." — Here in the original it is the AD ON or JEHOVAH ADONAI, him whom David called his Lord (as our Saviour himself remarked) Psalm ex. I. HE shall suddenly come to HIS temple, the temple of Jerusalem, that is, the temple of God, the temple of the Lord of Hosts ! Even the messenger of the covenant ; angel of the covenant would undoubtedly have been more proper. The angel of the covenant was the visible JEHOVAH ; no common angel, " not an angel in that low * Let the Jcivs attend to th'u, and see for a most circumstan- tial explanation of the passage, Bishop Horsley's four Sermons on the place in the 3d Vol. of his Discourses. f Nobody believing the New Testament, will deny that Jesus Christ is the Redeemer of the World ; but says Isaiah, xlvii. 4. The NAME of our REDEEMER is JEHOVAH SAB AOTHt Horn; Solitarice. "* \ [Instead of " make his paths strait," the LXX it is well known, for a.v» read tw PEOT 17,' >, which is agreeable to the He- brew, and "■ Make strait in the desert a highway for our GOD/* i» Bishop Loivlb'i translation.] sense Version of the New Testament. 95 sense in which it is objected to the Arlans, as if they believed him but little superior to mankind, hut as he is represented by Paul and Stephen and Moses, superior to all angels, who are under his command and pay worship to him. (Heb. i. 6. 9.) Who is declared by Moses to be the glory of God, and the similitude of God, and by the Chris- tians to be the brightness or ray of his glory, and the express image of his person ; and the whole of his character, as it is described Exodus, xxxlv. 5, 6. is particular and personal ; and designed to distin- guish him from all other angels, and as superior to xhem. For it is the glory of one particular person that was discovered ; and the moral attributes of one particular person which are there specified *.'* *' Taking then these Scriptures together,** says another learned writer *, " it appears that the pro- mised Messiah was the expected AD ON ; and being the ADON of the temple (or of his people,) he was therefore JEHOVAH ; and that consequently he is styled in the communion of the Sacred Trinity ADONAI JEHOVAH. Instances of this truth,'* he * Ben Mordecais Letters, ii. 19. And the same learned writer, speaking of this very prophecy of Malach't, Letter vi. p. 66. says, " These are the last words of the last of our Pro- phets : and these being claimed by Jesus Christ to refer to Joiin the Baptist and himself, connect the old revelation with the netv one ; and prove the Christian scheme to be only a continuance and farther completion of the original design of God, to bring men to eternal life by his Son, Jesus Christ, the Angel of the Covenant, the Adon or Lord of the Temple ; who was foretold by the pro- phets under the character of Jehovah ; who led our fathers out of EgypU that He should return, and dwell with them, and make a new cQi'enant with them. It is the completion of this prophecy, that begins the Christian dispensation : the promise being literally fulfilled, when Chr'iU appeared in the character of Messiah, the Son of Man, and Prince of Peace." t See Horx Solitariaj, 3d Edit. Vol. i. 64. adds, ^6 Remarks on the improved adds, " might be multiplied, if necessary : but pro- bably these will suffice to satisfy every believer, that he is not worshipping a mere man, as the So- cinians dream ; nor an inferior God, as the Arians maintain ; but JEHOVAH Elohim in the human nature, and united to the visible form of Jesus of Nazareth*.'* This is the sort of knowledge which the Unita- rians despise as cabalistical, mystical, and unintel- ligible, but it is purely scriptural. It is capable of being understood without the illustrations of Targum- ists or Rabbins. It is to be found in the Bible, in the very words and terms of Scripture ; it may be obscured or misrepresented, but it cannot be anni- hilated. The Logos of St. John is not to be sought for in the writings of Platonic Philosophers or Pla- tonic Fathers, except as far as their Logos agrees wdth the ADONAI JEHOVAH of the Jews, the angel of the covenant^ the angel of God's presence. These are the titles under which we must search for the true Logos of St. John ; not that I should disdain to refer to Jewish commentators upon such a subject, if we needed their help ; but Grotius has almost done this for us sufficiently in that short chapter of his book de Veritate Religionis Chris- iiance^ B. V. 21. (Much also to the same effect may be found in Witsius Misc. Vol. ii. de Michaele.) The following testimony however, produced by Grotius out of the comment of R. Moses the son of Neheman on the 5 th chap, of Joshua, is too * Sometimes, says Bishop Chandler, speaking of the Divine WORD " he is indeed treated as an Angel or Messenger ', but even then is so distinguished from all other angels in respect of majesty, authority, and power, or dignified with the incommunica- ble title of JEHOVAH, that they had not the least thought of his being a mere angel." Sermon before the King, 17 18. 8 much Versio7i of the New Testaftient. gj much to the purpose to be passed by. Speaking of the angel who presided over the Jewish dispensa- tions, he says, " Iste angelus, si rem ipsam dica- mus," " that angel, to say the truth, is the ANGEL REDEEMER, (angelus Rede?nptor) of whom it is written, for my NAME is in him. He was the angel who said to Jacob, I am the GOD of Bethel. Of whom it is said, GOD called to Moses out of the midst of the bush ; he was called an angel be- cause he governs the world. For it is written JEHOVAH (that is, the LORD GOD), brought us, out of Egypt. And again, the angel of GOD's pre- sence saved us, and without doubt the angel of God^s presence was he of whom it is said, MY PRESENCE shall go before thee, and I will give thee rest. In a word, he is the angel of whom the prophet spake, the Lord whom ye seek shall suddenly come to his temple, even the ANGEL of the COVENANT whom ye delight in *." If these were the opinions and expectations of the Jews, how intelligible would the begin- ning of St. John's Gospel be to them, if, laying aside all thoughts of the Platonic or Gnostic systems, we were to substitute for the term Logos, the angelus redemptor^ or angel of the covenant ! ♦ [And yet, says Bishop Horsley, with a degree of animation well befitting such a scholar and tlieologian, in the face of the perverse and ignorant contradictions he alludes to, " We are told that this doctrine (of the identity of Jehovah and the Ma- senger of the Covenant in Malachi ) no less than that of the Divinity of the Messiah, was a novelty in the third or fourth century after the birth of Christ — an invention of ihe dark and superstitious ages !^ The two indeed must stand or fall together : we claim for BOTH a reverend antiquity : we appeal to the sacred Archives of the ANCIENT JEWISH CHURCH, where^o/;& are registered in charafters which do to this day, and we trust shall to tire last, defy the injuries of time." Sermons, Vol. iii. 24, 25.] H It 9^ Remarks on the improved It would then be altogether consistent with the descriptions given in the Old Testament of the visible JEHOVAH, as well as of the Messiah, and the titles by which each is distinguished. *' In the beginning was the angehis rede?nptor or ANGEL of the covenant ; and the a?2gel of the covenant was with God, and the angel of the covenant was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by Him, and without Him was not any thing made that was made. In Him was life, and the life was the light of men. And the ANGEL of the COVENANT was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his GLORY, the glory as of the only-begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth," Instead of any reference of this nature to a pre- existent Being, whose coming in the flesh had been particularly foretold by all the Jewish Prophets, these Editors, I am sorry to say, so confound mat- ters, as to mislead beth Jew and Christian. The Word they make a mere title given to Jesus as the revealer of God's word *. *' In the beginning,''* is the beginning of his ministry. That " the Word was with God," signifies that he withdrew from the world previously to his ministry, and went into retirement more freely to commune with his Maker. And this is actually illustrated by a reference to Exodus, xxxiv. where Moses is said to have been with God in the Mount ; which presence of God every Jew ought to know was the visible Jehovah, in fact Christ himself. " And the word was God" v.ot,\ Qtoq nv o Aoloc, for want of the article before 0£o?, they render, and the * They quote Archbishop Newcome for this, as I have observed, but without noticing his subsequent remarks, \vhich are in con- formity to what is here advanced. word Version of the New Testament. 99 word was a God, rejecting Archbishop Newcome's reading, " was God," which of course they put in the margin. References are made, as we might expect, to that mode of speaking among the Jews, by which those are called Gods to whom the word of God came, and to which our Saviour himself particularly alluded, John, x. t^^.^ but it should at least be noted, that our Saviour's argument which he draws from it, evidently tends to exalt his own title far beyond these, and it can scarcely be held to imply less than this plain matter of fact : "If they were styled Gods, to whom the word of God only came, and with whom he conversed, can I who am this very Aofe? be said to blaspheme, in saying that I am the Son of God ?" And then, referring to his miracles, " If I do not the works of my FATHER, believe me not :" but, say the Editors, his argument only tended to shew that he was a God, like other prophets to whom the word of God came. Then it was a very weak argument surely, since the Jews so little un- derstood it, that after they had heard it, they renewed their charge of blasphemy, and again sought to take him, in order to stone him, so that he was obliged miraculously to escape from them. But two grammatical emendations are suggested ; " some translate the passage, God was the Word, and Crellius conjectured, that the true reading was 05y, the Word was God's." These emendations have long been known. The latter, however plausible, the translators reject, as of jio authority ; to the former they do not object. The mention of either is a plain proof that the original appears against them, but there is actually a rule among dialecticians which would secure to us the true reading. It is thus expressed by an eminent critic, " Nam dictio, qu?e habet arti>- culum, apud Grsecos est, ut aiunt dialectici, in ora- H 2 tione joo Remarks on the improved tione subjectum, seu prima pars/' The Word, that is, to which the article is prefixed, must be the sub- ject to the sentence ; so that " God was the Word,'* would be a perfect perversion of the text, and though true in a certain sense, by no means equivalent to the real import of the Greek. " Itaque, (thus Beza concludes his note upon it,) ut vitaremus periculosam amphiboliam, quae non est in Grseco sermone, na- turalem ordinem constructionis secuti, priore loco subjectum, posteriore attributum collocavimus." Eras- mus also has taken great pains to show how entirely the divinity and personality of the Logos, are esta- blished, by the peculiar construction of this sentence as it stands, K«j ©to? ?5v o Aofo?. The translators have added an article to 0£of in this passage, " The Word was a God." I have had occasion to notice such inser- tions before *. « By * God forbid that I should be wilfully ludicrous upon such a subject ; but so very strange do the comments of modern Unitarians appear to me, when, pretending to expound matters according to the Jeivish Phraseology, they would insist upon it, that the Unitarian sense of the Proem of St. John's Gospel must have been so obvious from the Jirst, as that none could mistake it, that I could scarcely express what I feel upon the subject, otherwise, than by contrasting the above simple Paraphrase, in which I have substituted the jingehs Redemptor for the Logoe, with the perplexed account of matters as explained by the Unitarians. We may then fairly suppose their Paraphrase to run thus — Er ufx^ r,v Aofc? — " In the beginning was the Word." — By the beginning I by no means intend the beginning of the Creation, or of all things, but merely the beginning of the Gospel dispen- sation. I do not specify this to be my meaning, because I con- clude you will perceive it, though I know well enough, that I express myself exactly as though I did mean it, and that another beginning must be present to your minds, when the ivorld was made, by the Logos or IVord of God ; however, I certainly do not mean this ; 1 mean to make no sort of allusion to any thing you may happen to know, or have previously heard, of the Logos Version of thg New Testament. loi *' By him was life." " In him was life," says their model archbishop Newcome; but his rendering is refused. Legos or U^ord of God, by whom the world was made ; but I mean merely to give this appellation to Jesus Christ, a man like myself, because he was commifiioned to reveal the IVord of God, (that is in Greek, the Xoj',^,) to mankind: it is what grammarians and rhetoricians would call a metonymy ; I do not tell you this in my gospel, because, notwithstandmg any prejudices to the contrary, I think you must know it by instinct. , , , txt j -.v — K«. Aofo, V ^fo,' T.v 0.o> '' And the Word was with God ;"— that is, not with him really or personally, but how do you think ? why, in the way of retiretnent or private communion, as might be the case with you or me or any other man. Do not fancy he was really with God, though I say so ; there is some- thing implied under the preposition w-^c? which I do not stop to explain to you, becaufe I conclude that you, and every convert that comes after you, however unacquainted with the Greek Ian- guage, women and children, will easily comprehend what I mean, by instinct. ^^-r^ ,, x>. Ka.Geoj^v SAofcj— *'And the Word was GOD."— Do not mistake me, I mean Go J was the IVord; though contrary to grammar, depend upon it this is my particular meaning ; or if you do not like this, mind that 0£o« has in this place no article before it, therefore, at the utmost it can only imply that the Word was A God, perhaps you will think Jupiter or Mercury : not so, but yet A God, one, in short, of the Jewish Elohim; but take special £are you do not account it one of the Elohim spoken of in Deuteronomy, vi. 4. for of course it is impossible I should mean any such thing, though indeed I know that you have been brought up to believe that the Word of God was the appearing Jehovah, and therefore might reasonably be ac- counted one of the Elohim, which God himself has told us, con- stitutes ONE Jehovah ; but had I meant to describe him to be Jehovah, I should, you may be sure, have put the definite article before ©for, and called him J ®ioc, a distinction which in no manner belongs to him. Though indeed I well know that St. Matthew has blundered so greatly as to deceive you in this par- ticular, when he tells you that the Messiah was to be GOD WITH US, that is, in our language, Emmanuel, in the blun- dering Greek of St. Matthew, .-.(i r.'-^i- h '-.. —This may not strike you at first sight ; but depend upon it, he never meant Jehovah, he only meant a God in some way or other as / do ; H 3 .. Archbishop Newcome is curiously cited upon this place. The learned Primate remarks, « If coming from above, or from heaven be meant only receiving a divine commission : then John came from above, or from htaven, as well as Jesus." This remark of the learned Primate, say the Editors, is perfectly just ; accord- indy the Baptist is said to have been sent from God, ch. 1. 6.^ and his Baptism to have come from Heaven. Matth. xxi. 25- Mark, xi. 30. Luke, xx. 4- Thus then the Primate, as well as John the Baptist, is made to express the very things he in- tended not. Both unquestionably meant to imply, that the mission and authority of Jesus far exceeded that of the Baptist, and to use the very words of the latter, that the one was from- Heaven, the other from the Earth: for the latter clause of the comparison is slighted, and scarcely noticed ; but it they would refer tot some of their own authorities, they wiU find that it plainly relates to the earthly origin of the Baptist ; m- tus secundum Adami legem, is Grotius's expression, (to whom they refer) ; and Doddridge, whom they cite in a former note, para- phrases it, - he that is born like me, in a natural way. lie- sides their reference to the Baptism of John, Luke, xx. 4. where our Saviour asks, the Baptism of John, was it from heaven or from men, &c. is ill-chosen, and their gloss upon it still worse : " Observe here," say they, " that coming from Heaven signihes not local descent, but being of divine authority ; tor it tney H 4 104 Remarks on the improved and every other prophet C2ime from Heaven^ and came from above^ in Uke manner ? The Editors determine not to see this inconsistency ; they continually insist will turn back to Luke, iii. 21, 22, they will find, that accord- ing to their own Version, there was at the Baptism of Jesus, both a bodily appearance, and a local descent of the spirit from Heaven, ciiTH If ffifeti, and " a voice from Heaven besides, saying, THOU art MY BELOVED SON!" One would scarcely believe, (but it is true,) that in another place, the Editors insist upon this visible appearance and audible voice, in strong terms, to support an argument, and to justify a new reading ; in doing which they expressly, and in terms, acknowledge a local and visible descent of tke Spirit of God. This is to be found in their note on John, T. 38. — chap. viii. 42. Our Saviour says, " I came forth from God." This, the Editors say, is explained in the next clause, ** he sent me," as his messenger, that is, and Revealer of his will to man : and they refer us to chap. i. 6, " There was a man sent from God whose name was John." Thus it is that they persist in confounding what the Baptist, the Evangelist, and Jesus him- self have in the strongest manner endeavoured to distinguish. The Baptist iays, he himself was from the Earth, but Jesus from Heaven ; the Evangelist records abundance of comparisons to this effect, and assures us, chap. xx. 3 i, that his sole object in writing his Gospel was to shew, that Jesus was the Christ, the Son of God ; and our Saviour himself declares, that no man but himself had seen the Father ; and yet we must merely regard him as a Pro- phet, no otherwise sent from Heaven than John was, no other- wise the Son of God than the Evangelist himself, no otherwise kiK)wn to the Father than as his inspired messenger : but if we consider the foregoing note, and compare Scripture with Scripture, we shall have further proof of their inconsistencies. To be sent from the Father, it seems, implies not any local descent from heaven, as we may see by the terms in which John's mission is mentioned, John, i. 6. : now in John, xiv. 26. it is said, " But the Comforter, even the Holy Spirit, which the Father will send in my name, he shall teach you all things. But when the Holy Spirit 'zvas sent by the Father to sanctify Jesus at his Baptism, the Editors admit a local descent and bodily appear, ance ; and this Spirit was clearly not the Father, though they insist upon it that the Spirit of God is God ; in chap. xvi. 7. this very Spirit (our Saviour says) I will send unto you, and he did so by a visible descent from Heaven on the day of Pentecost. upon Version of the New Testameni. 105 upon it, that Christ no more descended personally from Heaven than John the Baptist, and yet that the latter meant to show, by these very expressmis that the character and powers of Christ were super-eminent. They omit no opportunity of comparing the mission of the Baptist with the mission of our Saviour ; if the former is said to have been " sent from'''* God, so is the latter, therefore they would infer (indeed they insist upon it) that if the latter came down from Heaven, so did the former ; but as they know that the former did not personally descend from Heaven, so are they sure that the latter could not have done so: though the Baptist himself expressly draws that com- parison between them, " he that is from above," and *' he that is from the earth," yet will they positively assert, that his expressions imply, that he that was from above was only from the earth, and he who was from the earth, undoubtedly came down from Heaven. If John was sent fr 0711 God, he must have been with God, says their expositor Mr. Cappe. What then does our Saviour tell us of those who come from God in the way he himself came from God? '* No man hath seen the Father, but he that is from God, (so the Editors render John, vi. 46.) aro?, this person, this one person (for it is in the singular). He hath seen the Father." Whether this one person was John the Baptist or the Blessed Jesus, we leave the reader to determine. It is a question that surely needs no Elias to re- solve, though the Elias of the New Testament, John the Baptist himself, would surely have re- sented every doubt upon the subject ; however, they make an effort to get over this ; to " see the Fathery is to know his will^* we are told in the notes, and are referred back to v. 4. of the same chap, and to v. 9. of chap. xiv. These references, however. io6 Remarks on the improved however, upon other occasions, cannot resolve the principal question, which is, in what manner Christ came from God, so as to be unlike all other pro- phets. The Editors tell us, to coine fro?n God is to be com?nissioned by Him, as for instance, John the Baptist was ; but here they deviate something from the text, rendering £i u.n l m wapx ts Seh, he that is from God, though the passage is exclusive, and plainly distinguishes the blessed Jesus, from all other Prophets whatsoever ; and we have nothing but the positive contradictions of the Unitarian party, to prove to us, that though he says himself, he came from Heaven, he certainly did not come from Heaven ; though he declares he had seen the Father, he certainly had not actually seen the Father, though he assures us that He in a most peculiar and singular manner came forth from God, (fx Ta Qid i^r.x^iv, a strong and singular expression) he certainly came from him no otherwise than like the prophets of old, and his own immediate fore- runner. But in one place these critics seem to be caught in their own traps. The whole dispute rests upon what is to be understood literally, and what figura- tively. If this is to be left to the arbitrary determi- nation of every critic, what confusion must needs ensue ! Here then, if any where, we ought to look for some established canons of criticism. Now the Editors think they furnish us with one, upon this very subject. When our Saviour saith, chap, viii, 23, " Ye are from beneath, I am from above," they dispute the inference of Archbishop Newcome (their model), that " this clause is expressive of a local residence in heaven, antecedent to his existence on earth ; because, as the first clause must be under- stood figuratively, so 7nust the latter also : but when the Version of the New Testament, 107 the Evangelist (whose sense of matters m general the Editors would be thought to respect) writes thus : " Now Jesus having known that his hour was come, that he should depart out of this world to the Father, though he knew, I say, that the Father gave all things into his hands, and that he came from God, and was going to God;'* this canon of criticism must needs be laid aside to answer their purposes. Alas ! not so. It is a rule only to restrain Archbishops. They openly violate it, now it tells against them ; and hoping their readers may lose all recol- lection of matters between the pages 226 and 242, they deliberately explain it thus in their notes ; "he came from God," (which is the first clause of the verse,) " as his messenger to the world ;'* that is, figura- tively, as John did, to whose mission they again ex- pressly refer ; viz. ch. i. 6, but, *' he was going to God," the last clause of the verse, we must surely have leave to understand literally, for they do not discredit his death, resurrection, or ascension ; they acknowledge, *' he was (literally) going to God, to give an account of his charge, his public mission and ministry being closed." Thus it is, that the Editors undertake to render the New Testament " generally intelligible," by sending us from the figure to the letter, and from the letter to the figure, as from pillar to post, and from post to pillar. The two clauses of the verse before us cannot be re- duced to their canon, without rendering both of them literally, because nothing could be more lite- rally true, than that Christ was about to ascend per- sonally to his Father in Heaven *. *' So then, after the * Chap. xvi. ver, 28. is still stronger against them according to their own canon. "/ came forth from the Father, and am come into the nvorU. Again, / leave the ivorld, and go to the Father ;" and yet io8 Remarks on the improved the Lord had spoken to them, he was taken up into Heaven, and sat on the right-hand of God, Mark, xvi. 19. Whatever figure of speech there may be in • this passage, the Unitarians never doubt of the Hteral ascension * and glorification of the crucified Jesus ; they yet they forget themselves so much as to assert, in a note on the very next verse, that coming forth from the Father, is to be taken Jiguratively . *' He hath a demon and is mad," John, x. 20. These words, say the Editors, express cause and effect ; he was literally mad, they acknowledge ; but that he had a demon, is &o bold Tijigurey it seems, that nothing can he more absurd than the mere supposition of such a cause. — [See Mr. RenneWs Animadversions, pp-75.76. and some admirable remarks upon the subject in the Monthly Review of Mr. Belsliam's " Calm Inquiry into the Scripture Doctrine concerning the person of Christ." N°3. vol. Ixviii, July i8l2. — I have still another comment to produce to the purpose, some- what singular, but acute and forcible. In answer to the Unita- rian delegates travelling through Scotland, or rather to frustrate their insidious attempts, a learned presbyter thus addresses his countrymen on this very passage — " If they tell you, when Christ says, ' / came down from Heaven,^ he must be understood metaphorically, but when he says, ' J go to Heaven,^ ' / ascend to the Father.^ he is to be understood literally \ — this is to call you an ideot, since no rational creature can assent to such a commen- tary. T. F. P. says, ' I came forth from England, and am come into Scotland : again, I leave Scotland, and go to Eng- land ;' How would Mr. T. F. P. stare if some commentator ■were to argue thus : Mr. Palmer never was in England, there- fore the first clause of this text must be explained metaphorically ; it only can mean that he had his mission from England as an Uni- tarian prophet ; but the last clause must be taken in a literal sense ; for T. F. P. actually intends to return personally to England. Why should anUnitarian stare at this comment, when he daily puts the same brutish and nonsensical interpretation on the words of the Most High ?"] * Ii their note on John, vi. 62. they observe, " to ascend where he was before, is, as all interpreters agree, to ascend to heaven ;" but they pretend still that to the Son of Man, this can apply only figuratively. Christ then surely must have been literally the Son of God, in order to have literally so ascended to heaven ; and if one clause ot a verse is to determine the charader of both, this was. Version of the New Testament. 109 they ought not therefore according to their own rule to doubt of his actual descent from Heaven, which is quite as fully expressed in the first clause of this verse, as his death, resurrection, ascension, and glo- rification, are in the last member of it. *' Ka» Aofog ca.^^ fyivsro." This is rendered " and the Word was flesh,*' literally and correctly enough. The received text, however, and Archbishop New- come's rendering are rejected, " the Word was made flesh," and " the Word became flesh," (which latter is the Primate's rendering). But an amendment is proposed in the notes, as " nevertheless the Word was flesh ;" that is, say the Editors, " though this first preacher of the Gospel was honoured with such signal tokens of divine confidence and favour, though he was intrusted with so high an office, he was nevertheless a mortal man ! !" — Cappe. We was, where he literally was before : St. Paul himself, indeed, seems to have settled that where the ascent and descent of Christ are thus brought together, both must be taken literally, Ephe- sians, iv. 9, 10. for though Commentators differ as to the mean- ing of the lower parts of the Earth, yet they are agreed that it must be taken literally whether it alludes to the incarnation or death of Christ : see Doddridge. That it is not a figurative ex- pression for the descent into Hell, Bishop Pearson argues at length in his fifth Article of the Creed : see also Beza in Loc. Grotius's comment is, Etiam Deus, de quo sensu primum obvio agit Psal- mus, primum descenderat sed in Montem Sinai : Christus vero multo inferius in earn partem, in qua homines solent vivere ; and it is singular enough that in proof of this actual descent of Christ, he refers to those very passages wherein these Editors assure us no actual descent is spoken of, as John, iii. 13 ; vi. 33, 38, 41, 42, 50, 51, &c. It is well worth while for the reader to turn to Scott's Chris- tian Life, Part II. chap. vii. vol. 2. where he will see, how ad- mirably that very learned and excellent writer argues from this reference to Psalm Ixviii, that Christ must have been the Angel JEHOVAH, who so often appeared to the Patriarchs and gave the Law from Mount Sinai. are 1 1 o Remarks on the improved are glad to see that they are willing to admit, that it was something surprising that he should be a mortal man ; it must also be as surprising there- fore that he " should dwell among us ;" but how or where was he to dwell otherwise, if a mere man ? It could not be surprising that the man Jesus should dwell among his fellow-creatures, but surprising enough it was that the divine Logos should do so. This " nevertheless^* therefore we will admit, if they will allow us to give it its proper force, and read it thus — " nevertheless the divine Logos, that was in the beginning with God, and that was God, and who made the world, was man also, that is, took flesh, and dwelt among us." This must be the proper force of the Evangelists " Nevertheless " if that is to be the rendering of xaj, for the tokens of distinc- tion particularly enum.erated by the Evangelist are, that " the Word was actually in the beginning with God, and was God." A God only indeed, the Editors say, but that would give the same force to their " nevertheless," for the question is, how could a God become a man ? But the Evangelist goes on to say, " And we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only-begotten of the Father." Here then another " nevertheless" might be necessary. For if it were wonderful that the Logos should be man, it was equally wonderful that a man should be the Logos of God, or shine in the glory of his only-begotten Son. The great question is, what was that glory of which the Evangelist speaks ? Now in the language of those times, most unquestionably, *' the glory of the only-begotten of the Father" was the visible JEHOVAH, whom Philo the Jew calls the SON OF GOD ; and the FIRST BEGOTTEN of the Father before all creatures, and the WORD of GOD J and His glory was the Schechinah or h^x Gts mentioned Version of the New Testament. 1 1 1 mentioned so often in the Septuagint translation. The particle w? (as), Piscator and others tell us *, does not here signify similitude, but reality and cer- tainty ; the sense of the words therefore must be, '* We beheld his glory, (w?) namely, the glory or Schechinah of the only-begotten of the Father ; and, as Dr. Hammond explains it, such a glory as was incompatible with any other but the true eternal Son of God ; and this seems to be the right mean-^ ing t." I have observed, that the Editors set aside the received text, " and the Word was made flesh." They will never allow tyevilo to imply so much, because yivofAOii does not signify to create t, but to he. The being however of a thing made includes the making. When it is said above, K«t J"/ aura o xoa-fxoi; iytviTOf if xoTXi, and the WORD is MADE or BEGOT- TEN ; and the fear is turned into love, K«i [xvrinog fxiji-of AfyiXog Tt>cT£T«», "and that mystical angel is born." Psedag, Lib. i . cap. vii. Great objections are made to the use of the term Movoyiuvgy or rather to the English received translation of it, which Mr. Lindsey pronounces to be most gross and improper. We must say it seems to us almost unavoidable if we would give a literal rendering of the Greek, which in a descrip- tive title ought surely to be done : however, as thes Editors seem not unwilling to allow that it is, jointly with the other expression uv ug ro\> xox-n-ov t» TToIfof, a token of such favour and such intimate *' communion with the Father as has never been enjoyed by any of the sons of men,'* (which are the very words of their own favourite referee, Mr. Cappe,) their ob» jecdons cannot affect the main question, viz. What was the precise nature of that singular and most ex* I traordinary 1 1 4 Remarks on the improved traordlnary communion, as to the existence of which we all agree ? We say it consisted in being, " one with the Father^'^ as our Saviour himself declares, so inttjiiately and inseparably., that, as he further explains it, the one cannot ad: without the other. " My Father worketh hitherto, and I work ; what things soever he doeth^ these docth the Son likewise^'* Some Socinians have judged it to consist in our Saviour's having been actually taken up into Heaven before the commencement of his ministry, in order to be per- sonally instructed by God the Father, in all things appertaining thereto. The Unitarians of the present day, with the Editors of this Improved Version, are certain that it merely consisted in our Saviour's going into retirement, to commune with his God ; " The Word was with God," say they, *' implies no more than that Jesus withdrew from the world into the wilderness to commune with God, and be instructed and disciplined for his high office." They should have added, as any other mere man or prophet might have done ; for there was no singularity in such com- munications. Many of the ancient prophets received their revelations in retirement ; Ezekiel on the Banks of the Chebar, and Amos in the Wilderness of Tekoah, Daniel in the Lions Den, and Jonah in the outskirts of Nineveh, Elijah by the Brook Cherith, and the Baptist himself in the deserts of Judea. At the close of the notes on the first chapter of St. John we are favoured with Mr. Lindsey's Version. *' In the beginning was wisdom, and wis- dom was with God, and God was wisdom, &c.*" I have * Mr. Lindsey, it seems, would substitute WISDOM for the Logos, This emendation then ought to help us to the proper rendering and sense of £» af;)^;/, for in the Book of Proverbs, we happen to have an account of the eternity of WISDOM, in the following words. Kvp-.;; — it^i ra ajwco? eOe/xsAtwo-i pcj EN APXH, Version of the New Testament. 115 I have ventured to suggest a different reading, namely, to substitute the Ajigelus Redemptor or Angel trpo TS Tr,v ynwcuovat, koh vpo m tck; aQvo-aa^ Troiijcrai, Ttpo ra itcoe.'k^m Tcc(; iT-nyui toiv vSizlcc'i, las^o t» op>j edpaabrii/xi} Trgo ^i Travlcai ^uvuiv yivtcc ue. We read nothing here of the beginning oF the Gospel ministry. Let then the Logos stand for the WISDOM of God, what is gained ? The question remains, had the Wisdom or Loo-os of God any distinct personality ? [That the Wisdom of God in the book of Proverbs is described as a person can scarcely be denied, the description being altogether as of a person operating ; seeing, calling, speaking, dwelling, discerning, ruling, guiding, &c. &c. &c. 2dly, All the antient Fathers understood it as of a person, the Son of God ; Justin Martyr, Athenagoras, Theophilus , IrenauSf Clem^ Alexand^, Tertullian, Origen, Methodius, Cyprian, Lactan- tiusf &c. &c. Nay, even Arius acknowledged it ; weakly argu- ing from one passage in it, that the Son was no more than a Crea- ture, vid, Epiphanium in Har.Arian.p-p. 736, 738. Edit. Col. 1682.] And here it may be fit to notice one thing not yet observed upon^ namely, that in the Syriac the term used for Logos is Feminine, and yet the pronoun connected with it is Masculine : '*■ etsi enim, (says the learned Ludov. de Dieu,) jAl^^ apud Syros sit fcem. hie tamen masculine construitur, quia^^rjowa/i/ifr accipitur ; nam non dixit cloio sed oaio neque Z.ooi oi^ZUJ sed jooi «-i.oioA.j sic et apud Arabem Verbiim xX-SsiL, quod per se foemininum hie tamen construitur masculine." See much to the same purpose in Dr, Laurence's Sermon on the Logos of St. John, p. 67. — As the Editors conceive the term is only metonymically appHed to Christ, Dr. Laurence's note from Schroeder will settle this point also. In Aikin's Annual Register, in the review of Mr. Jones's illustrations of the Gospels, this author is blamed for saying, that the term Logos was borrowed from the Septuagint as exaftly ex- pressing the Word of God {or the Spirit of God, or the Wisdom of God.] It is alleged against Mr. Jones, that HD^H' which is rendered So?>ia. 135 times, is not once rendered Aofo, ; that of the other 1 1 words rendered Zopia, by the LXX, one only is also ren- dered Vj-yo?, and this is only once translated by o-oipia, and once by ?iovof. That on the other hand H^l* which is at least 800 times translated Xoyo?, is never translated o:, not one (except the one before mentioned) has o-o(pia or any equivalent used as the translation ; and that there does not appear to be a ©ingle instance in which the word ^oyoj is so used in the New Tes- I 2 tament. 1 1 6 Remarks on the improved An^el of the Covenant for the Logos, not as a ne- cessary matter, but as an illustration by synonimous terms. The reader must judge from the substance of the foregoing remarks, which amendment would be most consistent with the sacred writings. I have a high respect for Mr. Lindsey's character and con- sistency, but I cannot bow down to him as a critic *. From what is intimated in the beginning of St. John's Gospel relative to the divinity and pre-existence of Christ, the Logos or Word of God, I shall pro- ceed to consider what is to be found to the same tament, certainly not in the writings of St. John, though he has used it uptvards of 60 times. — [In some copies of the LXX the Logos is expressly stated to be " the Fountain of Wisdom ;" see the various Readings in Bos's LXX, Ecclus. i and Baruch ii. 12. See alfo Lord //o//inj/'i7w's Answer to JVhiston.'\ The Reviewer in the Theological Repository before cited, says, " he believes there is no Scriptural authority for supposing the Logos to mean the Wisdom of God, and is certain there is a great deal against it." But whatever the ^0^: stands for either in the LXX, or the New Testament, or elsewhere ; the main question is, whether it is to be considered as indicative of an actual subsistence, and real person ; upon which see Laurence before cited. * [If the Logos imply only Wisdom, aa Mr. L. pretends, what are we to think of JVisdom "coming to its own, and its own receiv- ing it not?" What of John the Baptist not being \.h.?i.X. yittribute of God? What of one Attribute, being the only-begotten or dearly beloved, as the Editors would have it ? Can tiiese passages be other- wise applied than to a person ? or what shall we say to Tertul- lian's expression in his treatise against Pni.w^j ; where he speaks of God being " alone before all things P" " Solus autem quia nihil aliud extrinsecus prceter ilium, caeterum ne tunc quidem solus, habebat enim secum rationem, banc Grseci \<,vo> dicunt." Is not aman alone with his own reason, as an j^ttrlbute ? besides, that in the begin- ning of Christ's Ministry, the Wisdom of God should exist, seems a strange piece of information to stand at the head of such a work as John's Gospel ; after all, if P);oc rv I Xoyo^ be, as Mr. Lindsey would have it, and " God was Wisdom ;" God and Wisdom must be the same ; now in p. 14. Mr. Lindsey must have read, " Wisdom vuas, [or was made, or became) flesh; a Xoyo; aapi tiyttil* i confc- quently God became flesh, and our point is carried.] purpose Version of the New Testament, 117 purpose In the beginning of the epistle to the He- brews ; for as this was certainly written by a Jew, and certainly addressed to Jews, we must reasonably expect to find in it some confirmation of the foregoing comments, if they be really consistent with the Jewish Scriptures, and Jewish opinions. The two first chap- ters will be sufficient for our purpose. There then, we are told, with a reference plainly to the records of the Old Testament, that God, who revealed him- self to the fathers in divers manners and at sun- dry times in or by the prophets, in the last days spake to the world in or by his Son, whom he con- stituted heir of all things, by whom also he made the worlds ; who being the shining forth of his glory, and the express image of his person, and upholding all things by the word of his power, when he had by himself purged our sins, sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on High ; being so much better than the angels, as he has by inheritance obtained a more excellent name than they, for unto which of the angels, said he at any time. Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten Thee, &c. I shall not proceed further with the text at pre- sent, having in these few verses sufficient to show the connexion between the Two Testaments, the ■object of our preceding remarks ; that there is a reference to the Old Testament, is evident. It is shown that the same eternal God is the author and giver of all revelations, and that very particu- larly, the Jewish and Christian dispensations are but different parts of one great scheme of human re- demption. Under the former, God spake to the fathers of the Hebrew nations, in or through the prophets ; under the latter, in his Son. It does not say that no communications took place immediately between God and man, but that God spake to the I 3 fathers ti8 Rejnarks on the improved fathers in general through the medium of pro- phets. To the prophets God spake himself*, in dreams, in visions, or in the refulgence of the She- chinah ; but under the Christian dispensation, the ministry of inspired prophets was laid aside, and God spake to the world in his SON ; who being, says the apostle, (and we must remember he is ad- dressing Hebrews) the brightness of his glory, and the express image of his person, and upholding all things by the word of his power, when he had by himself purged our sins, sat down on the right hand of the Majesty on High, being so much better than the angels, &c. It is surely not too much to say, that these terms re- gularly carry us back to the visible Jehovah of the Old Testament. From our Saviour's own reference to the CXth Psal.n, we know that He for whom it was reserved to sit do^^_'l :~!i the right hand of the Majesty on High was the ADON, or ADONAI, JEHOVAH, the Shechinah, 6ol.. O^a, the angel of the covenant, or of the presence of God ; for all these titles are easily shown to belong to the same person, and He the pro- mised Messiah of the Jews. The passage already cited from Malachi is much to the purpose, as evi- dently and expressly attributing to the Christ, three of these high distinctions — JEHOVAH, ADONAI, and nniin InVd <> AfyjAo? t-zi? AjaOnxr?. or the angel of the covenant ; being so much better than the angels, the apostle continues, as he hath by inheritance obtained a more excellent name than they. It is surely remarkable, and it is certainly true, that the angel of God's presence far surpassed all other angelic appearances ; in Him alone did God put his name ; He alone was called JEHOVAH, He alone ♦ The expression generally is, " the WORD of the LORD came to such and such a prophet." Spake Version of the New Testament 1 1 9 spake as JEHOVAH, He alone was worshipped as JEHOVAH. Well therefore may the apostle proceed to appropriate to Him those passages which follow, and which so remarkably establish his Divinity j such as, ** thy throne, OGod, is for ever and ever, a sceptre of righ- teousness is the sceptre of thy kingdom ;" " thou. Lord, in the beginning hast laid the foundations of the earth, and the heavens are the works of thy hands.^'' A pas- sage peculiarly necessary to evince his superiority to angels, because at that time there were divers heretics who ascribed the creation of this visible world to angels and not to Christ. Most of these passages were held by the ancient Jews and by the Chaldee interpreters, to relate to the Messiah ; but since our present expositors think otherwise, and that the last passage in particular was spoken of God alone, I shall cite the words of Grotius to show how little this would alter the case. Speak- ing of one of the citations from the Psalms, he says, *' at ihi de Deo agitur, hie de Messia. Verum hoc, sed quia pridem receptum erat apud Hebrasos, Deum singular! modo in Messia habitatum, et fore, (ut Thalmudici loquuntur) digito monstrabilem, ideo quascunque de homre Dei dicebantur, eadem appli- cari solebant ad Messiam." A strange thing for Jews to do, if not prepared to acknow^Iedge his full divinity. That Christ had obtained by inheritance a more excellent name than the angels, is a plain proof of his peculiar sonship. And though men should differ for ever as to the nature of this connexion, which it has not pleased God to reveal in all its circum- stances, yet if it appear to be a fact positively re- vealed, we may be sure the consent of human phi- losophers is not necessary to render it credible ; upon this relation to the Father depend all those glorious 1 4 titles ti6 Remarks on the improved titles and distinctions, upon which we have offered our remarks. The Unitarians apprehend they belong solely to the man Jesus, in consequence of his mi- nistry, and sufferings in testimony of the truth. But Trinitarians apprehend they belong exclusively td that pre-existent Being, who for our sakes in the last days becam.e man, entered into a close union with our nature, for the express purpose, as the Apostle says, of cleansing us from our sins J'l' ^auTj?, by himself, (which, as Grotius says, valde significanter diciturj and his explanation is most observable, ** non alias Victimas obtulit ut Levitici Sacerdotes sed SEMETIP- SUM */') and of rendering us capable of receiving •• the Spirit of Adoption t, that if we suffer with him, we may be glorified together." If now there should be any chance of prejudice inclining men to adopt such doctrines as matter of fact, it must be strange that so great an error can- not effectually be set aside by an appeal to Scrip- ture. It must be a prejudice of the most inveterate and infatuated nature that can confound men's un- derstanding so much, as to make them fancy they * Those who turn to Grotius for this reference will find that he says, " abest tamen hoc o/f»:vfc a Manuscripto." The Editors, however, admit it in their Version, Griesbach in his text, and with the greatest reason, it being acknowledged as Whitby has shown against Mill, by all the Greek fcholiasts, Theodoret ex- cepted, who however substitutes u.in>: with an aspirate which comes to the same thing; the comment of Grotius is of the more im- portance because the Editors particularly notice the Primate's rendering, " when he had made a cleansing of our sins by the sacrifice of Himself," and they observe that the words by tin sacrifice of are not In the original ; this is true, and yet I think the Primate right, at least justifiable : for Whitby has excellently shown, that the term Kabi p 0>i must have implied a sacrificial atone- ment, and Grotius's comment serves to convince us that ^»* ixrj'iu would convey the same meaning. \ Romans, viii. find Version of the New Tesimnent. 121 find in Scripture, what Scripture does expressly Con- tradict : for it is assumed by the Unitarians, that Scripture plainly speaks of our Lord as mere man, the offspring of Joseph and Mary, of one nature only, as being no actual sacrifice for sins, and as a Son only by appointment and adoption, like those he came to save. Of two opinions so diametrically opposite, it seems fair to conclude, that one must indeed be the effeft of prejudice, and this is a question which biblical Criticism seems as capable of resolving as any thing ; for all must depend on the original terms of Scripture, and the probable senti- ments of those who penned the sacred records. Inter- preters and translators may bewilder matters greatly ; the force of an original term may be greatly weak- ened by an inadequate rendering, greatly misrepre- sented by an ill-adapted substitute, or wholly lost by an artful evasion. We have undoubtedly great complaints of this nature to make against the pre- sent Editors, for their mode of rendering this parti- cular part of the New Testament ; they have not by any means been able totally to obscure the doctrines we espouse, but many suspicious circumstances be- tray their endeavours to do so ; I will do all in my power to represent matters with fairness and equity. The first passage in which they deviate from the received text is in verse 2. "By whom also he made the worlds :'* J^*' a kch mg Aiuvccc sTroina-iv. This, we are told should be, " for whom also he constituted the ages ;" viz. the Antediluvian, Patriarchal, and Mosaic ages or dispensations. I shall not contend with them much about this variation. I firmly be- lieve, the Antediluvian, Patriarchal, and Mosaic dis- pensations had all a reference to Christ. Aiuv is a very questionable word, and though I think it capable of proof, that as well as its correspondent Hebrew term 12 2 Remarks on the improved term tzh'iy Holam, it may reasonably be held to refer to the visible world or worlds, yet I shall give it up for the present as a matter of indifference. The rendering of the Editors, Dodderidge incorporates with his own paraphrase ; and we are told that Gro- tius, Schleusner, and Mr. Lindsey, vindicate the ren- dering of iioc with a genitive in the way proposed *. But should this be ever so jusifiable, in the very next chapter it happens to be used both with a genitive and an accusative ; and the Editors themselves render it both ways. " For it became him FOR whom, and BY whom are all things ;" which being clearly predi- cated of Christ t, brings us back to the old question concerning the ra -rrocvra, J and the grammatical co?i' struction of the passage is at the utm^ost neutral-^ rather indeed we may assert, that while it cannot be de- cisively turned against those who attribute the visible creation to the Logos or Christ, it may undoubtedly be turned with great effect against such as contend that Notbi?ig was really made by him, but only for him, and on his account ; — the case of the Unitarians. Let us, however, at present return to Aiccv, and let us grant, that J't' a kxi rag Aiuvx? sTroir\(r£v truly signi- fies ti For, or on account of whom, the several ages or dispensations were constituted : this settles * It should however be noted, that Dr. Whitby has shown against Grotius, tliat this is contrary to the rule of all grammari- ans; contrary to the Exposition of all the Greek Fathers ; and without example in the New Testament. See also Magee ob Atonement, p. 77. f See also Coloss. i. 15,16. I Cor. viii. 6. 2 Pet. iii. 5. X Should I for argument sake grant this, yet I could not agree to their rendering and interpretation of Ch. xi. 3. ; a text that might reasonably be expected to puzzle them, and so indeed it seems to have done. Their rendering is, " By faith we under- stand that the ages were so ordered ( ^ca^Tr.^rio-Gai) by the Word of God that the present state of things (t« 0\B'!Tof^£ta.) arose not from what did then appear, which is surely embarrassed enough, and ab- surd enough in point of meaning. See more upon this passage below. nothing j Version of the New Testament, il^ nothing; I still contend that Christ existed before those ages or dispensations, and I am inclined to cite a witness who ought to be unexceptionable, even Arius himself, who did not scruple to write, that the Son existed not only Ante Secula, but J?ite Ternpora* ; that he had a being not only before those ages, which may possibly be alluded to in the term Ajwi/a? but before all time, that he was indeed sine tempore^ et ante omnia genitus, begotten or produced, ere time was known, and literally before all things. After Arius, it will surely be allowed me to cite an Apostolic Fa- ther of the Church, whose expressions are too strong to be evaded : in his Epistle to the Magnesians, Igna- tius describes Christ, as rrpo Travlw!/ ^sv AinNJTiN TY}? TTXf^ivs S^-xot, TV? ofji^iXioi? oivS^oq J a testlmouy which may well leave us indifferent as to the exact rendering of Aiwi/a? as far as it regards our Saviour's pre-exist- ence. As to his creation of the visible worlds, which the received text plainly expresses, I apprehend that should the original have been otherwise intended, (which I cannot actually grant,) yet, the doctrine would remain as strongly asserted in various other parts of Scripture. Nor shall I ever be brought to think, that less than this can be intended, by the re- ference to, and citation from the cii'* Psalm, in this very- Chapter, ver. lo. And, " thou Lord, in the beginning hast laid the foundations of the Earth, and the Heavens are the work of thy hands." One would think it impossible for any person capable of examining the original, to deny that the Apostle meant to re- * Arius's idea certainly was, that he was created, and he even uses the term creature ; but it has been held, that according to the philosophy of those days, he might be eternal though created* snd we are at present only treating of hjs pre -existence. g presen 124 Remarks on the improved present this as spoken by JEHOVAH, of or to the Son. The connective particle )ta», as Whitby ad- mirably observes, must carry us back to ver. 8, its import and design being to knit together those two citations in proof of the Son's divirxity. A case so strong need to be provided against, and therefore in the notes, we are told, that it is a mere reference in proof of the immutability of God, " to show (says Mr. Emlyn, cited by Mr. Lindsey) how able his God, who had anointed him, was to make good and maintain what he had granted him, a durable king- dom for ever and ever.'* Surely neither Mr. Emlyn nor Mr. Lindsey could ever have noticed verses 7 and 8, where the discourse evidently turns upon what God said of his Angels, and what, in contra- distinction^ he said of the Son, tt^sc ^£ rov viov^ but to the Son, God saith ; and then follow the three citations, not to prove any such matter at all, as Mr. Emlyn and Mr. Lindsey would have us be- lieve, but expressly to show the super-eminence of the Son of God. The >c«i plainly appropriates the latter citation to Christ ; and indeed why not ? for *' it appears from Moses,'* to cite the words of a very ingenious writer, " that God (Elohim) cre- ated the Heavens and the Earth * j it was God that * We shall be reminded, I am aware, that Dr. Geddes has de- t'tded that Eloh'im implies no plurahty of persons. Let us consider then that Mofes in Gen. i. i. might have used the singular, as he does Deut. xxxii. 15, if». and as his object was to resist poly- theism, it is surely strange that on the contrary he should select (even) an ambiguous term ; for how strongly is it applied to the false Gods oi the Heathens by the prophet Jeremiah, x. ii. " The Gods that have not made the Hcai'ens and the Earth., THEY shall perish, (plural) &c :?' — here the term is Eloh'im^ (allowing for the Chaldee termination, the verse being in that dialect^,) and the verbs and pronouns plural, while he must have intended a reference to the Ekbim of Moses that did make the Heavens and Earth j nay. Version of the New Testament. 125 that commanded, and they were created ; by the WORD of JEHOVAH were the Heavens made ;'* and nobody can doubt, that the Apostles of Christ believed this ; and yet St. John tells us, and his words are very remarkable, " In the beginning was the WORD, and the WORD was with GOD, and the WORD was God ; all things were made by him, and without him was not any thing made that was made :'* and by the WORD he means JESUS CHRIST. But how could these things be consistent ; unless the Evangelist believed that Jesus Christ was the Elohi?n, who appeared all along in the Old Testament under the title of GOD ; [Zech. xii. 8. Acts. vii. 30, 32.] or the ANGEL of the LORD ; by whom God at first created all things ; that is, the visible JEHOVAH or WORD of GOD, as he is called by Philo and the Jews of that age * ?" The next thing I have to notice is the rendering of verses 4, 5 t. I must confess I should have sup- posed nay, in the very verse preceding he calls the true God, JEHOVAH ELOHIM. — [In Deut. viii. 19. the word Elobim is applied both to the true God and the false Gods ; in the first instance joined with the singular Jehovah, in the latter with a plural adjective C"^nj< ; the object in both places being evidently to enforce \.]\&Jirst commandment, which makes it the more remarkable that the term Eloh'im should be at all applied to the true God (JEHO- VAH), as it undoubtedly is. * Ben Mordecai's Letters, ii. p. 30. + At the end of his notes on ver, 3. the Primate adds, " What is asserted of the Son thus far in the verse before us, is true of him both when he appeared as the Jehovah- Angel and when he as- sumed the character of the Messiah :" and on Heb. iii. 3. he ob- serves, " Christ conducted the Mosaic dispensation as the visible representative of God, John, i. 18, See also the Postscript to Ben Mordecai's ii'^ Letter, and to show how much this appears to be the opinion of all denominations of believers, as I have not cited their testimony before to the fact, I add, from Cahin on Zech. ii. 10. " Hinc constat, (that is) because this Jehovah \9&s to 126 Remarks on the i?nproved posed no school-boy capable of reading the first Chapter of this Epistle in Greek could have doubted about the purport of it, but must have been certain that it was the design of the Apostle to show the superiority of the Son of God, not only above the Prophets of the Old Testament, but above the An- gels of Heaven : and indeed I am convinced that nothing less than a most prejudiced determination against the belief of Angels, could have led to a different interpretation of the words of the Apostle. After describing the Son, as the brightness of God's glory, and the express image of his person, and as sitting on the right hand of the Majesty on high, what could possibly connect more naturally with this description than that he should be shown to be, on this very account, greater than the Angels : and therefore the Apostle introduces it as an inference or explanation of matters, " being so much better than the Angels, as he hath by inheritance obtained a more excellent name than they :" but though it might be proved to demonstration, that the Author of this Epistle must have believed in the existence of Angels, and in the ministry of Angels ; yet I am not allowed by the Editors of the present Version to suppose, that in the 4th or 5th verse he speaks of Angels at all-; AfyEAo? being as well Greek for a Messenger as for an Angel, and Prophets being Messengers, advantage is taken of this circumstance, to suppress the very name of Angels, and the ruv uyyixuv of to appear consp'tcue et corporaUter ;) Sermonem hunc non posse tor» queri ad Prophetam ; nee posse Deo Patri competere. Christus ergo hie loquitur non ut Homo vel y^figclus, sedut Jehovah ; quo nomine hoc loco vacatur: et ut Dens Rcdemptor." — And Dr.Sykes on Heb. ii. 2. says, " It seems to be as universally received an opi- nion as any among the Christian writers ; that the Son of God was the ^ngel of the Covenant ; was the yingel that appeai-ed to jibra- ham^ and to Moses^ and to others." verse Version of the New Testament . 127 verse 4, as well as verse 5, is rendered those Mes- sengers^ with a reference to the Prophets mentioned ver. I. In every other part of the Chapter also, wherever the term Af^jx^? occurs, it is rendered Messenger ; I was in hope that I should have been permitted to cite against them the last verse, where they are spoken of as Aara^yixa Trvsujitala, minister- ing Sprits y but not so ; in vain do I appeal X.Q either their model Archbishop Newcome, or the original Greek ; Tn/fujw-aTa, it seems, is a mere exple- tive, and therefore, as particularly objectionable to the Priestleyan school, must be rejected *: Af-yfAof then is a Messenger, that is a Prophet, and Xeira^yixov -sri/fu/Aa, a Servant, that is a Prophet also ; for so it is rendered and explained, ver. 14, still with a refer- ence to the roig ziT popnT at g of verse i. Should this be thought an ingenious correct tion by Unitarians, yet it tends to settle nothing.. To unsettle things it certainly tends, inasmuch as it is a bold attempt, totally to get rid of some of the most established doctrines of Christianity ; but as long as the original is at all accessible, Afyixog may still pass for an Angel, and xiirspymx ■zzrvi\)iA.ocra, for 77ii}iistering Spirits ; if the received text gives offence to those who are now disposed to reject these doctrines, I may confidently' affirm it would have given content to the Author of the Epistle, who, being a Jew, must have believed in Angelsy must have regarded them as ministering Spirits, and must have considered them as concerned * [In justice, however^ to Dr. Priestley, I must observe here, that he appears, before he died, to have been a firm behever, both in the existence and ministration of superior beings and of divine communications in the early ages of the vi^orld. His note on Numbers, xxii. 8, 9. may be compared vsrith Bishop Patrick in the same place.] 128 Remarks on the improved in the promulgation of the Laiv^ and therefore must have felt it highly necessary and peculiarly proper, as Doddridge observes, to labour and press the argu- ment he is here upouy namely the superiority of our Blessed Lord to all the angelic orders. If any are still inclined to think the opinions of Mr. Lindsey, Mr. Wakefield, Dr. Priestley, &c. are of more nveight than the opinions of the Apostle himself, they must continue to read it Messengers and Servants ; but as long as we have the original by us, I shall never be persuaded that the received text requires correction. The Angels of God, though Angels, may, I grant, be Messengers also ; and the 7ninis- iering Spirits, vi'ho stand before the throne of God in Heaven, are undoubtedly his Servants and Vas- sals ; but this is not the point in quesdon. The only question is, — Does the Apostle m£an to speak merely of the prophets in the flesh, from the ist verse to the 14th of the first Chapter? If he does, he uses three terms for the same thing, Upo- 9»)Tai, AfysXoh and Asnapyi^ix Uvivfj^ccToc, which literally rendered, are Prophets, Angels, and Ministering Spirits. Bat if spoken of one and the same order, they must no longer be rendered literally, but as the present Editors propose, Prophets, Messengers^ and Servants. " We must not wonder," (they tell us in a subsequent note on Ch. ii. 5.) " that the Apostle uses the word Angel in different senses "without giving notice of the change. This incor- rectness of style is not uncommon in the sacred "Writers. This Author had before availed himself of the ambiguity of the word Angel, Ch. i. ver. 7. This is an extraordinary mode of reconciling matters : for it is not the Apostle, but the Editors themselves who give these different senses to the term Angel, and then censure the sacred writers gene- rally Version of the New Testaments 129 rally, for an incorrectness of style ! I am confident the Apostle uses the term in one and the same sense, even in the 7th verse of Chap. i. to which they re- fer, but in the rendering of which they adtually transpose the words both of the Apostle and the holy Psalmist. There is no incorrectness of style discoverable in the language of the Apostle, in the Chapters under consideration, if the term Angel may but pass for Angel, Prophet for Prophet, and ministering Spirits for ministering Spirits. But th^e is great incorrectness of style, and a most faulty ob- scurity in the language, if, as these Editors would have us believe, Angel stands for Messenger^ and ministering Spirits for Ser-vants, and both Messengers and Servants for Prophets, who were mentioned by their right title at the beginning of the Chapter. I may venture to assert, that not all the present expositors put together, had they lived in those days, would have been able to convince one of the Hebrew converts to whom the Epistle was addressed, that such was the intention of the sacred writer. They would have persisted in understanding Angels to be meant by each of the terms hyUxoi and Xim^yixx ■oTvvjy.a.Tx and Prophets only by the term z:po(pnTCii. The whole argument of the Chaptef being to this effect, that the Son was greater than either the Prophets of old, or the Angels of Heaven ; even as to his own ojfice and ministration, greater as the Messiah, than as the Jngel of the Jewish Covenant * j and if we are to suppose that St. Paul was * Ajchbishop Tenison says, God formerly spake by his Son, as the Logos or Minister ; and in the tatter times by Him as his SON incarnate, begotten by the Holy Ghost, of the substance of the Virgin Mary. The WORD was God's minister before K and 1^6 Remarks on the improved was the Author of this Epistle, what could be more necessary than that he should dwell much on the dis- tinction between our Lord Jesus Christ, and the An- gelic Host, in order to take men off from the worship of Angels, to which both Jews and Gentiles were in- clined, and which St. Paul expressly alludes to in his second Chapter to the Colossians. Had indeed the present expositors lived in those days, perhaps they would have had to contend with one whose authority upon another occasion they think great enough to out-weigh the evidence and testimony of all existing Manuscripts and Versions of the Scripture. We mean Cerinthus. So far from confounding Angels and Prophets, as these translators do, he held, (as Epiphanius their own referee assures us,) that both *' the Law and the Prophets came from the Angels, and that He who gave the Law was one of the Angels that made the world.'* Epipha- nius's words are, ^aa-an Si x]o; -rov vof/.ov )c«i nP0$HTA2 B-nro AFFEAIiN SeSoo-^ccIj x«i rsv Sitiwv.o\oc voy,ov iva. uvcci ruv AfyiXuv rov xovfAOv •unzjoinv.oruVy Her. 28. § I. And in this particular, Cerinthus was not indeed so and under the Zaw ; but not in the same quality as under the Gospel. And he considers it as proper to distinguish between Christ, as God's Word and Schechinah under X\\e foriiier Cove- nants, and as Mediator and God's Son under the Gospel. And for the same opinion he quotes Le Blanc's Theological Thesis ; who owneth Christ as the Minister of God of old, but not as Mediator ; he was then the ^rigej of the Covenant ; but when hff came into the world in the character of the Son of Man, he was made both the Lord and Christ, Acts, ii. 36. As the Angel of the Jewish Covenant he administered things through Moses, see Gal. iii. 19. who thereby became the Mediator of that Covenant; but of the Christian Covenant, Clu-isL himself was pei'sonally the Mediator, {Uia-vr.c) as the Apostle calls him. Chap. viii. Q. xfuTltvbi Ai»G(jx)!s M-uiTYii. See Chap, ix. i^. xii, 24. wide Version df the New Testament. 131 wide from the truth, as far as relates to the prevail- ing opinions of the Jews, for the Law was given by the Angel of God's Presence, and the world was made by the WORD of God, who was the Angel of the Covenant, and who appeared sv ^o^a Qr^ to the Prophets of old. Had he gone but a step farther, he might have been in agreement with St. John would he but have acknowledged, that is, that J Aohg a-ap^ lyii^iloy " the Word was made Flesh," which incon- sistently he denied. And here I have ventured again to render tyivila was made, though the present translators assure their readers, that y*>owa( never bears this sense, and that it is wrongly inserted in many passages of the received text ; I am inclined to think it really is so in one passage, and that the very one upon which I have been dwelling so long, viz. Heb. i. 4, which in the received text is rendered, " being made so much better than the Angels, as he hath by inheritance, &c.'* upon which the learned Wells has the following sensible note, yivoy.cn denotes jimply to BE as well as to BE MiiDE, and in the former as well as latter sense it occurs in the New Testament. Now it being evident from the passages of Scripture cited by the Apostle in the remaining part of this Chapter, that the name which Christ is aaid,^ ver. 4, to have obtained by inheritance, does refer to his divine as well as to his human nature ; hence yivo^ixioq must be rendered Being, that being ap- plicable to Christ's divinity as well as humanity, and not being made, m which sense it is applicable to Christ only in respect of his humanity. Now whether this remark of the learned Commentator be just or not, (1 think his reference to the fol- lowing citations supports him in it,) we might K 2 have 1-2 2 Remarks on the improved have expected at least to find it countenanced by the present translators who have so repeatedly objected to the received Version of tyivno ; but for this correction and improvementj I unfortunately looked in vain ; for alas ! they adopt the re- ceived reading in this particular passage, and fffo/Afj/o?, it seems signifies no less than, " having been made.^* I have already noticed the omission of which the Editors have been guilty in not rightly rendering the term >tfxA>i/)svo//,7ix£v in this verse. They have indeed wholly passed it over. Socinians would have taught them better. Crellius makes much of the heirship of Christ in the following words, and had he but put a Patre instead of a Deo, it would have been an ex- cellent account of matters. " Christus solus Om- nium plane rerum haereditate gaudet, et summo in omnes, tam angelos, quam homines, imperio ac domi- natu pollet. — Licet autem istis verbis significata sit summa Christi praestantia, ac Divinitas, ac veluti cum Deo unitas, tamen simul significata etiam Christi a Deo diversitas.'* Now this qualification of inheri- tance should not have been dropt, because we see it is in the opinion even of Socinians one of the main evidences of Christ's Divinity. But if it does not appear in this improved Version, it luckily remains in the plainest characters in the Greek original, Grotius would even help us to an improvement of Crellius and the Editors too. " Scandit Oratio," says he, " Prastulit Christum Patribus, Mosi, Pro- phet is. Jam et Angelis eum prseferre volens, per quos Deus Patres, Mosem et Prophetas fuit allocutus, ostendit ilium Solo Deo Patre minorem.'* This is a testimony also of no mean authority with the Editors and with Socinians on all points on which they happen 8 to Version of the New Testament. 13^ to agree ; he dwells on the term KXnpQvoy.ui/ as of par- ticular importance. There is a passage in the 3d verse of the first Chap, to the Hebrews, which I have ah eady alkided to in my notes, and which the Editors interpret very differently from other commentators. It relates to the Atonement and not to the Divinity or pre-existence of Christ, the chief subject of my present discussion. The expression tTt' saura xaOiX^Jo-iUov 'jronfifa.fx^uog twv ccfMoc^Tioov T^y-uv, *' When he had by himself made a cleansing of our sins." This is the rendering of the Editors, and I have nothing to object to it, except that they explain it thus : " that cleansing of sin is bringing us out of an unholy into a holy state ;" be it so, yet the question remains, how was this done ? we say by the precious Cross, and passion of the Lamb slain from the foundations of the world ; and that this is intimated both by the terms J'/ savm and xaOapjo-uov 7roi7](jizyEvog j which to Jewish ears, if we may trust to the Septuagint, must have conveyed the idea of a sacrificial atonement for sin *. It seems then, that in the compass of only four verses, there is a manifest attempt made, to get rid of the follovv^ing important doctrines, which the received text is sup- posed to countenance. First, that Christ, as the Logos of God, made the visible worlds. Secondly, that He existed before his birth of Mary, as the Son of the Father in glory and power. Thirdly, that there are any spiritual existences above us, denominated Angels : and fourthly, that Christ was any sacrifice for sins. Here are certainly four very important doctrines brought into a small compass, * See JFhitl>y before cited, and Scott's Christian Life. Part 11. c. 7. p. 383. K. 3 and 134 Remarks on the improved and it must be hard if there are no means left us o"^ ascertaining the truth. The Editors of this New Version would have us believe that there is no foun- dation at all for the opinions that have for a long time been current in the world ; opinions espoused, maintained, and propagated by some of the earliest, most celebrated, and most learned Fathers of the Church ; approved by a long succession of CxDmmen- tators, and Critics, and received as undoubted truths, by numerous sects and denominations of Christians, who differing upon other points, yet agree in de- ducing these doctrines from the very words of Scripture. Since the Editors, in their few short notes, have peremptorily decided against these and other important doctrines, often asserting that those passages which have been supposed to inculcate them have hitherto been grossly mistaken, and as grossly misrepresented, I have through a zeal for the truth, I hope as impartial and as pure as their own, endeavoured to bring back to the notice of all parties some very important facts indelibly re- corded in the history of the World, and to re- establish that indissoluble connection between the Old and New Testaments, which I am grieved to say this Improved version seems particularly calcu- lated, if not expressly intended, to weaken and destroy : my subsequent remarks will be of a more detached nature. THE Version of the New Testament » 135 THE professed design of the Improved Version, as stated in the introduction, is to rescue the public from the " technical phraseology of a systematic theology * :" this gives a strange air to many of the notes : the general mode of instruction is in the way of affirmation. Pains are generally taken to tell the ignorant what things are ; as for instance what a ransom is, what a sacrifice, what a propiti- ation, what a si?i-offering, &c. But the style of these Editors is totally different. All their efforts are directed to the discovery and relation of what things are noty a ransom is not a ransom, or a sacrifice a sacrifice ; sins are not sins, nor bearing of sins bear- ing of sins ; intercession is not intercession, nor pro- pitiation propitiation. This is puzzling enough to be sure, but I suppose not beyond the capacity of these improvers. If they understand themselves, their ca- pacity must indeed be great, for their system appears to me, I must freely confess, so opposite to the real * It is curious to see how they act with regard to technical phraseology ; their object is, as they profess, to relieve the public from the evils of it, and yet there is nothing they more boldly adopt, to prove their own system. Thus in the Apostohc writ- ings, S'triy Sinners, Devils, Angels, Redempiinn, and rumberless other terms, are not to be understood as at all expressing what is now understood by those words, but merely according to the " technical phraseology " of Jews and Gnostics. The real secret however is, that they would have us believe that the technical phraseology of Jews and Gentiles was quite as faulty as that of the particular system they wish to set aside, and that the sacred writers only used it in accommodation, that is, not in reality be- lieving a word of either, and yet leaving the world to find this out as they could, for they certainly apply the terms with as little reserve, as tliough they intended in the strongest manner to fix and confirm their ideas. K 4 language 136 Remarks on the improved language of Scripture, as to be wholly irreconclle- able to it ; but, from a work of Mr. Belsham's, published since the first edition of these remarks, and often noticed in the present impression, I find it laid down as an established Unitarian canon of cri- ticism, that, " Impartial and sincere inquirers after truthj must be particularly upon their guard against what is called the natural signification of words.** This canon may account, perhaps, for the perversity of their apprehension of things, however inconsistent with their dread of technical phraseologies \ let us see how they manage. *' A ransom,'* we are told, (on Matth. xx. 28.) *' signifies the price paid for the liberty of a slave ; and figuratively, any means of deliverance from bondage ; so God is said to have redeemed or ransomed the Israelites out of the House of Bondage from the hand of Pharaoh, not by paying a price for them, but by the splendid and awful miracles which he wrought for their deliverance ; in hke manner, the many^ that is all mankind, being in bondage to the Mosaic ritual, or to heathen superstition, are ran- somed by the death of Christ, which is the means or their deliverance, not as the suffering of a sub- stitute, but as the seal and ratification of a new and better covenant." I have put the note here before the text *, that I may have the pleasure of surpris- ing the reader the more when I produce it. The plain object of this note is undoubtedly to show that ♦ Archbishop Newcome, on the text, is among the references^ The Arclibishop iias no note upon it, nor a word in explanation of the term ransom, either here or Mark, x. 45. On i Cor. vii. 33, <' Ye have been bought with a price ;" he observes, it is addressed to those who were purchased to God and to Christ, by the JPllICE of Christ's blood. whatever Version of the New Testament, ^37 whatever the scripture tells us of a ransom paid for our redemption, no such thing really happened ; our Saviour paid no price for us, else undoubtedly there would have been a ransom m the strict definition of the word. His death indeed was a ??2ea?2s of deliver- ance, a seal and a ratification of a covenant, but no ranso?n, except figuratively^ and that not according to the common course of things, but as far as a seal may resemble a price paid, and the fulfilment of an agreement, liberty given to a slave. Who would think, after all this, that in the Scripture there is not a word of a seal, or a covenant, or a figurative ransom, but a direct literal price paid for the ransom of certain persons ; — " as the Son of man came — to give his Life a Ransom for many" Now according to their own definition of a ransom, how can this be taken figuratively ? It is used figu^ latively only where ?io price is paid, but here is a price paid and given for the deliverance of many, so that if ive may expound things negatively as weU as they, we should say this is not to be understood figuratively, it is not to be understood as a deliver-, ance without a specific price paid. It is 7iot to be understood as a mere seal or ratification of a cove- nant, but as a proper ransom, namely, the Life of Christ given and paid for the deliverance of sinful men. The Greek is certainly literal and plain enough, jtat Ssvxi, rnv ^i^riv aura Aurpov avri isroXXuv^ Here is the givi/ig or paying plainly expressed, xai ^avc/A^ — the thing given, or price paid, mv ^'u^.^ii' aura *, the character and intent of the gift, xvrpov a ransom, and the object atr* tuv ttoxXuv, to procure the deliverance of the many. The death of Christ * See Scott's Christian Life, Part ii. Chap. vii. §§ 3,4, they 138 Remarks on the improved they allow to have been the 7neans of deliverance ; and in another place they admit that the death of Christ vi^as voluntary on his part, therefore what can a voluntary surrender of life for a certain pur- pose be, but a gift of that life, or price paid for the accomplishment of that purpose ; and as for the differente betvi^een deliverance and ransom, it con- sists, it seems, merely in the payment or non-payment of a stipulated price ; then the hfe of Christ was the price of this ransom, according to St. Matthew, and it was of course a proper ransom, in the fullest sense cf the word. To the law then and to the testimony ; let us believe the Holy Evangelist when he speaks so plainly, rather than the Editors of this Improved Version, who to render the Scriptures more intelligible, thus darken and obscure the most perspicuous passages, and positively deny what the sacred writers ^ posi- tively assert *. But * I confess it is matter of astonishment to me how so acute a writer as the Author of the Letters of Ben Mordecai could fall into the strange but too common inconsistency of insisting upon the death of Christ being no price, no ransom, because we are said to be forgiven freely by God, {^d^iuv) ; and yet contending, that Christ received the power of forgiveness as a reward for what he underwent. For if our forgiveness is unconditionally free, why did Christ undergo any afflictions in order to acquire such power ? why suffer at all ? why be numbered with transgressors ? if this were a free gift to sinners, it was plainly no free gift to the innocent Jesus. And yet all was free, if the atonement as well as the forgiveness wrought out for us, was a voluntary act of God. [[And this may serve for an ansvver to Dr. Priestley, who^ in his treatise styled, " An Appeal to the serious and candid Professors of Christianity," p. 18. says, " We read in the Scriptures, that we are justified freely by the grace of God : but what free grace or mercy does there appear in God, if Christ Version of the New Testament. 135 But they tell us also, in their note on Matth. xx, 28. that Christ's death, as AJl^ov a.v\i ttoXXuv, a ransom for many, was NOT the suffering of a substitute. We might suppose from this that such a meaning could not be expressed by the term ransom, since they are so exceedingly careful to do away every impression of that nature ; why then, let me ask, do they so industriously select the very term ransom for the rendering of avraXXaffxa,, Mark viii. 37, setting aside the received text, and the Primate's rendering *' in exchange for ?" When it suits their purpose, it seems, ransom more strongly expresses the substitu- tion of one thing for another than even the terms, f* in exchange for ;" when it does not, we may none of us venture to give it any such meaning. I am obliged to speak in this manner of their bold and unjustifiable adulterations of the WORD of GOD ! Only a few pages further they again render Xvrpov avTt TrohXuv, a ransom for many, Mark x. 45. and send us back to their note on Matth. xx. 28, to prove that our Saviour's life given as a ransom, can in no manner imply the suiferings of a substi- tute ; I do not deny that ai/raXAaf/y-a may be ren- dered *' ransom," or that A-JIpov may sometimes- express deliverance generally ; but I contend, that if our Saviour gave his life as a ransom according to the Evangelist, and died in our stead, ai/1j ttoAAo)!^, for, or instead of, many, which the Greek expresses *, Christ gave a full price for our justification, and bore the infinite weight of Divine wrath on our account ?" See him cited in the *' New Theory of Redemption," toI. i. pp. 247, 24.8. and the re- inarks there; particularly, pp.252, 257, 258.] * What the Evangelist expresses by Anlpon f^li ■jro--., , St. Paul terms avli Xvrpof, v^fsp wafla>v, I Tim. ii. 6, Upon which see Outram dc Sacrjficiis, Lib. ii. c.6. § 4. p. 337. both 1^(5 Remarks on the improved both Avl^ov m the original and ransom in the re- ceived Version, are to be taken in their Hteral and proper sense ; and the pretended correction of the text is an open falsification of it." — " Ye were not redeemed," (or ransomed, £Ai/TpO»iT£) says St. Peter, '* with corruptible things as silver and gold *," (the price paid, that is, consisted not in actual money, or things bought with money,) " but with the pre- cious blood of Christ ;" this was the price paid, this was the literal and positive price wherewith *' ye were Bought j" as another Apostle expresses it, I Cor. vi. 20. We still are pressed with notes and expositions, to induce us to think of nothing but seals and ratifications y but we must abide by what is written, and persist in acknowledging a ransom, a price and a purchased redemption ; nor though they should insist ever so upon our doing otherwise, shall I cease to regard the ransom of his blood-shedding, as the suffering of a substitute, while I have the positive testimony both of St. Paul and St. Peter to the fact, that " Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law, by being made a curse for us," Gal. iii. 13. that he " suffered for sins, the just for the unjust," i Pet. iii. 18, that "he died for our sins t," i Cor. xv. 3. " died for the ungodly," and " was delivered for our offences," Rom. v. 6. iv. 25. I VEN. ♦ I Pet. i. 18, 19. •\ *' Died for our sins," I Cor. xv. 3. vinp rav a/xaprtw* ziauh. We arc bidden to take notice that " the true reading of " Gal. i. 4. is tfftp rc^v tt, ■». and not uVtp : that the expression is very genera^* q. d. in relation to our sins. Of course Cvif, if it dif- fers materially from Trsfi, must be allowed its full force in the passage cited above from the first Epistle to the Corinthians. Whitby considers them as equivalent. See his Examen Var, Lcct, Version of the New Testament 14! I VENTURED to assert of the present Editors, that It would also be found that with them, " to bear sins," is not " to bear sins.'* Hebrews, ix. 28. they render " so Christ also was offered once to iear away the sins of many ;" which in the note they tell us, (from Newcomey) is to cause the for- giveness of them. This I do not deny. If he caused the forgiveness of them I should think he was instrumental in rendering God propitious, and appeasing his just anger ; but there is a great difference between *' bearing '* and " bearing away,* the sins of many. The generality of the w^orld would scarcely suspect how much is hidden from their view by this small addition to the words of the Apostle. Bearing away our sins may be 2i figurative mode of expressing the -pardon and forgiveness of them, but bearing them points immediately to the nature and cause of Christ's suffering. If his death merely took place in ratification of his promises ; promises, that is, of forgiveness to all who would repent and be converted, he might be said to bear away the sins of those who entered Into the cove- nant, by a figure of speech not inapplicable cer- tainly, but yet not very appropriate ; but if he alsa suffered as a vicarious atonement, and the Scriptures tell us he bore our sins, the sense of this expression Lect.Millii, and in his notes on Romans, viii. 3. he shows that th^i a!A.ufTiuv, according to the language of the Old Testament, signi- fies a sin-offering. See also Magee on Atonement, vol. i. p. 234 — 243, 3d edit, and his xxixth note, p. 245, in which the Arguments which the Socinians draw from the Scripture ■use of the prepositions aili, v-Trif, ^ix, and tts^i, are briefly but very sufficiently answered. See also Outram de Sucrificiia, Lib, ii» «ap. vi. § ii. p. 345. is 142 Remarks on the improved is singular and peculiar, and cannot be mistaken ^ it is not a figure of speech, but an exact and literal representation of a matter of fact ; it must not be altered or expunged therefore upon light grounds. There is another passage where the term bearing of sins is applied to our Saviour, viz. i Pet. ii. 24. Thus rendered in this Version; " who himself bare our sins in his own body on the Cross," which we are also told in a note, signifies, " he removed them and carried them away ; so Christ is said, Matth. viii. 17. to bear our sicknesses.'* This reference to St. Matthew may help us to a right understanding of the case, for St. Matthew himself happens to cite Isaiah, chap. LIII*. To this writer then we must have recourse at last to determine the sense of "bear- ing of sins :" thus then does he describe the sujfferings of the Messiah. 4. Surely our infirmities he hath borne : And our sorrows he hath carried them. Yet we thought him judicially stricken. Smitten of God, and afflicted. 5. But he was wounded for our transgressions j Was smitten for our iniquities : The chastisement by which our peace was effected was laid on him ; And by his bruises we are healed. 6. We all of us like sheep have strayed : We have turned aside, every one to his cwn way ; And Jehovah hath made to light upon him the iniquity of us all. * The Evangelist's reference is supposed to be to the 4th rer. of Isaiah, chap. LIII. That this makes no difFerence, may be seen elsewhere. See the references below j and Outram de Sacrificiis, Lib. ii. c. 5. 7. It Venlon of the New Tesiammt. 145 7. It was exacted, and he was made answerable, And he opened not his mouth. 8. By an oppressive judgment he was taken ofF; For the transgression of my people he was smitten to death. 9. Although he had done no wrong. Neither was there any guile in his mouth. 10. Yet it pleased Jehovah to crush him with af- fliction. If his soul shall make a propitiatory sacrifice, He shall see a seed, &c. 1 1 . By the knowledge of him shall my servant justify many ; For the punishment of their iniquities he shall bear. 1 2. Therefore will I distribute to him the many for his portion. And the mighty people shall he share for his spoil, Because he poured out his soul unto death ; And was numbered with the transgressors ; And he BARE the SINS of many ; And made iotercession for the transgressors* To bear the sins of any, is allowed to be equivalent to the bearing the punishment or consequences of sin, and this even by those who are particularly adverse to the doctrine of a proper atonement, as Syke^) Crelliusy SocinuSf &c. ; but this conU'ibutes little to the settlement of the question, because though they admit it in the case of a man's own sin, they deny it where the sin Qf another is conr cemed, 244 Remarks on the improved cemed *, and besides the forgiveness of sins jna^ also be figuratively described as the bearing away the punishment thereof : in short, by this last mode of interpretation it is impossible to fix upon any terms that may not be explained away ; but it re- quires an extraordinary boldness to convert a term that may be understood literally into a figurative expression, for the mere sake of getting rid of a doctrine, too plainly expressed to be misunderstood, were the words left unchanged. " To bear the punishment of another's iniquities,*' is capable of being plainly and literally expressed, and in fact is so in the prophecy of Isaiah. " To bear the sins of many," when understood, as it should be, of the punishment or consequences of sin, is as plain an expression as the former, and equally capable of being understood literally : but to bear away the sins of many is very different, and must be under- stood figuratively, while " to bear them away in his own body on the cross," seems to be too ex- travagant an expression to be adopted even by Unitarians themselves ; so that here the present translators suffer the received text to stand good, though they explain it away in their notes. The simplest method to be taken in adjusting this dif- ferenjce is certainly to ascertain, if possible, how far the literal sense of " bearing sins," that is, " the punishment of sin," is to be considered as the original sense of the sacred writer, or whether we are compelled to understand the eX' pression only in the figurative sense of " bearing sins away„" as the bodily diseases of men were * [See most of the commentators on Numbers xviii. where the phrase frequently occurs, j bonis Version of the New Testament, i 45 iforne away^ by our Saviour in his miraculous cures. We say compelled to understand it, because the present Editors imply as much in all cases, where their sentiments happen to differ from those of the generality of mankind. One short note is introduced to tell the unlearned, (for the learned cannot be so imposed upon) that whatever any given passage may have heretofore been held to inculcate, it does not really inculcate any such thing. It would be great waste of time to go over ground that has been so recently pre-occupied by others, and where all seems to have been done that we could wish or desire, towards the settlement of this particular question. Professor Magee, in his celebrated work, so often referred to, has taken such particular pains in elucidating this point of criticism, and in replying to all the most laboured objections of the Unitarian and Socinian writers, that I shall think it quite sufficient to give the result of his curious researches. He has very particularly examined the two terms employed by Isaiah KiJ^i and hlU, as well as the term used by the LXX, and the Apostles (^a,vcc(pspu'), and has fully proved, in my estimation at least, that the literal sense of ** bearing the punishment of others sins,'* must have been intended by the sacred writers *. * The learned Ludovic de Dieu, in his Commentaries on the four Gospelsj has the following excellent note on John, i. 29. Ids cifA,'joi T« 0ty Aipaiv T'/)ii CifAjC<.priot,v ra xos-jua. Est attpnv a^xc-^ Tiuv peccatum in se suscipere et portare, sic\»t Matth. xvi. apx- Tu 'cov rotvfov aiPin. Christus, qua Dens, aipa aiifart peccatum remittendo. Sed qua Agnus Dei et Victima piacularis, de qua hie procul dubio agitur, aipsi portal peccatum, portando expiat, expiando aufert, efficitque ut remittatur, est ergo hie a-pEii- turn J*}1^^, turn 73D. Esa. LIII. ubi quoque ptS^^ Jgnus vocatur, et dicitur Correctio pacis nostrae fuisse V^V "'P'^f ^psum, et Deus 13 y^DDj '"J^"^ >" ^"^9 peccata omnium nostrum. L One 14^ Remarks on the improved One conclusion he is brought to, is, that " the word KC^J, when connected with the word SINS, is throughout the entire of the Bible to be understood in one of these two significations : BEARING, i. e. sustaining on the one hand, and FORGIVING on the other. And that, in neither of these appli- cations, does there seem any reason for interpreting it in the sense of BEARING AWAY ; nor has any one unequivocal instance of its use, in that sense, ever been adduced.'* The meaning of the word bllD, is still more evi- dent ; where 7iot connected with the word SINS, it has uniformly the sense of bearing a burden, and in one of the only two passages where it occurs connected with SINS, its meaning is too palpable to be misundersood, viz. Lament, v. 7. *' Our fathers have sinned, and are not, and we have borne their iniquities," or as Dr. Blayney renders it, we have undergone the punishment of their iniqui- ites. Primate Newcome, the model of these trans- lators, particularly renders the Proverb alluded to by Jeremiah and Ezekiel ; " The fathers have eaten a sour grape, and the children's teeth are set on edge," in this manner from the Chaldee, " The fathers have sinned, and the sons are smitten.'* Jf the words used by the Prophet to express the *' bearing the sins of many" and '* the bearing the punishnent of ??iens' iniquities" may with greater reason and propriety, and more consistently with the general use of the terms in Scripture, be understood to signify the bearing the punishment due to them, than the mere removal of them in the way of pardon and forgiveness, we may reasonably turn to the other parts of the prophecy as well as to its accomplishment, to see if they co-incide most with the former or the latter interpretation. In Vet^sion of the New Testament. 147 In explanation, then, of these very terms, we arg told, that " God ?7iade the 'miqidtics of us all to fall 7ipon him,** who is said to have " bonie the iniquities of matiy * ;" he was " numbered with the transgress- ors \** " woimded for our transgressions, and smitten for our iniquities ;" " for our peace appears to have been effected by his chastisement, and -we healed by his bndses ;" he came to " give his life a ransoni for many ;" he was " offered to bear our sins.** ''He who knew no sin was made a sin (or sin-offering) for us** He *' redee?Jied us from the curse of the law by being made a curse for us;** He *« suffered for our sins, the Just for the unjust** He was " delivered for our offences,** " died for our sins,** " gave him- self for us an offering and a sacrifice to God -,** " His blood was shed for many for the remission of sins ;" And " we are reconciled to God by the death of his Son.** Surely any person who could be brought without prejudice to look upon these passages, would be naturally led to think that Christ " bore the punishment of our iniquities,'' in some manner as a substitute; not by a mere figurative removal of them, but by an actual endurance of the penal con- sequences of sin, in his own body on the cross. I say the penal consequences of sin, for in the strict sense of the terms, as Dr. Magee has himself ably observed, the word punishment cannot so well be applied to the suf- ferings of our Lord : see his xlii^ note, pp. 457, 458, &c. vol. i. 3d. edit. The learned author, whose labours I have thus * How far these expressions may be understood, as bearing a reference to the Scape Goat, the Professor also considers at length, sho\yincr how little advantage is to be gained by Uni- tarians, by_ insisting so much as they do on this particular cere- mony ; which, when duly examined, does not in any manner con- tradict the doctrine of vicarious suffering, and a strict propitia- tory Atonement. L 2 attempted 148 Remarks on the i?nproved attempted to abridge, examines as well the Greek terms used by the LXX, as the original Hebrew terms of the prophet himself ; and it is sufficient to state that the conclusion he draws, from a careful investigation of the matter, is as strongly in favour of a proper atonement, as the circumstances I have already touched upon *. It is impossible to go into detail at present ; a reference to the Professor's own books must be the utmost I can attempt ; and I can only conclude with declaring it to be my firm persuasion, that in positive contra- diction to the confident assertions of these Editors, when Christ is represented as suffering for sin, we are bound to understand," that it ivas by bearing the penalty due to sin. A few remarks from Dr. Outram's celebrated work de Sacrijiciis should be added ; upon the 1 2th verse of Isaiah, *' Fortium dividit spolia, pro eo quod tradidit in mortam animam suam, et cum sceleratis reputatus est, et ipse multorum peccata tulit j" he observes, *' ubi Verbis lis, ipse multorian peccata tulit, ea tribuenda est sententia, quse cum persona ejus convenerit, qui cum sceleratis reputatus, hoc est, ut nocens tractatus erat. Jam vero quando talis quisquam, quails quidem tanquam nocens tractatur, peccata ferre dictus est, quis verba ilia peccata ferre aliud quid, ac poznas lucre valere judicet ? Nullas enim res inter se magis convenire possunt quam poenas lucre, et tanquam hominem nocentem tractari. Qu^e omnis conve- nientla tollitur, si peccata ferre in modo posito vatis dicto nihil aliud esse, nisi ea auferre ac delere, cum Soci7ii sectatoribus dixeris." Nothing can be fairer reasoning than this j and it is what we * See Parklmrst's Greek and Hebrew Lexicons also, under the words a»*f;ft , ^^'^ and 7^D • ^"^^ Leigh's Critica Sacra, wnder Kva(pifu-. have Version ef the New Testament, 149 have continually insisted on : why was he num« bered with the transgressors, in so marked and ex- traordinary a manner, if his death was only requi- site, to verify his promises, or ratify God's covenant ? And let us remember, that he was not merely, and as if by accident, a victim of Jewish spite aud cru- elty, but the Spirit of God foretold it. He who said he should *' bear our sinsy'* said also he should be " tiumbered with transgressors ;" and he who said he should be " numbered with the transgressors,** declared that " he should bear the punishment of other men*s iniquities.*^ Should all this appear a mere figure of speech to the Soci- nians and Unitarians, yet was it literally fulfilled by God Almighty, beyond all doubt and disputa- tion. He *' bore the punishment of sin * in his own body on the cross ;" and the very historian who thus records this undoubted fact in the history of our Saviour, declares also, that it was for no sins of his own, but that he suffered, " the just for the tinjusty* Si-Kocioq uTTf^ aSixuv. Dr, Outram insists also on the several versions of Isaiah, liii. 6. as tending entirely to confirm the sense conveyed by the received text, and to set aside the Socinian glosses on it. " Quid enim hie interpretes Graeci? Kvpiog fra^s^ujUEV ccvtou rtzig a//,«pTt«? ?i|awi/. Quid versio Vul- gata? Posuit Deus in eo iniquitateju omnium nostrum. Quid Arabica? Dominus autem tradidit eum peccatis nostris. Quid Syriaca? Dominus fecit , tit occur rerent in euju peccata nostra. Quid interlinearis ? Dominus fecit occur r ere in eum iniquitatem omnium nostrum.'" Quid Castellio? Jova in eum omnium nostrum crimen conjecit. Quae omnes ejusmodi sunt versiones, ut * The present translators positively contradict this ; but, to use an expression of Dr. Priestley, " this should not prevent our judging for ourselves :" it is admitted by many opponents of the doctrine of the Atonement, L 3 Christum 150 Remarks o?i the inproved Christum sic, ut onere quodam, peccatis nostris grava- tum fuisse, poenaque vicriria affeclum doceant." Besides trying to get rid of the word " bcar- ifig,'* an attempt is made throughout this Version to dispose also of the word " Sins," so that I may fairly add that, with the Editors, sins are not sins. The Authors already cited may give full sa- tisfaction also upon these heads ; Outram in his replies to Episcopius, and Magee in his animadver- sions on the contributors to the Theological Reposi- tory. The design of the present Editors is, as much as possible to confine the meaning of the term sin, to outward uncleanness, the disqualifications of an uncovenanted state, or what are commonly called " Sins of Ignorance," to the exclusion of all moral evil or moral guilt. This is done to so great a degree as to call forth the animadversions of a very learned writer of their own party*; the attempt has often been made before, and as often resisted. Outram de Sacrificiis, lib. i. c. 13. § 4, may be consulted as to the disputes of former days, and Magee in his 37th note. Sermon i, on the more recent ob- jections of our own contemporaries. See also Whitby, or Heb. ix. 7. I OBSERVED, that intercession also with the Editors, was ?iot intercession. To prove this, I need but give the word they substitute for inter- * See the Review in the Monthly Repository for July last, before cited. [Sec also Mr. Rennel/'s Animadversions, p. 3 J, where he very properly reminds the Editors, that in certain pas- sages of Scripture, particularly Acts, v. 31, the Jiirs as well as the Gentiles are spoken of as Sinners needing forgiveness ; the covenanted, that is, as well as the uncovenanted.] cession Version of the New Testament, 151 cession in the received text, Heb. vii. 25. viz. in- terposition. This they are willing to grant is fully- implied by the word ivrvyx^ocvw. But this interpo- sition may be any thing but intercession. " It may perhaps mean," they say, " that Christ in his ex- alted state is exerting his power in some unknozvn ivay for the benefit of his Church ;" and Mr. Lind- sey supplies us with another conjedure about it, (supposing it 7nust be intercession,) " the perpe- tual intercession of Christ may perhaps be, the continual operation and effect of his miracles and doctrines in the world, by which men are brought to believe in God by Him, and to be saved." Now, I cannot help saying, that this seems to me no more to resemble a proper intercession (God being the object) than a seal resembles a ransom. But why all these objections to the term intercession ? The Editors themselves inform us, they are desirous we should not apprehend that this text, viz. Heb* vii. 25, " gives any countenance to the custom of offering prayers to God through the intercession of Christ." But St. John tells us, that " if any man sin, we have an ad'vocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous, and he is the propitiation for our sins," I John ii. The manner in which our Sa- viour exerts his power for sinners in his exalted state, does certainly not appear to have been so much unknown to the Apostle, as to the Editors of the Improved Version. An advocate implies inter- cession ; but an advocate, when it occurs in Scrip- ture, is not an advocate, it seems ; TrxpixuXrilog is a word, we are told, of very general import. " It may only mean, that Christ is the medium of recon- dliation'^ This expression, medium of reconciliation^ serves them upon all occasions j if Christ is spoken 1-4 of tj3 Remarks m the improved of distinctly as a ransom, a sacrifice, a propitiation, an intercessor, or an advocate, v.e ai'e triumphantly told, he is not either of these as such, but merely as *' a medium of reconciliation.^^ This is curious in- deed : ive say he is the medium of reconciliation, as our ranso?n, atonement, propitiation, intercessor, he. : and they reply that he is not any of these things, though the Scriptures tell us so, but " a juediiim of reconciliation." But however, (to return to where we were) St. John describes our Lord to be " our advocate ivit/j the Father ;" let us now then adopt what the Uni- tarians would substitute for intercession, and see how the passage would stand. " If any man sin, we have, luith the Father, Trpog rov tzxti^oi.," the tontimial operation of Christ's miracles and doctrines ill the world, by which men are brought to believe in God by him and be saved. This would be as nearly as possible nonsense, and therefore I will not dwell on it ; let us try the other. " If any man sin, we have luith the Father, Christ in his exalted state exerting his powers in some unk?iown way for the benefit of his Church *.'* Now this would be admirable sense ; but it in no manner ex- cludes intercession, and we have quite as great a right to believe it on the assertion of an Apostle, as to rejed it upon the unsupported suggestions of the Editors. Take Trotf^cc^AXr^oi; m its other senses, it would not so well apply ; " if any man sin, we have a cofu- forte r, a gidde, an instructor, with the Father;''* an advocate is the very friend we stand in need of %vith the Father, and-^si;ice the Editors admit his -* "Christ liveth to intercede for us." Newcome, Rom. v. lo. interposition Version of the New Testament, 1 53 interposition aho'ue^ we must incline to think it can- not well be in any manner but as our advocate and intercessor : that is, without going minutely into particulars, the analogy is sound and good. As a very sensible writer observes, *' the interposition of Christ, if not literally and properly intercession, is nevertheless analogous to it ; for what a proper intercessor is, between one man and another, that Christ is, between God and man.''* He is not Jigu- rativelyj but analogously so called ; which comes much more near to an actual reality than a mere figurative expression, as is admirably shown in Veysie's Vlth Bampton Lecture. It is fomev/hat strange however that they scruple not to allow that Trap-xATiTo? clearly signifies advocate when predicated of the Holy Spirit, though, according to their ideas of things, this ought at least to justify our prayers to that Divine Being. Their great object is to deprive our Saviour of all right to this act of worship. I do not deny that the Holy Spirit is in some sense our advocate, but that he is so in a different manner from Christy may be seen by con- sulting the following learned authors : Bcza on John, xiv. 16 ; Ludov. de Dieu on the same passage ; Pearson on the Creed, fol. 328 ; and Outran de Sa- crificiis, c. vii. 1. 2, where also is much to the pur- pose on the term iVT:\)yx^a.vw, which the Editors dwell upon. See also the Appendix to Magee^s Sermons on Atonement, third Edition, which every person should consult who would desire to know what Unitarianism really is, as described by its great friend und patron Mr. Bclsha?n. To conclude, as to the countenance given by the text Heb. vii. 25. to the custom oi offering prayers to God through the intercession of Christy I shall ob- serve, that we had better not lay it aside upon such weeik I_j4 Remarks on the improved weak authority, since at all events the text positively declares, as the Editors themselves render, that ** Christ is able to save in the- fullest degree those who come to God by him, since he ever liveth to interpose for them.*' If he is able to save to the utmost by his interposition uith God, and has expressly told us, that " if we ask any thing in his name HE will do it," we had better trust his word, and con- tinue to " ask in his name,^'' than puzzle our brains, and endanger our salvation by listening to what I must call the sophistry of these new improvers of Christianity. In Rom. viii. 34, they admit the term intercede into their text, but explain it away, exactly in the same manner in their note on the place *. TIIERE are two very particular passages which the Editors undertake to assure the public, give no countenance to the commonly received doctrine of Atonement by vicarious sufferings, and they allege that the world has been misled by the com- mon translation ; the first is Romans, iii. 25, 26, and the other, 2 Cor. v. 21. If I am to be ac- counted among those who have been misled into such strange notions by the common translation, * I cannot help adding a note from Ph'tlo^ of which I am re- minded by an Unitarian, Mr. Jones, who is disposed to think Fhllo a Christian : ai/ayxaicv yap rv to» jipi'^jiov Tu T« XoJfJiii €ifA.upTi^A.a.Tu;v xcti •)(fjpr,y\a.v oc^^ovurccTuv ctyu^uii ; which he renders, " It becomes him who is devoted to the Father of the worlds to employ as his intercessor his oiun Son, who is most perfect in virtue, in order that he may obtain the forg'iTencss of his sins, and the supply of every good," Jones's Jllustratiotis of the Gospels, I must Version of the New Testament. 155 I must declare that I am also incapable of being set right (as the Editors would call it) by their own rendering of the passages ; the first they translate thus,—'* Whom God has set forth as a mercy- seat in his own blood, to show his [Method of] justification concerning the remission of past sins, through the forbearance of God ; to show [I say] his [Method of] justification at this present time ; that he might be just, and the justifier of him who hath faith in Jesus." I must now transcribe the note upon it, first however observing, that they follow Locke in rejecting the common reading, " through faith in his blood," (which Ncwco?ne adopts,^ and this, because the words $ioi Tng-ico? are omitted in the Alexandrian and some other MSS., and " because they obscure the sense." Their explanation or paraphrase of the passage, then, is as follows :— *' The Apostle represents Christ as a Mercy-Seat, consecrated by his own blood, upon which the goodness of God, as it were, takes its stand, and declares his gracious purposes and dispensations to mankind ; see Locke and Taylor's judicious note upon the text. The word Ixarr.piou never signifies " propitiation," as it is translated in the public ver- sion *, but is always used, wherever it occurs, both in the Old Testament and the New, to express the Mercy-Seat which was the golden lid of the ark, upon which the Shechinah or cloud of glory rested, * Some authors, however, have supposed Ixccr^ciot to be r;n adjective, and that Su/^ta or hpn'jv is to be understood as a sub- stantive. See Magee's Sermons on Atonement, note 26, Ser- mon I, and the references there, particularly Archbishop Neiv- .^o?Me's translation. I shall add /:«o//j^r authority ; see Y)r. Priest' ley 5 notes on all the Books of Scripture ; the Doctor admits that *' thus it may signify a propitiatory sacrifice, under which ideJ, %\\e death of Jesus is represented in the Epistle to the Hebrews." ([See also much to the purpose in Dr. Lockman's Theological ^Discourses, Sermon ii''. vol. i, 91, 92.] and 1^6 Remarks on the improved and from which oracles were dispensed, Exod. xxv. 22, Numb. vii. 8, 9, Lev. xvii. 2, Heb. ix. 5. It must be evident to every unprejudiced person, that this beaudful allusion of the Apostle, which is intended to represent Christ as the 7nessenger of divine mercy, and the medium of di\'ine communications to mankind, gives no countenance to the commonly received doc- trine of vicarious sufferings, though many lay great stress upon this text, misled by the common transla- tion." To shorten matters; I am always willing to grant every thing that can be granted ; let then lAampjoi^ be the mercy-seat or propitiatory, and not the propitiation itself, as rendered in the received text ; and let all the references be admitted as proving what they are brought to prove, still there remains much to be observed upon ; and first, though the lAampiov or mercy-seat, was the golden hd of the ark, upon which the Shechinah rested, and from ■which oracles were dispensed, yet the mention of the blood of Christ in this text, points clearly to another circumstance relating to the Jewish mercy- seat *, namely, that it was at or before the mercy- seat, that the High Priest sprinkled the blood of the Sin-offering, to make atonement for those who desired God to be propitious to them. Whoever will be at the pains to read the xvith Chapter of Leviticus, must surely be led to think, that if the term Ixccnfiov should point to the mercy-seat, and ought not to be confounded with the lAao-^ao? or Propitiation, yet the blood must have a reference to the blood of the sin-offering, sprinkled before the m.ercy-seat by the High Priest, to make atone- ment, not merely for the mercy-seat itself, but * ** Sanguinis aiitcm nomen ad veteriun sacrificiorum figuram scs rcvocat, quorum vcritas in ipso Christo fuft." Ecza, for Version of the Neiu Testament. I57 for the Sins of the people *. I am not conscious that I have written a word, that is not warranted by the language of the xvith Chap, of Leviticus. The term for making atonement in the LXX has a relation to Ixois-T^piov. The expression is e^iXKfnrau The Atonement itself, therefore, would be £^jAa(r/A05 or Ixaa-fAog, which is equivalent. Now we know- that St. John twice speaks of our Saviour as the iXoca-fAo? or Propitiation ; lKx.£f)3i6i Ta? »(:xiz,-7i«-. This, they say, is a remarkable expres- sion, and so indeed it is according to their interpretation, for to propitiate sins is as near as can be nonsense : but if they would look into Porphyry de Abstinentia, they would find, that in Greek, to propitiate sins is to propitiate 10 Q-nv the Deity. See Whitby in loco. * It -,vouM surely puzzle any plain understanding to conceive, how these Editors can fancy, that nothing was required, nothing done to reconcile God fo man, when, after assuring us, Pom, iv. 25, that Christ "being delivered for our offences," docs nof at all mean that he bore the punishment of them to appease the anger of God, they yet proceed, Ch. v. i, to adopt the Apostle's lan- guage of our having peace with God through Jesus Christ, and ver.9. of our being saved from anger through him. But nothing surprises me more than their note on i John, ii. 2, a passage I have had particular occasion to refer to. *' And he is the propitiation for our sins, &c. Their note is, " lAacr|Oi'A the act of pacifying an offended party : Schlemner. Christ is a propi- tiation as by his Gospel he brings sinners to repentance, and thus averts the divine displeasure.''^ — So that after all it would seem God is the offended party, whom it is necessary to concihate ; but yet in their note on Ch. iv. 10, they again explain this away. Greek i6o Remarks on the improved "Greek is iig ivhi^iv rng ^myAOTVvrig a\jliif ha. tw vocpt(rit ruv Trpoysyovoiuv cijj.ccprvi^'iX'ruv, iv rr\ a,v9^ri tou ©£a. NoW I disapprove of the rendering rn^ hxxioa-vung aurx, his justification or method of justification, instead of his Rig/jfeousnessy as the received text has it. I think the common Version is better, though that indeed, as commonly understood, does not come up in all respects to my idea of the matter. In these two verses we have J^tKatoa-ui/yj? twice, hxcciov once, and SiyixiovuTu — -Just 7i.nd justification 2ind justify sound alike, but are not strictly so ; Just, and ?'igbteous?icsSf and justify are neither quite ahke in meaning, nor sound alike ; just, and justice, and justify would perhaps come nearest both in sound and meaning, and in correspondence to the Greek *. Suppose then we were to read it, " to show, or make manifest his justice concerning the remission of past sins through the forbearance of God. To manifest, I say at this time, his justice, that he might be just, and the justijicr of him that hath faith in Jesus." Past sins remitted through the forbearance of God, with- out any implied atonement, might have brought his justice in question. This then required to be vin- dicated and manifested to the world in its proper light : How was this to be done ? the text tells us, by setting forth Christ as his mercy-seat by his blood. The legal atonements made before the * And thus the Vulgate and Beza ; ad demonstrationem Jus- iitla su32ut sit Justus, et Jtistfcans cum, Sec. " Justitiae autem No- mine, (Beza observes,) intelligitur summa ilia Dei, turn in vindi- candis peccatis severitas, Justissimx ipsius Naturae conveniens ; turn summa ipsius et in prcestandis promissis fidee, et in Christi Justitia credentibus imputata miscricordia, sic videlicet in suos sese simul, et justissimum, et clementissimum, in suos praebcndo." This note of Bexa and the following are so entirely consistent with all that I have ventured to suggest, that I hope the learned reader will uot fail to examine them. mercy- Version of the New Testament. i6i mercy-seat under the Old Covenant were supposed to render those for whom they were made holy and clean, and to bring them into a state of reconci- liation with God, so that God could bless them and be merciful to them, and that without imputa- tion of his justice, inasmuch as by their sin-ofFer- ing they made acknowledgment of their unclean- ness, and of their subjection, and the atonement, such as it was, was suffered to stand in the pkce of compensation. Now all parties I believe are agreed, (though the Socinians and Unitarians carry matters in this respect much too far), that the offer- ings and atonements under the Old Covenant by no means extended to the expiation of all sorts of sins, or rather to the removal of the guilt of them ; and yet there was some remission procured by them. Whatever in the mean time was not fully and ade- quately provided for, must be supposed to have re- quired by analogy some greater and more precious atonement. If atonement in small matters was neces- sar)'-, it must, a fortiori, be still more requisite, one should think, in greater concerns. Since the Editors choose to refer to the Old Testament, for which, however, I do not conceive they have much respeO: *, but since they do, I must have leave to argue with them, that if atonement was necessary, even for sins of ignorance as they call them, and I may add for in- firmities and accidents that were natural and unavoid- able, how much more necessary must it be to remove the contaminations of moral guilt, and the impurities of sin and wickedness ? • Dr. Priestley chose to declare, that the whole of the Old Testament is throughout a most unaccountable book: but I may as boldly assert, that when separated from the CMd Testament, the New Testament is still more accountable ; both are smfficiently intelligible, when applied to illustrate each other. M I main- i62 Remarks on the improved I maintain that the blood of Christ was the great atonement that extended to all these necessities, sup- plied all the deficiencies of the legal offerings, justify- ing the former forbearance of God, by connecting the remission of past sins under the Old Ccvenant, with the remission of sins through Christ under the New ; in this consisted the great display of God's justice and mercy combined, which tl\e term *' Righteousness," when properly understood, ad- mirably expresses ; when the justice of God, that is, is fairly taken into account ^ the great object and concern of ail offerings and atonements. Christ was set forth as a mercy-seat in his blood, being the ex- press antitype and substance of both ; the Propitia- tory and the Propitiation ; to manifest God's justice^ that none should have cause to suppose that any past sins under the Old Covenant, for v/hich no adequate legal atonement was provided, were really remitted without atonement, but that all ■was done vidth a view to the great Christian Sacrifice, " at this time," that is, in the Apostles days, manifested to the world, that God might be just, that is, might exercise his mercy, consistently with his justice, and in that manner be able to justify or acquit * him which believeth in Jesus. The * The Editors seem to admit this sense of JiKatcw, (see Gal. ii. 24.) so that I need not cite authorities ; but I cannot help adding Doddridge's remark on the preceding clause, '^' that he might be just : " By jusi, Mr. Taylor would under- stand merciful, and Mr. Locke, faithful to his promises ; but either of these makes but a very cold sense when compared with t'lat which I have here given. It is no way wonderful, that God shcidd be merciful, or faithful to his promises, though the justifier of believing sinners ; but that he should be JUST in such an act might have seemed incredible, had we not received such an account of the propitiation and atone- ment. ' Version of the New Testament, 163 The learned Witsius has many remarks in his (Economia Fcedenim corroborative of this interpretation of the passage, see Lib. i. c. 5. § 33. Lib. ii. c. 8. §§ 10, II, 12. 17. One expression he uses. Lib. iv, c. 13. § 4. is very strong to the point ; he observes, that the sins of beUevers remitted but not expiated by the legal sacrifices, remained as debts upon the surety, which he was to pay ; " and therefore God,*' he goes on to say, ** who had already beforehand remitted very many sins, exacted them of Christ at the time appointed," Isaiah liii. 7. " to declare his righteousness for the remission of sins that are past," Rom.m. 25; and he cites Pareus on Heb. viii. 18. whose words are, that " the expiatory offering was not yet made, in which the remission of sins, where- with they were favoured, was founded." ** In the mean time," (I am proceeding with the remarks of Witsius^ " sins even remitted without true expiation, remained till they were at length expiated by the death of the Mediator ; which expiation being made, both their sins and ours were at last truly abolished in the judgment of God. Cahin uses the same way of fpeaking, Institut. lib. ii. c. vii. c. 17. ** For which reason the Apostle writes, that the remission of the sins which remained under the Old Testament, was at length accomplished by the intervention of Christ's death. To which Witsius adds, " This then was the first defect of the Old Testament, that it had not ment." See also Veysie's viiith Sermon, and Magee on Atonement. [Since the first edition of this work, it has given me singular pleasure to find, that the very learned author last cited, in the third edition of his book, published 1812, has not hesitated to declare, that he entirely adopts the interpretation I have offered above, being affured that it expresses the true spirit of the origi- nal passage, vol. i. p. 478.] M 2 the 164 Remarks on the improved the cause of salvation completed, and consequently not a true expiation of sins/* To the above may be added the following expression, which I find in the Hydra expugnata Socinianismi of the learned Maresius j speaking of the death of Christ as a debt due in some sort to Qod*s justice, he says, " Imo eo ipso debuit ilia mors Christi fuisse satisfactoria justitise divince, et, si fas ita loqui, Jiu Deo acquisivisse nobis bene- faciendi et remittendi nostra peccata.'* I have not dwelt upon the particular doctrine of atonement by vicarious sufferings in this place, because in my view of matters, it is undeniably included m the redemption wrought by Christ, and I shall have occasion to touch upon it hereafter. My only in- tention and endeavour at present, has been to show, that atonement being necessary in the dispensations of God*s providence, (if the Old Testament is to be consulted) and being expressly alluded to in so many accounts of the death and sufferings of Christ, the most plausible conjecture as to its use and design is, tbat God*s mercy and justice might thereby be brought £0 coalesce, and the former be enabled free5y to act, without imputation of the latter ; and the text before us, in my estimation, so far from giving no countenance to it, admirably explains and confirms this doctrine, shewing that God particularly set forth, or gave his son, Christ Jesus, to be a mercy- seat and propitiation both for past sins iuid sins to come, that he might be in all his proceedings just, as well in the remission of sins heretofore, or forbear- ance of punishment, as in the future acquittal and justification of believers. In this point of view the Editors terms, " method of justification,** would not be objecdonable. For tljts I do maintain to be God*s fartkular mode of justification, viz. in consideration 7 of Version ef the New Testament. 165 of Christ's atonement, ransom, and propltiatioii : — *' j-o," as our Homilies express it, " the justice and mercy of God did embrace together, and fulfilled the mystery of our redemption.'* And nothing I think could more concisely, and at the same time more satisfactorily illustrate this than the second passage, which they declare contains " no allusion to the commonly received doctrine of atone- ment by vicarious sufferings," viz, 2 Cor. v. 21, " For God hath made him who knew no sia, to be a sin for us, that we may be justified before God through him.'* Instead of " to be a sin for us,** Archbishop Newcome reads a sin-cffering^ which the Editors reject ; but without reason, for a sin-offering might be so expressed, as Whitby has well shown *, and Doddridge has not scrupled to adopt Vl in his Paraphrase. That we might be justified before God " through him," though an undeniable Scrip* ture truth, is not the exact rendering of the Greek, in this place, seems clearly to be used in the third of the senses mentioned by Beza, and to express the righteousness of Christ, by way of antithesis to the term a^aapTta in the preceding clause of the verse ; but this, so far from being adverse to the doctrine of atonement by vicarious sufferings, seems expressly to confirm it ; for if by Christ's interposition and for his sake, we, who were ** sinners and outlaws," are to be accounted holy, and rendered capable of heavenly blessings, the antithesis demands, that both sin and the penalties of sin should have been under- • They also rejeiS; the Primate's rendering of Romans, viii. ,5. " an offering for sin," ttspi af*aprta?, which however is certainly the term used by the LXX for " an offering for sin," as many most learned commentators have been at the pains to prove. M 3 gone 1 66 Remarks on the improved gone by Christ for our sakes. Now the Editors ad- mit the sense of the first clause to be, that " Christ, who had never violated the law, suffered death as a transgressor * ;" but why "as a transgressor," ex- cept in the way of vicarious atonement ? His death, in ratification of a covenant, did not require this, un- less they would insist upon it that the blood of the Old Covenant, which Moses sprinkled on the Book, Exodus, xxiv. 8, was the blood of expiatory sacri- fices, which has appeared to many doubtful ; but if it were, then Christ's blood also was the blood of an expiatory sacrifice, and this would decide the case as much against them the other way. That Christ should sufi'er *■'■ as a transgressor^" merely to ratify a covenant, or attest the sincerity of God's promises, I cannot understand ; we might surely say with Lactantius, Cur non saltem honesto aliquo mortis genere affectus est ? See Barrow* s Works, vol. i. p. 468. The allusion that they talk of to the mercy-seat, as though the goodness of God there took its stand, to declare his gracious purposes and dispensations to mankind, so far from appearing beautiful to me, seems quite the contrary, if this could not be without the unnecessary suffer~ ings and disgrace of an innocent person ; but beautiful indeed is the allusion, if I may infer that on Christ as a mercy-^^2X^ the justice of God * They have a way of getting rid of the imputation of sin upon all occasions: thus when the Apostle, Gal. iii. 13, says that Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us, their gloss is, " as it were a curse," but why " as it were a curse," if his death had no object but that of bringing the Genales into a covenanted state ? His ignominy and sufferings were not merely •' as it were " ignominy and suffcr- in'^s, but really and adually such. Newcome's notes support then^ certaioly, but this does not change the case. took Versiofi of the New Testament. %y took its stand *, that through him as sole propitia- tory, propitiation and propitiator, God might freely dispense his blessings of pardon and forgiveness to every contrite and repentant sinner. Then I can understand what is meant by God's making " him who knew no sin, to be a sin for us ;" namely, that through bis sufferings toe might be justified ; that is, acquitted and released without un- dergoing the punishment strictly due to sin, or without any mistrust of God's purity and justice. In this manner I can easily comprehend why God permitted his beloved Son, as the Author of the Epistle to the Hebrew^ tells us, " to taste death for every man," and under such particular circuni- stances, which I must still be allowed to insist, do not apply to the ratification of a covenant, (for this passage of " tasting death for every man,*' is .also considered by the Editors, as a mere seal of God's covenant). Before I dismiss this text of Scripture, I must notice one other circumstance relating to it : the Apostle plainly describes the Messias as oite *' who knew no sin;'* but the present Editors will tell you he knew sin as well as others ; not indeed moral sin, but legal sin, which they would almost have us believe .is the only sin the sacred writers ever intended to speak of. But their management in fixing the charge of legal sin upon Christ, is most curious and most artful. Since the death of Christ ?nust be regarded in any other light than that of a sacrificial atonement, * In the Prayer of Neemias recorded in the 2d Book of Maccabees, these two attributes of God are admirably brought together, Ky^u Kt^if 5 0c-o; ira-vluv xlir*; 3 ^ Jot.- '.;, >ca.i I.-wao-, m- xa.io<;, Kon ihi-ni^wr, tcrribilis et fortis, JUSTUS et MIS E RI- CO RS. M 4 they i6S Remarks on the imprcved they endeavour to make it appear, that it was in- dispensably necessary as a formal consecration of him to the priestly office. This they think is easily proved by the following passage, Heb. vii. 27, " who needeth not, as the High Priests, daily to offer up sacrifice, first for his own sins, and then for those of the people, for this he did once for all, when he offered up himself." Their comment is as follows : *' this he did,''^ i. e. offer up sacrifice, first for his own sins. But Christ in a moral sense was sinless. See ver. 26. and Ch. iv. 15 ; his sins therefore were merely ceremonial, that is, being a descendant of the House of Judah, ver. 14, he was, as to the Priesthood, in an unconsecrated state * ; and as Aaron was consecrated to his priestly office by the blood of animal sacrifices, so Christ was consecrated to his nobler office, " by the sacrifice of himself.** In the first place Christ was not called or conse- crated according to the order of Aaron, but ac- cording to the order of Melchisedec ; see Hebrews, * There is no small embarrassment in their account of Christ's priesthooc' ; if he was duly consecrated to the priesthood, one would think he was a priest, and yet in a note on Heb. x. 14, we are told, on the authority of Mr. Ijindsey, that it was no real part of his character. We are taught, befides, to believe, that his consecration was an Aaronical consecration, and yet he was not a priest after the order of Aaron, but of Melchisedec, I rather wonder, that in order to be still more intelligible, they did not conclude with Dr. Priestley'.^ final remark upon all these passages ; namely, that after all it is only by way oi Jigure that he can be said to be a priest at all ; being in reality no more a priest than he was a door, a vine, or any other thing to which he was occasionally compared. As an antidote to such unaccountable scepticism, I would re- commend the perusal of Dr. Outram's ist and 2d Chapter of his 2d Book de Sacrificiis, as well as the conclusion of his seventh Ch. de Intcrceseione Christi. vii. Version of the New Testa?ne7it. 1 6g vii. II, See also Ch. V. 4 — ii. Indeed the Editors fully admit this in their note on Chap. vii. 3, Secondly, The particular form by which he was consecrated is so circumstantially delivered, verses 20, 21. that I cannot avoid believing, that ^^ the sacrifice of himself " was not so necessary a part of that form. Thirdly, this very form is again alluded to, ver. 28, to show, not how Christ was consecrated according to the ancient forms, but how he differed from the Aaronical priesthood, who had infrmify, and \vere consecrated " without an oath." Our High Priest on the contrary, being consecrated with an oath, and being *' holy, harmless^ undefled, separate from sinners," ver. 26. Fourthly, so far from need- ing, as these Editors pretend, to sacrifice for his own sins, the Apostle says, he needeth not do so, ver. 27 * : but for the sins of the people^ he did *' offer up himself," £^;c7ra^, once. But if this should be thought to be an unwarrantable dividing of the text, and that there is still room to infer that Christ did offer for his ovm sins, in ofFerinp- up him- self, Grotius's exposition must be in part received ; namely, that by his own sins, could only be meant t • See Beza in loc. — \Wits'ius also, lib. iv, c. 6. § 58. Patrick on Levit. ix. 7. and an excellent note in Goadby's Bible on the same passage, Lend. fol. 176^. Some curious things, pai-ticularly 40 the point, may be seen in a work of Rhsnfc-rdms, entitled Comparatlo Expiatlonls Anniz/ers an£«, after the flesh, or in- deed according to the common course of nature, but Isaac, who came by promise, not so ; his birth was miraculous and §ia, rn? iirocyUxictq, out of the ordinary course of nature, and merely by virtue of the promise made to Abraham : so that if xara a-xpy.a, means by natural descent in this place, it is in the way of contrast, and so I think it is undoubtedly used in Rom. ix. 5. t ; nor can I conceive it to be. * See Lactantius en this, Lib. iv. § 13, and Joshua Allen's Sermons, 1751. -j" It is used so also, Ch. i. 3, and even in vcr. 3, of this very Chapter ; St. Paul evidently alluding to a spiritual brother- hood and connection with the Gentile converts. The article insertedj ver. 5, gives force to the exprefIion_, as Beza observes, ** Vim habet excipiendi alteram naturam divinam videlicet quam postea describit." Grotius's note also is to the pur- pose, " Non secundum t« 0hs» quod in ipso, sed secundum ra A>6fw7ruc.." This Virus v,ritten before the publication of Dr. Carpenter's Letters in reply to Mr. Veysie, who refers us^ p. 145, to ver. 3. to show that to y.xnx acc^na. does noi infer two natures. I see no occasion to vary my remarks. They are already as applicable to Dr. C.'s objections as I could desire them to be. used Version of the New Testament. 183 used otherwise ; there is no occasion for it ; it might even have offended those Jews who were incUned to study the types and allegories of the Old Testament, and cerainly must have operated against the calling of the Gentiles, St. Paul's great object and commis- sion. The same writer who could allege against Ishmael, that very circumstance of his being born Kara. or wv, but as the principal proposer of it ; Crellius is a dangerous author for the Unitarians to cite, because we know that he lived to retract his opinions; but as to this par- ticular passage, it is upon record that he did not agree to the alterations proposed by his party, but understood it as spoken of Christ ; no Epiphonema, nor to be pointed as Erasmus proposed, pee Maresius contra Volkeliumf lib.i. c. 23.J serve 190 Remarks on the i?nproved serve to be listened to ; but where the sense ap- pears complete, where it is even illustrative of what precedes, and where it is sufficiently perspicuous, plausible conjectures as to a different reading can only tend to confound matters. Had our MSS. and Versions supported the reading which the Edi- tors approve, m i-Tn Travruv Jt. t. a., v/hat an outcry would have been raised against any plausible con- jecture on the part of a Trinitarian, that perhaps the true reading ought to be wv. But it seems this would complete the climax, Civ »j utoOEo-ja, Hv 01 7ra,Tipi^, Q.V Xpifof, flu Qbo;. " Of whom was the adoption, of whom were the fathers, of whom was Christ, of whom was God who is over all." Nor is it likely (add the Editors), when the Apostle was professedly summing up the privileges of the Jews, that he should have overlooked the great privi- lege which was their chief boast, that " God was in a peculiar sense their God." If Christ were God, this great privilege was not overlooked in stating him to be so, and as we have shown before, no- thing could be more magnificently complete than the winding up of the climax, with the incarnation of the Saviour of the world. Besides, if Christ was the Ao^x Qns, which appeared to the Patri- archs, the visible Jehovah which appeared to Moses on Mount Sinai, as we have also endeavoured to show, he was particularly the God and King of Israel, and the glory of his people. So that to pretend that this privilege is overlooked by render- ing it as the received text has it, is a Petitio Principiiy and like all their other remarks, leaves the main question totally undecided. But " it is not likely," they would have us believe, " that the Apostle would pass over that great privilege of the Jews, " that God was in a peculiar sense their God." But Version of the New Testament. 191 But unfortunately for their argument, nothing could be 7nore likely, if we are to believe St. Paul him- self. The whole drift and purport of his Epistle is to break down this distinction, to induce the Jews to receive the Gentiles into fellowship, and not to reject Christ, through any prejudices to the contrary. This is no plausible conjecture to help us out of a difficulty ; it is plainly written, and needs no transposition of words or particles. *' Is He the God of the Jews only ? Is He not also of the Gentiles? Yes, of the Gentiles also. Seeing it is one God who will justify the circumcision by faith, and the uncircumcision through faith," chap, iii. 29, 30. That the true God was the God of the Jews, had been previously and sufficiently implied in the terms m r\ JjoOjo-ia ; the reading proposed therefore would not only have been unnecessary, but a mere matter of tautology, had it been so peculiarly the object of the Apostle to magnify this privilege of the Jews, whereas, to show that the Messiah of the Jews, was, indeed, uu nn, IIANTON ©toe, completes the climax in favour of the Gen- tiles, and admirably expresses the feelings of the Apostle *. * Dr. Middleton's Work on the Greek Article fliould be consulted on this passage ; and I beg leave here to return my thanks to the Reverend Francis Huish^ of Clisthydon, Devon- shire, for some references and remarks on it, communicated by letter. [See on the passage itself, Michaelis's opinion in Professoc Marsh's Letter to the Condudor of the Critical Review, 18 10. Note B.j Invocation 192 Remarks on the improved Invocation of Christ, and Prayer addressed to Him. WE might naturally expect to find some varia- tion in the rendering of those passages, in which, according to the received text, prayer and invoca- tion appear to have been addressed to Christ. The phrase tynxxX^fxEvot to ovofxoi X^ira, I Cor. 1. IS of course rendered passively ; but they appear to be not so particular about i-mv.tx.Xsfxivoi rov Kvpiovf 2 Tmi. ii. 22 ; or £7rixaAajtA£vo» aiixof, Rom. X. 12. : It seems therefore, that the question does not depend on this term ; but that they are agreed that it 7?iay be applied actively ; that it ?nay signify calling upon the name of Christ, as well as calling upon the Lord, &c. I have often had occasion to observe, that the criticisms of these translators all tend to unsettle things and to settle nothing. In the first Chapter, ver. 2, of St. Paul's firll Epistle to the Corinthians, to»? s-?nxoi\^[xivoig to ovoi/.oi T8 Kupia r,fxu\> Ijio-a Xftra, is inevitably to be rendered, " to all, &c. that are called by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ*." And in Acts, xxii. 16. where Ananias is described as exhorting Paul " to arise and be bap- tised,'* £7rjxaA£(ra^si/o? to ovofAoc th Kvpus, we must read * To be called by the name of the Lord, or of any person, is not an uncommon phrase with the sacred writers, either of the Old or New Testament. In the former, the LXXII ex- press it thus, as in Deut. xxviii. 10. and other places ; rt oo/jlx an iTTHitay^yirxi, iD' rnjt.xc. '. in the New Testament we have the following instances; Luke, i. 61. 0; xaXEilai tw 'Pofta7» rali;. — Acts, xv. 17. i.f,Toi-\ TO ovof*a /xh. JameS, U. 7. to xa^c^ mo^a. iittK>.-n^i\) t

the Versiofi of the New Testamejii, 199 the previous question ; and the term, at all events, proves nothing on the side of the Editors, against the common Version. The same learned writer very ingenuously confesses, that " as far as the customary scriptural use merely of precisely this phrase is con- cerned, the evidence decidedly favours the active or common rendering,'* and *' that no instance appears in the Old Testament in which precisely this form of expression is used passively " so as to signify the being called by the name, &c. There is one thing then I must observe before I conclude my Remarks on this subject. It seems clearly to appear that the Unitarians would con- sider invocation and prayer under certain circum- stances, to be proper evidences of Christ's Divinity. If so, surely it turns upon a nice point, namely, whether a particular word in a particular place is to be rendered actively or passively, either being admissible, and the active form most usual. The learned Critic in the Monthly Repository just cited, whose good temper and good manners, independent of his abilities, entitle him to every respect, however discordant our opinions, observes upon another occa- sion, that upon doubtful points, it ought to be con- sidered, whether the Apostle could contradict him- self in a point of the first magnitude, or err in a grammatical nicety. The question in this instance is not exactly of this nature ; but it surely requires consideration also, whether a matter of such magni- tude would have been left by the Apostle to the random determination of a grammatical nicety : he could have expressed the being called by the name of Christ in other terms. O 4 I COR, 20© Remarks on the impro'ued I COR. XV. 47. THE first man was from the ground, earthy, the second man will be from heaven, [heavenly]. This is the improved reading of this celebrated passage, and I find it strongly defended by Dr. Carpenter in his Letters to Mr. Veysie. They seem to have authority for the omission of Kupio? *, though Qriesbach does not discard it from his text, and the verbs introduced have the sanation of 'New- come. It is to the latter that I chiefly object. I have read Dr. Carpenter's remarks with great atten- tion, but I cannot feel reconciled to the emenda- tion proposed : he begins his remarks by a reference to ver. 21. for since by man came death, by man also cometh the resurrection of the dead ; and this he says so plainly implies, that Jesus was properly a human Being, that if he had not been called man^ he sees not how it could fairly be interpreted to refer to a superior nature. Now I must declare that it has always appeared to me, that there is a great emphasis in the term since, iiti\^y\, and though it may perhaps have arisen from prejudice, that is, from certain preconceptions with regard to general doctrines, yet so it is, that I have ever regarded it as introduced to account for our Lord's assumption of the manhood. " For since by man came death, by man also cometh, &c." Did Christ then as man raise himself from the dead ? and yet he is the First Fruits. Why could not God raise the dead without the intervention of the second man ? Why lay such stress upon the comparison, unless the manhood of * The learned and impartial Welh long ago rejected it. Jesus Versio?i of the Nezv Testament. 201 Jesus was singular and extraordinary, and connected • with some particular ends of providence ? It seems to me, that the exact force of the first comparison, ver. 2 1 . and of the introductory causal conjunction, sirsi^n, is shown, and illustrated by the expressions, ver. 47. The first Man, that is, Adam, is or was from the earth, earthy, the second man is, ©r was from heaven, or the Lord from heaven. The first man was miraculously formed from the earth, and therefore earthv, but the second, who is to eive life to those on whom the first entailed death, was not formed miraculously from the earth, but came into the world miraculously from heaven. I may be wrong, but such have been long the impressions made upon my mind by the passages in question. Why the second inserted verb should of necessity have a future force, I cannot comprehend ; it is alleged in- deed that ver. 22. ver. 48. and ver. 49. point this out so plainly as to be an irresistible proof of it : but surely our own resurrection through Christ may be future, and yet be as closely and intimately conneded with thejirst advent of our blessed Lord, as with his final coming to judge the world. Our own death must as long as we live be future, yet surely we owe it to the first man who was from the earth, earthy ; why then may we not be dependent for a future resur- rection on the second Many who was or who is from heaven, heavenly ? I confess I am too dull to discern the necessity that is said to arise from the construction of verse 49. for the future force given to the last of the inserted verbs, ver. 47. I even think the circumstances of the case, upon which Dr. Carpenter dwells, strictly require, that it should have a past or present force ; to show what our Lord is and was in regard to his original nature, CQmparatively with the nature and original of the first 202 Remarks on the improved first man, Adam. The assn?nption of the manhood by a pre-existent being is the point generally over- looked. Thus Dr. C. who commonly writes like a sensible man, and no doubt is sincere, uses an ar- gument on Het>. ii. 14 — 18. that seems to me to border upon absurdity : he thinks our Saviour's mere manhood asserted in the strongest terms by the Apostle, where he says, that since the children are partakers of flesh and blood, the Son also par- took of the same, " for verily he helpeth not Angels, but he helpeth the seed of Abraham, wherefore it behoveth him to be like his brethren in all things ;" but what a strange conceit it must be to talk of a mere man helping Angels, or to draw such a compa- rison, if the same Being could not, if he had chosen it, have passed over the seed of Abraham, and assisted Angels. EPHESIANS, i. To.~vi. 42. THE Editors in their note upon this verse take notice of Mr. Locke's suggestion, that •' things in heaven and things on earth," may be understood to signify the Jewish and Gentile world. This remark of Mr. Locke*s, say they, is both curious and important, and will serve to explain many passages in this Epistle, and in that to the Colossians, which was written at the same time, and in the same figurative style. But the question remains, is it after all a fgurati-ve style or not ? Mr. Locke produces some instances to prove it so, and I do not deny the force of them as mere instances, but as applicable to this pardcular Version of the New Testament. 203 particular passage, I confess, I think them of no moment at all. The beginning of Mr. Locke's own note, in which the above remark occurs, con- vinces me, that he had much higher notions of the original supremacy of the Son of God than would at all quadrate with the doctrines of the Improved Version ; he particularly carries back our views to that first rule and dominion of Christ, when the rebellious angels of heaven revolted from the king- dom of God ; but the Editors of the Improved Version will tell us that all this is a dream * ; that nothing can be more absurd than to credit these stories of rebellious and revolting Angels, which Mr. Locke (a pretty good judge of evidence) de- clares tj be plainly though not fully revealed in holy Scripture, and to be proved by " manifest Indications.''^ Archbishop Newcome expressly says, " the things in heaven and upon earth," mean, not only Angels, but all mankind, whether Jews or Gen- tiles. The amiable and excellent Doddridge cannot bear the confinement of the passage merely to Jews and Gendles : *' both angels and men," says he, *' were at first in sweet and harmonious subjection to the Son of God, the great Creator of both ; but Man having broke himself off from the society, the Son of Man by his humiliation aixd sufferings recovers all who believe in him, and in his human nature presides over the kingdom ; to which in the world of glory, they and his Angels belong. This interpretation," he adds, " presents SO NOBLE A VIEW that NO OTHER WILL BEAR A COM- PARISON 1" and in this we perfectly agree ; m- deed, I must have leave to say, that I long ago * They expressly say so indeed ia almost the very next note. endeavoured 204 Remarks on the improved endeavoured to vindicate this noble passage from the low and debasing interpretation which the Edi- tors allude to, in a work little known, but which I have still a confident persuasion, has much support from the language of Scripture, I mean my book on the plurality of worlds, entitled 'Et? 0£o?, 'Ei? Msa-irvii;. There I have taken account of Mr. Locke's opinion, and ventured nevertheless to give to the passage, and to the mediation of Christ, a compass and extent that may fairly be said to comprehend the whole universe. I would not say so much upon the sub- ject, but that I think I see, an evident attempt in this note to turn our views from the grand ob- jects which it is peculiarly calculated to set before us, and to lower the expressions relating to Christ, in this and others of St. PauPs Epistles. When this design is made so apparent, it surprises us to turn to Archbishop Newcome, and read the motto he prefixes to the Epistle, from the great favourite of Socinians, the learned Grotius. " Paulus jam vetus in Apostolico munere, et ob Evangelium Romas vinctus, ostendit quanta sit vis Evangelii prse doctrinis omnibus : quomodo omnia Dei Con- cilia ab omni isvo eo tetenderint, quam admiranda sit in eo Dei efficacia : reruni sublimitatem adae- quans verbis sublimioribus quam ulla unquam ha- buit lingua humana *." I will not say /'/ is trick to have suppressed all this ; but surely I may say, that it is good management, as long as it is not detected. ♦ That Grotius considered angels to be included, rnay be seen both by his note on this passage and on Coloss. i. 20, wlicre he expressly says, the terms imply '* pios Angclos, et pios homines." Ephesians, Version of the New Testament. 205 Epheslans, vi. 12. We are told in plain terms in the note upon this verse, that " this scenic representa- tion, borrowed from the oriental philosophy, is not to be understood literally." " Principalities, powers, &c. express a personification of all wicked opposi- tion to the Gospel," and no more. The armour, it is added, with which we are directed to oppose them being wholly allegorical ; the persons against whom it is to be used, must also be figurative and allegorical. If the armour, described by the Apostle, be wholly allegorical, I should fear there was no truth, no righteousness, no Gospel of peace, no faith, no salvation. I grant, that the gird/e of truth, and the breast-plate of righteousness, and the helmet of salvation, are allegorical ; but there is at least as much of the armour perfectly literal and real : but I am not inclined to argue the matter with the Editors ; I would only beg leave to state what ap- pears to me particularly objectionable, in so peremp- tory a negation of a doctrine hitherto generally credited. To go no farther than their own chosen authority, how very contrary is their broad asser- tion, that the passage is not to be understood lite- rally, to the sentiments of Archbishop Newcome ; *' against spiritual wickedness in heavenly things *," he conceives to imply EITHER the wickedness of evil SPIRITS exercised in things relating to * " In heavenly things," en toi? ETrypanoif : this expression seems to have embarrassed commentators considerably. It has generally been rendered in heavenly places ; I am rather sur- prised that advantage has not been taken of a various reading noticed by Griesbach, iv toi? JTroyj-anoiv. This would pai-ticu- larly accord with the popular opinion to which the Primate al- ludes, and which Scripture seems to countenance, namely, that tlie air or sub-celestial regions were inhabited by the evil spirits. This was certainly a Jewish tradition, and one which, as Mr. Medc observes, St, Paul was disposed to approve. Heaven ; 2o6 Remarks on the improved Heaven ; OR evil SPIRITS properly supposed to occupy the air ; OR SPIRITS originally wicked in Heaven. And he adds a note of importance, that " some of the ancient interpreters observe, that God has not assigned any dominion to evil spirits j but that men voluntarily serve them." Here then, perhaps, we are brought to a footing. The princi- palities and powers of these evil spirits may perhaps be as allegorical as the hehnet and breast-plate and girdle of the Evangelical armour ; but the spirits themselves may be as real and actual as truth and righteousness^ faiths and salvation. PHILIPPIANS, ii. 6, 7, 8, 9. THIS celebrated passage is sadly mangled by the-, Editors ; being in the form of God, we are told, is being " invested with extraordinary divine powers,'* see Lindsey's 2d address, — " did not easily grasp at the resemblance to God," oujt a/iTray^uoi/ ny»(r«To to iivvA Jcra 0r-,-, is " he did not make an ostentatious display of his miraculous powers," " divesting him- self of the form of God," only signifies, it seems, that he relinquished his miraculous powers, when he submitted to indignity and crucifixion j to be made in the likeness of men, means only of conwion and ordinary mortals, which is also intended by the phrase, " being found in fashion as a man." This is sad trifling surely, and a miserable specimen of scriptural knowledge. Dr.Carpe^iter's Exposition, in his Letters to Mr. Veysie, appears to me still more extraordi- nary ; he thinks it means, that Christ thought it no improper assumption to be " as God," because he was his representative ; he conceives, that ** being in the form of God," must be the same as being instead Version of the New Testament. 207' instead of God, and that it was even his dutyt there- fore, to claim both honour and authority, " as God,''* when he spake and acted as such. But, let me ask, did any other representative of God think it no undue assumption to claim honour as God, the Jehovah Ajigel excepted ? Dr. C. declares, that " there is not one expression in this passage which implies that Jesus possessed a superior nature * ;" and yet willingly allows, that " the whole ?fiay admit of a convenient explanation upon the sup- position that that was the case." Now this is as much as I want ; because, except Socinians and Unitarians, there is no denomination of Christians, I believe, that does not fully suppose it to h the case, that Christ did possess a superior nature, and was undoubtedly in a state of glory before he came into this vv^orld. " And accordingly, we are told as plainly as can be, that he came down from heaven, John, iii. 13. xviii. 3. xvi. 28. That he was before all things, and by him do all things exist. Col. i. 17. That all things were made by him : and without him was not any thing made that was made, John i. 3. That he was the WORD that was in the beginning with God, and was God. And besides this, the extraordinary loye of God in not withhold- ing his only-begotten Son, but freely giving him up for mankind, is spoken of in such a manner, as proves him to have been a much greater being than a mere man, though made for a little while lower than the angels ; and this is clearly intimated in the words of Christ to the Pharisees ; what think ye of Christ ? whose Son is He ? They say unto him, the son of David. He saith unto them, how then does David * See on the term vTrapyo^t, Middleton's reference to Sutdat, in his doctrine of the Greek Article, p. 539, in $o5 Remarks on the improved in spirit call him Lord ? saying the Lord said unto my Lord, sit though on my right-hand till I make thine enemies thy foot-stool. If David then call him Lord, how is he his son ? Matth. xxii. 42, &c: Mark, xii. 37. Luke, xx. 41. Psalm, ex. i. The texts, that can only be explained upon these princi- ples, are very numerous ; which the Socinians at- tempt to explain away into a figurative meaning ; but without success ; for he that shall without pre- judice examine their interpretation of the beginning of St. John's Gospel, will find it as far-fetched and as unsatisfactory as Dr. Henry More's Philosophical and Metaphysical Cabala upon the three first chapters of Genesis *." If I were to say that the Editors never read Pearson's Exposition of the Creed, or Bishop Bull's Primitiva et Apost. Traditio, &c., I should think my- self guilty of great impertinence ; and yet I am sorry to say, their endeavours seem to me to be directed to the burying of all such works in perfect oblivion. And this, I confess, is among the most prevailing motives that have led me to engage in this under- taking, that I may at least raise ?ny feeble voice of warning to my fellow Christians, not to suffer themselves to be seduced and turned aside from studies of this nature. Bishop Pearson and Bishop Bull were such scholai's as the world seldom sees, and perhaps, indeed, will never see again ; if the present enlightening system continues to receive so much blind encouragement. These two giants in literature, particularly Biblical Criticism, long ago complained of the received text, the one impliedly, the other in express terms, for inserting in this • See Ben Mord. Lett. — [Confult also the Tth Sermon of lVatcrland\ Lady Meyer's Lecture.J passage, Version of the New Testament. 209 passage, viz. Philipp. ii. 7, two copulative conjunc- tions not warranted by the original ; thus making distinct propositions, of a connected sentence, to the great disparagement of the important truth intended to be conveyed by the terms used. Here then we might have hoped to have received help from the Improved Version ; but far otherwise, the two interpolated conjunctions are retained without the slightest mark of doubt or suspicion, though they are both omitted by Griesbach, with- out a single various reading alleged in their fa- vour. By this error, (which 1 firmly believe to be a complete oversight, but not the more cre- ditable on that account) they are certainly the bet- ter enabled to confound the humiliation of the Messiah with his exinanition ; the difference be- tween these is sufficiently marked in the original, not only by the omission of the two interpolated copulatives spoken of above, but by the insertion of 07ie immediately afterwards, for thus should the whole passage be read — " Who being, (or rather subsisting^ iirccoy^m^y in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal * with God ; but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being made in the likeness of man.'* This expresses his exin- anidon, namely, the voluntary assumption of the form of a servant, and that in the nature of man ; and then follows, " AND being found in fashion as a man, he HUMBLED himself, becoming obe- dient unto death, even the death of the cross;*' in this consisted his humiliadon, subsequent to his assumption. of the likeness of man. Instead of this the Editors would resolve the whole into his humiliation, in that * See Pearson also on this, [and Ham?notid. — See also on the whole passage Macknl^ht, and Dr. Twells's Sermons, vol, ii, 259—261.3 P he 210 Remarks on the improved he suffercdy not exertmg his miraculous powers to effec- tuate his own deliverance 1 1 Griesbach, indeed, attempts to vary the punctua- tion so as to give some assisrance to their interpre- tations, though as it happens they do not avail themselves of it. He puts a stop after AkGpwTrof in the 8 th verse, so as to break the connection be- tween that and what follows ; but it appears to me that nothing can be more manifestly wrong. The copulative seems particularly wanted to introduce the terms tTccnuvuiTiv sauTov^ and therefore standing In all copies, before the words oi must be the only thing to justify such an opinion. For the passage does not in any manner say, that St. Paul's Colossian dis- ciples were personally or bodily united to the fulness of the Deity, but that in or through Christ they were filled or perfected : tv ccvtu aaTCixsi ttuv to TrXri^MfAOi TJi? ^ioTviTo? (rW|aaTiHw$-, IS very different from tri iv au]w ztr£7rAypwjU£to;. It appears to me also, that there is as great a difference between ivx -irX-A^u^-^i n; TTocv TO 'jr?:y}pco[j.a, t« Gta, Ephes. iii. i^, and the in-dweirmg of the Godhead or Deity^ a-ufAUTiKcc;, and as it is necessary to be very circumspect with Uni- tarians in regard to terms, though I have granted them above, the use of the word Deity instead of Godhead, yet I must observe, that Qeomg in the judgment of the ablest critics,is a word of the strongest import ; Beza, Leigh in his Critica Sacra^ and Park- hurst, all agree in distinguishing it from 0£»oT»if, as signifying not merely the Divinity, but the very Essence and Nature of God ; thisy says the Apostle, dwelt bodily or personally in Christ. Maresius contra Volkelium urges us to notice, " Apostolum non sim^ pliciter t»ic QEiornrog Divinitatis, sed tus ©eotiito? Deitatis, id est, ipsiusmet Naturse et Essentiae divinse, plenam habitationem in Christo asserere ; ne divinum dumtaxat ipsum statuamus aut ejus Evangelium, sed ipsummet natura Deum confiteamur." — The mere will or revelation of God cannot surely be said to dwell " bodily i'* in any person. Version of the New Testament, aij COLOSSIANS, ii. 2. I NOTICE this passage because Mr. Bryant, in hisr Tract on Philo Judasus, has laid great stress, on it, as particularly in proof of the divinity of our Saviour ; which he renders, *' to the knowledge of the mystery of God, both of the Father and of the Christ," but Griesbach, and after him the Editors of the Improved Version, omit the latter words, viz. " both of theFather and of the Christ," but upon very- trifling authority; upon no authoritycomparatively that would justify its total expulsion from the text, while as it happens, among his various readings, Griesbach produces some still more strongly in favour of Christ's divinity, as, rov (Bts ra tv X^ira, t* Qm er» COLOSSIANS, iii. 16. THE Editors adopt Griesbach's emendation of ©£w for Kupiw : ** with psalms and hymns, and spi- ritual songs ; singing with thankfulness, and with your hearts to God." The received text has to the Lord. Here Griesbach's authorities are undoubtedly sufficient to support his amendment of the text; nor should I stop to notice it, but that Dr. Carpenter seems to think the correction sufficient to point out the meaning also of Ephes. v. 19.; his words are jis follow: — Col. iii, 16, might be supposed to show, that %ii Remarks on the improved that Christians were directed to sing hymns of grateful praises to Christ, but instead of, singing with thank- fulness in your hearts to the Lord, Griesbach has, * to God :* — Ephes. v. 19., * Singing and making melody in your heart to the Lordy* is certainly am- biguous; but as in the corresponding Epistle, I find the Christians directed to sing praises to God, it is reasonable to conclude that the Apostle meant the same here,' — Letters to Mr. Vcysie, p. 228. I am almost templed to tay, that the passage ir Ephe- sians so pointedly distinguishes our Lord as the object of the Psalms, and Hymns, and Spiritual Songs there spoken of by the Apostle, as to explain the ©fw of Griesbach's text, Coloss. iii. in our favour ; certainly however, whatever was the real purport of the Apostolic directions, I have the positive testi- mony both of friends and enemies to produce, that the hymns of the primitive Christians did express Christ's divinity. The Author of the Mixpcx, AxQvpiv^o^, written about the beginning of the third century, observes, that not only the ancienter Fathers before him did speak of Christ as God, but that the hymns also penned by Christians from the beginning, did set forth the divinity of Christ, the Logos ; fuX[ji,oi (Tf os-oi Koci wSeci aSiXQwv ^to Tnrwi* ypoi,^iiO'iii Tov Aoyov ra ©fx rov Xpifov u^i/acri ^toXoynvriCf and the Epistle of Pliny to Trajan testifies the same ; quod esent soliti stato die ante lucem convenire, car-, menque Christo quasi Deo dicere. Version of the Neiv Testament, 2,19 I TIMOTHY, iv. 10. Ort nXTTixxfAiv iin, GED. ZXINTI, oj jci SUTHP The Editors renders this, " Because we trust in the living God, who is a preserver of all men, but especially of those who believe/* Newcome has, " the Saviour of all men," and though preserver is not altogether objectionable in this place, as in- cluded in the term Zoomp, yet the latter clause of the verse seems to require Saviour. Eras?nus has Servator ; Beza, Cojiservator ; Whitby contends, that eternal salvation must have been in the view of the Apostle, as well as temporal protection ; compare ver. 8. and chap. ii. 4. where the Editors very pro- perly have " GOD our SAVIOUR : " Doddridge in his paraphrase has both terms. I shall venture to make some remarks on the expression in general : " the Living Gody who is the rwT»^, or Saviour of all men ;" a term, which though it may include under it that of temporal protection and preserva- tion, is, as Leigh in his Criiica Sacra shows, a scrip- tural expression of singular importance. My remarks will be somewhat irregular, but yet by no means I trust unconnected. There are no two passages in the New Testament more contested than Act?, xx. 28. and i Tim. iii. 16. The difficulty in the first, relates to that Churchy (Ejt«A)io-ja;) which Christ ^^ purchased with his oivn blood.'* It is doubted whether it could be called r ExxXna-ia ts ©£3, — the church of God ; for though the stress is laid upon aifAarog lam, this comes to the same thing j authorities are ransacked, and it is determined, that of the several various readings '■- > discovered, »2o Remarks on the improved discovered, viz. the Church, ra X^ir», of Christ, — Ta 0£H, of God — Kuptsj 0£g, the Lord God — Qid xui Kvpiii, the God and Lord — Kyp»3 xai ©eh, the Lord and God — and Kvpm, the Lord ; St. Luke in all like- lihood wrote the latter : — let this be so. In I Tim. iii. i6. it is doubted, whether the Apostle could have written, " GOD was manifested in the fiesh ;*' here, however, the Apostle is undoubtedly speaking of a mystery immediately connected with the Church, (Ex^Xno-ia) &iz ^oovrcc, " of the Iivi?ig God.'* In the passage before us, i Tim. iv. lo. the ©£of ^upy or livifig God, is plainly called ? EK',iXv(Tix T2 0£a; (if not Acts, XX. 28, yet) i Tim. iii. 5. Ejt>cAvi(rja ©fa ^w>toc ; I Tmi. Ul. 15. ©£8 ^|Uj/Tof o-wrnpo? TTtzj/Tcov avSpwTrwv : I Tim. iv. lo. That Chxxrch. which Christ himself so emphatically calls MY Church, Matth. xvi. 18. Mr. Lindsey, the Editors tell us, has observed, that the sacred writers were not very exact in the application of the terms, " Lordy" " Saviour^" and the like, which they indifferently gave both to God and Christ, This indifference was certainly very extraordinary, in writers, who have occa- sionally applied the same terms exclusively^ and with a marked and pecular emphasis. Thus i Con viii. 6, as there is ONE God, so is it declared, there is ONE Lord Jesus Christ *." In Isaiah, xliii. II. it is recorded as the declaration of JE- HOVAH : " I am the Lord, beside me there is NO SAVIOUR." Ch.xlv. 21.; a just GOD, and a SAVIOUR, there is none beside me." In Hosea xiii. 4. " There is no SAVJOUR beside me *' and yet, John Iv. 42. we read, ** this is the Christ, THE SAVIOUR OF THE WORLD ;" Tit. i. 3. St. Paul wishes peace to Titus " from the LORD * The comment of Jerome upon this, is as follows : Si enim ut existimant Ariani, Deus pater solus est Deus^ eadem conse- quentia, solus erit Domlnus Jesus Christus et nee Pater erit Do- minus nee filius Deus ; sed absit, ut non sit, vel in Dorainatione Deltas, vel ia Deitate Dominatio, Unus est Dominus, et unus est Deus ; quia patris et filii dominatio, una Diviuitas est. Hierom. Comment in Epha. iv. 5, JESUS 222 Remarks on the improved JESUS Christ OUR SAVIOUR :" see also Ch. iii. 6, And I John, i. 14. we are expressly told, that « the FATHER sent the SON to be the SAVIOUR of the WORLD :" compare Rev. vii. 10. In short, these terms are so applied by Prophets, Evangelists, and Apostles, that I must freely declare, that the only indifference they seem to 7ne to show, is corroborative in the highest degree, of that opinion which tends to identify the attributes of the Christy and " the living God J the Saviour of all men ;" and to prove this point I should be content merely to appeal to the Epistles of Paul to Timothy and Titus : for instance : In that to Titus, ch. ii. 1 3. he speaks of the appearance, (^S7npocviioci/J rr,g J'o^nf tx fJt.i'yciXii Qsa y.VA XuTnpoi rif/.uy leo-a Xpj?a — " of the glory of our great God and Saviour Jesus Christ," as it may be literally rendered ; to say no more at present. In the second Epistle to Timothy, ch. i. 10. the same Apostle speaks of the appear- ance, (£7^J^a^:^a.:') ra 'Eu)Tr,oo<; yi[xuv Ir.TH X^ifn " ot OUr SAVIOUR Jesus Christ : and in the sixth Chapter of the first Epistle, ver. 14. of the appearance (^1-nrKpixvua.v) of our LORD Jesus Christ ; which in his time he shall show, who is the KING of KINGS and LORD of LORDS ; the very title given to the WORD or Logos of God: Rev. xix. 16. Again: 2 Tim. iv. I. we have " the appearance (sTn (pccvuocu) of the Lord Jesus Christ and his kingdom :** see also ver. 8. But Titus ii. 11 — 13. taken all to- gether, is very strong to the purpose, — for there are two appearances * in reality spoken of. One appearance v^^hich is to be the happy end of our hope : and another appcarancCy ver. 11. which hath already taken place. *' When »' Xji^»? ts ©sa, — the grace * See Cyril, Catecli. 15. cited by Mr. Wordsworth, p. 69. and Chrysostom, pp. 76, 78. of Version of the New Testament. 22% of God, (the Editors render it favour^ but grace is unexceptionably better), appeared to all men, teaching us that we should live soberly, &c. : Ne-rn^ comers margin, indeed, gives us instead of grace or fa- vour, the ** gracious Gospel ;** but how this gracious Gospel was manifested, except by the personal ap- pearance of our Saviour Jesus, it would be hard to show, considering that ihisjirst appearance seems to be actually so explained, ver. 14. " Who gave him- self for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify to himself a peculiar people zealous of good works :'* compare Titus, iii. 4 — 7. : and it must be farther remembered, that the saving doc- trine spoken of, ver. 11, 12. is expressly said to be, ver. 10. the doctrine, ra Swrii^o? -/i^aw!/ 0ja — of GOD our SAVIOUR. In i Tim. vi. i. we read, *' that the name of the Lcrd and his doctrine be not blasphemed :*' here Griesbach reads the name, &c. of God, ©fa ; and yet ver. 3. serves to show, that the doctrine spoken of was particularly the doctrine, ra. Kupia >j/Awv Ii^o-a Xpira. In Titus, i. 3. we have m l.oornpo? ^fji.idv ©fa ; and in the very next verse, ts Kvfus Xf i^age in the Septuagint, in his edition of that Version. Version of the Nc-zo Testament, 229 HEBREWS, xi. 3. WE have in this passage a remarkable instance ol the manner in Avhich, upon occasion, the differences between the Editors and the learned Primate may be slurred over. The Editors read, " By faith we un- derstand that the ages were so ordered by the word of God, that the present state of things arose not from what did then appear ;'* for this reading they refer us to Wakefield and Sykes ; adding however that the Primate takes the words in th^/popular sense, " By faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God ; so that the things which are seen, were not made of things which appeared *." As the Notes of the Editors are the chief engines employed against us, it is fit to consult the Primate*s Notes also as well as his Version ; they are not indeed always so friendly as we could wish, but here he argues the case for us, viz. Tbe world'] This term is explained in the follow- ing clause^ by the things which are seen : so that it 7nust be understood of the visible material worlds called into being by the it;(3rj or command of God. — I must confess, the terms t« (^XiTroixs^a. appear to me, not- withstanding all the endeavours of the Unitarians to evade their force, to determine the point against them. The Editors cite Roscnmullcr, as though he were an evidence in their favour ; but I am very much mistaken indeed, if he has not a comment upon it expressly referring it to the material creation. If they will still persist in rendering alw^af, dispen- sations ; see what has been said before of the ^xataM? ruv onui/uvy p. 224. * Supported in a great measure surely by tie following read- lEg, 2 Mac. Vll. 28. uiici) ffi) TiKtot, avxc?\;-^ai\x ek Tof tifcivcv lem Ti]» yvt Kxi T« i> aVTi/tj iSovlai, yvuviti, on i^ ax diluv fTioir^aif avla i 0e»;. Q 3 23© Remarks on the improved HEBREWS, xii. 26. ANOTHER instance similar to the above we have in the very .next chapter, where the Apostle re- fers to the delivery of the Law on Mount Sinai. Nothing surely can be more evident than that in the Jewish phraseology, (to which the Editors pro- fess to have a particular respect in their interpre- tations) he who delivered the Law on Mount Sinai was the Angel of the Covenant^ and therefore the Primate himself, in his note on ver. 26. chap. xii. expressly observes, *' This favours the supposi- tion, that our Lord was the Angel of the Covenant who presided at giving the Law.'* But the Editors endeavour to elude this by inserting the word God without any authority whatsoever in ver. 25. ^Xiinre fx-A 7rx^cx,iTr,G-r,(r^c tov XaXcjvrx, which Newcome and others render, " See that ye refuse not Him who speaketh," they render, *' See that ye refuse not Go^l who speaketh." That this is done with a design to lead the unlearned away from any such conclu- sions as would follow from a right understanding ot the Jewish phraseology and tenets, is very evident, because no other cause could lead to such an altera- tion ; him who speaketh being quite sufficient to answer their ends, if the context did not strongly imply that Christ was the person alluded to through the whole passage. In Jewish phraseology, there- fore, I shall venture to say, so far from really evading this conclusion they strengthen it ; for if " Him who speaketh" mean, as they say, God, then Christ is God, the Jehovah Angel *, the Angel of the * " The Jehovah Angel of the Old Testament is no other than He, who in the fulness of time, was incarnate by the Holy Ghofl Version of the N£w Testame7Tf. 23 1 The Covenant, who gave the Law and instructed the Prophets.; and the language of the Apostle is truly consistent with what the most eminent writers of antient times, both Jews and Christians, believed and taught. Ghost of the Virgin Mary." See Bishop Horslev's Hosea. Ann Mr. Bennet, a writer whom his Lordship particularly commends, observes, " Since the world begiin, Messiali has asppeared under ■different characters, and suited to the different prevailing dispen- sations of the C!uux-h. During the ages preceding his incarna- tion, he was termed " the Angel in whom Jehovah put his Name." The Angel of his face, who calls himself Jehovah, and to whom, as we see in the case of Moses and Joshua, divine ho- nours were paid — honoiirs which created Angels, so far from de- manding, are rather represented as declining^ whom the Jewish ■Church, in her latter period, termed the M'lmra or Word of Je- hovah." [Dr. Gill also in his comments, particularly on Gen. xii. 7. XV. I. and xvi. y. lo. 13. contends, that Avhenever there was any visible appearance of a divine person, under the cln dispensa- tion, it seems to be always of the essential WORD, that was to l)e incarnate, and who s^jake with an articulate voice ; see also Scott's, Henry's, Goadby's, Marchant's, and Clarke's Bible, on all these passages.] I am almost tempted to cite Dr. Carpenter him- self in proof of the same point, for thus he paraphrases John, i 3. *' He was the agent in all the wonderful manifestations of divine power and goodness, which have been made to us : in every one he •was the agent ;" could a Jewish writer say this, in the Unitarian sense of the terms ? or could any Je'w undcistand it so ? I must declare, nothing to me can appear more laboured, or more distant from the truth, than the Unitarian paraphrases of this Proem, if really understood as they intend therri. I am happy to find from Dr. Carpenter's Summary, that he considers the equality of the Son iviih the Father, the proper Deity of the Son and his pre-exist- encey all countenanced by the ?/j«rt/ translation of this introduction. Me calls it of course a w/j-translation ; but who that can read Greek is bound to believe liim^ upon his mere v\ord.'' Dr.C. himself does not, I cojiceive, expect it, since he deals otherwise with us. Q4 232 Remarks on the iftipraved I PETER, iii. 19. THIS passage has pretty generally been thought to allude to an antecedent interposition of Christ, when he appeared on the earth, not incarnate, but as the Jehovah Angel ; and this the Primate expressly confirms, " by which spirit (see ver. 18.) he as the representative of Jehovah appeared on earth, and warned the old world of their guilt and impending punishment." Gen. vi.-^'* He warned, I say, the spirits now kept in custody, or safeguard, compare c. i. 5. [Svtt^J Syr. in hades, in the separate invisi- ble state, to the judgment of the last day ; see Bezay Schmidius, and Eisner. Or, by which spirit he inspired Noah, and thus in effect went, [compare iX^m, Ephes. ii. 17,] and preached, &c." Such is the Pri- mate's own note upon the passage, and his rendering of ver. 19, (which the Editors indeed add,) is, " by which also he went and preached to the spirits nozo in prison." But the Editors Version has it, " by which after he was gone he preached to the spirits in prison." And though it is so plainly specified by the Apostle that the period alluded to \\2s formerly, ttots, even tv ny^spxig Nuis, in the days of Noah, yet the Editors declare it was otherwise ; that the allusion to those days is merely in the way of comparison, and only means that Christ preached riot to the same individuals, but to men like them, in the same cir- cumstances, to their descendants, &c. And for this they cite Mr. Lindsey, as sufficient to stand alone against the Pr'miate and all those whom he cites by name, not to mention the numbers of other most able writers who perfectly agree with him ; of whom most particularly I must have leave to refer the reader to the Version of the New Testament. 233 the learned VVitsius, who, in lib. iv. ch. 2. of his ad- mirable work, the Q^cono/iiia Fcederum, §§ 8, 9, 10, 11. ably refutes Grotius on the very points insisted upon by the Editors of the Improved Version. As to my- self, I have already said, that I cannot trust so im- plicitly to Mr. Lindsey's Criticisms as the Editors seem to expect ; and I hope upon this particular point any person capable of reading Latin will have wisdom enough, instead of being contented with Mr. Lindsey's Sequel, to consult Beza*s long and excellent note upon the passage, to which the Pri- mate (so much more properly) refers us. — Bishop Pearson on the Creed, fol. Edit. 1 1 2. should also by all means be consulted. It is the more neces- sary to point these things out to the reader, be- cause Dr. Carpenter, in his Letters to Mr. Veysie, approves and supports the construction put upon these passages by the Editors of the improved Ver- sion ; and on this particular text ventures to assert, that it can have no reference to the pre-existence of Christ *. I still appeal with confidence from * The Doctor contends alfo for the Unitarian sense put upon John, viii. 58. He insists upon it, that in the plain and obvious sense of words, the assertion I am he (which latter term is an interpolation of their own) refers to the time actually present, and not to the time before which Abraham existed. I can only say, if this is so, there was neither arg\iment nor answer in the reply of our Lord. Bishop Pearson on the contrary says, the nature of the place absolutely reqmreth that it should not denote a present being, but 2^. priority of existence; see him cited by New- come. That Bishop Pearson understood not the plain and obvi-.ui sense of words, would be a most extraordinary inference ; yet so it must be if Dr. Carpenter is right. But what says the Primate^ who particularly cites Pearson ? he adds to the testimony of the latter as follows, " or there may be a reference to the name which God assumed, Exod. iii. 14. Eyu H[xi uv, I am He that is: cur Lord having been the visible Jehovah under the dispr 'saiicns pre- ceding the Evangelical." This great truth meets us so at every point, that I hope it will be duly attended to by all into whose kands Unitarian tracts may fall. Dr. 2^4 Remarks on the bnproved Dr. C. and Mr. Lindsey, and the improved Version^ to Beza^ Pears on^ Newcome, &c. — in proof of this point. As to the general interpretation of the pas- sage, I well know that critics have been more divided upon it than in regard to almost any other text of Scripture ; I only wish to obtain a hearing for the commentators who may be cited in favour of the pre-existence of Christ, in answer to those to whom the Editors refer the reader with such confidence, in direct opposition to their chosen model Archbishop Nc'wcome. 2 PETER, i. I.— TITUS, ii. 13.— JUDE, v. 4. THOUGH when I first sent my Remarks on the Improved Version to the Editors of the Brit. Crit., I had forborne to notice the example drawn from this passage in illustration of Mr. Sharp's Canon, because the Editors had marked this book of Scripture as a disputed one, (see Brit. Crit. Vol. xxxiv. 171.) > Y^t 1 shall now offer some remarks upon it, because in Dr. Carpenter's late work he has declared that my reliance upon that canon is alone sufficient in his eyes to prove the weakness of the cause I support. Much as the learned are obliged to Mr. Sharp (see p. 60.) for recalling their attention to tliis subject of criticism ; yet I am confident that pious and good man would ra- ther forego the distinction bestowed on him, in having it called his Canon, than that any ill use fliould be made of it : it is not Mr. Sharp's invention ; it ig no rule of modern discovery ; it is no newly de- vised Canon of Criticism at ail ; it is ancient ; was approved, and acted upon, by numbers before Mr. Sharp was born, or heard of. This is well known TO the learned but not to the unlearned, and it is for Version of the New Testament, 235 for the latter that the Unitarians are now preparing their books ; the real state of the case therefore should if possible be pointed out to them ; they should be made to understand that the old English editions are more conformable to the Greek ori- ginal * ; see them cited upon this passage by Mr. Sharp as excellent testimonies in his favour. " In the Righteousness that cometh of owe God and Sa- viour Jesu Christ,''* fol. edit. 1549. *' Through the Righteousnessc of our God and Sa-vinur Jesus Christy" i2mo. edit. 1595. *' By the Righteousnesse of our God and Sa-viour Jesus Christy" 4to. edit. 1599. *' The Righteousness of Jesus Christ our God and v)rtzw?/r,"" margin of the fol. edit. 161 1. See also Mr. CrutwelTs references (in his English Bible with Bishop Wilson's notes) to the Versions of Wiekliffe, Coverdale, Matthews, Cranmer, the Bishop's Bible, Geneva, and Rhenish Bibles, for the reading " of our God and Saviour Jesus Christ.'* The same author refers to Doddridge, Wesley, Scattergoody and Purver ; (to the above Mr. Middleton adds Tindal.') What strange work it is, after this, to re- present it as any new prop lately adopted in aid of * " As far as the Greek merely is concerned, it is admitted that it is a justifiable reading." Carpenter's Letters to Vey'-ie, 49. — As far as the Creek is concerned 1 Then, '^ our God and Saviour Jesus Christ," is also justiiirible undoubtedly, as far as the Etigl'ish is concerned. Eut if the Greek of Greek writers, and the English of English writers must, to be made into sense, undergo the revision and correction of Dr. Carpenter, then, before we may- trust to either, we must need all go to school again to Dr. C. I wish not to be rude ; but indeed, I cannot give up both Greek and English to Dr. Carpenter, when he admits that our sense is justified by the idiom of either language ; his concession is com- plete as far as the precise language of Scripture is concerned. He admits as much also with regard to Rom. ix. 5. Inhis Summary, however, p. lOO. he expressly calls the rendering of 2 Peter, i. i. ?in iinjiatifiahk rendering ; this is not fair. the 236 Reinarks o?i the improved the Trinitarian cause. It appears to be an old esta- blished canon *, that has been departed from, and which therefore deserves to be recalled to the notice of mankind. New translators are the very people we have to fear, as has been the case before : I shall give two instances of it, which may at once serve to show a striking correspondence between the present and former times, and the importance long ago attached to the canon on a similar oc- casion. Dr. Twells, to whom I have often before referred, thus comments then on the New Ver- sion that appeared in his days, viz. 1729. 2 Pet. i, I. " It is observable," says he, " that the absence of the article before 2wT»i/>of makes it evident, that God and Saviour are both 07ie person^ as above, Tim. ii. 13 : — but notwithstanding the New Versioii makes them two, " through the veracity of God and of Jesus Christ.'* 1 Peter, iii. 18. we have the very same construction, iv ^tx^in xoct yyaa-n TH Kvput vfAuv x«i (TUTTipoi; Iyktu X^irH' Here both Grotius and our translator make but one person spoken of. And the most probable reason of this exposition, where the construction is perfectly similar, is, that they are willing to own Jesus Christ for their Lord, but unwilling to admit him for their God ; whilst the Scrip- ture in these passages alike declares both or neither. Our translator, to make sure work with the place be- fore us, has dropt the words r/^wv xa» curveos in his Version, plainly because they favoured the orthodox sense of the place." The comment of the same learned writer t on Tit. * Mr. Sharp's principal rule must always be understood. ■j- Dr. Twells is particularly mentioned by Wolfius, as agree- ing with Bishop Bull, Calvin, and Vitringa, in supporting this sense of Tit. ii. 13. Wolfius's own remark is very strong to the Version of the New Testa?nent. 237 Tit. li. 13. to which he refers in the above, is as much to the purpose." *' Expecting the blessed Hope and glorious ap- pearance of our great God and Saviour Jesus Christ." — " This is the literal rendering of the Greek, Ua-H Xpifss. So tliat Jesus Christ is here called the great God. But the new interpreter gives us a different version thus, the glorious appearance of the supreme God and of our Saviour Jesus Christ. But first fn-Kpao/iix is an expression never applied to the Father^ (though Grotius affirms it without any proof,) but only to the glorious and last coming of the Son *. Secondly, there is no article before l'wT»i/)or, as there would have been if the Saviour had been a different person from the Supreme God, and therefore they are both the same. Grotius indeed upon this occasion tells us, that the article is often omitted by St. Paul, where it regularly should be expressed ; but he neither does nor can produce one instance of such omission, where it endangers the confounding of two distinct persons, so that Tit. i. 4, is no exception to us, because irxr^oq being added to ©£8 prevents all possible mistake, though the the purpofe. " Articulus xa prnsmittendus fuisset voci a-coTr.poi:, Tit. ii. 13. siquidem hie a ^lyoL-Kw ©-w, distingui debuisset." Drusiiis also on the same text says, " non solum Deus, sed etiam Dtus Magnus vocatm" hie Cliristus." See the 3d Appendix to the 3d Edit, of Sharp on the Greek Article. Basil, contra Etinom. See Wordsworth's Letters ; see also his citation from the Homilies of Chrysostom, p. 80. Mr. Wordsworth's authorities for the reading of this passage, as amended by Mr, Sharp, are so very numerous and particu- lar, that I confess I am astonished how it can be any longer doubted : those who have not read his book ought to know that he produces no less than 54 Greek authorities for it, ex- tending from the fecond to the 1 2th Century, a period of nearly a thousand years. article 238 .\v Remarks on the improved article be omitted ; but In the passage before us, the article is necessary to the sense of the 'New Version, and therefore would certainly have been inserted, if any such sense had been intended.'* It is certainly somewhat remarkable, but perfectly true, that the book from which I make the above extracts, though long known to the learned, did not only not come into my possession, till long after my Remarks in the Brit. Crit. had been printed, on which Dr. Carpenter has commented so severely, but actually not till after I had procured his own book in which his censure of me appears, and in which he speaks of Mr. Sharp's Canon as though all the Trinitarians were eagerly catching at it, as the last hope of their cause ; a cable newly thrown out to them when in the very act of sinking. Let the world then judge whether this be so. Seventy-four years ago it appears the same Canon was applied *, under €%actly the same circumstances, viz, in reproof of a too venturesome translator ; and had it been so manifest a proof of a zveak cause, as Dr. C. would insinuate it to be, how shall we account for the Uni- tarians not having made a greater progress in the interval that has elapsed ? How shall we account for their extreme jealousy of Mr. Sharp's interference of late, except that thev are afraid of his own refe- ;rences to ancient versions, and lo?ig established au- thorities? It is hwifair to add one more comment from the same learned writer, on another passage which the present Editors have converted to their own pur- poses, viz. Jude, ver. 4. ** The New Text, says ♦ Sec also Jone3 on the Trinity, Art. XIII. XL, a late edition of which was published 43 years ago. Dr. Version of the New Testament. 239 Dr. Twellsy runs thus : tov ^q\/ov iii|«,wv I}5o-ai/ Xpirof a^vsfAHioi : denying our only Master, God and Lord, Jesus Christ." But such a Hteral translation hurts Arianism ; (the Author had not to do with perfect Unitarians ;) " for which reason," (he proceeds,) the translator takes leave of the text, and gives us his own English prejudices. ** And renounce," says he, " their only Master, and Jesus Christ our Lord." First, he puts in the word their^ to which nothing answers in the Greek % next he overlooks ©jok in his Version *. Lastly, he makes (Tfo-TroTTiv denote God the Father, though Grotius explains it of the 5o/.', and the parallel place, 2 Pet. ii. I , makes this explication necessary, for there it is said of this very sort of men, that they deny jQv oiyojiix^o)/rx aura? ^bo-ttotw, their Master that bought «r redeemed them. The present Editors, I must confess, upon these points, have done all they could to puzzle me. Firsts they render the passage in Jude, " denying the only Sovereign, and our Lord Jesus Christ." Which is completely open to the correction of the criticism above. But in referring to 2 Peter ii. i, which Dr. Twells calls a parallel passage, and in which he concludes it to be indisputable that isu-Trorvv is pre- dicated of Jesus Christ, I not only find the whole Chapter marked by the Editors as spurious, con- trary to Griesbach and Newcomey their two prime * ©sov IS certainly omitted in MSS. of high authority, but Mr. Sharp has shown that this would not alter the case ; indeed it would not, according to the argument of the greatest adver- saries of the canon ; for they contend so strongly for the exclu- sive application of the term Sia'7i-o\;:<; to the Father, that if La-woln» alone can be shown to be connected with XDftcv, i. x. the case is proved, and the omissiou of Qio» only makes it more evident. 6 authorities. 24d Remarh on the improved authorities, but I find them rendering it, the Sovereign Lord ivbo bought them^ and informing us in their note that Dr. Whitby interprets this of God the Father, who only is called Afo-TroTn? in the New Testament. Dr. Whitby's comment is not much to the purpose, and I wonder at the Primate's noticing it as he does ; to refer to Deut. xxxii. 6. and Exodus, xv. 1 6. as a passage at all correspondent to i Cor. vi. 20, is sufficient at once to invalidate all the criticism. In the latter a price is spoken of, and the term is 7iyo^«r~^To.- and e «3-;)(;aT&?. Newcome and the Editors partly correct this, reading it, <' I am the first, and the last ; and he that lived :" but i very learned writer, Mr. Bennett of Carlisle, in his book en- titled Olam. Hanesbamotb, conti-nc's for its being read, " I am" the First and the Last, and the living Being ; but I was dead, &c.'' comparing it with Isaiah, xliv. 6, " I am the First and the Last, and besides me there is no God :" see also Sharp on the Article. difference Version of the New Testament, 257 difference being, that he has who for that in ver. 8» and unto instead of to before the several churches^ ver. 1 1 . How very trifling, after this, does Mr* Belsham's triumph over his Arian friend Mr. Car- penter, appear, when he so exultingly enquires, (see his Letters on Arianism, 1808, p. 77,) " Did he never hear that the church of God, Acts, xx. 28, was wrong ? and also God was manifested in the jQesh, I Tim. iii. 1 5 ; and, to add no more, that Rev. i. II, " I am Alpha and Omega, the first and the last,'* which Dr. Doddridge solemnly records in his note upon the passage, " as having done more than any other in the Bible towards preventing him from giving into the scheme, which would make our Lord Jesus Christ no more than a deified creature,*' is plainly proved an interpolation ; and as such is left out in the corrected text of Griesbach, and the Version of Archbishop Newcome : — And lo ! it was left out 95 years ago in the corrected text of the learned Edward Wells, and in his Version also, yet does he not hesitate to give the very same words to Christ, Ch. xxi. 6, xxii. 13 ; and to receive them as indisputable evidences of Christ's divinity ; and I will venture to say, the learned Doddridge would have done the same, had this new discovered interpo- lation, (as Mr. B. seems to consider it) been pointed out to him ; for I see nothing in the note Mr. B. refers to, that would have prevented Dr. Doddridge drawing exactly the same conclusions from any text in which those titles appeared to be clearly given to Christ ; and he expresses no doubt what- ever of this being the case, Ch. xxii. 13 ; he has some little hesitation about Ch. xxi. 6 j but Ch. i. 8, he assigns to Christ, because most of the phrases there used are afterwards used concerning our Lord Jesus Christ \ he only fixes upon the 1 1 th S verse 258 Remarks on the unproved verse of that Chapter as the first and nearest in- stance, at least so it undoubtedly appears to me ; and I think his reference to Bishop Pearson is suf- ficient to prove it, since the latter lays quite as much stress upon Rev. xxii. 13, as upon Rev. i. 11. * Mr. Belsham triumphs over his friend upon the new discovery also, that Sia th Xpifx should be omitted, Ephes. iii. 9, enumerating abundance of MSS. and Versions in proof of this. Now these words also, the impartial Wells discarded in the beginning of the last century, and yet lived and died a Trinitarian. In short, and to draw to a conclusion, it clearly appears to me that little has been gained to any party, and nothing certainly lost to ourselves and other Trinitarians, by the immense mass of various readings accumulated during the last century. At * [li Mr. Carpenter be living to read Mr. Belsham's book on the person of Christ, published 181 1, he will see that his triumph about this passage is somewhat abated since the date of his Letters on Arianism, for he there plainly acknowledges, that " though the words in the text are probably interpolated ; yet it must be admitted, that in other passages of this book and even in this vision, see ver. 17, 18, our Lord applies the very same, or nearly the same, epithets to himself. All therefore which can be justly advanced in reply to the argument above mentioned is, that Dr Doddridge, and other expositors, have laid greater stress upon the words than they \\''\W. properly bear." — These are Mr. Belsham's later sentiments. What he means by the greater stress is, that they " were not intended to express self-existence, but solely that the Christian dispensation was begun, and will be com- pleted by Christ, who is the author and the iinisher of our faith." , JVir. B. has certainly a right to put his own interpretation on the terms ; but he still assuredly appears suspicious of their higher import, for he is careful to add, that at all events, it must not be forgotten that the book of Revelation is one, the genuineness of which was much contested in the primitive Church, and which ought not therefore, according to Dr. Larduer, to be al- leged as affording a/one sufficient proof of any doctrine. Now ue do not depend upon it a/one, and thus we stand clear of blame.] the Vefsion of the New Test anient » 2^9, the very beginning of that century many of the most important were duly examined, and applied both to the correction of the Greek text, and the amendment of the common Version ; much more impartially than appears to be the case with the Version lately edited ; especially if we take into ac- count the notes added to the larger Edition, which I trust I have shown to be most artfully put together, totally contrary to the doctrines and opinions of many of the most able commentators that ever lived, and frequently in direct opposition to the learned Primate, whose name stands so conspicuous in their title-page* but whose authority has no weight whatever with them, where his comments or his Version happen in the smallest degree to interfere with the creed of modern Unitarians. I am not sensible that I have taken a single step in the course of these Remarks, beyond the bounds prescribed to Christians in general by Unitarians themselves. Mr. Belsham declares it to be " an imperious duty laid upon every serious and en- lightened Christian, to contribute his utmost to in- struct and benefit his fellow-creatures ; and to enter his grave and solemn protest against those errors which disfigure and disgrace the Christian Religion :" and Dr. Carpenter^ in order to encourage the exer- tions of his party, observes, that " however much we might feel authorized to sit down quietly in the possession of what we think to be Gospel truth, without attempting to spread it among others, if those who adopt contrary opinions were equally in- active, yet certainly nvhen they are making every effort to disseminate their tenets, we ought not to be behind hand to disseminate ours J* If any thing is free, thought is so. Mr. Belsham and Dr. Carpenter think all the errors are on our side, which is exactly what I tliink of their tenets. But as I have taken S 2 their 26o Remarks on the improved their own course in combating what appear to me to be errors of great moment in. their way of thinking, and to publish my protest against them, in as serious, grave, and solemn a manner as I could, I hope they will be consistent enough to regard me as a person actuated by that very spirit, they so much commend in themselves. Enlightened is a term of dubious import ; I lay no claim, to it : a most con- scientious regard to truth, and a becoming diligence in searching the Scriptures as far as my abihties and means extend, are all the pretensions I wish to insist upon. I had intended to say more upon some other topics, which I shall now pass over ; particularly that which relates to the existence and agency of evil spirits : all fuch agency, as well as the very existence of such beings, the Editors of this Im- proved Version, and I believe the Unitarians in general, deny, resolving all that is said of such mat- ters in the Scriptures into a figure of speech, an ac- commodation ( very unlikely surely in the book of God) to heathenish conceits and Jewish superstitions. Denial is no proof ; and as to the few arguments with which this denial is supported in the work before us, 1 confess they appear to me little calcu- lated to have any weight against the express decla- rations of Scripture *. I should, however, have gone farther into this and other subjefts, had not my Re- marks already far exceeded the limits I wished to assign to them. My great object has been to maintain and up- hold the doctrines of Atonement and the Trinity in the Godhead ; that Trinity into the name of * [Upon this point of controversy between tis, I may now refer to Dr. Lawi-ence's Critical Reflections on this Version; see his vith ChaDter on the Existence of an Evil Being ; and the Transla- tion of the words 'S^xriw and A»a(?e^o,-.l which Version of the New Tesiament, 261 which so * many of us have been baptized ; to o^/ofxa. T« TTOiTPO^f y.xi Ta Jjou, xai ra ayia TrvfUjaofof, the name of the FATHER, and of the SON, and of the HOLY GHOST : a passage, of which I am happy to say, neither Griesbachy nor Neivcome^ nor the Editors themselves attempt to deprive us. The latter inform us, that some have called in question its ge- nuineness, (and I remember that Mr. Evanson has done so,) but they add, without stvfficient authority^ which is surely true, for Griesbach does not pro- duce one single instance of its omission. The Edi- tors indeed speak of it in their notes, as a symbolical profession of that holy religion which originated with the Father^ was taught by Christy (the Servant and Messenger of God), and confirmed by the gifts of the Holy Spirit ; they assure the world that the Holy Spi- rit's being here named in connection with the Father and the Son, is no proof that the Spirit has a distinct personal existence. I shall only say at present, that * Nothing is more common than for the Unitarians to insist upon the contradictions into which Trinitarians fall, in their ex- positions of their faith. I wish all such expositions to be avoided, because they depend upon a branch of metaphysics, which must upon some points evade our researches ; but it is astonishing how some of the contradictions alleged against us vanish, even when examined by a comparison with familiar objects. Dr. C. calls the doctrine of Christ's omnipresence, a stupendous doctrine, and apo- logizes for so strong a term by observing, " that the doctrine supposes, that he who is present at the same instant in every part of the unbounded universe, descended from a local residence, li- mited himself to the narrow confines of a narrow region on this earth, and for thirty years dwelt in a human body ;" he cau- tiously adds, " as we do not know the nature of the Divine Pre- sence, it might bepresumption to say that this is impossible ;" and 60 indeed it would be, for even the nature of the human presence may satisfy our doubts ; for is not any man capable of being present to every part of a room, and to every person in it, though he seems to occupy but one small portion of it, and may move continually from one end of it to the other ? See this admira- bly argued in Deism Revealedy Vol. ii. pp. 88, 89. S 3 to 202 Remarks on the improved to me^ and I apprehend to very many others, nothing could possibly appear to be a greater proof of it ; and as it appears to be confirmed by many plain passages of holy writ, in which distinct personal acts are ascribed to the Holy Spirit, I do not hesitate to receive it, on the word of Christ, as an undoubted truth. It has been my endeavour to show, not only In what sense Christ was an Angel or Messenger, but that he was by nature the Son of the Most High, one with him in the unity of the Godhead ; and I have chiefly drawn my proofs of this from the names and attributes assigned to him, in com- mon with the Father. This is a proof, in my esti- mation, so strong and so incapable of being over- thrown, that I should be content to rest my faith upon it alone, but that I feel and am assured besides, that our Lord himself asserted it before his accusers *, and * Our Saviour's behaviour under the charge of blasphemy urged against him by the Jew^s, is to me the strongest, I may- even say, the fundamental proof of the Tritinarian doctrine. I have said much upon this in my Vllth Bampton Lecture, and in the notes there, and I only repeat it here, to explain v/hat 1 mean when I say, that, like Dr. Blayney, I rely upon Gospel -prooii. Did not the Trinity appear to me to be a doctrine of Christ, I should of course never look for it in the Jewish SS. ; but being persuaded of its revelation in the Gofpel of Christ, I turn with pleasure and fatisfaction always to the consideration of these marvellous circumstances which connect the Old Testament with the New, and which tend so remarkably to show, that the Chrlstiau scheme (including the doctrine of the Trinity) is only the continuance of one great design of Providence, to bring men to eternal life by Jesus Christ, the Angel of the Covenant ; the j^don or Lord of the Temple. Dr. Carpenter, I am sorry to say, would deprive pie even of the proof I so particularly rely upon. He says the charge of blasphemy was unfounded, both as to fact, and as to the inference from the supposed fact ; and he asks. Are we to rest our faith upon the perverse insinuations of the Jews ? 1 answer. No ; not if they were really so perverse, and so un- founded as to fact ; but these very things remain to be proved, and our Lord's condudl it is that justifies the inference we draw from it. The Jews, whether maliciously or not, could not charge him Version of the New Testament. 263 and no other proof can be requisite : however, in regard to the former attestation, on which I have had occasion more particularly to insist in the fore- going remarks, I cannot forbear adding the following observations of the celebrated President Edwards^ re- commending them to the attention of all serious and devout Christians. *' If the temptation to the children of Israel was so great, to idolize the brazen Serpent^ a lifeless piece of brass, for the temporal salvation, which some of their forefathers had by looking on it ; how great would be their temptation to idolatry by wor- shipping Christ, if he were a mere creature, from whom mankind receive so great benefits ? " If that brazen Serpent must be broken in pieces, to remove temptation to idolatry, 1 Kings, xviii. 4 ; «hall so great a temptation be laid before the world, to idolize a mere creature, by setting him forth in the manner that Christ is set forth in Scripture ? " Must Moses*s body be concealed, lest the chil- dren of Israel should worship the remains of him whom God made the instrument of such great things ? And shall another mere creature, whom men, on account of the works he has done, are un- der infinitely greater temptation to worship, instead of being concealed to prevent this, be mofl openly him with blasphemy, as assuming to be God in the low sense the Unitarians insist upon ; they must have pretended at least, that he made himself God in the highest sense ; and doing so, is it possi- ble to suppose our Lord would have left them in such an error, and died under such a charge, had there been no foundations for it ? would he have acted so, as even to increase their suspicions and aggravate their wrath ? But I must refer, as I have done on another occasion, to Bishop Burgess' % Sermon on the Subject, and Fuller i Socinian and Cal-vimstic Systems compared. See also of older writers, Leslie's Socinian Controversy, Stillingjleet on Scrip- ture Miracles, and IVaterland's Vindication of Christ's Divinity. Query xix. p. 280. S 4 and 264 Remarks en the improved aiid publicly exhibited, as exalted to Heaveriy seated at God's own right handy made head over all things^ Ruler of the Universe^ &c. in the manner that Christ is * ? *' Was not this the temptation among all nations to idolatry, viz, that ?nen had been distinguished as great conquerors, deliverers, and the instruments of great benefit ? and shall God make a mere creature the instrument of so many infinitely greater benefits, and in such a manner as Christ Is represented to be in the Scripture, without an infinitely greater tempta- tion to idolatry ? " When the rich young Man called Christ ' good Master,* not supposing him to be God, did Christ reject it, and reprove him for calling him so, sup- posing him not to be God ; saying, there is none good but one, that is God ; meaning that none other was possessed of that goodness that was to be trusted ? And yet shall this same Jesus, though in- deed not that God, not that God who only is to be called good, or trusted in as such, be called in Scripture, HE that is holy f j HE that is true ? the Amen] xhefaithfid and true witness ? the mighty God^ * [I have now Mr. Belsham's authority to declare that expres- sions of this nature, applied to a mere creature, are grand difficul- ties in the way of this system, and actually prevent many per- sons from becoming Unitarians. The considerations he pi-opbscs with a view to lessening these difficulties, appear to me very in- sufficient. See his Calm Inquiry, p. 341, &c. This is all I shall attempt to say upon the subject. The Reader may judge for himself.] f Compare Ifaiah, Ivii. 15. "• Thus saith JEHOVAH, whose name is, the Holy One;" and Mark, i. 24, Luke, iv. 34, and John, vi. 69. " Thou art the Holy One of God." Improved Version. *' The antient Jews and Christian Fathers,'' says Mr. Bennett, " unite in this, that the per&on called the Holy One of Israel, was the eternal Logos, termed the Mimra by the Jews ; the Word, that some ages after, was made flesh, and tabernacled on earth. The uncreated Angel in whom the divine name re- side(J." the Version of the New Testament* ^6^ jthe everlasting father^ the Prince of Peace ? the tlessed and the only Potentate ? the King of Kings and Lord of Lords ? the Lord of Li/"^, that has life in himself, that all men might honour the Son^ as they honour the Father? the wisdom of God^ and the power of Gfif^i /• the Alpha and Omega, the beginnmg and Z^*? .fwc// God, JEHOVAH, i:/o^/m, the King of Glory, land the Lord of Glory T' &c. The learned President proceeds to a comparison of texts in which these titles and attributes occur : but I am content to give this brief sketch of the questions he thinks it necessary to ask. They are, indeed, most wisely submitted to the consideration of every reader of the Bible. They stand clear of all that has beeii attributed to either antient or modern corruptors of Christianity ; for it is the revealed word of God, in its native and original languages, (if I may so speak) which we are called upon to examine and consider ; and that from the very beginning to the end of the Bible. No con- trariety of existing MSS. Hebrew or Greek, no ac- cumulation of various readings however great, can do away all these evidences. The questions pro- posed are truly important, for they amount (I had almost said) to a charge against Providence ; a charge which the history of the world seems to support ; for if it be really idolatry to worship HIM who is in Scripture dignified with those high and exalted titles, upon which the President insists, then undoubtedly the temptation to it has been so generally ensnaring, that few have escaped falling into it during the course of more than eighteen hundred years. No difference of opinion upon other subjects, has prevented the great mass of Christians according in this point ; that Christ was 9. pre-esistent super'angelic Being, even GOD, and 266 Remarks on the improved ^ 15) c. and a fit object of worship. In this particular, de- rived to all from the same consideration, namely, the exalted titles, and Godlike attributes assigned to him in Holy Scripture, Athanasians and Arians ; Papists and Protestants ; Cahinists and Arminianst may be said to have been agreed. That he was no more than vian^ in the strictest sense of those termsy is the doc- trine comparatively but of few ; and as far as my reading goes, (notwithstanding all that Dr. Priestley has advanced to the contrary,) seems always to have been so : since, f however, extraordinary efforts are now making to spread this doctrine among us, to the great disparagement, as it appears to me, of the glorious attributes, and exalted dignity of the Re- deemer of the World ; I have faithfully endeavoured to expose what I conceive to be, errors of the greatest magnitude, totally opposite to Scripture, and to the declared opinion of the most eminent critics and commentators, ancient and modern, Jews and Christians. " May GOD of his mercy grant, that we may all grow in grace and in the knowledge of our LORD and SAVIOUR Jesus Christ ; to HIM be GLORY, both now and for ever, AMEN !'* Rectory, Biddenden, Kent, 1814. •^^^e*^ A LETTER TO THE jREV, FRANCIS STONE, M.A RECTOR OF COLD NORTON, ESSEX J IN REPLY TO HIS SERMON PREACHED AT THE VISITATION AT DANBURY, ON THE 8th of JULY 1806. C 269 ] ADVERTISEMENT. TN republishing the following pamphlet, it may be necessary to state some circumstances that have taken place since its first appearance. The case of Mr. Stone, who paid the great debt of nature in the last year 1813, should not be revived by me now, had the dispute between us ever been of a personal na- ture ; but we were while he lived entirely strangers to each other. It is well known that he suffered depri- vation for his Sermon, and, as is commonly the case, he became in the eyes of the Unitarians a victim of Church severity, and a martyr to the Truth ; his case also still continues to be represented in this light. *' Though Truth in these controversies," to use Bishop Horsley's words, " can be only on one side ; I will - indulge, and will avow, the charitable opinion that sincerity may be on both." On these grounds Mr. Stone was ever secure from all personal hostility on the part of the Author of the following Tract ; but it 4 is [ 270 ] is a most solemn truth, that I judged him to be ex- tremely mistaken in regard both to his religious princi- ples, and the line of conduct he adopted ; and as these appear to be still countenanced and supported by those who in the first instance espoused his caufe, and as the subject of the pamphlet is nearly the same, in all points, with that of the foregoing Remarks, I have here reprinted it, with very few alterations, being more than ever assured as well of the facts insisted upon in it, as of the legal grounds upon which the sentence of deprivation was pafled, however much I might lament the occasion for it. N. B. For Readers who may come after us, it may be proper to add, that the history of the matter was briefly this: — that Mr. Stone, holding the Rectory of Cold Norton, in Essex, on an appointment by his Arch- deacon to preach before the Clergy at the Visitation held at Danbury, took the opportunity of openly professing the Unitarian faith, and of inveighing in severe terms against the Church Doctrines of the Trinity and Atonement ; maintaining afterwards, that the Vlth Article of the Church vi^arranted him in doing so, notwithstanding his subscription to the whole XXXIX when instituted ! A L E T T E R, S^t. Sir, THOUGH I had heard and read of your Sermon from the first moment of its appearance, I did not think of procuring a copy till lately ; so that the first I obtained was of your Second Edition. I did not foresee that any thing would move me to trouble you, or the Public, with my sentiments on the sub- ject ; nor would I now do any such thing, but for two reasons, in some degree personal. The first, that in your Address to the Public, prefixed to your second edition, you thank us, generally, for the favourable reception your Discourse has met with, the First Edition having experienced, as you say, a rapid sale. Indeed, Sir, you will err greatly, if you think the favourable reception of your work is to be inferred from its rapid sale. I bought it myself with very different feelings ; and to judge from the gene- ral surprise occasioned by such an Address to the Clergy, I cannot for a moment doubt that the rapid and extensive sale of your Discourse is quite as much to be attributed to the indignant curiosity of the Members of the Establishment as to the approbation or admiration of the Unitarian party. I beg, how- ever, to assure you, as one of the Public, that I bought your book, with no expectation of being converted by it, from a wrong mode of faith to a ri^ht 6^2 Letter to the Reverend Francis Stone. right one ; and I do most solemnly assert, though I lament the necessity of using such terms, that the only impression it has left upon my mind, is that of extreme disgust : — ^First, at the unfeeling rudeness of such an address at such a time, and on such an occasion ; secondly, at the glaring inconsistency be- tween your faith and your public fitu;ation ; thirdly, at the confident revival of old and continually re» futed objections ; and, fourthly, at the low and unmannerly allusions to opinions sanctioned by the consent of a large majority of the existing generation of your countrymen ; and by the most solemn decla- rations and profeffions of many of the most pious, learned, and conscientious persons, both of the laity and clergy, of the ages that are past. Another reason moving me particularly to address you, is, that you so particularly recommend in your Discourse, a book of Mr. John Jones's, entituled, " A Developement of remarkable Events^ calculated to restore the Christian Religion to its original Purity, and to repel the Objections of Unbelievers'* I am, Sir, well acquainted with that work, having perused it with great care and attention, as M^ell as another work of the same author, his " Analysis of St. Paul's Epistle to the Romans ;" and, as I stated my opinion of Mr. Jones's critical and theological labours long ago, I beg to take this opportunity of referring you to the Reviews of both those works, in the British Critic, [Vol. XVIII. 6x8, and Vol. xxi. 383,] of which articles I now avow myself the author ; and have only to add, that my own private memorandums of his errors and false reasoning far exceed what was so given to the public. I know not whether Mr. Jones has since published any other works, though if he has, I should not be fearful of entering the lists with him again ; but as you tell me in your Sermon, that his Letter to the Reverend Francis Stone. 273 his ** Developement of Facts," is " not sufficiently known" I conceive that he has not met with the en- couragement upon which you pride yourself, of a rapid sale for his books. — Tou call his book a *' valuable critical Work." I really, Sir, differ from you exceedingly ; I think no critical work can be valuable, that deals in fanciful hypotheses, gros5 misrepresentations, false and mutilated quotations, mixed with confident contradictions, unsupported by argument ; of all of which, I think, I have proved Mr. Jones guilty, in the Reviews referred to. I know nothing of Mr. Jones ; I speak only of his works, and your opinion of them. You recommend them as valuable critical performances; I know them to be otherwise, from a close, careful, and critical examination of them. You assume, as your general principle, in the title of your Discourse, that " Jewish Prophecy is the sole criterion to distinguish between genuine and spuri' oils Christian Scripture.'* I would wish then, Sir, to have leave to ask, if you and I should happen to dis- agree, as to the interpretation and application of the Jewish Prophecies, what criterion is to settle such differences ? I would wish to ask this, because throughout your w^hole Sermon, you do most essen- tially differ from me in regard to the Jewish Pro- phecies, in contempt, as it appears to jne, not only of sound criticism, but of all evangelical, apostolical, and, I would add, even the divine authority of our Saviour himself. I say, it appears to me so. Here then we are already at issue ; here we certainly want some other criterion to settle our differences, at the very outset; and I will tell you, Sir, fairly, what appears to me to be a principal difficulty in the way of our ever coming to an agreement upon the points m debate between us. Tou say that the Jewish Pro- T phecies 274 Letter to the Re'verend Francis Stone. phecies are the sole criterion of spurious and genuine Christian Scripture ; / say, that genuine Christian Scnpture is a criterion to help us to a right under- standing of Jewish Prophecy. This you cannot admit upon your principle, but / cannot give it up ; be- cause, to do so I must fairly sacrifice the authority of St. Paul to that of the Rector of Cold Norton. I say, consistently with your principle, you cannot admit of any appeal to the New Testament to deter- mine the sense of the prophecies. I do not say that you always abide by your own principle, for I think you, in a great measure, give it up in your Sermon ; where you particularly refer us to the striking inci- dent of our Saviour's discourse with the two disciples in their walk to the village of Emmaus. " Fools, and slow of heart" said the blessed Jesus, " to be- lieve all that the prophets have spoken ; Ought not Christ to have suffered these things, and to enter into his glory ? And beginning at Moses and all the Pro- phets, he expounded to them in all the Scriptures, the things conceriiing Kwiself." Now, Sir, let me ask, what would these dull- minded disciples have done, had not our Lord been at hand, mercifully to resolve their doubts, and give them the proper key to their own prophecies ? Re- member, Sir, he did not merely refer to the Pro- phecies, they knew them, perhaps, by heart ; but " he expounded unto them," (J'i>5f/x-/ll'£U£^) '* the things concerning himself." As you cite this passage your- self, in recommendation of your criterion, I may conclude that you esteem it to be genuine Christian Scripture. Now, Sir, does it not serve to show, that though Jewish Prophecy may be, as you state, a criterion of spurious and genuine Christian Scripture, yet that in the very times of our Saviour, his expositions were necessary to open the eyes even of some of the Letter to the Reverend Francis Stone. 27^ the Jews themselves. Dull and " slow of heart,'* to be sure, they were ; but, Sir, you and I at this moment differ about the interpretation of the Jewish Prophecies. It is probable, therefore, that one of us is as dull and *' slow of heart " as the disciples then were. Surely, then, it is fair to ask, may /, to resolve my doubts, and fix my judgment of the Jewish Prophecies, refer to the New Testament, or not ? I find you refer to any part that serves your purpose, (as to genuine Christian Scripture^ at once. I do not know that Jewish Prophecy foretold the incident we are at this moment talking of; I can only, therefore, suppose that you think it genuine Christian Scripture from the use you make of it in argument. I am sure that if it is authentic, and I thoroughly believe it to be so, it is a proof that our Saviour's expositions and illustrations of the Jewish Prophecies, were not only of importance, but indispensably necessary to men so dull and " slow of heart " as you and I, who cannot even yet, it seems, agree about them. Remember, Sir, I intreat, what I am now doing ; I am not objecting altogether to your criterion ; I am not proposing to set the New Testament against the 0/^, Apostles against Prophets: but I am desirous of knowing whether I may be allowed to appeal to St. Paul, or St. John, St. Luke, or St. Peter, to decide the matter between you and me ? You seem to object to such an appeal ; for, as a case in point, you positively assert, that according to the Jewish Prophecies, the Messiah was to be mere man ; and that according to the whole tenor of the New Testa- ment, he is represented conformably thereto, as no other than " the Son of Joseph." / beheve, that, ac- cording to Jewish Prophecy, the Messiah was to be miraculously born of a Virgin, and that he certainly was so, according to the testimony at least of two Kvangelists, T d and 2y6 Letter to the Reverend Francis Stone, and that Joseph was only his reputed Father. Now St. Luke, in speaking of our Lord, happens to say, *' being {as was supposed^ the Son of Joseph." I should much wish to appeal to this parenthesis in proof of 7ny interpretation of the Prophecies ; but you say no ; it is not consistent with jny view of mat- ters, and therefore, (though indeed I have no various reading, no defective manuscript, version, or copy to cite) yet it certainly must be an interpolation. How do you then prove your point ? Not because there is any instance to be brought of its ever having been left out, in this particular place, but because truly it is left out in other passages ; it is therefore " void,'* you say, " and of none effect." What other passages would you select, in which you might expect it to be inserted ? What, Sir, in the objections of the " murmuring " Jews ? Actually so, for to these very passages you allude, to prove your point of our Saviour's mere manhood. But, perhaps. Sir, you would expect to find it in your text : of this I will speak elsewhere. At present I would only ask, if this parenthesis is omitted elsewhere, and therefore excites your suspicions, are there no passages in the evangelical anc apostolical writings equivalent to it ? This question, perhaps, will give me an opportunity of explaining my whole mean- ing : for God forbid you should think I am so disputing your criterion, as to depreciate the value and importance of the Jewish Prophecies. Our Lord's own references to them must render them not only an important, but an indispensable criterion. I wish there were none who disputed or undervalued their authority more than myself; I wi^h no criterion more fallible had ever been resorted to! — But to show what I mean, as to the question concerning the Jew- ish Prophecies, The Letter to the Reverend Francis Stone. 277 The Jewish Prophecies, as you insist, and very correctly, represent the Messiah as a Man, of the seed of David. Now if any part of the New Testament represented him to be 7iot a Man, or if a man, not of the seed of Uavid, I should myself demur ; I should, as you do, appeal to the Jewish Prophecies against so manifest an inconsistency. But when St. Paul tells us he was a man, and a man of the seed of David, with this reserve^ ro xola o-apx.~, there is a distinction, which I think it would be folly to apply to any mere man. It agrees also with St. Luke's parenthesis ; and s^nce, on turning to the Jewish Prophecies, I find the Messiah sometimes foretold in terms which excite the most august and magnificent ideas, and in the New Testament described as superior to men and angels, far above all principalities and powers, surely I may be justified in thinking differently from you, concerning the nature and person of the Christ ; and in wishing to have leave to appeal to the apostolical illustrations and applications of the Pro- phecies ; that is, as I said before, to St. Paul, &c. against the Rector of Cold Norton. Fcr again, I must beg you to remember, that our dispute is not about the criterion upon which you insist, but about the sense of the Prophecies themselves. When I read in Isaiah, (a case you lay nmch. stress upon) that the Messiah was to be " ^? man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief' I naturally look, as well as yourself, for this character in tne person of our Saviour ; but when I read in the New Testament, in passages never suspected of being spu- rious Scripture, that the Son of God *' took our na- ture upon him^' in order to becom.e such, I am surely justified in supposing, that God may have his own method of fulfilling this Jewish Prophecy ; T 3 and 7yB Letter to the Reverend Francis Stonet and that though Christ was truly " a man of sGr' rows,"* the person who became so was nevertheless a super-angelic Being. I look upon it to be a case no longer admitting of dispute, that prophecies are necessarily obscure, till fulfilled. Surely, then, the records of such fulfil- ment must be a help to the due comprehension of the prophecies themselves. Every one knows, indeed you particularly mention it in your discourse, that the mam obstacle to the conversion of the Jews, when our Saviour appeared, was a mistaken preju- dice, which nothing but true, genuine Christianity could dissipate. Did they not all expect a temporal dehverer ? Who undeceived them, and explained their own prophecies to them, but Christ and his Apostles ? Suppose, Sir, then, the present race of Jews to be under the same prejudices ; are our ideas of the Messiah to be regulated by their expectations, or by our Saviour's professions of himseil ? You seem to think the former ; for you confidently refer, in p. 27. of the Discourse, to the expectations of some respect- able modern Jews of your acquaintance, to determine not only the sense and meaning of the ancient pro- phecies, but to distinguish, even now, between spu- rious and genuine Christian Scripture. This may help, I think, to explain the notion you really enter- ' tain of your general principle, which, from the whole tenor of your discourse, I take to be no other than this, that " Jewish Prophecy is the scle criterion to distinguish between spurious and genuine Christian Scripture ; and prophecy, only as interpreted by your- self , Mr. Jones, and others of your party,'" or, in short, as Dr. Priestley would have said, '■'■v:\ienproperly cor- rected by an Unitarian.''" I cannot mean to be ludicrous upon such a subjeft; but truly this must be the plainest iiiference to draw, when you shew yourself so deter- mined, Letter to the Reverend Francis Stone. 279 mined, as you certainly do in many instances, to get rid of every passage in the evangelical and apostolical writings, which does not accord with your own in- terpretation of the Jewish Prophecies. It is an old artifice, Sir, and has often been exposed. The whole of the firll Chapter of the Epistle to the Hebrews has been as much in some persons' way, as the first Chapters of 5/. Matthew and St. Luke are in your*s, and have been accordingly at once pronounced an interpolation. We have . a notable instance of this mode of criticism in one of the opponents of the learned Bishop Bull. The Bishop had referred to a passage in the Pa- dagogiis of Clemens Alexandrinus^ where the word of God is pronounced to be God Almighty. 'Aj/ei/d'f^if ya^ TOi/ TraWoK^aTO^ai 0£oi/ A&Toi/ tyj^Vy &C. NoW what says the Bishop's antagonist to this passage? Why truly, a small alteration would rectify it. That is to say, if it was written in the genitive case, tS Trai/rs^^iivopo? 0£a. In vain was he asked for the authority of some manuscript, or purer copy. This mattered not, he could still easily get over the difficulty ; for, savs he, unless some such error of the scribe be admitted, I may safely affirm the word Almighty to have been impudently foisted in by some impostor. Now this. Sir, is your mode of criticism to a nicety; to a word indeed, and that not an over-elegant one. For the parenthesis of St. Luke, already alluded to, not suit- ing your purpose, nor according with your views of Jewish Prophecy, you confidently assure the clergy of Essex, that it " 7iiust be a corruption /wV/f^ in to subserve the cause of the fanciful hyper-mei a phy- sical hypothesis of the diffi^rent sorts of Christian Platonists, of the School of Alexandria in Egypt !" " Quis autem," I must have leave to ask in Bishop Bull's language, " Jus illud dedit in sacras Scripturas, T 4 ut 28o Letter to the Reverend Francis Stone. ut quicquid in iis tibi displicet tanquam spurium re- jiceres ?" But to come, Sir, more particularly to your Ser- mon. — Your text you take from John, i. 45. " We have found him of whom Moses in the Law and the Prophets did write ^ Jesus of Nazareth, the Son of Joseph. '^ You say, you think these words suitable to a discourse, in which you propose to prove Jesus to h^ve been a mere man, from the expressions, " Jesus of Nazareth, the Son of Joseph." Now suppose. Sir, your object had been to prove the Divinity of Christ; you needed only to have gone four verses lower, and you would have found, that, though Jesus of Naza- reth, Son of Joseph, was, by Philip, pronounced to be the Messiah foretold, this did not prevent the very person he was speaking to, (Nathaniel) from con- cluding the Messiah to be " the Son of God, the King of Israel,'* see ver. 49. Nay, this ought to be received as evidence, on the part of the very Isra- elite whom our Saviour himself declared to be emi- nently *' without guile," (v. 47,) as to the tenor of the Jewish Prophecies, concerning the person and cha- racter of the Messiah. Now if the Jewish Prophecies are the sole criterion, what are we to judge from these two passages ? No where, in all the Jewish Prophe- cies, is the Messiah foretold to be the son of Joseph. (Nor need we wonder at this, for, as Irenceus long ago observed, lib. iii. c. 30. he could not have been the King of Israel ii hQ were.) Therefore, according to your hypothesis, this passage 7mght be suspected. But, accoiamg to your ideas of it, it is, in an emi- nent degree, true, genuine Christian Scripture ; since you cite it as :he ground of your argument, and mdke it your t-xt, as particularly autheniic. If then the text be authentic, are the succeeding verses so ? You do not say they are not j therefore, we have Nathaniel's Letter to the Reverend Francis Stone, 281 Nathaniel's declaration and acknowledgement, that Jesus, the Messiah, was *' the Son of God," in the face of Philip's assertion, that he was the " son of Joseph;" — and whence did Nathaniel infer, that he was the Son of God, but from the proof he had just given of his omniscience and omnipresence ? see ver. 50. Suffer me. Sir, to add to Nathaniel's testimony, that of Martha, (John^ xi. 27.) and that of St. Peter, [John^ vi. 69.) both of them expressly to the point, especially the former ; " I believe that thou art the Christ, the Son of God, which should come into the worlds ^ i. e. accordhig to the Jewish Prophecy : and if you wish to know the sense of this, turn to the xvith oijohn^ ver. 28. and our Saviour will explain it. *' I came forth from the Father, and am come into the world." Are these passages genuine Christian Scripture ? If they are not, it would be better worth your while to clear them away than the first chapters of St. Mat- thew and St. Luke : for it is on such passages as these that the Trinitarians build their faith. They give you free leave to prove them spurious if you can ; but we must not be robbed of them by such modes of criti- cism as are but too common with your party ; name- ly, that of explaining away their plain and literal meaning ; or pronouncing them interpolations, on no better authority than your own or Mr. Jones's ; or, as Mr. Lindsey admits to be the case even with him- self, substituting a meaning, " remote from the sound of the wordy" (see his Historical View of the state of the Unitarian Doctrine, &c. pp. 60, 61.) or, as Dr. Priestley admits, by " eff^ort and straining'^ (History of Corruptions, p. 279.) To all such modes of criti- cism we positively object, and shall do so, we must do so, if we retain common sense, as long as there is any controversy between us. Another 282 Letter to the Reverend Francis Stone. Another passage you cite in proof of our Saviour's being mere man, as " Son of Joseph," is John^ vi. 42. " Is not this Jesus the Son of Joseph^ whose fa- ther and mother we know ?" This also seems to me a very bad quotation for your purpose : for how came the Jews to put such a question ? Surely, Sir, you could not overlook the motive, since it is actually expressed in the very same verse ; " How is it then," say they, very properly and judiciously, " that he saith, I came down from Heaven ?'* On other occa- sions the wisdom of his discourse and the power of his miracles had driven them to the same reflections ; teflections, strongly corroborative I think of that doctrine which gives a literal meaning to some of the plainest passages of Scripture, and which represent our Lord, though " born of a woman," as being in existence " before all worlds," " the only-begotten Son" of the Everlasting Father, the " brightness of his glory and express image of his person." All in proof, I think, of the great propriety as well as au- thenticity of St. Luke's parenthesis, which you would expunge as an interpolation, because it happens to be left out elsewhere ; but which, I must again repeat, is also corroborated by St. Paul's to xola o-apna ; a limitation which some of the most eminent of the antient Fathers, as Irenmis, TertulUa)i, Origen, Nova- tian *, Hippolytus, Eusebius, and Lactantius, all agree in considering as especially introduced to distinguish our Saviour's incarnation, or human nativity, from a higher sonship in his divine nature. This is, I think, especially confirmed also by the ufe of the term, by the same apostle, (Ephes.y'u 5. Coloss. iii. 22.) where TOK xvoloig nx\y. (TxpKx, is evidently in direct opposition to the ToJ Kupt'u nx\ ijx ai/SpajTToi?, immediately follow- * Though in some things heretical. Letter to the Reverend Francis Stone, 28^ ing ; that is, to distinguish human from divine autho- rity : add to this, The opposition so strongly ex- pressed in Fhillppians, ii- 3. " Qui unus locus,'* as Bishop Bull says, " si recte expendatur, ad omnes adversus Jesu Christi Domini nostri personam rationes repellend'As sufficit ;" and with reason ; for if the *' Forin of a Servant," is admitted to be a proof of his proper humanity, as it always is, what can hinder the correspondent term of " the Form of God*^ from being a demonstration of his proper Divinity ? The reasoning of St. Basil appears, therefore, to me conclu- sive, " Ego, quod scnpLum est, m forma esse Dei, idem vaiere arbitror, atque in substantia esse Dei ; ut enim formam assumpsisse Servi, illud significat, dominum in substantia fuisse hu?nanitatis nostrse ; ita qui in forma Dei esse dicit, proprietatem divina substantia de- monstrate' Basil contra Eunom, Dial. 2. Havinsr. however, as you think, disposed of this troubksofne parenthesis, you scruple not to affirm, that you have by your references sufficiently established the strict, literal, and only humanity of Jesus. But what. Sir, if after all, the parenthesis be genuine Christian Scrip- ture, (and I am sure you have not brought even any plausible reason against it,) does it not confirm at once, the truth of our doctrine, and overthrow all that you have been endeavouring to prove ? You lay great stress on our Lord's being called " a carpenter," and you say it is highly probable that he worked at his Father's trade, as such, till when " about thirty years" of age, he was called upon by God to enter on his glorious ministry. But suppose, Sir, we grant you this, what say you to his open renunciation of all such worldly callings, " Wist ye not," says he, (when Joseph and Mary found him preaching in the Temple,) " that I must be about my Father's business ?" or if you render it «« in 284 Letter to the Reverend Francis Stone, " in my Father's house,'* (according to the Syriac version, and many of the Fathers, and approved by Grotius, Cassellus, &c. &c. By Bishop Burgess, more recently, in his admirable Sermon on the Divi- nity of Christ). The distinction is the same, and the renunciation of his reputed Father just as strong : and remember. Sir, this was long before the call to the ministry which you speak of ; this happened when he was only '* twelve years old.^* Luke, ii. 42. You suspect the whole genealogy of St. Luke, others have done the same, and their objections have been a thousand times replied to ; but your suspicions have a very whimsical foundation. You suspect it, forsooth, because St. Luke was the friend of St. Paul, and St. Fauly in his Epistles to Ti?nothy and Titusy speaks contemptuously of genealogies. I suppose St. Luke, Sir, let him have been ever so intimate with St. Paul, could not know St. PauVs mind better than he knew it himself ; and as it happens, St. Paul insists much upon his 01071 genealogy in his third chapter to the Phillip- pians. " Of the stock of Israel^ of the Tribe of Benja- min^ a Hebrew of the Hebrews :" and even again in the nth of his 2d Epist. to the Corinthians, *' are they Hebrews i* So ami: Are they Israelites? So am I : Are they the feed of Abraham ? So am /.'* There is something very like it also to be found in the 6th verse of the 23d chapter of the Acts, which being written by St. Lukcy and taken from St. Paul's own mouth, is perhaps more applicable to your sus- picions than the others. Have the goodness, Sir, however, once more to turn to the authorities you cite, I mean the passages in Timothy and Titus, where St. Paul is supposed to express the contempt you speak of; and you will find, that his objections lay against " fables^ foolish questions and endless genealo- gies." Now, Sir, let me ask. Is it any " fable," according Letter to the Reverend Francis Stone. 285 according to your own own criterion^ that Jesus is sprung from the seed of David ? Is it any " foolish question," or enquiry to ascertain this fact ; or are there any genealogies to which the term aVfpavloK could less apply, than those in St. Matthew and St. Luke, the one descending regularly from Abraham and David, in conformity to the promises and Jewish Prophecies concerning both ; the other ascending to Adam, the common progenitor of Jew and Gentile * ? You cavil greatly indeed at St. Luke's Catalogue being extended to Adam. " Nobody could doubt,'* you say, " the descent of Jesus from Adam." What, Sir, have you forgot the Gnostics, those ready helps to your Friend Mr. Jones, and all your party ? I thought truly, no Unitarian could forget them ; so useful have they been to help them out of every difficulty concerning Christ's Divinity, and to account for €very qualified intimation that is given in the Scriptures of his humanity ; such as the awkward parenthesis of St, Luke, or even the to xala iTol.f>y.oc of St. Paul ; which I remember, Mr. Jones particularly insists upon being intended to prove him a mere Man, against the Gnostics ; though I am as certain as I can be of a^^ y thing, that no such allusion was thought of. We have now, however, the confession of an Unitarian^ that " nobody ever doubted the de- scent of Jesus from Adam ;" pray then give a hint to your party, Sir, not to refer all those expressions of " his co?ning in thejiesh,** being " 7nade ?nant'* being " ?nade fieshy'^ taking "-^ our nature upon hi?ny'* he. he. to the extreme care of the Apostolic writers, not to humour the Gnostics, who" maintained that Christ was not a human being.''* I quote your friend Mr. Jones's * Chrysost, Homil. i. ir. Matt. i. Horsley's Sermon on the Incarnation, own 286 Letter to the Reverend Francis Sto?ic. own words, when he Ls actually endeavouring to account for the ro xxicc a-oipKcc., so often mentioned. This, however, by the way of transient suggestion. I could not help noticing it, thus briefly, just to show how easy it is to talk both ways, as occasion suits. You say it was nonsense to carry up the pedigree of Jesus to Adam, because nobody could doubt his human descent from the Protoplast ; Mr. Jones insists upon it, (and no doubt you agree with him,) that the quali- fication St. Paul introduces of his being sprung from " the seed of David, according to the fleshy'* was merely intended to meet the doctrines of the Gnostics, who thought him an iEon, or " God," and not a human being. A bungling way of opposing them certainly it would have been, for, while it is open to the charge of being a most absurd expletive in the Unitarian sense, {fee liorslefs Tracts^ p. 112. {p. 123. 3d Edit.) it manifestly infers some other condition of Being. But to return once more to the point. *' Nobody," you say, " could doubt the descent of Jesus from Adam ;" and, therefore, such a genea- logy is absurd : but. Sir, many have pretended to doubt and to dispute the cojniecnon so much insisted upon by the Apostolic writers, between the first and second Adam. Passing by then what has been said by others to account for St. Luke's carrying up the genealogy so high, (which T have hinted at already) surely there might be good reason for carrying back the genealogy of the second Adam to the frst, if it were only to prove him to be '* the seed" of that woman who forfeited the blessings which he came in his humim nature to restore. I say, " came in his human nature ;" not, I can assure you, to oppose any modern Gnostics, but, because 6V. Paul tells ps the second Adam, was " the Lord from Heaven^* I Cor. XV. 47. The conclusion of St. Luke's genea* Letter to the Reverend Francis Stofie. 287 logy, moreover, so pointedly alluding to the super- natural origin and creation of the ^rst Adam, from which he might be considered " the Son of God," and not of Mafi, affords no small proof, I think, that the birth of the second Adam might reasonably be expected to be supernatural also. And it would ap- p^r that even the Targumists had such an apprehen- sion ; for on Gen. iii. 22. we have this gloss in the T. of Jonathan, " Et dixit Verbum Adonai sive Domini, Ecce Adam quem creavi, Unigenitus est in mundo, sicut egoUnigenitus sum in Coelis excelsis — " a remark- able passage at the least, but of which I leave you to judge as you please ; for this Title of Ufiige?iitus is certainly not so liberally given to the jfirst Adam in holy Scripture. I would have you attend by all means, Sir, to the climax observed in the application of the title of " Son of God," in holy Scripture. Phrophets, Saints, and Holy men are " Sons of God," in a spiritual and general sense ; the ^rst Adam, *' the Son of God," in regard to his miraculous ori- gin; but no one, except the second Adam, was the " ONLY-BEGOTTEN Son of God ;" a title en- tirely peculiar to Christ. He is a Son, comparatively with all others, xocld a-^za-iu •JvJ/tjA&Tjpav, as G. Nazian" %en expresses it ; by " a relation," as our learned Barrow says, " in its kind, singular and incompa- rable, from which all others are excluded." I might notice also, in this place, the necessity frequently in- sisted upon, of the second Adam's being free from all hereditary gudt, which was particularly guarded against by the circumstances of his supernatural birth ; in which respect also he was more immediately, as man, the antitype of the first Adam, when he originally came out of the hands of the Creator. But as you. Sir, no doubt, do not acknowdge the doctrine of original sin, though you have subscribed the 9th ^- article 288 Letter to the Reverend Francis Stone, article of the Church, I shall not dwell upon this subject ; except to say, that when you make the 6th article a salvo for an hypocritical subscription to all the others, (as you do in your advertisement,) you ap- pear to me to be the last man that should pretend to talk of the legerdemain tricks of other people. See Serm. p. 21. You are very anxious it should be clearly shown, that Jesus was of the " seed of David,^* because, this you think is a clear proof that he was a man, in the Unitarian sense of the word. Let me ask, then, Sir, what do you think of that " Jewish Prophecy," which foretells, that the Deliverer and Avenger of fallen man should be of *' the seed of the Woman V* I do not mean to dwell upon this ; I would only ask, whether, if you insist upon the prophetic terms of *' the feed of David ^'^ being a proof of his being born of Man, (for that is your position) the prophetic terms of the *' feed of the Wo??ian,'* may not reasonably be adduced in corroboration of the belief of his being born of a woman, without the co-operation of man ? especially when, independently of the two first chapters of St, Matthew, (which, you say, are forgeries,) St. Paul, speaking of Christ, so emphatically tells his Galatian converts, that, when the fulness of time was come, *' God sent forth his Son ?}rade of a ivojnan." *' Ergo verum hominem sed axxropx,^' as Beza has it, " qua- tenus homo est, factus non ex patris semine sed ex mulieris substantia." I know, indeed, your valuable critic, Mr. Jones, oppofes to us this very passage, but with how much judgment and good sense, I willingly leave to every reader to judge. He tells us, truly, that had St. Paul had any idea of the miraculous con- ception at the time he wrote ; had he ever meant to infer, that Jesus was conceived wifhout the instrumen- tality of \ij.zi\ instead of ^fn/w/Afvcj' k y.yatxeo he must have Letter to the Reverend Fraticis Stone. 289 have put ytvvdij^tvoy £x 7rap9£i/»." I could not pass this by in my review of his work, to which I again refer you. At p. 9. of your discourse, Sir, you positively assert, what it is utterly and entirely impossible for you to know, that God " has never interrupted his system of the propagation of the human species, from the creation of the first pair to the present hour :'* and you incline to believe, that had God, in his infinite wisdom, thought proper to do so in the inflance of Jesus Christ, he would have directed Moses and the Prophets to presignify this most extraordinary transaction ; even as distinctly as the circumstances of his being brought as a lamb to the slaughter, and though innocent as a lamb, " numbered with the transgressors." It does not much become one of your party, Sir, to be talking to us of the clearness and distinctness of the Prophecies you have chosen to allude to ; they are certainly distinct enough, and one would think were a proper criterion to determine the sense of the Apos- tle to the Hebrews, but not in this mianner. Not to dwell upon this, however, at present, you cannot but know, Sir, how many (how large a majority, for I remember Mr. Jones acknowledges the *' majority of mankind " to be against him and you, in the Pre- face to his Developement of Facts) think that the miraculous birth of the Messiah ivas foretold ; how many think it was quite as distinctly foretold as the circumstances you mention. They think it was twice nay thrice foretold, that he was to be born of a woman without — (I was going to cite your terms, but I forbear — ) you, however, assure the Clergy of Essex, that not the least intimation of the kind, much less an express declaration of his merely maternal na- tivity, occurs in the writings of Moses, and the Prophets. XJ I declare. 290 Letter to the Reverend Francis Stone, I declare, Sir, I should be ashamed to affront the clergy of Essex so much as even to refer them to the passages that do so notoriously contradict your asser- tion. Nor can I conceive it possible, that you can ever have even looked into Bishop Pearson upon this sub- ject, who would not only tell you, that the Trini- tarian Christians have not mistaken the Jewish Prophe- cies upon this point, (as you would represent) accord- ing to the fairest tests of criticism ; but that they have the countenance and support of many Jewish Rabbis, as to the fact of a merely maternal nativity being ex- pressly in the view of the prophets. Your conclusion therefore. Sir, that your account of the matter alone is- supported by the prophecies, rests entirely on your own assertion: and what you, in the slowness of your heart, dulness of comprehension, and I must add, probably, defect of learning, think yourself bound to reject as an interpolated forgery, I trust the clergy of Essex, on the authority, as well of Jewish Rabbis as Christian Fathers, on the authority of such men as Bishop Pear- son and Bishop Bull, mm multis aliis, will feel bound to maintain inviolate, as an indisputable article of Faith 1 You object totally, and I think in very coarse terms, considering how many truly learned and good men have believed, and do believe it, (which I men- tion, to excuse the language I am sometimes obliged to use myself,) you object, I say, to the miraculous conception, and, of course, to the annunciation (as ■ it is called) of the blessed Virgin. (Luke, chap, i.) *' It could not be a real 7niracle," you say, " because it passed entirely in private ; in the nature of things, it did not admit of eye-witnesses ; nothing more need be added to evince the forgery.'* I think. Sir, that inftead of a real ?niraclef you Ihould have said a real roision, for the whole depends on the reality of the visions which Joseph and Mary had. Even your impostor Letter to the Reverend Francis Stone. 291 Impostor had not such gross ideas as you appear to entertain upon the subject. No fact is described, but only announced. This indeed passed in private, as you say ; but all we are told is, that both Joseph and Mary had visions, and what the purport was of the angelic salutation. A miracle is wrought to con- vince eye-witneffes ; a vision is vouchsafed for any purposes of supernatural instruction. That visions happen therefore in private, can be no objection to their authenticity ; for so happened all the prophetic visions on which you rest so much. Who saw the Word of the Lord come to Isaiah, Jeremiah, or Eze- kiel ? How do you know they were directed by God to disclose the things they uttered ? Only upon their own authority. But perhaps you will alledge, their veracity is confirmed by the fulfilment of their pro- phecies recorded in Scripture. I think so as well as you ; but you have no right to the argument, because, if you recollect, you profess to argue from the Old to the New Testament, not from the New to the Old. You set out with the inspiration of the Jewish Pro- phets, and, of course, give previous credit to their visions ; you, in short, argue like a Jezvish, not hke ' a Gentile believer. [See this distinction well explained by Bishop Hurd's Serm. v. p. 152]. But, Sir, if you doubt the veracity of Ma?y and Joseph, from the extreme privacy of the transadions, why doubt the vision ^ of Zach arias, so immediately connected with them in all its circumstances ? This, if it happened in private, was yet attended with circumflances of confiderable publicity. For though. Indeed, it was in the inner part of the synagogue that the angel appeared to Zacharias, yet " the whole multitude of the people " was praying juft without ; and, after an impatient expectation of his appearance, the inftant he came forth, it was the people in waiting who dis- U 2 covered 292 Letter to the Reverend Francis Stone, covered by his looks and manner, that he had seen a vision. What say you, Sir, to this annunciation ? Remember the two visions, (or miracles, if you please, for the truth of the latter depends on the former^ are closely connected, and cannot indeed be separated : and mark the character of Zacharias ; he was not only a good man, and " righteous before God,*' (Luke i. 6.), but he was by no means a credulous man ; the reverse indeed to a fault, v. 20. It is odd. Sir, how you Unitarians (as you call yourselves) receive or reject the Word of God just as you think proper. In Dr. Priestley's Notes on the Bible, now lying on my table, (a posthumous work in 4 vols.) I see he gives credit to the annunciation, but rejects the miraculous conception ; that is, he will believe that an angel appeared, but he will not believe what the angel announced. For I think, if the angel did appear, nothing can be more manifest than that it was a miraculous conception that he announced. Dr. P. thinks so much otherwise, that he even cites the 34th verse of the first chapter of St. Luke, to prove that Mary " expressed no surprise that the Messiah should be born in the usual course of generation ;" that is, (if it is possible to under- stand his views of the subject,) Mary objecting her virginity, and the angel declaring that nothing was Impossible with God, meant ?io more than that though she was then a Virgin, yet the Messiah should (in due course of time, for Dr. P. must mean this) spring from her loins ; but, as Irena^us says, *' Quid magnum aut " quod Signum fieret, in eo quod adolescentula con- " cipiens ex Viro peperisset, quod evenit omnibus " quse pariunt mulieribus." — Advers. Hasres. Lib. III. xxvii. And if this was really the purport of Mary's expostulation, what becomes of the following passages ? (I write to the learned, Sir, that is, if I may Letter to the Reverend Francis Stone, 293 may be permitted, through you, at least, to the Clergy of Essex), What becomes, I say, of the following passages, Auyipuni at luantp oItto m uttvou, £7roi»i(rfV wj TTpoa-iTtx^sv auTW uynXoi; Kvpin, xa,\ TrapiXx^i rviv yvuamx avTs. Kx\ OTK EFINnSKEN ATTHN, £w? Z iTens tov viov xvT^g TOV TTpuTOToyiov X. T. A.? — Matt. i. 24, 25. Dr. p. does not in this work rejed, or even dispute the two first chapters of Matthew, as you do, Sir ; he even refers to the very verses I cite, and even adopts notes to the same purport from Mr. Turner and Dr. Jebb ; so that these are the reasonings of more than one of your party. If you have any doubt about the term ly^uua-Ksv, I refer you to the autho- rities cited by Parkhurft, Leigh in his Critica Sacra, and Beza in loco, or even Dryden's Plutarch, Life of Ro7nulits, vol. i. 96. At p. 1 6. you come to the celebrated prophecy of Isaiah, ch. vii. 14, 15, 16. You say, that, to support the fiftitious miracle of the conception, a parenthefis is introduced by the pretended Matthew, containing an appeal to a prophecy of Isaiah, " Behold a Virgin (hall conceive," &c. These parentheses diftress you terribly. You take upon you, however, to tell the Clergy of Essex, that it is an evident misapplication of a prophecy, which relates to a different event, to come to pass in the reign of Ahaz, king of Judah, and about three years after the delivery of the pro- phecy in the said reign. So much has been written upon the subjed of this prophecy, that I really know not what to say, that has not been said over and over again by much abler men than myself. But I cannot help complaining of two very suspicious circumflances in your account of the matter ; first, that in yourcita- rion of the passage in Isaiah, you quote it thus ; " the Lord himself fhall give, you," Ahaz, " a sign," &c. Now, Sir, it is most particularly otherwise than you U 3 state 294 Letter io the Reverend Francis Stone. state It. The sign is not represented as given to Aha^, (he had expressly rejecled the offer of it) it is icpre- sented as given to " the Houfe of David.''* See Col- lyer*s Sacred Interpreter, vol. ii. 46. Kidder^s Demon- stration of the Messiah, and Origen contr. Cels. Lib. i. SriXovoTi ro tw Ap^a*^^ si^nixij/cv, ric ojxw fi^rjTCit Aocvt^. ThlS makes a considerable difference, and has been so in- sisted upon by the ablest commentators, that your insertion of Ahaz, in so marked a manner, has cer- tainly a very suspicious appearance, and of a kind not very creditable to your caufe. You also confidently assure us, that HD^y* in the Hebrew, means any young woman, with a plain insi- nuation that the Prophet did not intend a Virgin, by the use of this word in the place referred to. Mr. Jones, I remember, has much to say upon the ambiguity of the Latin word Virgo also, in his " Developement of Facts ;" but he goes a httle farther than you, for he declares, that " the Jews always maintained that the correspondent Hebrew v/ord signified in this place, not a virgin, but a young woman." As you make a common cause with him, Sir, it is fit to object to such confident and unfounded aff^rtions. — The Jews always maintained I ! I have at least. Sir, LXXII Jews to produce against it. For the famous Septua- gint version, undoubtedly has irap^iuog, which was so written 300 years before the birth of Christ, Nay, what is inore suspicious than all, Aquila, Symmachus and Theodotion, three apostates from Christianity, and whose versions, as the learned Brian Walter ex- presses it, ex odio Christianize RcUgionis fada fuerinty subsdtute the word vjan? ; and if you wish to know more of their perversions of Scripture, allow me to refer you to the Paris Edition of Ircnceus^ Lib. iii. c. xxiv, or to our own Ca-VL\ vol. i. 54, of his His- ioria Literaria SS. EE. The ancient father has more upon Letter to the Reverend Francis Stone. 295 upon the subject in his xxxist and xxxiiid Chap* ters of the same book, and in the 19th of Book v Mr. Jones's oversight is the more inexcusable, be- cause, Sir, as I mentioned before, he expressly objects to St. Paiirs evidence, Gal. iv. 4, in our favour, be- cause he did not write yswu^i^o]/ ex TrapOfi/S. I say nothing about the difficulties attending the application of this prophecy to Hezekiah. They have been so amply discussed by Commentators of the greatest name, that whoever will be at the trouble of con- sulting them may easily find enough to satisfy their doubts ; nor do I pretend to dispute the application of the prophecy, in a subordinate sense^ to the in- vading kings of Assyria and Israel. Your next passage, Sir, in which you exult in " having gained a complete triumph over an impostor, assuming the name of Matthew,*' can only excite my smiles ; accompanied with this one remark — that the Spaniards clai?ned the victory after the battle of Tra- falgar ! ! But, Sir, you say, this most impudent im^^ postor " has dared to invent a prophecy," p. 18. Is it any invention of a prophecy, to quote the very words of the prophet? for Hosea was a Jewish Pro- phet at all events ; a matter, I think, of some conse- quence, though you seem not to regard it. At the beginning of your Sermon, however, you refer to Revelations, xix. 10, and making it, as you say, a convertible proposition, (in which you agree with Bishop Hurd) you determine its meaning to be, that " the Spirit of Prophecy is the testimony of JesusJ* Now, without running into the extravagancies that some do, who pretend to find allusions to our Saviour in almost every word of the Bible ; it has been almost generally admitted, that our Saviour is so much the great object and end of all the Jewish Prophecies, that he never is so entirely out of sight, but that many U 4 passages^ 2g6 Letter to the Reverend Francis Stone. passages, relating apparently only to the occurrences of the Jewish state, may yet have a farther allusion to the Person, Office, and Ministry of the Messiah. If you do not admit this, Sir, I cannot help it ; I have wise and learned men enough on my side to insist upon it, if I chose it. Now, Sir, in quoting the pas- sage from Hosea, the author certainly says, " it was spoken of the Lord by the Prophet ;'* but he does not say it was primarily or exclusively spoken of him : he does not deny its being spoken also of the Exodus of Israel, as you insist. According to a very com- mon mode of interpretation, it might be spoken of both. Not a mode of interpetration adopted by Chris- tians to explain their own books, but by Jews them- selves, in the interpretation of their own Prophets, as is well shown by Dr. Whitby in loco^ Grotius, Heinsius, &c. and our own Wells and Doddridge^ consider it as a mere allusion. At all events, it is certainly no invention of a prophecy. You yourself teach us how to invent a prophecy, in p. i o. of your Discourse, where you tell us, in direct terms, what the Prophets should have said and declared, in case they had been commissioned to foretel the miraculous conception. You remind us, p. 19. " Fas est et ah hoste doceri" and are willing accordingly to adopt Julian's remark on Deut. xviii. 15. but a more idle remark, I will venture to say, could hardly have been made. Surely any human being born, or *' made of a woman,'* must be reckoned a man, and so far " of our brethren.'' What does the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews think of the matter ? " Forasmuch then as the child- ren are partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself took part of the same." (Heb. ii. 14.) or what does our Saviour himself say ? " That which is born of the flesh is flesh." {John, iii. 6.) As to your imperial authority, so strongly cited, to retort yoiu: maxim upon you, Letter to the Reverend Francis Stone, 297 you, let me remind you, that Julian bears testimony to St. John's assertion, that Jesus " was God" (See Jortin's Tracts, vol. i. p. 402 ; and Edwards* s, Pre- servative against Socinianifin, part iii. 32. ; — and re- member also, that if John wrote against the Gnostics, as you all pretend, he 7nust have meant 0jof in the highest sense, or he would have agreed with them in- stead of contradicting them;) — ** Fas est et ab hoste doceri 1" You see. Sir, the miraculous conception is not the only difficulty you have to get over, the hostile Juhan himself being judge. And now. Sir, you come to the common cant of your party about the origin of the Trinitarian Creed. " Piatonismus, Platonisfnus, (jnquiunt omnesy primum sinceram Apostolorum traditionem vitiavit." You think the doctrine of the Trinity in Unity en- tirely owing to the corruptions of the Platonic Phi- losophers at Alexandria, who, from their Polytheistic propensities, and offence at the cross of Christ, and having acquired a habit of Apotheosis, converted their master Christ into a God, and turned their esteem for him into Divine worship. Really, Sir, so much has been written upon this subject, that it seems almost ridiculous to attempt to convince you, or to make any impressions upon you in the compass of guch a reply as this ; and your elegant Apostrophe I ** Fief Fie / on all such old wives Fables,'* — p. 21. renders it absurd even to refer you to such writers, as have with great pains and infinite learning discussed this point ; while in regard to the Clergy of Essex, and even the pubHc in general, I cannot for a moment feel afraid of their being led astray by such empty declamation, and such vain assertions as you introduce into this part of your discourse. 1 Ihall, however, just attempt to follow you as far as you go. The Platonic Triad, Sir, may seem to agree in point of numbers j but when rightly understood, cannot, I think, 7 by 298 Letter to the Reverend Francis Stone. by any reasonable man be thought fit to be brought into comparison with the Church doctrine of the Trinity. But to wave this for the present, and to attend merely to your account of matters. Let us suppose then, Sir, that among the early proselytes to Christianity, there were many Platonic Philosophers ; and then let us examine how far it is likely, as you pretend, that the Christian Trinity was a mere cor- ruption introduced by them. You say they were *♦ inclined to Polytheism ; habitually fond of Apo- theosis, and offended at the idea of a crucified Re- deemer." They had moreover the doctrine among them of three, (not persons remember,) hut Principles , cr attributes, as you account them, r cifa^ou, voZq and TO Trvsuiota, p. 28. It would have been undoubtedly more correct to have said to eV, or, r a^oc^ovy i/i? and i^u;^^*, but this would not so well have served your purpose. But, Sir, these things being as you state them, (to which, however, I do not assent,) can it with any shadow of reason be said, that they were the authors of the Christian Trinity ? Did they intro- duce. Sir, into the canon of Scripture, any one of those terms which you pretend they endeavoured to identify with their own philosophical principles? For thisy Sir, is your position ; you do not, I think, pre- tend to say the Platoinsts first introduced three prin- ciples, or three persons into the system of faith, but that a parcel of " Gregories Thaiwmturgi or wonder- njoorkersy^ only endeavoured to establish an identity ^ (these are your words) of the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost, with r xyx^ouy vovg, and to TrvtZixx of Plato. Did they not find then, Sir, in Scripture, three names associated, in the form of Christian Bap- tism appointed by our Lord himself? And one of * See them so enumerated by Cudworth, Intell. Syst, B. L Cbap. 4, these Letter to the Rei'erend Fraticis Stone. 299 these evidently the name or Title of a Person, nay, his own most appropriate designation ? Did they not find these three names continually associated in the be?iedictions and doxologies of the Apostolic writers ? Did they not find in Scripture, that Christ had de- clared, that He and His Father were One ? That all things that the Father had were His ? That they ought to honour the Son even as they honoured the Father ? V/here, Sir, was the difficulty of Platonic Trinitarians, if there were any such persons, which is extremely doubtful, (see Dr. MorgarLs Treatise on the Trinity of Plato, he.) becoming Christian Trini- tarians ? Or, becoming so, where could be the won- der, if there was even the resemblance yoii admit, if they were still found to Platonize ? Where could the wonder be, I say, upon your own principles, that Platonic Proselytes fliould fall into some errors upon this head ; should improperly and unadvisedly blend their philosophy with Christianity, just as the Jewish Converts acted with regard to the Mosaic Institutions ? Can it, however, be said, with any show of reason, that there was iiofhing like a Trinity in Unity to be discovered in the Sacred Writings till the Platonic Philosophers incorporated their dogmata with the cre- denda of Christianity ? After all, Sir, neither you nor / are Platonic Philosophers. Not you certainly ; as to myself, perhaps, you will not believe me if I say it, for Justin Martyr has been treated by your party upon this occasion, as if he was not to be believed on his oath. How solemnly, how repeatedly, " Quo- ties, quam aperte, quam ardenti zelo atque effectu," as Bishop Bull says, does he renounce his Platonism, and refer solely to the Holy Scriptures ! I must urge you, Sir, in the words of the good Bishop, " Lege, lege incomparabilem ipsius Dialogum cum Tryphone Judaso 1" You will fmd much there, to correct your notions about Platonism, as well as in the learned Bishop's 300 Letter to the Reverend Francis Stone. Bishop's Prim, et Apostolic. Tradit. de Jesu Christi Divinitate^ ch. v. 1 fear, Sir, I am recommending these things in vain ; but, indeed, these authorities are, in my mind, far above any you refer to in your Discourse, and I hope they are so in the estima- tion of those you had the honour of addressing at the Visitation. But to return. — As I said before, Sir, neither of us are Platonic Philosophers ; neither of us were bred in the school of Alexandria, that terrible source, as you think, of all the follies and corruptions, " mon- strous figments," and " incredible errors," that have obscured the original system of " pure, plain, and primitive Christianity." The Scriptures themselves, Sir, are open to us ; Search Them ! and remember, Sir, that it is not the Trinitarians only, who blunder about these matters ; nor yet Pagan Polytheists in the habit of Apotheosis. Faustiis Socinus, Sir, neither Pagan, Platonist, nor Trinitarian, found many things in the Scriptures which you cannot find there ; nay, Sir, he even found himself compelled, by the ex- pressions there used concerning our Saviour, to con- fer on him, (what shall I call it ? You call ours a Christian Deification, I must have leave then to call Socinus's) an Unitarian Apotheosis ; acknowledging him to be clearly and indisputably a God by Creatiofi and Appointment, a " Deus Verus," a fit object of Prayer and Worship ! ! Nor is Socinus, Sir, the only Anti-Trinitarian, Anti-Platonist and Anti-Pagan, who has found these things in Scripture. Suffer me to refer you. Sir, to the notes to my viith Bampton Lecture, published last year ; you will there find that many who have been, with great ostentation, accounted of your party, and of course Anti-Trini- tarians, notwithstanding all their endeavours and eager desire to do away Christ's proper Diviniiy, have nevertheless (several of them even in the course of Letter to the Reverend Francis Stone. 301 of the last Century, the boasted Age of Reason') so read the Scriptures as only to fall into a worse dilemma, that of making him a subordinate and distinct God, at the hazard of the grossest idolatry. But a truce, Sir, to Platonism for the present, since you quit it for a short time in your Discourse, in order to return to the detection and exposure of the pretended Matthew, as you call him. Very curi- ous, indeed, is your next remark, because profane history corroborates what is said in general of the merciless disposition of Herod, you will believe it ; but because profane history does not mention the slaughter of the Bethlemite Infants, you will 7iot be- lieve it. So now, Sir, not " Jewish Prophecy," according to your first principle, but Profane History is to be the criterion of spurious and genuine Chris- tian Scripture ! Take care. Sir, lest even this cri- terion should be against you ; remember Jidia?i*s acknowledgment, that St. John plainly ascribed Di- vinity to Jesus Christ ; consider FIiny*s Tesumony to the Belief and Practice of the primitive Christians, <' Carmen Christo, quasi Deo, dicere solitos.'* Re- member the oath in Lucian, h U rpiwi/, xa) l^ tvcg Toix 1 ! And though Profane History may not supply you with the very fact of the slaughter of the Beth- lemite Infants, Profane History will at least carry you so far, as to render it an act not unsuitable to the " merciless dispositions '* of those days ; for Suetonius would tell you, that nearly at that very time, even the Senate of Rome, to evade a Sybilline Prophecy, actually passed a decree for the exposure, that is destruction, of all the children born in one ye^r ; *< ne quis illo anno genitus educaretur," are the very terms used. But you have another decisive proof of the actual falsehood of this relation; namely, that the author has grossly misapplied a prophecy 302 Letter to the Reverend Francis Stone, prophecy in Jere?niah, which relates to a totally dif- ferent event. Never, surely, were such stupid, bungling impostors ! ! You, however, have found out, it seems, what was the real purport of the passage in Jeremiah. It is, you say, " a beautiful species of prosopopoeia or personification of Rachel, a mother of two tribes of Israel, Joseph and Benjamin, Introduced as weeping inconsolably for her children ; these two tribes, because they were not in their own land, but carried into captivity." Indeed, Sir, this is a notable discovery; only, I think, everybody knew it before. You add, it is of Httle conse- quence what captivity of the Jews was particularly referred to ; and so I think too, Sir : for it is not about the Captivity that there is the smallest ques- tion : for if it was, as you say, only a beautiful Rrosopopma adopted by the Prophet, in reference to some event past, present, or to come, why might not St. Matthew ( or your impostor) adopt the same ? Many of your learned auditors no doubt could have pointed out to you, that the expression in this place, is not, iW. 7rATipc<;9i7 but TCTj E'7rAj)pw0*i, not this was done that it might be fulfilled, but as Dr. Whitby observes, and renders it, " then that happened which gave a more full completion to those words of Jeremy." And to show that the same idea of a prosopopxia struck the learned commentator, take the following excellent remarks upon it from the same place. — " Here was a greater occasion to Rachel to weep for her children than before, v/hich the Providence of God foreseeing, his Spirit might have a reference to it in these words. For first, Rachel being dead so long before the captivity, she may as well be introduced w.-^eping here, as there. Secondly, the slaughter of the Bethlemites might well be ftyled the slaughter of her children, she being buried there, (Geiu Letter to the Reverend Francis Stone. 303 (Gen» XXXV. 19), and the Bethlemites being de- scended from her husband and her own sister. Thirdly, the slaughter of the innocents being not restrained to Bethlehem, but extended to all the coasts round about., and Ramah^ being in the tribe of Benjamin, which sprang from Rachel, and not from Bethlehem, the voice of her weeping may well be said to be heard in RaniaJ* Even Crellius would have taught you better how to understand both this re- ference to Jeremiah, and that to Hosea, treated of be- fore. See his Annotations on the Second Chapter of St. Matthew. You next proceed to the detection, as you call it, of the last of these forgeries. " The pretended Matthew," you say, " relates, that Joseph, in his return from Egypt, with the young child and his mother, came and dwelled in a city called Nazareth, that it might be fulfilled, which was spoken by the Prophets, he shall be called a Nazarene ;" and you defy any person to find in all the Prophets, from Isaiah to Malachi, a single prediction answering thereto. Truly this must have been bungling beyond all that had gone before. The impostor mufl have gone quite out of his way, merely to betray himself. A reference to a prophecy that never had been known to exist, must have been madness in a per- son who meant to pass a cheat upon the world. Could not the forger examine the Jewish Prophecies, at the time he wrote, as well as the Rector of Cold Norton, 1800 years after the establishment of Christianity ; and, if he could not examine them, would he have ventured to refer to them ? So far from the apparent want of a correspondent predic- tion, (for perhaps it is yet in the original, though we cannot justly discover it) but so far from the want of a correspondent prediction being any proof of 304 Letter to the Reverend Francis Stone, of a forgery in this case, it is rather a proof, I con- fess, to me, that no forgery was intended. I could refer you to many commentators upon this point (for it is a difficulty not one of them has overlooked, though from your discourse any body would think it had struck nobody but you and your friend Mr. Jones) ; I shall, however, simply transcribe the note of Dr. Prksiley^ in the work I have already mentioned. — He is an Expositor you cannot well despise. He shall be called a NazareneJ] " This does not refer to any particular passage in any of the Prophets, but to the general idea that is given of the Messiah in all the Prophets, w^ho speak of him as a man who should be hated, reviled, persecuted, and afflicted ; and the Hebrew word, from which Nazareth is derived, fignifies this, as well as to be separated, or seques- tered from other men. And the town of Nazareth itself w^as both in name and in reality a despised place ; see Dr. Hunt's Sermon on this subject. Some have thought that the E'vaiigelist (mind, Sir, not the impostor') referred to the Messiah being called "^ii a branch ; but the word Nazarene is not derived from this, but from nUJ, as mentioned above.** Priestley's Notes on the Books of Scripture, 1804, vol. iii. p. 33. After all, Bishop Kidder might have reminded you that it is only said, it was spoken by the Prophets ; it is not said, it was written by them — and I would wish again to refer you to Crellius, whose note upon the passage is very curious, and who lays a stress upon its being put J.iv<; rat Atcvuv — a title of the Angel of the Covenant in Jewish Phraseology, p. 224, note. Beza — his suspicions concerning ch. xxii. of the book of Reve- lation, p. 253. ; his proposed correftion of the text, ibid. Bell (Dr.) — his works on the missions of John the Baptist and Jesus Christy P' 35- c. Cerlnlhla?is and Carpocratlans — their adoption of the Genealogy of Matthew, favourable to the views of the Unitarians, p.8. Carpenter (Dr ) — his strictures on the Author examined and ans\\ered, p. 47 — 54 ; his strange exj.^osition of Philippians ii. 6, 7, 8, 9. p. 206 ; his concession concerning Hebrews i. 8, p. 228. Clemens Streso — his remark on Coloss. i. 27. p. 62, note ; and on verses J5, 18, p. 213, note. Christ — the Jehovah Adonal of the Jews, p. 84 ; the Angel of God's presence, ibid ; the appearing God, &c. the Jehovah Angel, p. 230, 231, ibid ; sinless, p. 167, 168, Sec, 1 Corinthians, xv. 47. — considered, 200 — 202. 2 Corinthians, v. 21. — considered at length, 165 — 170. Colossians, ch. i. — strangely perverted by the Editors, p. 211, ai2, &c. *' Cleansing of Sins" — its scriptural import, p. 133 ; in the Jewish language must have implied a sacriticial atonement for sin, ibid. Crelllus — an authority for the common reading of Romans ix. 5. p. 1 8y, note. ConjeBural Crltlclfm — a very suspicious refuge on certain occa- sions, p. 189. Dissenters Index to the Remarks. 329 D. Dissenters — many classes implicated in the Criticisms of the Editors of the Improved Version, p, i, 266. Deuteronomy, vi, 4. — the terms in the original very extraordinary and important, p. 89, 90. AtaiioTtic — the term not exclusively appropriate to the Father, as the Unitarians pretend, p. 240, 245. Doxology — Matthew vi. 13 — probably a genuine passage of Scripture, 174, 175. Doceta — strange mode of combating their opinions, to say that Christ was manifested in the flesh, 247, note. E. Ehionites. — The beginning of their Gospel as represented by Epiphanius deserving of notice, strangely overlooked by the Editors of the Impr. Version, p. 5, 6, 7, note. why accounted wrong by the Editors for rejecting the Genealogy at the beginning of St. Matthew's Gospel, p. 8. not properly called by the Unitarians, the ancient Hebrew Christians, p. 9 ; their Gospel not perfect even in the estimation of the Editors, p. 37. ETTttp^'Eia — never applied to the Father, p. 62, note. Ephesians, v. 5. — how read by the Editors, p. 6'^. Exodus, xxiii. xxxii. xxxiii. with respect to the Jngel of the Lord considered and reconciled, p. 85, 86, note. Ekhim — Dr. Geddes's denial of the plural form of it of no ac- count in regard to the doctrine of the Trinity, p. 89, note* p,i24, note. 'EfXTvyx.u.m — its import, p. 15 1. E's-.xa^a^y.Ei'f.; — applied actively i Cor. i. p. 192, 193; the Editors inconsistent in their renderings of the term, p. 193, 198. Ephesians, \. 10. — low and narrow views of the Unitarians con- cerning the passage, p. 203, 104. Ephesians, vi. 12. — defended from the misrepresentations of the Editors, p. 205, 206. Exinanition 330 Index to the Remarks. Exinanition of Christ, confounded with his humiliation by the Editors, in their rendering and interpretation of that celebrated passage Phihppians ii. 7. p. 209. Edwards ( President) — his obsei-vations on the extraordinary terms applied to our Saviour in the Scriptures, p. 263, 264, 265. F. Falcontr [Kfi. Mr.) — his Bampton Lecture, and able remarks on a passage of Tertullian, p. 36. G. Gospels — spurious ones, evidences in favour of the miraculous conception, p. 14. Geddes (Dr.) — his remarks on the EloJnm answered in the British Critic, vol. xix. 136. of no moment in the controversy be- tween the Trinitarians and Unitarians, p. 89, note. Gnostics — their notions of the Logos, p. 6g, 71 ; their heresies strongly corroborative of the doctrines of the two Natures and Divinity of Christ, p. 71, note. H. Herod — the period of his death discussed, p. 12, 13, 27, 28, 39. Hales (Dr.) — his Discussion of the Christian Era, p. 29. Heresies — early ones corroborative of Christ's Divinity, p. 73' note. Hehreivsy ch. i. — The Unitarian comments on it considered at length, p. 1 17 — 134. Origen's opinion concerning the au- thor of the Epistle probably misunderstood, p. 225, 2 6. — Ch. xi. 3. The Editors remarkably at variance with Archbishop Newcome, in regard to this passage, p. 229. Isaiah, Index to the Remarks, 331 I. Isaiah, liii. — Professor Magee\ comments on it of great import- ance, p. 145. Intercession oi Chx'iit, d.eine(ihy the Unitarians, p. 150; the sub- ject considered at length, p. 150 — 154. Wt/.T'/ifi')-!, \>r"rn: and lAa'j-fxc,^- — the Scriptural use of these terms considered, p. 156 — 159. Invocation of Chrisif ■p.igi. J. John the Baptist — his ignorance of the person of Christ previous to his Baptism neither impossible nor improbable, p. 34, ^^ ; his mission strangely confounded with that of Jesus by the Unitarians, p. 102, 103, &c. JEHOVAH — jealousy of the Jews in regard to the Title, p. 41, 42, 85. The word of God the visible Jehoimh, p, 69. The Title of Jehovah given to the Messiah, p. 83, &: 90 — 94. I John, V. 7. — The weight of existing evidences decidedly against it, p. 248, some doubts however still hanging over the question concerning its authenticity, ibid, Jude, ver, 4. — Dr. Twells's remarks on the text conformable to Mr. Sharp's canon, p. 238, 239. K. KV|;io?.— the rendering of the Term Adonai in the Septuagint, p. 41, 42; must therefore occasionally stand also for Jehovah in its fullest and highest sense, p. 42, 43, 44, 64. Kidder (Bishop) — his summary of Philo^i sentiments and ex- pressions in regard to the Trinity, very good, p. 79, note. K«T« atifKcc — its proper import, Romans, ix. 5, p. 182, 183. L. Lardner (Dr.) — strange abuse of his authority in regard to the Death of Herod, p. 12, 13, 27, 28, 29. Lukcy ii. 49. — strongly illustrative of our Lord's Divinity, p. lo, n, 19. Ltih, 332 Index to the Remarks. Luket Hi. 13. — The rendering of the Editors examined at length, p. 24 — 26 ; Griesbach's note on it in favour of the common reading, p. 25, note ; Newcome and Wakefield also favour it, ibid ; Grotius quite against them, p. 26. Aofo? or IVordoi God, p. 43, 45; in what sense it must have been used by a Jewish writer, p. 46, 70, 73, 75, 79, 96; The ■visible Jehovah, p. 69; Angel of the Covenant^ ibid; Shech'mah, or manifested Glory of God, ibid. — Three opinions con- cerning the Logos, when John wrote his Gospel, p. 69. Laurence (Dr.) — his Dissertation on the Logos of St. John, p.yo* 74 ; his remarks on the Existence of an evil Being, p. 260, note, Ltndsey (Mr.) — objections to his Version of the beginning of John's Gospel, 114, 115, 116. Ati?po> — its force and meaning considered, p. 139, 140. M. Matthetv (St.) — consideration of the suspicions thrown out by the editors against the two first chapters of his Gospel, p. 4—27. Mary — her pedigree involved in that of Joseph, p. 12, 27, 32 ; EvangeHcal accounts of the miraculous birth of Christ, probably derived from her, p. 15, 16, 18. Marcion — the weight of his evidence against the accounts of the miraculous conception discussed, p. 29, 30, 35 ; strangely cited against himself by the Editors, as shewn by Mr. Ren- nell and Dr. Laurence, p. 30, note. Mo.oynr,!; — the received translation unavoidable, p. 113 ; Dr. Twells's able remarks on the term, p. 176, 177, 178. Mareslus contra Volkelium, his account of Christ's priesthood, p. 169, note. Mclchisedec — the proper type of Christ's priestly office, p.. i68» »^{C. Monthly Review of Mr. Belsham's Calm Inquiry concerning the Person of Christ, vol.lxviii. (new series), contains some ex- cellent remarks appUcable to the Improved Version, p. 108. note. Medium of Reconciliation — abuse of these terms by the Editors* p. 151, 152. Newcomt Index to the Remarks, N. 33: A'lfWtfowi^ — Archbishop, amount of the deviations from his trans- lation, calculated and considered by an Unitarian, p. 3, note ; his opinion of the Aoyoc,, p. 93, note. Narratives of the birth of Jesus in Matthew and Luke, extant in all MSS. and versions, p. 8. ^^^ and blU — an abstraft of Dr. Magee'i very learned com- ment on these two terms, p. 145 — 148. Names of God, of great importance, p. 88, &c. o. Obfcurity in which our Saviour's early days were passed, no ob- je6tion to the Gospel histories, p. ly, 18. Outram de Sacrificiis — his able remarks on Isaiah, liii. 1 2. should be consulted on the nature of Christ's priesthood, p. i6S, P. Prie/iley Dr. — his opinions, as exhibited in his last work, {Notes on all the Books of Scripture) far less objeftionable than his former works, and much less accordant with the spirit of the Improved Version, p. 2, note ; his opinion of the fpiirious Gospels, p. 14, note ; his notion of the angelic appearances to the Patriarchs, p. 74, note, 86, note. Prayer addressed to Christ, p. 195, 196, 197. Prophecies — reasoning from them by the sacred writers not incon- clusive, as the Unitarians pretend, p. 20. Propitiation — the Editors inconsistent in their notions concerning it, as applicable tro the Deity, p. 149, note. UfoaKwuv — probably employed by the sacred writers in the highest sense in many cases, p. 6^^ 66. UfUToroKo!, — first born, used comparatively by the LXX. p. 213, note. Platomjli — their notions of the Logos, p. 69. 2 Peter, i. i. — Dr. Twells's remarks on the passage 1729, per- fectly consistent with Mr. Sharp's canon, p. 236. Praludia 334 Indeic to the Remarks. Praludia Incarnat'tonh — a strong expression of the ancieht fathers as descriptive of the appearances of the Logos to the Patriarchs, p. 74, note. Philippians, ii. 6, "] , 8. 9, strangely perverted by the Unitarians, p, 206, 207, 208, 209. Psalm ex. I. — our Saviour's reference to it considered, p. 77, 78. 1 Peter^m. 19. — a proof the antecedent interposition of Christ, p. 232. Proem of St. John's Gospel according to the Unitarians, con- sidered, p. 97 — 116. n«f;a«Xy,T6,- ■— its import considered, p. 15 I — 153. Pr'teflhood — Christ's, grossly misunderstood and misrepresented by the Editors, p. 167 — 173. R. Regtjler of the birth of Jesus in the public records of the Empire, as noticed by Jtijl'in Martyr, TertuUtan, and Chrysostom, extremely probable, p. 14, 15, 25. Ranfom — the proper force of the term evaded and explained away by the comments of the Editors, p. 136, &c. &c. ; perfeftly applicable in its proper meaning to the death of Christ, p. 137, 138, 140, 243, 244.. RomanSi'm. 25, 26. — considered at length p. 154 — 165 ; the au- thor's sense of the passage approved and adopted by Dr. Magee in the 3d edition of his work on atonement, p. 163. RotnatiSfix. 5. — considered at length, p. 181 — 191. — Archbishop Newcome's paraphrase decidedly against the Editors, p, 1S4, note. s. Sharp, (Mr, Granville) — his canon, p. 51, 52, 60 ; his death noticed, p. 60, note ; his canon no new rule, p. 234 — 238. Son-ship of the Messiah, not in the way of adoption, as the Editors would insinuate, p. 59 ; contrary both to Newcome and Griesbach, ibid. note. Son of God — the title applied emphatically and singularly to our Saviour, p. 66. Son Index to the Remarks* 335 Son of Man — emphatically predicated of our Saviour, p. 50. Simon Magus — his pretentions strongly in favour of the do6:rine of Christ's Divinity, p. 72, note. Sowuera'in {^.) — his Platon'um unveiled — remarks on Psalm ex. I, correfted, p. 78, note. Stephen— -his address to Christ, Afts, vii. 59. admitted by the Editors to have been a prayer to Christ, p. 194. lluTfif — a term of singular importance in Scripture language, p. 219 ; so indifferently applied to Father and Son, as to go far to prove an identity of Nature^ p. 222. Scape-goat — its analogy to the vicarious sufferings of our Saviour ably pointed out by Yir.Mageey p. 147, note. T. TttuS) ii. 13, — how read by the Editors in defiance of Mr. Sharp's rule on remarks, p. 60, 61, 62. 2 Thessalonlansy i. 12. — how read by the Editors, p. 6^, I Timothy, v. 21. — not rightly rendered by the Editors, p. 63, 64. Terms applied by the sacred writers in the N. T. to the person of Christ, consistent with Jewish opinions and traditions, p. 76. Technical phraseology — remarks on the expression as used by the Unitarians, p. 135. Thomas — his reply to our Saviour, John, xx. 28., a proper con- fession of faith, p. 1 80, 181. ©i&Ij)5 — a word of stronger import than Quolnc, expressive of the very essence or nature of God in the estimation of the learned, p. 216. I Timothy, iv. 10. — compared with many other texts in proof of our Lord's being not only the Zojtjj^ or Saviour of Man, but the 0£o; Zwv, or Living God, p. 219 — 224. 27/KJ, ii. 13. — Dr. Twells's curious remarks on the passage, p. 337 ; entirely corroborative of Mr. Sharp's rule, p. 238. u. Unitarians — admit that if the doftrines of Christ's pre-existence and superior nature be true, the Scriptures contain expres- sions that may fairly be held to countenance such opinions, p. 20, note. — Their criticism systematically evasive, p. 40 ; and trifling, p. 80. Varioiit 336 ' Index to the Remarks. V. Various readings — nothing lost to the Trinitarian cause by the present immense number of them, p. 258, 259. w. Wells (Dr. Edward) — his correAions of the Greek text of Reve- lation, i. in conformity with that of the Improved Version, though upwards of 90 years old, p. 257, 258. FINIS. Strahan and Preston, Printers-Street, London. i?*>t