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to the opinion of his countrymen, was really the son of Joseph: and this fact, is of itself suffici ent to prove, that the disputed chapters never came from his hands, but have been inserted by some impostors in subsequent times.

The parable of the prodigal son (Luke xv. 10.) delineates the conversion of the Gentiles from vice and superstition, and the reluctance of the Jews to extend to their brethren of mankind the privileges of the Gospel. It states, in the most clear and unequivocal terms, the ground of reconciliation with God. Certain impostors had denied, on one hand, the necessity of repentance and reformation, and the mercy and goodness of God on the other. The parable is intended to refute these pernicious errors. With matchless simplicity, it represents the younger son as leaving his father's house, and, after going to a dis- tant country, spending his goods in riotous living. The feeling of want, the recollection of his high original, a sense of his present degraded state, bring him to himself: he determines to return home, to implore his father's forgiveness, and to be content even with a menial situation in his house. Christ, the author of the parable, was really the cause of his return; and in what light does he speak of the father's conduct? Does he represent his house as shut up, till the son had opened it by his death? Does he inculcate, that infinite mercy is for ever withheld, till infinite justice is appeased? The very reverse of this picture is said to be the truth. Sinking out of sight his own generous interference, the blessed Jesus exhibits the sinner returning to God, and God coming forth to receive him from pure love

and compassion, without any intercession or atonement on the part of Christ, and even with, out any acknowledgment or condition on the part of the apostate son, but that repentance and humility which his return clearly evinced. It is worthy of being further remarked, that this parable, in a very unequivocal manner, supposes man to be furnished with certain moral powers, the abuse of which alienates him from God; while the right improvement of them, or a return to the right improvement of them, when abused or neglected, is the only qualification that restores him to the favour and to the image of his Maker.*

We shall perceive additional beauty in this parable, if we suppose the Gospel of Luke published in Egypt:There chiefly the Universal Father was blasphemed, as arbitrary and cruel; there the men, represented by the Prodigal Son, were most debased by profligacy and superstition; and there, as we learn from Philo, multitudes of them were returning to God. From this we moreover see the reason why the Gentiles are called the younger son. In Gen. xxv. 23, Rebecca is said to have in her womb two sons; the one, namely, the elder, representing the Israelites; the other, or the younger, the Egyptians. See Rom. ix. 10, and Eccl. Res. p. 289.

CHAPTER III.

THE INTRODUCTION OF JOHN'S GOSPEL, WITH OTHER PASSAGES APPARENTLY ASSERTING THE DIVINITY OF CHRIST, EXPLAINED FROM PHILO.

THE introduction to the Gospel of John, though penned with matchless simplicity in regard to language, has ever been a subject of much dispute and uncertainty among critics. No hypothesis to explain it has been felt completely satisfactory; nor can the obscurity be removed, but by recurring to the circumstances in which the Evangelist wrote, to the object which he had in view, and to the meaning annexed to the term Logos by the learned Christians of those times.

The end which John had in writing his Gospel is thus stated by himself: " Many other signs did Jesus in the presence of his disciples, which are not written in this book. But these things are written, that ye might believe that Jesus is the Christ, the son of God." xx. 30.

In order to understand the import of these words, it is necessary to recollect that John addressed his Gospel not to unbelievers, but to a body or bodies of people who believed in Christ, The Evangelist then intended by it to refute

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those pretended Christians who denied that Jesus was the Christ, or that Jesus was the son of God, Now the Gnostics did actually deny that Jesus was the Christ; for they maintained that the Christ was a god, and not the Son of God, and therefore a distinct being from the man Jesus, though for a season resident in him. According to them, Jesus Christ was a compound being, a human being, and a divine being; they allowed Jesus to be a mere man; but they insisted, that because he was a man and a man ouly, he was not the Christ; that because he was a God, acting by virtue of his own power, he was not the Son of God, that is, he was not a man authorized by God. John wrote to affirm what the deceivers denied, and to deny what they affirmed; he therefore wrote to affirm the humanity, and to deny the divinity of Jesus: he wrote to prove, that Christ was one simple being, that he was not a god within Jesus, but Jesus himself, who was allowed by the adversary to be a mere man, and rejected on that accouut. The reasoning of the Evangelist is to this effect: "Jesus is the Christ; the Christ therefore is not a god, but a mere man. Jesus also is the Son of God; because, having given signs beyond the power of man, he must have acted with power and instruction from God. Being an authorized teacher from God, we have abundant cause for believing the great doctrine of eternal life, which he came to proclaim."

John has been supposed to publish his Gospel to prove the divinity of Christ; but we are assured by his own words, that he published it to refute his divinity, and to enforce his simple humanity. We

are therefore led to conclude, that the interpretation of those who understand by the Logos, or the word of God, the person of Christ, is a perversion of the words of the Evangelist. Philo has written about the Logos in various parts of his works, and I affirm, without hesitation, that he is the only author who furnishes the true explanation of the proem of John.

The term Logos is applied to God, and in that application denotes his perfections as a spiritual and intelligent Being, in contradistinction to the works of his hands. The advocates of atheism had ever applied the word God to nature, to physical causes, and to the heavenly bodies, seeking thereby to preclude all evidence for the existence of an intelligent spirit, independent of the properties of matter. To counteract this artifice, the supporters of theism were called upon to designate the author of the universe by a term expressing his power, intelligence, and goodness, distinct from the universe itself; to speak of him, when creating the world, as an artist or master builder, planning first the things he executed last, and forming each object throughout the whole creation, in precise correspondence with a perfect idea or model of it previously carved in his mind. "The Deity," says Philo, "foreseeing that nothing fair could be formed without a fair model, and that no sensible object would be perfect, unless made after some archetypical form, on having determined to frame this visible world, preconcerted an intellectual world, in order that using this immaterial and diviner world, he might execute that which is material, as a younger image

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