These are two very different conceptions. Both cannot De 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." If God be Father, Son, and Holy Ghost, the duties owing to God will be duties owing to that triune distinction, which must be paid accordingly; and whoever leaves out any of them out of his idea of God, comes so far short of honouring God perfectly, and of serving him in proportion to the manifestations he has made of himself."(4) As the object of our worship is affected by our respective views on this great subject, so also its character. We are between the extremes of pure and acceptable devotion, and of gross and offensive idolatry, and must run to one or the other. If the doctrine of the Trinity be true, then those who deny it do not worship the God of the Scriptures, but a fiction of their own framing; if it be false, the Trinitarian, by paying Divine honours to the Son and to the Holy Ghost, is equally guilty of idolatry, though in another mode. of God, " by whom, and for whom," it was built, and is preserved. The reason why the present circumstances of the natural world are, as before shown, neither wholly perfect, nor without large remains of original perfection; neither accordant with the condition of condemned, nor of innocent creatures; but adapted only to such a state of man as the redeeming scheme supposes, cannot, on the Socinian hypothesis, be discovered; for that redeeming scheme depends for its character upon our views of the person of Christ. Without a settled opinion on these points, we are therefore, in this respect also, without the key to a just and full explanation of the theological character of our present residence, the world. Another relation of the natural world to theology lies in its duration. It was made for Christ; and the reason which determines that it shall be burned up centres in him. He is appointed judge, and shall terminate the present scene of things, by destroying the frame of the visible universe, when the probation of its inhabitants shall have expired. I beg the reader to turn to the remarks before made on the reason of a general judgment being found in the fact, that man is under grace and not strict law; and the argument offered to show, that if we were under a covenant of mere obedience, no cause for such an appointment, as that of a general judgment, would be obvious. If those views be correct, then the reason, both of a general judgment and the final destruction of the world, is to be found in the system of redemption, and consequently in such views of the person of Christ, as are not found in the Socinian scheme. The conclusion therefore is, that as "to facts in nature," even they are intimately connected, in several very important respects, which no wise man can overlook, with the doctrine of the Trinity. Socinianism cannot explain the peculiar physical state of the world as connected with a state of trial; and the general judgment, and the "end of all things," bear no relation to its theology. Now it is surely important to determine this; and which is the most likely to have fallen into this false and corrupt worship, the very prima facie evidence may determine:-the Trinitarian, who has the letter, and plain common-sense interpretation of Scripture for his warrant ;-or he who confesses, that he must resort to all the artifices of criticism, and boldly challenge the inspiration of an autheicated volume, to get rid of the evidence which it exhibits against him, if taken in its first and most obvious meaning.(5) It is not now attempted to prove the Socinian heresy from the Scriptures; this has long been given up, and the main effort of all modern writers on that side has been directed to cavil at the adduced proofs of the opposite doctrine. They are, as to Scripture argument, wholly on the defensive, and thus allow, at least, that they have. The connexion of the orthodox doctrine with morals no direct warrant for their opinions. We acknowledge, is, of course, still more direct and striking; and dim indeed, that the charge of idolatry would lie against us, must have been that intellectual eye which could not could we be proved in error; but they seem to forget, discern, that, granting to the believers in the Trinity that it lies against them, should they be in error; and their own principles, its relation to morals is vital and that they are in this error, they themselves tacitly ac- essential. Whether those principles are supported by knowledge, if the Scriptures, which they now, in great the Scripture, is another consideration. If they could measure, reject, must determine the question. On that be disproved, then the doctrine ought to be rejected on authority, we may unhesitatingly account them idola- a higher ground than that here urged; but to attempt to ters, worshippers of what "is nothing in the world;"push it aside, on the pretence of its having no connexion and not of the God revealed in the Bible.(6) Thus, with morals, was but a very unworthy mode of veiling the only hope which is left to the Socinian is held on the case. For what are "morals," but conformity to the same tenure as the hope of the Deist,-the forlorn a Divine law, which law must take its character from hope that the Scriptures, which he rejects, are not true; its author? The Trinitarian scheme is essentiaily confor if those texts they reject, and those books which nected with the doctrine of atonement; and what is they hold of no authority, be established, then this called the Unitarian theory necessarily excludes atonewhole charge, and its consequences, lie full against ment. From this arise opposite views of God, as the them. Governor of the world; of the law under which we are placed; of the nature and consequences of sin, the violation of that law; points which have an essential relation to morals, because they affect the nature of the sanctions which accompany the law of God. He who denies the doctrine of the Trinity, and its necessary adjunct, the atonement, makes sin a matter of comparatively trifling moment: God is not strict to punish it; and if punishment follow, it is not eternal. Whether, under these soft and easy views of the law of God, and of its transgression by sin, morals can have an equal sanction, or human conduct be equally restrained, are points too obvious to be argued; but a subject which involves views of the judicial character of God so opposite, and of the evil and penalty of offence, must be considered as standing in the most intimate relation with every question of morals. It is presumed, too, in the objection, that faith, or, in other words, a firm belief in the testimony of God, is no part of morality. It is, however, sufficient to place this matter in a very different light, if we recollect that, to believe, is so much a command that the highest sanetion is connected with it. "He that believeth shall be saved, and he that believeth not shall be damned." Nothing, therefore, can be more important to us than to examine, without captiousness and the spirit of unbelief, what God hath revealed as the object of our faith, since the rejection of any revealed truth, under the influence of pride, whether of the reason or the heart; or through affectation of independence; or love of the world; or any other corrupt motive; must be certainly 4. Dr. Priestley objects, "that no fact in nature, nor any one purpose of morals, requires this doctrine." The first part of the objection is futile and trifling, if he meant that the facts of nature do not require this doctrine for their philosophical illustration; for who seeks the explication of natural phenomena in theological doctrines? But there is one view, in which even right views of the facts of nature depend upon proper views of the Godhead. All nature has a theological reason, and a theological end; and its interpretation in these respects, rests wholly upon the person and office of our Lord. All things were made by the Son and for him; a theological view of the natural world, which is large or contracted, emphatic or spiritless, according to the conceptions which we form of the Son (4) WATERLAND. (5) St. Paul says, that all Scripture is given by inspiration of God; but Dr. Priestley tells us, that this signifies nothing more, than that the books were written by good men, with the best views and designs. (6) To this purpose Witsius, who shows that there can be neither religion nor worship, unless the Trinity be acknowledged. "Nulla etiam religio est, nisi quis verum Deum colat; non colit verum Deum, sed cerebri sui figmentum, qui non adorat in æquali divinitatis majestate Patrem, Filium, et Spiritum Sanctum. nunc, et doctrinam eam ad pracin inutilem esse clama, sine qua nulla Fidei aut, Pietatis Christianæ praxis esse potest." I visited with punishment: the law of faith having the same authority, and the same sanction, as the law of works. It is, therefore, a point of duty to believe, because it is a point of obedience, and hence St. Paul speaks of "the obedience of faith." For, as it has been well observed, "As to the nature of faith, it is a matter of obligation, as being that natural homage which the understanding or will pays to God in receiving and assenting to what he reveals upon his bare word or authority. It is a humiliation of ourselves, and a glorification of God."(7) It may be added, too, that faith, which implies a submission to God, is an important branch also of discipline. In or as a Divine person,-as merely a Son of man, or as The objection, that there can be no faith where there is not sufficient evidence to command it, will not affect this conclusion. For when once the evidence of a divine revelation is admitted, our duty to receive its doc- For the same reason, the doctrine which denies our trines does not rest upon the rational evidence we may Lord's Divinity diminishes the love of Christ himself, have of their truth; but upon the much easier and takes away its generosity and devotedness, presents it plainer evidence, that they are among the things ac- under views infinitely below those contained in the tually revealed. He, therefore, who admits a divine New Testament, and weakens the motives which are revelation, and rejects its doctrines, because he has not drawn from it to excite our gratitude and obedience. a satisfactory rational evidence of them, is more ob- "If Christ was in the form of God, equal with God, viously criminal in his unbelief than he who rejects and very God, it was then an act of infinite love and the revelation itself, for he openly debates the case with condescension in him to become man; but if he was his Maker, a circumstance which indicates, in the most no more than a creature, it was no surprising condestriking manner, a corrupt habit of mind. It is, in- scension to embark in a work so glorious; such as deed, often pretended, that such truths are rejected, not being the Saviour of mankind, and such as would adso much on this account, as that they do not appear to be vance him to be Lord and Judge of the world, to the sense of the revelation itself. But this cannot be be admired, reverenced, and adored, both by men and urged by those who openly lay it down as a principle, angels."(8) To this it may be added, that the idea that a true revelation can contain nothing which to of disinterested, gerous love, such as the love Christ them appears unreasonable: or that if it does, they are is represented to be by the Evangelists and the Aposbound by the law of their nature not to admit it. Nor tles, cannot be supported upon any supposition but that will it appear to be any other than an unworthy and he was properly a Divine person. As a man and as a dishonest pretence in all cases where such kinds of creature only, however exalted, he would have profited criticism are resorted to, to alter the sense of a text, by his exaltation; but, considered as Divine, Christ or to disprove its authority, as they would not allow gained nothing. God is full and perfect-he is exalted in the case of texts supposed, by a partial construction, "above blessing and praise ;" and, therefore, our Lord, to favour their own opinion; or such as would be con- in that Divine nature, prays that he might be glorified demned by all learned and sober persons as hypercri- with the Father, with the glory he had BEFORE. Not tical and violent, if applied to any other writings. It a glory which was new to him; not a glory heightened may also be added, that should any of the great quali- in its degree; but the glory which he had with the ties required in a serious and honest inquirer after Father " before the world was." In a manner mystetruth have been uncultivated and unapplied, though a rious to us, even as to his Divine nature," he emptied sincere conviction of the truth of an erroneous con- himself-he humbled himself;" but in that nature he clusion may exist, the guilt of unbelief would not be returned to a glory which he had before the world was. removed by such kind of sincerity. If there has been The whole, therefore, was in him generous, disinteno anxiety to be right; no prayer, earnest and devout, rested love, ineffable and affecting condescension. The offered to God, to be kept from error; if an humble heresy of the Socinians and Arians totally annihilates, sense of human liability to err has not been maintained; therefore, the true character of the love of Christ, “so if diligence in looking out for proofs, and patience and that," as Dr. Sherlock well observes, "to deny the Diperseverance in inquiry have not been exerted; if honesty vinity of Christ alters the very foundations of Chrisin balancing evidence, and a firm resolution to em-tianity, and destroys all the powerful arguments of the brace the truth, whatever prejudices or interests it may contradict or oppose, have not been felt; even sincerity in believing that to be true, which, in the present state of a judgment determined, probably, before all the means of information have been resorted to, and, perhaps, under the perverting influence of a worldly or carnal state of mind, may appear to be so, will be no excuse. We are under "a law of faith," and that law cannot be supposed to be so pliable and nugatory, as they who contend for the right of believing only what they please, would make it. These observations will show the connexion of the doctrine of the Trinity with morals, the point denied by Dr. Priestley. love, humility, and condescension of our Lord, which are the peculiar motives of the Gospel."(9) But it is not only in this view that the denial of the Divinity of our Lord would alter the foundation of the Christian scheme, but in others equally essential; For, 1. 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. The Arians, now, however, nearly extinct, admitted the doctrine of atonement, though inconsistently. "No creature could merit from God, or do works of super he pleased, it may be said, upon the same principle, that he might accept the blood of bulls and of goats. Yet But, to leave this objection for views of a larger ex-erogation. If it be said that God might accept it as tent; our love to God, which is the sum of every duty, its sanctifying motive, and consequently a compendium of all true religion, is most intimately and even essentially connected with the doctrine in question. God's (7) "Equidem rem attentius perpendenti liquebit, ex love to us is the ground of our love to him; and by hypothesi sive Sociniani sive Ariana, Deum in hoc our views of that, it must be heightened or diminished. negotio amorem et dilectionem suam potius in illum The love of God to man in the gift of his Son is that ipsum filium, quam erga nos homines ostendisse. Quid manifestation of it on which the Scriptures most em- enim? Is qui Christus dicitur, ex mera Dei Evdokia et phatically and frequently dwell, and on which they beneplacito in eam gratiam electus est, ut post brevem establish our duty of loving God and one another. hic in terris Deo præstitam obedientiam, ex puro puto Now the estimate which we are to take of the love of homine juxta Socinistas, sive ex mera et mutabili creaGod, must be the value of his gifts to us. His great-tura, ut Ario-manitæ dicunt, Deus ipse fieret, ac diviest gift is the gift of his Son, through whom alone we have the promise of everlasting life; but our estimate of the love which gives must be widely different, according as we regard the gift bestowed,--as a creature (7) NORRIS on Christian Prudence. nos honores, non modo a nobis hominibus sed etiam Spirit. For can a creature be the universal spring and fountain of divine grace and life! Can a finite creature be a kind of universal soul to the whole Christian Church, and to every sincere member of it? Can a creature make such close application to our minds, know our thoughts, set bounds to our passions, inspire us with new affections and desires, and be more intimate to us than we are to ourselves? If a creature be the only instrument and principle of grace, we shall soon be tempted either to deny the grace of God, or to make it only an external thing, and entertain very mean conceits of it. All those miraculous gifts which were bestowed upon the apostles and primitive Christians, for the edification of the church, all the graces of the Christian life, are the fruits of the Spirit. The Divine Spirit is the principle of immortality in us, which first gave life to our souls, and will, at the last day, raise our dead bodies out of the dust; works which sufficiently proclaim Him to be God, and which we cannot heartily believe, in the Gospel notion, if he be not."(3) All this has been felt so forcibly by the deniers of the Divinity of the Holy Spirit, that they have escaped only by taking another leap down the gulf of error; and at present, the Socinians deny that there is any Holy Ghost, and resolve the whole into a figure of speech. But the importance of the doctrine of the Holy Trinity may be finally argued from the manner in which the denial of it would affect the credit of the Holy Scriptures themselves; for if this doctrine be not contained in them, their tendency to mislead is obvious. Their constant language is so adapted to deceive, and even to compel the belief of falsehood, even in fundamental points, and to lead to the practice of idolatry itself, that they would lose all claim to be regarded as a revelation from the God of truth, and ought rather to be shunned than to be studied. A great part of the Scriptures is directed against idolatry, which is declared to be "that abominable thing which the Lord hateth;" and in pursuance of this design, the doctrine that there is but one God is laid down in the most explicit terms, and constantly confirmed by appeals to his works. The very first command in the decalogue is, "Thou shalt have no other Gods before me;" and the sum of the law, as to our duty to God, is, that we love HIM "with all our heart, and mind, and soul, and strength." If the doctrine of a Trinity of Divine persons in the unity of the Godhead be consistent with all this, then the style and manner of the Scriptures are in perfect accordance with the moral ends they propose, and the truths in which they would instruct mankind; but if the Son and the Holy Spirit are creatures, then is the language of the sacred books most deceptive and dangerous. For how is it to be accounted for, in that case, that in the Old Testament, God should be spoken of in plural terms, and that this plurality should be restricted to three? How is it that the very name Jehovah should be given to each of them, and that repeatedly and on the most solemn occasions? How is it that the promised incarnate Messiah should be invested, in the prophecies of his advent, with the loftiest attributes of God, and that works infinitely superhuman, and divine honours, should be predicted of him? and that acts and characters of unequivocal divinity, according to the common apprehension of mankind, should be ascribed to the Spirit also? How is it that, in the New Testament, the name of God should be given to both, and that without any intimation that it is to be taken in an inferior sense? That the creation and conservation of all things should be ascribed to Christ; that he should be worshipped by angels and by men; that he should be represented as seated on the throne of the universe, to receive the adorations of all creatures; and that in the very form of initiation by baptism into his church, itself a public and solemn profession of faith, the baptism is enjoined to be performed in the one name of the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost? One God and two creatures! As though the very door of entrance into the Christian church should have been purposely made the gate of the worst and most corrupting error ever introduced among mankind, -trust and worship in creatures, as God; the error which has spread darkness and moral desolation over the whole pagan world! And here it cannot be said that the question is begged (3) SHERLOCK's Vindication. that more is taken for granted than the Socinians will allow; for this argument does not rest at all upon what the deniers of our Lord's Divinity understand by all these terms, and what interpretations may be put upon them. This is the popular view of the subject which has just been drawn from the Scriptures; and they themselves acknowledge it by resorting to the arts and labours of far-fetched criticism, in order to attach to these passages of Scripture a sense different to the obvious and popular one. But it is not merely the popular sense of Scripture. It is so taken, and has been taken in all ages, by the wisest men and most competent critics, to be the only consistent sense of the sacred volume; a circumstance which still more strongly proves, that if the Scriptures were written on Socinian principles, they are more unfortunately expressed than any book in the world; and they can, on no account, be considered a Divine Revelation, not because of their obscurity, for they are not obscure, but because terms are used in them which convey a sense different from what the writers intended, if indeed they were Socinians. But their evidences prove them to be a revelation of truth from the God of truth, and they cannot therefore be so written as to lead men, who use only ordinary care, into fundamental error; and the conclusion, therefore, must inevitably be, that if we must admit either on the one hand what is so derogatory to the Scriptures, and so subversive of all confidence in them, or, on the other, that the doctrine of the Divinity of the Son and Holy Spirit is there explicitly taught, there is no medium between absolute infidelity and the acknowledgment of our Lord's Divinity; and indeed, to adopt the representation of a great divine, it is rather to rave than to reason, to suppose that he whom the Scriptures teach us to regard as the Saviour of our souls, and as our wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption; he who hears our prayers and is always present with his Church throughout the world, who sits at the right hand of God, in the glory of his Father, and who shall come at the last day, in glory and majesty, accompanied with ministering angels, to judge all mankind and to bring to light the very secrets of their hearts, should be a mere man, or a created being of any kind.(4) I close this view of the importance of the doctrine of the Trinity with the observations of Dr. Waterland. "While we consider the doctrine of the Trinity as interwoven with the very frame and texture of the Christian religion, it appears to me natural to conceive that the whole scheme and economy of man's redemp tion was laid with a principal view to it, in order to bring mankind gradually into an acquaintance with the three Divine persons, one God blessed for ever. I would speak with all due modesty, caution, and reverence, as becomes us always in what concerns the unsearchable councils of heaven: but I say, there appears to me none so natural, or so probable an account of the Divine dispensations, from first to last, as what I have just mentioned, namely, that such a redemption was provided, such an expiation for sins required, such a method of sanctification appointed, and then revealed, that so men might know that there are three divine persons, might be apprized how infinitely the world is indebted to them, and might accordingly be both instructed and inclined to love, honour, and adore them here, because that must be a considerable part of their employment and happiness hereafter."(5) (4) Οικονωμία, quæ ipsi tribuitur, θεολογιαν necessario supponit, ipsumque omnino statuit. Quid enim? Messiam sive Christum prædicant sacræ nostræ literæ et credere nos profitemur omnes, qui sit animarum sospitator, qui nobis sit sapientia, justitia, sanctificatio, et redemptio-qui preces suorum, ubivis sacrosanctum ejus nomen invocantium, illico exaudiat-qui ecclesiæ suæ per universum terrarum orbem disseminatæ, semper præsto sit-qui Deo Patri, ovv@povos, et in eadem sede collocatus sit-qui denique, in exitu mundi, immensa gloria et majestate refulgens, angelis ministris stipatus, veniet orbem judicaturus, non modo facta omnia, sed et cordis secreta omnium quotquot fuere hominum in lucem proditurus, &c. Hæccine omnia in purum hominem, aut creaturam aliquam competere ? Fidenter dico, qui ita sentiat, non modo contra Fidem, sed et rationem ipsam insanire.-BULL, Judic. Eccl. Cath. (5) Importance of the Doctrine of the Trinity. In order to bring this great controversy in such an order before the reader, as may assist him to enter with advantage into it, I shall first carefully collect the leading testimonies of Scripture on the doctrine of the Trinity and the Divinity of the Son and Holy Spirit,-adduce the opinions of the Jewish and Christian churches,-answer objections,-explain the chief modern heresies on this subject, and give their Scriptural confutation. An observation or two on the difficulties in which the doctrine of a Trinity of persons in the Unity of one undivided Godhead is said to involve us, may properly close this chapter. Mere difficulty in conceiving of what is wholly proper and peculiar to God, forms no objection to a doctrine. It is more rationally to be considered as a presumption of its truth, since in the nature of God there must be mysteries far above the reach of the human mind. All his natural attributes, though of some of them we have images in ourselves, are utterly incomprehensible; and the manner of his existence cannot be less so. All attempts, however, to show that this great doctrine implies a contradiction, have failed. A contradiction is only where two contraries are predicated of the same thing, and in the same respect. Let this be kept in view, and the sophisms resorted to on this point by the adversaries of the faith, will be easily detected. They urge, that the same thing cannot be three, and one, that is, if the proposition has any meaning at all, not in the same respect; the three persons are not one person, and the one God is not three Gods. But it is no contradiction to say, that in different respects the three may be one; that is, that in respect of persons, they shall be three, and in respect of Godhead, essence, or nature, they shall be one. The manner of the thing is a perfectly distinct question, and its incomprehensibility proves nothing but that we are finite creatures, and not God. As for difficulties, we shall certainly not be relieved by running either to the Arian or the Socinian hypothesis. The one ascribes the first formation and the perpetual government of the universe, not to the Deity, but to the wisdom and power of a creature; for, however exalted the Arian inferior Deity may be, he is a creature still. The other makes a mere man the creator of all things. For whatever is meant by "the Word in St. John's gospel, it is the same Word of which the evangelist says, that all things were made by it, and that itself was made flesh. If this Word be the Divine attribute wisdom, then that attribute in the degree which was equal to the formation of the universe, in this view of the Scripture doctrine, was conveyed entire into the mind of a mere man, the son of a Jewish carpenter! A much greater difficulty, in my apprehension, than any that is to be found in the Catholic faith."(6) CHAPTER IX. TRINITY.-Scripture Testimony. IN adducing the doctrine of a Trinity of Divine persons in the Unity of the Godhead from the sacred volume, by exhibiting some of its numerous and decisive testimonies as to this being the mode in which the Divine nature subsists, the explicit manner in which it is there laid down, that there is but ONE God, must again be noticed. This is the foundation and the key-stone of the whole fabric of Scriptural theology; and every argument in favour of the Trinity flows from this principle of the absolute UNITY of God, a principle which the heresies at which we have glanced fancy to be inconsistent with the orthodox doctrine. The solemn and unequivocal manner in which the Unity of God is stated as a doctrine, and is placed as the foundation of all true religion, whether devotional or practical, need not again be repeated; and it is here sufficient to refer to the chapter on the Unity of God. Of this one God, the high and peculiar, and, as it has been truly called, the appropriate name is JEHOVAH; which, like all the Hebrew names of God, is not an insignificant and accidental term, but a name of revelation, a name adopted by God himself for the purpose of making known the mystery of his nature. To what has been already said on this appellation, I may add, that the most eminent critics derive it from fuit, existit; which in Kal signifies to be, and in Hiphel to cause to be. Buxtorf, in his definition, includes both these ideas, and makes it signify a being existing from himself from everlasting to everlasting, and communicating existence to others, and adds that it signifies the Its derivation Being who is, and was, and is to come. has been variously stated by critics, and some fanciful notions have been formed of the import of its several letters; but in this idea of absolute existence all agree. "It is acknowledged by all," says Bishop Pearson, -and God's Own in היה or הוה is from יהוה that * terpretation proves no less, Exod. iii. 14. Some contend, that futurition is essential to the name, yet all agree the root signifieth nothing but essence or existence, that is, το είναι or υπαρχειν.”(7) No appellation of the Divine Being could therefore be more distinctive than that which imports independent and eternal being; and for this reason probably it was, that the Jews up to a very high antiquity had a singular reverence for it; carried, it is true, to a superstitious scrupulosity; but thereby showing that it was the name which unveiled, to the thoughts of those to whom it was first given, the awful and overwhelming glories of a self-existent Being, the very unfathomable depths of his eternal Godhead.(8) In examining what the Scriptures teach of this selfexistent and eternal Being, our attention is first arrested by the important fact, that this ONE Jehovah is spoken of under plural appellations, and that not once or twice, but in a countless number of instances. So that the Hebrew names of God, acknowledged by all to be expressive and declaratory of some peculiarity or excellence of his nature, are found in several cases in the plural as well as in the singular form, and one of them, ALEIM, generally so; and, notwithstanding it was so fundamental and distinguishing an article of the Jewish faith, in opposition to the polytheism of almost all other nations, there was but one living and true God. I give a few instances. Jehovah, if it has not a plural form, has more than one personal application. "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 had talked with Abrahamn, raining the storm of vengeance from another Jehovah, out of heaven, and who was therefore invisible. Thus we have two Jehovahs expressly mentioned, "the LORD rained from the LORD," and yet we have it most solemnly asserted in Deut. vi. 4, "Hear, O Israel, Jehovah our God is one Jehovah." The very first name in the Scriptures under which the Divine Being is introduced to us as the Creator of heaven and earth, is a plural one, 'N ALEIM; and to connect, in the same singular manner as in the foregoing instance, plurality with unity, it is the nominative case to a verb singular. "In the beginning, GODS created the heavens and the earth." Of this form innumerable instances occur in the Old Testament. That the word is plural, is made certain by its being often joined with adjectives, pronouns, and verbs plural; and yet when it can mean nothing else than the true God, it is generally joined in its plural form with verbs singular. To render this still more striking, the Aleim are said to be Jehovah, and Jehovah the Aleim thus in Psalm c. 3, "Know ye, that Jehovah, he, the Aleim, he hath made us, and not we ourselves." And in the passage before given, "Jehovah our ДLEIM, (Gods,) is one Jehovah." AL, the mighty one, another name of God, has its plural ALIM, the mighty ones. The former is rendered by Trommius ecos, the latter Ocot. N ABIR, the potent one, has the plural D'N ABIRIM, the potent ones. Man did eat the bread of the Abirim, "angel's food," conveys no idea; the manna was the bread provided miraculously, and was therefore called the food of the powerful ones, of them who have power over all nature, the one God. (7) Exposition of the Creed. (8) MAIMONIDES tells us, that it was not lawful to utter this name, except in the sanctuary, and by the priests. "Nomen, quod, ut nosti, non proferre licet, nisi in sanctuario, et a sacerdotibus Dei sanctis, solum in benedictione sacerdotum, ut et a sacerdote magno in die jejunii." |