BY REV. ANDREW CARROLL.
SENECA, CINCINNATI:
1846
"For in him dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead bodily." COL. 2. 9.
IN presenting this little volume to the public, our design is to be useful, not to write for writing's sake. We are aware that many volumes have been written on this subject, some in one way, and some in another. Many orthodox divines have written well on this topic, but their works are too voluminous to have a general circulation, and others, as we think, have not exactly followed the Scriptures, particularly in defining the title "Son of God." They apply this to the human nature of the Blessed Savior. Among these writers we find the venerable Dr. A. Clark, Messrs. Ethan Smith, and Drew.
The absolute Divinity of Christ has occupied our mind for the last six or seven years. And in writing these pages, we think, we have been patient in investigation, and prayerful in application.
Our mind was called to investigate this subject some years ago, by reading a work published by Mr. Kinkade, which we think has slandered the character of the Savior, by striving to rob him of his absolute divinity. Our appeal is made to the PREFACE.
Scriptures, emphatically, as the ultimate and only certain proof of the Supreme Divinity of Jesus Christ. The Christian church is divided into what is termed, Trinitarians and Unitarians. The former believe the Scriptures reveal three persons in one God, called, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost. The class called Unitarians is divided, and subdivided under various appellations, as Newlights, Campbellites, Universalists, etc.
Unitarians of all grades and names, do not profess to believe that Jesus Christ is " God manifested in the flesh." Newlights, both preach and pray in the name of Christ, still will not admit He is equal with the Father, or that he is the Supreme God. Campbellites, are not so distinguished for directly denying the absolute Deity of Christ. Nevertheless, they have but little, if any claims to the creed of Trinitarians, as they deny the personality of the Holy Spirit, and hold that the Word, (the Scriptures,) and the Spirit are synonymous, and to cap the climax, Mr. Alex. Campbell affirms in answer to a letter of Mr. B. W. Stone, "I have also disavowed Trinitarianism and every sectarianism in the land."—Millen. Harb. vol. 4, No. 6, 1840.
The point at issue between Trinitarians and all species of Unitarians, is not whether Christ be the Son of God, nor is it, whether Christ be a man. But it is, whether Christ be equal with God the Father. Here we affirm, and they deny. Again, whether this Christ be " God manifested in the flesh." As the Unitarian champion, Dr. Priestly says, we may say. " The truth is," says he, " there neither can, nor ought to be, any compromise between us. If you are right, we are not Christians at all; and if we are right, you are gross idolaters."
PREFACE. V In connection with the remarks on the divinity of Christ, we have added a few thoughts on the nature of his death. All of which, with meekness and prayer, we submit to the serious consideration of the reader—hoping, through divine mercy they may be to him of some benefit. August 19, 1845.
CHAPTER 1.
Ancient Heathen Nations believed in the Doctrine of Three Persons in the Divine Nature. Hindoos, and Persian Triad
—Orphic Theology
—Greek Philosophers
—Ancient Scandinavians
—Japanese
---Chinese, acknowledge a Triad,
CHAPTER 2.
Testimony of the Ancient Jewish Nation—The Jews had a Revelation from God. The Predictions of the Old Testament are fulfilled in the New,
CHAPTER 3.
The Testimony of Pagan Writers, touching the Character of Jesus Christ. Tacitus—Sentorius—Celsus—Julian,
CHAPTER 4.
The Christian Church in the time of the Apostles, and after, held the Doctrine of the Supreme Divinity of Jesus Christ.
Barnabas
Clemens
Romanus
Ignatius
Polycarp
Athenagoras
Tertullian, etc.
CHAPTER 5.
The Primitive Christians held the Doctrine of Christ's Supreme Divinity, as is proved by the fact, that all who rejected it were expelled from the Church as Heretics. Cerinthians, Ebionites, Sabellians, Socinians, Arians, etc., expelled from the Church, etc.
CHAPTER 6.
Objections made by the Unbelievers of Christ's Supreme Divinity
CHAPTER 7.
Scriptural Evidence of the Trinity in Unity:
Gen. 1. 1-26—Aleim in the plural—
The visible Jehovah raining fire from Jehovah in Heaven: Gen. 19. 24—
Lord God and his Spirit: Isa. 48. 16—
Divine Sonship. Watson, C. Butler, etc.
CHAPTER 8.
The Bible teaches the pre-existence of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Christ sent into the world—
He was in the Beginning —
Before Abraham—
Pre-existence before he was born of the Virgin, etc.
CHAPTER 9.
The Divinity of Christ is proved by the names of Jehovah, etc. in the Scriptures being applied to him. God; Angel, Man, Lord God, Angel of the Lord, Jehovah's Messenger, Everlasting Father,
CHAPTER 10.
Our Lord Jesus Christ possessed Divine Attributes. Attributes Indivisible
—Christ Eternal
—Omniscient
—Omnipresent
— Immutable
— Omnipotent
—Judge of Quick and Dead,
CHAPTER 11.
The Acts, and the Divine Worship of Christ, are proof of his Divinity. He created all things
—Preserves all things
—All things created for him
—He is worshipped by Angels, and Men, etc.
CHAPTER 12.
The Humanity of Christ—Hypostatic Union. The Gnostics, Eutyches, Apollinarians, refuted—Christ truly Man— Three classes of Scripture apply to Christ,
CHAPTER 13.
Jesus Christ made a Propitiatory Sacrifice for mankind, which is farther proof of his essential Divinity.
The Lord God King of the Israelites—The Tabernacle—Court of the Lord—Civil and Ceremonial Laws—Offerings, Eucharistic and Sacrificial, Propitiation, Atonement, Reconciliation—Sacrifice, Vicarious and Piacular,
CHAPTER 14.
Faith Essential to Salvation—Justification and Sanctification by Faith,
THE HEATHEN NATIONS BELIEVED IN THE DOCTRINE OF THREE PERSONS IN THE DIVINE NATURE.
As the doctrine of Christ's Supreme Divinity, as set forth in the scriptures, is associated with a triad in the divine nature, it may be proper, briefly, to consider the belief of the Ancient Heathens on this point. For the candid will admit, that the Almighty God could as well instruct them touching this matter, as to do what the scripture affirms He had done, to make known to the Greeks and to the Barbarians, "both to the wise and to the unwise, the invisible things of him from the creation of the world," clearly "being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead." Rom. 1. 20. So, we infer, that the very Godhead, as well as the power thereof, may be known by the Gentiles, or heathens. Mr. R. W. Landis affirms, that Dr. Priestly, in his "Comparison of the Institutions of Moses with those of the Hindus," section 1, page 7, has the following quotation from the celebrated infidel, Mr Langles: "Many thousand years before these people (among which are included the Egyptians, Jews, and Chinese,) formed themselves into societies, or even thought of forming a religion, the civilized Indians adored the Supreme Being, Eternal, Almighty, and All-Wise, divided into three persons." So, we see, that in the opinion of this infidel, the ancient Indians worshipped a triune God, It is clear that the Hindus have holden a triad in the divine nature. " The manner of the three persons in the Godhead are Brahma, Vishnu, and Seeva. Brahma they consider as the Father, Vishnu as the Mediator, whom they assert to have been incarnate, and Seeva as the destroyer and regenerator. The three faces of Brahma, Vishnu, and Seeva, they always formed on one body, having six hands, or two to each person.—This method of delineating the Godhead is very ancient, universal, uncontroverted, and everywhere in their worship; particularly in the celebrated cavern in the island of Elephanta."
The Persian triad is well known, the names of which were Ormusd, Mither, and Ahriman; called by the Greeks, Oromasdes, Mithras, and Arimanius. Among them, too, the second person is called Mediator, and he is regarded the great agent in this world. The Egyptians have their triad, whom they named Osiris, Cneph, and Phtha, and afterwards Osiris, Isis, and Typhon. These denote light, fire, and spirit.
The Orphic theology, the most aged recorded in Grecian history, taught the same doctrine, styled Light, Council, Life. Suidas says, " They express only one and the same power." Proclus, a Platonic philosopher, says, that Orpheus taught "the existence of one God, who is the ruler over all things; and that this one God is three minds, three kings: he who is, he who has, or possesses, and he who beholds." These answers, says Proclus, "with the triad of Orpheus, viz. Phanes, Uranus, and Chronus."
The Greek philosophers also acknowledged a triad. Plato named the triad " Mind, or Word, and the soul of the world."
Parmenides, the author of the Eleatic philosophy, says, " The Deity is one and many."
In the empires of Thibet and Tangut, three persons in one God is acknowledged in the popular religion. These people worship an idol as a representation of a threefold God.
The ancient Scandinavians represented a triad, whom they styled Oden, Frea, and Thor. The Romans, Germans, and Gaul’s acknowledge a triad. The Romans and Germans worshipped Mairian, three Goddesses inseparable.
The Japanese and Chinese anciently acknowledged a triad. So did Peruvians. In Cuquisaco, a province of Peru, they worshipped an image called Tangatanga; which, in their language, signifies " One in three and three in one."
There appears to be a universal impression in the minds of human beings of three persons in one God; hundreds of instances, in addition to the few cited above, might be produced, but let these suffice.
TESTIMONY OF TIIE ANCIENT JEWISH NATION.
AFTER presenting briefly the testimony of pagan nations touching a triad as peculiar to their idea of God, which goes to show, in some degree, the universal belief of three persons in one God, and that Jesus Christ, in the more enlightened and Bible sense, is in person one of these three, possessing wholly the infinite essence of that Being whom we term the eternal God, it may be of some utility to present to the candid reader the ancient Jewish idea of this matter.
The ancient Jews had credible evidence to believe in God, predicated in the Old Testament scriptures. They had the idea of one God, Deut. 6. 4, "Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God is one Lord." Jesus, in speaking of this scripture, Matt. 22. 37, 38, calls it the "first and great “Commandment." But the primitive Jews were instructed by their prophets to believe in and expect a Messiah, which signifies Christ, the anointed, which was to come into the world for the redemption of man. The first promise given of Christ is thus stated, Gen. 3. 15. " And I will put enmity between thee (Satan) and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed: it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel." Again, Haggai 2. 7. "And I will shake all nations, and the desire of all nations shall come: and I will fill this house with glory, saith the Lord of hosts." Again, Christ was to appear before the dominion of the Jews should bel taken away: "The scepter shall not depart from Judah, nor a lawgiver from between his feet, until Shiloh come; and unto him shall the gathering of the people be." Gen. 49. 10. Again, Christ was to be born, not according to the ordinary course of nature, but to descend from a virgin: " Therefore the Lord himself shall give you a sign: Behold, a Virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel." Isa. 7. 14.
This son was to be born in poverty, and live in a poor and low estate: "For he shall grow up before him as a tender plant, and as a root out of a dry ground; he hath no form, nor comeliness; and when we shall see him, there is no beauty that we should desire him." Isa. 53. 2. This Messiah was to be born in Bethlehem: "But thou Bethlehem Ephrathah, though thou be little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of thee shall he come forth unto me that is to be ruler in Israel; whose goings forth have been, from of old, from everlasting." Micah 5. 2. This ruler in Israel was to be a divine Shepherd, and lay down his life for the sheep. As the prophet saith, "Awake, O sword, against my Shepherd, and against the man that is my fellow, saith the Lord of hosts: smite the Shepherd, and the sheep shall be scattered." Zech. 13. 7. The blessed Savior was to be betrayed by his intimate friend: "Yea, mine own familiar friend, in whom I trusted, which did eat of my bread, hath lifted up his heel against me." Psa. 41. 9. The very manner of his death was predicted in the Jewish scripture; to be by his enemies annoyed with gall and vinegar during his suffering: "They gave me also gall for my meat, and in my thirst they gave me vinegar to drink." Psa. 69. 21. And his hands and feet were to be pierced: " And they shall look upon me whom they have pierced."—Zec. 12. 10, and Psa. 22. 16. And the very manner of distributing his clothes was predicted by the prophet: " They part my garments among them, and cast lots upon my vesture." Psa. 22. 18. It is obvious from the above quotations, that the Jewish church possessed ample means of knowing the character of their Messiah. In their writings they style him the Redeemer, the Branch, and the Everlasting Father, etc. They held him to be the Son of God, the Jehovah. It is., shown from this that they held his supreme divinity:,—they paid him, the Messiah, divine worship; and yet they held that no creature should be thus worshipped, for their "first and great commandment" forbid such. They were to worship God only, but the Messiah was their God.
THE TESTIMONY OF PAGAN WRITERS TOUCHING THE CHARACTER OF JESUS CHRIST.
AFTER Pontius Pilate put Jesus Christ to death, A. D. 33, April 3, he wrote an account of him to the Emperor Tiberius. There had been an ancient decree, "that no one should be received for a deity unless he was approved of by the Senate. Tiberius, in whose time the Christian religion had its rise, having received from Palestine, in Syria, an account of such things as manifested the truth of Christ's divinity, proposed to the Senate that he should be enrolled among the Roman gods, and gave his own prerogative vote in favor of the matter; but the Senate (without whose consent no deification could take place) rejected it, because the Emperor himself had declined the same honor. Nevertheless the Emperor persisted in his opinions, and threatened punishment to the accusers of the Christians." This is re-corded by a learned writer who lived a short time after the Apostolic age.
The Christians were first persecuted in the reign of the Emperor Nero, A. D. 65. This persecution is mentioned by two Roman historians, Tacitus and Sentorius.
The latter says, " The Christians likewise were severely punished—a sort of people addicted to a new and mischievous superstition,"--the worship of Christ. Pliny the Younger, was sent to the provinces of Bithynia and Pontus by the Emperor Trajan, A. D. 106-108, as his lieutenant with proconsular power. In these provinces the Christians were numerous, against whom Pliny, by orders of the Emperor, was obliged to use all manner of hardness. But being moderate in acting, he thought it best to write to the Emperor before he should execute the full force of the law. He therefore wrote to the Emperor, A. D. 107. The following is an extract of the letter:
They affirm that the whole of their fault or error lay in this, they were wont to meet on a certain day before it was light, and sing among themselves alternately a hymn to Christ as God."
Again, Celsus, who lived A. D. 176, ridicules the Christians for their worship of Christ. He says that "Jesus was owned by the Christians to be the Son of God."
Lucian, his contemporary, was a bitter enemy of the Christians; he charges the Christians with "worshipping their crucified impostor," as he malignantly styles our blessed Lord.
Again, Julian "ridicules the adoration of Christ; the Godhead of Christ, the birth of Christ from the Virgin; the conception by the Holy Ghost," etc. In fine, the doctrine of the supreme divinity of Christ was the doctrine of the early Christians, so attested by secular and unbelieving writers, as well as it was the faith of all true Christians.
THE CHRISTIAN CHURCH IN THE TIME OF TIIE APOSTLES, AND AFTER, HELD THE DOCTRINE OF THE SUPREME DIVINITY OF JESUS CHRIST.
1. We will begin with the testimony of Barnabas, who was the companion of St. Paul in some of his journeys, and wrote soon after Titus destroyed Jerusalem.—In the 5th section of his catholic epistle he says, " The Lord was content to suffer for our sins, although he be the Lord of the whole earth, to whom God said, before the beginning of the world, Let us make man after our image and likeness.'" And in the 7th section he says, " If, therefore, the Son of God, who is Lord of all, shall come to judge both the quick and the dead, hath suffered, that by his stripes we might live, let us believe that the Son of God could not have suffered but for us."
2. Clemens Romanus, [Phil. 4. 3.] who was likewise a companion of the apostles, mentioned in the New Testament, and who wrote near the end of the first century, speaks as follows: "God is good to all, especially to those who flee to his mercy through our Lord Jesus Christ, TO WHOM BE GLORY AND MAJESTY FOR EVER AND EVER."
3. Again, Ignatius, a disciple of St. John, who suffered martyrdom under the wicked emperor Trajan, A. D. 107: Ignatius to the church which is at Ephesus in Asia, most deservedly happy, being blessed through the greatness and goodness of God the Father, and predestinated before the world began, being united and chosen through his true passion, according to the will of the Father, and Jesus Christ and his undefiled grace."—Again, says he, " There is one physician, both fleshly and spiritual, God incarnate, both of Mary and of God, all happiness by Jesus Christ our Lord." Again, " Ignorance is taken away, and the old kingdom abolished, God himself appearing in the form of a man." Many other passages from the same writer we might adduce on the divinity of our Lord Jesus Christ.
4. Polycarp, another of St. John's disciples, flourished about the beginning of the second century, and suffered martyrdom under the emperor Marcus Antonius, in his epistle to the Philippians, speaks thus: " Mercy and peace from God Almighty, and the Lord Jesus Christ, our Savior, be multiplied,—every living creature shall worship Christ,—to whom be glory and majesty for ever and ever. Amen." When old and gray-headed, and bound at the stake, with his heart and voice engaged in addressing a throne of heavenly grace, he closes his prayer with these words, " I bless thee, I glorify thee, by the eternal and heavenly High Priest, Jesus Christ, thy beloved Son, with whom, to thee, and the Holy Ghost, be glory both now and forever, world without end. Amen." As Barnabas, Clemens Roman-us, Ignatius and Polycarp, lived in the first century, and were personally acquainted with some of the apostles, hence their testimony is of great importance, and is worthy of particular notice.
5. Another strong testimony we have in the writings of the beloved Justin Martyr, who was born A. D. 103, and sealed his testimony with his own blood. In his dialogue with one Trypho, an infidel Jew, he calls Christ "the God of Israel who was with Moses." And in the fourth book of his work against the infidels, he begins with asserting that " God was made man." In the same book he asserts also, that " Jesus Christ was the God who interrogated Adam, conferred with Noah, and gave him the dimensions of the ark; who spoke to Abraham; who brought the destroying judgments on the inhabitants of Sodom; who directed Jacob in his journey, and who addressed Moses out of the burning bush of Horeb." Again he says, " That the Word, that is the Son of God, always existed with the Father, I have largely demonstrated."
2. Athenagoras, an Athenian philosopher, but converted to Christianity, A. D. 150, wrote about A. D. 175, speaks thus: " I have sufficiently demonstrated, that we (Christians) are not atheists, since we believe in one God, unbegotten, eternal, invisible, incomprehensible, known only by reason, and the Logos, surrounded by light and beauty, and spirit, and power, ineffable, who by his Logos created, adorned and upholds the universe. We acknowledge also a Son of God. Nor let anyone consider it ridiculous that we should attribute a Son to God; not as the poets who, forming their fables, exhibit gods in no respect better than men. We do not thus think concerning God the Father, or concerning the Son.—But the Son of God is the Word of the Father, in manifestation and energy; by him and for him were all things made, If you desire a further explanation of the meaning of Son on this point, I will endeavor to give you a brief one: He is the first born of the Father, but not as ever beginning to exist. Who is not filled with admiration, that we who declare God the Father, and God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit, showing both the power of their unity, and the distinction of their order, should be called perverse atheists?"
7. Theophilus, who lived about A. D. 181, expressly acknowledges Christ to be God, and the Creator of the world. Says he, " When the Father said, let us make man in our image, after our likeness, he spoke to no other but his own Word and his own Wisdom, that the Son, and the Holy Ghost."
8. Clemens Alexandrinus, who lived A. D. 194, says, " Let us give thanks to the only Father and Son, to the Son and the Father, to the Teacher and Master, with the Holy Spirit, one in all respects, in 'whom are all things, by whom all things are one, by whom is eternal existence, whose members we are, whose is the glory and the ages, who is the perfect good, the perfect beauty, all wise, and all just; to whom be glory now and for ever. Amen."
9. Tertullian, who lived about A. D. 200, is very precise in his testimony on the supreme divinity of Jesus Christ. He says that the terms Lord, God, Lord of hosts, Almighty, King of Israel, etc., belong properly to Christ. He styles him "the omnipotent God," and in proof of this quotes Romans 9. 5.
10. The testimony of the learned Origen, touching the divinity of Christ, is very appropriate. He was born at Alexandria, A. D. 185, and thus speaks concerning Christ: " If he is the image of the invisible God, the image itself is invisible. If he is the likeness of the Father, no time ever was when he was not; for when was God, who by St. John was called light, without the splendor of his own glory? That anyone should presume to assign a beginning to the Son, before which he was not, let him who dares speak thus, 'there was a time when he was not,' consider what he says, namely, that there was a time when reason, and wisdom, and life were not." Origen's comment on Matt. 11. 27, is thus stated: "For it is impossible that he who was begotten from eternity, and who was the first born before every creature, should be known as to his real dignity by any but the Father who begat him." Again, he says, in a creed drawn up by him: "The things handed down by apostolical preaching are these: 1st. There is one God who created all things; Jesus Christ, who came into the world, was begotten of the Father before every creature; he who was God was made flesh; when he was a man he continued the same God that he was before.—
They (apostles) also delivered that the Holy Ghost was joined in the same honor with the Father and the Son." Again: " There are some," says he, "indeed, who make a declaration concerning the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost, but not in sincerity nor in truth. Such are all heretics, who indeed profess the Father, the Son, and the Spirit, but not in a right and believing manner. For they either separate the Father from the Son, that they may ascribe one nature to the Father and another to the Son; or they erroneously compound them, thinking to make of them a compound God, or by supposing only three different names; but he who rightly confesses the truth, will indeed ascribe to the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost their distinct properties, but confesses there is no difference as to nature or substance." Origen's Comment. p. 49, 52.
11. About the year of our Lord 246, Cyprian, a devoted martyr to the truth, contributes decisive testimony to the divinity of our blessed Savior. " The Lord says, I and my Father are one; and again it is written, these three are one; whoever does not hold this unity, does not hold the law of God—does not hold the truth unto salvation." Again he says, " If anyone could be baptized among heretics, he might also obtain remission of sin, be sanctified and made the temple of God. I ask of what God? If of the Creator, he could not who did not believe in him. If of Christ, neither could he be his temple who denies Christ to be God. If of the Holy Ghost, since these three are one, how could the Holy Spirit be reconciled to him who is an enemy to the Father and Son? " And in proving the supreme divinity of Christ quotes Rom. 9. 5, and uses our translation, " Of whom, as concerning the flesh, Christ came, who is over all, God blessed forever."
12. Dionysius, bishop of Alexandria, who flourished A. D. 252, says that "Christ is uncreated —the creator of all things—God by nature—immutable—Lord over all—Lord and God of Israel." Having been charged with saying there was a time when the Son was not, he affirms that he "always had acknowledged the co-eternity of the Son."
His namesake, Dionysius, bishop of Rome, says: "If he (Christ) was made, there was a time when he was not, but he always was."
13. Lucian, a proselyte of Antioch, a great biblical scholar, also a martyr to the cause of Christ, flourished A. D. 300. We have the following from a creed drawn up by him, which is very worthy of particular regard. Says he, " We believe, agreeable to evangelical and apostolical tradition, in one God, the Father Almighty, Creator and Maker of all things, and in one Lord Jesus Christ, his only begotten Son, God, by whom all things were made.—God of God, Whole of Whole, Alone of Alone, Perfect of Perfect, King of Kings, Lord of Lords; the Living Word, Wisdom, Life, the true Light, f the Way of truth, the Resurrection, the Shepherd, the Door, Immutable, Unchangeable, the exact image of the Godhead, the Essence, Power, Council, and Glory of the Father," etc. Hillary says: "A synod of twenty-five holy bishops, who intended thereby to establish the catholic faith against the Sabellians and Arians, sanctioned this creed of Lucian. The council was held at Antioch, A. D. 341."
The testimony of many other of the early fathers might be added here, such as Gregory, Thaumaturgus, Novation, Lactantius, and others, which we have not room even to name. Let it suffice to say, that no writer can be found, before the Council of Nice, held in A. D. 325, whose testimony is valid, who does, not agree with the testimony quoted above.
THAT PRIMITIVE CHRISTIANS HELD THE DOCTRINE OF CHRIST'S SUPREME DIVINITY IS PROVEN, EY THE FACT, THAT ALL WHO REJECTED IT WERE EXPELLED FROM THE CHURCH AS HERETICS.
THE Cerinthians, called so from Cerinthus, a disciple of Simon Magus, were expelled from the church for denying the supreme divinity of Jesus Christ. Cerin-thus believed that a super-angelic being, or influence was united to Christ at his baptism, which constituted him the Messiah.
Irenmus says, that the apostle "John designed by his gospel to remove the error which was sown among men by Cerinthus."
The Cerinthians were soon succeeded by the Ebionites, who appeared early in the second century. They were named after Ebion, a disciple of Cerinthus, who adopted the sentiments of his teacher, denying not only Christ's divinity, but teaching that he was only a mere man-Irenaeus, speaking of this sect, says: " If the Son shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed; but not knowing him who is incarnate of the Virgin, they are deprived of his gift, which is eternal life."
After the Ebionites, Marcion, an Asiatic, appeared. Being expelled from his father's church for immorality, he went to Rome and espoused the cause of heresy. Like modern Unitarians, he mutilated the gospels and the whole Bible with freedom. 'We find that Justin Martyr took up his erroneous doctrine and refuted it. Tertullian wrote against him, and condemns him as a gross unbeliever, as having departed from the faith of the church of Christ. Polycarp also denounced him as a heretic and acknowledged him only as the "first born of Satan." Concerning Marcion, Cyprian writes, "Our Lord, after his resurrection, instructing his disciples how they should baptize, says, Go ye, therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.' Here he gives an intimation of a trinity, in whose sacrament the nations were to be baptized. Does Marcion believe the trinity? Does he believe the same Father the Creator, as we believe in? Does he acknowledge the same only Son, Christ, born of the Virgin Mary, who being the Word, was made flesh, and suffered for our sins? Marcion and all other heretics, held a very different faith."
Again, Noetus of Smyrna embraced certain opinions concerning Jesus Christ, which a few years afterwards were adopted by Sabellius of Africa, and have since received the name of Sabellianism. Sabellius rejected all the distinction of persons in God, and alleged that the trinity was only nominal, that the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, were only three names of the one and the same hypostasis or person. This doctrine was condemned by the church as a ruinous heresy. Noetus was excommunicated from the church, and his doctrine condemned as heretical by two successive synods, and shortly afterward Sabellius and his doctrine received the same end.
Meryllus, bishop of Bozrah, adopted a modification of the system of Sabellius. He was opposed by Origen, and excluded from the Christian church, but soon after professing to be convinced of his error, joined the church again, and his party became extinct.
Another conspicuous advocate of skepticism concerning the Savior, was Paul, of Samosata. He coincided in opinion almost with the modern Socinians. He was unanimously condemned as a heretic, and deposed from the ministry.
Early in the fourth century, the celebrated Arius, an eloquent ecclesiastic, taught that Christ was the most exalted of all creatures, but still a creature: that he was inferior to the Father, both in nature and dignity; that Christ had nothing of man in him but the flesh to which the Logos was joined, which was the same as the soul in us. The Arians were first condemned by a council at Alexandria, in 320, under Alexander bishop of that city, who accused Arius of impiety, and caused him to be expelled from the communion of the church; and after-wards by 380 fathers in general council at Nice, assembled by Constantine in 325. This was the first general council ever convened by the Christian church. It is said that more than six hundred members were present. Of this number only twenty-three dissented from the final judgment; and of these, twenty finally yielded and subscribed to the orthodox synodical creed, part of which is as follows: " We believe in one God Almighty, maker of all things visible and invisible, and in one Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, begotten of the Father,—God of God, Light of Light, very God of very God, begotten, not made,—who for us men, and our salvation, came down from heaven, and was incarnate; and made man, and suffered,—and on the third day rose again, and ascended into heaven, and shall come again to judge the quick and the dead. And in the Holy Ghost. And the Catholic and Apostolic church anathematizes those who say that there was a time when the Son of God was not, or that he was not before he was born; or, that he was made out of nothing, or of another substance or essence, or that he was created or mutable" etc. This creed expressed the solemn judgment of the whole church.
The above testimony is sufficient to show what the belief of the church was; that in the times of Christ and his apostles and after, the Primitive church believed in the supreme divinity of Jesus Christ. All the testimony on this point, from the creation of the world to the pre-sent time, from Pagan, Jew and Christian, agree in proof thereof.
We shall conclude this chapter, with a few reflections.
1. The Unitarian writers boast of the validity of their arguments, as being the "early opinion." Surely these obsequious disciples, anti-apostolic Cerinthians, Ebionites, and Arians, may have had their skeptical glory. But, of all those innovators, not one of them suffered martyrdom for their unbelief of the supreme divinity of Christ. It pleased the world and Satan too well. How is it, that Dr. Priestly and his copiers, tell us, that the Primitive Church was Unitarian? If so, is it not astonishing, that when the Christians began to get into the error of Trinitarians, that not a word was heard against this "monstrous" error; and not a Trinitarian was condemned for heresy. And according to Unitarians themselves, the whole church was Trinitarian about the close of the third 'century. And still not a word was said against it. Then, how wicked is it in Priestly and others, to publish to the world, that the apostolic church was Unitarian, in the days of the apostles and afterwards. And to try to establish their error, by wresting the writings of the Fathers from their legitimate import to make the unbaptized monster of Unitarianism to be the faith of the Fathers, and the belief of the Primitive church. That the honest reader may not think that we have falsely represented the Unitarian writers, we shall present a few facts in the case. We have a quotation from Origen, who lived only 130 years after the apostolic age.—It is as follows: "When they (catechumens) shall have become firmly compacted in the spirit, and when they shall bring forth fruit in it; then, as loving the heavenly wisdom, we may safely impart to them the hidden doctrine respecting the ascent of the incarnate Word to the state in which he was God in the beginning." [Orig. Comment. in Johan. p. 9.]
This passage with a few others have been adduced by Dr. Priestly to show that in the days of Origen, "the great multitude of Gentile Christians were generally Anti-trinitarian, who rejected with abhorrence the doctrine of our Lord's divinity." [History of Early Opinions, book 3, chapter 13, section 2. Works, vol. 6, p. 483.] This proves either his ignorance or his wickedness. Again, we adduce a quotation from Mr. Jared Sparks, to show his inconsistency. Says he, "As for a trinity of persons, nothing was heard of it, till the deity of the Holy Ghost was decreed by the Council of Constantinople, near the close of the fourth century."
This gentleman affects not to know that the whole Christian church believed in the personality and deity of the Holy Ghost always, and that the church condemned Macedonius, the only man that denied it. But, did not Mr. Sparks know, that the whole Christian church had by their representatives at the Council of Nice, held A. D. 325, upwards of thirty years before the time he says a trinity was first heard of, that they professed their belief in a trinity? Again, the same author says, Inquiry p. 152, " No history, either sacred or profane, acquaints us with a single fact, from which it can be inferred that the Jews had any knowledge of a three-fold nature in the Deity. On the contrary, all history is against such an inference." [Rev. R. W. Landis.] The reader will see from the foregoing quotations that we have not misrepresented Unitarian writers. And though, we have mentioned but two authors, yet many more we might mention, but as they are generally copyists of those we have mentioned, let these suffice.
2. We profess not to know, how the God of the universe is one God and three persons. But the fact, is he so? The scriptures establish the fact. And it is the duty of everyone to believe this doctrine is true, though he cannot know, how it is true. We say the Scriptures, for though we should receive the testimony of the Primitive Fathers, nevertheless, if this doctrine be not proven fully and clearly by the Bible, it is not yet established by divine authority; hence not binding on any individual to believe, or disbelieve. I ask the unbeliever in the supreme divinity of Christ; if the doctrine be proven in the scriptures, whether he would not believe it?
If he would not, then we have no controversy with him. But if the doctrine be clearly proven in the scriptures, and therefore he is willing to receive it, why then, always to be crying that it is a manifest contradiction, irrational, 4.c. This surely can have nothing to do with the subject. We appeal for the truth of the doctrine to the Bible, and if the Bible will not prove it true, Unitarians need not trouble themselves with trying to prove its absurdity, or self-contradiction, for the matter must be given up as lost, after all that has been said about Jew and Gentile testimony.
LET US PRESENT SOME OBJECTIONS MADE BY THE UNBELIEVERS OF CHRIST'S SUPREME DIVINITY.
THEY say, " The Father, according to the Trinitarian doctrine, is God; the Son is God; and the Holy Ghost is God. Three cannot be one, three units cannot be one unit." This objection is not made against the doctrine of Trinitarians, but against the "inconsistency of tri-theism with the unity of God." But the objection would be good against the Trinitarians, if they admitted the existence of three Gods, and of course against the divinity of Christ as one of the three; but this is not admitted by any enlightened Trinitarian, hence it is inapplicable and powerless.
Trinitarians believe in the scriptural account of Jehovah, that " He is one perfect existence, underived and unlimited; and that this one perfect existence is in the scriptures declared to be the Father, Son and Holy Ghost." These are called persons. But, what is the true meaning of the word person? In the application of the term to the Deity, no living being, either man or angel, can tell. Men cannot tell what the human soul is, or even the body And who can tell how the Father, Son and Holy Ghost are three persons, and but one God? Can the Unitarians inform us, how God is God.
Indeed, it appears to us, that the " unbelievers" try to prove what the scriptures do not teach, and are appealing nearly always to reason, as they call it, instead of applying to the scriptures for their proof: just as if by reason they could find out God. It is enough that the scriptures reveal the fact, and it should be the duty of fallen men to receive the truth, with meekness and thanksgiving. Again, Unitarians offer as an objection the mysteriousness of the proposition, "that God can be one in one sense, and three in another." We grant its mysteriousness, but God has thought propel' to reveal himself thus in the scriptures; and demands our belief of what he reveals, and that which is essential to our salvation. The proposition asserted by Trinitarians, and denied by Unitarians," that God is tri-personal," is a profound mystery, implying infinite existence, which no finite being in the universe can have a definite idea of. Neither Trinitarians nor Unitarians can by any possible mental effort discern, whether the fact asserted be true or false, or whether the ideas denoted by the words " God and tri-personal," agree or disagree.
Until this can be done, nothing is made out by either party. If the research is to be conducted as an object of "mental discernment, or philosophical inquiry," without resting the matter on Divine Revelation, then there must necessarily be distinct ideas in the mind, before it can compare them, or discern the agreement or disagreement of a proposition, whose truth or falsehood, the mind can conceive.
That three Beings should be one Being, is a proposition which certainly contradicts reason, that is, our reason; but it does not from thence follow, that it cannot be true, for there are many propositions which contradict our reason, and yet are demonstrably true. One is the very first principle of all religion, the being of a God: for that anything exists without a cause, or that anything should be the cause of its own existence. are propositions equally contradictory to our reason: yet one of them must be true, or nothing could ever have existed.
"Can reason teach us how the sun's luminous orb can fill a circle whose diameter contains many millions of miles, with a constant inundation of successive rays during thousands of years without any perceivable diminution of that body from which they are continually poured, or any augmentation of those bodies on which they fall, and by which they are continually absorbed? Can our reason tell us, how any union can be formed between material and immaterial essences? Or how the wounds of the body can give pain to the soul; or the anxiety of the soul emaciate and destroy the body?" Jenyn's Internal Evidence, page 57, 63.
Then, unless the advocates of Unitarianism avow that they have distinct ideas of the infinite God, they must give up the argument, or maintain that, unlike all other rational beings, they can reason without distinct ideas of the essence of the supreme God, yet they can have distinct ideas of what we call a trinity. But, before they go any farther, we challenge them to prove this. In doing so, it is more than probable, they will find it as difficult to do, as to give distinct ideas of the essence of God. If they ask us, " why do Trinitarians adopt it as essential to their creed which is so unintelligible?"—we answer because God hath revealed it. Then, the mysteriousness of the doctrine lies in the nature of the thing which it declares, and not in the fact declared. Certainly it is with but little grace, that mysteriousness can be alleged as an objection against any doctrine, as mystery envelopes nearly everything: the soul of man, the body of man, the vegetable, the atom, etc. But, if Unitarians be not disposed to rest their faith on reason alone, but on the Scriptures, to the Scriptures we likewise appeal, and by them, and them only, to stand or fall.
We have deemed it proper to make the above remarks in connection with the evidences produced, apart, as we may say, from the Bible, with the exception of a few quotations touching the belief of the ancient Jewish church. But, it may be thought, that all this labor, to prove what no person cares about, is at least lost time. We are aware that Socinian writers, and others of nearly like heresy, try to make it appear that the doctrine of the Trinity is useless, or nearly so. But this is not so. The knowledge of God is fundamental to religion; and as we know nothing of Him, but what he has been pleased to reveal, and as these revelations have all moral ends, and are designed to promote piety, and not to gratify curiosity, all that he has revealed of himself in particular, must partake of that character of fundamental importance, which belongs to the knowledge of God in the aggregate. "This is life eternal, that they might know thee, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom thou hast sent." Nothing, therefore, can disprove the fundamental importance of the Trinity in unity, but that which will disprove it to be a doctrine of Scripture. [Watson's Theol. Inst. 1 vol. p. 452.]
Again, it essentially affects our views of God as the object of our worship, whether we regard him as one in essence, and one in person, or admit that in the unity of this Godhead there are three equally Divine persons. These are two very different conceptions. Both cannot be true. The God of those who deny the Trinity, is not the God of those who worship the Trinity in unity, nor on the contrary; so that one or the other worships what is "nothing in the world;" and for any reality in the object of worship, might as well worship a pagan idol. which also, says St. Paul, "is nothing in the world."
They do not now attempt to prove the " Socinian heresy from the Scriptures; this has long been given up, and the main effort of all modern writers on this side has been directed to cavil at the adduced proofs of the opposite doctrine." On this authority alone they might be accounted idolaters, worshipping of what "is nothing in the world," and not the God revealed in the Bible. Again: the doctrine that destroys the divinity of Our Lord Jesus Christ, is ruinous on another account, "our love to God, which is the sum of every duty, is most intimately and essentially connected with the doctrine in question. God's love to us is the ground of our love to him. The love of God to man in the gift of his Son is that manifestation of it on which the Scriptures most emphatically and frequently dwell, and on which they establish our duty of loving God and one another; but our estimate of the love which he gives must be widely different, accordingly as we regard the gift bestowed.—as a creature or as a Divine person,--as merely a son of man, or as the Son of God. If the former only, it is difficult to conceive in what this love, constantly represented as "unspeakable" and astonishing, could consist. Indeed, if we suppose Christ to be man only, on the Socinian scheme, or as an exalted creature, according to the Arians, God might be rather said to have "so loved his Son" than us, as to send him into the world, on a service so honorable, and which was to be followed by so high and vast a reward, that he, a creature, should be advanced to universal dominion and receive, universal homage as the price of temporary sufferings, which, upon either the Socinian or Arian scheme, were not greater than those which many of his disciples endured after him, and in many respects, not so great." For the same reason, the doctrine which denies Our Lord's divinity diminishes the love of Christ himself; takes away its generosity and devotedness, presents it under views infinitely below those contained in the New Testament, and weakens the motives which are drawn from it to excite our gratitude and obedience. " If Christ was in the form of God, equal with God, and very God, it was then an act of infinite love and condescension in him to become man; but if he was no more than a creature, it was no surprising condescension to embark in a work so glorious; such as being the Savior of mankind, and such as would advance him to be Lord and Judge of the world, to be admired, reverenced, and adored both by men and angels." [Waterland’s " Importance of the Doctrine of the Trinity."]
As a creature, no matter however highly exalted, he would have profited by exaltation after redeeming the world. But considered as divine, Christ gained nothing. God is full and perfect, and essentially glorious in and of himself, exalted "above blessing and praise;" hence our Lord prays, that he might be glorified with the Father, with the glory which he had "before the world was;” hence "to deny the divinity of Christ alters the very foundations of Christianity, and destroys all the powerful arguments of the love, humility and condescension of Our Lord, which are the peculiar motives of the gospel." [Dr. Sherlock's Vindication.]
"The doctrine of satisfaction or atonement depends upon his divinity; and it is, therefore, consistently denied by those who reject the former. So important, however, is the decision of this case, that the very terms of our salvation and the ground of our hope are affected by it." [Watson's Inst. vol. 1, p. 458.]
Again, a denial of the divinity of Christ lowers in men the sense of what the apostle calls, "the exceeding sinfulness of sin," and weakens the hatred of it among men, and of course encourages it. And totally changes the character of Christian experience, and takes away those strong emotions attendant on repentance. But this is not all. The Christian's trust and hope and joy is materially marred, and Bible religion goes to the moles and to the bats. Hence, how important is it to have consistent views of Our Lord Jesus Christ? Let none say that it is of but little moment: on the contrary it is of vast moment,—all depends upon it in time and in eternity. In the foregoing pages we have at least presented reasonable evidence in favor of our Savior’s supreme divinity; nevertheless, this we freely grant is insufficient to establish beyond contradiction his divinity, apart from the Holy Scriptures. Then in introducing the scripture evidence, we shall commence with the "Trinity in Unity and Unity of the Trinity." Then show that Jesus Christ is one of the three persons, God over all, blessed forever more. From the foregoing chapters, we may conclude, that it is beyond doubt that the God of the universe has endued all men in all ages with evidence of His eternal power and Godhead. And although men live wickedly, nevertheless, the things that are seen, carry with them indubitable testimony, that some being is to be worshipped, and that this being is to be adored as a Being of three persons in one essence. The primitive Jews had not only the evidence of visible things, but the prophecies to inform them, by the light of the spirit, that the Shiloh, the sent of God, the Son, the Messiah, was a person of the Godhead, and that this Godhead was " One Lord," Deut. 6. 4. Thus stating their belief in the personality and unity of the Deity. In addition to this, the testimony of pagan writers touching Jesus Christ is farther proof of his Deity; and as the Christian church in the time of the apostles and afterward held the supreme divinity of the Savior, the evidence still presses on the mind that Jesus is the Son of God, and equal with the Father. And this is still more obvious, from the fact, that all those who rejected the doctrine of Christ's absolute divinity were expelled from the church as heretics.
SCRIPTURAL EVIDENCE OF THE TRINITY IN UNITY.
BY some, it may be thought, that it is not necessary to introduce, on the plurality of persons in the Godhead, any evidence, seeing that the evidence in favor of Christ's divinity is all sufficient. Conscious of the force of this idea, we shall not trouble the reader with many scriptural evidences on this topic. Notwithstanding, we see no just reason not to present evidence on this point, as it appears to be the commencement of the whole matter on hand. And if there be three persons in the Godhead, Jesus Christ necessarily is one of them; the second adorable one of the eternal Trinity. Hence, when we try to prove the Trinity, we give the same proof of his hypostasis or personality, for this plain reason, we proceed to the Biblical proof of the Trinity.
The point disputed, is not whether there be one God; for in this we all agree. Neither, whether there be three Gods; for in this we likewise agree. But, whether there be in the divine Essence one person, or three.—We affirm and they deny.
We find in the first verse of the first chapter of the Bible, this language: "In the beginning God created the heaven and the earth." Here the word God, is from Aleim, which is the plural number, though annexed to a verb of the singular number, which evidently shows there are three persons in the divine nature. Again, in the 26th verse of the same chapter, we read, "And God said, let us make man in our own image." Here, likewise, persons in the Godhead are not only implied, but expressed, "Let us make man." In the 18th chapter, second verse of Genesis, God appeared to Abraham in the form of "three men." These three are mentioned in verse 10th as one person only, " And he said, I will certainly return unto thee," etc. Again, "And the Lord God said, Behold the man is become as one of us to know) good and evil." The phrase " Lord God," and "us," suggest the tri-unity of the Godhead. The following passages are to the same purpose: " Go to, let us go down, and there confound their language."—Gen. 11. 7. " Wo unto us! who shall deliver us out of the hand of these mighty Gods? These are the Gods that smote the Egyptians with all the plagues in the wilderness." 1 Sam. 4. 8. Of the last passage, the enemies of the doctrine we advocate may say, that the term Gods was a heathen notion of the wicked Philistines, and not the true scriptural and Christian idea of God. In answer we say, though the Philistines may be called heathens, nevertheless, they only express what God has expressed of himself in the holy scriptures; hence, they expressed the truth. And this truth we apply to prove a plurality of persons in the Godhead. [By the term Gods, we understand persons.] In Genesis, chapter 19. 24, we have these words: " Then the Lord rained upon Sodom, and upon Gomorrah, brimstone and fire from the Lord out of heaven." We have here the visible Jehovah who conversed with Abraham, raining the storm of vengeance from another Jehovah out of heaven, who was therefore invisible.
The unity of the deity is likewise fully shown in the holy scriptures, "Hear, O Israel, Jehovah our God is one Jehovah." Deut. 6. 4. " O Lord God of Israel, which dwellest between the cherubims, thou art the God, even thou alone, of all the kingdoms of the earth." 2 Kings 19. 15. Hence, we see that the scriptures set forth three persons in one God. But we have still more testimony from the scripture to adduce. The cry of the seraphims to God, when sitting upon his throne, high and lifted up, and his train filled the temple. " And one (seraphim) cried unto another, and said, Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is full of his glory." This distinct trine act of devotion, is answered by the voice of Jehovah from the "throne high and lifted up." "Also," says the prophet, "I heard the voice of the Lord, saying, Whom shall I send, and who will go for us." Isa. 6. 3-8. Each of the holy ones in the Godhead is addressed with his appropriate and equally grand appellation of Holy, holy, holy, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. The apostle John applies this vision of Isaiah to Christ, as is most likely, where he says, " These things said Esaias, when he saw his glory, and spoke of him," that is of Christ. John 12. 40, 41. This vision all acknowledge to include the Father; St. John applies it to Christ, and the apostle Paul applies it to the Holy Ghost. " Well spoke the Holy Ghost by Esaias the prophet unto our fathers, saying, Go unto this people, and say, Hearing ye shall hear, and shall not understand; and seeing ye shall see, and not perceive," etc. Acts 28. 25, 26, 27. Compare this with Isaiah 6. 9, 10.
There can be no doubt but that both, St. John and St. Paul, quote from, and allude to, Isaiah's vision. And here we have a trinity of persons in defiance of all criticism on this subject. On this passage in Isaiah, the Rev. R. Watson says in his Theological Institutes, vol. 1, part 2, p. 471, "Now let all these circumstances be placed together—the place, the holy place of the Holy Ones; the repetition of the homage, THREE times, Holy, holy, holy,—the one Jehovah of hosts, to whom it was addressed,—the plural pronoun used by this one Jehovah, us; the declaration of an evangelist, that on this occasion Isaiah saw the glory of Christ; the declaration of St. Paul, that the Lord of hosts who spoke on that occasion was the Holy Ghost; and the conclusion will not appear to be without most powerful authority, both circumstantial and declaratory that the adoration, Holy, holy, holy, referred to the Divine three in the one essence of the Lord of hosts. Accordingly, in the book of Revelation, where 'the Lamb' is so constantly represented as sitting upon the divine throne, and where he by name is associated with the Father, as the object of the equal homage and praise of saints and angels; this scene from Isaiah is transferred into the fourth chapter, and the living creatures,' the seraphim of the prophet, are heard in the same strain, and with the same trine repetition, saying, 'Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty, which was, and is, and is to come."' Isaiah 48. 16, makes a three-fold distinction and limitation: "And now the Lord God, and his Spirit, hath sent me." This agrees with our Lord's own discourses, who speaks of himself and the Spirit. And this strengthens the application, by bringing the phrase nearer to that so often used by our Lord, who speaks of himself and the Spirit, being sent by the Father. "The Father which sent me—the comforter whom I send unto you from the Father, who proceeded from the Father." John 15. 26. The following passages in the New Testament are familiar to everyone who reads the Bible:
Baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost." Matt. 28. 19. "May the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, and the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Ghost, be with you all, amen." 2 Cor. 13. 14. "Now there are diversities of gifts, but the same Spirit. And there are differences of administrations, but the same Lord. And there are diversities of operations, but it is the same God which worketh all in all." 1 Cor. 12. 4, 5, 6. Here the Spirit, the third person, is mentioned, the Lord the second person, and the "same God which worketh all in all," the first person. The apostle Peter to the strangers scattered throughout Pontus, Galatia, etc., says: "Elect according to the fore-knowledge of God the Father, through sanctification of the Spirit, unto obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ; grace be unto you and peace be multiplied." 1 Peter 1. 2. We shall close this part of the subject with one more text, found 1 John 5. 7. "For there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost: and these three are one." We are aware that even some strong believers in the holy trinity object to the genuineness of this text; Griesbach and others. But, if this text, and some others, were left out of the argument in foyer of the trinity, it would still have ample proof to establish it beyond successful contradiction.
Nothing can be clearer than this, that the Father sent the Son, and, therefore, the Father and the Son are distinct; that the Father and the Son sent the Holy Ghost, and that, therefore, the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Ghost, are distinct persons, and that each of these distinct persons is called God. In the language of inspiration this is true of the Father, which, we suppose, none doubts. " The only true God." John 17. 3. "The Word was God." John 1. 1. "The Word was made flesh and dwelt among us." John 1. 14. From these texts the plain conclusion is, the Word which was God, the same which was made flesh and dwelt among us, is the very and eternal God. Again, to lie unto the Holy Ghost" is to lie " Unto God." Acts 5. 3, 4. In view of these last quotations, we cannot perceive any great necessity for calling forth this disputed text. (1 John 5. 7.)
But certainly there is no valid argument against it, and there never can be. The learned opponents of this text assert, that " It is not found in a single Greek manuscript written before the sixteenth century." Yet they grant that there are but about four hundred MSS. collated, and there are thousands that are in existence which those critics have never seen. The Paris library has two hundred and two, of which but forty-nine have been collated.
From the vast number in the Vatican library, as all the learned agree, but only thirty-four of which have been collated. "In the Grand Ducal library at Florence alone, there are at least one thousand Greek MSS. of the New Testament, and of these only twenty-four have been collated." And very few of the Greek MSS. now exist. In Diocletian's time many thousands were burned by the hand of persecution. And in the great fire of Constantinople, A. D. 476, there perished in the flames 120,000 valuable manuscripts, so that the number collated bears a very little proportion to those destroyed.—Yet from the few remaining, our learned antagonists peremptorily conclude, "that this verse under discussion is not to be found in a single Greek MSS. written before the sixteenth century." It might have been found in 999 MSS. for all they know, or after all they possibly may find out on the subject.
The reader may see this text, (1 John 5. 7,) vindicated in Horn's Introduction, vol. 4, page 437.
However, it is very true, that all this text is comprised in John's gospel. Does the text in 1 John 5. 7, say, that "there are three that bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Ghost." In John 8. 18, it is said, " I am one that bear witness of myself; and the Father that sent me bears witness of me." From this we see the Father bears record in heaven, the Son bears witness in heaven. John 8. 14. The Holy Ghost, or Comforter, bears testimony of Christ in heaven. "But when the Comforter is come, whom I will send unto you from the Father, even the spirit of truth, which proceeded from the Father, he shall testify of me." John 15. 26. " I and my Father are one."—John 10. 30. These texts express all that we find in 1 John 5. 7.
The letter of that accomplished scholar, Charles Butler, Esq., (in the second volume of his Horae Biblicae,) to Dr. Marsh, contains evidence of great weight in proof of the authenticity of the text in 1 John 5. 7. 8.
This letter can be found in the Panoplist for May, 1811, page 534. Part of this letter we beg leave to present to our readers.
" THE REV. HERBERT MARSH:
Dear Sir,—When I had last the pleasure of your company, I mentioned to you that I thought the argument in favor of the
verse of the Three Heavenly Witnesses, 1 John, chap. 5. 5, 7, from the confession of faith presented to the Catholic Bishops to Huneric in 484, had not been sufficiently attended to: I now beg leave to trouble you with my thoughts upon it. I shall first copy Mr. Archdeacon Travis's account of it, from his letters to Mr. Gibbon, 3rd edition, page 57.
In A. D. 484, an assembly of African Bishops was convened at Carthage by King Huneric, the Vandal and the Arian. The style of the edict, issued by Huneric on this occasion, seems worthy of notice. He therein requires the orthodox Bishops of his dominions to attend the council thus convened, there to defend by the Scriptures the consubstantiality of the Son with the Father, against certain Arian opponents. At the time appointed, nearly four hundred Bishops attended this council from the various provinces of Africa, and from the isles of the Mediterranean; at the head of whom stood the venerable Eugenius, Bishop of Carthage. The public professions of Huneric promised a fair and candid discussion of the divinity of Jesus Christ; but it soon appeared that his private intentions were to compel, by force, the vindicators of that belief to submit to the tenets of Arianism. For when Eugenius, with his anti-Arian prelates, entered the room of consultation, they found Cyrila, their chief antagonist, seated on a kind of throne, attended by his Arian coadjutors, and surrounded by armed men; who quickly, instead of waiting to hear the reasoning of their opponents, offered violence to their persons. Convinced by this application of force, that no deference would be paid to arguments, Eugenius and his prelates withdrew from the council room; but not without leaving behind them a protest, in which (among other passages of Scripture) this verse of St. John is thus especially insisted upon, in vindication of the belief to which they adhered: That it may appear more clear than the light, that the Divinity of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit is one, see it proved by the Evangelist St. John, who writes thus: There are three which bear record in heaven, the Father, the Word, and the Holy Spirit, and these three are One.' " This remarkable fact appears to be alone amply decisive as to the originality of the verse in question. The manner in which it happened seems to carry irresistible conviction with it. It was not a thing done in a corner, a transaction of solitude or obscurity.—It passed in the metropolis of the kingdom, in the court of the reigning prince, in the face of the opponents, exasperated by controversy, and proud of royal support, and in the presence of the whole congregated African Church. Nor is the time when this transaction happened, less powerfully convincing than its manner. Not much more than three centuries had elapsed from the death of St. John, when this solemn appeal was thus made to the authority of this verse. Had the verse been forged by Eugenius and his Bishops, all Christian Africa would have exclaimed at once against them. Had it even been considered asof doubtful original, their adversaries, the Arians, thus publicly attacked by this protest, would have loudly challenged the authenticity of the verse, and would have refused to be in any respect concluded by its evidence. But nothing of this kind intervened. Cyrila, and his associates, received its testimony in sullen silence; and by that silence admitted it to have proceeded from the pen of St. John.
With great respect, dear sir, I am, CHARLES BUTLER. January 7, 1806."
MacKnight, in his translation, says, that some of the most ancient and correct Vatican Greek copies have this verse. All Stephen's MSS., seven in number, and which contain the whole epistles, have this verse. The Vulgate versions, in most of the MSS. and the printed editions, have it. Tertullian bears testimony in favor of this verse, in the second century. In St. Jerome's Testament this verse of St. John is found. [Rev. E. Smith's View of the Trinity.] Augustine, of the same age, bears testimony to its authenticity. Cyrillus, in his commentary, uses it without any doubt of its authenticity. It appears strange, that ever there should have been any doubt of the authenticity of this portion of the sacred Scriptures. Nevertheless, some of the pious and learned of modern times, express doubts touching its genuineness; among others the venerable Dr. A. Clark says, " It is likely this verse is not genuine. It is wanting in every MSS. of this epistle written before the invention of printing, one excepted, the Codex Olontfortii, in Trinity College, Dublin; the others which omit this verse amount to one hundred and twelve." Comment. 1 John, 5. 7, 8. The Rev. J. Wesley says in his Notes on the New Testament on this verse, " What Bengelius has advanced both concerning the transposition of these two verses, and the authority of the controverted verse, partly in his Gnomon and partly in his Apparatus Criticus, will abundantly satisfy any impartial person that there are three that testify, etc.
2, It may be proper for us in this place, to adduce a few Scriptural proofs for the unity of the Trinity. "By the Word of the Lord were the heavens made: and all host of them by the breath of his mouth." Psa. 33. 6. Here the Trinity created the world; but this Trinity is only one Lord. " I am the Lord that makes all things, that stretches forth the heavens alone: that spreads abroad the earth by myself."—Isa. 44. 24. " It follows, therefore, that the Word and Spirit did not make the heavens, or that the Father with his Word and Spirit are alone the Lord and Creator of all things." (Landis.) " That men may know that thou, whose name alone is JEHOVAH, art the Most High over all the earth." Psa. 83. 18. Christ is Jehovah, " and this is his name whereby he shall be called, THE LORD OUR RIGHTEOUSNESS." Jer. 23. 6. The Holy Ghost, or Spirit, is likewise Jehovah, "the hand of the Lord Jehovah fell there upon me.—And he put forth the form of an hand and took me by a lock of mine head; and the Spirit lifted me up between the earth and the heaven," etc. Ezek. 8. 1, 3. Therefore the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit are the one Jehovah; these are three persons, of one nature. It is remarkable that the name Jehovah is not capable of equivocation as that of God; it has no plural, and is not applicable to any created or derived being, but is peculiar to the divine nature, and descriptive of it alone.
3. The Trinity in unity is eternal, so taught in the holy Scriptures, "according to the commandment of the everlasting God." Rom. 16. 26. Jesus Christ, who saith, "I am the first and the last." Rev. 22. 13. " Who through the eternal Spirit," etc. Heb. 9. 14. Thus hath God revealed himself in his holy word. Again, says Christ, " I and my Father are one." John 10. 30. The Holy Ghost, or Comforter, " who proceeds from the Father." John 15. 26. The inference is, from the above, that the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost are three persons, and one God, Omnipotent, Omnipresent, Omniscient, and eternally glorious. Hence, the Godhead of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost is one; the glory equal, the majesty co-eternal. "So the Father is God, the Son is God, and the Holy Ghost is God, and yet there are not three Gods, but one God." (Athanasian Creed.) "There is one divine nature of reason and science, common unto three persons, incomprehensibly united, and ineffably; distinguished; united in essential attributes, distinguished by peculiar idioms and relations; all equally infinite in every divine perfection, each different from the other in order and manner of subsistence; that there is a mutual existence of one in all, and all in one; a communication without any deprivation or diminution in the communicant; an eternal generation, and an eternal procession without precedence or succession; without proper causality or dependence, a Father imparting his own, and a Son receiving his Father's life, and a Spirit issuing from both, without any division or multiplication of essence.
"These are notions which may well puzzle our reason in conceiving how they agree; but ought not to stagger our faith in asserting that they are true; for the holy Scripture teaches us plainly, and frequently doth inculcate upon us, that there is but one true God; if it manifestly doth ascribe to the three persons of the blessed Trinity, the same august names, the same peculiar characters, the same divine attributes, the same superlatively admirable operations of creation and providence; if it also doth prescribe to them the same supreme honors, services, praises, and acknowledgments to be paid to them all; this may be abundantly enough to satisfy our minds, to stop our mouths, to smother all doubt and dispute about this high and holy mystery." (Dr. Barrow's Defense of the Trinity.)—"The proof of the doctrine of the Trinity grounds itself on the firm foundation of the divine unity, and it closes with it; and this may set the true believer at rest, when he is assailed by the sophistical enemies of his faith with the charge of dividing his regards, as he directs his prayers to one or other of the three persons of the Godhead. For the time at least, he is said to honor one to the exclusion of the others. The true Scriptural doctrine of the unity of God, will remove this objection.—It is not the Socinian notion of unity. Theirs is the unity of one, ours the unity of three. We do not, however, as they seem to suppose, think the divine essence divisible, and participated by, and shared among three persons; but wholly and undividedly possessed and enjoyed. Whether, therefore, we address our prayers and adorations to the Father, Son, or Holy Ghost, we address the same adorable Being, the one living and true God.—"Jehovah, our Aleim, is one Jehovah." With reference to the relations which each person bears to us in the redeeming economy, our approaches to the Father are to be made through the mediation of the Son, and by, or with dependence upon, the assistance of the Holy Spirit. Yet, as the authority of the New Testament shows, this does not preclude direct prayer to Christ and to the Holy Spirit, and direct ascriptions of glory and honor to each. In all this we glorify the one God over all, blessed for evermore.' " (Rev. R. Watson's Institutes, part 2 of vol. 1, p. 415.) The reader will perceive, that our intention is not to mistake our own arguments on the one hand, nor misrepresent the opponents on the other; but to gather the plain facts on the subject, and present them to the mind of the reader in their native character. Touching the mode of three persons existing in one God, we know nothing, and possibly never shall know. Nevertheless, from Genesis to the Revelation, by God himself this doctrine is plainly revealed. And why should the reader think this a thing incredible. Does he not find that the apostle Paul sets man forth in a three-fold sense. " And I pray God your whole spirit, and soul, and body, be preserved blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ." 1 Thess. 5. 23. How the spirit, and soul, and body form one being, is beyond the reason of man, notwithstanding it is positively revealed in Scripture.
THE BIBLE TEACHES THE PRE-EXISTENCE OF OUR LORD JESUS CHRIST.
THE pre-existence of Christ does not wholly establish the Godhead of Christ; hence it is not, therefore, full proof against the Arian hypothesis, but it is proof sufficient to destroy the Socinian idea that he was a man only. As no person in his right mind claims pre-existence for the human soul, so we apply it to Christ alone, not to his soul, but to his supreme divinity. The preexistence of Jesus Christ is clearly proven from the scriptures. Instance, "he was sent into the world;" John 17. 18. " Forasmuch then as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself likewise took part of the same." Heb. 2. 14. "And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us." John 1. 14. John the Baptist bare witness of the pre-existence of Christ as follows, "John bare witness of him, and cried, saying, this was he of whom I spoke. He that cometh after me is preferred before me: for he was before me." John 1. 15. It is well known that John the Baptist was six months older than the incarnation of Christ.
Socinian writers say, that the term, "preferred before me," must be taken in the sense of dignity, and not of time. But they should consider that the term is never in the Old or New Testaments used for dignity or rank, but refers either to place or time, hence their application of the text is foreign to their purpose. The phrase to be "sent from God," they maintain, is said of John the Baptist, hence of no use in proof of Christ's preexistence. " There was a man sent from God, whose name was John." "Hence if Christ was sent from God, so was John the Baptist; if the former came down from heaven, so did the latter." But this reasoning contradicts other scripture. Christ says, " Not that any man hath seen the Father, save he which is of God; he bath seen the Father." John 6. 46. Christ applies this scripture to himself and none else. Therefore if Christ was that person, as it cannot be disputed; John cannot be sent from God in the same way that Christ was sent. John gives testimony himself, "He that cometh, from above is above all; he that is of the earth is earthly." John 3. 31. The former part of the above text he applies to Christ, and the latter to himself. Christ, "above all," which he could not be if every other prophet came in like manner from heaven, hence if John was sent from God it cannot be in the same sense that Christ was sent from him, which destroys the objection.
Again, says Jesus to the Jews, "your father Abraham rejoiced to see my day: and he saw it and was glad. Then said the Jews unto him, Thou art not yet fifty years old, and hast thou seen Abraham? Jesus saith unto them, verily, verily I say unto you, before Abraham was, I am. Then took they up stones to cast at him: but Jesus hid himself; and went out of the temple, going through the midst of them, and so passed by." John 8. 56, 59. In the above passage, the verb " I am," is equivalent to Jehovah, Exo. 3. 14. The sense is, "before Abraham was born, I was in existence." The Jews answer, "Thou art not yet fifty years old, and hast thou seen Abraham?" The Jews did not mistake his meaning, but were so enraged at so manifest a claim of Divinity, that " they took up stones to stone him," without judge or jury. Our Savior says to the Jews, "your Father Abraham rejoiced to see my day; and he saw it, and was glad." Here Our Savior presents himself to his Jewish brethren as their Messiah, whose day their Father Abraham rejoiced to see prospectively, or "having seen them afar off," Heb. 11. 13. The Blessed Jesus, "mounts up far beyond Abraham. He ascends beyond all the orders of creation. And he places himself with God, at the head of the universe. He thus claims to himself all that high pitch of dignity, which the Jews expected their Messiah to assume. He cries "verily, verily, I say unto you, before Abraham was, I am." He says not of himself; as he says of Abraham, "before he was, I was." This indeed would have been sufficient, to affirm his existence previous to Abraham. But it would not have been sufficient, to declare what he now meant to assert, his full claim to the majesty of the Messiah. He therefore drops all forms of language, that could be accommodated to the mere creatures of God. He asserts one, that was appropriate to the Godhead itself. "Before Abraham was," or still more properly, "Before Abraham was made," he says "I AM." He thus gives himself the signature of untreated and continual existence, in direct opposition to contingent and created. He attaches to himself that stamp of eternity, which God appropriates to his Godhead in the Old Testament; and from which an apostle afterward describes Jesus Christ expressly, to be "the same yesterday, and to-day, and forever." Nor did the Jews pretend to misunderstand him now. They could not. They heard him directly and decisively vindicating the noblest rights of their Messiah, and the highest honors of their God, to himself. They considered him as a mere pretender to those. " Then took they up stones, to cast at him," as a blasphemer, as what indeed he was in his pretensions to be God, if he had not been in reality their Messiah and their God in one. But he instantly proved himself to their very senses, to be both; by exerting the energetic powers of his God-head, upon them. For he ' hid himself; and went out of the temple, going through the midst of them; and so passed by.' "
The above reasoning, we deem conclusive, which none can gainsay, or overthrow. If then we find that the titles and works which are given Christ in the New Testament, are ascribed to a Divine person in the Old, who is represented as distinct from God the Father, we shall hereby gain another step, and obtain a valid proof, of the pre-existence of Our Lord Jesus Christ. But let us follow up this point, a little farther. It is said in John, 1. 1. "In the beginning was the Word, (Logos,) and the Word was with God, and the Word was God." This Word or Logos, was with God and was God, who existed in the "beginning;" he was not the beginning, but existed before the beginning, in the glory which he had with the Father, "before the world was." John 17.
5. And if he thus existed before the beginning, he must necessarily be eternal. Who said to the Father and the Spirit, " Come let us make man," etc. This agrees with what is said in John 1. 3. "All things were made by him; and without him was not anything made that was made." The heavens, the earth, and man were made, but without Jesus Christ, they were not made. Therefore, if he made all things he must necessarily have been before all things, possessing infinite wisdom to construct, and infinite power to create all things. But more than this, the apostle Paul in speaking of him, Col. 1. 17. says: "And he is before all things, and by him all things consist," or are preserved; but the same Apostle says in the same chapter, verse 16: "all things were created by him and for him." Therefore, Christ made all things for himself and not for another: then if he made all things, for himself, he surely could not have been a delegated being to create and preserve for God, as some affirm. The conclusion is inevitable, that Jesus Christ had a pre-existence before he was born of the Virgin Mary.
THE DIVINITY OF JESUS CHRIST IS PROVEN BY THE NAMES OF JEHOVAH IN THE SCRIPTURES BEING APPLIED TO HIM.
ALL, we suppose, will agree, that that Person, called the " Angel of the Lord," and Jehovah, "I am that I am, the judge of all the earth," etc., in the Scriptures of the Old Testament, was a divine person, or the Supreme God. If Arians, or Unitarians, would dare to cavil about any of these appellations, we suppose it would be the first quotation, the "Angel of the Lord." But we shall prove that the term Angel, is a name of the eternal Jehovah. When the Angel of the Lord found Hagar in the wilderness, "she called him JEHOVAH, that spoke unto her; Thou God sees me." Jacob wrestled with the Angel at Peniel, or with the This angel of Hagar and man of Jacob, is no less than the Jehovah of the universe; this is fully proven by the prophet Hosea. "Yea, he (Jacob) had power over the angel, and prevailed; he wept, and made supplication unto him; he found him in Bethel, and there he spoke with us. Even the Lord God of hosts; the Lord is his memorial." Chap. 12. 4, 5.
Again, the " Angel of the Lord" appeared to Moses in a flame of fire; but this same Angel of the Lord called to him out of the bush, and said, " I am the God of thy father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, and Moses hid his face, for he was afraid to look upon God." Exo. 3. 6. The plain and obvious meaning of this text is, that the angel is the name of God himself. God said to Moses and the Israelites, "Behold I send an angel before thee to keep thee in the way, and to bring thee into the place which I have prepared; beware of him, and obey his voice, provoke him not; for he will not pardon your transgressions, for my name is in him." Exo. 23. 20, 21. This Angel was to give them the promised land. 2. He was the object of their fear, "beware of him." 3. He was to pardon their "transgressions." And who can pardon sin, but God only?
Finally. He should possess the name of God Jehovah, I am. No created being could possibly possess the functions of this Angel, our enemies themselves being judges. Both parties agree, that God hates idolatry;—and hence He could not recommend idolatry. This is obvious from Exo. 32. 7, 8: "And the Lord said unto Moses, Go, get thee down; for thy people, which thou brought out of the land of Egypt, have corrupted themselves—have made them a molten calf, and have worshipped it." Again, "I am the Lord thy God, which have brought thee out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of bondage. Thou shalt have no other Gods before me." Exo. 20. 2, 3. After all these plain and convincing Scriptures, which prove so plainly that the term Angel is an appellation of Deity,—yet, some artful Arians try to make it appear, that the term Angel was only a created being appearing in the name or person of the Father. But this assertion wants proof.
" An earthly ambassador indeed represents the person of his prince, is supposed to be clothed with his authority, and speaks and acts in his name. But who ever heard of an ambassador assuming the very name of his sovereign, or being honored with it by others? "Would one in this character be permitted to say, I George, I Louis, I Frederic. As the idea is ridiculous, the action would justly be accounted high treason." (Jamieson's Vindication, Watson's Institutes.)
Dr. Priestly "assumes the marvelous doctrine" of "occasional personality," thinks "in some cases angels were nothing more than temporary appearances, and no permanent beings; the mere organs of the Deity, assumed for the purpose of making himself known, a power occasionally emitted, and then taken back again into sits source." Well may the Rev. R. Watson say of him, " The doctor, and his adherents, had little cause to talk of the mystery and absurdity of the doctrine of three persons in one Godhead, who can make a person out of a power, emitted and then drawn back again to its source; a temporary person, without individual subsistence."—The truth of the matter is, this Angel of Jehovah, as in the Scripture of the Old Testament, thus manifesting himself; and receiving divine worship, was not a created angel as the Arians say, nor a meteor, an atmospheric appearance, according to the theory of Socinians, but a DIVINE PERSON.
2. This divine person is not God the Father, but the Lord Jesus Christ. This is said to be proved from the following Scriptures: "No man hath seen God at any time." John 1. 18, and 1 John 4. 12. " Who only hath immortality, dwelling in the light which no man can approach unto; whom no man hath seen nor can see." 1 Tim. 6. 16. " Ye have neither heard his voice at any time, nor seen his shape." " Not that any man hath seen the Father." It is, however, certified in the Old Testament, that God frequently appeared in the Patriarchal and Levitical dispensations, therefore we must conclude, that the God that appeared was God the Son.
This argument, though plausible, is not exactly conclusive, though it may be admitted in the general, yet there are exceptions. Instance, " We have seen that the Angel, in whom was the name of God, promised as the conductor of the Israelites through the wilderness, was a divine person; but he who promised to send him," must be a different person from the Angel sent, and that person could be no other than the Father.
"Behold, I send an angel before thee," etc. On this occasion, therefore, Moses heard the voice of the Father. Again, at the baptism of Jesus the voice of the Father was heard, declaring, " This is my beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased." The above passages must be, therefore, interpreted to accord with these facts, that is, " No man hath seen God at any time,—No man can see my face and live." They express the pure spirituality of God by audible sounds and appearances. "There was an important sense in which Moses neither did nor could see God; and yet it is equally true, that he both saw and heard him. He saw the "back parts," but not the "face of God." Exo. 33. 20, 23. " The manifestation of the Father was, however, very rare." Nearly all the divine appearances were of the Angel of the Lord. The Jehovah was an Angel who appeared to Abraham at Sodom. The Jehovah who appeared to Hagar was "the Angel of the Lord." The Angel of Jehovah from heaven swore by himself to Abraham.—Jacob calls the God of Bethel the Angel of God. He who took up his residence over the Ark, and received the homage of the Jews, is called the Angel of the Lord. And so in many other places of the Old Testament Scriptures. The impartial reader will perceive, that there is no necessity to try to press the audible agency, or visible appearance of the Father from the Old Testament. It should be our object to prove, not that the Father was not manifested in his own person, but that the Angel of the Lord is not the Father." The term Angel is either descriptive of nature or office. In its general application, it is applied to those superior intelligences in heaven, employed in administering to man, but finite and created. It is obvious from what we have said, that the Angel of the Lord is not a created being, and he is not therefore called an angel in reference to his nature.—The appellation, Angel, must be a term of office; An- gel, or messenger of the Father, hence distinct from the Father, which shows from the Scriptures two divine persons.
3. This Angel of Jehovah of the Old Testament, is the Lord Jesus Christ' of the New Testament.
The Angel of Jehovah gave the law to the Israelites. In doing so, he is the angel, or messenger, in the matter. This is obvious from Jeremiah 31. 31, 32, "Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, that I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel, and with the house of Judah: not according to the covenant that I made with their Fathers, in the day that I took them by the hand, to bring them out of the land of Egypt; which my covenant they brake." It is plain, then, that the Angel of Jehovah, who gave the old covenant, is the giver of the new covenant.
The apostle Paul, speaking of this covenant, and quoting the words of Jeremiah, in the eighth chapter of Hebrews, plainly sets forth Jesus Christ as the author of the new covenant, or testament, another name for covenant: for in speaking of "the first covenant," chap. 9. 1, he calls it in verse 18, "the first testament." So this new covenant predicted by Jeremiah, is the New Testament dispensation, having Jesus Christ for its author; then the Christ of the New Testament, is the Angel of Jehovah of the Old, and the same person, as the Scriptures fully certify.
The last Jewish prophet establishes the same point beyond successful contradiction. "Behold, I will send my messenger, and he shall prepare the way before me: and the Lord whom ye seek, shall suddenly come to his temple, even the messenger of the covenant, whom ye delight in; behold, he shall come, saith the Lord of hosts." Mal. 3. 1. The temple at Jerusalem was God's house, or the temple of the messenger, Jesus Christ, Jehovah's messenger, or servant,—one sent, and implies a person sending, and one sent, two different persons. " The same person, therefore, is servant and Lord; and by uniting these characters in the same person, what does the prophet but describe that great mystery of the gospel, the union of the nature which governs, and the nature which serves,—the union of the divine and human natures in the person of Christ." [Horsley's Sermons.]
The Angel of Jehovah was the King of the Jews, who resided in the temple, called "the house of the Lord;" the same who resided in the Jewish tabernacle. Jesus, in the days of his incarnation, ratifies the prophesies of the Old Testament Scriptures, when he went forth into the temple at Jerusalem, amid shouts of triumph attended with kingly "pomp. They strewed the way with green branches of trees, and spread their clothes in the way, "and cried hosanna! Blessed is the King of Israel, that cometh in the name of the Lord." John 12.13. St. Luke says, " He went into the temple, and began to cast out them that sold therein, and them that bought; saying unto them, it is written, My house is the house of prayer: but ye have made it a den of thieves." Chap. 19. 45, 46. Here Christ calls the temple his house, according to Isaiah 56. 7.
From the above, and many other parts of Scripture, it is plainly proven, that the messenger of the covenant is the testator of a better covenant. See St. Mark 1. 1, 2, 3. The voice here crying in the wilderness, was John the Baptist. The burden of the cry was, " Prepare ye the way of the Lord, (Jehovah,) make his paths straight." Verse 3. This answers to the prediction of Isaiah, chapter 40. 3, and the application made expressly by the Baptist to our Lord, that He is the person to whom the prophet attributes the incommunicable name of JEHOVAH, and styles him "our God." But another prediction of Isaiah is with equal force applied to our Lord: "Therefore the Lord himself shall give you a sign, Behold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and shall call his name Immanuel," chap. 7. 14, which, as St. Matthew says, being interpreted, is, God with us. Chap. 1. 23.
Again, says Isaiah, in chapter 9. 6, 7, "For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given: and the government shall be upon his shoulder; and his name shall be called Wonderful, Counsellor, the Mighty God, the Everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace," etc.
It is unnecessary at present to quote more of those numerous passages which speak of the future Messiah under divine titles, and which are applied to Jesus as that Messiah actually manifested. They do not in so many words, connect the Angel of Jehovah with Jesus as the same person; but, taken with the passages above adduced, they present evidence of a very weighty character in favor of that position.
A plurality of persons in the one Godhead is mentioned in the Jewish Scriptures; this plurality is restricted to three; one of them appears as the "acting God" of the patriarchal and Mosaic age; the prophets speak of a divine person to come as the Messiah bearing precisely the same titles. No one supposes this to be the Holy Ghost; it cannot be the Father, seeing that Messiah is God's servant and God's messenger; and the only conclusion is, that the Messiah predicted is he who is known under the titles of Angel, Son, and Jehovah, etc. , in the Old Testament, and Jesus is that Messiah, he is that Son, that Word, that Servant, that Messenger; and bearing the same divine characters as the Angel of Jehovah, is that Angel himself, and is entitled in the Christian Church to all the homage and worship which was paid to him in the Jewish.
There are, however, a few passages which in a still more distinct manner than any which have been introduced, except that from the prophecy of Jeremiah, that identify Jesus Christ with the Angel of Jehovah in the patriarchal and Levitical dispensations; and a brief con-sideration of them will leave this important point established. Let it then be recollected, that he who dwelt in the Jewish tabernacle, between the cherubim, was the Angel of Jehovah. In Psalm lxviii. which was written on the removal of the Ark to Mount Zion, he is expressly addressed, " This is the hill which God. desires to dwell in;" and again, " They have seen thy goings, O God, my King, in thy sanctuary." But the apostle Paul, Eph. 4. 8, applies this psalm to Christ, and considers this very ascent of the Angel Jehovah to Mount Zion as a prophetic type of the ascent of Jesus to the celestial Zion,—" Wherefore he saith, when he ascended up on high, he led captivity captive," etc. The conclusion, therefore, is, that the Angel Jehovah, who is addressed in the psalm, and Christ, are the same person. This is marked with equal strength in verse 29. The psalm, let it be observed, is determined by apostolical authority to be a prophecy of Christ, as indeed. its terms intimate; and with reference to the future conquests of the Messiah, the prophet exclaims, " Because of thy temple at Jerusalem shall kings bring presents unto thee." The future Christ is spoken of as one having then a temple at Jerusalem.
The fact should be admitted, that the Jehovah of the Israelites was Christ, whose name and worship Moses professed: this is too plain to be doubted. For, in the eleventh chapter of the Hebrews, Moses is said to have esteemed the reproach, of Christ greater riches than the treasures of Egypt. Moreover, St. Paul says in his first Epistle to the Corinthians, "Neither let us tempt Christ as some of them also tempted, and were destroyed of serpents." Chap. 10. 9. It is therefore proven, that the Angel Jehovah and Jesus Christ our Lord, are the same person, and hereby his divinity is established.
4. The title of God is applied to our Savior. This the adversaries of his divinity admit, and this concession shows that the letter of the Scriptures is favorable to the orthodox opinion. All must allow it is a term in the Scriptures expressive of the divine character. The opposers of the supreme divinity of Christ say, that the term God is applied to Christ in an inferior sense. If all admit that in its highest sense, it involves the idea of absolute divinity, denoting a Being eternal, infinite, and absolutely perfect. The Being thus expressed by the Psalmist, "Before the mountains were brought forth, or ever thou had formed the earth and the world, even from everlasting to everlasting, thou art God." Psa. xc. 2. This establishes the term in its highest sense.
Again, "Now all this was done, that it might be fulfilled which was spoken of the Lord by the prophet, saying, Behold, a virgin shall be with child, and shall bring forth a son, and they shall call his name EMMANUEL, which being interpreted, is God with us." He is directly called God. " In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God."—John 1. 1. Were the Scriptures allowed to speak their own language, this single passage would decide the controversy. Again, "Of whom, as concerning the flesh, Christ came, who is over all, God blessed for ever."—Rom. 9. 5.
But Socinians say, that the term God was applied to Moses. " See, I have made thee a God to Pharaoh."—Exo. 7. 1. This is explained by chapter 4. 16: "Thou 7 shalt be to him instead of God." These passages appear to be applied in a figurative as well as in a lower sense, and inapplicable to the Deity.
But the Savior is termed by the prophet Isaiah, "the MIGHTY God." Isa. 9. 6.
He is called God. The Hebrew word El, in the singular number, in Isaiah 9. 7, which is applied to Christ, and there rendered God, is never used of any created being. It is peculiar to Almighty God, as will be evident to everyone who will be at the pains to examine all the texts in the Hebrew Bible, where it occurs." DR. C. ELLIOTT.
He is also emphatically called Immanuel, or EL, that is God, and is really with us. No inferior Deity, but " the Mighty God." This answers to what Thomas says of Christ: " And Thomas answered and said unto him, my Lord and my God." John 20. 28. Again, " Looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Savior Jesus Christ." Titus 2. 13. Our Lord is not only called God, but the GREAT God, which gives us indubitable evidence of his divinity. Another passage in which Christ receives the appellation God in the highest sense, is Heb. 1. 8: " But unto the Son he saith, Thy throne, O God, is forever and ever." "And we know that the Son of God is come, and bath given us an understanding that we may know him that is true, and we are in him that is true, even in his Son JESUS CHRIST. THIS IS THE TRUE GOD AND ETERNAL LIFE." 1 John 5. 20. Socinians interpret the clause, " him that is true," of the Father, and refer the pronoun this not to the nearest antecedent " his Son Jesus Christ," but to the most remote, "him that is true." As the Rev. R. Watson says, " Yet even this feeble opposition to the received rendering cannot be maintained: for, 1. To interpret the clause, him that is true,' of the Father, is entirely arbitrary; and the scope of the epistle, which was to prove that Jesus the Christ was the true Son of God, and, therefore, Divine, against those who denied his divinity, and that ' he had come in the flesh,' in opposition to the heretics who denied his humanity, obliges us to refer that phrase to the Son, and not to the Father. 2. If it could be established that the Father was intended by him that is true,' it would be contrary to grammatical usage to refer the pronoun this is the 'true God and. eternal life,' to the remote antecedent, without obvious and indisputable necessity."
"These were the Docete, who taught that our Lord was a man in appearance only, and suffered and died in appearance only. On the contrary, the Cerinthians and others believed that the Son of God was united to the human nature at his baptism, departed from it before his passion, and was re-united to it after his resurrection. According to the former, Christ was man in appearance only; according to the latter, he was the Son of God at the time of his passion and death in appearance only. We see, then, the reason that St. John who writes against these errors, so often calls Christ - him that is true,' true God and true man, not either in appearance only." Watson's Theological Institutes, vol. 1, p. 523.
But, again; the apostle says of the Savior, "Whose are the fathers, and of whom, as concerning the flesh, Christ came, who is over all, God blessed forever."— Rom. 9. 5. The apostle enumerates the privileges of the Jewish nation, " whose are the fathers," the patriarchs and prophets, of whom Christ came. But this very Christ is " God blessed forever." " The word God in this text, is found in every known manuscript of this epistle, in every ancient version extant, and in every Father who has had occasion to quote the passage; so that, in truth, there can scarcely be instanced a text in the New Testament in which all the ancient authorities more satisfactorily agree." (Magee on the Atonement.)
5. I will hasten over titles given to the Savior, such as the " LORD OF GLORY," 1 Cor. 2. 8, " KING OF KINGS AND LORD OF LORDS," "KING OF ISRAEL," etc., and contemplate as briefly as possible, one title particularly given to the Savior in the Scriptures, that is the "SON OF GOD." That this title was applied to Christ, before and after his resurrection by his disciples, is an indisputable fact: and he assumes it himself; and it was indignantly denied him by the Jews.
Then let us examine what this title means, if it be applied to his humanity only, as some affirm, or to his divinity as the Scriptures signify.
In proof of the latter signification, we have the following reasons: I. Our Lord calls God his Father, and grounds the proof of it upon his miracles. The Jews, too, clearly conceived, that in making this profession of Sonship with reference to God, he assumed a divine character, and made himself "equal with God." They therefore took up stones to stone him. In that important argument between our Lord and the Jews, in which his great object was to establish the point, that, in a peculiar sense, God was his Father, there is no reference at all to the miraculous conception. On the contrary, the title "Son of God," is assumed by Christ on a ground totally different; and it is disputed by the Jews, not by their questioning or denying the fact that he was miraculously conceived, but on the assumed impossibility that he, being a man, should be equal to God, which they affirmed that title to import. Nor did the disciples themselves give him this title with reference to his conception by the Holy Ghost. Certain it is, that Nathanael did not know the circumstances of his birth; for he was announced to him by Philip as Jesus of Nazareth, the "son, of Joseph;" and he asks, " Can any good thing come out of Nazareth?" He did not know, therefore, but that Jesus was the son of Joseph; he knew nothing of his being born at Bethlehem, and yet he confesses him to be "the Son of God, and the KING OF ISRAEL." [Institutes, vol. 1, p. 529.]
In the confession of St. Peter, he says of the Savior, "Thou art Christ, the Son of the LIVING GOD." In this he had no reference to his miraculous conception; " probably not known even to the apostles, and one of the things which Mary kept and pondered in her heart, till the Spirit fully revealed Christ to the apostles."—But even if the miraculous conception was known to Peter, it formed no part of the ground on which he confessed the "Son of man" to be the "Son of God;" for the Savior answers him, " Blessed art thou, Simon Barjona, for flesh and blood hath not revealed this unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven." That Peter had been specially taught this doctrine of the Sonship of Christ by God, appears an unnecessary thing, certainly, if the miraculous conception had been the only ground of that Sonship, for this fact might have been received from the "Virgin Mother" without any express revelation from the Father.
But, if it be argued that the "Son of God" is but another name for Messiah, and was so used among the Jews; or, in other words, it is only an official designation, and not a personal term. This cannot well appear, as the term Messiah can only apply to the Messiahship, or office of the Savior: and Son applies to the relation of character. 1. " The Jews recognized the existence of such a being as the ' Son of God;' and that for any person to profess to be the Son of God, in this peculiar sense, was to commit blasphemy. 2. That for a person to profess to be the Messiah simply was not considered blasphemy, and did not exasperate the Jews to take up stones to stone the offender." Our Lord professed to be the Messiah, and many of the Jews believed on him as such, and it may be some even of those very persons that believed on the Savior as the Messiah took up stones to stone him as a blasphemer when he declared himself the " Son of God."
The Savior is called the " Son" of God in the second Psalm, 7: " The Lord bath said unto me, Thou art my Son; this day have I begotten thee." Apostolic authority vouches that the " Son " introduced here as speaking, is Christ; and if we think with some that this day" is the day of Christ's resurrection, "and should interpret his being begotten' of the Father of the act itself of raising him from the dead, it is clear that the miraculous conception of Christ is not in this passage laid down as the ground of his Sonship. But he is often called the Son where there is no reference even to his resurrection." We perceive from the above psalm that the mind of the inspired writer is filled with ideas of the divinity of his claims and works. This Son whom the nations of the earth are called to kiss, lest he be angry, and they perish from the way, etc.
The truth of the matter is, that neither the miraculous conception nor the resurrection of Christ from the dead, is the foundation of his being called the Son of God in this Psalm. " Not the first, for there is no allusion to it; not the second, for he was declared from heaven to be the beloved Son' of the Father, at his very entrance upon his ministry, and consequently, before the resurrection; and also, because the very apostle who applies the prediction to the resurrection of Christ, explicitly states that even that was a declaration of an antecedent Sonship. It is also to be noted, that in the first chapter of the Epistle to the Hebrews, St. Paul institutes an argument upon this very passage in the second Psalm, to prove the superiority of Christ to the angels. "For unto which of the angels said he any time, Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten thee."' [Watson's Inst. vol. 1, p. 532]The force of this argument lies in the expression 'begotten,' importing that the person addressed is the Son of God, not by creation, but by generation. Christ's pre-eminence over the angels is here stated to consist in this, that whereas they were created, he is begotten; and the apostle's reasoning is fallacious, unless this expression intimates a proper and peculiar filiation." [Holden's Testimonies—Inst. vol. 1. 533.]
The relation of Father and Son in the Godhead was not unrevealed to the Jews, and consequently, this accounts for the ideas of divinity which they in the days of Christ, connected with the term "Son of God." Says Mr. R. Watson, "This relation is most unequivocally expressed in the prophecy of Micah, chap. 5. 2. But thou, Bethlehem Ephratah, though thou be little among the thousands of Judah, yet out of thee shall he come forth unto me that is to be ruler in Israel; whose goings forth have been from of old, from everlasting;' or, as it is in the margin, ' from the days of eternity.'"
Here the person spoken of is said to have had a twofold birth, or "going forth."
By a natural birth he came forth from Bethlehem to Judah; by another and a higher, he was from the days of eternity. One is opposed to the other; but the last is carried into eternity itself by words which must clearly intimate an existence prior to the birth in Bethlehem, and that an eternal one: while the term used and translated his "goings forth," conveys precisely the same idea as "the eternal generation of the Son of God." Thus says Dr. Pocock, " This passage carefully distinguishes his human nature from his eternal generation. The prophet describes him who was to come out of Bethlehem' by another more eminent coming or going forth, even from all eternity. This is so signal a description of the divine generation, before all time, or of that going forth from everlasting of Christ, the eternal Son of God; ' God of the substance of the Father, begotten before the worlds;' who was afterward in time made man, and born into the world in Bethlehem, that the prophecy evidently belongs to him, and could never be verified of any other."
" This prophecy of Micah is, perhaps, the most important single prophecy in the Old Testament, and the most comprehensive respecting the personal character of the Messiah, and his successive manifestation to the world. It crowns the whole chain of prophecies descriptive of the several limitations of the blessed Seed of the woman, to the line of Shem, to the family of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, to the tribe of Judah, and to the royal house of David, here terminating in his birth at Bethlehem, ' the city of David.' It carefully distinguishes his human nativity from his eternal generation; foretells the rejection of the Israelites and Jews for a season, their final restoration." etc. (Hales's Analysis.) " The same relation of Son, in the full view of supreme divinity, and where no other reference appears to be had to the office and future work of Messiah, is found in Proverbs 30. 4, 'Who hath ascended up into heaven or descended? Who hath gathered the wind in his fists? Who hath bound the waters in a garment? Who hath established all the ends of the earth? What is his name, and what is his Son's name, if thou canst tell?" Here the Deity is contemplated, not in his redeeming acts, in any respect or degree; not as providing for the recovery of a lost race, or that of the Jewish people, by the gift of his Son: he is placed before the reverend gaze of the prophet in his acts of creative and conserving power only, managing at will and ruling the operations of nature; and yet, even in these peculiar offices of divinity alone, he is spoken of as having a Son, whose ' name' that is, according to the Hebrew idiom, whose nature, is as deep, mysterious and unutterable as his own, "what is his name, and what is his Son's name, canst thou tell?"
" The phrase ' Son of God' was, therefore, known to the ancient Jews, and to them conveyed a very definite idea; and it is no answer to this to say, that it was a common appellative of Messiah among their ancient writers. The question is, how came 'Son of God' to be an appellative of Messiah. ' Messiah' is an official title; 'Son,' a personal one. It is granted the Messiah is the Son of God; but it is denied that therefore, the term Son of God ceases to be a personal description, and that it imports the same with Messiah. David was the Son of Jesse,' and the ' king of Israel;' he therefore who was king of Israel was the son of Jesse; but the latter is the personal, the former only the official description; and it cannot be argued that the son of Jesse' conveys no idea distinct from 'king of Israel.' On the contrary, it marks his origin and his family; for, before he was king of Israel, he was the son of Jesse. In like manner, ' Son of God' marks the natural relation of Messiah to God; and the term Messiah his official relation to men. The personal title cannot otherwise be explained; and as we have seen that it was used personally, and not officially, and, also, without any reference to the miraculous conception at all, as before proved, it follows, that it expresses a natural relation to God, subsisting not in the human but in the higher nature of Messiah; and, this higher nature being proved to be divine, it follows, that the term Son of God, as applied to Jesus, is therefore a title of absolute divinity, importing his participation in the very nature and essence of God. The same ideas of DIVINE Sonship are suggested by almost every passage in which the phrase occurs in the New Testament." [Watson's Theo. Inst. vol. I, p. 539.]
“When Jesus was baptized, he went up straightway out of the water; and lo, the heavens were opened unto him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove, and lighting upon him; and lo, a voice from heaven, This is my BELOVED SON, in whom I am well pleased." Mat. 3. 16, 17.
None will say that this passage applies to his resurrection, nor as a plaudit for the manner in which he discharged the office of Messiah, for he was only about to commence it; if it was not given him with reference to his miraculous conception, it must follow it was given on grounds independent of his office, and independent of the circumstances of his birth, and that for a higher reason than either his official, or his human birth, he was the "Son of God." John the Baptist when he heard this, exclaims, " And I saw, and bare record, that this is the Son of God," John 1. 34. The Son of God and Messiah also as has been shown. It was to the Jews that he bore this record, who knew well the application of the term. The Baptist says in John 3. 35, " The Father loveth the Son and bath given all things into his hand." That is, because he is his Son, all power and all offices: not his Son because of the office, but the office because he was the Son of God. The Jews were enraged against him, "sought the more to kill him, because he not only had broken the Sabbath, but said also, that God was his Father, making himself equal with God." John 5. 18. The Savior here does not reprove the Jews for attaching such meaning to the term Son of God, or, making God his Father, but confirms it by saying that whatsoever thing the Father doeth "these also doeth the Son likewise," verse 19. The epithet "only begotten" as is found in John 1. 14, and in other places in the New Testament affords farther proof of the divine Sonship.
"If" says Mr. Watson, "the epithet only begotten, referred to Christ's miraculous conception, then the glory of the 'only begotten' refers to, and must be the glory of the human nature of Christ only, for that alone was capable of being conceived. This is, however, clearly contrary to the scope of the passage, which does not speak of the glory of the nature, 'the flesh,' which 'the Word' assumed, but of the glory of the Word himself; who is here said to be the only begotten of the Father. It is therefore the glory of the divine nature which is here intended." The title ‘only begotten’ or only Son, this cannot be reasonably applied to the miraculous conception of Christ or his Messiahship, or his being the first begotten from the dead, or as being appointed heir of all things, but to his pre-existence and divine nature. Where the terra only is applied to angels or men, it is in an accommodated sense. Isaac is termed the only son of Abraham. In Luke it is used, chap. 7. 12, "Behold there was a dead man carried out, the only son of his mother." And where it is said the "one only daughter." Luke 8. 42, and in chap. 9. 38, where it is " Master, look upon my son, for he is my only child."
If it be said, that because the Savior was by the Holy Ghost, made in a peculiar sense, he is the Son of God only. But were not angels in as high a sense the sons of God? and Adam directly made by God, and in this sense the son of God? and while the first man Adam stood alone in creation, who would have denied him the epithet of God's only son, thereby excluding Christ from the relation of only Son, if it only applies to his human nature, but the epithet of only Son can only be applied to the divine nature of our Lord, in which he is emphatically the "Son of the living God."
The answer of the Savior at his trial to the direct question of the Jewish council.—" Then said they all, art thou the Son of God? and he saith unto them, ye say that I am," or I am that ye say, Luke 22. 70, thus declaring that, in the very sense in which they put the question, he was the Son of God. In confessing himself to be, in that sense, the Son of God, he did more than claim to be the Messiah, for the council judged him for that reason guilty of "blasphemy;" a charge which could not lie against anyone, by the Jewish law, for professing to be the Messiah. It was in their judgment a cause of blasphemy explicitly proved against him by their law, which inflicted death upon the offence; but in the whole Mosaic institute, it is not a capital crime to assume the title and character of Messiah. Why then did the confession of Christ, that he was the "Son of God," in answer to the interrogative of the council, lead them to exclaim, "What need we any farther witness? for we ourselves have heard of his own mouth—he is worthy of death. We have a law, and by our law he ought to die." The reason is given, because he made himself the "SON OF GOD."
In the following passage, his divine and human natures are placed in opposition and contradistinction to each other. Rom. 1. 3, 4, "Concerning his Son Jesus Christ our Lord, which was made of the seed of David according to the flesh; and declared to be the Son of God with power according to the spirit of holiness, by the resurrection from the dead." It appears very plain that the divine nature of Christ is put in opposition to his human nature, the latter is reckoned the "seed of David," the former, the " Son of God," according to the 4, spirit of holiness."
Again, God says to Christ, " Thou art my Son, this day have I begotten thee." And again, "I will be to him a Father, and he shall be to me a SON." Christ is begotten, not created, "For unto which of the angels said he at any time, Thou art my Son, this day have: I begotten thee?" This can only refer to the divine nature of our Lord. In conjunction with the Sonship the apostle applies the lofty language of the Psalmist, chap. 45. 6, 7. " Thy throne O God, is forever and ever," etc., again, "God sending his own Son, in the likeness of sinful flesh," Rom. 8. 3. But, in what other sense was, or could he have been sent, if he were a son only as a man? The apostle most clearly intimates that he was Son before he was sent; and that flesh was the nature assumed by the Son, as he here uses the term.
In John 14 and 15 chapters, Christ calls the third person the Holy Ghost, and the first person the Father; " the Holy Ghost, the spirit of truth, which proceeded from the Father." Therefore the Holy Ghost is not that Father, nor is the creation of the human nature of Christ the product of the Father, but of the Holy Ghost, see Luke 1. 35. And if the Holy Ghost be the Father, then we hear the Savior praying that the Father may send the Father instead of the "Comforter," which is absurd. Therefore I conclude, that God the Father is the Father of the supreme divinity of our Lord Jesus Christ, and Christ is the only begotten Son of God the Father. It is well remarked by Professor Kidd, in his Dissertation on the Eternal Sonship of Christ, that, " Our Lord's humanity or human nature had never subsistence by itself."
Hence our Lord in his human nature never had personality apart from his divine nature, therefore, it was not in respect to his human, but his divine nature that his Sonship is predicated. It is contended that the expression mentioned in Luke 1. 35, signifies that the term, " Son of God," must be applied to the human nature of Christ: from the fact, that "that holy thing which shall be born of thee, (the Virgin,) shall be called the Son of God." We are aware that the illustrious Dr. A. Clarke thus applies the above text, to the human nature of Christ; so does the Rev. Ethan Smith, in his " View of the Trinity," and a few other modern writers, who, nevertheless believe and vindicate the supreme divinity of Jesus Christ. As however, all such persons acknowledge the title " Son of God" to be a descriptive not an arbitrary title, and that it has its foundation in some real 'relation; so if the incarnation of Christ be the foundation in that title, it must be used with reference either to the nature in which he was incarnated, that is to say, his manhood; or to the action of incarnation, that is the act of assuming our nature. If the first be allowed, then this is saying no more than that he is the Son of God, because of his miraculous conception in the Virgin, which has been already refuted. If the second, then it is yielded, that with reference to the Godhead, he is the Son of God, which is what we contend for; and it is allowed that the "holy thing," or offspring, born of Mary, is therefore, called the Son of God, not because his humanity was formed in her immediately by God; but, as it is expressly stated in Luke 1. 35, because "the Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the Highest shall over-shadow thee," the effect of which would be the assumption of humanity by the divine nature of him who is, in that nature the Son; and that the holy offspring should on that account, be called the Son of God. This would fully allow the doctrine of Christ's divine Sonship, and is, probably, the real import of the important passage referred to. But if the title Son is given to Christ, neither with reference to the miraculous conception of the human nature, nor yet because the higher nature united to it in one person is, eminently and peculiarly, the Son of God; then it only remains to those who refer the title to the incarnation of our Lord, to urge that it is given to him with reference to the act of incarnation, that is to say, the act of assuming our nature.
Now it is impossible to maintain this, because it has no support from Scripture. The passage in Luke 1. 35, has been given, but that admits certainly only of one of the two interpretations above given. Either the coming of the Holy Ghost upon the virgin, and the overshadowing of the power of the Highest, refer to the immediate production of the humanity by divine power, so that for this reason he is called the Son of God, which might be allowed without excluding a higher and more emphatic reason for the appellation; or it expresses the assumption of human nature through the "power of the Highest," by the divine nature of Christ, so that the "holy offspring" should be called "the Son of God," not because a divine person assumed humanity, but because that divine person was antecedently the Son of God, and is spoken of as such by the prophets. The mere act of assuming our nature gives no idea of the relationship of a Son; it is neither a paternal nor a filial act in any sense, or expresses any such relation. It was an act of the SON alone; "forasmuch as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, he also took part of the same;" and, as his own act, it could never place him in the relation of Son to the Father. It was done, it is true, in pursuance of the will of the Father, who "sent him" on this errand of mercy into the world; but it was still an act done by the Son, and could not lay the foundation of a filial title and character. The hypothesis cannot, therefore, be supported. If; then, the title, "Son of God," as given to our Lord, is not used chiefly, probably not at all, with reference to his miraculous conception; if it is not an appellative of his human nature, occasionally applied to him when divine acts and relations are spoken of, as any other human appellation, by metonymy, might be applied; if it is not given him simply because of his assuming our nature; if we find it so used, that it can be fully explained by no office with which he is invested, and by no event of his mediatorial undertaking; it then follows, that it is a title characteristic of his mode of existence in the divine essence, and of the relation which exists between the first and second persons in the ever blessed trinity. Nor is it to be regarded as a matter of indifference, whether we admit the eternal filiation of our Lord, provided we acknowledge his divinity.
It is granted that some divines, who truly decided on this point, have rejected the divine Sonship. But in this they have gone contrary to the judgment of the churches of Christ in all ages; and they would certainly have been marked among heretics in the first and purest times of the primitive Church, as Bishop Bull has largely and most satisfactorily shown in his "Judgment of the Catholic Church." Nor would their professions of faith in the divinity of Christ have secured them from the suspicion of being allies in some sort of the common enemies of the faith, nor have been sufficient to guard them from the anathemas with which the fathers so carefully guarded the sacred doctrine of Scripture respecting the person of our Lord. Such theologians have usually rejected the doctrine, too, on dangerous grounds, and have resorted to modes of interpretations so forced and unwarrantable, that if turned against the doctrines which they themselves hold sacred, would tend greatly to unsettle them. In these respects they have often adopted the same modes of attack, and objections of the same character, as those which Arians and Socinians have wielded against the doctrine of the Trinity itself; and have thus placed themselves in suspicious company and circumstances.
The very allegation that the divine Sonship of Christ is a mere speculation of no importance, provided his divinity be held, .is itself calculated to awaken vigilance, since the most important doctrines have sometimes been stolen away "while men have slept," and the plea which has lulled them into security has always been, that they were not fundamental.
I am not indisposed to give up that point with Episcopius and Waterland, who both admitted the divine Son-ship, though I would not concede its fundamental character on the same grounds as the former, but with the caution of the latter, who had views much more correct on the question of fundamental truths. But though the Sonship of Christ may be denied by some who hold his divinity, they do not carry out their own views into their logical conclusions, or it would appear that their notions of the TRINITY greatly differ in, consequence, from those which are held by the believers in this doctrine; and that on a point, confessedly fundamental, they are, in some important respects, at issue with the orthodox of all ages. This alone demands their serious reflection, and ought to induce caution; but other considerations are not wanting to show that points of great moment are li involved in the denial or maintenance of the doctrine in question.
1. "The loose and general manner in which many passages of Scripture, which speak of Christ as a Son, must be explained by those who deny the divine filiation of Christ, seems to sanction principles of interpretation which would be highly dangerous, or rather absolute y fatal, if generally applied to the Scriptures.
2. " The denial of the divine Sonship destroys all relation among the persons of the Godhead; for no other relation of the hypostases are mentioned in Scripture, save those which are expressed by paternity, filiation, and procession; every other relation is merely economical; and these natural relations being removed, we must then conceive of the persons in the Godhead as perfectly independent of each other, a view which has a strong tendency to endanger the unity of the essence.
3. " It is the doctrine of the divine paternity only which preserves the Scriptural idea that the Father is the fountain of Deity, and, as such, the first, the original, the principle. Certainly he must have read the Scriptures to little purpose, who will not perceive that this is their constant doctrine—that 'of him are all things;'; that though the Son is Creator, yet that it was ' by the Son' the Father made the worlds: and that the Father hath given him to have life in himself which can only refer to his divine nature, nothing being the source of life in itself, ' as the Father bath life in himself.' But where the essential paternity of the Father and the correlative filiation of the Son are denied, these Scriptural representations have no foundation in fact, and are incapable of interpretation. The term Son at once preserves the Scriptural character of the Father, and sets up an everlasting barrier against the Arian heresy of inferiority of essence; for, as Son, he must be of the same essence of the Father.
4. " The Scriptural doctrines of the perfect EQUALITY of the Son, so that he is truly God, equal in glory and perfection to the Father, being of the same nature; and, at the same time, the SUBORDINATION of the Son to the Father, so that he should be capable of being' sent,' are only to be equally maintained by the doctrine of the divine Sonship. According to those who deny this doctrine, the Son might as well be the first as the second person in the Godhead; and the Father the second as well as the first. The Father might have been sent by the Son, without incongruity; or either of them by the Holy Spirit. On the same ground, the order of the solemn Christian form of blessing, in the name of the Father, Son, and Spirit, so often introduced in the New Testament, is grounded on no reason whatever, and might be altered at pleasure. These are most violent and repulsive conclusions, which the doctrine of the Sonship avoids, and thus proves its concordance with the Holy Scriptures.
5. "The love of the Father, in the gift of his Son, a doctrine so emphatically and so frequently insisted upon in Scripture, can have no place at all in the religious system of those who deny the relations of Father and Son to exist in the Godhead. This I take to be fatal to the doctrine; for it insensibly runs into the Socinian heresy, and restricts the love of the Father in the gift of his Son, to the gift of a man only, if the Sonship of Christ be human only; and, in that case, the permission of the sufferings of Christ was no greater a manifestation of God's love to the world, than his permitting any other good man to die for the benefit of his fellow creatures,—St. Paul, for instance, or any of the martyrs.
"Episcopius, though he contends against the doctrine of the divine Sonship of our Lord being considered as fundamental, yet argues the truth of the doctrine on this very ground." [Watson's Theo. Inst. Vol. 1, Part Second, p. 552.]
To this doctrine of our Lord's eternal Sonship, objections have been raised, such as the following: First, " If the Son be of the Father in any way whatsoever, there must have been a commencement of his existence."
The following we give as an answer: " If these terms are properly taken, it will be found, that though every effect may be said to be posterior to its cause, it is merely in the order of nature, and not of time; and, in point of fact, every effect, properly so called, is co-existent with its cause, and must of necessity exactly answer to it, both in magnitude and duration; so that an actually infinite and eternal cause implies an actually infinite and eternal effect.
"Many seem to imagine, as the words cause and effect must be placed one after the other, and the thing intended by the latter is different from what is meant by the former, that, therefore, a cause must precede its effect, at some very short time. But they ought to consider, that if anything be a cause, it is a cause. It cannot be a cause and the cause of nothing; no, not for the least conceivable space of time. Whatever effect it may produce hereafter, it is not the actual cause of it till it is actually in being; nor can it be, in the very nature of things.
" Now, suppose, I should call the Son of God the infinite and eternal effect of an infinite and eternal cause; however the terms of the proposition might be caviled with, and however sophistry might avail itself of the imperfection of human language, and the ambiguity of words to puzzle the subject, in the sense in which I take the terms cause and effect, the proposition is true, and cannot be successfully controverted. And though I would by no means affect such language, yet I should be justified in its use by the early orthodox writers of the Church, both Greek and Latin, [See Bull's Defensio, etc.] who did not hesitate to call the Father the cause of the Son; though the Latins generally preferred using the term principium, which, in such a connection, is of the same import as cause.
"Nor can we consider the following words of our blessed Redeemer in any other view: ' I live by the Father,' John 6. 57, and 'As the Father hath life in himself; so hath he given to the Son to have life in himself;' John 5. 26. Such language can never be understood of the mere humanity of Christ.
" Secondly:—Some persons think they reduce the doctrine in question, to an absurdity, by saying, If the Father generate the Son, he must either be always generating him, or an instant must be supposed when his generation was completed. On the former supposition, the Son is and must ever remain imperfect, and in fact, ungenerated; on the latter, we must allow that he cannot be eternal.' " No one can talk in this manner, who has not first confounded time with eternity, the creature with the Creator; beings whose existence, and modes, and relations are swallowed up and lost in the divine eternity and immensity with him who is, in all essential respects, eternal and infinite. The orthodox maintain that the Son of God is what he is from everlasting, as well as the Father. His generation no more took place in any imaginary point of eternity than it took place in time. Indeed all duration, which is commenced, is time, and time it must ever remain. Though it may never end, it can never be actually eternity; nor can any being, whose existence has commenced, ever become actually eternal. This thing implies a contradiction in terms.
"The nature of God is perfect from everlasting; and the generation of the Son of God was no voluntary and successive act of God, but something essential to the Godhead, and therefore natural and eternal. We may illustrate this great subject, though we can never fully comprehend it. All natural agents, as we call them, act or operate uniformly and necessarily. If they should change their action or operation, we should immediately infer a change of their nature. For their existence, in a certain state, implies that action or operation. They act or operate by, what we call, a necessity of nature, or, as any plain uneducated man would express himself; it is their nature so to do. Thus the fountain flows. Thus the sun shines. Thus the mirror reflects whatsoever is before it. No sooner did the fountain exist in its natural state, than it flowed. No sooner did the sun exist in its natural state, than it shone. No sooner did the mirror exist in its natural state, than it reflected the forms placed before it. The actions or operations are all successive. But had the fountain existed from everlasting, in its natural state, from everlasting it must have flowed. Had the sun existed, so it must have shone. Had the mirror so existed, so it must have reflected whatever was before it. The Son of God is no voluntary effect of the Father's power and wisdom, like the created universe, which once did not exist, and might never have existed, and must necessarily be confined within the bounds of time and space: he is the natural and necessary, and, therefore, the eternal and infinite birth of the Divine fecundity, the boundless overflow of the eternal and infinite splendor of the eternal Son, the unspotted mirror and complete and adequate image, in whom may be seen all the fullness of the Godhead. This places the orthodox faith at an equal distance from the Sabellian and Arian heresies, and will ever make that distance absolutely infinite. This is no figure of speech, but a most sober truth." (France's Three Discourses on the Person of Christ.)
We think it is irrefragably proven from Scripture, that the term "Son of God," contains a revelation of the divinity of our Lord as being of the same nature and essence with the Father.
Very much more we might say on the divinity of our blessed Savior, as touching the divine appellatives given to him in the Holy Scriptures; but let the above suffice. We have been somewhat particular on the term " Son of God," for the reasons that some are in danger of misapplying it. As many of our younger brethren in the ministry, fond of Dr. A. Clarke's exposition of the term, are in danger of misapplying the same, as the Dr. has done. As he is nearly alone among the orthodox commentators on this point, that is in applying the term "Son of God" to the Savior's humanity. We find in the memoirs of the Rev. Richard Watson, by Rev. Thomas Jackson, " That about the year 1818, Dr. Clarke's very elaborate commentary on the Holy Scriptures was then in a course of publication. In this work the Dr. strenuously contends for the true and proper divinity of Jesus Christ; but at the same time maintains that he is the Son of God merely in regard to his human nature. It was however at variance with the tenets of Mr. Wesley and of the Methodist body; and was clearly opposed to almost every orthodox confession of faith, and to the general sense of the Christian Church in every age. The argument upon which he rests his cause, and which is contained in his note on Luke 1. 35, is deduced entirely from human analogies. Against the principles Mr. Watson felt it his duty to raise his warning voice. Early in the year 1818, he published one of his most important theological works; an elaborate dissertation on the divinity and eternal Sonship of Christ, and on the use of reason in matters of revelation.
"Dr. Clarke offered no reply to Mr. Watson's publication. The pamphlet of the latter on the Sonship of Christ was accompanied by similar publications from the pens of the Rev. Messrs. Moore, Hare, and Robert Martin; and by these means, and the interference of the conference, the orthodoxy of the body was preserved.
Dr. Clarke's theory is now generally discarded." [Life of Watson, by Thomas Jackson, Chap. 2.]
It appears that nearly all the orthodox divines, from the days of the apostles to the present, take no other view of the phrase " Son of God," than this we vindicate. We shall close this point with a quotation from Bishop Morris:
"We think the divine, as well as the human nature of Christ, is called Son in divers places by the sacred writers; and among others in the following. 'For the Father judges no man , but path committed all judgment unto the Son: that all men should honor the Son, even as they honor the Father. He that honored not the Son, honored not the Father which bath sent him.' John 5. 22, 23. But unto the Son, he saith, Thy throne, O God, is forever and ever: a scepter of righteousness is the scepter of thy kingdom.' Heb. 1. 8. It will here be observed, that the being called the Son,' is to judge the world, and is to be honored even as the Father; that he is called God, and that his throne, as such, is forever and ever. Now, to apply all this to the humanity of Christ, would be absurd."
In our opinion, in view of the Scriptures which may be adduced, the title " Son of God," is the richest appellative given to the adorable Savior in proof of his absolute divinity. The reader will see that the names of God are given to the Savior, which is farther proof of: his Supreme Divinity.
CHRIST POSSESSED DIVINE ATTRIBUTES.
IN the foregoing chapter we have proved that the Scriptures apply divine titles to Jesus Christ, implying his Supreme Divinity. We come now to consider the attributes which the Scriptures ascribe to him. Of the essence of Deity we profess to know nothing, but that he is a Spirit. Being known to us by his attributes, and by these we know that he is different from all intelligent beings, because the latter, though possessing attributes, yet they are finite; the Deity possessing infinite attributes, a "single, indivisible, independent, and eternal UNIT, we cannot ascribe different perfections or attributes to him, so as to suppose one attribute separate from, and independent of, another, capable of acting per se, or participating conjunctively with other attributes as an integer. It will follow, that every act of the divine Being, in regard to himself; is precisely the same in nature, so that we cannot say of one act it is an effort of his power to the exclusion of his wisdom; nor of his wisdom to the exclusion of his goodness; nor of his goodness to the exclusion of his holiness, and so of the rest. Strictly speaking, we cannot say the power of God, the wisdom of God, the goodness of God, etc. , because the power of God is God; the wisdom of God is God; the goodness of God is God.
In contemplating this awful subject abstractly, we should say that there are no such things as attributes in the divine Being, as they arc commonly understood.
What we call his attributes, are only different modes of the operations of the same eternal, undivided, and independent Unit. Indeed, God is one entire perfection, which exerts itself in different ways and actions. But as we cannot comprehend this single entire perfection, or understand how it exerts the whole of itself; as a single individual agent, in, each particular act, as it really does, mankind have always been in the habit of assisting their contemplations by regarding the nature of the acts of this single, indivisible, and eternal agent, and thus inferring the nature of the divine Being. And as these acts appear to differ in quality, we infer a quality in the agent, corresponding with the quality of the actions which we see; we call this quality by a NAME, and thus derive the doctrine of attributes.
" For example: When we see this single, indivisible, agent manifesting himself in such a manner as to give us the idea of unlimited power, we ascribe omnipotence to him as an attribute. When we see a manifestation indicating infinite wisdom, we ascribe omniscience to him as an attribute. In the same manner in reference to the manifestations which indicate justice, goodness, mercy, truth, holiness, faithfulness, righteousness, etc., all of which we ascribe to him upon such indications. Hence, we must never conceive that any act of the divine Being proceeds from one or more attributes to the exclusion of others; or that one attribute participates more in one act than in another. It is sufficient to say, if we conceive correctly of the divine acts, we will ascribe each equally to all the Divine Attributes." [Wood's Mosaic History, improved by J. P. Durbin, A. M.]
It appears obvious, if Deity be a living, rational, un-derived, independent Unit, a Unit, not merely a reality of attributes or perfections, but one single, entire perfection, a Spirit without parts, or a whole, as a whole implies an aggregation of parts, then he necessarily is the infinite God. And if Jesus Christ, according to the Scriptures, possesses the nature of this unoriginated God, he necessarily must be the eternal God. That the Scriptures apply the attributes of this God to Jesus Christ, is obvious from the following quotations, etc.: It is allowed by all that ETERNITY is an attribute of Deity, Christ is called the "Everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace," by the prophet Isaiah 9. 6, and in Rev. 1. 17, 18, "I am THE FIRST and THE LAST. I am he that lived and was dead." In chapter 22. 13, Christ speaks and declares himself to be "Alpha and Omega, the BEGINNING and the END, the FIRST and the LAST." This agrees with the eternity of God declared by Isaiah 43. 10, 11, " Before me there was no God formed, neither shall there be after me. I, even I, am the Lord; and beside me there is no Savior." Isaiah 45. 6, " I am the Lord, and there is none else."
In Revelation the terms agree with Isaiah in meaning, and are applied to Christ most certainly. Also Rev. 1. 8, "I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the ending, saith the Lord," it is added, "which is, and which was, and which is to come, the Almighty." Everyone may see that these words cannot apply to the Father, in their connection, but to the Son of God. These terms are applied to the Father in verse 4. " Grace be unto you, and peace from him which is, and which was, and which is to come: and from seven spirits which are before his throne; And from Jesus Christ, who is the faithful witness." The same declaration as is made in verse 8, by our Lord to himself; hence, if the terms which was, and is, and is to come, are descriptive of the eternity of the Father, they are also descriptive of the eternity of the Son. In Heb. 13. 8, "Jesus Christ the same yesterday, to-day, and forever." This is not spoken as some Socinians contend of the doctrine of Christ, but of Christ himself, as is obvious from the context.
Again, Heb. 1. 10, 12: " Thou, Lord, in the beginning hast laid the foundation of the earth: and the heavens are the works of thine hands. They shall perish; but thou remains: and they shall all wax old as cloth a garment; and as a vesture thou shalt fold them up, and they shall be changed; but thou art THE SAME, AND THY YEARS SHALL NOT FAIL."
These words are quoted from Psalms 102 which all admit to be a lofty description of the eternity of God. They are here applied to Christ, "and of him they affirm, that he was before the material universe;" and they affirm, moreover, the immutability of his character, as the eternal Jehovah. " Thy years shall not fail," is not, only asserted of Christ; "but thou art the same." " To get rid of the difficulty which presents itself in the words, " In the beginning," John 1. 1, Unitarians tell us, in a note in the improved version, that E here rendered " In the beginning," signifies " from the commencement of Christ's ministry." The word they admit to be Christ; that is, Christ had an existence in the commencement of his ministry. But had he not, even according to their own doctrine, an existence thirty years before? But let us compare the above quotations. We find in Heb. 1. 10: " And thou, Lord, in the beginning hast laid the foundation of the earth," etc. In John 1. 1, 3: " In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. The same was in the beginning with God. All things were made by him; and without him was not anything made that was made."
Now, if Unitarians maintain, that " In the beginning," (John 1. 1) signifies "from the commencement of Christ's ministry," then we are obliged to read the quotation from John thus: " In the commencement of Christ's ministry was the Word. All things were made by him," etc. When were all things made by him? At the commencement of his ministry, or thirty years before? "Thou, Lord, in the beginning hast laid the foundation of the earth," When did the Lord (for Jesus is called Lord, as the person addressed here, Heb. 1. 10) lay the foundation of the earth? In the beginning of his ministry, or thirty years before this time, or from everlasting? Infidelity tells us, Christ existed in the commencement of his ministry. But can infidelity tell when he did not exist? What are we to understand by the ruler of Israel, " whose goings forth have been of old from everlasting?" Micah 5. 2. Surely the "beginning of his ministry" cannot mean "from everlasting." But Jesus Christ is " from everlasting;" therefore he is the everlasting or eternal God, as none in the universe can be eternal but the unoriginated God. Another text in the 1 Epistle of St. John 1. 2, says: " For the LIFE was manifested, and we have seen it, and bear witness, and show unto you that ETERNAL LIFE, which was with the Father, and was manifested unto us." In the first clause, Christ is called the life; he is then said to be " eternal;" and, that no mistake should arise, as though the apostle merely meant to declare that he would continue forever, he shows that he ascribes eternity to him in his pre-existent state—that " eternal life" which was WITH THE FATHER, and with him before he was "manifested to men." And eternal pre-existence could not be more unequivocally marked. The above Scriptures are but a specimen of many that might be brought in proof of the eternity of Jesus' Christ, but are full proof thereof.
We notice, in the second place, the omnipresence of Christ. " Where two or three are met together in my name, there am I in the midst of them," Matt. 18. 20. From the days of the apostles to this present time, hundreds and thousands of (congregations have met in the name of Jesus for divine worship, and Christ is in the midst of them at the same point of time—consequently he is omnipresent. The Socinian comment in the New Version maintains that this promise is to be "limited to the apostolic age." Well, what does this avail? if in the apostolic age the disciples of the Savior met in sundry parts of the world at the same time, Judea, Asia Minor, Europe, etc. , he who could be " in the midst of them," whenever and wherever they assembled, must be omnipresent. The unbelievers try to say, that the gift of omnipresence was sometimes given to the apostles, and refer to 1 Cor. 5. 3. Here the apostle does not say that he was present with them, but judged " as though he were present." And if St. Paul had, by a figure of speech, asserted his presence with, when distant from the Corinthians, it would not be a "spiritual" presence, as the Socinian Version has it, but a figurative presence. Yet no such meaning is hinted at in the text before us.
Christ has declared himself to be in heaven at the same time he was on earth; this is plain from John 3. 13: "No man hath ascended up to heaven, but he that came down from heaven, even the Son of man, which is in heaven." Hence, if in heaven and on earth at the same time, he must be omnipresent; and if omnipresent he must be the Supreme God. Again, in Matt. 28. 20: "And lo I am with you always, even unto the end of the world." The unbelievers try to explain it, "to the end of the age, the Jewish dispensation, till the destruction of Jerusalem." It is certain that the clause, "Lo, I am with you always," "at all times," even to the end of the world, in its literal and popular sense. And it has no reference to the Jewish or any other dispensation, but the continual presence of Jesus with his disciples, from generation to generation, till the end of time. Christ necessarily must be present in every place, and pervade all things, for "by him all things consist," Col. 1. 16. Here the apostle attributes conservation of all things to Christ; hence his presence must be co-extensive with them; and thus heaven and earth, the universe, must be filled with him, with his power and presence: hence, this proves the omnipresence of our Lord Jesus Christ.
3. Perfect knowledge, or omniscience, is ascribed to Christ, John 21. 17. "Peter saith unto him, Lord thou knows all things." To this Christ made no reply, and therefore admits it in its full latitude; had it not been true, he should not have suffered Peter to continue in so dangerous an error. It cannot be said that this knowledge is an attribute of the creature, for the most extraordinary creature cannot "know all things." But he has a perfect knowledge of the thoughts and intents of the heart. " I, the Lord, search the heart, I try the reins," Jer. 17. 10. " Thou, even thou only, knows the hearts of all the children of men," 1 Kings 8. 39. This knowledge was not the consequence of a special revelation or supernatural gift, to answer a temporary purpose; but the eternal wisdom or knowledge of God, the Son. A gain: "Jesus, knowing their thoughts, said," etc., Matt. 9. 4. In Revelations 2. 23, it is said: " And all the Churches shall know that I am he which searches the reins and hearts." It is obvious that the Son speaks here, from verse 18: "These things saith the Son of God," etc. "He knew what was in man." As the object to whom prayer is addressed, knowing the hearts of all. Acts 1. 24: "Thou, Lord, which knows the hearts of all." As none can know the hearts of all but Jehovah, therefore, Christ is Jehovah, because he knows the hearts of all.
Socinians urge against this ascription of infinite knowledge to our Lord, a passage found in Mark 24. 36: " But of that day and that hour knows no man, no, not the angels which are in heaven, neither the Son, but the Father only." The genuineness of the clause, neither the Son, has been disputed, and is not inserted by Griesbach, in his text; there is not, however, sufficient reason for its rejection, though certainly in the parallel passage, Matt. 24. 36, " neither the Son" is not found. We are then reduced to this: A number of passages explicitly declare that Christ knows all things; there is one which declares that the Son did not know " the day and the hour" of judgment. Again: there is a passage which certainly implies that even this period was known to Christ; for St. Paul, 1 Tim. 6. 14, speaking of the "appearing of our Lord Jesus Christ," as the universal judge, immediately adds, " which in "his own times, shall show who is the blessed and only potentate," etc. The day of judgment is here called "his own times," or " his own seasons," which, in its obvious sense, means the season he has himself fixed, since a certain manifestation of himself is in its fullness reserved by him to that period. As the " times and the seasons," also are said, in another place, to be in the Father's "own power," so by an equivalent phrase, they are here said to be in the power of the Son, because they are " his own times." Doubtless, then, he knew "the day and the hour of judgment." Now, certainly, no such glaring and direct contradiction can exist in the word of truth, as that our Lord should know the day of judgment, and, at the same time, and in the same sense, not know it. Either, therefore, the passage in Mark must admit of an interpretation which will make it consistent with other passages, which clearly affirm our Lord's knowledge of all things, and consequently of this great day, or these passages must submit to such an interpretation as will bring them into accordance with that in Mark. " It cannot, however, be in the nature of things, that texts, which clearly predicate an infinite knowledge, should be interpreted to mean a finite and partial knowledge, and this attempt would only establish a contradiction between the text and the comment." [Watson's Inst., vol. I, pp. 583, 584.]
There is an interpretation which involves no contradiction or absurdity whatever, and which makes it accord with the rest of the Scripture testimony on this subject. The first, "making the word Greek, here to have the force of the Hebrew conjunction, hiphil, which in verbs denoting action, makes that action pass to another. Wherefore, Greek, which properly signifies, I know, used in the sense of hiphil, signifies I make another to know, I declare. The word has this meaning without dispute. 1 Cor. 2. 2: " I determined, to know nothing among you, but Jesus Christ and him crucified." The same, I determined to make known, to preach nothing. but Jesus Christ. So, likewise, in the text: " But of that day and that hour none makes you to know,"—none have power to make you know it.
[McKnight's Harmony.]
But cannot this difficulty be reconciled on the plain ground that the Savior speaks here as man, and not as God. That the words, "neither the Son," apply exclusively to the human nature of our Lord, as to his body which "grew in stature," and as to his soul or mind which increased in wisdom. "He could not be said to increase in wisdom," Luke 2. 52, " as he was God; nor could this be said of his body, for that is not the subject of wisdom." It will be granted, as man he did not know beyond the capacities of human and finite understanding. He could not, in this respect, know things not knowable by man, otherwise than the divine nature thought proper to communicate to him. Therefore. Christ did not know, as man, the precise time, the day and hour of the judgment. This matter is stated peculiarly by the evangelist: " Of that day and hour knows no man;" it follows, "neither the Son." "He cloth not say the Son of God, nor the Word, but the Son only." It may be said, "that the Son of man was ignorant of some things, though the Son of God knew everything." Shall it be asked, why this equivocation in the answer of the Savior? We cannot behold any inconsistency or insincerity in the Savior, "to deny that he knew what he really did know in one capacity, while he was ignorant of it in another. Thus, in one place he says, Now I am no more in the world,' John 17. 11; and in another, Ye have the poor always with you, but me ye have not always,' Matt. 26. 11. Yet on another occasion he says, Lo, I am with you always,' Matt. 28. 20."
Again, Eccl. 3. 17:" God shall judge the righteous and the wicked:" But it is said in John 5. 22: " For the Father judges no man; but hath committed all judgment unto the Son." Hence, the Son of God shall judge the world, but He that shall judge the world—" the righteous and the wicked," is God, therefore Christ is God: who shall judge the world, consequently if Christ shall be the judge, would any dare affirm, that the judge is ignorant, not knowing the day or hour of such judgment? What but eternal Omniscience could judge the world, to judge it equitably?
Christ as judge of the world necessarily must possess Omniscience.
And by this perfect knowledge he " Knew from the beginning who they were that believed not, and who should betray him;" John 6. 64. Thus the Scripture ascribes to him an existence infinitely glorious and holy, knowing all things from everlasting to everlasting, as God over all, blessed for evermore.
Fourthly. Omnipotence is peculiar to supreme divinity; degrees of power are applicable to a finite being, but his capacity cannot admit of infinite power; hence God alone is susceptible of Omnipotence, which implies infinite power. The Scriptures ascribe infinite power to Jesus Christ, therefore Jesus Christ must be God.
For instance, in Rev. 1. 8, we read " I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the ending, saith the Lord, who is, and who was, and who is to come, the ALMIGHTY." In the eleventh verse of this chapter Christ speaks these words of himself, or declares them of himself in both these verses: which show his Omnipotence.
To the Jews Christ said, " What things soever he (the Father) doeth, these also doeth the Son likewise."
"That as the Father hath LIFE IN HIMSELF, so hath he given to the Son to have LIFE IN HIMSELF," which marks an obvious distinction between Christ and all the created beings in the universe, he has " life in himself," even as the "Father hath life in himself;" hence Christ is equal with the Father in the strongest sense. "By his eternal generation this LIFE was derived from the Father to him, and he possesses it equally with the Father; by the appointment of his Father he is made the source of eternal life to believers, as having that LIFE IN HIMSELF to bestow, and to supply forever."
We read in John 1. 3: "All things were made by him, and without him was not anything made which was made; and in Heb. 1. 2: "Upholding all things by the word of his power." These texts present us with the strongest possible proof of his absolute Omnipotence, and we shall close this point with the Savior's own declaration, "ALL THINGS which the Father hath are MINE," John 16. 15.
Fifthly. Immutability is ascribed to Christ, Heb. 13. 8. "Jesus Christ, the same yesterday, to-day, and forever." Psalm 102. 27, quoted by St. Paul, Heb. 1. 10: "And thou, Lord, in the beginning hast laid the foundation of the earth, and the heavens are the works of thy hands; they shall perish, but thou remained: yea, all of them shall wax old as doth a garment, and as a vesture shalt thou change them, and they shall be changed; but thou art the same, and thy years shall have no end." The apostle declares this passage to be spoken of Christ, which manifests his absolute immutability.
Hence the word of God directly ascribes to Christ the attributes of Eternity, Omnipresence, Omniscience, Omnipotence and Immutability. No angel or creature can possess those attributes. If this could be possible, then a finite being could possess an infinite; but this is absurd. Hence, if no finite creature can possibly possess infinite attributes, Jesus Christ can according to the Scriptures, and as they are only peculiar to God, Jesus Christ is God, the Supreme Being of the universe.
And who can conclude otherwise, when it is considered, that the Scriptures positively assert, that the world shall be judged, at the "revelation of the righteous judgment of God; who will render to every man according to his deeds." Rom. 1. 5, 6. In connection with this, read Ecclesiastes 11. 9: " But know thou, that for these things God will bring thee into judgment." And chapter 12. 14: " For God shall bring every work into judgment, with every secret thing, whether it be good or whether it be evil." But the Scriptures assert too, that Jesus Christ shall judge the world. This is plain from the following Scriptures. Rom. 14. 10: " For we shall all stand before the judgment seat of Christ." Acts 10. 42: "And he commanded us to preach unto the people and to testify that it is he which was ordained of God to be the judge of quick and dead." Again, John 5. 22: "For the Father judges no man, but hath committed all judgment unto the Son." From the above passages, the evident conclusion is, that God shall judge the world. But Jesus Christ shall judge the world, therefore Jesus Christ is God. Take this in connection with the foregoing pages, and the reader may perceive, that the adorable Savior possesses the totality of absolute and eternal Divinity.
THE ACTS AND DIVINE WORSHIP OF CHRIST ARE PROOF OF HIS DIVINITY.
1. THE acts of Christ are numerous, and peculiar to the character of God, acts which cannot be performed by any creature however exalted. The first of this kind is creation, the making out of nothing all things; this is possible only to divine power.
The "worlds" were made by him—"by whom also he made the worlds." Heb. 1. 2. " Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things that do appear;" ch. 11. 3. In both texts the physical creation is meant.
Modern Arians (Newlights) say of the text first quoted "by whom (Christ) he (God) made the worlds." That is, God by Christ, as a delegated being made the visible creation; this is a pitiful exposition. All that can in truth be said of this matter is, that, the Father made the " worlds" by "his Son;" by faith we understand that the worlds were made or framed by the word or fiat of God, but Jesus the Son of God made the " worlds," therefore Christ is the God that made all things.
According to the Arian scheme of reasoning, a creature may be a creator, and a creature. They admit that Christ made the "worlds" and that he was made for this purpose; and that it cannot from hence be concluded that he is God equal with the Father. This implies that Christ as a creature is finite, for the unbelievers of his supreme divinity cannot for consistency sake make him infinite; for then they would have two infinite beings, the Father and the Son, which according to their own common sense would be absurd. Then the Son of God as a finite being, made the worlds. This conclusion is obviously contrary to the word of God. Instance, Rom. 1. 20: " For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse." So we find that the invisible things of God, " even his eternal power and Godhead," are "clearly seen" by the things that are made, that even the heathens are without excuse, that is, they may know God by the works of God. What monstrous nonsense it is to say that a creature is the creator, and preserver of all things?
But is it not said that " God " by his Son "made the worlds?" Yes, in this phrase it is so said, but the same Apostle says that the "worlds were framed by the word of God." There are several passages of Scripture wherein the persons of the Godhead address each other. Hos. 1. 7. "But I (Jehovah) will have mercy upon the house of Judah, and will save them by the Lord their God. " Again. " Then the Lord rained upon Sodom and upon Gomorrah brimstone and fire, from the Lord out of Heaven; " Gen. 19. 24. Will any class of Unitarians make the Lord, who rained brimstone, less in character than the Lord in Heaven, or the Lord that saved the house of Judah, less than the Lord their God. If not, then the phrase that God made the world by his Son does not imply of course, that the Son is of an inferior nature. " It implies that there is a distinction between the Father and the Son."
The conclusion is, that " creating power is the source of all power," except itself; and if it be not infinite, there is no infinite power manifested, hence no " Godhead clearly seen." But the scriptures determine this point incontrovertibly, Heb. 3. 4: "every house is built by some man; but he that built all things, is God. " Then the conclusion inevitably fastens upon the mind, that if God, by his Son made the worlds, and " he that made all things is God," therefore the Son of God, is the God of creation, and creation is the act of the Son of God.
Another act of Christ's is preservation, " by him all things consist," or are preserved. He must possess Omnipotence not only " but also ubiquity, since he must be present to all things, in order to their constant conservation. "
But Jesus Christ does the work of the Father, as he says, "If I do not the works of my Father, believe me not; but if I do, though ye believe not me, believe the works."
Does the Father send the spirit? He claims the same power,—" the comforter, whom I send unto you." The Spirit is hereby called, "the Spirit of Christ," and "the Spirit of God." Thus the giving of the Spirit is indifferently ascribed to the Son and to the Father."
Another act peculiar to God, is the forgiveness of sins, as sin is the transgression of the law of God, he alone is the offended party, and he only can forgive; others may declare the conditions on which God forgives, but actual forgiveness is with God only. But Jesus Christ forgives sins, therefore he is God.
Many passages of Scripture might be adduced. Let one suffice: " He said to the sick of the palsy, Son, be of good cheer, thy sins be forgiven thee."
Such were the acts of the Savior of men in the days of his sojourning on earth. "If any creature is capable of doing the same mighty works, then is all distinction between created, finite, natures, and the untreated Infinite destroyed." But creation, preservation and salvation, can only be the work of the immaculate God. But these works are ascribed to Jesus Christ, because he actually has wrought them, then the inevitable conclusion is, that he is the Supreme God.
In the second place, we come to show that divine worship was paid to Christ.
The disciples worshipped him, they worshipped him as a divine person, and enjoined this upon Christians to the end of time. God, and his prophets and apostles, reprobated in the severest terms idolatry. Hence, if Jesus Christ were only a created being, the apostles were idolaters, and Christianity is a system of impiety. The Holy Scriptures teach that Jesus is the Son of God, and equal with God; therefore, worthy of supreme adoration.
"The fact that divine worship was paid to Christ by his disciples, must be first established. Instances of falling down at his feet and worshipping him are so frequent in the Gospel, that it is not necessary to select the instances which are so familiar; and though we allow that the word proskuncia is sometimes used to express that lowly reverence with which, in the east, it has been always customary to salute persons considered as greatly superior, and especially rulers and sovereigns, it is yet the same word which, in a great number of instances, is used to express the worship of the supreme God. We are, then, to collect the intention of the act of worship, whether designed as a token of profound civil respect or of real and divine adoration, from the circumstances of the instances on record. When a leper comes and 'worships' Christ, professing to believe that he had the power of healing diseases, and that in himself, which power he could exercise at his will, all which he ex-presses by saying, 'Lord, if thou wilt, thou canst make me clean,' we see a Jew retaining that faith of the Jewish Church in its purity, which had been corrupted among so many of his nation, that the Messiah was to be a divine person; and viewing our Lord under that character, he regarded his miraculous powers as original and personal, and so hesitated not to worship him.
Here then is a case in which the circumstances clearly show that the worship was religious and supreme. When the man who had been cured of blindness by Jesus, and who had defended his prophetic character before the council, before he knew that he had a higher character than that of a prophet, was met in private by Jesus, and instructed in the additional fact that he was the 'SON OF GOD,' he worshipped him. Jesus heard that they had cast him out, and when he had found him, he said unto him, Dost thou believe on the Son of God? He answered, and said, Who is he, Lord, that I might believe on him? And Jesus said unto him, Thou bast both seen him, and it is he that talked with thee. And he said, Lord, I believe, and he WORSHIPPED him;' be it observed under his character, ' Son of God,' a title which, we have already seen, was regarded by the Jews as implying actual Divinity, and which the man understood to raise Jesus far above the rank of a mere prophet."
When the disciples were fully convinced of our Lord's Messiahship arising out of a "series of splendid" miracles, "they came and worshipped him, saying, Of a truth thou art the Son of God! " Matt. 14. 33. Upon the miraculous draught of fishes, Peter "fell at his feet." Here was divine homage. The apostles worshipped the Savior. This the Father commanded to be so by the prophets. Instance, Isa. 8. 13, "Sanctify the Lord of hosts himself; and let him be your fear, and let him be Your dread." Psa. 97. 7: " Worship him all ye gods;" compared with Heb. 1. 6: " And again, when he bringeth in the first begotten into the world, he saith. And let all the angels of God worship him." Again. Zech. 12. 10: "And I (Jehovah) will pour upon till. house of David, and upon the inhabitants of Jerusalem. the spirit of grace and supplications; and they shall look upon him whom they have pierced." John 19. 34: "But one of the soldiers with a spear pierced his side, and forthwith came thereout blood and water." Jesus Christ. therefore, is Jehovah, the object to be sanctified and feared. But, if there be doubts about Jesus Christ being the true object of worship after all we have said above, we shall produce texts from the Scripture of the New Testament in greater abundance in proof thereof.
It is clear from John 5. 22, 23: "For the Father judges no man; but hath committed all judgment unto the Son: that all men should honor the Son, even as they honor the Father. He that honors not the Son, honors not the Father which hath sent him." Here we see the infinite prerogative of judging the universe, is committed by the Father to the Son, for this great end. that all intelligent beings should honor the Son as they honor the Father, in the same manner and in the same degree. In doing this they worship one God, as the Savior told the Jews, "I and my Father are one."—" Wherefore, God hath highly exalted him, and given him a name which is above every name; that at name of Jesus every knee should bow, of things in heaven, and things in earth, and things under the earth.—That every tongue should confess, that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father." Phil. 2. 9, 11. In this passage all celestial, terrestrial and subterranean (as is meant by the original) are required to worship Christ "to the glory of God the Father." The above passage is probably quoted from Isa. 45. 22, 23, where to God "shall every knee bow—shall every tongue swear." We have said the apostles worshipped the Savior, so did many others. The Syrophoenician woman "worshipped him, saying," etc. Matt. 15. 25. And this act of religious worship was commended by our Savior, and her prayer answered. The man who came to Jesus to cast the devil out of his son, worshipped him. Mark 9. 24. But it appears needless to multiply quotations on this point. We shall, however, adduce a few instances of divine worship given to the Savior subsequent to his resurrection and ascension. Luke 24. 51, 52: "He was parted from them, and carried up into heaven. And they WORSHIPPED him, and returned to Jerusalem with great joy." This act must have been one of divine adoration, since it was performed after he was parted from his disciples, and cannot be resolved into a token of personal or civil respect; which is always done in the presence of superiors.
When St. Stephen, called the protomartyr, was stoned, the Evangelist records two instances of prayer offered to our Lord by this man "full of the Holy Ghost." "Lord Jesus! receive my spirit." " Lord, lay not this sin to their charge." Acts 7. 59, 60. In the former, ho acknowledges the Savior to be the disposer of the spirits of the sons of men in the eternal state; in the latter acknowledges Christ to be the governor and judge of men, having the power to remit sins, to judge or pass by their sins, all of which are manifestly divine acts, which prove that Stephen addressed his prayers to Jesus Christ as God. But Socinians say, it is right at sometimes to address prayers to Christ while living and seen, but not being seen alters the case.
" The papists, if this be so, would find a new refutation of their practice of invocating dead saints furnished by the Socinians. Were they alive and seen, prayer to them would he lawful; but now they are invisible, it is idolatry! Even image-worship would derive from this casuistry, a sort of apology, as the seen image is, at least, the visible representation of the invisible saint or angel." But, "suppose a dying person to pray to a man, visible and near his bed, Lord, receive my spirit: Lord, lay not this sin to the charge of my enemies,' who sees not that this would be gross idolatry? And yet if Jesus be a mere man, the idolatry is the same, though that man be in heaven. It will not alter the case, for the Socinian to say, that the man Jesus is exalted to great dignity and rule in the invisible world; for he is, after all, on their showing, but a servant; not a dispenser of the eternal states of men, not an avenger or a passer by of sin in his own right, that he should lay sin to the charge of anyone, or not lay it, as he might be desired to do by a disciple; and if St. Stephen had these views of him, he would not, surely, have asked of a servant what a servant had no power to grant. Indeed, the Socinians themselves give up the point, by denying that Christ is lawfully the object of prayer. There, however, he is prayed to, beyond all controversy, and his right and power to dispose of the disembodied spirits of men is as much recognized in the invocation of the dying Stephen, as the same right and power in the Father, in the last prayer of our Lord himself; ' Father, into thy hands I commend my spirit.' " (Rev. R. Watson.)
St. Paul "sought the Lord thrice" that the thorn in his flesh might be removed. That the apostle prayed to Christ is plain, for he adds, "and he said unto me, My grace is sufficient for thee, for my strength is made perfect in weakness: most gladly, therefore, will I glory in infirmities, that the POWER OF CHRIST may rest upon me."
Again, "St. Paul prays to Christ conjointly with the Father in behalf of the Thessalonians." " Now our LORD JESUS CHRIST HIMSELF, and God, even our Father, which hath loved us, and hath given us everlasting consolation, and good hope through grace, comfort your hearts, and establish you in every good word and work." 2 Thess. 2. 16, 17. In like manner he invokes our Lord to grant his spiritual presence to Timothy, " The Lord Jesus be with thy spirit." 2 Tim. 4. 22.
Again, " Unto the church of God which is at Corinth, to them that are sanctified in Jesus Christ, called to be saints, with all that IN EVERY PLACE CALL UPON THE NAME OF JESUS CHRIST OUR LORD, both theirs and ours." 1 Cor. 1. 2. In Revelation, too, St. John worships Christ, "falling at his feet as dead." Rev. 1. 17. Moreover, the inhabitants of heaven worship Christ. "And again, when he bringeth in the first begotten into the world, he saith, AND LET ALL THE ANGELS OF GOD WORSHIP HIM." Heb. 1. 6. The apostle in this text proves that Christ is superior to angels, and therefore supremely divine, because angels themselves are commanded to worship him.
In the scenic representation of the book of Revelation, the direct worship of Christ is exhibited. Rev. 5. 11, 14: "And I beheld, and I heard the voice of many angels round about the throne, and the beasts, and the elders; and the number of them was ten thousand, and thousands of thousands; saying with a loud voice, Worthy is the Lamb that was slain, to receive power, and riches, and wisdom, and strength, and honor, and glory, and blessing. And every creature which is in heaven, and on the earth, and under the earth, and such as are in the sea, and all that are in them, heard I, saying, Blessing, and honor, and glory, and power, be unto him that sits upon the throne, and unto the Lamb, forever and ever. And the four beasts said Amen. And the four and twenty elders fell down and worshipped him that lives forever and ever." To this may be added, " all the doxologies to Christ, in common with the Father and Holy Spirit, and the benedictions made in his name in common with theirs; for all these are forms of worship. The ascription of eternal glory and everlasting dominion, if addressed to any creature, however exalted, would be idolatrous and profane." "To him be glory and dominion for ever and ever, Amen." "But grow in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ: to him be GLORY for ever and ever. Amen." 2 Pet. 3. 18.
These are but a few of the many passages which might be quoted that ascribe "glory" to our Adorable Redeemer; but those will suffice. " The apostles blessed the people ministerially in the name of Christ, as one of the blessed Trinity." For instance, " Grace to you, and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ." " The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with you all," or more fully, " The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the communion of the Holy Ghost, be with you all." 2 Cor. 13. 14. The whole tenor of the Old and New Testaments recognize Jesus Christ to be the Eternal God, worthy of divine homage. Some Arians suggest, that there are supreme and inferior worship set forth in the Scriptures: this is the way that Dr. Samuel Clark reconciles the worship of Christ with his half Arian doctrine, "The same distinctions are sophistically resorted to by Roman Catholics to vindicate the worship of angels, the Virgin Mary, and departed saints." Who cannot see the whole tenor of Scripture runs counter to it? For example, "He that sacrifices unto any god, save unto the Lord only, he shall be utterly destroyed." Exo. 22. 20. " Now suppose any person, considering with himself that only absolute and sovereign sacrifice was appropriated to God, by this law, should have gone and sacrificed to other Gods, and have been convicted of it before the judges:—the apology he must have made for it, I suppose, must have run thus: Gentlemen, though I have sacrificed to other gods, yet, I hope you will observe that I did it not absolutely: I meant not any absolute or supreme sacrifice, (which is all the law forbids,) but relative and inferior only. I regulated my intentions with all imaginable care, and my esteem with the most critical exactness: I considered the other gods, whom I sacrificed to, as inferior only, and infinitely so; reserving all sovereign sacrifice to the supreme God of Israel! This, or the like apology, must, I presume, have brought off the criminal, with some applause for his acuteness, if your principles be true. Either you must allow this, or you must be content to say, that not only absolute supreme sacrifice, (if there be any sense in that phrase,) but all sacrifice was, by the law, appropriated to God only.
"Another instance of worship is, making of vows, religious vows. We find as little appearance of your famed distinction here, as in the former case. We read nothing of sovereign and inferior, absolute and relative vows, that we should imagine supreme vows to be appropriate to God, inferior permitted to angels or idols, or to any creature. Swearing is another instance much of the same kind with the foregoing. Swearing by God's name is a plain thing, and well understood; but if you tell us of sovereign and inferior swearing, according to the inward respect or intention you have, in proportion to the dignity of the person by whose name you swear, it must sound perfectly new to us. All swearing which comes short in its respects, or falls below sovereign, will, I am afraid, be little better than profaneness." Dr. Waterland.
The Socinians have at length discovered the above absurdity of sovereign and inferior worship and profanity, etc. In fact the Holy Bible from first to last recognizes Jesus Christ as God, the Eternal God, overall and blessed forever; and all the sophistry in the universe cannot overthrow this grand and glorious truth. None less than the glorious Lord God, the infinite and eternal One, could act or do what Jesus Christ has done, in creation and preservation; therefore, from his acts, he must be God, equal with the Father in glory, majesty and power.
Again: From the divine worship paid him, He necessarily must be God, worthy of the same honor as the Father, and the only conclusion is found in Revelation 19. 10, "Worship God." The Gospel, according to John, chap. 1. ver. 17 says, " Grace and truth came by Jesus Christ." Verse 34: "And I saw and bare record, that this is the Son of God." Verse 14: "And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us." Verse 1: "And the Word was God." Jesus Christ was God, therefore worship Jesus Christ.
THE HUMANITY OF CHRIST. HYPOSTATIC UNION.
IN the early ages of the Church, it was necessary to establish the proper humanity of the Savior, as well as his divinity. The former was denied even in the days of St. John, as his epistles appear to be answers, or arguments, going to substantiate the proper humanity of Christ. " Hereby know ye the Spirit of God: Every spirit that confesses that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh, is of God: And every spirit that confesses not that Jesus Christ is come in the flesh, is not of God: and this is that spirit of anti-Christ." 1 John 4. 2, 3. So it appears that those who deny that Christ possessed proper humanity, that he possessed a real body and soul, were, by the evangelist's own showing, spiritually anti-Christians.
The divinity of Christ is strongly proven by the Gospel of St. John, as it appears his humanity is by his epistles.
The Gnostics denied in reality the humanity of the Savior; they erred as to both natures. They did not deny, but affirmed that they took place in appearance only. Still later, the Eutyches fell into a similar error, by teaching that the human nature of Christ was absorbed into the divine, and that his body had no real existence. While the Eutyches thus erred, the Appoloninarians rejected the existence of a human soul in our Lord, and taught that the Godhead supplied its place.
" Various other refinements were at different times propagated; but the true sense of Scripture appears to have been very accurately expressed by the Chalcedon council, in the fifth century,—that in Christ there is one person; in the unity of person, two natures, the divine and the human; and that there is no change, or mixture, or confusion of these two natures, but that each retains its own distinguishing properties. With this agrees the Athanasian creed, whatever be its date,—perfect God and perfect man, of a reasonable soul, and human flesh subsisting,—who, although he be God and man, yet he is not two; but one Christ: one, not by conversion of the Godhead into flesh, but by taking the manhood int-, God; one altogether, not by confusion of substance, but by unity of person; for as the reasonable soul and flesh is one man, so God and man is one Christ.
" The Church of England by adopting this creed, has adopted its doctrine on the hypostatical union, and has further professed it in her second article: The Son, which is the Word of the Father, begotten from everlasting of the Father, the very and eternal God, of one substance with the Father, took man's nature in the womb of the blessed virgin of her substance; so that the two whole and perfect natures, that is to say, the Godhead and manhood, were joined together in one person, never to be divided, whereof is one Christ very God and very man.' Whatever objections may be raised against these views by the mere reason of man, unable to comprehend mysteries so high, but often bold enough to impugn them, they certainly exhibit the doctrine of the New Testament on these important subjects, though expressed in different terms." Rev. R. Watson.
Without doubt the "completeness of each nature, and the union of both in one person," is the only key to the language of the Scriptures, and explains and harmonizes the whole so as to afford the strongest proof, that our Lord is truly God and truly man. All the Scriptures say of Christ, either belonged to the " Theologia, the divinity of our Savior, or to the incarnation of Christ."
"Does anyone ask, for instance, if Jesus Christ was truly God, how he could be born and die? How he could grow in wisdom and stature? how he could be subject to law? be tempted? stand in need of prayer? how his soul could be exceeding sorrowful even unto death? be ' forsaken of the Father?' purchase the church with 'his own blood?' have a joy set before him?' be exalted? have ' all power in heaven and earth' given to him? etc. The answer is that he was also MAN. If; on the other hand, it be a matter of surprise, that a VISIBLE MAN should heal diseases at his will, and without referring to any higher authority, as he often did; still the winds and the waves; know the thoughts of men's hearts; foresee his own passion in all its circumstances; authoritatively forgive sins; be exalted to absolute dominion over every creature in heaven and earth; be present whenever two or three are gathered in his name; be with his disciples to the end of the world; claim universal homage and the bowing of the knee of all creatures to his name; be associated with the Father in solemn ascriptions of glory and thanksgiving, and bear even the awful names of God, names of description and revelation, names which express divine attributes:—what is the answer? Can the Socinian scheme, which allows him to be a man only, produce a reply?" [Watson's Inst. Vol. 1, part 2, page 619] They cannot give a proper answer on their hypothesis, for the only explanation of all these statements is, that Jesus Christ is God as well as MAN, and by this the consistency and truth of the Bible are exhibited.
Again: without doubt, Jesus Christ is truly man, "though modern Arians inform us that Christ possessed no rational soul, by which, if they mean anything, they must mean either that the soul of Christ was irrational, or that he had no soul; the latter being the more charitable conclusion, we will fix on it as the correct one. But how does this agree with the Scriptures, ' Thou shalt make his soul an offering for sin;' My soul is exceeding sorrowful, even unto death?' Judge ye. But though they say he had no rational soul, he was a pre-existent, super-angelic spirit, created at some period before the temporal universe, and who, in the fullness of time, assumed a human body, and animated it as our souls animate our bodies. To all this it is enough to say, that if this account of Christ be true, then he belongs to the classification of neither God, angels, nor men, and is a being unheard of before, unknowing and unknown, till the Unitarian revelation brought him to light; but how many of these sentiments can be found in the Bible? Not one. Christ then is the Son of God respecting his humanity.
" His mediatorial character, comprises both his human and divine natures. After asserting, and we trust proving, from the Scriptures, both the proper humanity and real divinity of our Lord Jesus Christ, let us, for a moment, observe him in the union of these two; for though the divine nature is not absorbed by the human, nor the human changed into the divine, yet are they permanently united in the person of the Son of God: and, hence, while some Scriptures speak of him only as a man, and others only as God, there is still another class of Scriptures which speak of him in reference to both, and which can be explained on no other principle; as John 3. 13: ' And no man hath ascended up to heaven, but he that came down from heaven, even the Son of man, which is in heaven.' Here Christ speaks to Nicodemus in the present tense; and though his bodily presence was on earth, yet he calls himself the Son of man which is in heaven; for, as God, he fills immensity." [Bishop Morris's Sermon.]
We perceive the Bishop has distinguished the Scriptures that apply to Christ into three classes: " Some Scriptures speak of him only as man; others only as God; another class of Scriptures which speak of him in reference to both," God and man. Dr. Durbin has made about the same divisions of the Scriptures in proof of the supreme divinity of Christ, in a sermon he preached first in the representative hall, during the session of the legislature of South Carolina. In viewing these divisions of Scripture in their application to the character of Christ, we hope to exhibit more largely the hypostatic union of Christ.
First, let us notice the class of Scriptures that speak of Christ as man only, proving him to be verily and truly man. We presume it is needless to gather all the Scriptures which apply to this point; a few texts will serve our purpose, as we have already adduced sufficient evidence on this head.
The Savior is called "the Son of man" repeatedly. "A man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief." This can only be affirmed of real humanity. But Christ had a body which grew in "stature;" he was hungry, and thirsty, and weary; "He took on himself not the nature of angels, but the seed of Abraham:" that is, our nature, with all its innocent infirmities, and every thing pertaining to it; having a body, which is known from his being born, suffering, dying, etc.
Again: he had a reasonable soul as well as a real body. This is obvious from the following Scriptures " Thou shalt make his soul an offering for sin;" " My soul is exceeding sorrowful, even unto death." The Scriptures in speaking of the efficacy of the sufferings of Christ for the remission of sins are in proof of the manhood of Christ; instance the following examples, Heb. 2. 14: " Forasmuch, then, as the children are partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself likewise took part of the same; that through death he might destroy him that hath the power of death," etc. Here the power of Christ's death is set forth; it is the death of one who partook of flesh and blood. But some unbelievers say Christ only took part of " flesh and blood," that is, he took a body like ours, but not a soul, his divinity is instead of a soul. Surely they cannot derive such a conclusion from the above text, for the reverse is the truth. " As the children are partakers of flesh and blood, he also himself likewise," like the children, "took part of the same flesh and blood." He did not take our sinful infirmity, or original depravity, but he took our nature, or "the seed of Abraham." Heb. 2. 16. But, whoever heard of a being thus dying? as it is said, Coles. 1. 14: "In whom we have redemption through his blood, even the forgiveness of sins," and " that through death he might destroy him that hath the power of death," and still have no soul. Can a human body exist without a soul? Can a being of flesh, and blood, and intelligence, have an existence without a soul Or can the body suffer without a soul? Did not the Savior exclaim that his "soul was exceeding sorrowful, even unto death?" "Now it is plain that the sufferer and the Savior are the same person. The man might suffer, but suffering could not enable the man to save." This suffering man was sustained by the divinity, which is one in personal unity with that which suffered, and it is this divinity and humanity which constitutes that " GREAT HIGH PRIEST " of our profession.
But, how can any man deny that Christ possessed a human soul, with such plain Scriptures before him, without joining issue with the Scriptures? Certainly he cannot. But are not some Scriptures expressly clear in applying a soul and heart to God as an infinite spirit? Hence may not all the Scriptures that speak of God and Christ be explained in this sense? We answer, by no means, because such explanation would be absurd.
While we grant that the figure called Anthropopathy, a species of metaphor in which the powers or members of human beings are ascribed to God, hence that infinite spirit is said to have eyes, Psalm 11. 4; Heb. 4. 13; ears, Psalm 31. 22; "thou heard the voice of my supplications,"—Psalm 8. 3; " When I consider thy heavens the work of thy fingers,"—Exo. 15. 6; "Thy right hand, O Lord, is become glorious in power." Here are eyes, ears, fingers, hand, ascribed to God: still more, he is represented to "repent,—and it grieved him at his heart," Gen. 6. 6. Again, " Mine heart is turned within me, my repenting are kindled together." Hosea 11. 8. Though all these things are ascribed to 1' that infinite spirit, called God, nevertheless none of these texts positively affirm that the infinite spirit is in possession of a soul, and the Scriptures intend no such thing; so it is a casuistry unworthy of attention, to try to set forth, that the Scriptures which affirm that Christ has a soul are applied only figuratively: no such thing can be proven or credited. For the blessed Savior is a man of sorrow, "the man whose name is the Branch," Zech. 6. 12; "Since by man came death, by man came also the resurrection of the dead," 1 Cor. 15. 21; verse 47: "The first man is of the earth, earthy; the second man is the Lord from heaven." "After me cometh a man which is preferred before me; for he was before me." John 1. 30. " A man that] is called Jesus, made clay," etc. John 9. 11. "Jesus of Nazareth, a man approved of God among you:" Acts 2. 22. These Scriptures sufficiently prove that Jesus Christ is "very man." There is no rational idea that can possibly exist of a human living being having a body without a soul. But, beyond all doubt and controversy, every rational being must conclude from the Scriptures, that "the man that is called Jesus" who "increased in wisdom and stature," Luke 2. 52, must necessarily possess both body and soul: for he increased in stature. This applies to his body undoubtedly, as everyone must believe this from such a host of evidence. We shall make one remark on Christ's increasing in wisdom, and close this point of the subject. To those who affirm that the Savior had no soul, we ask in what sense did he "increase in wisdom," if his Deity or Godhead made up, and took the place of a soul in Christ, how could that Divinity increase in wisdom, if you allow that the Godhead was infinite in holiness and wisdom? for without this, there could not be a God at all. If so, how did the Savior increase in wisdom? To this question there can be no valid answer: all the intrigue and subtilty of infidelity cannot answer it satisfactorily. Then the fact must be granted, that Jesus Christ is truly man, having a real body and a rational soul; and all the Scriptures which mention his sufferings and death, or indicate his inferiority in any sense, are in proof of his real humanity.
2nd Class of Scriptures sustains the following proposition:—" Jesus Christ is the very unoriginated God."
" That all men should honor the Son, even as they honor the Father. He that honored not the Son, honored not the Father which hath sent him," John 5. 23. By this Scripture we are under obligation to give the same respect or worship to Jesus Christ as to the Father. But in an examination of the nature of religious worship, it will be found that the Father's honor must necessarily be the faithful homage of the whole heart, and this in the supreme sense. Then if Christ be less than the eternal God, it would be idolatry to serve him. And if he is to receive equal worship with the Father, he must be co-equal in the sense of supreme divinity, so that the principles of true religious honor must be in proportion to the excellence of the object of worship; hence it is impossible to give the same homage to a being of less excellence that we give to a being of greater excellence.
It follows evidently that Jesus Christ is as excellent as the Father, consequently he must be the unoriginated God. And we ask if there are words more definite than the following, in either Greek or English languages. John 1. 1. This appears even stronger than our translation. And in both, the language is too definite to be misunderstood. Again, Col. 2. 9: " For in him (Christ) dwelleth all the fulness of the Godhead bodily;" "By the Godhead or Deity, we are to understand the state of being of the divine nature; and by the fulness of that Deity, the infinite attributes essential to such a nature. Bodily, signifies truly, really; in opposition to typically, figuratively. There was a symbol of the divine presence in the Hebrew tabernacle, and in the Jewish temple; but in the body of CHRIST the Deity, with all its plenitude of attributes, dwelt really and substantially, for so the word somatikos means; and so it was understood by the ancient Greek fathers, as is fully shown by SUICER, in his Thesaurus, under the word." [Dr. A. Clark's Commentary.] Consequently, as the Godhead dwelt bodily in Christ, so he is necessarily the unoriginated God.
"From these two classes of Scripture, two different classes of men have drawn two different conclusions. The Deist, finding that these passages declare two different things, has determined that the Scriptures contradict each other. From the very same premises the Arian
has determined that the Scriptures (being consistent,) Jesus Christ is not God, though the Scriptures seem to say so. Hence they make many efforts to explain away the force of these Scriptures. But neither of these conclusions is correct, or even unavoidable, as will appear from the 3rd " Class of Scriptures sustaining the following proposition:—Substantial divinity and real humanity are combined in the person of Jesus Christ."
This is a proposition very clearly expressed in the Scriptures, though it appears to have been neglected by readers generally, by all particularly who deny the divinity of Christ. We cane at once to present a few texts in proof of the above proposition, Isa. 7. 14: "Be-hold, a virgin shall conceive, and bear a Son, and shall call his name Immanuel." Compare this with Matt. 1. 23: "And they shall call his name Immanuel, which being interpreted is God with us;" God in human nature. The word Immanu, with us, el God, or the mighty God with us, not in the sense of divine presence, for this text is addressed to mankind. This is the fact beyond contradiction, a fact, we suppose, that all admit. But if it be in the sense of divine presence, and universal in its application, of course then it must apply to devils, as well as to men and angels, which makes this text superfluous. And of course if so applied, it is as advantageous to devils as men, which is absurd. Hence the true meaning then is, God with us, taking our nature upon him to redeem us from "all iniquity."
Again: Rom. 1. 3, 4: " Concerning Jesus Christ, which was made of the seed of David according to the flesh (HERE is his HUMANITY,) and declared to be the Son of God according to the spirit of holiness," (HERE IS HIS DIVINITY.) Thus we see both joined in the person of Jesus Christ. Again: Rom. 9. 5. " Of whom, as concerning the flesh, Christ came, (HERE IS HIS HUMANITY) who is God over all, blessed forever." Here is his divinity. These are a few of the many Scriptures which so clearly support the proposition, JESUS CHRIST IS VERY GOD AND VERY MAN.
" In the controversy on this subject, it is universally allowed, that if the above proposition could be established, the essential divinity of Jesus Christ must of course be acknowledged. Now, gentle reader, peruse again the above Scriptures, and ask your own reason if they do not make out clearly the proposition. Yes, if there be any one truth more clearly revealed than another, it is this—Jesus Christ is the God of the Bible.
Hence we see the Scriptures that say Christ is man are true; and those which set him forth as God are true also; the third class of Scriptures shows he is both God and man. Consequently all objections brought against his inferiority are easily refuted, as all such Scriptures go to prove he was man. When "such passages as are quoted under the second class are produced, showing Jesus Christ is God, by what means can their force be avoided? None has ever yet found out a reasonable answer. Let the above division of the Scriptures be observed, and all will be dissolved, and this truth will rest with eternal conviction on every mind, Jesus Christ is the very unoriginated God."
It is unnecessary to dwell here much longer, in order to refute the new styled errors that may rise up in these days of much inventions—for the reason they cannot have much influence. We trust that in the foregoing pages, the errors of the sundry species of Unitarians have received, in some sense their merited reward, in truth and righteousness.
It will be understood by the reader, that all the unbelievers of the essential Divinity of our Savior are refuted under the generic term of Unitarianism.
As Jesus Christ is the divine Son of God; as he was "sent" by the Father, and "returned" to the Father; He distinguished himself from the Father both in his divine and human natures, saying, as to the former, " I and my Father are one," and to the latter, " My Father is GREATER than I." If there be any meaning at all in his declaration, "that no man knows the Son but the Father, and no man knows the Father but the Son," words which cannot, by any possibility, be spoken of an official distinction, or of an emanation or operation, then all these passages prove a real personality, and are incapable of being explained by a "model one." The errors of every species of Unitarianism are chased through all their changeful transformations, and they have no good reason for their hypothesis. The unbelievers of *See Dr. Durbin's Sermon.
the supreme divinity of our Lord Jesus Christ cannot well boast of their sufferings for his holy name; they never had a martyr in their ranks, and it is very likely they never will have. That, while the believers in the Lord Jesus Christ have had the honors of martyrdom, he unbelievers of Christ's supreme divinity, generally, never had much else than a zeal for their opinions. The deniers of the Son have not honored the Father; save where involuntary ignorance was joined with pure intention. We see no hope of salvation for them on any other foundation. Consequently, they have never, in general, borne that lucid testimony for the Lord Jesus Christ, that the true believers in his eternal Godhead have done. Therefore they have escaped persecution to the death, while the true believers have suffered the fires of the stake and ascended to heaven in the flames of martyrdom, crying as they passed the confines of this, and as they neared the borders of the eternal world, Hosanna to the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Ghost; while greeting angels with the lutes of heaven, in tones of Eolian sweetness welcome those martyred spirits to the bosom of Abraham, to the throne of God.
We shall close our remarks on this chapter with one thought more, that is, the mediatorial character of our Lord Jesus Christ. In this character, Christ dwells at the right hand of the Father in heaven. In possessing absolute divinity, he has access to God the Father, in behalf of mankind. On the other hand, Jesus has access to man, having satisfied the demands of the moral law.
In this way, the adorable Savior reconciles the fallen heart to God, by removing the " enmity," without infringing on the moral agency of the heart. Is there a possibility for any being to mediate for mankind, if that being could not manifest mercy. Man could not show himself mercy; the pure law could not, it demanded the life of the rebel; God could not, for his law was violated and demanded penal satisfaction. Hence Jesus, only by his death, could mediate mercifully, after paying the demands of the law. For Jesus, only, can be "touched with the feeling of our infirmities," and hereby mediate for man. Hence, it was requisite that our mediator possess absolute divinity, and complete humanity to become a mediator in the court of heaven. Again: these two distinct natures of Christ, must necessarily remain distinct; the divine cannot be absorbed by the human, for this would be the lesser receiving the greater. On the other hand, if the divine could absorb the human, this would be a strange compound, and God would not be a spirit, an infinite, indivisible essence: hence this cannot be. Nevertheless the two natures of Christ are permanently united in the person of the Son of God. Jesus says, John 3. 13: "And no man hath ascended up to heaven, but he that came down from heaven, even the Son of man, which is in heaven." Here he addresses Nicodemus, in his bodily presence, but affirms at the same time, that he is in heaven. Thence here is a distinction of his divinity and humanity and a union of both, which form the Mediator. Very God and very man.
JESUS CHRIST MADE A PROPITIATORY SACRIFICE FOR EVERY MAN, WHICH IS FARTHER PROOF OF HIS ESSENTIAL DIVINITY.
Tuts chapter will close our remarks on the character of our Lord Jesus Christ.
The unbelievers in his essential divinity, deny that he made a propitiatory sacrifice for the world. That he made such a sacrifice is proven from the Holy Scriptures—a proof of which will corroborate the divinity of his character and mission.
To place this subject in its proper light, we must consider the Old and New Testaments as the history of man's redemption. The Jewish government was a theocracy. God was their chief magistrate. " The Lord was their king, the Lord was their law-giver; the Lord was their judge." "The elders of Israel came to Samuel, and said, Make us a king, to judge us like all the nations. The Lord said unto Samuel, They have not rejected thee, but they have rejected me, that I should not reign over them," 1 Sam. 8. 4, 7. Gal was their king. " The Lord his God was with them, and the shout of a king was among then)," Num. 23. 21. The tabernacle was the place of his court, and the holy of holies was his pavilion; here the king resided, and manifested his royal presence by the Shechinah; here, as law-giver, he was consulted; and as judge, he administered justice.
God not only gave them civil, but ceremonial laws; and enforced on them profound reverence for his gracious majesty, and external purity. And in order to perpetuate this, priests and Levites were appointed, as intermediary officers, to execute his will, and receive the offerings of the people, and present them to their sovereign.
" Those offerings were of two kinds: some were eucharistic, [The sacrament of thanksgiving.] and were offered in acknowledgment of benefits received; others were piacular, and were offered to avert impending evil, or to regain forfeited blessings. This is an important distinction, which is preserved through the whole of the Levitical law, and is particularly noticed by an apostle: For every high priest taken from among men, is ordained for men in things pertaining to God, that he may offer both gifts and sacrifices for sins,' Heb. 5. 1.
" The gifts which the apostle here mentions, were undoubtedly the meat offerings, the drink offerings, the offering of the first fruits, the thank offerings, the free will offerings. From these gifts, 'the sacrifices for sins' are always to be particularly distinguished, as their nature and design were essentially different. And this difference renders that comparison which, for the sake of reducing the sin offering' to the standard of their own opinion, the Socinians make between them, altogether inadmissible. No proof of what was, or what was not the design of the gifts,' can afford any decisive evidence concerning the design of the sacrifices for sin." (Hare.)
1. A propitiation for sin, is a sacrifice to expiate the guilt of sin, in such a manner as to avert the punishment from the sinner. Such were the sin offerings of the Levitical law.
Impurities occasioned by neglect of duty, etc., excluded the subject from the congregation and its privileges. A breach of the civil law was followed by the same consequences. An offence against a brother was pardonable when restitution was made, as it was an offence against the legislator. In all such cases, " all things under the law were purged with blood, and without shedding of blood was no remission," Heb. 9. 22. For these reasons were instituted the sin offerings, by which the impure were absolved.
The Levitical law of sacrifices exhibits the nature and design of sin offerings. This is plain from Lev. 4. 13-21: " If the whole congregation of Israel sin through ignorance, and the thing be hid from the eyes of the assembly, and they have done somewhat against any of the commandments of the Lord, concerning things which should not be done, and are guilty; when the sin which they have sinned against it is known, then the congregation shall offer a young bullock for the sin, and bring him before the tabernacle of the congregation. And the elders of the congregation shall lay their hands upon the head of the bullock before the Lord; and the bullock shall be killed before the Lord. And the priest that is anointed shall bring of the bullock's blood to the tabernacle of the congregation; and the priest shall dip his finger in some of the blood, and sprinkle it seven times before the Lord, even before the Veil. And he shall put some of the blood upon the horns of the altar, which is before the Lord, that is in the tabernacle of the congregation, and shall pour out all the blood at the bottom of the altar of the burnt offering, which is at the door of the tabernacle of the congregation: and he shall take all his fat from him, and burn it upon the altar. And he shall do with the bullock as he did with the bullock for a sin offering, so shall he do with this: and the priest shall make an atonement for them, and it shall be forgiven them. And he shall carry forth the bullock: it is a sin offering for the congregation."
Here it is obvious that sin was the occasion of the offering, and that for which it was offered.
" The life of the flesh is in the blood; and I have given it to you upon the altar, to make an atonement for your souls," Lev. 17. 11. It is required that the blood, in which is the life of the flesh, shall be sprinkled before the Lord, and put on the horns of the altar within the tabernacle, and thus an atonement is made, and the sin pardoned.
The plain meaning of atone is, " to make reparation, amends, or satisfaction, for an offence or a crime." In the above cases, atonement was made to reconcile God to man. This is rational from the facts that " God had not offended men, but men had offended God, to whom the sin offering was to be offered. And because God was offended, God was to be reconciled." Again: It was not God who presented the sin offering to the congregation, but the congregation who presented it to God. This was the condition that God proposed to be merciful to them.
The "peace offerings were tokens" of peace and " mutual friendship. The offeror was allowed to eat a part of the offering, in the presence of the Lord," Lev. 7. 15.
Again: When the congregation had sinned, God permitted them not to enjoy " the privileges of his peculiar people; whereas, when the sin offering had been presented, he did permit them." Hence we see that forgiveness was not on the part of the congregation, but God.
If it be objected, " that the immutable God cannot change, as the explanation of atonement, as given above, suggests," we answer, In the immutability of God we believe most certainly, but " dare not attribute to him the immutability of a stone." Jehovah cannot change " in what he is," yet he can undoubtedly " change in what he does. He can at one time be angry with us, and at another time turn away his anger," both as a secular governor, and as the God, who, being gracious and merciful, can forgive iniquity, transgressions and sin. Again: In the " Christian economy," and under the government of him who is "a great king in all the earth," Jesus Christ is ordained the "High Priest of our profession," Heb. 3. 2, infinitely greater than Aaron or his sons. "We have a great High Priest, that is passed into (or through) the heavens, Jesus, the Son of God," Heb. 4. 14. " We have such a High Priest, who is set on the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in the heavens; a minister of the sanctuary and of the true tabernacle, which the Lord pitched, and not man," Heb. 8. 1, 2. " Christ is not entered into the holy places made with hands, which are the figures of the true; but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God for us," Heb. 9. 24. The priests who "offer gifts according to the law; who serve unto the example and shadow of heavenly things; but now hath he obtained a more excellent ministry, by how much also he is the mediator of a better covenant, which is established upon better promises," Heb. 8. 3-6. "But Christ being come an high priest of good things to come, by a greater and more perfect tabernacle, not made with hands, that is to say, not of this building; neither by the blood of goats and calves, but by his own blood, he entered in once into the holy place, having obtained eternal redemption for us." Heb. 9. 11, 12.
In these texts the reader will find a continual " comparison between the priesthood, ministry, and sacrifices of the Jewish institution and those of Jesus Christ, the design of which is to show that the former is figurative of the latter, but that the latter infinitely excels the former." Whereas, the Jewish high priests were to offer " gifts and sacrifices for sins." But Christ offered only one sacrifice for sins. This will lead us to notice:
As the Jewish church had her priests who made atonement for the sins of " their souls," so Christ is the High Priest of the world, who, by his blood, obtained eternal redemption, for us.
If the " congregation of Israel sin through ignorance, and have done somewhat against any of the commandments of the Lord, and are guilty, the priest shall make an atonement for them, and it shall be forgiven them," Lev. 4.
That Jesus Christ was made an offering for sin, is plain from the following Scriptures: " When thou shalt make his soul an offering for sin," Isa. 53. 10. " He bath made him to be amartian, a sin offering for us," 2 Cor. 5. 21. " Who needed not daily as those high priests to offer up sacrifice, first for his own sins, and then for the people's: for this he did once when he offered up himself," Heb. 7. 27. " Christ died for our sins," 1 Cor. 15. 3. " Christ hath once suffered for sins," 1 Pet. 3. 18. Christ " offered one sacrifice for sins," Heb. 10. 12.
These and other Scriptures represent our sins as the "impulsive cause of the death of Christ." Our sins deserved punishment; Christ "was delivered for our offences," Rom. 4. 25. " In all which places we have either Greek, with the genitive case. But Socinus maintains, that in all these places a final and not an impulsive cause is intended. He even goes so far as to say, that the Latin pro and the Greek word never denote an impulsive, but always a final cause. Many examples prove the latter assertion to be untrue. For both uper and peri are used to signify no less an impulsive than a final cause. The Gentiles are said to praise God uper eleous for his mercy, Rom. 15. 9. Paul says, thanks are given uper for us, Eph. 1. 16. And for all, Eph. 5. 20. Great is my glorying for you, 2 Cor. 7. 4; 9. 2; and 12. 5. In all these places pro, or Greek does not signify a final, but an impulsive cause. So when Christ is said to have suffered and died for sins, the subject will not allow us, as Socinus wishes, to understand a final cause. Hence, also, as the Hebrew particle In, denotes an antecedent or impulsive cause, (see Psalm 38. 9, and many other places,) the words of Isaiah 53. cannot be better translated, or more agreeably with other Scriptures, than He was wounded on account of our transgressions; he was bruised on account of our iniquities. And what can Romans, 6. 10, denote, but that he died on account of sin?" [Grotius, by Watson Inst., vol. 2 pp. 103.]
It is in this sense that Christ is said to bear our sins. " Who his own self bares our sins in his own body on the tree," 1 Peter 2. 24—where the apostle evidently quotes from Isaiah 53: " He shall bear their iniquities." " He bore the sin of many." St. Paul uses the same expression, Hebrews 9. 28: "So Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many." To bear sin in the sense of the Scripture, is to bear the punishment of sin. Levit. 22. 9; Ezek. 18. 20. Again: Isaiah says, "He was wounded for our transgressions; he was bruised for our iniquities; the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed." Now chastisement is the punishment of a fault; but the suffering person of whom the prophet speaks, is declared of him to be wholly free from transgression; to be perfectly and emphatically innocent. This prophecy is applied to Christ by the apostles, whose constant doctrine is the entire immaculateness of their master and Lord. If chastisement, therefore, was laid upon Christ, it could not be on account of faults of his own; his sufferings were the chastisement of our faults, the price of peace, and his "stripes," another punitive expression, were borne by him for our " healing." The only course which Socinus and his followers have taken, to endeavor to escape the force of this passage, is to render the word not chastisement, but affliction; in answer to which, Grotius and subsequent critics have abundantly proved that it is used not to signify affliction of any kind, but that which has the nature of punishment.
These passages, therefore, prove a substitution, a suffering in our stead. The chastisement of offences was laid upon him, in order to our peace; and the offences were ours, since they could not be his " who did no sin, neither was guile found in his mouth." The same view is presented to us under another and even still more forcible phrase, in the sixth and seventh verses of the same chapter: " All we, like sheep, have gone astray; we have turned everyone to his own way, and the Lord hath laid on him (literally, hath made to meet on him,) the iniquity of us all; it was exacted, and he was made answerable." In 2 Cor. 5. 21, the apostle uses almost the same language: "For he hath made him to be sin (a sin offering) for us, who knew no sin; that we might be made the righteousness of God in him." The Socinian Improved Version has a note on this passage, so obscure that the point is evidently given up in despair.
St. Paul places "sin" and "righteousness" in opposition to each other—" We are made the righteousness of God;" that is, are justified and freed from Divine punishment; but in order to this, Christ was "made sin," or bore our punishment. There is also another antithesis in the apostle's words: God made him, who knew no sin, and consequently deserved no punishment, to be sin; that is, it pleased him that he should be punished; but Christ was innocent, not only according to human laws, but according to the law of God. The antithesis, therefore, requires us to understand that he bore the penalty of that law, and that he bore it in our stead. How explicitly the death of Christ is represented in the New Testament as penal, which it could not be in any other way than by his taking our place, and suffering in our stead, is manifest also from Gal. 3. 13: " Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse (an execration) for us, for it is written, cursed is everyone that hangs on a tree." The passage of Moses, to which St. Paul refers, is Deut. 21. 22, 23: " If a man have committed a sin worthy of death, and be put to death, and they hang him on a tree, his body shall not remain all night upon the tree, but thou shalt in any wise bury him that day, for he that is hanged is accursed of God, that thy land be not defiled." This infamy was only inflicted upon great offenders, and was designed to show the light in which the person thus exposed was viewed by God—he was a curse or execration. On this, the remarks of Grotius are most forcible and conclusive: "Socinus says, that to be an execration, means to be under the punishment of execration, which is true. For Greek, everywhere denotes punishment proceeding from the sanction of law, 2 Peter 2. 14; Matt. 25. 41. Socinus also admits, that the cross of Christ was this cure; his cross, therefore, had the nature of punishment, which is what we maintain. Perhaps Socinus allows that the cross of Christ was a punishment, because Pilate, as a judge, inflicted it; but this does not come up to the intention of the apostle; for, in order to prove that Christ was made obnoxious to punishment, he cites Moses, who expressly asserts, that whoever hangs on a tree, according to the Divine law, is accursed of God; consequently, in the words of the apostle, who cites this place of Moses, and refers it to Christ, we must supply the same circumstance, accursed of God,' as if he had said Christ was made accursed of God, or obnoxious to the highest and most ignominious punishment for us, that the blessing of Abraham might come upon the Gentiles,' etc. For when the apostles speak of the sufferings of Christ in reference to our good, they do not regard the acts of men in them, but the act of God." (De Satisfactione.)
2. Let us notice more particularly the nature of the death of Christ.
" We are carried still farther into the real nature and design of the death of Christ, by those passages of Holy Scripture which connect with the propitiation, atonement, reconciliation, and the making peace between God and man; and the more attentively these are considered, the more unfounded will the Socinian notion appear, which represents the death of Christ as, indirectly only, a benefit to us, and as saving us from sins and their punishment only as it is a motive to repentance and virtue." (R. Watson.)
In the doctrine before us, the wrath turned away is the wrath of God. Jesus Christ makes the propitiation; this is done by his blood, according to 1 John 2. 2: " And he is the propitiation for our sins." Again, 1 John 4. 10: " Herein is love, not that we loved God; but that he loved us, and sent his Son to be the propitiation for our sins." Rom. 3. 25: " Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood." Both are from the Greek verb, so often used by Greek writers to express the action of a person, who, in some appointed way, turned away the wrath of a Deity; and, therefore, cannot bear the sense which Socinus would put upon it." When the unbelievers in the Savior's essential divinity are pressed on this point, and denying that mankind needed a propitiatory sacrifice, the death of Christ was only necessary as it was a motive to repentance and a holy life—that is, if they believe in holiness in the Scriptural sense at all. Hence, they deny the mystery of "God manifested in the flesh." We can expect nothing better from them, if they be consistent with themselves, than a virtual denial of the propitiatory sacrifice of Christ. All unbelievers in the supreme divinity of Christ, of whatsoever name they may assume, deny original sin, and the vicarious atonement of Jesus Christ—whether called Socinians, Unitarians, Campbellites, and Newlights, etc.
There is but little difference between Socinians and Unitarians. As the former maintain, " that Jesus Christ was a mere man, who had no existence before he was conceived by the Virgin Mary," but "he preached the truth to mankind, to set before them an example of heroic virtue," etc.
The latter maintain,
1. "That Christ is not truly a divine being, but an exalted and pre-eminent pattern of human perfection."
2. That the Scriptures are " not a revelation, but the record of a revelation."
3. That the Sabbath, or Lord's day of Christians, under the New Testament, has no connection whatever with the ancient Jewish Sabbath; that although it is to be honored by resting from secular business, yet it is not to be considered as set apart from our common lives to religion," nor is it to be regarded as more holy than any other day of the week.
4. That it is doubtful whether soul is a substance or a principle separate from the body.
5. That there are no such spiritual beings as the devil, or evil angels.
6. That the Scriptures do not teach the doctrine of eternal punishments to be inflicted upon the wicked.
The reader may easily perceive that these two sects embrace some tenets nearly alike; and the Campbellites, Newlights, and all other lights, but the true lights, have nearly the same doctrine touching the Lord Jesus Christ, the Holy Ghost, and the piacular atonement. Hence, we have called them repeatedly unbelievers, as this term seems to embrace them all, even down to Universalism, as it appears to be the near kinsman of Unitarianism itself.
Now, to proceed. The apostle to the Ephesians 1. 7, says: " We have redemption through his blood, the remission of sins." Here it appears that it is only through the blood of Christ that he himself can reconcile us to God.
But will it be said by our opponents, that in vindicating our idea of Christ's propitiation, we " make God an implacable being?" By no means. We all agree that " God is love;" still it is not necessary in order to support this, to "assume that he is nothing else." Has he not other attributes that harmonize with his love? Most certainly. Then we do not make Jehovah an implacable being, but rather that " God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life," John 3. 16. " He spared not his own Son, but delivered him up freely for us all." " Thus God is the fountain and first great moving cause of the scheme of recovery and salvation. The question is not whether God is love, but whether he is holy and just; whether we, his creatures, are under law or not; whether this law has any penalty, and whether God, in his rectoral character, is bound to execute and uphold that law." The justice of God is punitive; if not, his law is a dead letter. But it is obvious that his law is punitive; then a violation of his law incurs his anger. God is angry with the wicked; then " a man as a sinner is obnoxious to this anger; and so a propitiation becomes necessary to turn it away from him." John the Baptist declares, that if any man believeth not on the Son of God, "the wrath of God abideth upon him." St. Paul declares, that " the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men." The day of judgment, in reference to the ungodly, is said to be "the day of wrath;" fearful inflictions of punishment shall be the cup of the rebellious.
"All evils which history has crowded into the lot of man, appear insignificant in comparison of banishment from God—separation from the good—public condemnation—torment of spirit—" weeping, wailing, and gnashing of teeth"— " everlasting destruction"—" everlasting fire." " Let men talk ever so much, and eloquently, of the pure benevolence of God, they cannot abolish the facts recorded in the history of human suffering in this world, as the effect of transgression; nor can they discharge these fearful communications from the pages of the book of God. And if Jesus who saves us from the wrath to come,' that is, from those effects of the wrath of God which are to come, then but for him we should have been liable to them." "The principle in God, from which such effects follow, the Scriptures call wrath; and they who deny the existence of wrath in God, deny, therefore, the Scriptures. It by no means follows,' however, that those who thus bow to inspired authority, must interpret wrath to be a passion in God; or that though we conclude the awful attribute of his justice to require satisfaction, in order to the forgiveness of the guilty, we afford reason to any to charge us with attributing vengeful affections to the Divine being." [Watson's Inst., vol. 2, pp. 116.]
Again: To those Scriptures which represent Christ as our propitiatory sacrifice, we will append those which speak of reconciliation, and the establishment of peace between God and men, as the result of his death. Col. 1. 19-22: " For it pleased the Father that in him should all fullness dwell: and (having made peace through the blood of his cross) by him to reconcile all things unto himself; by him, I say, whether they be things in earth or things in heaven." Again: " For if, when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, being reconciled, we shall be saved by his life. And not only so, but we also joy in God, through our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom we have now received the atonement." 2 Cor. 5. 18, 19: "And all things are of God, who bath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ, and hath given us the ministry of reconciliation." " The verbs translated to reconcile, which signify a change from one state to another; but in the passages, connection determines the nature of the change to be a change from enmity to friendship." The best critics maintain that the term atonement signifies propitiation in the proper and sacrificial sense. " The word atonement would have been a proper substitute for propitiation,' in those passages of the New Testament in which it occurs, as being more obvious in its meaning to the common reader; and because the original word answers to the Hebrew which is used for the legal atonement." And "the effect of the Jewish atonement was, that the sins of the persons for whom they were offered, were forgiven. Such precisely is the consequence of the death of Christ." (Hare.)
This agrees with the prophet: " My righteous servant shall justify many, for he shall bear their iniquities," Isa. 53. 11. " For this is my blood of the new covenant, which is shed for many for the remission of sins," Matt. 26. 28. " We have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins," Eph. 1. 7. The bearing of iniquities, his blood which was shed for the remission of sins, redemption through his blood, 4-c., are terms exhibiting the foundation of reconciliation, the only means of reconciliation and peace. But these terms necessarily suppose a previous state of hostility between God and man, which is reciprocal.
This hostility between God and men is sometimes called enmity; but the oppugners of this doctrine, the doctrine of atonement, urge that there is no such affection in the divine Being, therefore, reconciliation in Scripture does not mean a reconciliation of God to man, but of man to God. But, with what poor grace can Socinians and all other unbelievers in the Deity of Christ, and the fall of man, make this turn in the argument?—when in fact they deny the fall of man; and argue his natural innocence, that "original sin is a scholastic chimera." In the face of this, how can they maintain that the Scriptures teach a reconciliation not of God to man, but of man to God. If man be a naturally innocent being, where is the enmity on his part to God? Let the infidel brotherhood answer this.
The truth is, man is an enemy to God, "the carnal mind is enmity against God; for it is not subject to the law of God, neither indeed can be." Rom. 8. 7. Again: " For if; when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son:" Rom. 5. 10. Hence we see plainly that man is naturally an enemy of God, but is reconciled " by the death of his Son." So Christ made "peace" between God and man, by his death. But what are we to understand by being enemies to God? It means, because man violated his law, he has fallen under the "divine judicial displeasure of God," accounted an enemy and subject to be punished as such. Here it is obvious, that this " enmity, in the sense of malignity and the sentiment of hatred, is added to this relation in the case of man; but it is no part of the relation itself; it is rather the cause of it." But according to the reasoning of Socinians, and others, God is so good, he cares not, particularly, about the violations of his law, though sinners do violate it; He remains continually a Being of unchanging love toward them; and needs not to be reconciled to them. But they must admit that the term "reconciliation," means something, and they have it to mean the reconciliation of man to God, taken, we sup-pose in the sense of that which was really effected by the death of Christ, and still try to maintain man's natural innocence. What nonsense! Why not throw away the Bible at once? And not only so, but, true reason also. They admit that Christ died for men, and hereby he made a reconciliation for them, but, nevertheless men are naturally innocent, and God is so loving, yes, unchangeable in his love, that he cannot need any reconciliation. Then we ask the reader, what shall they do with the reconciliation made by the death of our Lord Jesus Christ?
4. After all, some of the Socinians assert, "that reconciliation means no more than laying aside our enmity to God." The contrary may be shown from various express passages. For instance, Rom. 5. 10: "For if; when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God." The act of reconciliation is here ascribed to God, and not to men. "But if this reconciliation consisted in the laying aside our own enmity, the act would be ours alone; and, farther, that it could not be the laying aside of our enmity, is clear from the text, which speaks of reconciliation while we were yet enemies. ' God was in Christ reconciling the world unto himself; not imputing their trespasses unto them:' 2 Cor. 5. 19. Here, the manner of this reconciliation is expressly said to be not our laying aside our enmity, but the non-imputation of it to us by God, in other words, the pardoning our offences and restoring us to favor. The promise on God's part, to do this, is expressive of his previous reconciliation to the world by the death of Christ; for our actual reconciliation is distinguished from this by what follows, and hath committed to us the ministry of reconciliation,' by virtue of which all men were, by the apostles, entreated and besought to be reconciled to God. The reason, too, of this reconciliation of God to the world, by virtue of which he promises not to impute sin, is grounded by the apostle, in the last verse of the chapter, not upon the laying aside of enmity by men, but upon the sacrifice of Christ:
For he hath made him to be sin (a sin offering) for us, who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God in him.' Eph. 2. l6, 'And that he might reconcile both unto God in one body by the cross, having slain the enmity thereby.' Here the act of reconciling is attributed to Christ. Man is not spoken of as reconciling himself to God, but Christ is said to reconcile Jews and Gentiles together, and both to God, by his cross.' Thus, says the apostle, 'he is our Peace;' but in what manner is the peace effected? ' Not, in the first instance, subduing the enmity of man's heart, but by removing the enmity of the law.' Having abolished through its fulfilment in Christ 'the enmity, even the law of commandments.' " The ceremonial law only is here, probably, meant; for by its abolition through its fulfilment in Christ, the enmity between Jews and Gentiles was taken away; but still it was not only necessary to reconcile Jews and Gentiles together, but to 'reconcile both unto God.' This he did by the same act; abolishing the ceremonial law by becoming the antetype of all its sacrifices; and thus, by the sacrifice of himself, effecting the reconciliation of all to God, 'slaying the enmity by his cross,' taking away whatever hindered the reconciliation of the guilty to God, which, as we have seen, was not enmity and hatred to God in the human mind only, but that judicial hostility and variance which separated God and man as judge and criminal c When we speak of the necessity of Christ's atonement, in order to man's forgiveness, we are told that we represent the Deity as implacable; when we rebut that by showing that it was his very placability, his boundless and ineffable love to men, which sent his Son into the world to die for the sins of mankind, they rejoin with their leaders, Socinus and Cerellius, that then ' God was reconciled before he sent his Son, and that, therefore, Christ did not die to reconcile God to us.' The answer plainly is, that in this objection, they either mean that God had, from the placability and compassion of his nature, determined to be reconciled to offenders upon the sending his Son, or that he was actually reconciled when our Lord was sent. The first is what we contend for, and is in no wise inconsistent with the submission of our Lord to death, since that was in pursuance of the merciful appointment and decree of the Father; and the necessary medium by which this placability of God could honorably and consistently show itself in actual reconciliation, or the pardon of sin The reconciliation of God to man is throughout, a conditional one, and, as in all conditional processes of this kind, it has three stages. The first is when the party offended is disposed to admit of terms of agreement, which, in God, is matter of pure grace and favor; the second is when he declares his acceptance of the mediation of a third person, and that he is so satisfied with what he has done in order to it, that he appoints it to be announced to the offender, that if the breach continues, the fault lies wholly upon himself; the third is when the offender accepts of the terms of agreement which are offered to him, submits, and is received into favor." (R. Watson.)
5. Again, it is still more clear, that Christ Made reconciliation for us, etc. if we consider the Scriptures still farther. "Upon the death and sufferings of Christ, God declares that he is so satisfied with what Christ hath done and suffered in order to the reconciliation between himself and us, that he now publishes remission of sins to the world upon those terms which the Mediator hath declared by his own doctrine and the apostles he sent to preach it; but because remission of sins doth not immediately follow upon the death of Christ, without any sup-position of the performance of the conditions which are required of us." (Stillingfleet.)
6. To those Scriptures which treat of our reconciliation to God by the death of Christ, we add those which speak of " redemption" either by employing that word or others of like import. By redemption, those that deny the atonement made by Christ try to understand DELIVERANCE merely, regarding only the effect and studiously putting out of sight the cause so far as they can; which is a plain prevarication of Scriptural truth. But to the Scriptures on this point, 1 Cor. 6. 19, 20: "And ye are not your own, for ye are bought with a price."
1 Peter 1. 18, 19: "For as much as ye know that you were not redeemed with corruptible things, as silver and gold, from your vain conversation, etc., but with the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb without blemish and without spot." Rom. 3. 24. "Being justified freely by his grace, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus." Gal. 3. 13. " Christ bath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us; for it is written, cursed is everyone that hanged on a tree." Eph. 1. 7: " In whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of his grace." It is very obvious that these texts refute the notion of a mere deliverance, whether we take it in the sense of sin, or punishment, or both. The English word redeem signifies to buy back, to redeem, and redemption, are both used to signify the act of freeing a captive, by paying a ransom or redemption price. Hence in the above and other passages, it is said " we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins," redemption from "the curse of the law;" deliverance from the power of Satan; from death and future " wrath," by Jesus Christ's death, which he endured in our stead. Matthew 20. 28: The Son of man came "to give his life a ransom for many." 1 Tim. 2. 6: " Who gave himself a ransom for all." Again, says St. John, Rev. 5. 9: " Thou vast slain, and hast redeemed us to God, (has purchased us) by thy blood." " The lutron, in the case of man, is the blood of Christ; and our redemption is not a commutation of a pecuniary price for a person, but a commutation of the sufferings of one person in the stead of another, which sufferings being a punishment, in order to satisfaction, is a valuable consideration, and, therefore, a price for the redemption of man out of the hands of Satan, and from all the consequences of that captivity."
Hence we see that the death of Christ, in the Scriptures is exhibited as the price of our redemption. Against this doctrine an objection has been urged from Socinus to Dr. Priestly, and is thus stated by the latter: "The Scriptures uniformly represent God as our universal parent, pardoning sinners freely, that is from his natural goodness and mercy, whenever they repent and reform their lives. All the declarations of Divine mercy are made, without reserve and limitation, to the truly penitent, through all the books of Scripture, without the. most distant hint of any regard being had to the sufferings or merit of any being whatever!' Here Dr. Priestly restricts the love of God, as it is only "to the truly penitent." Then God has no love or mercy only for the truly penitent, would be the conclusion of this logic. Hence God, according to the Dr. has respect to a " consideration foreign to his goodness and mercy."
"For, if forgiveness of sin can only be accounted a free gift by being dependent upon no condition, and subject to no restrictions, it follows, that the repentance and amendment of the offender himself are no more to be regarded than the sufferings and merit of any other being:
and, consequently, that all sinners, without reserve and limitation, have an equal claim of pardon, whether they repent or not. if; to avoid this consequence, it be said that God is free to choose the objects to whom he will show mercy, and to impose upon them such restrictions, and require of them such qualifications as he thinks fit; it may then, be with equal reason, asserted, that he is also free to dispense his mercy for such reasons and by such methods as he, in his wisdom, shall determine to be most conducive to his own glory and the good of his creatures, and there is no reason whatever to be given why a regard to the sufferings or merit of another person should more destroy the freeness of the gift, than the requisition of certain qualifications in the object himself."
The sum of the matter is, it is altogether with the ever blessed God whether he forgive sin on this or the other condition, as it is his free gift and unmerited love; for the showing mercy to the guilty, by any method, was a matter in which the Almighty was perfectly free.
Dr. Priestly rests his impudent assumption on Romans 3. 24: "Being justified freely by his grace, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus." Here he builds his argument on the term 'freely,' but explains not the character of redemption, nor gives the apostle's meaning of the text. " Being justified freely," signifies a gift unmerited by us, "not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us." It denotes the manner in which the blessing was bestowed. It was the result of the pure love of God, who provided the means of our delivery by sending his only begotten Son into the world, to die for us; that he might become the propitiation for our sins, and reconcile us to God.
Again, in 1 Cor. 6. 20, "For ye are bought with a price." The Socinians have founded another argument upon forgiving sins according to the verbiage of this text. That sin is forgiven as a debt, is canceled. Hence atonement is left out of the question. But when sin is spoken of as a debt, a metaphor is plainly employed. Says Mr. Watson, " It would be a novel rule to interpret what is plainly literal by what is metaphorical. There is, undoubtedly, something in the act of forgiving which is common with the act of remitting a debt by a creditor, or there would be no foundation for the metaphor; but it can by no means legitimately follow, that the remission of sins is, in all its circumstances, to be interpreted by all the circumstances which accompany the free remission of a debt. We know, on the contrary, that re-mission of sins is not unconditional; repentance and faith are required in order to it, which is acknowledged by the Socinians themselves. But this acknowledgment is fatal to the argument they would draw from the instances in the New Testament, in which Almighty God is represented as a merciful creditor, freely forgiving his insolvent debtors; for if the act of remitting sins be in all respects like the act of forgiving debts, then indeed can neither repentance, nor faith, nor condition of any kind, be insisted upon in order to forgiveness; since in the instances referred to, the debtors were discharged without any expressed condition at all."
Again: But something beyond repentance and faith was necessary in order that sins be forgiven. "It behooved Christ to suffer, and to rise from the dead on the third day," that " repentance and remission of sins should be preached in his name among all nations." If by an act of divine prerogative, without regard to justice or right, he would forgive sins, then there would be no necessity for " Christ to suffer;" and the offer of remission of sins wholly independent of his sufferings, which is contrary to the Scriptures. " The idea of absolute right in one party, and of binding obligation on the other, holds good equally as to the law-giver and the transgressor, the creditor and the debtor." The one has a right to demand obedience, the other to demand his property. Every crime involves an obligation to punishment, but when sin is forgiven the liability to punishment is removed; as when a debt is paid all obligations are removed touching the debt. But the Scriptures connecting the pardon of sin with a previous atonement cannot be carried farther. The holiness of the nature of God demands penal sanctions against offences committed. That hypothesis which has mercy, and mercy only administered on a mere principle of feeling, without regard to holiness or justice, is not the doctrine of the Bible. But, the doctrine which connects pardon with the meritorious death of Christ, exemplifies both the justice and mercy of God. "At the same time it guards with great care, the doctrine of non-impunity to sin, and offers impunity to the sinner." And the medium through which this offering is made, serves to show God's hatred to sin, and shows his character of justice at the same time. Jesus " Christ, our pass-over, is sacrificed for us." 1 Cor. 5. 7. In Col. 1. 14, 15, we are said to have "redemption through his blood, who is the image of the invisible God." Again, 1 Cor. 2. 8, it is said, "they would not have crucified the Lord of life and glory." The blood of Christ is called "precious." From these passages we gather the facts, that the sacrifice offered to satisfy divine justice, was no mean offering; it was not the blood of bulls and of goats, but the precious blood of Christ. This contradicts the Socinian theory, namely, that the blood of Christ was no more efficacious in answering its end than the blood of animals shed under the law. Again, the apostle says, " How MUCH MORE shall the BLOOD of CHRIST, who; through the eternal Spirit, offered himself without spot to God, purge your conscience from dead works to serve the living God."
But another objection is, that because the divinity suffers not, therefore it does not enter into this consideration of punishment. "This is as much as to say, that it is an offence of the same kind, whether you strike a private person or a king, a stranger or a father, because blows are directed against the body, not against dignity or relationship."
Though, by the death of Christ, men are put in a salvable state, yet none of them are by this act of Christ brought from under the moral law. As this law remains in its full force, and as sinners continue under the "original obligation of obedience, so in case of those conditions not being complied with, on which the actual communication of the benefits of redemption has been made to depend, and those who neglect the great salvation offered to them by Christ, fall under the full original penalty of the law, and are left to its malediction, without obstruction to the exercise and infliction of divine justice." (Watson.)
7. It may be asked, to them that flee to Christ for mercy, by repentance and faith, can the law still hold its justice and rigor? The answer is, certainly, the law did not give up any of its claim, but its demands are all fully satisfied through Christ. The end of justification is not to set men free from the law, but from its punishment. With "justification, but distinct from it is the communication of the regenerating grace of the Holy Spirit," by which the corrupt nature of man is purified and restored to the love of holiness, and power to practice it; as those who, as the apostle argues, Rom. 6. 2, are thus "dead to sin cannot continue any longer therein," but bring forth the fruits of righteousness, or of the Spirit, which are love, joy, peace, etc.
By this divine plan, the law of God is not repealed, but established.
Again: Some affirm, that we cannot know "the vinculum, or bond of connection, between the sufferings of Christ, and the pardon of sin, and this, therefore, they place among the mysteries of religion." But does not this arise from obscure views of the atonement? It appears so to us, as the connection of Christ's suffering appears to be matter of revelation, it being called the " demonstration of the righteousness of God," of his righteous character and just administration, making provision for the honorable " exercise of mercy without impeachment of justice, or any repeal or relaxation of his laws."
We have read of a Locrian legislator voluntarily suffering the loss of one of his eyes, to save that of his son condemned by his own statutes to lose both, and did this that the law might neither be repealed, nor exist without efficacy. Who does not see that the authority of his laws was as much, nay more, impressively sanctioned than if his son had endured the full penalty?" This will only apply to the point in hand, as it has not a general application to the work of Christ. Here " Mercy and truth meet together, righteousness and peace kiss each other."
Still, it is objected, by the opponents of the doctrine of atonement, to the "justice of laying the punishment of the guilty upon the innocent." In answer to this objection, we present the following: " It is most certain, all who make them do not see the consequence, that they conclude altogether as much against God's whole original constitution of nature, and the whole daily course of Divine Providence in the government of the world, i.e. against the whole scheme of Theism, and the whole notion of religion, as against Christianity. For the world is a constitution or system, whose parts have a mutual reference to each other: and there is a scheme of things gradually carrying on, called the course of nature, to the carrying on of which God has appointed us, in various ways, to contribute. And when, in the daily course of natural providence, it is appointed that innocent people should suffer for the faults of the guilty, this is liable to the very same objection, as the instance we are now considering. The infinitely greater importance of that appointment of Christianity which is objected against, does not hinder, but it may be, as it plainly is, an appointment of the very same kind with what the world affords us daily examples of. Nay, if there were any force at all in the objection, it would be stronger, in one respect, against natural providence, than against Christianity; because, under the former, we are in many cases commanded, and even necessitated whether we will or not, to suffer for the faults of others; whereas the sufferings of Christ were voluntary.
The world being under the righteous government of God does imply, that finally and upon the whole, every one shall receive according to his personal deserts; and the general doctrine of the whole Scripture is, that this shall be the completion of the divine government. But during the progress, and, for aught we know, even in order to the completion of this moral scheme, vicarious punishment may be fit, and absolutely necessary. Men, by their follies, run themselves into extreme difficulties which would be absolutely fatal to them, were it not for the interposition and assistance of others. God commands by the law of nature, that we afford them this assistance, in many cases where we cannot do it without very great pains, and labor, and suffering to ourselves. And we see in what variety of ways one person's sufferings contribute to the relief of another: and how, or by what particular means, this comes to pass, or follows, from the constitution and laws of nature, which came under our notice; and being familiarized to it, men are not shocked with it. So that the reason of their insisting upon objections of the foregoing kind against the satisfaction of Christ, is either that they do not consider God's settled and uniform appointments as his appointments at all; or else forget that vicarious punishment is a providential appointment of every day's experience; and then, from their being unacquainted with the more general laws of nature or divine government over the world, and not seeing how the sufferings of Christ could contribute to the redemption of it, unless by arbitrary and tyrannical will; they conclude his sufferings could not" contribute to it in any other way. [Bishop Butler's Analogy of Religion, p. 222.]
Parents and friends endure labor and make sacrifices for their children. To save a fellow creature from perishing by water or fire, generous men have exposed themselves not only to pain but often to death, yet the claims of humanity are considered sufficient to justify such deeds, which are always applauded. When men fight for their country's liberty, etc., on justifiable ground, the opinion is, that the life of every man is placed by Providence at the disposal of his country, and this justifies the hazard. In times of religious persecution, it is right to suffer, and even to die, rather than to deny Christ. And no one argues that it was not right for the martyr to die, to suffer the pains of the rack and the fire. And God himself has not only permitted it, but blessed them in the flames, in their expiring moments. So men have suffered and even died for the benefit of others. Still we do not adduce these cases as a parallel of the death of Christ for sinners; but to show that it agrees with the "ordinary course of Providence, and by the express appointment of God." Farther, we know that there is no instance of a legal substitution of one person for another: human governments could not in justice cause the innocent to suffer for the guilty, for that would be unjust to him.
Says Rev. R. Watson, "They could not accept his offer, were he ever so anxious to become the substitute of another, for that would be unjust to God, since they have no authority from him so to take away the life of one of his creatures, and the person himself has no authority to offer it. In the case of St. Paul we see a willing sufferer; he chose to die "for the elect's sake," and that he might publish the gospel to the world. Was it, then, unjust in God to accept this offering of generous devotedness for the good of mankind, when the offering was in obedience to his own will? Certainly not. The same considerations of choice and right unite in the sufferings of our Lord; though the case itself was one of an infinitely higher nature, a circumstance which strengthens but does not change the principle. He was a willing substitute." And he could say, "No man taketh my life from me; but I lay it down of myself." Jesus Christ was not a mere creature; hence he had a right of doing so in a sense that no one else had. He died not only because the Father willed it, but because he had the supreme power of death, and, therefore, from his benevolence to man, he chose to die; hence, in this there was a perfect concurrence between the Lawgiver and Jesus Christ, our substitute. To say that this was unjust, is to say that the right of some one was invaded, which was not so; therefore it is in perfect accordance with the justice of God, and truly comports with the moral government of Jehovah, that Christ died for Adam and his posterity.
8. This atonement was made by Jesus Christ as very God and very man. For apart from "God manifested in the flesh," such an atonement could not have been made as Jesus Christ made by his suffering and death; no, not all the Intelligences of heaven could have atoned for the human race. That sealed book which no man, no person, or being, "in heaven, nor in earth, neither under the earth, was able to open the book," but "the Lion of the tribe of Judah, the Root of David, hath prevailed to open the book." Rev. 5. 3, 5.
One mystery of this book was the redemption of a lost or fallen world which none in the universe but Jesus Christ could redeem.
Again: It is too obvious to be doubted, that the Almighty hates all species of idolatry. This he prohibits in the very commencement of the sacred decalogue, which he wrote with his own fingers on two tables of stone, for the Israelites, and all people favored with divine revelation. " Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of anything that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth: Thou shalt not bow down to them, nor serve them: for I the Lord thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me." Exo. 20. 4, 5. Again, Exo. 22. 20: "He that sacrifices unto any God, save unto the Lord only, he shall be utterly destroyed." 1 John 5. 21: “Little children, keep yourselves from idols."
Many of those called Campbellites and Newlights, in both their preaching and praying, etc. , call upon Jesus Christ to intercede, to hear and bless them. They speak of him as their Redeemer and Savior, as well as pray in his name. Still these very people pointedly deny that Jesus Christ is " God overall and blessed forever," or that in Christ " dwelleth the fullness of the Godhead bodily." Col. 2. 9. Yet, though they deny his supreme divinity, nevertheless they have Christ some way or other in their religious ceremonies, they call upon his name, etc.
Now, to the point: if they deny Christ's supreme divinity, in other words, if they will not worship him as equal with the Father, as possessing the " Godhead bodily," is it possible for them to worship the Father?—We answer, no, from the words of Jesus Christ himself. John 5. 22, 23: "For the Father judges no man; but bath committed all judgment unto the Son. That all men should honor the Son, even as they honor the Father. He that honored not the Son, honored not the Father which hath sent him." So we see plainly, that there cannot be a religious man, a purely religious honorary of the Father, who does not honor the Son as he honors the Father. So all sects, and denominations, and individuals that honor not the Lord Jesus Christ in spirit and in truth, never did nor never can worship the true God.
Again No man, or class of men, who deny the supreme deity of Jesus Christ, can consistently believe in the true Scriptural atonement made by our Lord Jesus Christ; hence their minds must necessarily be in darkness, and their faith obscure, if they have any at all. Is not this the reason why some sects of those unbelievers put so much stress in water baptism, and other non-essential ceremonies? Some of them do make immersion essential to salvation. Mr. Alex. Campbell asserts, in his " Millennial Harbinger," " It is not our faith in God's promises of remission, but of our going down into the water, that obtains the remission of sins." Again, the same writer affirms, "Remission of sins cannot, in this life, be received or enjoyed previous to immersion."—Hence, I cannot believe that such a man as Mr. C. can possibly have a correct Biblical view of the atonement made by the blessed Savior; and it is no marvel that the same gentleman asserts, that he "disavowed Trinitarian-ism, and every other sectarianism in the land."
Once more: So far as our observation has extended, the deniers of the divinity of Christ and his atonement, do not observe to keep holy the Christian Sabbath, either themselves or their offspring. This is ruinous to morals and Christianity. And if they repent not, God will hold them guilty in the day of judgment. Hence, not to believe in the divinity and atonement, is to caricature the love of God, as manifested to mankind through Christ. If Jesus was only a created, peculiar being, then God was not manifested in the flesh according to the Scriptures, 1 Tim. 3. 16; but he created a peculiar Being for the purpose of atoning for the world. On this hypothesis, God did not love us so much as to come himself, but he made and sent one. But, if Jehovah had sent the assembled universe to try to redeem men, they could not have effected it; neither could they have manifested the love of God toward us, as God did by coming himself and taking our nature upon him, and in that human soul and body, by virtue of his divinity, suffered and died, and thereby made a plenary atonement for all mankind.
We may remark again, that the unbelievers in the Deity of Christ, under whatsoever name they may be called, rob him of divine honor. The self-same divine honor that the Father merits the Son merits. (John 5. 23.) Then to dishonor the Son is to affront the Father, for " He that honored not the Son, honored not the Father." And why so? The Savior gives the reason, " I and my Father are one." On this very ground, says the Savior, " If any man serve me, him will my Father honor." (John 12. 26.) Consequently those that serve not Christ, the Father will not honor, therefore they cannot be servants of God, not Christians in the Scriptural sense, which is clearly shown from the Scriptures: "He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life; and he that believeth not the Son shall not see life; but the wrath of God abideth on him." John 3. 36.
To believe in Christ as the Scriptures reveal him, is the belief that is required.
6. The Scriptures reveal him as " God overall and blessed forever;" as God having an everlasting throne. " Thy throne, O God, is forever and ever." These are the words of the Father to Christ his Son. Heb. 1. 8.
7. The Scriptures reveal him as being a perfect man, having both a human soul and body.
8. The Scriptures reveal him as a vicarious, sacrificial offering for the sins of the world. Then we are to believe on him as perfect man and very God; as dying for us, to redeem us from the curse of the law, and through his blood by the agency of the Holy Spirit, to prepare us for eternal life. To believe in Christ in the proper Scriptural sense, is to believe him equal with the Father in power, majesty, and dominion; for unless this be so, he cannot be an object of worship equal with the Father, as he says himself, " I and my Father are one." And if we do not believe him equal with the Father, and the same with the Father, we cannot honor him as one with the Father. And "he that honored not the Son. honored not the Father." The unbelievers in the supreme divinity of the Son, cannot honor him as they honor the Father, for they profess to believe that the Father only is the supreme God, and worthy of supreme honor. Hence they deny three persons in the Adorable Godhead, though the Scriptures reveal them. Hence, they cannot believe Christ Jesus as God overall and blessed forever, therefore cannot worship or honor him as God; as the Father: consequently, "he that honored not the Son, honored not the Father; and he that believeth not the Son shall not see life; but the wrath of God abideth on him." John 3. 36.
FAITH ESSENTIAL TO SALVATION-JUSTIFICATION AND SANCTIFICATION BY FAITH.
IN the foregoing chapter we discover that the Scriptures prove that Christ has made a vicarious, penal, and a plenary offering for the world. It may be then asked in conclusion—" If so, is not our salvation absolutely secured?" This is not exactly so. There is a difference between redemption, and salvation. The former signifies, theologically "the ransom or deliverance of sinners from the bondage of sin and the penalties of God's violated law by the atonement of Christ." (Webster.) The latter embraces the former, but means something besides, that is, it signifies deliverance from sin and the effects of sin in time and in eternity, and it confers everlasting happiness. In connection with a state of probation it embraces remission of sins, pardon, justification and sanctification. Then every reader must see that these blessings are connected with the absolute divinity of Christ, as well as his real humanity, suffering and death; for without these, there could not possibly be hope for man after all, according to the moral agency of man, and the government of Jehovah. It hath pleased God to enjoin one particular on man, called in the Bible, faith, whereby he may be a partaker of the blessings of the atonement and secure salvation through our Lord Jesus Christ.
Then, faith is essentially necessary to our salvation. Where God has made a revelation of himself to man, through the. Scriptures, all rights, or ceremonies, if necessity require, may be omitted, but faith in Christ cannot, if salvation be secured. But if circumstances admit of it, all the ceremonies of the Gospel and means of grace should be received in connection with faith.
There is no salvation apart from faith in Christ Jesus. The Savior himself and his apostles prove this beyond doubt. Belief and faith are nearly synonymous, as terms purporting that act of the human heart, whereby the virtue of the blood of Christ is applied to the soul by which we are justified in the sight of God. Now for the testimony.
"I said, therefore, unto you, that ye shall die in your sins: for if ye believe not that I am he, ye shall die in your sins." John 8. 24.
"He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned." Mark 16. 16.
"That they all might be damned who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness." 2 Thess. 2. 12.
"And to whom swore he, that they should not enter into his rest, but to them that believed not?" Hebrews 1. 18.
"But he that believeth not is condemned already; because he hath not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God." John 3. 18.
"He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life; and he that believeth not the Son shall not see life; but the wrath of God abideth on him." John 3. 36.
“But without faith it is impossible to please him: for he that cometh to God, must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him." Hebrews 11. 6.
Without faith we discover plainly, that we cannot be justified, but must suffer the abiding wrath of God; and by having it we can be justified, if all things else fail. Rev. Alex. Campbell, [Christian System, p. 258.] has asserted recently that "justification is ascribed to seven causes," viz: to faith, to grace, to the blood of Christ, to works, to the name of Christ, to Christ, to knowledge. What would a penitent sinner seeking justification understand by such a presentation of things? "By works," says he, and quotes James 2. 21, 25, to prove it. As if a fallen sinner before justification could have works to justify him, or that a corrupt tree could bring forth good fruit. "As reasonably" says Mr. Campbell, "might you pray for loaves from heaven, or manna, because Israel eat it in the desert, as to pray for pardon, while you refuse the remission of sins by immersion.' [Christian System, 251.]
Neither Mr. C. nor any other man on earth, can prove, either that immersion is the proper, and only mode of baptism, or that it is the condition of the pardon of sin or justification. Surely he will not point to the baptism of Christ, for he had no sins to be pardoned; or to Simon Magus, for though baptized, and if Mr. Campbell please immersed, and he neither received pardon of sins or justification, but remained in "the gall of bitterness and in the bond of iniquity." Acts 8. 23.
1. But, it is objected by some, that any should be lost for the lack of faith, as all have faith, less or more.
In answer, we say, all have not saving faith, or fiducial reliance on Christ. "For all men have not faith." 2 Thess. 3. 2. There are others in a worse state still, as we learn from the Scriptures. "Now, as Jannes and Jambres withstood Moses, so do these also resist the truth; men of corrupt minds, reprobate concerning the faith." 2 Tim. 3. 8.
" There must be good works with faith," as St. James says, 2. 26. We answer not at all. The stream must partake of the nature of the fountain, and the fruit of the tree. Before justification there can be no works of righteousness. " Can a fig tree, my brethren, bear olive berries? either a vine, figs? so can no fountain both yield salt water and fresh." James 3. 11, 12.
But does not St. James say, that "faith without works is dead?" St. James here condemns a dead faith, and not the faith of the heart which "works by love." But something like a bare theoretic faith, which can be no saving benefit to us. The apostle does not condemn the doctrine that we are saved in Christ by faith alone.
We have shown from the Scripture, that without faith it is impossible to please God, and whosoever has it not cannot be saved, but the wrath of God abideth on him. Now we prove that justification comes by faith in Christ Jesus alone. Rom. 5. 1. "Therefore, being justified by faith, we have peace with God, through our Lord Jesus Christ." This text is to the point. By faith in the days of Christ the maimed were not only healed, but they received pardon of all their sins. Jesus said unto the " sick of the palsy, son be of good cheer, thy sins be forgiven thee." Matt. 9. 2. Christ said to the woman who was affected with an issue of blood, " Daughter, be of good comfort; thy faith hath made thee whole." Matt. 9. 22. As the blind men followed Christ, crying, " Thou Son of David, have mercy on us. Jesus saith unto them, Believe ye that I am able to do this? They said unto him, yea, Lord. Then touched he their eyes, saying, According to your faith, be it unto you." Matt. 9. 28, 29.
When the woman of Canaan cried after the Savior in behalf of her daughter, " Then Jesus answered and said unto her, O, woman, great is thy faith; be it unto thee even as thou wilt. And her daughter was made whole from that very hour," Matt. 15. 28.
The Centurion of Capernaum thought himself not worthy that Christ should come under his roof, but desired him to speak the word only. " And Jesus said unto the Centurion, Go thy way, and as thou hast believed, so be it done unto thee. And his servant was healed in the self-same hour," Matt. 8. 13.
Again: Hear what the Savior said to the blind beggar of Jericho: " What wilt thou that I shall do unto thee? And he said, Lord, that I may receive my sight. And Jesus said unto him, Receive thy sight—thy faith hath saved thee," Luke 18. 41, 42.
Whether we behold the cripple at Lystra, or the lame man at the beautiful gate of the temple, or any other case in the New Testament, all received their cures and pardon of their sins through faith in Christ Jesus. Again: "For we walk by faith, not by sight," 2. Cor. 5. 7. " That they may receive forgiveness of sins, and inheritance among them which are sanctified by faith that is in me." Here we see that forgiveness of sins is obtained by faith in Christ, and faith alone. Furthermore, " But to him that worked not, but believeth on him that justifies the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness," Rom. 4. 5. These, and hundreds of other texts which we might adduce, if necessary, prove that faith, and faith alone, is the condition of our salvation. Justification comes by faith in Christ—instance the last quoted text: " Him that work-eth not, but believeth."
Sanctification is received by faith, and faith alone. When the Pharisees disputed with St. Peter touching the circumcising of some Gentiles, the apostle said, that God " put no difference between us and them, purifying their hearts by faith," etc., Acts 15. 6-10. "That Christ may dwell in your hearts by faith; that ye, being rooted and grounded in love," Eph. 3. 17. "That they may receive forgiveness of sins, and inheritance among them which are sanctified by faith that is in me," Acts 26. 18. We are not only sanctified by faith, but after being justified and sanctified, we are to live by faith. "The just (or righteous) shall live by faith," Gal. 3. 11. We have just said that justification is received by faith, and that sanctification likewise is obtained by faith. These are two different blessings, and not as the Council of Trent would state them. The Council says, "That justification is not only the remission of sins, but also the sanctification of the inner man." That justification and sanctification go together, we believe, and thus conclude; but this is not what is meant by the Council, but that a man is made just or holy, and then justified. According to them sanctification is the formal cause of justification, which cannot be any more than justification can be the formal cause of glorification.
Some affirm, that faith apprehends and appropriates the merits of Christ's death to make up for the deficiency of our imperfect obedience. This view of the matter is sufficiently refuted, from the fact that the Scriptures neither intimate nor teach any such a thing. Either this imperfect obedience has a share in our justification or it has not; if it has, then we are saved by faith and works united, which has been destroyed, or disproved, as above shown. Then, we conclude, that we are justified, or what is equivalent, pardoned, by faith alone, without works or merit of our own.
It is by others intimated, that faith, as per se, is the necessary root of obedience; so that pardon by faith may still be allowed, and faith in itself is such an excellent virtue, that it naturally produces good works. This theory has been advocated by many of the primitive divines. To say that faith is the "root and mother of obedience," is to say, indirectly, that regeneration does precede pardon of sin, which is not the fact; for until pardon, man is under bondage, and does not " walk after the Spirit." But as nearly all agree, that faith does precede pardon, if so, it cannot therefore presuppose a regenerate state of mind. The truth is, then, that faith does not produce obedience. Faith unites us to Christ, and gives us a personal interest in the covenant of God's mercies, from which flow the gift of the Holy Ghost, and the regeneration of our nature. Mr. John Wesley affirms, in one of his sermons on faith, that " there is no justification without faith. He is still a child of wrath, still under the curse, till he believes in Jesus. Faith, therefore, is the necessary condition of justification; yea, the only necessary condition thereof. We mean, thereby, this much, that it is the only thing without which no one is justified; the only thing that is immediately, indispensably, absolutely requisite in order to pardon. As, on the other hand, though a man should have everything else, without faith, yet he cannot be justified; so, on the other, though he be supposed to want everything else, yet if he hath faith, he cannot but be justified." Therefore, we conclude, that a hearty or fiducial reliance in the absolute divinity of Christ, and in the vicarious and piacular atonement of the Lamb of God, is requisite to our salvation. And this offering made by our Lord, embraces his supreme Deity and humanity, which, as we have proved form the character of our Lord Jesus Christ.
THE END.