now glorify him, that is, after his sufferings; he refers to the past, when he says that he had glory with the Father before the world began. The import of the prayer is, that his original glory might be manifested in a particular manner, or after a temporary obscuration. We have here an answer to an objection, that Christ cannot be conceived to pray for the same state of glory which, on the supposition of his pre-existence, he enjoyed before his humiliation, because it had never been lost. But it had been concealed from the eyes of men by his voluntary abasement, and it would be displayed in a new light, by his exaltation in our nature to the throne of the universe, and by the result of his administration in the perfection and eternal happiness of his people. Unitarians, and some others, have held that this, as well as the former passage, refers to the Divine decrees, and understand "the glory which he had with the Father before the world was," to be the glory which the Father had purposed to confer upon him. But the same reasoning may be opposed to both interpretations. Things future are sometimes represented as present, particularly in the prophetical style; but it is contrary to the laws of language, especially in a narrative of facts, to describe things present, or on the eve of accomplishment, as having taken place many ages before. How would it sound if a good man, who had the hope of immortality, should say, I was glorified in the presence of God, before I or any created being existed? Let us not put words into the mouth of our Saviour which would be extravagant and absurd if uttered by any other person.

The pre-existence of Christ is sufficiently established by the passages quoted; and the Unitarian doctrine of his simple humanity is proved to be unscriptural. But more is necessary to demonstrate his Divinity. Arians allow that he existed before his manifestation in human nature, but they do not admit that he is God in the proper sense of the term. The doctrine of the founder of the sect was, that there was a time when Christ was not, and that he was created before all worlds. They have this advantage, that they are not under the necessity of explaining away, by dishonest criticism, many passages which press upon the Unitarian system. They can understand literally those texts which we have considered, and say without equivocation or mental reservation, that Christ was with God in the beginning, and had glory with him before the foundation of the world; that he existed before Abraham; that he came down from heaven, and came in the flesh. Those things, which are affirmed of him, are strictly true according to their system, which is more plausible than that of Socinians, and thus far agrees with the plain meaning of Scripture. It is therefore surprising that so many of its friends should have abandoned it, and adopted the doctrine of the simple humanity of Christ, which is embarrassed with so many additional difficulties. An Arian can not only go along with the Scriptures, when they assert that our Lord existed before his incarnation, but can give him the high titles which he receives, and ascribe to him the mighty works which are there represented as having been performed by him. He does not hesitate to say that the Son created the world, and appeared to the patriarchs, and governed the Church under the old dispensation; nor to call him the image of the invisible God, and the first-born of every creature, the brightness of the Father's glory, and the express image of his person. He can use such language with a nearer approximation to the truth than a Socinian, who is compelled to fritter it away into mere inanity; to reduce the pompous display of metaphors and similes into humble and creeping sense. Yet the distance between us and Arians is immense. This Being, whom they portray in such magnificent terms, is a creature superior to angels, but alike indebted for his existence to the will and power of the Almighty, a God not by nature, but by office. In the following discussion, therefore, we shall have to contend with them as well as with Unitarians, while we endeavour to prove, in oppoVOL. I.--40 2 B

sition to both, that Jesus Christ is truly and properly a Divine Person, a partaker of the same nature with the Father, and possessed of all his perfections. In prosecuting this design, I might go over the Scriptures in regular order, selecting such information as they supply with respect to his personal dignity. It would not be necessary to confine your attention to the New Testament, because the Old is a part of the same revelation, and amidst its notices and predictions may be expected to give us some knowledge of his character, as well as of the work which he had undertaken to accomplish. But this method would be tedious, and would require more time than can be allotted to this department of our course. There is a classification of the proofs which we may commodiously adopt, because it is a comprehensive one, and, arranging them under distinct heads, leads the mind, by a clear and successive induction, to the conclusion. Jesus Christ is proved to be God equal to the Father, by the ascription of the same names, and perfections, and works, and worship to him.

In the first place, Let us attend to the Divine names which are given to him in the Scriptures. That he is called, God, is so well known, that it is almost superfluous to produce particular passages. Now, it is acknowledged, that the name is sometimes given to creatures, to magistrates and angels; and Moses is said to have been a god to Pharaoh.* In the latter case, the meaning evidently is that Moses was in the room of God to Pharaoh, delivered God's commands to him, and denounced his judgments. The name, as we shall see, is used concerning Christ in a quite different manner. It may be observed, that when creatures are called gods, we are led to a figurative sense, not only by the plural number—which shews that their real divinity cannot be meant, because it is a fundamental doctrine of religion that there is only one-but by some adjunct or circumstance which qualifies the term; whereas in its application to our Saviour, the laws of just reasoning require it to be literally understood. If it is said to earthly princes, "Ye are gods," it is added in the same breath, "but ye shall die like men ;'t and when angels are addressed as gods, they are at the same time commanded to acknowledge their inferiority by worshipping the first-begotten of the Father; but the Godhead of our Saviour is expressed in such terms, and associated with such attributes and operations, as demonstrate it to be absolute.

"The Word was God."§ He was made a God, say the Socinians; but the deification of a creature is a notion which receives no countenance from Scrip ture, and it may be pronounced to be impossible. How was it done? Was a divine nature given to him? or were divine perfections communicated to him? Not a word of these things is to be found in the Bible, and either supposition is grossly absurd. How could a man be changed into a God? or how could a limited nature be endowed with omniscience and omnipotence? Modern Socinians translate the passage thus, The Word was a God; but how strange is it to the ears of christians to speak of more Gods than one, as if, like the heathens, we had subordinate deities! No; they say, our meaning is that he is a figurative god, like magistrates and Moses. But besides that, in the following verses, the Evangelist ascribes to him a work which is peculiar to the true God, namely, the creation of all things, the original does not admit of this translation. es, they reply, is without the article, and ought therefore to be rendered a God. But here the idiom of the Greek language is violated, and scholars know, that while the subject of a proposition admits, the predicate rejects, the article, and that the proposition, "The Word was God," could have been expressed only as it is, ens. It is evident, that although ess *Exod. vii. 1. Compare Ps. xcvii. 7. with Heb. i. 6.

§ John i. 1.

Ps. lxxxii. 6, 7.

John i. 3.

stands first in order, it is the predicate of the sentence, and denotes what ages, the subject, is. This criticism, then, proves only the ignorance of those who have made it.

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To

Unto the Son he saith, Thy throne, O God, is for ever and ever. evade the evidence of this text, Unitarians tell us that it may be translated, "God is thy throne;" because the words rendered O God, are note, in the vocative, but es, in the nominative. They ought to have remembered, that this is a Greek idiom, and that in the Attic dialect, the nominative is frequently put for the vocative. God is said to be a shield, a rock, and a fortress to his people, and as in these cases it is signified that he protects and defends them, there is nothing inconsistent with his dignity and supremacy. "But it is the reverse in the case before us. A throne," it has been justly remarked, "derives its dignity from the character and dominion of the sovereign who sits upon it. To call the Eternal Majesty the throne of a creature," as the Messiah is supposed to be, "seems little suitable to the reverence which is ever to be maintained towards the Creator, and which is one of the most distinguishing characters of the Scripture style." The design of the Apostle, in quoting these words of the Psalmist, is to prove the superiority of Christ to the heavenly messengers. He begins well, by shewing that God makes the winds his messengers, and flames of fire his ministers, thus reducing angels to the condition of servants; but he does not end well, if he say only that God is the throne of Christ, or the support of his authority. Where is the contrast? If he has given power to our Saviour, and upholds him in the exercise of it, he has done the same thing to angels and other ministers of his will; and how does his pre-eminence appear? If we read, "Thy throne, O God, is for ever and ever," the point is decided, for he is God, and they are creatures; but the new translation destroys the force of the argument, and must therefore be false. The ancient versions agree with ours; and as far as I know, the new translation was not thought of till modern times, when arguments against the divinity of Christ were eagerly sought and collected from every quarter. We may rest satisfied that this is another passage, in which our Saviour is called, God, in the proper sense of the term.

'O or con

The Apostle Paul, when enumerating the privileges and honours of the Jews, thus expresses the last and greatest of them:-" And of whom, as concerning the flesh, Christ came, who is God over all, blessed for ever. Amen." This single passage furnishes a decisive answer to the question respecting the divinity of our Saviour. The adversaries of this doctrine, fully aware that it is fatal to their system, have tried every possible method of destroying its force. "Of whom Christ came," WY SITI TAYTAY CEOS. nects Θεs with Χριστος, and is used for os εστι. To evade this evidence that he is God, they have proposed a different reading, ev -of whom, namely, the Jews, is God over all; that is, he is their God. But besides that, if this were the genuine reading, the article must, by the laws of the language, have been prefixed to ευλόγητος, (των ὁ επι πάντων Θεὸς ὁ ευλογητος) which it is not ; the alteration is made without the authority of a single manuscript, in order to silence the testimony of Scripture in favour of a particular doctrine. It is a mere conjecture, which Griesbach has mentioned among his various readings, while it would have been more worthy of him to have passed it over with contempt. We have said more than enough of it, and proceed to another attempt to annihilate the evidence, by converting the words into a doxology; as if the Apostle. while reviewing the instances of divine goodness to his nation, had felt the spirit of devotion arise, and burst forth into an expression of praise, "God over all be blessed for ever!" It is an overwhelming objection, that the words canDr. Pye Smith's Scripture Testimony to the Messiah, Book ii. c. 4. § 14,

Heb. i. 8.

Rom. ix. 5.

not be so translated without a violation of the idiom of the language. In all the doxologies where was occurs in the New Testament and in the Septuagint, (and more than forty instances have been observed,) it is placed at the beginning of the sentence. If, then, Paul had intended a doxology, he would have said, ευλογητος ὁ ων επι παντων Θεὸς εἰς τους αιώνας. As he has placed the words in a different order, they are plainly and necessarily an affirmation concerning the person last spoken of, namely Christ, who is pronounced to be God. And you will observe, that there is no room for the pretext which is employed in other places, that he may be called God in a figurative and subordinate sense; because he is denominated Os TT, the Supreme God, or the Most High God over all the earth. That he may and ought to be so designated, will be readily admitted by those who believe, and entertain just notions of, the Trinity; for if the nature is the same, the persons must be equal, and one of them cannot be greater than another.

When Jesus shewed the wounds in his hands and his feet, Thomas said unto him, "My Lord, and my God."* We are told that this was merely a sudden expression of surprise and admiration. But to use the name of God on such occasions is profane; it is the practice of irreligious men, and would not have been imitated by a follower of Christ in the presence of his Master; or if he had inadvertently fallen into it, he would not have passed without reprehension. We have no evidence from the Scriptures that the Jews indulged in such exclamations, although they are too common among Christians. It has been said again, that they are an ejaculation addressed to the Father, “My Lord, and my God, how great is thy power!" or, My Lord and my God

has done this." We need only reply, that according to the Evangelist the words were not addressed to the Father, but to Christ, "Thomas said unto him," &c. It follows that Christ was acknowledged by Thomas as his Lord and his God; and surely if he had been in an error, his Master would have set him right.

Besides the passages which have been quoted, there are several others in which the name of God is given to our Saviour, but the evidence does not appear to common readers, in consequence of the manner in which they have been translated. It is a rule laid down by some late critics, that when two or more personal or attributive nouns, joined by a copulative or copulatives, are assumed of the same person or thing, before the first attributive the article is inserted, before the remaining ones it is omitted. It follows, that when two or more attributives occur with the article prefixed only to the first, they ought to be understood as referring to the same individual. For example, if we find Apros and coupled by the conjunction 4, and before Xpres, but not repeated before us, we must not explain them as referring to two persons but to one, and as asserting that he who is Christ, is also God. This canon has been established by examples from the classics, from the New Testament, and from the Fathers; so that we are fully authorized to apply it for the correction of some passages, in which, in consequence of not attending to it, our translators have misrepresented the sense. Dr. Wordsworth, who has examined the subject with great care, says, "I have observed more, I am persuaded, than a thousand instances of the form Xpes nae, some hundreds of instances of ò μέγας Θεός και σωτηρ, and not fewer than several thousands of the form : Θες και terap; while in no single case have I seen, where the sense could be determined, any one of them used but only of one person." The Fathers are good authority, as they certainly were acquainted with the idiom of their own language. When the same phrases, therefore, occur in the New Testament, we are bound to understand them as they were understood by the Greeks. On this ground we beg leave to differ from the received version in some texts, and * John xx. 28. Six Letters to Mr. Granville Sharp, p. 36, &c.

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to give a translation more conformable to the original:-"Looking for the glorious appearing of the Great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ,"* ought to be, the appearing of our Great God and Saviour Jesus Christ; TOÙ μjañÙ Θεύ και σωτηρες ήμων Ιησου Χρίστου. "That the name of our Lord Jesus Christ may be glorified in you, and ye in him, according to the grace of our God and the Lord Jesus Christ,"t should be rendered, according to the grace of our God and Lord Jesus Christ; τω Θεού ήμων και Κυρίου Ιησού Χριστου. "No whoremonger -hath any inheritance in the kingdom of Christ and of God,"‡ in the kingdom of the Christ and God; εν τη βασιλεια του Χριστου και Θεου. "I charge thee before God and the Lord Jesus Christ,"§ before the God and Lord Jesus Christ ; ενώπιον του Θεου και Κυρίου Ιησου Χρίστου. « Through the righteousness of God, and our Saviour Jesus Christ," through the righteousness of our God and Saviour Jesus Christ; του Θεου ήμων και σωτρήρος Ιησου Χριστου. Ungodly men, denying the only Lord God, and our Lord Jesus Christ," denying Jesus Christ the only Lord and our Lord; τον μόνον δεσποτων και κυριον ήμων Ιησούν Χριστον. Enough has been said to prove that, according to the New Testament, Christ is God in the true and proper sense of the word. But this is not the only name expressive of his divinity, and in the next Lecture I shall shew that he is also called JEHOVAH.

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LECTURE XXXI.

ON THE DIVINITY OF CHRIST.

Divinity of Christ inferred from the ascription to him of the title Jehovah; Instances-Inferred from the ascription to him of Divine Perfections; as Eternity, Omnipresence, Omniscience, Immutability, and Omnipotence-Inferred from the ascription to him of Divine Works; Instances.

God revealed

I PROCEED to another name which is given to our Saviour. himself to his ancient people by the name JEHOVAH, derived from the verb

, to be or to subsist, and therefore signifying Ens, Existens ab æterno et in æternum, or the self-existent and eternal Being. Its import shews that it cannot be given to a creature, but is appropriated to God; and accordingly he makes an exclusive claim to it in Scripture. As the name of a man distinguishes him from all other men, so the name, JEHOVAH, distinguishes the Most High from all other beings. Seek ye him that maketh the seven stars and Orion, and turneth the shadow of death into the morning, and maketh the day dark with night; that calleth for the waters of the sea, and poureth them out upon the face of the earth; JEHOVAH is his name.' "** The Psalmist says,

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That men may know that thou, whose name alone is JEHOVAH, art the most High over all the earth." These passages are instances of the exclusive ascription of this name to the Creator and Governor of the universe, and prove that it is peculiar to him. I shall, however, add one quotation more, in which he takes it to himself, with a solemn declaration that he will not give it, and consequently that it ought not to be given, to any other: "I am Jehovah; that is my name: and my glory will I not give to another, neither my praise to graven images." It implies something in which no other can share the glory of underived and independent existence belongs to no man or angel.

Titus ii. 13. † 2 Thess. i. 12. + Eph. v. 5. § 1 Tim. v. 21. | 2 Pet. i. 1. ¶ Jude 4. The word ee, God, in our translation of this last verse, is omitted by late critics. Amos v. 8. tt Ps. Lxxxiii. 18.

#Isaiah xlii. 8.