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it would in all cases, according to this doctrine, render | it morally fit and right that forgiveness should be exercised, and consequently wrong that it should be refused. In no case, therefore, could the penalty of the law be in any degree enforced.

But if repentance be taken in the second sense, and this is certainly the light in which true repentance is exhibited in the Scriptures, then it is forgotten that such is the corrupt state of man, that he is incapable of penitence of this kind. This follows from that view of human depravity which we have already established from the Scriptures, and which we need not repeat. In conformity with this view of the entire corruptness of man's nature, therefore, repentance is said to be the gift of Christ, who, in consequence of being exalted to be a Prince and a Saviour, "gives repentance," as well as "remission of sins," a gift quite superfluous, if to repent truly were in the power of man, and independent of Christ. To suppose man to be capable of a repentance which is the result of genuine principle, is to assume human nature to be what it is not. The whole rests on this question: for, if man be totally corrupt, the only principles from which that repentance and correction of manners, which are supposed in the argument, can flow, do not exist in his nature; and if we allow no more than that the propensity to evil in him is stronger than the propensity to good, it would be absurd to suppose that in opposing propensities, the weaker should ever resist the more powerful.

But take it that repentance, in the best interpretation, is possible to fallen unassisted man, and that it is actually exercised and followed even by a better conduct, still in no good sense can it be shown, that this would make it morally right and fit in the Supreme Being to forgive offences against his government. Socinus, we have seen in the above quotation, allows that it would not be right, not consistent with God's moral attributes, to forgive the impenitent; and all, indeed, who urge repentance as the sole condition of pardon, adopt the same principle; but how, then, does it appear that to grant pardon upon repentance is right, that is, just in itself, or a manifestation of a just and rightGous government?

proaches, rather than die; and so he may sin as often as he pleases, and yet have it always in his power to turn aside the punishment, which amounts to a substantive repeal of the law and the abrogation of all government. If, on the other hand, the production of a penitent disposition is not in his own power, and can only come from above, as a matter of grace, it is a strange anomaly to suppose a government so established as to oblige the governor to concur in producing repentance in those who despise his authority, so that they may avoid punishment. This would be grace, and not law, most emphatically: for if the governor were bound by any principle of any kind to produce this sentiment of repentance in order to constitute a moral fitness in the exercise of pardon, he would, for any thing we can see, be bound by it to use the same means to render all penitent, that all might escape punishment; and to do this, too, as often as they fell into sin, that punishment might, in no case, follow, except when the means employed by him for that purpose were obstinately resisted; and thus repentance would be brought in as the substitute of obedience. But since the end of law is to command obedience, and it is invested with authority for the purpose of effecting that, it ceases t answer the purpose for which it was established, when it accepts repentance in the place of obedience. This is not its end, as an instrument of moral government; nor is it a means to its proper end, which is obedience; for repentance can give no security for future obedience, since a penitent transgressor, whose nature is infected with a corrupt moral principle and habit, is much more liable to sin again than when innocent as in his first estate; and, as this scheme makes no provision at all for the moral cure of man's fallen nature by the renewing influences of the Holy Spirit, so it abolishes all law as an instrument of moral order, and substitutes pardon as an END of government instead of obedience.

With this view of the insufficiency of repentance to obtain pardon the Scriptures agree; for, not now to advert to the doctrine of the Old Testament, which will be subsequently considered, we need only refer to the Gospel, which is professedly a declaration of the mercy of God to sinning men, and which also professedly If right be taken in the sense of moral fitness, its lays down the means by which the pardon of their oflowest sense, the moral correspondence of one thing fences is to be attained. Without entering at all into with another, it cannot be morally fit in a perfectly other subjects connected with this, it is enough here to holy being to be so indifferent to offences, as not to ex- show that, in the Gospel, pardon is not connected with press towards the offenders any practical displeasure mere repentance, as it must have been had the docof any kind; yet this the argument supposes, since the trine against which we have contended been true. slightest infliction of punishment, should repentance John the Baptist was, emphatically, a preacher of retake place, would be contrary to the principle assumed. pentance, and, had nothing but mere repentance been If justice be taken in the sense of giving to every one required in order to salvation, he would have been the what is due, the Divine Being cannot be just in this most successful of preachers. So numerous were the sense, should he treat an offender, though afterward multitudes which submitted to the power of his minis. penitent, precisely as he treats those who have perse- try, that the largest terms are used by the evangelist vered in obedience, without defect of any kind; and Matthew to express the effect produced by it-"Then yet, if repentance be pleaded as a moral reason for en- went out all Judea, and all Jerusalem, and all the region tirely overlooking offence, then will all be treated alike, round about Jordan, and were baptized of him in Jorwhether obedient or the contrary. But, finally, if the dan, confessing their sins." Of the truth of their rejustice of God be considered with reference to govern-pentance, no doubt is expressed. On the contrary, ment, the impossibility of exonerating a penitent of fender, and the upholding of a righteous administratration, is most apparent. That we are under government is certain; that we are under a settled law is equally so, and that law explains to us the nature of the government by which we are controlled. In all the statements made respecting this government in Scripture, the government of earthly sovereigns and magistrates is the shadow under which it is represented, and the one is the perfect model after which the other has been imperfectly framed. Nothing that is said of God being a father is ever adduced to lower nis claims as Lord, or to diminish the reverence and fear of his creatures towards him under that character. The penalty of transgression is DEATH. This is too plainly written in the Scriptures to be for a moment denied, and if it were righteous to attach that penalty to offence, it is most certainly righteous to execute it; and, therefore, administrative justice cannot be maintained if it be not executed. As to the impenitent, this, indeed, is conceded; but penitence makes no difference; for, if the end of attaching this penalty to offence was to maintain the authority of the law, then not to execute it upon the repentant would still be to annul that authority. This repentance is either in the power of the transgressor, or it is not. If the former, he will always be disposed to exercise it, when the danger ap

when John excepts only "many of the Sadducees and Pharisees" who came to his baptism" as hypocrites, we are bound to conclude, that he, who appears to have had the supernatural gift of discovering the spirits of men, allowed the repentance of the rest generally to be genuine. It would follow, then, from the principle laid down by the adversaries of the doctrine of the atonement of Christ, namely, that repentance alone renders it morally fit in God to forgive sin, and that, therefore, he can require nothing else but true repentance in order to pardon, that the disciples of the Baptist needed not to look for any thing beyond what their master was the instrument of imparting by his ministry. But this is contradicted by the fact. He taught them to look for a higher baptism, that of the Holy Ghost; and to a more effectual teacher, the Christ, whose voice or herald he was; all he did and said bore upon it a preparatory character, and to this character he was most careful to give the utmost distinctness, that his hearers might not be mistaken. To two of kis disciples, standing with him when he looked upon Jesus as he walked," he said, "Behold the Lamb of God which taketh away the sin of the world;" and thus he confessed that it was not himself, nor his doctrine, nor the repentance which it produced, which took away sin; but that it was taken away by Christ alone, and that in his sacrificial character, as "the Lamb of

God." Nay, what, indeed, is still more explicit, he him- |
self declares that everlasting life was not attained by
the repentance which he preached, but by believing on
Christ; for he concludes his discourse concerning
Jesus (John iii. 25, 36) with these memorable words,
"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." The testimony of
John was, therefore, that more than repentance, even
faith in Christ, was necessary to salvation. Such
also was the doctrine of our Lord himself, though he,
too, was a preacher of repentance; and that of the
apostles, who, proclaiming that "all men every where"
should repent, not less explicitly preached that all men
every where should believe; and that they were "justi-
fied by faith," and thus had "peace with God through
our Lord Jesus Christ."

CHAPTER XX.

REDEMPTION.-DEATH OF CHRIST PROPITIATORY. THESE points, then, being so fully established, that sin is neither forgiven by the mere prerogative of God, nor upon the account of mere repentance in man, we proceed to inquire into the Scripture account of the real consideration on which the execution of the penalty of transgression is delayed, and the offer of forgiveness is made to offenders.

To the statements of the New Testa:nent we shall first direct our attention, and then point out that harmony of doctrine on this subject which pervades the whole Scriptures, and makes both the Old and New Testaments give their agreeing testimony to that one method of love, wisdom, and justice, by which a merciful God justifies the ungodly.

1. The first thing which strikes every attentive and, indeed, every cursory reader of the New Testament, must be, that the pardon of our sin, and our entire salvation, is ascribed to the death of Christ. We do not, now, inquire in what sense his death availed to these great results; but we, at present, only state that, in some sense, our salvation is expressly and emphatically connected with that event. "I lay down my life for the sheep." "He gave himself for us." He died, "the just for the unjust, that he might bring us to God." "Christ was once offered to bear the sins of many." "While we were yet sinners Christ died for us." "In whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our sins." "He gave his life a ransom for many." "We who were afar off are inade nigh by the blood of Christ." "Unto him that loved us, and washed us from our sins in his own blood;" with innumerable other passages, in which, with equal emphasis, the salvation of man is connected with the death of Christ.

this respect, important, that they concede that the death of Christ, as the means of human salvation, is made so prominent in the New Testament, that it cannot be left out of our consideration when the doctrine of man's salvation is treated of; and also, that this is a doctrine of the Holy Scriptures which must, in some way or other, be accounted for and explained. The Socinian accounts for it by making the death of Christ the means by which repentance is produced in the heart of man, so as to constitute it morally fit that he should be forgiven. The modern Arian accounts for it by connecting with this notion that kind of merit in the death of Christ which arises from a generous and benevolent self-devotion; and which, when pleaded by him in the way of mediation, God is pleased to honour by accepting repentance, when it is produced in the heart, and accompanied with purposes of amendment in place of perfect obedience.

2. But the views given us of the death of Christ by the writers of the New Testament, go much farther than these, because they represent the death of Christ as necessary to the salvation of men, a principle which both the hypotheses just mentioned wholly exclude. The reason of forgiveness is placed by one in repentance merely; by the other also in the exercise of the right which God had to pardon, but which he chose to exercise in honour of the philanthropy of Jesus Christ. Both make the death of Christ, though in a different way and in a very subordinate sense, the means of obtaining pardon, because it is a means of bringing men into a state in which they are fit objects for the exercise of an act of grace; but the Scripture doctrine is, that the death of Christ is not the meritorious means, but the meritorious cause of the exercise of forgiveness; and repentance but one of the instrumental means of actually obtaining it; and in consistency with this view, they speak of the death of Christ, not as one of many means, by which the same end might have been accomplished; but as, in the strictest sense, necessary to man's salvation.

This has, indeed, been considered, even by some divines professing orthodoxy, to be a bold position, but, as we shall see, with little consistency on their part. It follows, of course, from the Socinian and Arian hypotheses, that if our Lord were a man or an angelic creature; and if he were rather the mere messenger of a mercy which might be exercised on prerogative, than the procuring cause of it; any other creature beside himself might have conveyed the message of this mercy, might have exhibited a generous devotion in our behalf, and been an effectual instrument to bring men to that repentance which would prepare them to receive it. But when it is admitted that Christ was the Divine Son of God; that he was "God manifest in the flesn;" that the forgiveness of sin required a satisfaction to Divine justice of so noble and infinitely exThis is so undeniable, that it is, to a certain extent, alted a kind as that which was offered by the sufferings recognised in the two great schemes opposed to that and death of the incarnate Deity; even from such prewhich has been received generally by the church of mises alone it would seem necessarily to follow, that but Christ, which in all ages has proclaimed that the death for the interposition of Christ, sin could not have been of Christ was an expiatory sacrifice for the sins of men, forgiven consistently with a perfectly righteous governand necessary to make the exercise of pardon consis-ment, and therefore not forgiven at all, unless a sacritent with the essential righteousness of God, and with fice of equal merit, which supposes a being of equal his righteous government. The Socinian scheme ad- glory and dignity as its subject, could have been found. mits that the death of Christ was important to con- If no such being existed out of the Godhead, then hufirm his doctrine, and to lead to his resurrection, the man hope rested solely on the voluntary incarnation crowning miracle by which its truth was demonstrated; of the Son of GOD; and the overwhelming fact and and that we have redemption through his blood, the mystery of his becoming flesh in order to suffer for us, forgiveness of sins, because "we are led, by the due itself shows that the case to be remedied was one of a consideration of Christ's death and its consequences, character absolutely extreme, and therefore not otherto that repentance which, under the merciful consti- wise remediable. If inferior means had been sufficient, tution of the Divine government, always obtains for- then more was done by the Father, when he delivered up giveness." The second scheme, which is that of the his Son for us, than was necessary; a conclusion of an modern Arians, goes farther. It represents the coming impious character: and if the greatest possible gift was of Christ, whom they consider to be the most exalted bestowed, then nothing less could have been effectual of the creatures of God, into the world, and his labours and this was necessary to human salvation. Every be and sufferings in behalf of men as acts of the most dis- liever in the Divinity of Christ is bound to this conclusion. interested and tender benevolence, in reward and honour of which he is allowed to bestow pardon upon his disciples, upon their sincere repentance, and to plead his interest with God, who delights to honour the generous conduct of his Son towards the human race. His voluntary sufferings and death for the sins of mankind, according to them, gave to his intercession with God great efficacy, and thus, by his mediation, sinners are reconciled to God, and raised to eternal life.

Far as even the latter of these theories falls below the sense of Scripture on this subject, yet both are, in

This matter is, however, put beyond all reasonable question by the testimony of Scripture. "Thus it is written, and thus it behooved Christ to suffer and to rise from the dead." Here a necessity for the death of Christ is plainly expressed. If it be said that the necessity was the fulfilment of what "had been written" in the prophets concerning the sufferings of Messiah, it is to be remembered, that what was predicted on this subject by the prophets arose out of a previous appointment of God, in whose eternal counsel Christ had been designated as the Redeemer of man; and that the sole

and stead. With this representation, neither of the hypotheses to which we have adverted, as attempting to account for the importance attached to the death of our Lord in the New Testament, agrees, and therefore both of them fall far below the whole truth of the case. The Socinian scheme makes the death of Christ only an incidental benefit, as sealing the truth of his doctrine, and setting an example of eminent passive virtue. In this sense, indeed, they acknowledge that he died "for" men, because in this indirect manner they derive the benefit of instruction from his death, and because some of the motives to virtue are placed in a stronger light. The modern Arian scheme, sometimes called the intercession hypothesis, acknowledges that he acquired, by his disinterested and generous sufferings, the highest degree of virtue, and a powerful interest with God, by which his intercession on behalf of penitent offenders is honoured by an exercise of higher mercy than would otherwise have taken place; but it by no means follows from this, that repentance might not otherwise have taken place, and mercy have been otherwise exercised. According to this view, then, Christ died for the benefit indeed of men, somewhat more directly than on the Socinian Scheme; but he did not die for them in the sense of the Scriptures, that is, in their room and stead; his death was not vicarious, and it is not on that account directly that the guilty are absolved from condemnation.

end and reason of the death of Christ could not, there- | inform us that he died "FOR us," that is, in our room fore, be the mere fulfilment of the prophecies respecting him. The verse which follows abundantly proves this: "And that repentance and remission of sins should be preached in his name." Luke xxiv. 47. His death was not only necessary for the accomplishment of prophecy, but for the publication of "repentance and remission of sins in his name," both of which, therefore, depended upon it. It was God's purpose to offer forgiveness to man, before the prophets issued their predictions; it was his purpose to do this in "his name," on account of and in consideration of his dying for them: this was predicted; but the necessity of the death of Christ rested on this previous appointment to which the prophecies corresponded. In Matthew xvi. 21, the same sentiment is expressed, without any reference to the fulfilment of prophecy. "From that time forth began Jesus to show unto his disciples, how that he must go unto Jerusalem, and suffer many things of the elders, and chief priests, and scribes, and be killed, and be raised again the third day." The answer, too, of our Lord to Peter, who upon this declaration, said, "Be it far from thee, Lord: this shall not be unto thee," is remarkable. "But he turned and said unto Peter, Get thee behind me, Satan; thou art an offence to me; for thou savourest not the things that be of God, but those that be of men." These words plainly imply, that for Christ to suffer and die, and in this manner, and not according to the carnal and human views of Peter, to accomplish the purpose of his coming into the world, was " of God;" it was his purpose, his appointment. This is not language to be used as to a martyr dying to prove his sincerity; for death, in such cases, is rather permitted than purposed and appointed, and it would be to adopt language never applied to such cases in the Holy Scriptures, to say that the sufferings and death of martyrs are "of God." The necessity of Christ's death, then, rested on Divine appointment, and that on the necessity of the case; and if he "must" die in order that we might live, then we live only in consequence of his death.

The same view is conveyed by a strongly figurative expression in John xii. 23, 24: "And Jesus answered them, saying, The hour is come that the Son of Man should be glorified. Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone; but if it die, it bringeth forth much fruit." From which it inevitably follows, that the death of Christ was as necessary to human salvation as the vegetable death of the seed of corn to the production of the harvest; necessary, therefore, in this sense, that one could not take place without the other. But for this he would have remained "alone," and have brought no "sons to glory."

To prove that our Lord died for men, in the sense of dying in their stead, the testimony of the sacred writers must, however, be adduced, and it is equally abundant and explicit. St. Peter says he died, "the just for the unjust," that "he suffered for us." St. Paul, that "he died for all," that he tasted death for every man," that he died "for the ungodly," that he gave himself a ransom for all," and our Lord himself declares "that he gave himself a ransom for many." To show, however, that this phrase means no more than a final cause, and that the only notion intended to be conveyed is, that Christ died for our benefit, it is argued by the objectors, that the Greek prepositions used in the above quotations, vπɛр and avri, do not always signify substitution; but are sometimes to be rendered "on account of," as when Christ is said to have" suffered for our sins," which cannot be rendered instead of our sins. All this may, indeed, be granted; but then it is as certain that these prepositions do often signify substitution; and that the Grecks, by these forms of expression, were wont to express a vicarious death, is abundantly proved by the examples given by Raphelius, on Romans v. 8. Nor are instances wanting of texts in which these particles can only be interpreted when taken in the sense of "instead of," and in "the place In a word, all those passages of Scripture which of." So in the speech of Caiaphas, "It is expedient speak of our salvation from death and misery by the that one man should die (vrεp) for the people, and that sufferings of Christ, and call upon our gratitude on the whole nation perish not ;" he plainly declares, that this account, are founded upon the same doctrine. either Christ or the nation must perish; and that, by These are too numerous to be cited, and are sufficiently putting the former to death, he would die instead of the familiar. "We have redemption through his blood;" nation. In Romans v. 6-8, the sense in which Christ "We are saved from wrath through him," &c. Such "died for us" is indubitably fixed by the context. "For forms of speech are continually occurring, and the scarcely for a righteous man will one die, yet peradhighest ascriptions of praise are given to the Father venture for a good man some would even dare to die; and to the Son on this account. But most clearly, they but God commendeth his love towards us, in that while all suppose that "wrath" and "death," but for this in- we were yet sinners, Christ died for us;" on which terposition of the passion of Christ on our account, passage Doddridge has observed, "One can hardly imawould have been the doom of sinning men. They con- gine any one would die for a good man, unless it were tain not the most distant intimation, that had not he to redeem his life by giving up his own." In this sense come into the world "to seek and to save them that also, avri is used by the LXX. 2 Sam. xviii. 33, where were lost," they would have been saved by any other, David says concerning Absalom, "Would to God I had means; that had not he, the good Shepherd, laid down died for thee," (avri cov.) Here he could mean nothing his life for the sheep, they would have been brought by else but to wish that he had died in Absalom's stead. some other process into the heavenly fold. The very em- In the sense of "in the room or stead of," avri is also phasis of the expression "lost" implies a desperate case, used in many places of the New Testament; as "Arfor as lost they could not have been described, if pardon chelaus did reign in Judea (avr) in the room of his had been offered them on mere repentance; and if the father Herod ;" "If he ask a fish, will he (avri) for a death of Christ had been one only of many means, fish (in place or instead of a fish), give him a serpent?" through some of which that disposition of God to for- When, therefore, the same preposition is used, Mark give offenders must have operated, which is the doc-x. 45, "The Son of Man came to give his life a ransom trine of all who set up the goodness of the Divine government against its justice. In that case, mankind could not have been in a hopeless state, independent of Christ's redemption, the view which is uniformly taken of their case in Scripture, where the death of Christ is exhibited, not as one expedient of many, but as the only hope of the guilty.

3. The Scriptures, in speaking of the death of Christ,

for (avri) many," there can surely be no reason drawn from the meaning of the particle itself to prevent its being so understood. That it may be so taken is certain, for this is a sense of the preposition constantly occurring; and if that sense is rejected, and another chosen, the reason must be brought from the contrariety of the doctrine which it conveys to some other; whereas not one passage is even pretended to be pro

duced, which denies that Christ did thus die in the | In the same manner, the Latins say, to give or render stead of the ungodly, and give his life a ransom in the place or stead of the lives of many. The particles up and avri have other senses; this is not denied; but as Bishop Stillingfleet has observed, "a substitution could not be more properly expressed than it is in Scripture by them."

thanks (pro beneficiis) for benefits, as often in Cicero. IIe also says to take vengeance (pro injuriis) for inju ries; to suffer punishment (pro magnitudine sceleris) for the greatness of a crime; to fear torments (pro maleficiis) for evil deeds. Plautus, 'to chastise (pro commerita noxia) for faults which deserve it.' And Terence, 'to take vengeance (pro dictis et factis) for words and deeds. Certainly, in all these places, pro 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 denotes an antecedent or impulsive cause (see Psalm xxxviii. 9, and many other places), the words of Isaiah liii. 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 vi. 10, τn apapria are avεv, denote, but that he died on account of sin ?"

The force of this has at all times been felt by the Socinians, and has rendered it necessary for them to resort to subterfuges. Socinus acknowledges, and after him Crellius, that "when redemption is spoken of, avr implies commutation," but they attempt to escape, by considering both the redemption and the cominutation metaphorical. Dr. Priestley, too, admits the probability of the interpretation of Christ's dying for us, being to die instead of us, and then contends that he did this consequentially and not directly so, "as a substitute for us; for if, in consequence of Christ's not having been sent to instruct and reform the world, mankind had continued unreformed, and if the necessary consequence of Christ's coming was his death, by whatever means, and in whatever manner it Crellius, who attempted an answer to Grotius, at was brought about; it is plain that there was, in fact, length acknowledges sin to have been an impulsive no other alternative but his death or ours."(3) Thus, cause of the death of Christ; but neutralizes the adunder the force of the doctrine of the New Testament, mission by sophistry, on which Bishop Stillingfleet has that Christ died in our stead, he admits the absolute well observed, that we understand not an impulsive necessity of the death of Christ in order to human sal-cause in so remote a sense, as though our sins were an vation, contrary to all the principles he elsewhere lays occasion of Christ's dying, so that his death was one down, and in refutation of his own objections and those argument, among many others, to believe his doctrine, of his followers to the orthodox view of the death of the belief of which would cause men to leave their our Saviour as being the only means by which mercy sins; but we contend, for a nearer and more proper could be dispensed to mankind. But that Christ died sense, that the death of Christ was primarily intended for us directly as a substitute, which is still the point for the expiation of sins, with respect to God, and not denied, is to be fully proved from those Scriptures, in to us, and that our sins, as au impulsive cause, are to which he is said to have borne the punishment due to be considered as so displeasing to God, that it was neour offences; and this being established, it puts an cessary, for the vindication of honour and the deterring entire end to all quibbling on the import of the Greek the world from sin, that no less a sacrifice of atonement prepositions. should be offered than the blood of the Son of GOD.

To prove this, the passages of holy writ are exceed-The sufferings of Christ, when considered with respect ingly numerous; but it will be more satisfactory to select a few, and point out their force, than to give a long list of citations.

Grotius(4) thus clearly proves that the Scriptures represent our sins as the impulsive cause of the death of Christ:

to our sins, are to be considered as a punishment; when with respect to God, as being designed to expiate them

as a sacrifice of atonement.

It is thus that Christ is said to bear our sins. "Who his ownself bare our sins in his own body on the tree." 1 Peter ii. 24, where the apostle evidently quotes from "Another cause which moved God was our sins, Isaiah liii. "He shall bear their iniquities." "He bore which deserve punishment. Christ was delivered for the sin of many." The same expression is used by our offences. Rom. iv. 28. Here the apostle uses the pre-St. Paul (Heb. ix. 28), "So Christ was once offered to position dia with the accusative case, which with all bear the sins of many." Now to bear sin is, in the lanGreck authors, sacred and profane, is the most usual guage of Scripture, to bear the punishment of sin,(5) manner of expressing an impulsive cause. For in- and the use of the compound verb avadɛpw, by both stance, dia Tavra, 'because of these things cometh the apostles, is worthy of notice. St. Peter "might have wrath of God upon the children of disobedience.' Eph. said simply nveyke, he bore; but wishing at the same v. 6. Indeed, whenever the expression, because of sins, time to signify his being lifted up on the cross, he said is coupled with the mention of sufferings, it never ad-avnvεyke, he bore up, meaning, he bore by going up mits of any other interpretation. I will chastise you to the cross."(6) St. Paul, too, uses the same verb with seven times, because of your sins.' Levit. xxvi. 28. reference to the Levitical sacrifices, which were carried Because of these abominations the Lord God east to an elevated altar; and to the sacrifice of Christ. Sothem out from his sight.' Deut. xviii. 12. So it is used cinus and his followers cannot deny that to bear sin, in in many other places of the sacred writings, and no Scripture generally, signifies to bear the punishment of where in a different sense. The expression, for sins, sin; but, availing themselves of the very force of the is also evidently of the same force, whenever it is con- compound verb avapepw, just pointed out, they internected with sufferings, as in the example following:- pret the passage in St. Peter to signify the bearing up, 'Christ died for our sins.' I Cor. xv. 3. Christ hath that is, the bearing or carrying away of our sins, which, once suffered for sins.' 1 Peter iii. 18. 'Christ gave according to them, may be effected in many other ways himself for our sins.' Gal. i. 4. 'Christ offered one than by a vicarious sacrifice. To this, Grotius replies, sacrifice for sins.' Heb. x. 12. In all which places we "the particle ava will not admit of such a sense, nor is have either vεp or Tept with the genitive case. But the word ever so used by any Greek writer. In the Socinus maintains, that in all these places a final and New Testament it never occurs in such a meaning." not an impulsive cause is intended. He even goes so It is also decisive as to the sense in which St. Peter far as to assert, that the Latin pro and the Greek UTEρ uses the phrase to bear sin, that he quotes from Isaiah never denote an impulsive, but always a final cause. liii. 11, "For he shall bear their iniquities," where the Many examples prove the latter assertion to be untrue. Hebrew word, by the confession of all, is never used for For both unεp and Tɛpt are used to signify no less an taking away, but for bearing a burden, and is employed impulsive than a final cause. The Gentiles are said to to express the punishment of sin, as in Lamentations praise God VTEρ Eλess for his mercy. Rom. xv. 9.- v. 7. "Our fathers have sinned, and are not, and we Paul says thanks are given vεp nuwv for us. Eph. have borne their iniquities." i. 16. And unεр navтwy for all; Eph. v. 20. you' UTEO XOLOTOU for Christ. 2 Cor. v. 20. 'Great is my glorying for you' vπEρ vрov. 2 Cor. vii. 4, ix. 2, and xii. 5. Distresses (UTEP Xplory) for Christ.' 2 Cor. xii. 10. I thank God (vreρ vμwv) for you.' 1 Cor. i. 4. 'God shall reprove all the ungodly (пερ Tаνтwν Eрywv acebɛias) for all their works of ungodliness.' Jude 15.

(3) History of Corruptions, &c.
(4) De Satisfactione.

We pray

Similar to this expression of bearing sins, and equally impracticable to the criticism of the Socinians, is the declaration of Isaiah in the same chapter, "he was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities;" and then to show in what sense he was wounded and bruised for our transgressions, he adds, "the chastisement of our peace was upon him, and with

(5) Leviticus xxii. 9. Ezekiel xviii. 20.
(6) GROTIUS.

his stripes we are healed." Now, chastisement is the punishment of a fault; but the suffering person, of whom the prophet speaks, is declared by 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 our 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 endeavour 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 6th and 7th verses of the same chapter. "All we like sheep have gone astray, we have turned every one to his own way, and the Lord hath laid on him [literally hath made to meet on him] the iniquity of us all; he was oppressed and he was afflicted." Bishop Lowth translates this passage, "and the Lord hath made to light upon him the iniquity of us all; it was exacted and he was made answerable." In a similar manner, several former critics,(7)" he put or fixed together upon him the iniquity of us all; it was exacted and he was afflicted." This sense is fully established by Grotius against Socinus, and by Bishop Stillingfleet against Crellius, and thus the passage is obviously incapable of explanation, except by allowing the sufferings and death of our Lord to be vicarious. Our iniquities, that is, according to the Hebrew mode of speaking, their punishment, are made to meet upon him; they are fixed together and laid upon him; the penalty is exacted from him, though he himself had incurred no penalty personally, and, therefore, it was in consequence of that vicarious exaction that he was "afflicted," was "made answerable," and, voluntarily submitting, "he opened not his mouth."

In 2 Cor. v. 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. Socinus before had attempted an elusive interpretation, which requires scarcely an effort to refute. By Christ's being made "sin," he would understand being esteemed a sinner by men. But, as Grotius observes, (8) neither is the Greek word, translated sin, nor the Hebrew word answering to it, ever taken in such a sense. Besides, the apostle has attributed this act to God; it was he who made him to be sin: but he certainly did not cause the Jews and others to esteem Christ a wicked man. On the contrary, by a voice from heaven, and by miraracles, he did all that was proper to prove to all men his innocence. Farther, St. Paul places"sin" and "righteousness" in opposition to each other-"we are made the righteousness of Gop," 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 the 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 Galatians iii. 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 every one that hangeth on a tree." The passage in Moses, to which St. Paul refers, is ¡ (7) Vide Poli Synop.

(8) De Satisfactione.

Deut. xxi. 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 GODhe 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 καταρα every where denotes punishment proceeding from the sanction of law. 1 Peter ii. 24. Mark XV. 41. Socinus also admits, that the cross of Christ was this curse; 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,' &c. 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. "(9)

4. 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 it 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 our sins and their punishment only as it is a motive to repentance and virtue.

To propitiate is to appease, to atone, to turn away the wrath of an offended person. In the case before us the wrath turned away is the wrath of God; the person making the propitiation is Christ, the propitiating offering or sacrifice is his blood. All this is expressed, in most explicit terms, in the following passages: 1 John ii. 2, "And he is the propitiation for our sins." 1 John iv. 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. iii. 25, "Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood." The word used in the two former passages is tλacuos; in the last Maornotov. Both are from the verb ackw, 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,--the destruction of sin. This is not supported by a single example: with all Greek authorities, whether poets, historians, or others, the word means to propitiate, and is, for the most part, construed with an accusative case, designating the person whose displeasure is averted.(1) As this could not be denied, Crellius comes to the aid of Socinus, and contends, that the sense of this word was not to be taken from its common use in the Greek tongue; but from the Hellenistic use of it, namely, its use in the Greek of the New Testament, the LXX., and the Apocrypha. But this will not serve him; for, both by the LXX. and in the Apocrypha it is used in the same sense as in the Greek classic writers. Ezekiel xliv. 27, “He shall offer his sin-offering (aopov) saith the Lord GOD;" Ezekiel xlv. 19, "And the priest shall take of the blood of the sin-offering, etλaous." Num. v. 8, "The ram of the atonement,” κριος τε ιλασμό; to which may be added, out of the Apocrypha, 2 Maccabees iii. 33, "Now as the high priest was making an atonement,"

acpov. The propitiatory sense of the word acuos being thus fixed, the modern Socinians have conceded, in their note on John ii. 2, in their Improved Version, that it means "the pacifying of an offended party; but they subjoin, that Christ is a propitiation, because "by

(9) De Satisfactione.

(1) GROTIUS De Satisfactione.

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