verse of Mark's Gospel, where the sense is the same. Their use of the Greek word in these places is exactly similar to the use which our translators have made of the words of the Septuagint, Genesis and Exodus, which serve for names to the two first books of the Pentateuch, but which they have never employed in the body of the work, where the words yéveous and ódos occur in that version. Thus, in every other passage of the Gospels and Acts, evayyilov is rendered no sabartha, a plain Syriac word of the same signification and similar origin. In this the Syriac interpreters appear to have acted more judiciously than the Latin, as they have been sensible of the impropriety of darkening some of the plainest, but most important declarations, by the unnecessary introduction of an exotic term which had no meaning, or at least not the proper meaning in their language. In Paul's Epistles, I acknowledge, they have several times adopted the Greek word; but let it be observed, that in these the term evayyektov is frequently employed in a different sense. This has in part appeared already, but will be still more evident from what immediately follows.

19. The fourth sense of evayyihov in the New Testament is the ministry of the gospel. In this acceptation I find the word used oftener than once by the apostle Paul. Thus, Rom. 1: 9, "God is my witness, whom I serve with my spirit, in the gospel of his Son," Ev 19 εvaryiλign that is, in the ministry of the gospel, or in dispensing the gospel of his Son. This is one of the passages in which the Syriac interpreter has retained the original word. In another place, "What is my reward then? Verily, that when I preach the gospel, I may make the gospel of Christ, to evayyikov, without charge," 1 Cor. 9: 18; that is, that the ministry of the gospel of Christ may not by me be rendered chargeable. This the context plainly shows; for this is the only expense he is here speaking of. think, for perspicuity's sake, the word ministry should have been used in the translation, as the English name gospel hardly admits this meaning. Nor are these the only places wherein the word has this signification; see 2 Cor. 8: 18, and Phil. 4: 15.

20. I observe also, in the epistles of this apostle, a fifth meaning, or at least a particular application of the first general meaning, good news. It sometimes denotes, not the whole Christian dispensation, but some particular doctrine or promise specially meriting that denomination. In this sense Paul uses the word, writing to the Galatians, (2: 2.) The particular doctrine to which he gives the pertinent appellation evayyihtov, good news, is the free admission of the Gentiles into the church of Christ, without subjecting them to circumcision and the other ceremonies of the law. This, considering the Jewish prejudices at that time, accounts for the reserve which he used at Jerusalem, where by his own representation, he imparted privately to the disciples of chief distinction, and con

2.

sequently of the most enlarged knowledge and sentiments, that doctrine which he publicly proclaimed in Gentile countries. I think it is this which the apostle sometimes, by way of distinction, denominates his gospel. For though there was no discordancy in the doctrine taught by the different apostles, yet to him and Barnabas, the apostles of the uncircumcision, it was specially committed to announce every-where among the heathen, God's gracious purpose of receiving them, uncircumcised as they were, into the church of Christ. Accordingly, as he proceeds in his argument, the gospel or good news, evayyihtov sent to the Gentiles, is expressly contrasted with that sent to the Jews; Gal. 2: 7.

This seems also to be the sense of the word in another passage, (Rom. 16: 25), where what he calls to evayyehov pov, he describes ας μυστηρίου χρόνοις αἰωνίοις σεσιγημένον, " kept secret for ages, but now made known to all nations for the obedience of the faith. For in this manner he oftener than once speaks of the call of the Gentiles. In all such passages, it is better to retain the general term good news in the version. This appellation is, in some respect, evidently applicable to them all, whereas the term gospel is never thus understood in our language.

PART III.

OF THE PHRASE ἡ καὶνη διαθήκη.

ANOTHER title, by which the religious institution of Jesus Christ is sometimes denominated, is ή καινη διαθήκη, which is almost al ways, in the writings of the apostles and evangelists, rendered by our translators "the New Testament." Yet the word diadnan by itself is, except in a few places, always there rendered not Testament, but Covenant. It is the Greek word whereby the Seventy have uniformly translated the Hebrew ♫ berith, which our translators in the Old Testament have invariably rendered Covenant. That the Hebrew term corresponds much better to the English word Covenant, though not in every case perfectly equivalent, than to Testament, there can be no question; at the same time it must be owned, that the word dianan, in classical use, is more frequently rendered Testament. The proper Greek word for Covenant is ouvonxn, which is not found in the New Testament, and occurs only thrice in the Septuagint. It is never there employed for rendering the Hebrew berith, though in one place it is substituted for a term nearly synonymous. That the Scriptural sense of the word danan is more fitly expressed by our term Covenant, will not be doubted by any body who considers the constant application of the Hebrew word so rendered in the Old Testament, and

of the Greek word, in most places at least, where it is used in the New. What has led translators, ancient and modern, to render it Testament, is, I imagine, the manner wherein the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews argues (chap. 9: 16, 17), in allusion to the classical acceptation of the term. But however much it was necessary to give a different turn to the expression in that passage, in order to make the author's argument as intelligible to the English, as it is in the original to the Greek reader; this was not a sufficient reason for giving a version to the word in other places, that neither suits the context, nor is conformable to the established use of the term in the sacred writings.

2. The term New is added to distinguish it from the Old Covenant, that is, the dispensation of Moses. I cannot help observing here by the way, that often the language of theological systems, so far from assisting us to understand the language of holy writ, tends rather to mislead us. The two Covenants are always in Scripture the two dispensations or religious institutions; that under Moses is the Old, that under the Messiah is the New. I do not deny, that in the latitude wherein the term is used in holy writ, the command under the sanction of death which God gave to Adam in paradise, may, like the ordinance of circumcision, with sufficient propriety be termed a Covenant; but it is pertinent to observe, that it is never so denominated in Scripture; and that when mention is made in the epistles of the two Covenants, the Old and the New, or the first and the second, (for there are two so called by way of eminence), there appears no reference to any thing that related to Adam. In all such places, Moses and Jesus are contrasted, the Jewish economy and the Christian, Mount Sinai in Arabia whence the law was promulged, and Mount Sion in Jerusalem where the gospel was first published.

3. It is proper to observe further, that, from signifying the two religious dispensations, they came soon to denote the books wherein what related to these dispensations was contained; the sacred writings of the Jews being called y nadala diavηn, and the writings superadded by the apostles and evangelists, ἡ καὶνη διαθήκη. We have one example in Scripture of this use of the former appellation. The apostle says, (2 Cor. 3: 14), speaking of his countrymen, "Until this day remaineth the veil untaken away in the reading of the Old Testament,” ἐπὶ τῇ ἀναγνώσει τῆς παλαιας διαθήκης. The word in this application is always rendered in our language Testament. We have in this followed the Vulgate, as most modern translators also have done. In the Geneva French, the word is rendered both ways in the title, that the one may serve in explaining the other, "Le Nouveau Testament, c'est à dire La Nouvelle Alliance," &c. in which they copied Beza, who says, "Testamentum Novum, sive Foedus Novum." That the second rendering of

the word is the better version, is unquestionable; but the title appropriated by custom to a particular book, is on the same footing with a proper name, which is hardly considered as a subject for criticism. Thus we call Cæsar's Diary, Cæsar's Commentaries, from their Latin name, though very different in meaning from the English word.

PART IV.

OF THE NAME ὁ Χρίστος.

THE only other term necessary to be examined here is ó XoioTos, the Messiah, or the Christ, in English rendered, according to the etymology of the word, the anointed; for so both the Hebrew

Meshiach, and the Greek Xoiotos signify; and from the sound of these are formed our names Messiah and Christ. What first gave rise to the term was the ceremony of anointing, by which the kings and the high-priests of God's people, and sometimes the prophets, (1 Kings 19: 16), were consecrated and admitted to the exercise of their holy functions; for all these functions were accounted holy among the Israelites. As this consecration was considered as adding a sacredness to their persons, it served as a guard against violence, from the respect had to religion. Its efficacy this way was remarkably exemplified in David, who acknowledges, that when he had it in his power to avenge himself of Saul, his enemy, who sought his life, he was principally by this consideration restrained from killing him: "The Lord forbid," said he, "that I should do this thing unto my master, the Lord's anointed, to stretch forth mine hand against him, seeing he is the anointed of the Lord." 1 Sam. 24: 6. The word here translated anointed, is, as in other places, in Hebrew, Messiah, and in the Greek of the Seventy Christ. It was a term, therefore, in its original use, applicable to all the succession of kings and high-priests, good and bad, of the people of Israel.

2. But as the king and the high-priest were the heads of the whole nation, the one in civil, the other in religious matters, the term anointed, that is, Messiah, or Christ, might not improbably serve by a figure to denote the head, chief, or principal of any class or people. So thinks the learned Grotius. Thus the high-priest is sometimes distinguished from ordinary priests by the title the anointed priest; in the Septuagint, ó iɛpevs ò xoioros; though this I own is not a proof of the point, since he was literally so distinguished from the rest.* But that the word is sometimes applied,

The sons of Aaron were indeed all anointed in their father's lifetime, by the express command of God; but it does not appear that this practice descended to other ordinary priests.

when in the literal sense no anointing had been used, cannot be questioned. In this way it is applied to Cyrus the Persian monarch by the prophet Isaiah, ch. 45: 1: "Thus saith the Lord to his anointed, to Cyrus ;" yet Houbigant, differing from his usual manner, renders the words "de uncto suo Cyro." But whether the import of this expression be, that Cyrus was a chief among kings, a most eminent sovereign, as Grotius seems to imagine, or that he was selected of God for the restoration of Judah, and the rebuilding of the temple of Jerusalem, the only temple dedicated to the true God, may be made a question. For my part, I am inclinable to think, that it is rather this latter interpretation which conveys the prophet's idea, and the meaning intended by the Spirit of God. And to this interpretation the context entirely agrees. The word was also employed to denote those specially favored of God, as were the patriarchs Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob; concerning whom he is represented by the Psalmist as having said, "Touch not mine anointed," Ps. 105: 15. 1 Chron. 16: 22. The word is in the plural number, táv zocorov pov, in the Vulgate Christos meos, which, in our idiom, is not distinguished from the singular. Now there is no ground from Scripture to believe that any of them was in the literal sense anointed.

3. But the most eminent use and application of the word is when it is employed as the title of that sublime Personage typified and predicted from the beginning, who was to prove, in the most exalted sense, the Redeemer and Lord of God's people. He is spoken of by the prophets under several characters, and amongst others, under this of God's anointed, the Messiah, or the Christ. Those of the prophets who seem more especially to have appropriated this title, formerly more common, to the Mediator of the New Covenant, were the royal prophet David, Ps. 2: 2. Isaiah, chap. 61: 1, etc., and Daniel, chap. 9: 25, 26. The first represents him as anointed of God king of God's heritage; the second, as set apart and consecrated to be the messenger of good tidings to the inhabitants of the earth; the third, as appointed to make expiation for the sins of the people.

4. It deserves to be remarked, that in the English translation of the Old Testament, the word is always rendered anointed, to whomsoever applied, except in the two verses of Daniel already quoted, where it is translated Messiah. In the New Testament, the corresponding Greek word is always rendered Christ, and commonly without the article. In this our interpreters have been so uniform, that they have employed the word Christ, where the passage is a quotation and literal translation from the Old Testament, in which the Hebrew word, though perfectly equivalent, had been by themselves rendered anointed. Thus, Acts 4: 26, 27, "the rulers were gathered together against the Lord and against his Christ,' VOL. I.

20