being interpreted is, God with us, does not prove that he whom they were so to call should necessarily be God, but only a messenger from God, according to the song of Zacharias, Luke i. 68, 69. blessed be the Lord God of Israel; for he hath visited and redeemed his people, and hath raised up an horn of salvation for us, &c. Nor can anything certain be inferred from Acts xvi. 31, 34. believe on the Lord Jesus Christ,-and he rejoiced, believing in God with all his house. For it does not follow from hence that Christ is God, since the apostles have never distinctly pointed out Christ as the ultimate object of faith; but these are merely the words of the historian, expressing that briefly which there can be no doubt that the apostles inculcated in a more detailed manner,―faith in God the Father through Christ. Nor is the passage in Acts xx. 28. more decisive,-the Church of God, which he hath purchased with his own blood; that is, with his own Son, as it is elsewhere expressed, for God properly speaking has no blood; and no usage is more common than the substitution of the figurative term blood for offspring. But the Syriac version reads, not the Church of God, but the Church of Christ; and in our own recent translation it is, the Church of the Lord. Nor can any certain dependence be placed on the authority of the Greek manuscripts, five of which read Toù Kupiov κai Оcov,3 ac 3 2 In the list of various readings given in Bp. Wilson's Bible, it is stated that the reading of the Lord exists in one of the English Bibles printed by Whitchurch, which is probably the 'recent translation' alluded to by Milton. This printer published many editions of the Bible, separately or in conjunction with Grafton, about the middle of the sixteenth century. The library at St. Paul's contains ten editions published in different years between 1530 and 1560, but the reading alluded to appears in none of them. The libraries of the British Museum, Lambeth, and Canterbury (which latter collection contains about fifty ancient English Bibles and Testaments presented by the late Dr. Coombe) the Bodleian library at Oxford, the University library, and the libraries of Trinity and St. John's Colleges, Cambridge, have also been searched without success for a copy of the edition in question. 3 This is the reading of the Codex Passionæi, the date of which, however, is not earlier than the eighth or ninth century, and of sixty-three other MSS. none of which are among the most correct or authoritative. See Horne's Introduction, &c. Vol. II. 352, for an analysis of what Griesbach, Hale, Michaelis and others have written on the verse. The sum of the whole is, that ¿kkλŋσía Toû Denù, Church of God, the received reading, 'is better supported than any of the other readings, and consequently we may conclude that it was the identical expression uttered by Paul, and recorded by Luke.' cording to Beza, who suspects that the words Tou Kupiov have crept in from the margin, though it is more natural to suppose the words kai Ocoû to have crept in, on account of their being an addition to the former. The same must be said respecting Rom. ix. 5. who is over all, God blessed for ever. Amen. For in the first place, Hilary and Cyprian do not read the word God in this passage, nor do some of the other Fathers, if we may believe the authority of Erasmus; who has also shown. that the difference of punctuation may raise a doubt with regard to the true meaning of the passage, namely, whether the clause in question should not rather be understood of the Father than of the Son.1 But waiving these objections, and supposing that the words are spoken of the Son; they have nothing to do with his essence, but only intimate that divine honour is communicated to the Son by the Father, and particularly that he is called God; which has been already fully shown by other arguments. But, they rejoin, the same words which were spoken of the Father, Rom. i. 25. more than the Creator, who is blessed for ever. Amen, are here repeated of the Son; therefore the Son is equal to the Father. If there be any force in this reasoning, it will rather prove that the Son is greater than the Father; for according to the ninth chapter, he is over all, which however, they remind us, ought to be understood in the same sense as John iii. 31, 32. he that cometh from above, is above all; he that cometh from heaven is above all. In these words even the divine nature is clearly implied, and yet, what he hath seen and heard, that he testifieth, which language affirms that he came not of himself, but was sent from the Father, and was obedient to him. It will be answered, that it is only his mediatorial character which is intended. But he never could have become a mediator, nor could he have been sent from God, or have been obedient to him, unless he had been inferior to God and the Father as to his nature. Therefore also Sanctus Cyprianus adversus Judæos libro secundo, capite quinto, adduxit hunc locum, omissa Dei mentione. Itidem Hilarius enarrans Psalmum cxxii. quod incuria librariorum esse omissum videri potest.' Erasmi Annotationes ad Rom. ix. 5. See also his treatise entitled Responsio de Filii divinitate. Tom. IX. p. 849. Macknight in his notes on the passage of the Romans, answers Erasmus with regard to both the points which Milton mentions. after he shall have laid aside his functions as mediator, whatever may be his greatness, or whatever it may previously have been, he must be subject to God and the Father. Hence he is to be accounted above all, with this reservation, that he is always to be excepted who did put all things under him, 1 Cor. xv. 27. and who consequently is above him under whom he has put all things. If lastly he be termed blessed, it must be observed that he received blessing as well as divine honour, not only as God, but even as man. Rev. v. 12. worthy is the Lamb that was slain to receive power and riches and wisdom and strength and honour and glory and blessing; and hence, v. 13. blessing, and honour, and glory, and power, be unto him that sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb for ever and ever. There is a still greater doubt respecting the reading in 1 Tim. iii. 16. God was manifest in the flesh. Here again Erasmus asserts that neither Ambrose nor the Vetus Interpres read the word God in this verse, and that it does not appear in a considerable number of the early copies.5 However this may be, it will be clear, when the context is duly examined, that the whole passage must be understood of God the Father in conjunction with the Son. For it is not Christ who is the great mystery of godliness, but God the Father in Christ, as appears from Col. ii. 2. the mystery of God and of the Father, and of Christ. 2 Cor. v. 18, 19. all things are of God, who hath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ.... to wit, that God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them. Why therefore should God the Father not be in Christ through the medium of all those offices of reconciliation which the apostle enumerates in this passage of Timothy? God was manifest in the flesh-namely in the Son, his own image; in any other way he is invisible: nor did Christ come to manifest him 'Ambrosius et Vulgatus Interpres legerunt pro Ocò's, ô, id est, quod.' Erasmus ad 1 Tim. iii. 16. The Clermont MS. the Vulgate, and some other ancient versions read, which. The Colbertine MS. reads ös, who. All the other Greek MSS. have eós. For a defence of the latter reading see Mill and Macknight in loco, and Pearson On the Creed. See also Waterland, Works, II. 158. self, but his Father, John xiv. 8, 9. Justified in the Spirit-and who should be thereby justified, if not the Father? Seen of angels-inasmuch as they desired to look into this mystery, 1 Pet. i. 12. Preached unto the Gentiles that is, the Father in Christ. Believed on in the world—and to whom is faith so applicable, as to the Father through Christ? Received up into glory-namely, he who was in the Son from the beginning, after reconciliation had been made, returned with the Son into glory, or was received into that supreme glory which he had obtained in the Son. But there is no need of discussing this text at greater length: those who are determined to defend at all events the received opinion, according to which these several propositions are predicated not of the Father but of the Son alone, when they are in fact applicable both to the one and the other, though on different grounds, may easily establish that the Son is God, a truth which I am far from denying but they will in vain attempt to prove from this passage that he is the supreme God, and one with the Father. The next passage is Tit. ii. 13. the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ. Here also the glory of God the Father may be intended, with which Christ is to be invested on his second advent, Matt. xvi. 27. as Ambrose understands the passage from the analogy of Scripture. For the whole force of the proof depends upon the definitive article, which may be inserted or omitted before the two nouns in the Greek without affecting the sense; or the article prefixed to one may be common to both. Besides, in other languages, where the article is not used, the words may be understood to apply indifferently either to one or two persons; and nearly the same words are employed without the article in reference to two persons, Philipp. i. 2. and Philem. 3. except that in the latter passages the word Father is substituted for great. So also 2 Pet. i. 1. through the righteousness of [our] God and our Saviour Jesus Christ. Here the repetition of the pronoun On the importance of the Greek article, see Mr. Granville Sharp's Remarks on the Uses of the Definitive Article, &c.; Dr. Wordsworth's Six Letters to Mr. Sharp; Mr. Boyd's Supplementary Researches; and Bp. Middleton's Doctrine of the Greek Article. v without the article, as it is read by some of the Greek manuscripts, shows that two distinct persons are spoken of. And surely what is proposed to us as an object of belief, especially in a matter involving a primary article of faith, ought not to be an inference forced and extorted from passages relating to an entirely different subject, in which the readings are sometimes various, and the sense doubtful,-nor hunted out by careful research from among articles and particles, nor elicited by dint of ingenuity, like the answers of an oracle, from sentences of dark or equivocal meaning-but should be susceptible of abundant proof from the clearest sources. For it is in this that the superiority of the gospel to the law consists; this, and this alone, is consistent with its open simplicity; this is that true light and clearness which we had been taught to expect would be its characteristic. Lastly, he who calls God, great, does not necessarily call him supreme, or essentially one with the Father; nor on the other hand does he thereby deny that Christ is the great God, in the sense in which he has been above proved to be such. Another passage which is also produced is 1 John iii. 16. hereby perceive we the love of God, because he laid down his life for us. Here however the Syriac version reads illius instead of Dei, and it remains to be seen whether other manuscripts do the same. The pronoun he, ékeivos, seems not to be referred to God, but to the Son of God, as may be concluded from a comparison of the former chapters of this epistle, and the first, second, fifth and eighth verses of the chapter before us, as well as from Rom. v. 8. God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. The love of God, therefore, is the love of the Father, whereby he so loved the world, that he purchased it with his own blood, Acts xx. 28. and for it laid down his life, that is, the life of his only begotten Son, as it may be explained from John iii. 16. and by analogy from many other passages. Nor is it extraordinary that by the phrase, his life, should be under stood the life of his beloved Son, since we are ourselves in the habit * The Ethiopic version reads αὐτοῦ. Mill omits Θεοῦ. |