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no interpretation of it in Dr. Hammond's and and Whitby's comments Burkett says it denotes "the SAVIOR" Bifhop Patrick's and Lowth's

comment takes no notice of it: Dean Stanhope interprets it "the SAVIOR:" Mather, after faying JOSHUA is an HEBREW name" which

is in the GREEK JESUS," adds with Calvin, it is the SAVIOR:" Mr. Wogan (cited p. 40,) interprets it" the SAVIOR ;" and indeed many others, fome of whom, it may be, took it on truft; and fome of the Jews alfo understood it to carry with it this fenfe, at leaft, with the CHRISTIANS. Yet great as these authorities may appear to be, they fhould have no undue influence on our judgment in our enquiry after truth, any more than they fhould be caufelessly difregarded. And there is no little room to fufpect that many of them, both ancients and moderns, did not themselves think this was, or did not intend it as the precife meaning of the name; because we shall see they have actually given us another. Though, had they all agreed in this interpretation, it is notwithstanding very clear from SS that this cannot be the whole of its fignification.

For, if this only be supposed to be its meaning, then it has no other sense than the first name OSHA, and confequently fuch interpretation leaves no ground for the alteration of his firft name into that of JeнOSHUA or JOSHUA: nay, H 2 makes

makes the text contain a repetition, that must feem unbecoming divine wisdom. For then the paffage in Num. xiii. 7. will run thus, MOSES called the name of [OSHEA] the SAVIOR, the fon of NUN, [JeнOSHUA] the SAVIOR. So that fuch verfion is greatly deficient and cannot be received, as leaving no mark of diftinction between OSHA and JeнOSHUA, which yet there certainly muft be. One would therefore almost wonder this should have been fo much countenanced, if it was not clear from these interpretations that their authors understood it to be a word of a fimple form, and therefore to fignify nothing but the SAVIOR.

Eufebius's verfion of it by " the HEALER,” and Cyril's and Epiphanius's, in the places cited above, fall of course, because they affign it to it, as a word of GREEK extraction, when it has been proved to be HEBREW, and this by the confeffion of the former two. The first of whom we shall find has given the true interpretation of it from the HEBREW, as the latter has tranflated it The SAVIOR.

Cyril of Alexandria (in his Oration. in occurfum DOMINI, p. 386,) makes it [owтngia dar soTERIA LAOU] the SALVATION OF THE PEOPLE; a verfion which is indeed diftinct from that of OSHA "the SAVIOR," and would evince the change of name. But there is no part of the name which stands for "the people;"

fo

fo that this is not the meaning, though CHRIST is what this fpeaks, and what, I apprehend, this author took from the ANGEL's words in St. Matt. i. 20. HE shall fave His [λdov LAON] people, &c.

Theophylact's tranflation is not lefs erroneous on this account. For he renders it [ως σωσας os SOSAS] AS ONE SAVING, or LIKE a SAVIOR; whereas there is nothing in the word, which fignifies as; and therefore this meaning must be also rejected.

But we find from them that it was not always confidered as a name confifting only of one word, nor this version of it "The SAVIOR" always thought to be its full meaning. Indeed what, I fhould fuppofe, gave rise to this notion, after an inattention to its true derivation and fenfe, was the occurrence of the word apparently as a verb in 1 S. xvii. 47. JeHoVaH [ JeнOSIO] faveth not with the fword and fpear; and in Pf. cxvi. 6. I was brought low, and HE [y] helped me. For the word differs in nothing from the name but the inferted letter [JOD] J. But then, firft, it may here be understood as a noun and title of GOD, importing that JeHovaн was a JeнOSHUA, being and doing what the name fignifies, (as He takes, we have seen, the title of [OSHEA] the SAVIOR, p. 16,) and then nothing uncommon

will appear in its form: (a) Secondly, it is diftinguished from the name by the insertion of this letter []J: Thirdly, the fame objection lays against its fignifying no more than this word is thought to do; for in this cafe both names, JeнOSHUA and OSHA will have the fame meaning, and there be no foundation for the change of name.

Jo

Some may have more readily thought this a fimple word, thus formed from [y SHIO] He shall fave, because they faw JeHONaTHAN and JONATHAN, and JeHoRam and JoRaM, JeнosePH and JosePH, &c. in the language for when the one were imagined to have been abbreviations of the others, it was not furprizing JesHUA fhould have been fupposed the contract word for JeHOSHUA: which there

(a) The regular future form is [y] Justo, as may be feen in Pf.lv. 13. lvii, 4. If. xxiii. 22, & al. Therefore Robertfon and others, finding the [n] z stand in the way, say, it is added in order to conftitute the conjugation Hipbil, according to the ufage in the Chaldee tongue, after []Job Ethan, and is a quiefcent letter in the regular form fometimes, by virtue of the frange compofing quality of a point. In anfwer to which it may be remarked, Ift. that the future of the conjugation Hiphil is clearly formed without the [JE: 2dly. that it is a quiescent in the regular form is a mere affertion, as appears from the abfurdity of fuppofing that added, which is not to be feen or heard in a word. So that it can by no means be made a verb according to the ordinary rules of grammar. Whence I fufpect it to be a defcriptive name given this perfon, with the [] JOD to denote, as ufual, the thing already effected to the perfons, and importing HIM to have been what JeHOSHUA fhall be found to fignify. Which I am the more induced to do, from this conftant treatment of thefe words, which begin with [m] JE, as compound names.

therefore Drufius thought it to be, though it is unfair to deduce the fenfe of the word at full length from what the contract word (then like the future [y] Jeso) fignifies. But the truth is, these are not the contracted forms of the others. "The [n] Jeн prefixed to proper "names stood," "according to the sentiments "of fome," as Schindler tell us, (a)" for the "LORD," though he, without any evidence, gainfays it. Marius de Calafio often treats it as fuch, as well as Broughton. Pafor, and Schotanus in his Manual underftood [] JeH in JeHosapHaт to have this meaning, rendering it "the LORD will judge," [more literally "the "LORD THE JUDGE," he bearing the name as the figure of HIM, who is fo.] This name and JeHONATHAN and JeHozaBaD are ranked by Noldius amongst the proper names compounded of [n] JeH, THE LORD; and all who have interpreted the names looked upon it in this view. Whence Walton and Cruden tranflate JoHaNaN, "Grace of the LORD" [more properly fignifying, "The LORD, the GRACIOUS "ONE"]; JeHOIDA," the knowledge of the "LORD," [more properly denoting, "The "LORD TO BE KNOWN"]; JONATHAN the "gift of the LORD" [ftrictly "The LORD THE MADE TO BE GIVEN ONE”], Joh.

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